Permitted development rights to support the provision of new homes: SEA Environmental Report

2. Assessment approach

2.1. What is Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA)?

2.1.1 SEA is a systematic method for considering the likely environmental effects of certain Plans, Programmes or Strategies. It identifies potential significant environmental effects and, where relevant, describes how negative effects can be avoided or reduced or where positive effects could be enhanced.

2.1.2 The Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005^[17] (‘the 2005 Act’) requires all qualifying policies, plans, programmes and strategies (referred to generally as ‘plans’) to undergo SEA. The 2005 Act requires that the environmental effects of a qualifying plan are assessed, and the findings set out in an Environmental Report. The Environmental Report and the plan to which it relates must then be open for public consultation, providing an opportunity for the public to express their views on the proposals and assessment findings.

2.1.3 Options for permitted development rights to support the provision of new homes are considered to fall under Section 5(3) of the 2005 Act and this Environmental Report has been prepared in accordance with the Act. The SEA process includes the following stages:

• Scoping: establishing significant environmental topics, setting the environmental baseline, developing the proposed method(s) and intended approach to the assessment, and setting out the proposed consultation period;
• Environmental Assessment: assessing the likely significant environmental effects of the proposed plan and any reasonable alternatives, and consulting on both the draft plan and Environmental Report;
• Post Adoption Statement: setting out how the assessment and the consultation results have been taken into account in the finalised plan:
• Monitoring: monitoring the significant environmental effects of the implementation of the plan.

2.2. Structure of the Environmental Report

2.2.1 This Environmental Report includes the following information:

• Section 1 introduces PDR and sets out the relationship to other plans, programmes and strategies.
• Section 2 details the approach to the assessment.
• Section 3 describes the current baseline environmental conditions and environmental protection objectives.
• Section 4 presents the assessment findings by development type and outlines potential mitigation.
• Section 5 presents the secondary, cumulative and synergistic effects.
• Section 6 sets out the monitoring arrangements
• Section 7 sets out the conclusions and next steps.

2.3. SEA activities to date

2.3.1 In previous years the Scottish Government has amended PDR through a phased approach, reflecting evolving objectives and priorities. A programme for reviewing and extending PDR for a broad range of development was set out in 2019 and this was accompanied by a Sustainability Appraisal (SA)^[18], which incorporated the requirements of SEA. The ‘2019 SA Report’ was published and consulted on alongside the draft work programme from November 2019^[19].

2.3.2 The 2019 SA Report set out the potential for significant environmental, social and economic effects (both positive and negative) arising from options for changes to 16 development types – including some which are relevant to this SEA. The SA findings were used to inform the Scottish Government's iterative work programme for extending PDR. Subsequent updates to the SA were undertaken as the phases of work progressed. Further information on this approach is set out in the associated Post Adoption Statement^[20]. The findings of the 2019 SA Report, the subsequent updates to the 2019 SA, as well as the previous consultation responses have been taken into account where relevant in undertaking the current SEA.

2.3.3 This SEA specifically concerns options for new or extended PDR to support the provision of new homes and low/zero carbon heating/cooling technologies. Work commenced with the preparation of a SEA Scoping Report which was submitted to the SEA Gateway in July 2025. Comments were received from the SEA consultation authorities (Scottish Environment Protection Agency, NatureScot and Historic Environment Scotland) who were broadly content with the proposed approach. Where more detailed comments on the baseline have been received, these have been taken into account.

Scoping the environmental topics

2.3.4 The Scoping Report considered that all environmental topics should be scoped into the assessment due to the potential for effects to occur across all topics. This Environmental Report therefore considers the following SEA topics, and their inter-relationships:

• Air
• Biodiversity, flora and fauna
• Climatic factors
• Cultural heritage
• Landscape and geodiversity
• Material assets
• Population and Human Health
• Soil
• Water

2.4. Assessment methodology

2.4.1 This SEA was undertaken by the Scottish Government’s Planning, Architecture, and Regeneration Directorate.

2.4.2 The assessment methodology broadly follows the approach taken to the consideration of environmental topics in the 2019 Sustainability Appraisal and the subsequent updates.

Setting objectives

2.4.3 SEA objectives were developed to assist in predicting and evaluating the potential effects of the proposals on the environment, informed by the likely scope, NPF4 policy context, relevant environmental protection objectives, and the environmental baseline. The draft objectives were developed during scoping and refined during the assessment process. They are:

• Air: To avoid adverse effects on air quality.
• Biodiversity, flora and fauna: To avoid adverse effects on all habitats and species. To protect, maintain, and enhance biodiversity.
• Climatic factors: To avoid new greenhouse gas emissions. To support climate change adaptation.
• Cultural heritage: To avoid adverse effects on designated and undesignated heritage assets and their settings. To enhance, where appropriate, heritage assets and their settings and to improve the quality of the wider built environment.
• Landscape and geodiversity: To avoid adverse effects on landscapes and geodiversity.
• Material assets: To avoid adversely impacting on material assets through the loss of resources or the generation of waste. To promote sustainable design, reduce vacant and derelict land/buildings and promote long term use and management of new and existing assets/infrastructure.
• Population and human health: To protect people and places from environmental harm. To facilitate development that improves health and wellbeing.
• Soil: To protect and avoid adverse effects on valuable soil resources, (including peatland, carbon rich soils, priority peatland habitat and prime agricultural land). To reduce contaminated land.
• Water: To avoid adverse effects on the quality and quantity of watercourses and waterbodies. To avoid and reduce flood risk.

Assessment of proposals

2.4.4 The assessment considered a broad range of potential options for new or extended PDR against each of the SEA objectives. Appendix A contains the assessment tables, the findings of which are summarised in Section 4 of this report.

2.4.5 Where significant negative effects have been identified through the SEA, options for potential mitigation have been included wherever possible.

Assessing significance

2.4.6 The 2005 Act requires the Environmental Report to set out the likely significant environmental effects expected from the proposed plan. The following factors have been taken into account:

• The magnitude or scale of effects.
• The sensitivity of the receiving environment including existing known problems and potential effects on designated areas or landscapes.
• The likely probability, duration, frequency, reversibility, cumulative effects, transboundary effects, risks to human health or the environment, and the magnitude and spatial extent of the effects where known.

2.4.7 Additionally, the Environmental Report notes more minor effects arising where these are identified, but aims to focus primarily on effects that are considered to be significant when considered in relation to the above criteria.

Cumulative effects

2.4.8 The assessment tables in Appendix A do not seek to identify cumulative, secondary or synergistic effects between the potential PDR changes. This is because there are a large number of potential permutations of combinations, and the potential combinations would be influenced by the detail of each potential PDR change. Instead, possible secondary, cumulative and synergistic effects are considered in Section 5 in the main body of this report.

2.4.9 Due to the range of potential combinations, the assessment of secondary, cumulative and synergistic effects is based on the ‘maximum development’ scenario of all of the PDR options for each development type, where multiple changes are identified. For the development types where only a single change to PDR is identified, there is no assessment of cumulative effects.

2.4.10 Secondary or indirect effects are effects that are not a direct result of the proposal but occur away from the original effect or as a result of a complex pathway.

2.4.11 Cumulative effects occur where two or more impacts combine to form a significant impact; or where several individual effects have a combined effect. Small-scale, localised effects can be significant if they occur in particularly sensitive areas or have the potential for wide-ranging effects.

2.4.12 Synergistic effects interact to produce a total effect greater than the sum of the individual effects. For example, a wildlife habitat could be progressively fragmented with limited effects on a particular species until the last fragmentation makes the area too small to support that species.

2.5. Mitigation

2.5.1 Where significant negative effects are identified through the SEA, recommendations are made for mitigation.

2.5.2 Mitigation options include:

• Adding conditions or restrictions on the extension of particular PDR, for example in terms of numbers, dimensions (e.g. height or area of development) and locations of development types.
• Retaining or requiring prior notification/prior approval^[21].
• Promoting guidance and best practice to ensure that development which is implemented under PDR achieves high standards of design and implementation.

2.6. Statutory mechanisms relevant to PDR

2.6.1 There are several statutory mechanisms that are relevant to the SEA which support the provision of new homes. Where relevant these have been taken into account in the assessment and include:

• Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)^[22] PDR do not apply to developments listed in Schedule 1 of the EIA Regulations. For Schedule 2 developments, PDR are disapplied if the proposal meets or exceeds the relevant thresholds or is located in a sensitive area (as defined in the Regulations), unless a screening opinion or direction has confirmed that an EIA is not required.
• Habitats Regulations^[23] - Where a development is likely to have a significant effect on a European Site (either alone or in combination with other plans or projects), and is not directly connected with or necessary to the site's management, it cannot proceed under PDR until the planning authority has issued written approval following an appropriate assessment.
• European Protected Species (EPS)^[24] - Certain species are protected under the Habitats Regulations. While activities that may impact EPS are generally prohibited, a licensing regime exists to permit specific actions that would otherwise be unlawful, subject to meeting legal tests.
• Listed Buildings^[25] - All listed buildings in Scotland are protected both externally and internally. This includes attached structures and associated features such as boundary walls, gates, gate piers, and outbuildings. Listed Building Consent is required for any works that would demolish, alter, or extend a listed building in a way that affects its character as a building of special architectural or historic interest.
• Scheduled Monuments^[26] - Scheduled monuments are protected due to their national importance. Scheduled Monument Consent is required for any works that would demolish, damage, remove, repair, alter, or add to a monument, or for activities such as flooding or tipping on the site.
• Article 4 Directions^[27] - Planning authorities or Scottish Ministers may issue Article 4 Directions to remove specific PDR in defined areas, typically to protect the character of conservation areas or other sensitive locations.
• Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)^[28] - Certain operations within SSSIs may require consent from NatureScot, even if they benefit from PDR, to ensure the protection of nationally important natural heritage features.
• Building Warrants^[29] - a building warrant may be required under the Building (Scotland) Regulations for works involving structural alterations, drainage, or other regulated building standards.
• Conservation Area Consent (CAC)^[30] - Demolition of buildings within conservation areas generally requires CAC under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) (Scotland) Act 1997, unless exempted by direction.

2.7. Consideration of reasonable alternatives

2.7.1 The 2005 Act requires the Environmental Report to identify and assess any reasonable alternatives to the plan or programme, taking into account its objectives and geographical scope. The approach to assessing options in this SEA is broadly consistent with that of the 2019 Sustainability Appraisal and involves the assessment (unless otherwise noted) of:

• no change to current PDR (where PDR already exist);
• alteration of current PDR for a development type in relation to current restrictions in designated areas, and/or thresholds relevant to the scale/size of development; and,
• creating new PDR for a development type in designated areas, non-designated areas, and/or introducing size/scale restrictions of receptors.

2.7.2 In line with SEA guidance, these options have been considered and assessed whether or not they form substantive proposals in the consultation paper.

2.8. Consideration of the guiding principles on the environment

2.8.1 The assessment process for the plan has included consideration of the guiding principles as set out in section 13(1) of the UK Withdrawal from the European Union (Continuity) (Scotland) Act 2021 (the Continuity Act)^[31]. The principles are as follows:

• The principle that protecting the environment should be integrated into the making of policies.
• The precautionary principle as it relates to the environment.
• The principle that preventative action should be taken to avert environmental damage.
• The principle that environmental damage should as a priority be rectified at source.
• The principle that the polluter should pay.

2.8.2 The Strategic Environmental Assessment process ensures the integration of environmental protection throughout policy development. During the assessment, potential significant environmental effects, both positive and negative, have been considered, and opportunities for avoiding or mitigating negative impacts while enhancing positive ones actively sought. This will help to inform future legislation where relevant and appropriate including any measures to avert environmental damage. In this way the assessment can help ensure that any changes to PDR are made in full knowledge of the likely effects on the environment as well as opportunities for avoiding or rectifying them.

2.9. Limitations and uncertainty

2.9.1 The extent to which individual changes to PDR affect the quantity or rate of development coming forward is an area of uncertainty.

2.9.2 As indicated in the consultation paper, evidence indicates that since their introduction in 2021 some classes of PDR have had relatively limited use and there are likely to be a broad range of factors influencing the uptake of any future changes.

2.9.3 The assessment approach has however been based on a number of assumptions about the effect of changes to PDR:

• The current requirement to apply for planning permission has a positive effect on topics such as biodiversity, flora and fauna, air, water, soil, cultural heritage, landscape and geodiversity as it ensures consideration of effects on these topics through the planning application process.
• All PDR changes would potentially increase the speed at which the development type may be delivered, due to the removal of the time element of the planning application process.
• PDR changes for small scale developments will result in an increase in development, following the removal of the cost disincentive of the planning application fee. The cost element is not viewed as a significant factor for larger developments where the planning fee would form a smaller percentage of the overall project cost.
• All other statutory requirements will continue to apply.