Making a planning application

Enplanner is intended to provide assistance to both planning applicants/agents and planning officers to meet the local planning requirements for on site renewable energy generation and lower carbon development. The toolkit can be accessed at http://www.enplanner.com/

Do I have to use Enplanner?

We encourages the use of Enplanner to assist applicants in meeting renewable energy targets. However, applicants do not have to use this tool and can submit their own energy reports although the use of Enplanner will give more certainty that the report that will be produced will be of a format that is acceptable to the local planning authority.

Sustainability

Issues of 'Sustainability' are of significant importance in planning and the local planning authority will ensure that applicants are addressing the policies in our adopted Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) 'Creating a more sustainable city', adopted January 2009. One of these policies, relating to energy, states: "In all major developments, a minimum of 10 percent of the development's energy requirements should be provided through the on-site generation of renewable energy". To accord with this policy applicants should currently be submitting sustainability assessments with all major developments with a section (or separate document) covering the energy requirements.