Schofield Sweeney

This Practice Note outlines the offences and enforcement tools available to regulators under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016 (EPR 2016), SI 2016/1154, such as enforcement notices, suspension notices, revocation notices, prohibition notices, landfill closure notices, mining waste facility closure notices, restriction notices and civil sanctions, including enforcement undertakings. Looking at offences, the cases of Stone v Environment Agency [2018] EWHC 994 (Admin) and R v Ryder [2020] EWCA Crim 1110 are considered. The Practice Note goes on to consider sanctions for failure to comply with a notice, failure to obtain an environmental permit (EP) or register an exemption and breach of an EP condition, as well as defences. It also considers information breaches and failure to comply with information requests without reasonable excuse, or creating or providing false or misleading information. It was updated in partnership with Craig Burman. This Practice Note also links to related Brexit content.

This Practice Note sets out the regulatory regime for groundwater activities (formerly groundwater authorisations) under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016, SI 2016/1154 (EPR 2016), including the prohibition on unauthorised groundwater activities, discharges from public sewers, the procedure for obtaining a permit and the offences for groundwater pollution. A groundwater activity is a type of regulated facility that requires an environmental permit or exemption in England and Wales. The former system of groundwater authorisations (under the repealed Groundwater Regulations 1998, SI 1998/2746 and Groundwater (England and Wales) Regulations 2009, SI 2009/2902) was brought within the environmental permitting regime on 6 April 2010. The groundwater permitting regime is further amended by the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2023, in force from October 2023. This Practice Note also links to related Brexit content.

This Practice Note outlines the different types and classes of regulated activities that require an environmental permit under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016 (EPR 2016), SI 2016/1154, (such as installations and mobile plant, waste operations, mining waste operations, groundwater activities, water discharge activities and radioactive substance activities), exemptions and sanctions. It also covers the permitting process, types of permits (eg standard rules permits and bespoke permits), permit application and guidance and provision for varying or transferring environmental permits. This Practice Note also links to related Brexit content.

This Practice Note considers the history of waste permitting, regulated facilities, regulated waste activities and what amounts to a waste installation, a waste operation, and an exempt waste operation. It looks at low impact installations, those waste related activities which do not require an environmental permit, bespoke permits and standard rules permits for A1 installations. low risk activities and regulatory position statements. It was produced in partnership with Craig Burman of Schofield Sweeney. This Practice Note also links to related Brexit content.

This Practice Note sets out the regulatory regime for water discharge activities (formerly water discharge consents) under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016, SI 2016/1154 (EPR), including the procedure for obtaining a permit and the criminal and civil offences for water pollution. It also looks at the types of water discharge activities that require a water quality permit in England and Wales and what may be exempt, charges for water quality permits, and considers civil liability and sanctions such as anti-pollution works notices, enforcement and suspension notices and enforcement undertakings. The Practice Note also includes details of an appeal test case, heard at the Planning Inspectorate, against decisions to impose conditions on water quality permits for water companies—the decision was dated 30 April 2014 (APP/WQ/10/2770–71, APP/WQ/11/2772–78, APP/EPR/11/2–5, 9–10, 13–16, 18–21, 34 and APP/EPR/12/41, 57–60, 64, 97–98). This Practice Note links to related Brexit content.