Addressing Climate Change through the Surrey Heath Local Plan A report to inform Local Plan preparation September 2020 Addressing Climate Change through the Surrey Heath Local Plan Quality information Prepared by Checked by Verified by Approved by Eleanor King, Mark Fessey, Steve Smith, Steve Smith, Senior consultant Associate Director Technical Director Technical Director Rosie Cox, Consultant Jess Wood, Assistant Consultant Prepared for: Surrey Heath Borough Council Prepared by: AECOM Limited Aldgate Tower 2 Leman Street London E1 8FA United Kingdom aecom.com © 2020 AECOM UK Limited. All Rights Reserved. This document has been prepared by AECOM Limited (“AECOM”) in accordance with its contract with Surrey Heath Borough Council (the “Client”) and in accordance with generally accepted consultancy principles and the established budget. 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AECOM Addressing Climate Change through the Surrey Heath Local Plan Table of Contents Executive summary 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1 Part 1: Mitigation ...................................................................................................................... 2 2 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 3 3 What is the context? ..................................................................................................... 3 4 What is the baseline scenario? .................................................................................. 16 5 Review of intervention options ................................................................................... 26 6 Conclusion of Part 1 ................................................................................................... 59 Part 2: Adaptation .................................................................................................................. 61 7 Introduction ................................................................................................................ 62 8 What is the context? ................................................................................................... 62 9 What is the baseline scenario? .................................................................................. 66 10 Review of intervention options ................................................................................... 79 11 Conclusion of Part 2 ................................................................................................... 86 Part 3: Conclusions and recommendations ........................................................................... 87 12 Conclusions ................................................................................................................ 88 13 Recommendations ..................................................................................................... 89 Appendix 1: Climate change risk assessment ....................................................................... 91 AECOM Addressing Climate Change through the Surrey Heath Local Plan Executive summary AECOM was commissioned in early 2020 to prepare a report aimed at exploring how climate change objectives, both in respect of mitigation and adaptation, might most effectively be addressed through the emerging Surrey Heath Local Plan. More specifically: • Climate change mitigation - the aim is to understand the likely future trajectory of de-carbonisation within Surrey Heath and then explore Local Plan interventions to increase the speed of decarbonisation and therefore bring forward the date for achieving net zero emissions. • Climate change adaptation - in a similar fashion, the aim is to understand anticipated climate change impacts and then explore Local Plan interventions to reduce risk and strengthen resilience. There is a particular focus on identifying how the Local Plan might respond to climate change through setting a spatial strategy, i.e. by allocating sites and assigning a quantum of development / mix of uses to each. However, there is also a focus on how the Local Plan can respond through setting development management policy, i.e. policy to guide decisions on planning applications. Additionally, this study explores certain ways in which the Council might respond to climate change through its wider functions, where there are links to the Local Plan. This report considers climate change mitigation and adaptation in turn, in both cases exploring three key questions: • What is the context? • What is the baseline scenario? • What are the intervention options feasibly open to the Council? Part 1: Climate change mitigation What is the context? There is a raft of international and national context with a direct bearing on preparation of the Local Plan, but a logical starting point is the “2050 Target Amendment” to the Climate Change Act (2019), which introduced a national net zero target, following the international Paris Agreement of 2015. A high proportion of Local Planning Authorities (LPAs) nationally subsequently declared a Climate Emergency and set their own target dates for achieving net zero. Surrey Heath Borough Council (‘the Council’) declared a Climate Emergency on 9th October 2019 and, at the same time, committed the Council to achieving net zero by 2030. It is important to note that no target date has yet been set for Surrey Heath Borough as a geographic area. This approach is not uncommon amongst local authorities nationally and locally, although a number of authorities are going further. Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council, for example, is committed to borough-wide carbon neutrality by 2030, with the Council ‘leading by example’ by achieving carbon neutrality by 2025. With respect to the Local Plan, the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF, 2019), which establishes principles, policies and procedures to guide Local Plan preparation, sets out policies on, and relevant to, climate change. Local Plans must accord with the NPPF, hence Part 1 of this report concludes by presenting a checklist of NPPF requirements, including that Local Plans “contribute to radical reductions in greenhouse gas emissions”. The context review then goes on to explore: • The Committee on Climate Change (CCC)’s report on “Net Zero” (2019) – the CCC is the Government’s official adviser on climate change, hence their recommendations are a material consideration for Local Plans; however, it is important to recognise that many recommended policy interventions are of limited relevance to Local Plans. What does come through strongly though is a need to focus on decarbonising transport and heating. • Guidance for Local Plans – the official guidance is the Planning Practice Guidance (PPG) on climate change; however, this largely dates from 2014. The Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) produced guidance for Local Plans in 2018; however, even since this time understanding has moved on at pace. • Decarbonising transport – Government published Decarbonising Transport in March 2020, ahead of a full Transport Decarbonisation Plan. The report begins by setting out the scale of the challenge: ─ Transport overtook power supply as the largest source of emissions nationally about four years ago; ─ Transport emissions will decrease significantly, but at a rate well short of what is required for net zero; ─ Passenger car emissions dominate but are decreasing, whilst van and HGV emissions are increasing. Executive summary AECOM i Addressing Climate Change through the Surrey Heath Local Plan The Government identifies strategic priorities to include: accelerating modal shift to public and active transport; supporting electric vehicle (EV) take-up, including by delivering charging infrastructure and supporting electricity network readiness; transforming ‘last mile’ deliveries; and, more generally, delivering “place-based solutions”, including with a view to minimising the need for people to travel in the first place. • Decarbonising heating – it is difficult to overstate the scale of the challenge posed by Government’s commitment (2019 Spring Statement) to see “the end of fossil fuel heating systems in new homes from 2025”. The UK has lagged behind other comparable nations in respect of decarbonising heating, but there will now need to be a rapid shift to the use of electricity for heating, and specifically the use of heat pumps.1 Work is ongoing nationally to understand how best to roll-out heat pumps across different development contexts, and also retrofit existing buildings. For Local Plans a key point to note is that heat pumps can work most effectively when delivered as part of a heat network (or ‘district heating’ scheme), where heat is shared between buildings and/or drawn from a communal source (e.g. an open space, water body or sewage works). Aligned with this, there is a focus nationally on rapidly increasing fabric standards within new and existing buildings, in order to minimise need for winter heating and summer cooling. Work is also ongoing to explore ways to ensure thermal efficiency (and support solar PV) through building location, orientation and design. • The Future Homes Standard (FHS) – over recent years there has been a focus on exploring ways in