Environmental Delivery Plans (EDPs) could provide a more strategic way to manage the ecological impacts of infrastructure and housing projects, but planning specialists have warned that the system is not yet mature enough to deliver significant programme savings.
The geographically defined plans are intended to address specific impacts on sites or species. Developers would pay a levy to use an EDP, with Natural England responsible for delivering the resulting conservation measures through the Nature Restoration Fund.
The Nature Restoration Fund, the levy and EDPs were established by the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025. No EDP has yet been completed.
Strategic alternative to project-by-project mitigation
The proposed system is intended to replace a fragmented approach in which individual developers identify mitigation land, negotiate legal agreements and develop their own ecological measures.
Shen Neville-Clarke, director for NSIPs and major projects at Greenshank Environmental, said developers in heavily constrained catchments can end up competing for the same mitigation land, increasing costs and delaying projects.
Under an EDP, Natural England would assess the ecological requirements of a catchment and arrange strategic interventions such as habitat creation, wetlands or changes to farming practices. Developers would contribute through the levy rather than procuring separate mitigation schemes.
Georgina Dowling, Stantec’s national lead for environmental planning and assessment, said the model would allow developers to pay a flat rate while Natural England took responsibility for delivering the relevant compensation. She added that backup measures were expected to be available if primary interventions underperformed.
The experts broadly agreed that a strategic approach could produce better ecological outcomes than a patchwork of small, site-specific schemes. David Thomson, sector director for environment at Pell Frischmann, said the model could be particularly useful for linear infrastructure such as roads and pipelines, as well as some large industrial developments.
Limited effect on complex infrastructure consents
EDPs are not expected to remove every environmental assessment required for a nationally significant infrastructure project (NSIP). Thomson said developers would still need to consider impacts not covered by the relevant plan, including some effects on migratory birds, through environmental impact assessment and Habitats Regulations Assessment processes.
Dowling said EDPs would be “one of many solutions” rather than a universal answer for NSIP developers. In her view, a substantial suite of plans would need to be available and operating effectively before they could address the range of environmental issues that can affect major projects.
Thomson said EDPs could reduce the workload associated with planning and environmental approvals, but questioned whether that would necessarily shorten the overall consenting process. Dowling similarly said one plan alone would not materially change an NSIP programme.
Neville-Clarke said developers would still need to compare their project’s ecological impacts with the scope of the relevant EDP. Any impacts outside that scope would have to be dealt with through private mitigation arrangements.
Uncertainty over price and delivery
The absence of completed plans means developers currently have limited information on the likely cost, timing and scope of the new mechanism.
Neville-Clarke said a developer preparing a development consent order application for a new nuclear power station could not yet rely on an operational EDP. He said there was no levy price transparency, robust delivery plan or certainty over which impacts would be covered.
He also questioned whether Natural England had the capacity to secure land, complete procurement and deliver restoration measures at infrastructure scale. If those elements were not delivered on time, he said, the expected consenting benefits would not materialise.
Thomson raised similar concerns about resources and expertise, while also pointing to the need for local authorities and environmental organisations to understand their responsibilities within the new system. Further guidance is expected to clarify how EDPs will operate at local level.
Dowling described the current position as a research exercise in which the system would develop through experience. She said the significance of EDPs would depend on how many Natural England brought forward and how effectively they operated.
First plan open for consultation
Natural England and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs published a draft nutrient pollution EDP for Norfolk on 17 September. The consultation is due to close on 27 October.
The draft plan is intended to protect and enhance the Norfolk Broads Special Area of Conservation, the Broadland Ramsar site and the River Wensum Special Area of Conservation while enabling sustainable development. It is expected to be the first of an initial 17 EDPs.
The Norfolk plan will provide an early test of whether the strategic model can offer developers a predictable alternative to securing individual mitigation measures. However, the experts said its effect on major infrastructure would remain limited unless plans covered a much wider range of ecological impacts.
Long-term liability remains a concern
Natural England has committed to maintaining EDP measures for 100 years, according to Dowling. She said that commitment raised questions about the management of land over a period significantly longer than the 30-year maintenance requirement associated with biodiversity net gain.
Neville-Clarke questioned who would bear the cost if an EDP failed after a development had paid its levy. He said the current proposals appeared to transfer much of that risk to Natural England, with the taxpayer potentially exposed if additional conservation measures were needed.
He also called for greater clarity over who would trigger a review when conservation measures underperformed, how quickly backup measures would be deployed and what exposure developers would retain after paying the levy.
Despite those concerns, the specialists did not reject the principle of EDPs. Thomson said regional-scale intervention was needed because isolated environmental enhancements were not reversing biodiversity decline. Dowling described the move towards strategic nature recovery as a positive development, while stressing that the system would need time and effective implementation to mature.