The UK’s rivers have been in the news recently, often for all the wrong reasons. Communities have experienced significant river flooding in Cumbria and Scotland. In Parliament, the Government has had to toughen the law on water companies discharging sewage into rivers, after a public outcry about the millions of hours that sewage is allowed to be discharged under current rules. The public is demanding that rivers, streams and headwaters are valued in all land development and management decisions.
The Environment Bill has just received royal assent. The Bill supports the government’s approach for leaving nature in a better state than before and includes biodiversity net gain (BNG) provisions. TEP is proud to announce it now has qualified staff that can offer River Condition Assessments utilising the Modular River Survey (or MoRPh) field survey techniques, as required by the BNG guidance. The assessment has two components, a desk study and a river survey, which collects information on sediments, vegetation, morphological and water-related features; and the extent and severity of physical modification within the channel, channel margins, banks and riparian zone. This assessment is particularly important for developments with rivers and streams because it assesses any impacts from the project or development and the requirement for specific mitigation.
TEP already delivers on other sections of the Biodiversity Metric, including identifying baseline scores for terrestrial habitats, advising on high-value areas to allow avoidance of high compensation requirements, modelling final scheme scores and creating the necessary 30-year management plans. In addition to completing the BNG baseline assessment for rivers, our staff, in conjunction with our in-house GIS team and Land Management Team can provide watercourse enhancement options for your schemes to work towards achieving a biodiversity net gain within the rivers section of the Biodiversity Metric. All of which can help turn our murky waters clear and promote sustainable development.
If you are interested in using our BNG services, would like a CPD for your staff on any aspect of BNG or just want some friendly advice, please get in contact by emailing ecology@tep.uk.com.
