Environmental Planning Consultancy

Environmental Planning and Development aims to support clients through the different stages of the development lifecycle, ranging from initial constraints mapping through to technical support on planning site delivery.

Our commercially focused project managers have extensive knowledge of technical and planning issues, working knowledge of Environmental Permitting as well as practical experience of project implementation; as such we recognise the importance of de-risking your project at planning stage to secure robust, commercially viable and deliverable consents.

We will pull together and manage the right team for your project from a combination of in house specialists and network of independent associate companies who are experts in their respective fields to provide competitive service offering. Each project will be managed by a senior member of the Delta Simons team providing a single point of contact for the client.  

The Environmental Planning team support a range of sectors including commercial, residential and mixed use development, low carbon and renewable technologies, waste utilities and industrial.

Services we offer

Environmental Planning Feasibility / Risks Review

In the early stages of development, it is essential to understand the constraints associated with a site in order to minimise risks and maximise development opportunity.  Our team has the skills and experience to assess the feasibility and deliverability of individual and multi-site portfolios at the outset by reviewing all key subject areas in a staged process. 

This may include:

• High-level environmental-planning constraint and opportunity with constraints plan
• Stakeholder consultation
• Identification of strategies for the next stages of the project
• Providing advice to inform masterplanning of sites

Delta-Simons offers a fully flexible approach to respond to our client’s needs and requirements and by using our genuinely multidisciplinary team allows us to identify opportunities and threats across a broad range of disciplines.

Environmental Planning Team Coordination

Often projects are driven as much by technical planning issues as planning policy issues. Understanding the correct technical approach/scope, identifying commercial and policy compliant solutions as issues arise and managing the interactions between technical disciplines can be a headache for the client or their architects. Our team, who have an excellent working knowledge of a wide range of technical disciplines, will pro-actively manage the technical disciplines working with them  in order to resolve issues as they arise and ensuring crossovers are captured and appropriately considered. We can create and manage an environmental project team which meets the client's needs along with incorporating any existing specialists that the client would prefer to use where applicable. Our project teams include, but are not limited to, the following specialisms:

Ecology	Air Quality, Dust & Odour
Landscape & Visual	Arboricultural
Heritage & Archaeology	Noise & Vibration
Geo-environmental & Land Contamination	Flood Risk & Drainage
Transport & Highways	Socio-economic
Health Impact	Sustainability & Energy
Environmental Impact Assessment	Environmental Permitting
Greenhouse Gas Emissions	Topographical & Utilities
Agricultural Land Classification	Geographic Information System (GIS)

Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA)

We have extensive experience of managing and producing EIA screening letters, EIA Scoping Reports and Environmental Statement scoped to focus on the significant, decision-influencing issues to provide our clients with a pragmatic and robust Environmental Statement that explores the concerns of the planning authority and its key stakeholder.  Our expert team of in-house and approved suppliers allows us to bring tailored teams of experts to offer the full range of EIA services, including:

• Water resources assessments (including flood risk, surface water drainage and groundwater)
• Air quality, greenhouse gases and odour assessment
• Landscape and visual impact assessments
• Ecology surveys and assessment
• Cultural heritage and archaeology assessments
• Noise and vibration surveys and assessments
• Traffic and transport assessments, incl. transport statements and travel plans 
• Socio-economics – effects on local communities
• Health impacts assessment
• Ground conditions
• Natural disasters and major incidents

Environmental Planning Conditions Discharge Support

Prior to planning permission being granted, Delta-Simons can provide technical advice on the suggested and acceptability of the wording of planning conditions to ensure they are commercially sound and workable.  Following the granting of planning permission, we can produce and manage the production of technical reports and provide site support work to enable environmental planning conditions to be discharged and liaise with Local Authorities regarding this process.

Environmental Reports

We can produce comprehensive environmental reports to accompany planning applications that do not require EIA but due to the complexity of the proposed development require some additional explanation of what is proposed.  The environmental report will describe the proposed development and for each relevant environmental topic summarise the findings of any accompanying technical reports.

Environmental Planning Due Diligence

We provide expert due diligence advice to a range of developers and portfolio holders.  We offer independent certification and auditing of environmental aspects of developments to ensure the work has been carried out in accordance with necessary regulations, permits and consents. We can also review existing planning permissions in order to establish whether there are any risks associated with a new client purchasing and/or developing out a site for the client's proposed use (whether through inappropriate conditions, incorrect drawings or deliverability of the planning application generally).

COMAH Zone & Hazardous Pipeline support

We are able to provide assistance on developments in proximity to COMAH zones and hazardous pipelines. This may include establishing whether planning permission is likely to be granted or developing risk ratings for parts of the site which are deemed at risk by the Health & Safety Executive. We are also able to provide GIS support by mapping the 'Inner', 'Middle' and 'Outer' risk zones for pipelines and providing advice to aid masterplanning/layout design to minimise risks where possible.