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SUSTAINABLE WASTE MANAGEMENT
10. Efforts to reduce, reuse, recycle, compost and recover waste to meet the Landfill Directive targets are succeeding but waste will, of course, continue to be generated. Sustainable development in waste management turns on several principles. Paramount is the waste hierarchy, favouring prevention over reuse, recycling, recovery then disposal, guiding choices about waste management options. The polluter-pays principle applies to business waste producers who must take responsibility for the cost of collecting and disposing of their waste. The UK Government's Landfill Tax is another way in which the polluter-pays principle is applied. The Business Waste Framework 9 explains what more is being done to encourage sustainable waste management in the business sector. Providing sites for managing business waste supports economic activity, consistent with SPP 2: Economic Development.
11. A development strategy should guide development to the most sustainable locations 10. Coordinating the needs of economic development while safeguarding communities and fostering environmental stewardship is an important policy objective set out in the National Planning Framework ( NPF), SPP 1: The Planning System and SPP 2. In waste management, land use decisions may depend on the features of the proposed technology or the waste stream. The process of strategic environmental assessment ( SEA) will apply to development plans, Area Waste Plans have undergone Best Practicable Environmental Option assessments and Area Waste Plan reviews will also be subject to SEA. EIA will apply to certain development proposals; all those processes ensuring that environmental effects are considered and mitigated.
WASTE MANAGEMENT, HEALTH AND THE ENVIRONMENT
12. Ensuring that waste is recovered or disposed of without endangering human health 11 is effectively a function carried out by SEPA. Further detail is provided in Section 1B of the policy framework table. The independent 'Review of Environmental and Health Effects of Waste Management' published by DEFRA12 so far indicates that the treatment of municipal solid waste has at most a minor effect on health in this country particularly when compared with other health risks associated with day to day living. SEPA is commissioning research on the health effects of facilities handling non-municipal waste. Appropriately located, well-run and well-regulated, waste management facilities operated in line with current pollution control techniques and standards should pose little risk to human health. Where concerns about health are raised, planning authorities should ensure, through their consultations particularly with SEPA and in avoiding duplication with the provisions of other legislative regimes, that they consider the locational implications of any advice on health that requires to be controlled by a planning condition, for example on amenity. Once installations are operational, planning authorities and SEPA should monitor and if necessary act to enforce the conditions of planning consents, permits and licences. EIA will in many cases also consider potential health impacts.
WASTE MANAGEMENT AND THE PROXIMITY PRINCIPLE
13 The proximity principle refers principally to dealing with waste as close as possible to where it is produced. As far as possible this principle will apply at Area Waste Plan level. The proximity principle is outlined in paragraph 2.1.2 of the National Waste Plan. The proximity principle applies to avoiding the adverse environmental impacts of unnecessary transport. In line with SPP 17: Planning for Transport, consideration should be given to transportation of freight by modes other than road. A planned approach to the location of new installations which may be of more than local importance should take account of economies of scale, including the trend towards fewer but larger landfills where the proximity principle may be one of a number of considerations.
14 The proximity principle also allows for the consideration of opportunities to create accessible jobs and recycle brownfield land. The impact of new well regulated waste installations can be mitigated and in line with SPP 2: Economic Development, the use of brownfield sites can support social and environmental justice, by helping to stimulate enterprise in or close to disadvantaged areas. This is consistent with the Scottish Sustainable Development Strategy ( SSDS) and supports green jobs within the waste management industry. The Framework for Economic Development in Scotland 13 ( FEDS) also covers economic sustainability. Development plans that have already been subject to SEA should contain allocations of employment or industrial land well suited to a range of waste management installations.
WORKING WITH COMMUNITIES
15 Modern waste infrastructure is designed and regulated to high standards and can be regarded as similar to other industrial processes. Where waste management infrastructure is proposed close to communities, it can be seen as an unwelcome environmental intrusion and nuisance. Environmental justice aims to address the cumulative effects of developments with negative environmental impacts, including landfill. It is therefore crucial to provide information that can be interpreted sufficiently well to allow full participation in decisions that will affect quality of life. PAN 81: Community Engagement Planning With People provides relevant advice. When preparing development plans, the Executive expects planning authorities to identify community sensitivity and look to overcome it by working closely with communities to shape policy and in allocating land uses. Proposals for development plan schemes include statements on the publicity and consultation measures taken during the preparation of the plan. The adequacy of consultation measures will be considered by inquiry reporters as part of the examination of the development plan on behalf of Scottish Ministers.
16 Planning reform aimed at strengthening public participation brings with it new expectations for the processing and implementation of applications. In order to build early consensus, applicants will be required to undertake pre-application consultation with local communities on categories of development to be defined in secondary legislation and submit a report of consultation alongside the planning application before it is registered. Planning authorities will be required by legislation to decline to determine planning applications which do not comply with requirements on pre-application consultation. Reports of consultation are considered to be appropriate for local developments which are significantly contrary to the development plan; major developments; proposals that require an Environmental Impact Assessment; and proposals defined as large scale "Bad Neighbour" development for which no specific provision is made in the development plan. Developers and communities can then consider issues and where necessary give the developer an opportunity to alter proposals to alleviate concerns. The extent to which consultation is sufficient will be assessed by the planning authority and if appropriate the Scottish Executive Directorate for Planning and Environmental Appeals. Pre-determination hearings will be required for major developments significantly contrary to the development plan.
17 For the largest installations, a community liaison or an advisory panel can be established to promote mutual understanding and to ensure that concerns are addressed properly and quickly. These may be specified in planning conditions. Good neighbour agreements ( GNAs) are intended to be voluntary and may have a role where they offer communities increased involvement with the way in which sites operate. These form part of a range of proposals for enhanced monitoring and enforcement of developments and to strengthen the involvement of communities in developments that affect them.
18 Benefits in the form of new community facilities or community trust funds offered by developers or sought by planning authorities should only be treated as material considerations in planning applications if they meet the tests set out in Circular 12/1996 on planning agreements. Other than in the case of landfill, such facilities or funds will generally be regarded as an excessive burden to an industry capable of locating on industrial sites where other operators or tenants are free from such costs and where installations can meet or exceed environmental emissions standards.
PROXIMITY TO SETTLEMENTS
19 Waste should be handled as close as possible to source. It follows that towns and cities will be the best locations for new waste transfer, separation and handling installations. Community infrastructure (paragraph 5) is already well established where people live, shop and work. At the next level, community composting and "bring" facilities may also create a demand for local sites that support waste recycling which can be identified in development plans at appropriate locations. Other sites, particularly for larger scale installations should also be identified through the development plan process consistent with this SPP's model policy. Existing waste handling installations should be protected by development plan policy and care should be taken to ensure that future allocations for other adjacent uses do not compromise waste handling operations, which may operate 24 hours a day and partly outside buildings.
20 The case for consideration of a buffer zone of about 250 metres between sensitive receptors (in most cases, dwellings) and operations may arise where outdoor composting, anaerobic digestion, mixed waste processing, pyrolysis and gasification, large scale thermal treatment or landfill gas plant is to be located. However that depends on each site and separation by about 100 metres or less may be sufficient for recycling facilities, small scale thermal treatment or leachate treatment plant. Greater separation distances may arise predominantly in connection with landfill sites which may bear the characteristics of mineral operations which may have preceded them.
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