Re. BCT LinkedIn forum requests for BREEAM Report

Over the last few months, I have received around 30 requests for a copy of the Arbtech BREEAM Ecology Report (link to service page only) featured by the BRE themselves, in their 2011 guidance note to BREEAM assessors, GN01.

An apology from Robert Oates

A lot of the requests came via a Bat Conservation Trust post on LinkedIn, which I confess I had completely forgotten about.

It’s been pretty hectic here. What with Arbtech being invited to contribute to the BBC’s One Show and working at the Richmond home of Sir David Attenborough, as well as running a business, I had other things occupying my mind. However, a friend amongst you alerted me to several postings in that thread, where it seems, several people have grown a bit restless.

Unfortunately, I can’t upload documents to a post on LinkedIn, so anyone who would like a copy of the report can download it here.

Best wishes,

Rob.

Surrey Wildlife Trust require Bat Surveys

Surrey Wildlife Trust oversees the assessment of planning applications, often with the help of Surrey Bat Group. Following the link, you will be taken to Surrey Bat Group’s web site page that highlights the criteria Surrey Wildlife Trust use to determine the risk to bats, in consequence of your demolition and construction, or conversion. They do this generally, using their own criteria, which looks for habitats and protected species of all kinds, including bats.

Bat Surveyors in Surrey

Bat surveys come in two varieties: an initial bat survey and bat emergence surveys. By following this link, you can watch a video clip taken during a recent bat survey in Berkshire.

Initial bat surveys in Surrey will cost £329 from Arbtech and involve a licensed bat surveyor attending your site to conduct a very thorough internal and external inspection. The results of the survey are presented in our report which will define bat presence, evidence of activity—such as droppings—and habitat value as negative or positive. In the case that any of these findings are significant, Surrey Wildlife Trust will undoubtedly ask you to present a more detailed study: the emergence bat survey. However, bats hibernate overwinter because the insects upon which they predate are not abundant. This means that while initial, scoping bat surveys can be undertaken year-round, bat emergence surveys are time limited.

Licensed Bat Consultants in Surrey

Natural England, the Bat Conservation Trust, and most local planning authorities, will accept your summer (emergence) bat survey report provided that the surveys are undertaken during the activity season for bats: April through October. Regrettably, Surrey Wildlife Trust has taken the decision to challenge consultant’s reports of bat surveys for emergence and re entry activity if they are undertaken outside of May through August. Undertaking as we do, perhaps 300 or more bat surveys in Surrey throughout each year, we have to engage Surrey Wildlife Trust many times to challenge their consultations to local planning authorities. To date, we have never had a bat survey refused in Surrey, though because Surrey Wildlife Trust adopt this unusual (and in our opinion, excessive) policy, several applicants each year come close to getting refused.

If you want to talk about your bat survey in Surrey, or perhaps Surrey Wildlife Trust have commented on your application, then call us today and book your survey while our great offer on initial bat surveys for £329 persists. It won’t last long!

Robert Oates

Similar offsetting schemes are already in place in countries such as Australia, and the US. The way it works is that developers can ‘buy’ the right to remove habitat, provided that they then enhance or create another habitat area. Many global schemes achieve this with a credit system, in which the developer buys credits in conservation projects in return for any habitat loss caused.

How the system will work in practice when it is launched remains unknown, with even Defra’s July 2011 ‘Biodiversity Offsetting’ Technical Paper conceding, “Applying biodiversity offsetting in England would be a new and innovative approach, and there are many aspects which we don’t fully understand yet.”

A risky approach?

The authors of a recent study, entitled ‘The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity’, consider any metric which translates abstract natural values into tangible and rigidly defined financial value a risky approach. They say that, “ecological processes are too complex and interlinked and present too many unknowns for us to do this without risking grave damage.”

The Ecologist meanwhile described it as, “a licence to cause ecological damage.” But could biodiversity offsetting be a better deal for the environment than the current system, whereby developers are permitted to permanently lose quality habitats in exchange for a few ecological surveys and reports? Quite possibly.

If created conscientiously and managed properly, a system of offsetting could lead to a much more sustainable situation in the UK, in which the loss of one habitat is compensated by either the creation of a new habitat space, or the enhancement and protection of other existing habitats.

A complex metric

Getting the metric itself right will be crucial to the effectiveness of the offsetting scheme. One potentially worrying point from the Defra document is that, “metrics [will be] transferable between sites and habitats, allowing an impact on one habitat type to be offset with conservation action elsewhere, or involving a different habitat type and/or quality of habitat.”

To succeed in protecting habitats and biodiversity itself, there must be measures in place to ensure that one particular type of habitat does not suffer overall across the country, while another flourishes due to offsetting. Furthermore, it must not be made possible for developers to destroy irreplaceable habitats that have developed over centuries, regardless of compensation elsewhere.

Perhaps one of the most important things is that the metric and the offsetting process in its entirety is constantly monitored and refreshed by a human element, and not left simply to rigid formulas. A guiding human hand which is focused on environmental preservation but sympathetic to developers needs must remain at all times.

The challenge for ecological consultants

The scheme is certainly a step in the right direction, at a time when the reversal of habitat loss is absolutely paramount. But despite its noble intent, one great danger of biodiversity offsetting is the commoditisation of habitat loss, and developers and politicians simply paying lip service to conservation aims, while ‘fiddling’ the system, where possible.

In order to achieve its aim, of preserving biodiversity now and in to the future, all those involved in the offsetting scheme pilot must stay true to the overarching philosophy of natural conservation that informs it.

Continued ecological functionality

Everyone, from the policy makers and planning authority officials to the developers themselves and the professionals they employ, must recall that aim in each decision they take, instead of simply adhering to a system and working it where possible. And of course, the role of qualified and experienced ecologists and habitat surveyors will be crucial in ensuring that any offsetting scheme provides a good deal for nature.

Robert Oates

Save £££ on Your Badger Survey with Arbtech

Badgers hibernate. This means that if you have been asked for a badger survey by Elmbridge, Guildford, Surrey Heath or any other council, the constraint on your development is not only physical (do I/Don’t I have badgers,) but time-limited. The optimal survey season for badger surveys is February through April and October through November. Outside of this time, so-called “bait marking” badger surveys are impossible.

Badger Survey Video Clip

In the video that follows, Arbtech surveyor Mark Best watches the progress of a building contractor in Cheam, Surrey, carefully scrape away earth just outside of a known protection zone, identified in a badger survey earlier this year. By phasing the development, the applicant was able to progress part of the site works, while she applied for a Badger License to do works elsewhere in the site, known to be used by badgers.

Badger Habitat Surveys in Surrey

However, what you can do is provide the council with a badger survey that concentrates on habitats and local, known populations. If there are no records of badgers in your area, and you have no habitat to support them, then only the presence of a badger sett found during a badger survey, should be able to hold up your development application.

Badger Survey Summary

Bait marking badger surveys are expensive, very expensive. They are usually performed over at least a two-week period, and use lots of peanuts, syrup and plastic pellets—not forgetting of course, they are also time limited. Why go to this up front expense? You could try to eliminate the need altogether with a less comprehensive, more practical and cheaper badger survey for habitats—which can be undertaken year-round. If minimizing your up front costs is important to you, or you think there is very little chance of badgers being effected by your development, then call us today!
Robert Oates

100% Money Back Guarantee on Arboricultural Reports

You should always buy from someone who puts their money where their mouth is. We do this. Our arboricultural reports for planning applications come with 100% money back guarantee if the planning authority is not happy with the tree survey data presented in your arboricultural report, we commit to putting our mistake right immediately. If we can’t do this, for any reason, you get your money back. No hassle, no quibbles.

Save £££: Get your Arboricultural Report up front

An arboricultural report is likely to be a validation requirement for your planning application. Having your report to hand can eliminate the likelihood of your application being refused or not validated, due to a “lack of information.” Even if not a validation requirement, it’s more than likely that in the long run your application wont be determined without an arboricultural report. This can be more costly than meets the eye. If you have already paid your Chartered architect or consultant to prepare your proposed development’s plans, they may need to change in consequence of the results of your tree survey report. Better to make edits to your arboricultural report at very little relative cost, than to pay the architect to make changes to the scheme you’ve pinned your hopes and dreams on.

What does an Arboricultural Report actually cost?

Expect to pay from £199 for a basic mortgage application arboricultural report and from of £349 for a basic arboricultural report for planning and development.

Robert Oates

This blog post explains a little bit about bat surveys and what goes on while our surveyors are at your property!

Berkshire bat surveys by Berkshire licensed bat surveyors

This was a site we surveyed earlier this year in Old Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead, Berkshire. Previously, a scoping bat survey had been undertaken whereupon the surveyors found the site had ‘high’ habitat value – assessed by the Bat Conservation Trust good practice guidelines for bats surveys – in the form of loose tiles on the roof, large gaps along ridgeline and yet more gaps at eaves.

Finding evidence of bat activity during a bat survey

In context, the site lies close to the river Thames and Runnymead Nature Reserve, which of course is very high value habitat, offering numerous roosting and foraging opportunities: adding further weight to the case that bat would be using the building.

Finally, the internal inspection revealed two droppings in the loft space, which are evidence of bat activity and “confirm” the roost. In consequence, the report of our initial bat assessment required that so-called bat emergence surveys should be undertaken to determine the species of bat (often the species can be identified from droppings, but not always,) and the population number.

Bat Emergence Survey in Berkshire

The emergence surveys for bats were duly undertaken by undertaken by three of Arbtech’s bat surveyors: Martin O’Connor, Mark Best and Polly Booth. The defacto standard ‘two dusk and one dawn’ survey was undertaken in August. A total of four common pipistrelle bats were seen to emerge from the building.

Several other species of British bats were heard and record by our bat surveyors, including brown long eared, daubentons and serotine.

The emergence surveys were undertaken and our report sent to the local planning authority for their assessment and approval. Naturally, the report breezed past the planners and consent to build subject to a European protected species license and bat mitigation method statement was granted without conditions (relating to bats at any rate.)

Robert Oates

BS5837 Tree Surveys for Planning and Development

When proposing to construct new buildings – or even small extensions – it may prove necessary to have adequate tree surveys completed. The survey will often be a validation requirement and hence many local councils will not consider planning application without an accompanying arboricultural survey to cover the trees at a particular site. A BS5837 tree survey and tree constraints plan can help developers to quickly and painlessly gain planning permission for any new development.

Tree Survey Reports for Mortgage Approval

When applying for a mortgage it may become necessary to have tree surveys completed. Typically, these are done in order to ensure that existing trees have not caused damage to the property, though the survey will also highlight any potential risk not only to your house, but also to people and surrounding properties, say, if the tree collapsed. A mortgage lender may make a tree survey a specific requirement of your credit application and it may prove impossible to get your mortgage without one.

Health and Safety Tree Surveys

Health and safety is a major concern (bain?) in the modern world. Tree surveys can be completed in order to assess the health safety risk of a particular tree. Low hanging branches, root growth, and potential structural damage are all assessed in such a survey and it will give recommendations on how best to proceed and whether the tree should be pruned or whether it is safe to leave it to grow.

Tree Survey Costs

Tree surveys are a legal requirement for planning permission or, may be a necessary requirement set out by your prospective mortgage lender. As such they are a critical component in many instances. Arbtech offers high quality and competitively priced tree surveys conducted by trained experts in arboriculture, so providing you with the reports that are required for your planning permission (from £349 ex VAT) or mortgage approval (from £199 ex VAT.)

Watch the video and request a free, no obligation quote today.

Robert Oates

You may or may not have noticed, but the start of October (3^rd to the 9^th) was British Tree Week. Designed to promote knowledge and awareness of Britain’s many native species, the week was organised by Bosch Lawn & Garden and featured a variety of special woodland walks and other events around the country.

Young Britons ignorant about trees

Unfortunately British Tree Week also exposed the ignorance of the nation’s young. According to a survey carried out by Bosch at the start of the week, less than a quarter of under-25s understand the meaning of the word deciduous, while 20% thought that acorns come from willow trees.

What’s more, despite the enduring popularity of conkers in school playgrounds around the nation, less than half of young people knew that they come from horse chestnut trees. Older generations proved more knowledgeable, but Gary King from Bosch Lawn and Garden said, “Our research shows that a quarter of us can’t even name the trees in our own garden which is a real shame. We want to help shine a light on our native varieties and motivate people to learn how to care for and look after their own trees.”

Tree surveyors plug knowledge gap

This apparent shortfall in tree-related knowledge however is made up for by a small and relatively unheard of group of professionals whose business it is to know about trees in all their different shapes and sizes. No, not superheroes, tree surveyors.

You may not yet have had the need for a professional surveyor, or arboriculturalist, to visit your home, but it’s possible that in the future you might. The role of a tree surveyor is to assess and study the type and condition of trees in a specific area, and their relationship with the surrounding environment.

Tree surveys: what are they for?

Perhaps the most common reason why you might need a surveyor to visit your home is if you’re planning on building an extension to your property, or building a enclosed swimming pool or other development on your land.

In order to obtain planning permission for your development you would most probably need to have a BS5837 tree survey carried out. This is an in-depth arboricultural report which provides your local planning authority with an overview of the tree population on and around your land, and how any building work might affect it.

Another reason you might require the services of a tree surveyor is if you’re thinking of buying a house. In some cases you may be required to submit the findings of a tree survey when applying for a mortgage. However you might also want to have one done simply for your own peace of mind, to ensure that the trees which surround the property you are buying will not have a negative effect on your home in the future. For example, if the roots are too close to the house they may result in subsidence. Tree surveyors can also assess the health and safety of the trees in a public or private area.

Robert Oates

Whether you’re a corporate developer or a home owner looking to build an extension to your property, if you’re going to be building or developing property close to trees, you’ll probably require a tree survey in order to do so.

In an increasingly environmentally conscious age, many local planning authorities are taking measures to conserve endangered trees and protect natural biodiversity from being adversely affected by building developments.  As a result, before beginning any building work, you may need to have a tree survey undertaken by a professional. The results of this arboricultural Report will then form part of your planning permission application.

If you’re not sure whether you need a tree survey or not, get in touch with your local planning office and they’ll be able to give you an answer.

How do I get a tree survey done?

The specific survey you will need is a BS5837 tree survey carried out by professional tree surveyors.

The purpose of the BS5837 aboricultural report is to assess the extent to which your building developments may affect the trees in the surrounding area. This may include not only the trees on your property itself, but also those adjacent to it.

The tree survey will look at a large number of highly specialised factors relating to the land your property is built on, your development plans and the trees in the area.

What does a BS5837 tree survey include?:

• How close your development and its foundations will be to tree roots
• Proximity of the structure to tree crowns
• Details on the species and condition of trees
• Tree coverage densities
• Overall analysis of the location
• Soil types
• Wildlife in immediate area
• Proposals of protective measures to enable trees to be retained
• Proposals for any tree removals as part of the development

Why is an arboricultural report necessary?

The reason that such a detailed report needs to be compiled is that the majority of local councils are currently doing their utmost to preserve trees, both in the countryside and within urban areas. To this end a thorough report into the potential consequences of building developments on trees is now required, as well as an assessment of how the loss of certain trees might affect the immediate area.

Generally speaking, the purpose of a BS5837 is to minimise the impact of new buildings and extensions/ conversions on good quality trees.

What to look for when choosing tree surveyors

Your planning permission tree survey should be carried out by a qualified professional arboculturist. As with any other trade professional, when choosing from the tree surveyors available you should go for one who offers a fair balance of experience and cost. Some will charge varying rates, depending on the location and nature of the site, and even charge for additional hidden costs, but there should generally be no reason for these price discrepancies. Try to find a suitably qualified and experienced tree surveyor or company that offer a transparent pricing structure.

Watch our video on tree surveys and what a tree survey costs…

Hope you enjoyed this blog post.

Robert Oates

By Robert Oates

Arbtech Consulting Ltd

Bats in the UK are enjoying a bit of a comeback—no doubt in part to having less of their habitat permanently lost to development. British Waterways’ annual wildlife and biodiversity survey shows that sightings of bats are up approximately nine percent on last year’s figures.

Of course, we all know that bat survey statistics of this nature (excuse the pun) are next to meaningless, especially when comparing one year to that of previous.

Why would this bat survey statistic in itself not be positive?

Well, because the increase in bat sightings may be correlated to other things e.g. more warm weather this year resulting in more people out walking of an evening and so more bat sightings.

Or it could be that the British Waterways’ survey was better publicised this year than last, so bats have ‘gained’ from a better survey response.

Focusing on the positives about the bat survey sighting increase

However, all scepticism aside; British Waterways wildlife survey, which takes in all species, not just surveys of bats, is extremely important. It raises the profile of British Wildlife and that in turn provides the public with information about the rich ecological resource that is our waterways.

Canals and other waterways are of incredible importance as they provide the basis for a food chain and valuable habitat to many species. Bats for example predate upon flying insects that are rarely found far from a water source. Further, most canals are tree-lined and this provides yet more foraging opportunities, as well as habitat value for bat roosting.

Photo Source: The Guardian