 Dyma. Beth ddweud y gwaith i ni i'n meddwl. A dyma. Fawr iawn i'r ddechau ar gyfer. Grŵp Fawr iawn i chi, a ddweud I'r ddweud i chi. Mae gennym 편io hwn o'r ddredg yn ysgrifftlfarian, Ddiolch yn symud hynny. Diolch. Dwi dri, ond a'n gweithio. Ddiolch yn rhaid i ni i ddweud i chi. So, fod yn formation effeithi, mae ar gyfer y ffyrnod. A'n hyd o gweithio diolch phobl eich ffythio, llawr eu halu ysgrifennig, ac rwy'n oedda i'n trafn am fyddai am gael ei fod yn ymweld ar ei gair. Mae'r mwyllgor yn y cwm yn enwedd iín y bydd y gweithgareddau. Mae'r fân â yo ar iechyd, ond mae'r cysyllt yn dweud i'r cimru, ym gael y cymdeithio, ac dyne'r gweithio ar y ffrif, ac mae'r gweithgareddau yn cyd-dweud i'r gylel, ac mae'n gweithi drwy'n gweithgareddau. So gydwch chi'n ffrif Ileol maeth o gwyfodreid ymweld i'n dod. Thank you very much, Chair, and good afternoon everyone. Two apologies for incidents today, one from Councillor Dr Martin Khan and another from Councillor Bunty Waters. Councillor Peter Fane has kindly joined us to substitute today. Thank you. Wonderful. Thank you very much. For declarations of interest, do any members have any interests to declare in relation to any item of business on this agenda? No, that's fine. If any interest does subsequently become apparent in the meeting, please can you raise it about going to the agenda. Thanks very much. So we'll go straight into minutes of the previous meeting and thank you for the minutes that have been taken there, which is on the 13th of February 2024. Do any members wish to make any amendments to the minutes? Good. So can I take approval of these minutes by affirmation members? Wonderful. Thank you very much. Those have been taken as a correct record of the meeting on 24th of February. We'll move straight into the agenda, and we have a weighty item, which is Agender Item 6, the Greater Cambridge Air Quality Strategy. Here we as the committee are being invited to recommend to the lead Cabinet Member for Environmental Services and Licensing that the Joint Greater Air Quality Strategy be adopted in partnership with Cambridge City Council. I'm inviting one of the officers to help present the strategy itself, which is one that we've, in principle, approved in our meeting around this. Amazing piece of work, so thank you very much. Thank you, Councillor Halings, for the introduction. I'm Matthew Axton, scientific officer, and I'm just going to do a verbal introduction to the report. I gave quite a comprehensive presentation last time, so I'll go slightly easier on you this time. So the report before you today follows on from the report presented to this committee on the 7th of December 2023, where the principles of a joint South Cambridgeshire and Cambridge City or a Greater Cambridge Air Quality Strategy was presented. As was the principle of adopting the World Health Organization guidelines as long-term targets with more achievable interim targets for the lifetime of this strategy. Since the December 2023 committee, the Greater Cambridge Air Quality Strategy has been finalised and consulted on with the results of that consultation presented in the report before you today. The results of the consultation were that the majority of respondents agreed with the objectives of the strategy and with the adoption of the WHO guideline values. There were those that disagreed and those reasons for those disagreements are summarised in the report. The key priority for instance, the key priority of infrastructure improvements was clearly the most important to the majority of respondents with a rep awareness raising the least important. Almost half of respondents agreed or strongly agreed that the actions within the action plan would deliver the objectives of the strategy. However, a significant proportion gave a neutral response to this question and from the corresponding written responses it inferred that members of the public taking the survey didn't feel they had sufficient information to make this judgement. When asked what factors impacted people's day-to-day air quality, Vans, lorries and cars came out as the highest factors, although over a third of respondents also said that vehicle idling and domestic burning impacted their day-to-day lives. Only half of respondents were aware that the councils presented air quality information on our websites and we acknowledge that better promotion of the monitoring work that we do is required with a need to present results of that monitoring in an easily digestible and public friendly manner. It was positive that a large proportion of respondents already undertake action to improve air quality and many would like to take more actions with appropriate support. Following the consultation, the draft strategy was finalised with a number of minor amendments, one of which was renaming a key priority one from policy and development control to regulatory policies and development control with greater emphasis on some of the regulatory activities we undertake outside of the planning regime. The final Greater Cambridge Air Quality Strategy is presented here within the report. Just as a reminder, the strategy has three main objectives. Continue to meet and deliver all legislative and policy requirements associated with air quality. Continue to improve air quality across Greater Cambridge, enhancing the health of those living, working and visiting Greater Cambridge. Work towards World Health Organisation air quality guideline annual averages as long-term targets with interim targets for delivery within the lifetime of this strategy. These objectives are supported by four key priorities, key priority one, regulatory and policy, sorry regulatory policies and development control, two infrastructure improvements, three community engagement and promotion and four monitoring. Each of these key priorities is underpinned by a number of actions in the action plan, which is included as Appendix B of the strategy or slightly confusingly Appendix C of this SEAC report. The strategy was endorsed by Cambridge City Council Environments and Community Scrutiny Committee on the 21st of March this year and so the recommendation as Councillor Halings has already said is for this committee to recommend to the League Cabinet Member to adopt the Greater Cambridge Air Quality Strategy and I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you very much Matthew and I also note that you know we have in the annex to the strategy and the report provided the differentiation between the actions which are relevant to City and which are relevant to South Cambridgeshire and that's something that was discussed in the committee here as well I think in December that there are differences and so it's good to see those you know those laid out there in in the report too. So members any questions or comments that will lead us to a decision of recommendation or not? Councillor Peter Fane. Thank you chair. I'm particularly interested in the section relating to bonfires particularly paragraphs 23 to 25. It's interesting that the response was not particularly different in rural areas i.e. in South Cambridgeshire other than in city but I'm not quite sure whether there's sufficient distinction between bonfires burning of plastic which should be covered by the Environmental Protection Act and is frequently a problem on building sites and so on occasionally and bonfires particularly on farms of for instance cuttings from clearance of trees or cutting hedgerow you know there is a need on some farms to burn items that are not covered by the Environmental Protection Act but I'm just wondering whether we've made sufficient allowance for that in our strategy. Can you just give the reference again because I'd had a different interpretation of the report and I read it. The section on bonfires that I was referring to was paragraph 22 on page 13 onwards which is the response of SEDC residents as compared with city residents paragraph 23 that I was referring to. Yeah Matthew. Yeah thank you Councillor Fane. Yeah that's a good question and so I don't think the strategy goes into quite enough detail to sort of set out our full position with regards to how we deal with different types of bonfires but we do treat them differently and we do react to them differently so you're quite right that bonfires on farms and in agricultural areas in certain circumstances are allowed and we do get complaints about those and we do when we do get complaints we do go out and speak to the farmers we give them advice on how to minimise the impact of those of those burning events but yes obviously as you say they are legal so we can't stop them. Yeah burning on for example a building site and burning plastics and things like that is a very different matter and yes we would deal with that in a different manner depending on the severity of the case and improper disposal of trade waste is something that is also dealt with by the environment agency so we would work with our partners at the environment agency to try and deal with that and obviously building sites come and go so it's something that we're constantly having to kind of think about and adapt to but yeah they are two different things that are dealt with in two different ways and hopefully that answers your question. Councillor Peter Pan are you satisfied? Thank you for the answer. Councillor Dr Timmy Hawkins. Thank you chair. I found it a bit concerning um page 17 looking at the results that we got that there were three to seven responses of which only 54 if I put my glasses on I can really properly 54 were from south campers I don't know why do we have any idea why and if that's the case does that not mean then that there's a skewing of the implications or the results that we might draw from the consultation as an application within south camps itself. Thank you Matthew. Thank you for the question um so yes so um 327 responses is is considered quite a good response to um to a survey of this nature and you're right that there were a lot more for Cabbage City than there were for the the district um I think by its very nature air quality is a is an issue that is more pronounced in the city because of the of the greater number of traffic and the and the more concentration of traffic so I think it is something that resonates um more with with city residents um so we did do some analysis on um on some of the questions about especially those that um particularly relevant to either city or or um other district um through example that did the burning that um Councillor Fane just mentioned um impacts of agriculture as well and we did find that there wasn't a huge difference between the responses uh or the proportion of responses um from each each district so um I'm fairly confident that the the results are representative across the board I think um yeah I don't I don't think there was a huge difference on the on the questions that we analysed between between the two um two areas yes Councillor Ong. Thank you chair I have a question about the key priority to the infrastructure improvements in every month in the parish council meetings I go to I am asked about public transport as I think many people are and I just wonder what your view is around the influence we can have around public transport options and where in the priority pegging order that might be. Thank you Councillor Ong Green that's um a really interesting question um the air quality has always been a a slightly difficult subject because the responsibility for monitoring and things like writing a strategy for with the district councils or the borough councils um whereas most of the solutions sit with the county or the highway authority and so there there's always been a little bit of a conflict there um so yes that's that's always been a sort of inbuilt difficulty into their air quality um uh structure and we we are having quarterly meetings with all stakeholders um so hopefully we will be able to um keep this as a as a high priority so we will be having quarterly updates we've we've already had a couple um in in the um preparation of this strategy um and we will be continuing to have those um as we move forward um and they involve all all of the key stakeholders such as um the GCP um the I mean they're saying many isn't they the county uh the uh Peterborough and Cambridge combined authority um Highways England um and obviously district and city so all the stakeholders do get together every quarter we have a big discussion so um there are definitely mechanisms there to keep the pressure and the influence up thank you very much I'll be very useful feedback for from my council thank you thanks very much and maybe it would just be good to have a sort of an update from those meetings things come out of those meetings that would be good as well in terms of communication and back out to wrap up the monitoring yes councillor Jeff Harvey thank you chair um on um page 29 which is the section covering responses um question 11 what actions would you like to take and what are the barriers that prevent you from currently undertaking these actions um and um one of the points there is to buy an air source heat pump and also panels um referring to air source heat pumps um response number four um difficulties with listed properties or difficult because living in a rented property um taking the first of those two um I've personally seen the problems that one of my residents had um installing a heat pump and um the the amounts of go around with with with um the conservation officer around um what type of trellis should be put around the heat pump um you know the design of the trellis that should be put around the heat pump all of this introduced so many delays that the heat pump delivery had to be rescheduled um at the end of last year um historic england um published new guidance um aimed at um local authorities um aimed to um clarify um their position on the balance between improving the energy efficiency of historic buildings and preserving the historic fabric um and there was a quite a long paper um specifically on the issue of um air source heat pumps which um really the stated aim of which was to dispel some of the myths around heat pumps um so um I know this is one of the threads that is in our forward plan either to look again at the balance between improving energy efficiency and preserving the historic fabric um and I and I hope we can um sort of add that to the list of things that we were just discussing in that session um and I think it's I've just sort of looked up I think it's the case that for example if I wanted to put an oil boiler in my house I could put an oil tank there and that would be a permitted development but you know oil tanks are quite a bit larger than air source heat pumps um so I just wanted to sort of flag that really I think that's a very valid piece of feedback um from our residents noted you want to say anything yeah negative um I yeah I don't I think that's a detailed response is beyond this strategy thank you for highlighting thank you council doctor to me Hawkins thank you chair just to um make a point on the issue of the um air pump installation that's been made um the greater cable chair planning service actually we do have a web page on the website that talks about how listed buildings um can be made more energy efficient and it's something that you know we constantly continually work on um to improve the you know the advice and the assistance that the planning service can give um obviously there's issues with you know listed buildings what you cannot cannot do etc but it's um I believe also in the policies we're looking at um for emerging local plan anyway so yes we're doing the best we can for now I will carry on doing that but if if um you know there's negative feedback that anyone is getting then do please raise that um directly with me or with the conservation or the director of planning and um we hope to improve on what we're doing thank you thank you thank you guys adopt to me as um Cats of Jeff Harvey said we do have in the forward plan something that came out of the motion that was adopted by full council which was to enable that to improve was to collate a series of case studies of different ways in which planning applications had been dealt to look at positive and other examples rather than just to be reactive as it I think we've come to the point now where we've got enough evidence to then say so how how what could be the next step forward so I think that's what we're saying with the forward plan it will come to committee in that way to sort of workshop it together with planning that'd be a good thing thank you very much do you have anybody else with comments on the air quality strategy council doctor shaburnish oh sorry no no no no because your people online won't be able to hear you so council doctor shaburn about a chair is just going to have help I think just for those who are they won't be able to hear you if they're online yeah I have a question on the page number 27 so you have a very nice way of nice ground and that shows that we can do lots of public education actually the public is a main people they can change their behaviour and everything so my question is that how are we reaching out to the public we are trying to reach out in different ways and how we are reaching out every time with the with the new updates like in the research and everything like the before and after so this before condition before statistics and after statistics it really brings the trust and the faith that what whatever they are doing that is correct method and any any measurable outputs will bring even more trust that yeah the whatever they're doing that's a correct way so how do you do that like is it a continuous process reaching out to the public through the updates what is happening what was there before what is coming what what is the result coming after some changes in their lifestyle is there any procedure like that yep thank you yeah thank you a really interesting question and I do think this is one of the areas where we do need to improve slightly and South Cambridgeshire is we actually do fantastic monitoring here but we don't shout about it enough and so I think presenting our results of our monitoring in a in an easily digestible way making sure that the public is kept up to date with everything we're doing and simple bits of advice on a regular basis through our social media and another another South Cambs magazine and things like that is is definitely what what we need to do and so we did have a an article in the South Cambs magazine just before Christmas on solid fuel burning and how to minimise your impact and so it is about drip feeding and drip feeding the message and making sure that that the residents hear about it regularly and and but it's also about getting that messaging right and I've seen some other examples of of local authorities where they don't get the messaging right and it almost has a negative impact if you if you're perhaps too harsh and you're messaging or over overstate the impacts so it is a really difficult thing to get the balance right but yeah it is something we know we need to keep doing keep improving on and and yeah definitely happy for to engage with any councillors who want to do any work in their particular areas and we do have the the portable and the zephy monitors that we we have around at various locations and if there's any way that that accounts for the bills that would be a particularly interesting study and then please let us know and either directly to me or our generic air dot quality email. Yeah I have a follow-up question like your your your first point is very interesting that is the behaviour change of the eating behaviour. You said in a way that we can also go for the not the public consultation but the consultation among the business holders and if we can see the their statistics of the business how they are going in the curve like how the business is going like in terms of the purchasing and then we can really come to the we can co-relate what we are trying to establish the public behaviour of a responsible eating is it working or not. Can we bring some work methodology working directly with the business and those who are involved in the food business especially the meat because it's your first point is a eat less meat so I'm asking is it any way that we can do that going to the meat industry the business and looking into their statistics how the business works is there any change of the behaviour it's a it's a it's a difficult question but I'm thinking that when we do some research and statistics we can really establish that what we are trying to do from the behind in the background in a closed-room thinking procedure is it actually working in the field. Yeah yeah thank you some really interesting points there so yeah I think that was um I think eating less meat was one of the respondent suggestions to what they could um what they could do to reduce their impact um but yeah there's potentially lots of research out there we could do um happy to discuss outside this meeting with some more detailed ideas um happy to discuss yeah. Gats, Llyw, Morrin Green just a question about monitoring and the reporting and I think at the last committee I asked about benchmarking across other places in the country and I'm just wondering whether or not that is something that will be implemented in this because I didn't see it and I feel like in the media at the moment there's a lot of coverage at the moment about air quality in different places in my city I feel like Cambridge and Cambridge are somewhere I want to attract more people to come to with the booming economy that's coming and air quality does come into decision making and I'm just wondering if we are benchmarking and if we are whether or not we'll be able to get data on that to use out in our communities as well thank you. Yeah thank you um it's not something we're doing at this moment but um as I said in response to an earlier question getting out really good easily digestible information to the public is is something we need to improve on and I'll be looking to work on over over the following months and and yes benchmarking against similar um yeah similar sized cities or similar um sort of near the nearest neighbours in terms of um sort of urban rural makeup and things uh yeah so we can look at we can look at how we um how we respond to that I would say um east the east of england does have a higher level of particulates because we're more impacted from um sort of intercontinental particulates so if you start comparing us to places in the northwest we might look worse but that's not necessarily any of our own uh making but it's just but we're you know we're more impacted by intercontinental particulate matter um so yeah we can look at we can look at benchmarking but um yeah obviously um just with with caution I would say um yes thank you chair um for the the data on particulate matter it's got non-industrial combustion plants as the is the main source I guess that means the sources that we can control perhaps I just wondered if we had any idea of the makeup of that at all if it is mostly wood burning stoves or if it is bonfires I was hoping not barbecues personally but that was just my own thought on that and just if if we were using that kind of information to help prioritise um our action plan um and then also this is just me not knowing whether there's any kind of regulation over whether you can have wood burning stoves or anything like that because we've been hearing about all the regulation for our source heat pumps there's a heat source but I just wondered if there was anything on that as well thank you um so thank you councillor Redrup that's um yeah a couple of interesting questions and so firstly yes it's it's the the non-industrial um it's made up of all of those things that you you mentioned basically um and it varies from place to place um we get that that data from DEFRA and I don't think it's granulated enough to um to say which of those particular sources is is the worst I I think generally it's considered that um yeah it is domestic um solid fuel burning um it is one of the worst um but yeah obviously outside bonfires will have an impact um unfortunately barbecues we can't avoid it but barbecues will have an impact uh obviously um we need to take a balanced view on these things and um yeah so so yes it will be made up of all of those uh all of those things um and the second um the second question rules around um what burning stoes so um so certain areas have smoke control areas um we don't have any in south cambridge here and and and there are restrictions to to what you can burn and to what and what you can install in smoke control areas um but uh yeah obviously if you don't have any you can't can't enforce them um we don't have any in in south cambs though they do have uh one in in cambridge um but this is sort of legislation which was was brought in um I think in the 60s and and a lot of the the existing smoke control areas are sort of outdated and don't necessarily reflect the the communities that that uh present today um there are also um regulations on uh solid what um the sale of solid fuels and um that should be enforced by trading standards I'm not sure how rigorously that's enforced in south cambridge here or or in cambridge here in general um but yes there are there are regulations around what what people can sell in terms of the moisture content of the woods and the types of coal that that can be sold and so and and in what volumes they can be sold and things like that um but yeah I think I think we need to um we perhaps need to do a bit of work on how how well that's being enforced council dot but okay thank you there is a there is a new national layer quality 2023 on the page number 33 so my question like what are what are we standing now can council help me uh to to know that what are we standing in terms of the national statistics like far better or average or below average and are you good and so uh in south cambridge yeah in so uh there's different pollutants so in terms of nitrogen dioxide um where we have fairly good air quality um that's uh so nitrogen dioxide is is principally associated with um with exhausts vehicle exhausts and particularly diesels um and so generally we're we're one of the lowest levels of pollution in terms of that so in terms of that we are very good um particulate matter um we are not quite as um as good um partly because of the as I mentioned in answer to earlier question about the intercontinental particulate matter that impacts the east of england more than it does um the north and the west um so yeah it's different for different part of different or different pollutants um but generally generally um we are reasonably good air quality um but as as as mentioned in the report you know there's no no safe level and and so any reductions are are sort of welcome so can I come in with my question just before Dr Tim Yorkins or you were going to have yours first can I just something that um has been at the back of my mind is the fact that so this is an issue that we didn't have before and it's the fact that um this part of south comes now lies under a new air space um deployment scheme the 86 for flights to luteon um and there and what we found is that planes coming across are having to use their air brakes to get down to a the level that they can then go into luteon and some have a totally reported smelling um plane fuel um now we'd hope that the test would have proven that this was not the right thing to do it did go quiet until about two three weeks ago and now we're hearing the planes again so this is going to be a big issue for us and I just wonder if any of this I didn't see anything in it in the report so I'm just bringing that up now that that's something that we really need to um to look at very seriously yeah thank you councillor Hawkins it that wasn't an issue I was aware of so um thank you for bringing it to my attention um if you want to um speak to me afterwards and give me some of the more details I'll be be happy to uh to look into it thank you thanks I think it is of such grave concern it would be good actually for something to come back to the committee with because if it's defra bringing what we're getting is defra sort of non-differentiated information but if indeed this stacking that's happening of this of the flights coming from luteon is um causing even more greater ambient particulate matter then I think you know as background that's that's really important so that would be good to know if that's something for us to consider and it's something that I would kind of like to bring back kind of with Dr Batchacharia's question there I think so the the objectives we're saying here are to maintain and improve our quality because we know that any air pollution actually isn't safe and reading the chief medical officers report on air pollution and air quality from December 2022 which gives us indications of the types of disease and mortality from you know in the womb to elderly frail and vulnerable people it it is very worrying so we have got a situation inside cams where it's been seen as pretty good but we've always wanted to be aware of any changes because we are one of the fastest growing places in the country so it is our duty to make sure that we understand what is happening and put the regulatory aspects into place particularly around development and planning to make sure that it is and as I understand south cams is one of the few places in the country that whilst others are managing to decarbonise because of decarbonisation of transport but actually our emissions for transport are going up because of the growth and the increased traffic so what we have any you know your mention of the intercontinental particulates if I understand correctly it's about the level of exposure cumulatively over the day which is the most damaging thing so it's not just where have you got sort of some bad air quality it's what is your day like from when you leave home or you're at home you're going to school dropping the kids or perhaps going to work the children in the school and all of those particulates where we've got a baseline where we've already got intercontinental particulates that come to the east of England that are hanging around so if we then add to that from our new development from new transport from things that we're not controlling we've actually got a more vulnerable situation so it can see that we're quite good with it with our pollution but actually we've got less bandwidth for things to get worse because we've already got so rather than comparing us you know I think Dr Warren with Councillor Warren Green rather than kind of the benchmarking it's more given that we've got this amount already in the atmosphere how much are we adding to that and therefore what is that leading to in terms of exposure of our residents to that so for me it's far less about saying we haven't got a problem because our air quality is fine no it's at no level is good of air pollution and we've got this amount of air particulates hanging around anyway for a long time therefore we have to make sure that we're as cautious as possible given our growth with that I think what I'd like to celebrate is the fact that this is a joint air quality strategy so when we started the committee after we were elected in 2018 the climate change environment advisory committee at that point there was a the two air quality strategies between the Cambridge city and south Cambridge became separate and yet we know these are inextricably linked so the fact that you've managed to bring these together gone out to consultation and we now have a greater Cambridge air quality strategy I think is is really good to the point of around the education and I noticed that sort of the anti idling so the anti idling of cars particularly outside school gates um the 20 mile per hour zones I've seen wonderful campaigns by children and transport ambassadors for example melbourne and meldrith I've seen those happening I think where we can actually as part of the zero carbon communities education and the green connect is making sure that there's more and more information about that because I don't know any parent that wouldn't want that would want to see idling knowing the impacts of that out right outside the school so I think things like that and also the fact that was it less than 50% knew that you can actually look at daily air quality on the website and I think that we've got to let people know it's in their own hands they can go to back they can see it for themselves so there's obviously like you're saying even though it was said that it was least important didn't mean it's not important it was least important of a multiple choice of priorities it was least important the issue around communication I do think it's um our responsibility to make sure people know that what's happening in terms of positive campaigns but also that they can have at their fingertips the level of air quality in different areas thank you so I just I just want to mention I wasn't suggesting that in benchmarking we would say we're all fine everything's fine I was suggesting that we should benchmark so we can actually can get lessons learned as well from other places and um to give people confidence that we are addressing the areas where we have issues as well as celebrating those areas where we don't so it's it's a mix of both I think people tend to focus on the things that aren't going well so I think that we do need to be aware of those and then I know that within the communities that I'm representing they really want to help they really want to make a difference if they know where the trigger points are where the issues are they can help to bring that down but there are lessons to be learned from elsewhere I think sorry if we've misinterpreted what you were saying but absolutely yeah that's that's completely right members any other questions or comments through that spectrum page number 38 if you see the table my question is that are we adding more pollutant what the WHO expect us to do why the WHO is so less and you don't have to answer if it is not related to the council but I'm very surprised to see this table why the WHO like allowed pollutants are so less and why we are so high so are we adding more pollutant what the WHO expect us not to do or but we are also part of the country of the nation like how it is so different in number thank you council doctor by chari we couldn't agree with you more and this is what we said at the committee meeting in december is that there was lots of criticism of the environment act when it didn't come in with similar targets or even interim targets which were equivalent to the WHO because we know that no level is is safe so what we're doing in this air quality strategy is going beyond the national we're saying we're going to try and be better than that because of everything that you've said that we should absolutely be on that pathway to being as good as we can be so on that note members and thank you to officers for all that work would we like to recommend therefore that the air quality strategy be approved by cabinet by affirmation great thank you wonderful good we go to agenda item seven which is the social housing stock decarbonisation update and as you know this is something that is very dear to our hearts and we've been pursuing regularly so it's very very good to see a lot of the information in this update and also yes if you'd like to give us a briefing on that yeah good afternoon um yeah i'll make it as brief as possible throughout for some questions and so on um we as a staff guys we have been quite ahead of the curve um in relation to decarbonisation the housing stock over the last sort of 10 15 years we've been um quite proactive in insulation and solar panels and those kind of things so we we had a bit of a head start um before we got involved um so the the government's targets have changed yet again there the timescales have extended for the targets to reach EPCC so we've now moved from 20 25 27 up to 28 and 30 um there is probably potential that that will change again purely based on the resources that are available to deliver um so we'll see how that goes um where we are currently um we're we're in a reasonably good place we've just completed a um a full stock condition survey on all of all of our properties um and what that's returned is that we've had a slight drop on our overall average by about one and a half um EPCC points which has just dropped us down from an average C into an average D um but they're they're easily recoverable because this they're simple measures that will sort of get us back from the extra two points that we need um we are look we've had a bit of a um sort of restructuring the proxy services side of things which has given us a vacancy um where we had a previously had a gas engineer um that was sort of doing a lot of gas heating and so on and with with the obviously the phase in the out of gas and so on we've um changing that um post slightly to be a dedicated um heat and surveyor with uh good specialist specialisms in um sort of sustainability and decarbonisation so that will help us a lot further on the um on the heating of properties which is good um and we're starting to sort of steer away from any storage heat that type of heating because that's um at the at the moment they're sort of maybe it's turned reasonably well on EPCs but with the new standards that are due to come in they will be a poor performer so there's a lot of things to consider as the sort of rules regulations and the technology advances as we go through um really as a um sort of an overview um we don't we don't really want to be um just aiming for numbers um whereas we've got the target to to reach the EPC sort of sea on all their properties um we're very much focused on the affordability and the comfort of the property itself um rather than fitting um sort of supplementary items like solar panels and that kind of stuff which which will have a um an effect on the EPC values the actual running of the property itself with the extra insulation and so on it won't won't be as beneficial to the property but it will be beneficial to the EPC rating so there's there's a lot of things to um consider within that um so we're working on that at the moment we've got a partly funded um project at the moment aimed at around about the 250 properties where we are concentrating on fabric first um some some properties we have are very complex or very difficult to retrofit too so they are being looked at in more detail um but this the current funded project um is is for about four million pound over um two years and we're just about to start on some of the installation works on those um so that will that will be good for that project and based on the information from the stock condition survey that we've we've had back we've got um a much better basis to plan for um the the rest of the stock for a future planning and and so on um within the report there's some examples of different um scenario plans that we've got on there and rough costings of what it's going to cost to achieve that um and what percentage of our stock we could actually get to a band B or a band A or so on and uh to try and achieve a band A we would only we wouldn't even make 60 percent of our stock because the the type of property is just not um not the right type of property to be able to install enough measures to bring that up to um that level so um once we've got all the rest of it in a sort of in a number of years time we'll we'll have a um a selection of properties which are either impractical or impossible to um increase to a better level than we would imagine um so yeah over the over the coming months um now we've got the rest of the data in we will be sort of putting together a um sort of a plan which will take us up to the current deadline of 2028 so that we know roughly where we are um and that have some costings associated with that so we know what funding we need to um provide um and obviously from there on it will it will be for the overall um sort of 2050 as best as we can um attached within the um report is the two appendices one is the um example of the retrofit assessment which is part of the past 2035 requirements for the government funding which most retrofit is now um sort of required to have uh which gives quite a lot of detail in so far as what the property is like now what we can possibly achieve um the emissions of the property and so on so once we get all those in we can collate um sort of a project report on what we have um what we're saving on on the on the actual carbon footprint as well as where we achieve on the EPC ratings um and for anybody that likes a bit of uh soft bedtime reading is the SHDF uh report submissions which we have to do on a monthly basis um back to dense for the um funding um part of the project um so that's probably an overview so if I open up and I've got the questions in relation to that I'm happy to answer. Thank you Eddie um yes any questions from the committee on the report? Councillor Dr Timmy Hawkins. Thank you Eddie for your update um I think two things for me EPC ratings um I presume those are being done initially by the you know normal assessors rather than Mears who I think I read that doing the retrofit work is that correct? Yes yeah Mears are a um main contractor for that um but obviously from there there are subcontractors which go out and we've been using consultants called C6 which are specialist retrofit assessors that are doing the retrofit assessments and designs and so on. Okay so I'm just trying to understand whether the EPCs are a basis um for carrying out the retrofit work are you using that as a baseline? That's where a baseline has come from which is current EPC ratings um historically the EPC data that we've got could be up to 10 years old um which is why we're we're having the past 2035 retrofit assessments although it's um a requirement of the funding it's also a far more in-depth version of the EPC which is where the um detail for the report come from so we get a much more detailed view. Okay now that's thank you for that it's just somebody who deals with EPCs um on a regular basis I must add that I have seen some her reports that did not take into account all the features in the property and give a lower rating than they should have done um so it's making sure that those those um reports are done properly. Yeah yeah on on standards um on the standard EPC there are some where assumptions are made um on things like uh sort of things that aren't visible without being intrusive um but with with these if there's any question on um things where they have done intrusive uh sort of boryscope inspections and that kind of stuff to ensure that things like cavity wall insulation is in place and and that kind of stuff. And um secondly it's on the quality of the retrofit being done. Now I um yes mires we know mires you know do good work were there times when the work doesn't come out as good quality as it should and I have recently come across information that might suggest that mires might not be doing as well as they say they are. How do we um uh what's what I'm looking for? Is there a quality um certainly or something that we do for the work to make sure that what they say they've done is actually good enough? Yeah I'm yeah I'm fully I'm fully aware of what you're referring to with that. Um within um our mires contract the the delivery of the SHDF work is being done from mires central department um which is it's they're doing um about 11 or 12 I think local for it is and the house associations across the country on the same SHDF project so it's being sort of managed centrally from mires um the delivery of the installation work is being run from our local branch um and there will be um regular inspections and so on on the on the delivery of that um within place and in regard to the um the other comments that sort of recently cropped up about um the quality of information and so on we are as we we always do do um sort of diligence checks but we're increasing the level of diligence checks that we're actually doing um on any returned data that we get from them um but last say we we're we're also hoping um to have a retrofit officer in place that will actually manage this completely um on the delivery side so we'll see how it turns out but I'll I'll I'll can assure you that it's uh it won't be the um the the double glazing of many years ago situation so it's uh we'll make sure that what we what we get is a good quality. Galsby Defend did you speak? Thank you yes just following up that briefly another question if I may um I think it's important that C6 in undertaking the baseline work are seen to be independent of MIAS in following up with the installation rather than subcontractors I don't know if that's the case um my question was really in relation to we are coming to a point where a gas as a source of heating will be for new heating systems will be phased out I'm not quite sure now the exact date because that's changed but um there are schemes that are showing benefits of heat networks um particularly inclusion of ground source rather than air source heat pumps I'm thinking of course of schemes like SWFAM prior where the results are now starting to come through and I think that councils have a particular opportunity to demonstrate those because we have a number of properties in the same area whereas builders uh of new properties are reluctant to include ground source because that's not what their people are demanding they want individual systems and I'm wondering whether as part of this strategy we are looking at heat source and uh at heat networks at heat pumps and heat networks and then you just before that can I also add in to this mix I think um perhaps Brian Millins had put a a question in he's online he's put it into the chat as well it's just whether given the heat pumps that have been installed already is there any data already collated in terms of the impacts on residents bills so far if you can find that in with Councillor Peter Fane's question then yeah in I'll touch on the bill situation um first because that's probably the easiest one to um deal with um because of the um increase unit costs um people aren't necessarily seeing huge benefits on their costs um because um I mean we've had huge increases over the last few years on uh on electricity unit costs um and I think we're I mean we're we're we're four or five times where we were four years ago so what what would normally show as a as a benefit in reduction in costs um are only really showing a benefit in reduction in number of units used so it's it's it's it's hard for um the residents to sort of see um that decrease because the the unit cost increase of have have covered off what they would have saved anyway um it's only once you sort of sit down and work out what their bills would have been if they hadn't moved across that you would actually see the the the benefits to that um we have on a couple of properties done um sort of a bit bit more of a detailed breakdown of it um we haven't shared it maybe we should have shared some more more data on that but um we we can look to uh including that in the in the next report if that's something that people would wish for yeah I think that'll be very useful okay no problem um okay and then in regard to the um heat network situation um there there is a project sort of bubbling away um very very early stages at the moment um we are also looking ourselves at doing one on a um on a small smaller scale on a on a block block of flats that we've got um we've got a good number of flats and we've got a decent amount of land um that surround the flats where we could introduce a ground source of some description um but that is is very much at uh idea stage before we go into sort of any kind of feasibility or so on um we have had a basic feasibility on it to give us an idea but uh we've got a sort of follow that forward because the infrastructure side of it is is incredibly expensive um it does get slightly more problematic when you've got lease holders and so on in in flats and how we uh sort of bring those on board and whether bringing them a choice or that kind of thing um in regard to sort of the wider um looking look at the sort of projects it is slightly difficult um because of the the the make-up of the stock and the the lease holders private owners and so on and the land that's available to actually install um the infrastructure of these things and on a lot of places where we have got a sort of a density of properties we don't necessarily have available land to put the infrastructure in so there's there's various things but I'm sure as we um sort of progress further and these these technologies become um more widely understood um it's it's something that may be um that we sort of start to look at in a in a in a bigger way but at the moment it's it's very difficult bearing in mind the the costs involved. Thank you yes councillor Peter Sanford. Thank you chair um with respect to heat networks one of the Caxton parish councillors went off on his own and did a feasibility study um he came back reporting the costs were probably 10 times what an individual village stands so maybe we need to think about all coordination as a district level perhaps joining up schemes perhaps finding grants please guys um we're very keen to get started that the cost was a blocker. Yeah I'll totally agree. Sorry there you go. No just just I totally agree it is the infrastructure costs that um are the sort of crippling factor really. Councillor Jeff Harvey. Thank you chair um it's fashionable to take a contrarian view to all our efforts to reduce carbon emissions in some quarters and I had a discussion on a doorstep somebody who who really claimed to have you know professional knowledge in these matters saying all of course retrofitting external retrofitting doesn't work because you get build up a moisture and talking about membranes and this and that and I am I say I'm really skeptical on that but I just wondered I mean can we is this now at a stage where it could be regarded as a mature technology and if there were tubing issues at the start we now understand how to avoid those problems you know and I'm thinking about sort of damp and mould and all those things I mean is it now the case that we understand what we need to do so well that actually really all we need is is more resource and more people trained to really accelerate this process. Yeah we've definitely learned a lot of lessons over the years um I mean if we go back to the sort of early days when um sort of the external warning solution for example um become um the the way forward on a lot of the solid wall properties um I mean we we we were putting those in sort of 10 plus years ago um and the biggest problem that was identified over time with that is that you were making the property sort of so airtight and you was having the problems of damp and mould and so on forming in the properties because of lack of airflow so within what that is the designs and so on that are put in place now for um insulation and cavity wall and all sorts of um works that we do is to make sure that the whole property is reviewed properly that there is suitable ventilation and the airflow through the properties that kind of thing um it's it's the same with most things that become sort of a new technology that become more mainstream the more we do the more we learn and as a sector and an industry we have learned a lot over the last um sort of number of years even with the air source heat pumps there's there's been a number of um sort of design changes with those to make them more effective um and make them work better where the the the perception that a lot of people had is that they weren't work very good didn't work very well but then it's it's down to the the older type of design um was letting them down the more modern ones that that we're looking at now are much more efficient they do much better heating they're a a higher um temperature base so it's it's the same with all all technologies we we learn all the time and I'm sure that the more we do the more we'll learn and I don't think the learning the learning circle of that is ever going to stop to be fair so but what we've learned from um historic installs yes we have learned a lot about what we need to do to change thank you Councillor Paticharian and then of course your page number 33 this is 33 there's number 92 there is a flood risk and I'm actually mentioning about it about area in the corner of the A428 and Caxton where there is a kebab shop the whole area is actually flooded is it anyway to be discussed in this meeting? Eddie um I mean there there there are various areas in the in the district that are liable to flooding um and that that's generally because of the the increased rainfall whatever that we have had so far this year we've had an incredibly high level um there are a couple of areas where it seems to be a continued problem but that's more um for the the waterways that are looking into that rather than a housing issue um I know there are a couple um that they are sort of concentrating on at the moment where there has been a bit um a bit a bit of backing up and a bit of flow issues with flooding so uh but as far as the sort of the housing side of things where we're discharging into the drainage and the local system um they're kind of they're doing what they should be doing it's the wider drainage system which has issues really. Thank you. I just follow up question it looks like the house problem and the drainage system not like the rain water are stagnant over there it's a completely flooded in the park in the parking zone I have taken I have taken couple of photos which I can post it but then if council can have a look into it it looks like a housing. Yeah if you if you if you want to email me those directly you can work well I'll I'll I'll speak to you about those outside this meeting we're looking at the specifics on that. Councillor Peter Fein. Just a brief follow-up to uh there are not entirely except what Eddie Spacer says about the difficulties of uh heat networks and the potential costs but I think some of the research that's been going on elsewhere and indeed the it's often prior project that I mentioned is suggesting that maybe some useful ways of tackling those that are more available to councils where there may be for instance large council houses and there may be neighbouring properties of course there are intervening properties that would have been sold off so that makes it more complicated um but I also thought I think it's something that it would be very interesting if I may suggest to come back to this committee at some future date um to report because I understand you're looking at this as a possible project it may be a the narrative I don't know and there is some very interesting work which has been funded by the government under the green transition scheme one looking at specifically of energy efficiency retrofitting to existing houses that I thought might be relevant to us and perhaps would be worth looking into. Thank you and Gatsler Dr Lisa Redder. Thank you chair I was just wondering if it's possible to give any information about the solar PV self-installed trials that are mentioned um which says 10 properties are being involved in a viability trial. Thank you. Um yes there is um with the solar panels that we've got on our properties at the moment we've got over over 2000 I think in um in various places um the initial project that was um done in bulk was a an investment um an investment render roof system where they um investment companies were taking advantage of the high level of feeding tariffs at the time um since then obviously the um feeding tariffs are so so low or the the um the the the smart generation um returns that we get now um are so low that there's no financial incentive um or benefit to actually installing the solar panels for for us as a council um however the benefits to the the residents are quite large because they get the savings on on the um generation that they've got um there would probably be um a greater savings at a resident if we was to look at battery storage as well which we're at this moment where we've been advised to sort of stay away from the battery storage just at a minute for various reasons um so with the the ones where we're saying that we're self-delivering is we've got some properties which are part of the um SHDF funding project which may end up with um some solar pv on as a supplementary measure to sort of finish off the um decarbonisation of the particular property and there are also um some trials that we're doing on different archetypes in different parts of the district um with a a new um contractor that we've got that's given us um very favourable sort of rates on on the install um so it in that respect it's purely for the benefit of the residents as opposed to the benefit to us other than um showing a benefit on the decarbonisation side and um and an increase in the EPC um so if if that's successful and the the contractor that we've got um doing these works out to be okay and the quality is good um then that's something that will be integrated potentially sort of in a bit more longer term as part of the wider picture for decarbonisation of the stock. Thank you. Can I just ask what the self-installed bit means so I didn't quite follow that. Sorry that in regards to that that's self-installed as in we're installing them as opposed to um the the the majority that we've got which are um sort of rent a roof so we we aren't actually responsible for the solar panels there they're an investment company elsewhere that uh that manage those we just rent the roof to them if that makes sort of a bit more sense. Yeah yeah that's great thank you. Yeah no problem. Thank you councillor Warren Green. Hiddie, first of all I just want to say I thought this report was really thorough and I really like the data within it and I like the fact that you've got time frames and can very very clearly see what you're working on and the um quantity and the sort of span of your work. I'm also interested to hear what you've been saying about the benefits to residents and I'm interested to know how residents are responding. Are they feeling the benefits? Are you getting positive responses? How's it going out there for you? We seem to have sort of two levels of response if you like. You've got the the very invisible ones people that have had solar panels and that kind of stuff it's it's it can be seen it's very much there and it's it's yes it's great and so on. We've had other feedback for ones but more with the and the fabric first side of things where we're looking more towards the fabric of the building, the insulation and making the building itself more more insulated cheaper to run etc. We've had sort of some feedback that the property feels better but again with the the way that the unit costs of electrical gas or oil for their heating financially they don't necessarily see the benefit but that will as as sort of time progresses and the fuel costs hopefully stabilise then there will be sort of much much better benefits shown financially for them but from from my point of view doing doing the property and insulating the property gives us the the best longevity for for that property for ongoing benefits whereas with a solar panel for example is a supplementary addition it does make a a small difference but it's from a sort of a sustainable long-term perspective that they do have a lifespan and at some point they will start to de-generate and start sort of generating far less than they do whenever they're new so it's yeah it's a bit a bit of both but we are getting some good feedback we're also getting some some poor comments that people that haven't noticed the difference or or whatever or we need to revisit the property and look at additional measures for example because some of their properties are very very difficult to retrofit and we could put in thousands of pounds worth of insulation but if it's got drafts coming up through the floor you're never you're never going to make it the best you can be then we've got to revisit it and look at insulated floors and things like that so it's it it's a bit of a minefield but the majority is good feedback thank you and so that's useful and I think that it's good that you're getting the feedback and you're clearly engaging with people as you're doing it and that's great to hear thank you thanks and to eddie can I just in terms of understanding what you've given as well here in the report which is you know you're saying using that planning tool it's really brilliant to see here that planning tool that's therefore saying you know what are the estimations for all of the the stock that we have for different levels of retrofit yeah and so what you've got there which is when you say about the what's required to get 99.5% of properties to EPC band C as a minimum that's that's that final row there as I'm understanding from the report that is what we've chosen to do as a council is to that's the 2.7 million that's in the report what I'm not sure about because that if you look at the equivalent sort of other types of getting up to band B or band A you know it's just astronomical the difference in in cost therefore of doing that type of retrofit what I wasn't sure about was within the report and when you presented it is whether or not there's a feeling of pressure that we need to go beyond band C and and I'm remembering that in the local government association LGA when we had board discussions around this and a lot of the reports came in it was that that actually band C is good and it is good enough and both for emissions and for keeping people warm and keeping their bills down so I'm just wondering is there a debate still at the moment within the council about whether or not we should be looking for our own housing stock to be going beyond that band C and then also my second question then is that 2.7 million the report seems to say and one of the reasons we were so keen to see this was what is the cost of getting rid all of our properties that 99.5% to a point where we're reducing the emissions we're getting people's bills down and we're keeping them warm in our properties how much will that cost us in terms of what needs to be done and where will we find that money so at the moment as I'm understanding the report is saying all of that would have to be funded by grants if there are properties just like you said which is so difficult so one is that right are we only looking at grants and therefore if we don't get the grants and brilliant that you've got the 4 million of grants you know that's really good and hard work by offices to get those 4 million over two years we need another 2.7 that's officer time to get those additional grants if there are properties that actually it doesn't make sense are we looking also at rebuilding at replacing those properties because of that so there's kind of two and a half questions there. Okay I'll start on the easy one which is quite complicated but it's probably the easiest one to answer on those figures that we've got there like I said previously with different types of measures and solar panels are a great way to improve your EPC rating on that one of 2.7 million that is kind of the cheapest option to get to band C within that will include a substantial amount of solar panels and other type of supplementary areas the best way to achieve it is obviously like I said through fabric first and fabric first is by far the more expensive retrofit options but they are the better options so longer term so that the figures that are shown there are quite they're more for an indicative type of guides to show you what kind of what costs different type of options would be I mean if you look at the first one the SAP B to bring 89% of properties up to SAP B which is where the FF is the fabric first approach you're looking at best part of 60 million I unfortunately I haven't included on there the band C fabric first which was somewhere around about 19 million so there is a huge difference between quick fix supplementary stuff to raise the raise EPC ratings against retrofitting of things that are actually going to be a good long-term benefit so there's there's there's there's sort of a number of options to explore if we were given a very short deadline and so right you've got to do this by next week then it would be sort of the biggest bang for you for your buck if you like but for the benefit of the residents and the properties themselves is the fabric first option which is the way forward so can I ask on that one to Eddie that that would have been really good to include I understand now that FF on them so but actually so our ideal situation with given sort of you know how much resources are available really but it would be around sorry about that I had turned all this would be the nine we're looking at not 2.7 million but you're looking at 19 million yeah if we were to take the fabric first approach however obviously the costs and prices and so on they're constantly varying and the different ways of doing things are obviously always changing and technology is changing as we go forward and as far as the funding that we've got so far our current project that we've got over the current two years is a co-funded we got grant funding of 1.7 million and we are funding the balance which brings it's almost 50-50 so going forward from a financial point of view now we've got the real data and we we're going to work on that plan over the next couple of months to actually so this is definitely the way we want to go forward that will give us the the best idea on exact costings and then we can sort of look at what funding is available to us there the shgf funding which we're currently involved with there was a an additional phase which was released at the end of last year but because we were so deep into this one we're just from a resource perspective it wouldn't make sense for us to then take on a second round of funding in the middle of this one while we're still collecting the data and everything from stock conditions surveys and make a plan once we've got the plan in place then we can try and sort of gain as much funding as we possibly can for whatever's available and then try and do that in the at some speed but again we're trying to do things at speed with the current situation is the lack of resource and sort of skilled staff in the marketplace and that is the biggest hindrance to the the whole thing at the moment because it's obviously there's a lot of funding around a number of billions of pounds that the Governments put into this over the last sort of couple of years and the whole country is getting involved so there's a lot of money there that's available to be spent but the the resource to actually deliver that at this moment in time doesn't exist so there's a lot of training going on and so on to get the skilled staff in place to be able to deliver this. Thanks so much so in a way what we'd be looking at is kind of the next update which is when we've got more the more detailed information and that would be because what we're not saying here is oh it's great to see that 2.7 million would be the sort of the quick fit approach what we're looking at is that balance between the emissions reduction and what's better longer term for residents in terms of keeping them warm in their bills down so between 2.7 and 19 million in a way I suppose you'd be then looking at some decisions being made as to what's available with the existing grant future grants and what the council may put forward as well or may be able to through its own budget. Yes yeah and and noting as well the the additional pressure on on staff on staffing and officers I think we should note that as well how in you know that's a key issue for you to be able to continue with this work. Yeah and that that was from what I understand it was a key driver to the um government extending the deadlines from 25 27 to 28 and 30 because of the the resource to actually deliver just doesn't exist. Thank you Dr Timmy Hawkins. Thank you um very interesting to um you know get the explanation that Eddie has given um I deal a lot with this sort of thing and having um EPC rating greater than C frankly is a lot more cost for not much gain. Yes. And I say that because the um the average energy saving um I mean if you look at an EPC rating you always have at the bottom where it says if you do this you know you spend this much to install it you get this much saving um where you have flow solid for insulation for example typical cost is up to six grand that is six thousand pounds and the yearly saving is 50 pounds and you go why would I bother yeah exactly you know there's there's there's things like that the other is the opposite we say is hot water um cylinder insulation 30 quid you save 11 pounds a year you know there's a percentage that you go yeah that's probably worth me doing that spending 6 000 to save 50 pounds a year. This is why I was asking I think that piece of work done by the LGA by the local government association was saying because of the minimal gains you get going above C to get to B or A the higher costs it's not necessarily the best way to go is setting you know our targets above C but I think within that C is what you've just explained Eddie which is which of those are fabric first and which of those are just are in a renewable energy kind of options and so that putting renewable energy where it just leaks out you know your all your energy leaks out just doesn't make sense especially if this is in our own housing stock yeah but the fabric the fabric first is expensive it is very expensive so there's got to be that balance there um enough you know the the the requirement for the private rented sector to bring all rented properties up to C um has been pushed back the deadline has been pushed back again partly because of the you know recognizing that this is a lot of investment that has to be made and grants relying on grants as I have found privately in my private work is that the government analysis all will give you all this many grants you try and apply for them and you've got to jump through this hoop and that hoop all the time you've tried to jump and you can't jump it it's not there a lot of grants have been returned back to the treasury because councils could not you know give them out and you go what's the point there's a lot of talk I think we need to see a whole action yeah and I think on the sort of as at the form of the future which is about sort of both children looking at careers young people as careers but also that transferring of skills within trades people so I don't know any we've seen but part of that lack of absorptive capacity in the market to say yeah we'll go for those grants is that they've been short term grants and they don't signal the billions that are actually out there in the market that people would say oh actually I'll move my company towards that because they're there so it's this and the LGS insisted on this and councils and the district council network as well that what we need are bigger longer term grants to enable you know to get the resource both within councils and to be able to subcontract that work in the marketplace is that would you agree with that yeah definitely I mean you've only got to look back when the the the solar panel industry when the feeding terrace was sort of like 40 50p a unit for feeding and there was loads of companies that sort of rushed into it and now you try and find a company that'll install your solar panel now they're very few and far between because they've all gone bust and broke or just shut the company because there's no there's no business sort of really for it because the way the government structured the feed in tariff there isn't that market anymore good well we'll look forward to seeing that the next update and I think as members have said it's really really helpful and useful for us to be able to see this level of the the data that's now there in terms of that stock update and therefore the evidence than which kind of decision making to base that one what we're pushing for in terms of the carbon emissions reduction but also in terms of um in a well-being of residents so thank you very much Eddie yeah yep no problem thank you yeah I think the other one that as I understand is um is around planning so just on planning for heat pumps Desnes and Defra have just finished a review at the end of last year recommending that pretend that they may need to have um a reduction in planning permission requirements around noise because it's such that the noise levels means that every air source heat pump is above the recommended noise if it's not in a back garden and therefore every installation requires planning permission so what they're saying is that is a huge barrier at the moment I don't know if you've seen it within any of our properties Eddie but you've been doing this where that that's been an issue but they're saying it's a barrier to reaching the the targets for installations um yeah I mean we we're constantly looking at air products we're just in regards to the air source heat pumps we're we look obviously the sustainability and so we've just moved to a different product which is primarily manufactured in the UK as opposed to coming from all over the world um and one of the the key features on the the new heat pumps is to keep the noise as low as possible um and that also relates to sort of the the the type of servicing that it needs and so on so if the if the fan gets dirty they get them dirty and they get the noisy and they get so it's all about those kind of things and keeping it clean so with the the ones we're looking at that is one of the key considerations is the um sort of noise noise disruption because some of the early early units were quite noisy like a someone had them described in the past of like a jet taken off in the garden so uh yeah that is a definite consideration we haven't had any real issues with it to be fair on plan inside but uh but yeah it is definitely a consideration okay good thank you councillor Jeff Harvey thank you chair yes um because I was interested in this I did a mini survey of the Larkfield estate in um Great Abington um where every house has an air source heat pump and and I knocked on every door some people weren't in but quite a lot were um nobody was bothered by the noise um there were some issues about well sometimes it gets too hot upstairs and not hot enough downstairs like these kind of things but nobody mentioned noise as a problem so that was interesting thank you very much Eddie and so members I think what we can do is note with with interest um that that update thank you very much for the detail in that okay thank you thank you good and we'll go now on to agenda item number eight which is an oral update on the local nature recovery um strategy and we have with us um Gabrielle Yeomans who is the local nature recovery strategy officer at Cambridge County Council hello oh can't hear you Gabrielle isn't it yes we heard you just then oh can you hear me now yes okay wonderful sorry about that I'm trying to get the technology to work um let me just share my screen bear with me apologies there you go can you see my screen yes we can and Phil I think Phil Clark you're here as well so welcome to nice to have you with us thank you hello wonderful thank you so much for inviting us along today to talk about the Cambridge and Peterborough local nature recovery strategy um thank you for the introduction my name is Gabrielle Yeomans I am the local nature recovery strategy officer and I've got my colleague here today as well Phil Clark um I apologise in advance if you've already seen this presentation we have been making new rounds around different committees but hopefully there will be the most up-to-date information on our strategy as well as what is a local nature recovery strategy um including the responsibility of South Cambridgeshire as a supporting authority um so just a bit of background of what is a local nature recovery strategy uh local nature recovery strategies are a system of spatial strategies for nature and environmental improvements and they're required by law under the Environment Act of 2021 the purpose of these strategies is to identify locations to create or improve habitat that is most likely to benefit nature um a local nature recovery strategy must include two components we have a local habitat map which consists of areas that are already important for nature so that could be local nature reserves trip less size etc and then a statement of biodiversity priorities which is our priorities of identifying where we can create or enhance biodiversity and then the potential measures to go alongside them uh it's important to note that there are about 48 local nature recovery strategies currently being developed developed um and Camershire and Pugetborough is one of them and we will be alongside those other 47 be connecting up into that wider nature recovery network so Camershire and Pugetborough is one of the most nature-decluted counties across England and we want to respond to the existing deficit deficit of rich wildlife sites across the county as well as um responding to the national decline in biodiversity so just a little bit of information we the DEFRA have assigned a responsible authority for each one of those 48 LNRSs and the responsible authority has been assigned to the combined authority however they've contracted this responsibility to Camershire County Council which is where Phil and I come into and we are also working very closely with our local nature partnership Natural Camershire on developing an LNRS for the county so how are we going to go about developing an LNRS so we want it to be a cross-county collaboration and drawing upon existing assets and expertise we want it to be a really good well-resourced stakeholder engagement activity making sure we're engaging with a wide range of partners and stakeholders and everyone has the opportunity to feed into the process we want it to be the end result to be a document that everyone can get behind and is well coordinated and it guides the shared ambition of doubling nature as well as building on existing great work that's already happened such as the Cambridge Nature Network we also want to develop a governance framework that utilises existing groups and partnerships and forums we also would like to link into other environmental incentives such as biodiversity net game and alms we will also you know like to engage with our local communities and make sure that nature recovery is being led on the ground as well as expanding on our natural capital opportunities and fully embracing those ecosystem services and lastly the wider environment and benefits as well making sure we're linking into them such as health and well-being flood risk and climate change so the governance structure that has been set up we have the combined authorities environment committee and they will have the political oversight we have our steering group that meet on a monthly basis and we have representatives from the cpca the county council natural england natural cambershare as well as representatives from each of us supporting authorities alongside that we have our production group which is the core group working on developing the LNRS underneath that we have our development group which is a wider stakeholder group that we are using to ground truth and making sure the outputs of the LNRS are being coordinated correctly and then underneath that we will be setting out working groups to focus on the different priority habitats and that prioritisation process so progress so far so we started in january of 2023 and i started setting up the project management principles creating a governance structure and timelines we also started our early on engagement with various stakeholders to bring them along on this journey as well as understanding that that baseline information that can feed into developing the LNRS then we move on to october 2023 where we actually commenced developing the LNRS and we've got our three work streams here so we've got a stakeholder engagement communication work stream which we've procured natural camershare to lead on we have our data and evidence work stream and we've procured consultants natural capital solutions to assist in the GIS supporting role and then lastly we have our land use and strategies and policies and a wider environmental work streams and we have procured consultants land use consulting to review these work streams and feed into the writing of the strategy so LUC are writing the strategy for us so now we get to march 2024 we've commenced our stakeholder engagement work stream and since january of 2024 we've undertaken a series of workshops and different engagement activities such as expert workshops we've had multiple development group workshops we've gone to loads of different community engagement events as well as starting to talk to our farmers and landowners as well via different cluster groups that are dispersed across the county we've come to a member engagement sessions like today and we've also started talking to particular interest groups we've also just we've launched in February our surveys which i will touch on in a little bit so then we have our data and evidence work stream so natural capital solutions have been busy collecting all the different GIS and using that to update our baseline habitat mapping and then we have LUC who have been undertaking a review of the different strategies and understanding that wider environmental benefit to feed into the strategy writing so next steps we are connecting all of our outputs from all of these different work streams and using that to create a habitat priority longlist we would then commence a four wheel calling prioritisation process into shortlist what is our priority habitats and those actions that go alongside them we're using the baseline habitat mapping that's being created to create our local habitat map as well as supporting opportunity maps to identify where our priority areas are the different habitats and LUC have started commencement on writing the draft the first drafts of the chapters for the strategy so as mentioned South Camershire has enrolled as a supporting authority and we as the responsible authority must take the reasonable steps to involve our supporting authorities and have regard to their opinions share information with them and seek their agreement for our consultation and publication so the timelines you see on your screen today are our current timelines although we do appreciate that we might have that we are currently developing a plan B timeline for the case that there is a general election so the most important date for you to note today is that we will be coming to our supporting authorities including South Camershire on Thursday the 12th of September to seek your pre consultation approval and that's your approval of a consultation draft before we go out for public consultation it's important to note that in the regs and guidance of the LNRS that you have 28 days to provide your approval and then a similar process for our pre-publication approval and important to note that we are aiming for the 27th of February to come to all of our supporting authorities for pre-publication approval with the same timeline of that 28-day approval process. Before I just also wanted to touch on species recovery in Camershire so we have to consider species recovery in the development of the LNRS and we're currently working closely with the record centre and local recorders to identify those key species and identify a species priority list that will be fed into the overall document. We have set out a species working group and we actually have our first meeting this Friday which is very exciting which is to formally agree the process to identify those key species to be included. So as I briefly mentioned we have a few surveys out at the moment we have one that is for individuals and I'm really pleased to say that we've had over a thousand people respond to this survey which is absolutely brilliant. We also have a survey for local groups and organisations and then lastly a survey for farmers and landowners and I'm sure this presentation would be circulated around afterwards and we'll ask you today if you're able to spread these links or these surveys through your different networks that would be amazing so we can get to maybe two thousand. Thank you for listening today it was a whistle stop tour of the LNRS and how things are progressing in Camershire and Peterborough but now there's an opportunity for you to ask if you have any questions. Thank you. Thank you very much members do you have any questions or comments? Councillor Peterfane Thank you very interesting to hear progress on the project. One of the aspects and perhaps the most visible of any local nature recovery strategy they're not always the most relevant is of course the degree of tree cover and this is where the low tree covering in Camershire and particularly South Camershire for understandable reasons rather stands out not only in UK terms but even you know average tree covering Europe 38% I believe here you know 13% and I just wonder to what extent you it's not the appropriate form of recovery no doubt in many areas we wouldn't want to see a lot of it a lot more of it perhaps in our short grasslands or whatever it may be but to what extent will the NNRS seek to increase tree cover and at this stage you have any idea of how that might be done other than through existing mechanisms like Elms which is starting to emerge. I'll take that yes so hi so the local habitat map will identify priority areas for creating restoring connecting up habitats and there will be a woodland group so it will identify areas where woodland or tree planting or hedgerow planting can take place to increase canopy cover and the way that it will be delivered is so obviously one of the mechanisms for delivering new woodland new hedgerows is through BNG so where appropriate the right tree in the right place the the strategy will identify where the most appropriate place to plant trees hedgerows woodlands will be and as you say to avoid planting trees on some of their best short grassland sites which we really want to avoid so it will go into it and it will also identify these opportunity areas as to where the best place to plant trees is on a separate note one of the pieces of work that we're doing internally is we're doing a canopy cover survey for the county council land holdings and that will give us a percentage cover and one of the things that we've thought about is whether we could reproduce that across the whole of the county to give us a baseline of how much tree hedgerow woodland cover we have as a baseline and then for us to come up with a target that's evidence-based that will say say for by 2040 will increase canopy cover from say 7% to 14% so those are sort the some of the things that we're looking at that will target tree planting in the right places and ours will be certainly one of those mechanisms for delivering it as well as being G and there's also grants coming through from central government all the time around tree planting um we don't know if there'll be a general election if we'll get a different colour government next year but I I imagine that some of these priorities will still remain then so in the short to medium term I think there are going to be grants available for directly at tree planting thank you so um it was good to hear that that could potentially be from 7% to 14% which would be consistent with our doubling nature vision an ambition that is been adopted in south cams and each of the councils up to the combined authority so yeah that's really good to hear but to do that and as you're saying if we're looking at where nature is recovered and whether that's through bng biodiversity net gain for new developments or it's through other initiatives it's going to be an issue around land and land use and that's where directly and indirectly our planning service as south cambridge plays a huge role as to whether or not there is land that could be allocated for nature for tree recovery you know with the competing claims on that land particularly with Michael Gove's current you know quarter of a million houses to be fitted onto that same land so my question here is in the house of lords it was the Lib Dems that led an amendment to the planning reforms that came out at the end of december that said that material consideration must be given to the LNRS the local nature recovery strategy so my question is to what extent are we looking at that within the emerging local plan and within the local nature recovery strategy that you are preparing that you're looking at because if we just prepare lines on a map and we don't have due consideration made to these within planning and and it's you know that then we have an issue don't we so i was just wondering if you could give us a bit of an update on that and what you're thinking is around that thanks so at this stage in the development of the strategy we we are aware of that and we're we're working with colleagues so your colleagues within south cam so joncle now and others present present here is you know he's lurking there somewhere so when we become when we get to the stage where we identify the opportunity areas that's something that will need to be fed into the your local plan review process which i think is due to start soon so it's making sure as soon as we identify where the priority areas are that that becomes embedded in your local plan so that it does become a statutory requirement as you said a material consideration so through the work that we're doing with your supporting authority and with colleagues like jon and alex and others we are starting to think about how that can feed in to the local plan because that as you say that's the only way that it is potentially going to get delivered that it becomes statutory that it's embedded in all the local plans so yes that's that is actually yeah so thank you so all the work that you're doing and that everyone's done and all of the work that's been done before on that biodiversity opportunity mapping you know all of that and all of the work by locals and people who are answering the survey will only make sense if that becomes embedded in the local plan which leads to the next question so one is our local plan emerging local plan process the other is the Cambridge development group and potential growth group that's been created by Michael Gove also are you work you know do you have contact with peter freeman who's leading that group and others that would be beyond our democratic planning system at the moment that looking to come outside of that so you know what kind of conversations are you having there in in short none so but we'd be happy to be but in contact to have those conversations with them so if you could facilitate that that would be really helpful I think it would be a recommendation coming out of this committee if members were minded to recommend that members anything else on the local nature recovery strategy I think we definitely will take up and I think across our zero carbon community networks as well I know that's already been used to let's just as much as possible it's fantastic to see that a thousand responses to this consultation and this is actually this is the this is the grassroots kind of people saying yet we absolutely want this to happen and be a part of it and recover nature in this area so let's make sure that we can spread those those QR codes and the the adverts that you've got there as far or might as possible so that we get an even greater response and from groups as well so all of the groups and parish councils and things like that that put that in so that'd be fantastic so if you can share the presentation so that we've all got those QR codes as well that'll be absolutely fantastic thank you very much oh sorry I just wanted to say that actually we've had a really big uptake from South Cambridgeers communities and members of the public and that's actually been one of the the largest responded income from South Cambridgeers so thank you just very thank you for sharing that for your networks we'll make it even bigger so that's because it does matter to people which is fantastic good thank you very much for that report thanks thanks so we go on to last item on the agenda members which is the forward plan and any other business so please Alex Nelliedave you can update us sorry I've borrowed maths beside me yes so just to say that this is a look at the forward plan we have on the agenda some upcoming items so I have noted down the ones that we that were mentioned today as well in terms of the next meeting ahead we've got an update on the water beach renewable energy network project and we've also got an update on risk and adaptation which I know has been moved from some previous committee meetings as well so that's for the next June meeting and then looking ahead to September October we've got some of those annual cycle reports so around the zero carbon and doubling nature annual reports and the greenhouse gas report as well and I've also noted that we will need to try and find a way to get that pre-consultation draft of the local nature recovery strategy to members as well so it's likely to come within those meetings but just dependent on the timings and how that matches up looking ahead just say I've noted down the items around committees requesting an update on the air quality strategy periodically and I've also noted the request for the council housing retrofit kind of more of that action plan side of things the delivery plan to come back to the committee as well if I missed anything thanks for picking all of that so I saw that in the presentation as well so that looking at between September and October we would need to see the local nature recovery strategy so that's a pre-consultation draft so supporting authorities of which we are one will be asked to comment on or at least to prove that pre-consultation draft to go out so that's that that's that point and yes so that's done that so that'd be great to get that on how fitted into the agenda then anything else members any other business or anything else you'd like included on the forward plan no thank you with six minutes over time but I think that's managed very well thank you very much thank you everyone for your time and I think being over time was my fault for arriving late otherwise thank you very much everyone