Natural England Introduces Biodiversity Credits Scheme Pilot

Natural England has introduced a pilot project which will support the design of the biodiversity net gain credits scheme by developing a biodiversity credit investment pipeline and payment structures to fund habitat provision.

Under proposed mandatory biodiversity net gain in the Environment Bill, when a developer cannot achieve at least 10% biodiversity net gain on their development site following application of the mitigation hierarchy, they will have the option to purchase biodiversity units from an offsite habitat market. If units cannot be sourced from local habitat markets, developers will be able to purchase their required units (as credits) which will be invested in habitat creation.

One aspect of the pilot project will involve a ‘call for projects’ in July to establish what is required in terms of cost and outputs to get a project ready to receive credit investment.

Further details from Natural England are available here.