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Environmental permits

Introduction

Operators of certain industrial processes carried out in fixed installations or by mobile plant must obtain an environmental permit.

Environmental permits are legal documents setting out conditions that operators must comply with. The conditions are intended to minimise the environmental impact of the process. For example, many environmental permits require operators to use equipment to reduce the amount of pollution released by their installation.

In England and Wales environmental permits are issued by the Environment Agency and, for less polluting processes, by Local Authorities. This guide concentrates on permits issued by the Council. In Calderdale there are currently over 90 installations and mobile plant holding permits issued by the Council.

There are three categories of environmental permit:

1. Part A (1) permits for large or complex industrial installations and most waste activities
2. Part A (2) permits for intermediate installations
3. Part B permits for relatively simple installations.

The Council only issues Part A (2) and Part B permits. Part A (1) permits are issued by the Environment Agency. Part A (1) and A (2) permits are concerned with emissions to air, land and water, while Part B permits are, broadly speaking, only concerned with emissions to air.

Legal background

The legislation relating to environmental permits is set out in the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2007. The regulations include a complete list of all the processes that require environmental permits. The regulations, and a fuller explanation of how they are applied, are set out on the Defra website: Pollution Prevention and Control: Guidance, regulations and directives|.

Some of the processes requiring a permit are:

• burning waste, including wood waste and oil
• crushing and screening stone and other minerals
• manufacturing concrete blocks
• storing cement in silos
• melting metal, for example at a foundry
• storing certain chemicals in bulk
• coating wood, metal or plastic
• printing.

This is not a complete list and you should contact the Council if you are not sure whether your process requires a permit. In most cases there is a threshold, for example the amount of solvent used in a year, below which a permit is not required.

Exemptions from the need to obtain an environmental permit

In exceptional circumstances the Council may agree that a particular installation is so unlikely to cause pollution that it does not need a permit. This is rare, and the Council periodically reviews installations of this kind to make sure the process remains unlikely to cause pollution. These installations are called 'trivial'.

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