Mainstream Adoption

2. MAINSTREAM ADOPTION
2.1. There is no systematic national timeframe for the UDP turnaround, with some boroughs as much as four years out of kilter with others. Merton has been unusually advanced in its process (on average about 2-3 years), and this very fact has been crucial in the extensive nationwide adoption of 10% policies. There has been sufficient time for extensive promotion and scrutiny of the policy, and for the idea to permeate down into the relevant Council departments and political champions.

Throughout 2003 there were a trickle of LAs that wrote a prescriptive 10% policy into their UDP (or SPDs), including Croydon, Ealing, Oldham and North Devon. In Feb 2004 the Greater London Authority adopted an unwieldy 10% policy partly laid out in the Regional Spatial Strategy and partly in the non-statutory Energy Strategy. The thresholds were 15,000 m2 of commercial space, and 500 residential units - though this dropped to 5K m2 and 150 res units if the development land was a change of use. Nevertheless, the view of the individual boroughs was that the thresholds were too high for the policy to act as an example of good practice. The lead was always taken at a local level with the Croydon policy becoming the best practice model.

2.2. Best current example
London Borough of Croydon
“The Council will expect all development (either new build or conversion) with a floor-space of 1000m2 or ten or more residential units to incorporate renewable energy production equipment to provide at least 10% of the predicted energy requirements.”

The Croydon policy above contains the eight criteria essential for a prescriptive policy.

1. It includes the word “Require” or “Expect”.
2. It states it is for “new build or conversion” – to catch change of use in regeneration areas
3. It is for the combined floor space of commercial and residential.
4. It establishes the floor-space and residential unit number threshold.
5. It states it is for on site renewable energy equipment - buying in green energy is absolutely unacceptable as a mechanism for implementing the policy. This is because in many cases it’s not actually “real” green energy but merely forms of carbon offsetting or double accounting on existing generation such as hydro. Also it may include nuclear, and as nuclear is clearly not remotely carbon neutral, then it would be a false implementation. In addition, the key rationales for adopting the policy were not just to lower CO2 emissions, but also to stimulate the micro-renewables economy, address fuel poverty, and lower energy bills for businesses – all of which can only be done if the equipment is installed on-site. Also someone from Building Control will have to keep checking on the end user procurement – and no local authority will want that headache.
   
   Also – the equipment should provide energy for the development, and not just feed it into the national grid. The policy is not designed to promote renewables as purely grid linked mini-power stations, but as a way of helping address fuel poverty.
6. It sets the % target – in this case 10%.
7. It is for the “predicted energy/ CO2 usage” - It is not acceptable to build and monitor and then retrofit the renewables.
8. It says to provide “at least 10%” - which means that a higher target can be required if technically feasible and financially reasonable.                

It is this last point that explains the joint Merton/Croydon 10%(+) branding of the policy seen at the top of the briefing.

2.2.1. Throughout 2004/5 – particularly after the publication of PPS22 the trickle became something of a flood, with an estimated 100 boroughs either adopting (or in the process of adopting) a prescriptive 10% policy. There is no official list of boroughs adopting a 10% policy into their UDPs, SPDs or front-loading into their LDFs, but Merton has kept an ad-hoc list which we add to as we get to hear of a new 10% boroughs. Friends of the Earth spent some time phoning around boroughs and uncovered some new 10%-ers – this list is available on the Merton Council website as part of the downloadable PowerPoint. Please note that it is an informal list and there are many boroughs with a policy that do not appear on it – and some that do that shouldn’t. By the time the LDF takes over from the UDP it is it is likely that around 250 boroughs will have a policy.

2.2.2. By 2006 a number of Regional Spatial Strategies have incorporated a policy with thresholds of around 1,000 m2 and 50 residential units. These SDSs are acting as a “security blanket” for individual boroughs still a little reticent about taking the plunge themselves, and also as a safety net to catch at least the medium sized developments that will fall through the net when there is no borough policy in place.

2.3. Barriers to adoption
There appear to be three main psychological barriers that are preventing some boroughs from adopting a policy.

1. a) That it may not be legal and b) would it stand up at a Planning Inquiry.
   In theory it is clearly legal and should therefore stand up at a Planning Inquiry.
   
   The ODPM Planning Dept (and its lawyers) determined that Merton was entitled to include the policy, and in so doing was perfectly aware that it was establishing a legal mechanism for other LAs to do the same.
   
   This was reinforced in Section 8 and 18 of the revised Planning Policy Statement 22 (PPS22), which expressly confirms not only the right of LAs to adopt prescriptive RE policies, but also makes it quite clear their desire to see them do so. It leaves the percentage target up to the LA, but says that it cannot be so high as to place an undue burden on the developer, such as requiring all the buildings energy needs to come from renewables.
   
   Section 8
   “Local planning authorities may include policies in local development documents that require a percentage of the energy to be used in new residential, commercial or industrial developments to come from on-site renewable energy developments.”
   
   Section 18
   “Local planning authorities and developers should consider the opportunity for incorporating renewable (sustainable) energy projects in all new developments - - -
   Local planning authorities should specifically encourage such schemes through positively expressed policies in local development documents.”
   
   The ODPM Planning Policy Statements are regarded by LAs as the most secure basis for any local planning policy – they are the sow that the local Development Documents suckle from! PPS22 breached the main psychological barrier, and as more and more boroughs across the country adopt 10% policies of their own then the tipping point into the mainstream will be reached relatively quickly – probably by the time the LDF kicks-in in 07/08.
   
   Obviously as Merton, and now other boroughs like Croydon, implement the policy on the ground, then they are setting precedents which would add weight at an Inquiry. It is inevitable that at some point a developer will choose to appeal, and the outcome will have to be factored into renewable energy planning equation. Any appeal will presumably be on the grounds that the LA is asking for too higher percentage – but as PPS22 indicates 100 percent as being unreasonable, then it would be hard for a developer to maintain that 10 or 15 percent was.
   
   
2. Will it scare developers away from our borough?
   The simple answer to this is, almost certainly not. It is conceivable that if the development was in a severely deprived area with marginal land values then it might – just. But the counter argument runs that these are precisely the areas that would benefit most from lower domestic or business energy bills.
   
   Any developer attempting to claim that the policy will render the development commercially unviable is merely trying to establish a negotiating position. In this instance the local authority should simply call their bluff.
   
   In Merton there were initial concerns that the policy might deter development but experience is disproving the idea, and the first company that had to respond to the policy has now returned to build their second and third developments in the borough.
   
   
3. Will it overload my Development Control officers?
   There is a real possibility that this could be the case. There is a false perception that DC officers should somehow become experts in renewable energy in order to implement the policy. This is not the case. All they need to do is identify what the predicted energy use/CO2 emissions of the building will be, and then verifying if the developers proposal meets the target. It is not for them to advise in any way on what that proposal might be, in the same way they would not expect to advise on the technical engineering specifications for a building’s structural integrity or the plumbing options for a hire rise block of flats. Planning is one discipline and engineering another. However, if there is a DC or energy officer with a particular interest in the subject then it’s certainly helpful to have one around.
   
   Identification takes a few minutes referring to the London Renewables Toolkit, and verification is equally simple. There are any number of independent organisations like the Building Research Establishment, Energy Saving Trust or local EEAC that can supply you with a list of how much carbon a particular piece of equipment cuts. You multiply that figure by the number of devices and if nit equals the target than you can grant planning permission.
   
   If detailed CO2 emission assessments are required as part of the process (and this is increasingly the case especially with the revised Building Regs in place), then it is the developers responsibility to commission an engineering consultant to do a feasibility study, which should then be verified by an independent consultant.