Protected Species Licensing & Ecological Mitigation

A Natural England license is often required in order to develop a site that is host to protected species.

Where potential impacts to protected species are unavoidable, appropriate licences must be obtained from Natural England (in England only).  These licenses essentially permit activities that would otherwise be illegal. Licences generally cover European species protected under the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017, such as bats, dormice, great crested newts and otters but can include other species such as water voles and badgers that are protected under domestic legislation, for example the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981).

PJC Consultancy (and our partners) have experience working on licences for a variety of protected species across a variety of projects and can guide you through the licencing process, work with your design team to put together an appropriate mitigation / compensation strategy and produce the licence application as well as any accompanying method statement.

Mitigation is sometimes necessary and appropriate outside of the formal licencing process. Where potential impacts to protected species are deemed very low-risk, some works can proceed in accordance with a ‘precautionary non-licensed method statement’ or ‘precautionary method of works’.

Where potential impacts to some protected species are unavoidable, and where licensing isn’t appropriate, for example our common / widespread reptile species, a comprehensive mitigation strategy is often required. With respect to reptiles, this can often include capturing reptiles from the development site (sometimes refer to as the ‘donor site’) and moving them to a pre-identified and appropriate receptor site. In most cases, exclusion fencing is often installed around the donor and receptor sites before the translocation commences, in order to prevent reptiles from re-entering the donor site and/or leaving the receptor site.  This process is often referred to as a reptile translocation.

PJC Consultancy have considerable experience in preparing mitigation strategies which are usually required to discharge various planning related conditions. PJC Consultancy can also assist with the post-planning implementation of these mitigation strategies, whether that is undertaking a reptile translocation or providing ecological supervision / clerk of works support during site clearance works.