12 June 2009

Environment Agency - Home

Environmental Permitting guidance

You can use the following guidance to help you complete your application and also to help you comply with the conditions of your environmental permit.

Environmental Permitting Regulations

Information to help you understand the wider regulatory framework:

Government guidance

Defra has produced a series of guidance documents. These include 'Core Environmental Permitting Guidance', which describes the general permitting and compliance requirements, and guidance on the European directives which are implemented through the Environmental Permitting Regulations. 

Our Guidance

Regulatory Guidance notes are Environment Agency guidance on policy and legal interpretation issues associated with implementing the regulations. They sit in a hierarchy – below government guidance and above our technical guidance and internal operational instructions.

These contain both general and specific standards and measures which operators must use. You can use the technical guidance when preparing applications and for operating your facility. Our staff use the standards and measures both in determining applications and for compliance assessment.

There is one application form in six parts, which must be used to apply for a new bespoke or standard permit or to vary, transfer or surrender your permit. Guidance on how to complete the form is provided.

Other information

To find out about the mechanism we use to assess risk of EP site operation, please visit our Opra page. Opra is a risk screening tool we use in our work regulating operators under the Environmental Permitting Regulations. It allows us to allocate our resources appropriately and we also use it to inform our charges.

Our Environmental Permitting charges pages will explain how much a permit will cost.