Skip to main content
Find a National Infrastructure Project

Beta This is a beta service - your feedback will help us to improve it

Meeting with RWEnpower

Back to list

Enquiry

Meeting with
RWEnpower
Date of meeting
3 February 2011
Enquiry type
Meeting
  1. Can submit certain reports which relate to protected species marked as confidential?
  2. Request for an update on where the DCLG is currently at with their review of the Fees Regulations and whether there will be any consultation on the draft proposals.

Advice given

  1. The Commission needs to determine in each case whether the information provided is considered to fall within the definition of 'environmental information' under the Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (EIR). If information is environmental information for the purposes of the EIR, it is exempt information under section 39 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA) and the public authority (in this case the Commission) is obliged to deal with any request for such information under the EIR rather than under the FOIA. Information Commissioner?s Office (ICO) Guidance on the EIR ('What is Environmental Information?' Version 3, 16 March 2009) notes, for instance, that when considering whether information is ?environmental information? a site does not need to have been formally designated as requiring protection to qualify as a ?natural? site for the purposes of Regulation 2(1)(a) of the EIR. Exceptions to the duty to disclose environmental information are set out in Regulation 12 of the EIR. Although Regulation 12(2) of the EIR states that a public authority shall apply a presumption in favour of disclosure, there are grounds on which a public authority may refuse to disclose environmental information if one of the specific exceptions apply and in all the circumstances of the case the public interest in maintaining the exception outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

Under Regulation 12(5) of the EIR a public authority may refuse to disclose information to the extent that its disclosure would adversely affect (g) the protection of the environment to which the information relates. In the event of a request for such information, the Commission may assess whether disclosure of the information would adversely affect the protection of the environment to which the information relates and whether in all the circumstances of the case the public interest in maintaining the exception outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.

In order that the Commission can easily identify such information, we would suggest that if such documents need to be submitted with your application for a development consent order then they should be clearly marked as ?Potentially Excepted Information? and reference made on them to Regulation 12(5)(g) of the EIR.

  1. We have been advised by DCLG that it is likely that fees are going to be reviewed over the coming year, subject to Ministerial agreement. However, any proposed changes would first undergo public consultation which may take place towards the end of 2011.