Introduction
The West Midlands needs to adapt to respond to the changing climate. Nature-Based Sustainable Drainage can be part of our adaptive response.
The climate is changing, with more extreme weather events, flooding and heating of our urban centres. In response, the West Midlands Combined Authority declared a climate emergency in 2019. The world is also in the middle of a biodiversity crisis, with species disappearing faster than ever in human history. The two crises are fundamentally linked.
The region now needs to respond and adapt appropriately to these emergencies. As part of the functioning system of our urban conurbation, Nature-based Sustainable Drainage Systems (NbSuDS) can be part of our adaptation response, to provide a more resilient and sustainable future, with the ability to provide shade, decrease flooding events, and increase biodiversity.
Providing a more sustainable approach to drainage design through the use of SuDS is not a new concept, with some of the first examples of SuDS to be given that name in the UK being seen in the 1990s. However, the adoption of SuDS across the country and indeed the world has been patchy, with several ‘hotspots’ generally driven by the attitudes of the local authority.
With the upcoming adoption of Schedule 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, SuDS is set to become the standard approach to drainage design in new developments. With this in mind, and other legislative factors at play (discussed further in Section One), it is increasingly important that we in the West Midlands ‘get SuDS right’.
Since its birth as a principle, it has become apparent that even within the definition of SuDS there is a vast disparity in quality between applications. Steep-sided ‘bomb-craters’ with concrete headwalls, fenced off from the public and pushed to the corner of new housing developments are an increasingly common sight in the West Midlands and across the UK. Whilst in some ways these interventions fit within the definition of SuDS (although their inclusion is questionable), they fall short in reaching the potential of what SuDS and NbSuDS can offer in terms of multiple environmental, social, and economic benefits (discussed further in Section Three).
Purpose of the Document
The purpose of this document is to provide guidance on the use of SuDS as nature-based solutions in the context of the West Midlands region. The guidance intends to highlight the multiple benefits of NbSuDS in the context of legislation including the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), Schedule 3 of the Flood and Water Management Act 2010, biodiversity net gain (BNG) requirements, and upcoming developments of Local Nature Recovery Strategies (LNRSs).
The document is advisory rather than technical and aims to highlight the opportunities that NbSuDS offer in meeting multiple legislative requirements via one solution. It aims to dispel some of the myths around SuDS which are preventing more widespread adoption, and promote well-considered holistic SuDS design that achieves multiple benefits.
BACKGROUND CONTEXT TIMELINE
June 2019
- West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) declared a climate emergency.
- A ‘green paper’ was written to indicate how the region could take action in order to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2041.
September 2021
- WMCA published its Natural Environment Plan outlining how the region can protect, restore, and enhance nature.
2022
- WMCA published a high-level Summary of Climate Impacts facing the organisation’s seven constituent authorities.
June 2023
- WMCA was formally appointed as Responsible Authority for delivering the Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS) for the West Midlands region.
- The duty of delivering the LNRS and the initiatives we are adopting to tackle climate adaptation challenges also align with and complement the objectives of the WMCA West Midlands Natural Environment Plan 2021-2026 (wmca.org.uk).
2024
- In addition to these developments in the adaptation landscape, mandatory requirements for Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) came into effect in 2024.
- Similar legislation for Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) in all new developments is expected to come into force in 2025.