Issue - meetings

Steve Buffery and Richard Sandbach attended the meeting to inform the Committee of the progress in the collaborative working relating to the Derbyshire Renewable Energy Spatial Study, Climate Change Planning Guidance and associated assessment tool (metric).

Local Planning Authorities (LPAs) were bound by the requirement in Section 19 of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, as amended by the Planning Act 2008, for development plan documents to include policies designed to secure that the development and use of land in the LPA’s area had contributed to the migration of, and adaption to, climate change.

The Planning Guidance had been drafted by the officer working group and had addressed current Derbyshire local plan climate change-related policies and considered good practice from across the UK. To support the Guidance, an innovative climate change metric had been produced which at planning application stage, quantified the degree to which a development contributed to climate change mitigation, adaptation and resilience. Both the Guidance and metric were now being used in the revision and drafting of new local plans and in the development management process across the County. The Guidance and metric had also been taken up by authorities outside of Derbyshire, including Staffordshire Moorlands District Council and Wokingham Borough Council.

RESOLVED that the Committee acknowledges the progress in the collaborative working, relating to the Derbyshire Renewable Energy Spatial Study, and the Climate Change Planning Guidance and associated assessment tool, as summarised in the report.