Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what animals will be included in the proposed pet abduction offence recommended by the Pet Theft Taskforce report.
Answered by Jo Churchill
We are currently developing the new ‘Pet Abduction’ offence and the details of this new offence are subject to further consideration. The scope of the offence should include dogs, and the applicability to other types of animal will be explored during the development of the policy.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of introducing a 24 hour (a) mean or (b) exceedance level for fine particulate matter 2.5.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
The Government recognises that short-term exposure to elevated levels of PM2.5 can impact health, particularly for vulnerable groups. This is why we provide alerts and advice during air pollution episodes to ensure people can access the information and health advice they need in order to minimise impacts. We are also taking action to increase public awareness about air pollution, including through an expanded £8 million funding pot which will be made available to local authorities through the Air Quality Grant scheme.
Under the Environment Bill, the Government will have a duty to bring forward a target for PM2.5 by October 2022. In setting our air quality targets, we have sought advice from the Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants (COMEAP) on whether the priority aim should be long-term exposure rather than short-term. COMEAP advised that a focus on long-term average concentrations of PM2.5 is most appropriate to deliver public health benefits. This advice has been published and can be accessed via this link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/fine-particulate-air-pollution-pm25-setting-targets.
The two air quality targets that we plan to set will focus on reducing the long-term exposure to PM2.5 and its associated health impacts, actions taken to achieve these targets will contribute to reducing average daily concentrations of PM2.5.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of live emissions data monitoring being made a requirement in all environmental permits for incinerators in England.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
In England, all large incinerators, also known as energy from waste (EfW) plants, are regulated by the Environment Agency (EA) and must comply with strict emission limits set by the Industrial Emissions Directive (as amended under the EU Withdrawal Act 2018). Permits are not issued if the proposed plant will have unacceptable impacts on human health or the environment.
Emission limits within permits are set for total particulate matter (TPM), which includes both PM10 and PM2.5. New permit applications are assessed to ensure that impacts from both types of particulate matter will be acceptable by assuming worst-case scenarios, whereby TPM is made up entirely of either PM10 or PM2.5. This allows the EA to determine the potential impact from each of these pollutants were they to make up the entirety of the TPM emitted. This is a precautionary approach as in practice TPM will be a mixture of sizes, and so the true impact will be less. The EA has not carried out a formal assessment with regards to setting limits for emissions of PM10 and PM2.5 individually because the TPM approach delivers effective control of both PM10 and PM2.5 emissions.
The EA takes into account the existing concentration of particulate matter in the areas surrounding EfW plants when setting TPM emission limits. The EA assesses new EfW plant permit applications using air quality modelling to predict the worst-case scenario for the concentration of particulates arising from the plant for both PM10 and PM2.5. This concentration is then added to the existing (background) concentration to determine the total predicted environmental concentration, which is then compared against the relevant air quality standard. If impacts from the EfW plant could cause an air quality standard to be exceeded, then a lower limit for total particulate matter could be specified in the permit, or the permit may be refused.
Finally, on the potential merits of live emissions data monitoring for EfW plants; all EfW plants in England are already required to continuously monitor emissions of oxides of nitrogen, total particulate matter, carbon monoxide, total organic carbon, sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride. Some are also required to continuously monitor ammonia.
Operators are required to report the results from monitoring to the EA every 3 months, and to submit annual reports of their emissions to the EA’s Pollution Inventory. The EA also carries out regular inspections and audits to ensure plants comply with their permits.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 11 December 2020 to Question 124345 on Incinerators: Air Pollution, what assessment he has made of the feasibility of requiring the Environment Agency to take into account existing levels of particulate matter in the surrounding area when setting total particulate matter limits in environmental permits for incinerators in England.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
In England, all large incinerators, also known as energy from waste (EfW) plants, are regulated by the Environment Agency (EA) and must comply with strict emission limits set by the Industrial Emissions Directive (as amended under the EU Withdrawal Act 2018). Permits are not issued if the proposed plant will have unacceptable impacts on human health or the environment.
Emission limits within permits are set for total particulate matter (TPM), which includes both PM10 and PM2.5. New permit applications are assessed to ensure that impacts from both types of particulate matter will be acceptable by assuming worst-case scenarios, whereby TPM is made up entirely of either PM10 or PM2.5. This allows the EA to determine the potential impact from each of these pollutants were they to make up the entirety of the TPM emitted. This is a precautionary approach as in practice TPM will be a mixture of sizes, and so the true impact will be less. The EA has not carried out a formal assessment with regards to setting limits for emissions of PM10 and PM2.5 individually because the TPM approach delivers effective control of both PM10 and PM2.5 emissions.
The EA takes into account the existing concentration of particulate matter in the areas surrounding EfW plants when setting TPM emission limits. The EA assesses new EfW plant permit applications using air quality modelling to predict the worst-case scenario for the concentration of particulates arising from the plant for both PM10 and PM2.5. This concentration is then added to the existing (background) concentration to determine the total predicted environmental concentration, which is then compared against the relevant air quality standard. If impacts from the EfW plant could cause an air quality standard to be exceeded, then a lower limit for total particulate matter could be specified in the permit, or the permit may be refused.
Finally, on the potential merits of live emissions data monitoring for EfW plants; all EfW plants in England are already required to continuously monitor emissions of oxides of nitrogen, total particulate matter, carbon monoxide, total organic carbon, sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride. Some are also required to continuously monitor ammonia.
Operators are required to report the results from monitoring to the EA every 3 months, and to submit annual reports of their emissions to the EA’s Pollution Inventory. The EA also carries out regular inspections and audits to ensure plants comply with their permits.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 11 December 2020 to Question 124345 on Incinerators: Air Pollution, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of requiring environmental permits for incinerators in England to set specific limits for (a) PM10 and (b) PM2.5 emissions rather than for total particulate matter.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
In England, all large incinerators, also known as energy from waste (EfW) plants, are regulated by the Environment Agency (EA) and must comply with strict emission limits set by the Industrial Emissions Directive (as amended under the EU Withdrawal Act 2018). Permits are not issued if the proposed plant will have unacceptable impacts on human health or the environment.
Emission limits within permits are set for total particulate matter (TPM), which includes both PM10 and PM2.5. New permit applications are assessed to ensure that impacts from both types of particulate matter will be acceptable by assuming worst-case scenarios, whereby TPM is made up entirely of either PM10 or PM2.5. This allows the EA to determine the potential impact from each of these pollutants were they to make up the entirety of the TPM emitted. This is a precautionary approach as in practice TPM will be a mixture of sizes, and so the true impact will be less. The EA has not carried out a formal assessment with regards to setting limits for emissions of PM10 and PM2.5 individually because the TPM approach delivers effective control of both PM10 and PM2.5 emissions.
The EA takes into account the existing concentration of particulate matter in the areas surrounding EfW plants when setting TPM emission limits. The EA assesses new EfW plant permit applications using air quality modelling to predict the worst-case scenario for the concentration of particulates arising from the plant for both PM10 and PM2.5. This concentration is then added to the existing (background) concentration to determine the total predicted environmental concentration, which is then compared against the relevant air quality standard. If impacts from the EfW plant could cause an air quality standard to be exceeded, then a lower limit for total particulate matter could be specified in the permit, or the permit may be refused.
Finally, on the potential merits of live emissions data monitoring for EfW plants; all EfW plants in England are already required to continuously monitor emissions of oxides of nitrogen, total particulate matter, carbon monoxide, total organic carbon, sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride. Some are also required to continuously monitor ammonia.
Operators are required to report the results from monitoring to the EA every 3 months, and to submit annual reports of their emissions to the EA’s Pollution Inventory. The EA also carries out regular inspections and audits to ensure plants comply with their permits.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps the Government is taking to reduce levels of PM2.5 pollution (a) in total and (b) emitted from (i) existing and (ii) future incinerators.
Answered by Rebecca Pow
Our Clean Air Strategy, published in 2019, set out the comprehensive action required across all parts of Government and society to reduce our emissions of five key pollutants, including particulates, to meet legally binding targets for 2020 and 2030.
We are taking action now to deliver these commitments. For example, we recently passed legislation to phase out the sale of house coal and small volumes of wet wood for domestic burning across England – measures focused on tackling a key source of PM2.5.
Our landmark Environment Bill delivers key parts of the Strategy. It introduces a duty to set a legally binding target for fine particulate matter, in addition to a further long-term air quality target. In August, Government published a policy paper on environmental targets which outlined our objectives for air quality targets – to reduce the annual mean level of PM2.5 in ambient air and reduce population exposure to PM2.5 in the long-term.
Emissions from incinerators in England are regulated by the Environment Agency under environmental permits. Permits contain limits for total particulate matter (TPM) which includes particulates of all sizes, including PM2.5. All incinerator permits issued since 3 December 2019 have contained a lower daily average TPM limit of 5 mg/Nm3 (compared with permits issued before then for which the limit was 10 mg/Nm3). Permits for incinerators issued before 3 December 2019 will be changed to require compliance with the lower 5 mg/Nm3 limit by 3 December 2023. Operators must continuously monitor their TPM emissions and the Environment Agency carries out regular inspections and audits to ensure that plants are complying with their permits.
Asked by: Jane Hunt (Conservative - Loughborough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the efficacy of Public Space Protection Orders regarding dog control as a tool for encouraging responsible dog ownership.
Answered by Baroness Prentis of Banbury
Under the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime & Policing Act 2014 each individual Public Space Protection Order (PSPO) should be reviewed every three years by the relevant local authority. This allows PSPOs to be assessed for their efficacy and to be possibly amended or cancelled.
In addition to PSPOs there are other tools that police and local authorities can use to control dogs and encourage responsible ownership. The 2014 Act includes specific measures to enable the police and local authorities to tackle irresponsible dog ownership before a dog attack occurs. The main tool to combat this form of irresponsible dog ownership is the Community Protection Notice (CPN). CPNs can be issued by local authority officers or the police on dog owners, or anyone temporarily in charge of a dog at the time of an incident, where dogs are behaving in an unruly way; for example, if a dog is running loose in a park and threatening children, or where a dog threatens, or is allowed to attack another dog.
The CPN could require the dog’s owner, or the person in charge of it, to take appropriate action to prevent a reoccurrence of the offending behaviour. To breach a CPN is a criminal offence and could lead to a significant penalty. The Government is determined to crack down on irresponsible dog ownership and to that end we are encouraging police forces across the country to use these new tools.