Recent reforms, coming as soon as July 2026, aim to streamline and simplify the regime.
Since BNG (Biodiversity Net Gain) was introduced as a mandatory requirement in 2024 the system has not been without challenge with the Government reporting delays to planning and various complexities and cost burdens arising. The Government has consulted on ways to reform the process with the following outcomes.
By way of a brief reminder, Biodiversity Net Gain means that, after any development, there must be an overall increase in the amount and quality of wildlife habitat compared to what was there before. All new developments must include an improvement of at least 10% and this can either be done by improving or creating habitats on-site or by enhancing habitats on other land, or by buying ‘biodiversity credits’. In all cases this gain is to be secured for 30 years.
- More exemptions
From 31 July 2026, small developments (being developments of 0.2 hectares or less) will no longer need to demonstrate the 10% biodiversity uplift.
This will help streamline and simplify planning applications for a considerable number of small applications meaning that small developments won’t now need to commission ecological surveys and submit biodiversity plans where the impact was only ever going to be small. Estimates from the Government show that around 50% of residential planning permissions that were previously required to deliver BNG will now not need to.
For anyone considering submitting a small development application, this exemption might present a very good reason to delay the submission of the application until after 31 July 2026.
Biodiversity-led development will now also be exempt, and further reforms will also look to exempt temporary developments (where granted for up to 5 years).
A separate consultation is looking at potential new exemptions for certain brownfield residential schemes which we will report on in due course.
- Simpler requirements for Minor and Urban (brownfield) development
For smaller and more urban brownfield development sites the space constraints mean that the provision of on-site habitat provision is more challenging. The new reforms will therefore allow for greater flexibility to deliver off-site biodiversity gains (in lieu of prioritising on-site provision). Additionally, the ‘hierarchy’ of biodiversity gain will also be relaxed for minor development to allow off-site solutions to be used more readily alongside on-site mitigation. Please note that statutory biodiversity credits will still remain the last resort option.
- BNG for Major Infrastructure
While the requirement for smaller developments is being simplified, from 2 November 2026, BNG will also be expanded to apply to applications made in England for Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs). NSIPs are major construction projects such as large road, rail or energy schemes.
Perhaps helpfully for such large and strategic projects, the provision of on and off-site gains will rank and be treated equally, meaning that there will be no requirement to delivery on-site before exploring off-site options. Whilst on-site and off-site routes rank equally, the buying of statutory biodiversity credits is to remain a last resort. but the requirement for a 10% gain across all types of NSIP remains. There is undoubtedly some fairness to now also including NSIPs into this BNG framework.
With the hierarchy of biodiversity gains set to change allowing the potential for more off-site gains, landowners who are interested in putting their land forward for habitat creation may find that there is now a bigger pool of developers interested in buying credits for such off-site BNG and Laura Czapski in our Agriculture and Rural Land team has experience of helping landowners do this. Please do speak to Laura Czapski or Vicky McDonald for more details about this.
