Government launches biodiversity metric consultation in latest step toward mandating Biodiversity Net Gain

The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has launched a consultation on the Biodiversity Metric to be used for the purpose of calculating Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) as required under the 2021 Environment Act.

The DEFRA consultation marks one of the last steps before the statutory metric will be produced and published by the Secretary of State.

The metric is a key tool that supports the delivery of BNG and is used to calculate the baseline biodiversity value of a site and forecast its future biodiversity value.

The consultation is on version 3.1 of the metric, which Natural England developed. It will also include a consultation on the Small Sites Metric, which Natural England released as a streamlined version of the metric for use on small development sites.

The Government plans to publish the statutory metric in late 2022, giving up to a year of use before mandatory BNG commences from November 2023 for Town and Country Planning Act 1990 development.

According to Natural England, once mandated, the intention is that the metric will then remain stable and unchanged for a period of between 3 and 5 years to provide certainty and consistency for all users.

"However, any metric needs to evolve and develop over time in response to new knowledge, science and technology. This will be the case with the Biodiversity Metric," Natural England said in a post highlighting the consultation.

"Natural England will continue to work behind the scenes, together with Defra group colleagues, metric users and other interested parties, on future metric updates and developments."

Natural England later added: "November 2023, the start of mandatory BNG, is fast approaching. There is still work to do. However, the publication of this consultation on the Biodiversity Metric that will underpin and inform all calculations for mandatory BNG is an important milestone."

The consultation is scheduled to close on 27 September 2022. The consultation page can be found here

Adam Carey