The Drax Power Station Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage Extension Order 2024

Provision of landscape and biodiversity mitigation and enhancement

7.—(1) No phase of the authorised development or part of numbered works 5, 6 and 8 is to commence until, a written strategy for that phase or part, which is substantially in accordance with the outline landscape and biodiversity strategy, has been submitted to and, after consultation with the Environment Agency and Natural England, approved by the relevant planning authority.

(2) The strategies submitted and approved pursuant to sub-paragraph (1) must include details of—

(a)the hedgerows to be removed including-–

(i)where the hedgerows are located; and

(ii)if and how they are to be replaced,

(b)all proposed hard and soft landscaping works;

(c)ecological mitigation;

(d)enhancement measures;

(e)the location, number, species, size and planting density of any proposed planting including details of any proposed tree planting and the proposed times of such planting;

(f)cultivation, importing of materials and other operations to ensure plant establishment;

(g)hard surfacing materials;

(h)a confirmation that numbered work 6 is in accordance with items G8, E2, E6, E8, E10, E11 and E14 of the register of environmental actions and commitments;

(i)an implementation timetable;

(j)annual landscaping and biodiversity management and maintenance;

(k)the ecological surveys required to be carried out prior to commencement of a numbered work, or following completion of a numbered work in order to monitor the effect of the ecological mitigation measures and the monitoring regime to be taken forward following those initial surveys; and

(l)an explanation for how the design of the numbered works comprised in the part of the authorised development, which is the subject of the strategy, has sought to minimise the biodiversity net loss as a result of the authorised development as far as reasonably practicable.

(3) Any shrub or tree planted as part of the approved strategy that, within a period of five years after planting, is removed, dies or becomes, in the opinion of the relevant planning authority, seriously damaged or diseased, must be replaced in the first available planting seasons with a specimen of the same species and size as that originally planted.

(4) The strategies must be implemented in accordance with the implementation timetable and the measures implemented pursuant to the strategies maintained as approved once implemented throughout the operation of the numbered works to which they relate.

(5) For the purposes of sub-paragraph (1) a phase of the authorised development means a phase as identified in the phasing plan with respect to numbered works 1, 2, 3, 4 and 7 as approved pursuant to sub-paragraph (1) of Requirement 2.