Substitute Consent

Substitute Consent – HRA PLANNING is providing increasing clarity on this piece of planning legilsative to waste facility and quarry operators, semi-state bodies and other interests.

Substitute Consent can be interpreted simply in lay terms as the obligation to seek retrospective planning consent for a development activity that is occurring but which should have been, but was not subject to; Environmental Impact Assessment – EIA; a determination if EIA was required, and/or Appropriate Assessment (a Habitats Directive assessment).

The obligation to seek Substitute Consent can be applied to a person by notice from a planning authority or otherwise maybe sought by a person who has carried out such development seeking to regularise the development activity.   The requirement for Substitute Consent may in some instances be necessary to enable an operator to apply for IED (Industrial Emissions Directive) licensing from the EPA.

In the first instance, an application must be made to An Bord Pleanála (the Board) for leave to apply for Substitute Consent and the Board must be satisfied that the development meets specific criteria before leave to apply for Substitute Consent can be given.  This requires careful consideration and understanding of existing development and activities in Planning terms and whether such activities should have been subject to EIA or AA assessment previously.

Read about the success of HRA PLANNING in securing substitute consent in 2017.

If you have a development or activity and need professional clarification of the Substitute Consent, other planning and environmental obligations in relation to it then please contact HRA PLANNING.