On Tuesday the UK Government revealed plans to make it easier to build on disused industrial sites in England, but Wales is one step ahead with its planning bill gaining royal assent last week.

Although not a wholesale reform, The Planning (Wales) Act 2015, is the first separate Planning Act for Wales since planning was devolved to Wales in 2011. There are five main objectives:

• a modernised framework for the delivery of planning services (e.g. by enabling some planning applications to be made directly to the Welsh Ministers);
• strengthening the plan led approach (e.g. by the introduction of a National Development Framework and Strategic Development Plans);
• improved resilience (e.g. by enabling the Welsh Ministers to direct that local planning authorities work together and be merged);
• frontloading and improvement of the development management system (e.g. by introducing a statutory pre-application procedure for certain planning applications);
• enabling effective enforcement and appeals (e.g. by way of changes to enforcement procedures and increased transparency and efficiency in the appeal system).

The UK Government announced a shake-up of the planning system in England to achieve similar goals. But in England, the announcement highlighted the target of making it easier to build upon industrial land in a bid to encourage greater house building. Wales faces similar housing issues to England and the act makes provision for the preparation and revision of a National Development Framework for Wales (NDF). The NDF is a national land use plan which will set out Welsh Government’s policies in relation to the development and use of land in Wales. This replaces the Wales Spatial Plan.

The Act gives the Welsh Ministers a power to designate an area of Wales as a strategic planning area and establish a strategic planning panel for that area. These will be to deal with cross boundary issues, for example, waste disposal. A strategic planning panel must prepare a plan for its strategic planning area, known as a strategic development plan (SDP). An SDP must be in general conformity with the NDF. Three possible areas have been identified – Cardiff, Swansea and the A55 corridor. Not all areas of Wales will have an SDP.

The Act provides that a (Local Development Plan) LDP must be in general conformity with the NDF and any SDP which includes all or part of the area of the authority.  Following the publication of the NDF, local planning authorities will be under a duty to consider whether to carry out a review of their LDP. The same duty will exist where an SDP is adopted or approved and the area of a local planning authority is included in the strategic planning area.

The team at Ty Ffynnon made great use of BIM and showcased the lessons learned at a recent CEW Exemplar event.

CEW’s exemplar programme is all about improvement, identifying and showcasing evidence of good practice and sharing it across the industry and using BIM is a key area. But not as many SMEs in Wales are embracing the benefits of BIM, they should because BIM works on small projects for SMEs just as well as it does for larger organisations and their supply chains on landmark schemes.

Flintshire County Council’s School Modernisation Strategy, published in 2009, places special emphasis on community focused schools provision. These buildings expand the range of activities that take place in a school as they seek to provide a range of services and activities, often beyond the school day, to help meet the needs of pupils, their families and the wider community. This principle underpins the provision of Ty Ffynnon and the vision for the 360 pupil school is that, working with local partners, the school can help to develop the community it serves.

Through a combination of collaborative procurement processes and a proactive, client focused approach from the delivery team this project is addressing, one of the main issues facing the construction industry at the present time, namely the application of BIM and, in this case, how locally based SMEs are responding to the challenges of implementation – and showing what can be done by relatively small organisations.

Clearly BIM is also of significant interest to the wider construction industry and this particular project demonstrates how the BIM approach supports better project delivery, efficient management of project changes, cost reduction and better performance of the asset. The outputs of this project also supported the work of CEW and the Consortium of Local Authorities Wales (CLAW) in developing a BIM toolkit for public sector clients in Wales.

For more information about the project contact the CEW team on 02920 493322 or email CEWales

The biggest wind farm development in England and Wales is being completed by Jones Bros and Balfour Beatty and could generate £1.8M a year for local people every year for 20-years.

Pen y Cymoedd Wind Energy Project is going to be the largest onshore wind scheme with a total of 76 turbines that when it is finished and operational by 2017 will generate enough electricity to power 140,000 homes.

Built as a 50:50 joint venture with Balfour Beatty and Jones Bros Civil Engineering UK it is located on land managed by Natural Resources Wales within Rhondda Cynon Taf and Neath Port Talbot situated between Neath and Aberdare in South Wales.

It is an excellent example of not just what great construction can deliver, but also what it can enable if the scheme is approached correctly with one eye on collaborative procurement and the other on long term value. Pen y Cymoedd will provide a Community Fund of £1.8 million per annum for more than 20 years and more than 3000 residents of the upper Rhondda, Cynon, Afan and Neath Valleys had their say on what they think the money could do in the area.

There is huge potential within all the ideas that have come in – developing the possibilities so they can deliver maximum benefit is the next task for the community.

Meanwhile, the civil engineering work will see 50,000m³ of concrete, 6,000 tonnes of reinforcement used to construct the 76 turbine bases and crane pads along with the construction of around 80km of access tracks, as well as 80km of cabling. Two-thirds of all plant operatives have been recruited from within 30 miles of the site and it is hoped that six apprentices will be employed over the course of the project, in roles including plant operation and maintenance.

As well as gaining support for their local initiatives via the benefit fund local people are in touch with the project via their schools. Over the last three months around 200 primary school pupils from both Rhondda Cynon Taf and Neath Port Talbot have visited the site

For more information about the scheme please contact the CEW team.

Your business or public sector organisation could reduce its costs by using less energy and water, consuming fewer raw materials, and reducing waste. Even the smallest changes can make the biggest difference, and the new Resource Efficient Wales (REW) service, funded by Welsh Government and delivered by resource efficiency experts WRAP Cymru and Carbon Trust, is here to show you how.

For further information: click here

These webinars are aimed at businesses and public sector organisations in Wales, although anyone can register to attend the sessions. 

Click here to find out more and to book your space(s).

The Zero Carbon Hub recently released an informative, simple to use guide that promotes good craftsmanship and highlights key construction details when building a new home. Aimed at on site personnel, this new “Builders’ Book” will improve quality of the homes by identifying, and recommending solutions to, the most common construction issues which may lead to poor performance, loss of comfort, and increased energy bills in new build homes.

Further information about the Builders’ Book can be found at www.zerocarbonhub.org

Climate Change Commission for Wales survey - deadline extended to 31 July!

COP21 is the 21st United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change conference. It will see 50,000 participants from around the world, from all sectors, gather in Paris to discuss how to reach a universal, legally binding agreement enabling us all to combat climate change.  

This agreement will ask countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, in order to limit global warming to below two degrees. The forthcoming Environment (Wales) Bill commits Wales to this aim by targeting an 80 per cent reduction in emissions against 1990 levels by 2050.   Ahead of the event, which takes place from 30 November to 11 December, the Climate Change Commission for Wales is asking the sector how climate change affects them, and what they’d like COP21 to deliver for the country.  

This short survey should only take around five minutes to complete, but will really help inform the work of the CCCW ahead of the conference. They’re keen to hear from all sort of sector organisations on this – not only those working directly in climate change, but those involved in social care, housing, education, heritage, sport, equalities, animal welfare and so on. Whatever area you work in, your views are needed.  

The deadline for the survey is 31 July 2015.   Prior to COP21, a series of climate change events will take place across Wales, include a Cynnal Cymru ‘Spoken World’ event in July, Size of Wales’ Go Green Day and Climate Week in October and the CCCW’s manifesto launch in November.  

For more information on these, or on COP21 itself, please contact email or call 029 2019 2021.