Developers and construction companies must consider pollution issues when designing and building new schemes. They must deal with pollution on sites (like contaminated land or asbestos) and during construction (like noise or dust).
Air quality
They must consider the air quality impacts along with the existing surrounding air quality, and how it affects the development occupants.
Find out more about how businesses can help improve air quality.
For advice, contact our Air Quality team, on: 020 8921 8349.
Contaminated land
Brownfield sites are land that may have been contaminated, often because of previous industrial use. If you want to develop on a brownfield site, you must consider how to deal with potentially contaminated land.
This could include:
- doing a desk top study, with or without intrusive investigation
- drawing up a remediation strategy
- providing a full validation of the installed scheme
How to assess and manage the risks from historic land contamination (GOV.UK).
Demolition
Developers or construction contractors are encouraged to discuss schemes with our Environmental Protection team as soon as possible.
They advise on pollution issues affecting planning decisions. They'll make comments on issues such as:
- contaminated land
- noise
- air quality
- smells
- smoke from burning
They may also comment on:
- public health aspects of asbestos contamination of sites or buildings
- public health aspects of electromagnetic or radio-frequency radiation
- nuisance aspects of light pollution
- sound insulation between commercial and residential uses
- any other pollution issue with public health or nuisance concerns
Pollution issues can be more easily resolved if tackled early in the planning process.
Dust, noise and smells
Contractors must make sure they do not cause dust or noise pollution during construction.
Download our codes of practice for building noise:
Get government guidance and industry standards information from:
- The control of dust and emissions from construction and demolition (The Mayor of London)
- Controlling particles and noise pollution from construction sites (Building Research Establishment (BRE))
- British Standard 5228: Noise from construction sites (British Standards Institution (BSI))
- British Standard 4142: Methods for rating and assessing industrial and commercial sound (BSI)
Developers must make sure their schemes have proper ventilation systems to avoid odour problems from commercial kitchens and hot food outlets. Existing businesses must be able to install ventilation systems.
Download our advice on ventilation for commercial kitchens and hot food outlets: