APPENDIX 11
Memorandum from the Natural Environment
Research Council
The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
welcomes the opportunity to provide evidence.
NERC is one of the UK's seven Research Councils.
It funds and carries out impartial scientific research in the
sciences of the environment. NERC trains the next generation of
independent environmental scientists. Its priority research areas
are: Earth's life-support systems, climate change, and sustainable
economies.
NERC's research centres are: the British Antarctic
Survey (BAS), the British Geological Survey (BGS), the Centre
for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) and the Proudman Oceanographic
Laboratory (POL).
NERC's comments draw on inputs from BGS, CEH
and Swindon-Office staff.
The British Geological Survey's Economic Minerals
and Geochemical Baseline Programme (EMGB) focuses on delivering
information, expertise, advice and research on solid minerals
(metallic, industrial, construction, coal) and geochemical baseline
surveys (for environmental and resource assessment end-uses).
These various activities are undertaken on local, regional, and
national scales within the UK and throughout the world. EMGB supports,
develops and promotes best-practice sustainable development principles
within the mineral development and environmental fields. BGS is
thus in a particularly good position to comment on the issue of
whether resources can be used and waste produced without harm
to the environment.
CEH conducts environmental research under a
wide range of programmes; one of its newest is the Sustainable
Economies Programme, which covers land-use, energy, and hazards
and risks of several kinds.
INTRODUCTORY COMMENTS
The Committee will be aware of the April 2004
DEFRA publication "Study into the Environmental Impacts of
Increasing the Supply of Housing in the UK" (Entec/Hodkinson/eftec
Final report), which covers many of the issues raised by the Environmental
Audit Committee.
We are concerned that environmental factors
should not be seen only as obstacles to development. We need to
recognise the value of land that has a tendency to flood, is unstable
or whose vegetation can contribute to carbon sequestration, for
example. Ideally, full life-cycle analyses incorporating all the
externalities associated with housing development should be conducted,
but this would be difficult for the several hundred thousand new
houses planned. It is therefore particularly necessary that relevant
datasets of environmental information are maintained and consulted,
and that the expertise of organisations such as the NERC Research
Centres is sought when developments are planned or decisions made
about land allocation.
SPECIFIC ISSUES
1. Are the conclusions of the Barker Review
compatible with the general principles of sustainable development
and the Government's own sustainable development objectives?
The Barker Review appears to base its recommendations
regarding how much more housing is needed and where it is needed
largely on house-price increases. It is possible that the resulting
decisions regarding location could conflict with advice based
on predictions of climate change and water security, for example.
2. In view of the Barker Review is there are
need for an overarching national strategy to ensure that the environment
is at the heart of any building programme?
Yes, for at least two reasons. First, the recommendations
of the Barker Review could affect large areas of land in the UK,
including the areas where the raw materials are sourced. There
is a need to look systematically at the value of this land, to
employ national environmental datasets to assess land suitability
and potential impacts, and to consider the possible impacts of
climate change.
Second, housing should be built according to
guidelines which take into account the need to minimise environmental
damage during construction and environmental impact during occupation.
The current building programme has failed to keep up with the
advances that have been made in environmental technology, and
the opportunity to incorporate this technology into the proposed
building programme should not be lost. A national strategy could
consider issues such as the lifetime of new building stock, and
ways of minimising maintenance and repair costs. Public-transport
provision and the need for local facilities could also form part
of a national strategy.
3. Is the current planning system robust enough
to ensure that the environmental implications of building projects
are fully taken into account? How can the planning system be used
to increase the building of more sustainable housing? Would the
proposed changes to the planning system in the Barker Review have
a positive or negative effect on the environment?
No, the current planning system is not robust
enough. It is also very uneven in its requirements for and use
of environmental information.
Where materials-sourcing is concerned, the planning
process must balance the national, regional and local requirements
against the need to protect the environment, in order to secure
essential materials at least environmental cost. Effective planning
for minerals supply depends on identifying locations where mineral
extraction will have least effect on the environment and amenity,
undertaking operations with minimum environmental impacts and,
as mineral extraction is not a permanent use of land, ensuring
high quality restoration to beneficial after-use. Well-restored
mineral workings may often become important environmental assets,
for example in terms of biodiversity and amenity.
4. Where will the proposed new housing be
built? What are the implications for land-use and flood risk of
the large-scale proposed building projects?
It is clear that costs will be lower if building
occurs in areas with a stable geology and hydrology. These features
of the location should at least be fully understood before construction
starts, both to avoid damaging the environment and to ensure that
the buildings themselves do not suffer subsequent damage. In particular,
the following should be avoided: building over grubbed-out hedges,
on swell/shrink clays, on flood plains, on landslides, or over
mined ground; the use of chemically-aggressive materials etc.
Working with the landscape/geology/hydrology rather than fighting
it can save costs especially if the housing stock and infrastrucure
is to last a long time. Water supply and waste-water handling
is likely to become an important constraint in some locations
especially in the South-East, and will need to be examined in
the context of possible climate change, agricultural needs and
the preservation of habitats. It is important that construction
take account of the possible extremes that might result from climate
change, rather than the predicted average conditions.
Much of the information required by planners
is available but it isn't always used. CEH would be able to provide
information on the land-use and flood-risk implications of proposed
large-scale building projects, based on a flood-risk database,
the Land Cover Map 2000 (LCM 2000) and the Countryside Survey.
It would also be able to comment on the ecological implications
at the landscape scale (eg fragmentation, isolation, colonisation),
and on the effect on carbon balance of the land-use change. BGS
can offer extensive geological data.
5. Is it possible to ensure materials and
resources used, and waste produced, during building do not have
a harmful impact on the environment?
The need for materials
Construction projects (including housing and
associated infrastructure) require a wide range of mineral raw
materials and mineral-derived products, eg sand, gravel and crushed
rock for concrete, crushed rock for road surfaces, clay for bricks
and tiles, limestone and chalk for cement, gypsum for plasterboard
and plaster, and metals for plumbing and wiring. Many of these
materials are produced in the UK (some 248 million tonnes of construction
minerals were produced in the UK in 2002), but some may need to
be imported. It is obvious that materials and resources should
be locally sourced if possible, and waste locally managed. About
60 tonnes of aggregates (crushed rock, sand and gravel) are used
in building the average house. Per capita consumption of primary
(natural) aggregate is about 4 tonnes.
Sources of aggregate materials
Aggregate and cement sources will require identification
and earmarking for a sustained house-building programme. Minerals
are not always found close to where they are required, so some
have to be transported from locations across the UK and, in the
case of metals, even from overseas. For example, there are many
sand and gravel quarries in the Southeast but materials from these,
while suitable for many purposes, cannot meet all specifications.
Construction of access roads for housing developments requires
a supply of tough resistant rocks like hard limestone and granite.
These do not occur naturally in the Southeast and have to be quarried
in areas such as the Mendip Hills in Somerset or Charnwood in
Leicestershire, and then transported.
Marine-dredged aggregates (chiefly from the
English Channel and North Sea) account for about 20% of the sand
and gravel used in England and Wales. Recycled materials from
various sources including glass, concrete rubble from demolition
sites, blast-furnace slag and old road surfaces now account for
about 25% of all aggregates used in Britain (the total being about
230 to 250 million tonnes per annum). The use of recycled materials
has doubled in the past 15 years but there are only limited prospects
of this increasing further.
Competition for aggregates between construction
and flood protection is likely to increase in the UK and Europe.
Environmental impact of quarrying
Land worked for mineral extraction accounts
for about 0.5% of the total land area of England. The local impacts
of quarrying create significant public concern. Impacts include
traffic along access roads, noise, vibration and dust caused by
quarry machinery, the visual impact of the quarrying operations
and the potential effects on groundwater and river systems. These
can lead to opposition to new developments or extensions of operating
quarries. However, new quarry developments must comply with locally-agreed
planning policies before permission can be granted to allow extraction.
Once a quarry is working, the operations are closely monitored
and regulated to minimise environmental impacts. Before operations
are permitted to start, quarry owners are required to present
detailed plans for the restoration of sites. These measures may
preserve or even improve the overall quality of the natural environment
after the quarry is worked out. Quarries are restored to a range
of uses including agriculture, forestry, nature conservation and
recreation.
Environmental impacts from transport can be
minimised by extracting aggregates close to the construction site,
and using rail rather than road for long-distance transport.
6. Are the building regulations as they stand
capable of ensuring that new housing is truly sustainable in the
long term? How could they be improved? Could greater use be made
of existing environmental standards for housing?
There probably is a need for greater regulation,
both at the level of individual buildings and at the level of
infrastructure planning. It is promising that the Deputy Prime
Minister has welcomed the recent report of the Sustainable Buildings
Task Group, which called for a new code of practice for the construction
industry.
Improvement could take place by learning from
test projects. An example of a development where environmental
sustainability is being considered is Nottingham University's
new student accommodation. This development is being monitored,
especially for its energy efficiency, and such monitoring should
provide feedback to allow improved planning of subsequent developments.
7. How will it be possible to ensure a sustainable
infrastructure, including transport and water supply, which will
be necessary to support any extensive house building, is put in
place?
The infrastructure and the buildings themselves
should be designed together to make the most of the opportunities
for sustainability. For example, the design of buildings needs
to allow for the application of renewable-energy technologies.
Measures which should be considered include:
the collection and recycling of water for use in twin systems
(potable/non-potable), as in the Netherlands, and the local sourcing
of power and heat (by each individual building having its own
CHP and fuel source, for example, or by the exploitation of local
geothermal energy opportunities).
The location of community facilities could be
planned to reduce transport requirements, ie where extensive new
housing is planned it should be thought of not simply as additional
housing but as multiple-use development.
8. Do those involved in housing supply, both
in the public and private sector, have the necessary skills and
training to ensure new housing meets environmental objectives?
If not, how can the knowledge base of those involved in the planning
and building process be improved?
Not all do, and this is an issue which could
be addressed as part of a national strategy aimed at ensuring
that the environment is at the heart of any building programme.
In particular, the involved parties could benefit from visits
to certain continental European countries where planning and construction
have for many years been closely linked with environmental objectives.
May 2004
| 
