Environmental Protection UK has told DCLG its planning guidance for "eco towns" should demand preservation of greenfield land, encourage sustainable remediation of brownfield sites and protect embodied carbon from soil sealing.
Its response to the draft PPS on eco towns welcomes some of the environmental criteria but says standards on local environmental quality, especially on biomass, transport, noise, construction and health are inadequate or lacking.
It wants extra standards on air quality, noise, land and light and attacks the likely soil sealing the towns would bring about.
"The preservation of greenfield land should be further enshrined in the policy statement to ensure sustainable and appropriate development. Furthermore, while land contamination is covered in PPS23, which encourages a sustainable approach to land remediation, no comprehensive guidance exists," it says.
It warns that soil sealing is contributing to the 13mt of soil carbon lost in the UK each year and says that although eco town green space standards are welcome, there needs to be protection for soils with high carbon content.
"We realise that the zero-carbon definition does not include embodied carbon however we question whether the loss of carbon through soil sealing should be included in this definition and believe that the policy statements should take the opportunity to highlight the necessity of protecting this valuable resource and ensure soil functions are adequately protected, protection that does not sufficiently exist in other planning statements or guidance," it says.
