Biodiversity Net Gain is a Government policy that is aimed at protecting nature in the UK. There is considerable ignorance of the dire state of biodiversity in this country amongst the public. As Edie reported in June 2025, the UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world, with less than 10% of its original biodiversity intact. This situation has been created by – and continues to be exacerbated by – ever expanding development on virgin land.
The Government therefore signed up to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in 1992 and the latest treaty under this mantle was the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework of 2024 which laid down 23 targets and 4 goals to preserve nature this decade.
These provisions were brought into law in the UK via the Environment Act 2021, which amended the Town & Country Planning rules covering all new development. Under these provisions, which came into effect in 2024, all new developments must ensure that any biodiversity that is lost due to the development of land are replaced on site and in addition that the biodiversity is increased by a minimum of 10%. This is essential for any new development to secure planning consent.
Using an example, if a developer wants to build a new factory on a greenfield site, which contains some trees, a hedgerow and a watercourse and these features will be lost in the building works, it will have to replace that lost biodiversity elsewhere on the development site and also increase it by 10%.
Importantly, even though the hierarchy suggests that this must be achieved on the development site itself, where this is simply not possible, the rules allow for the biodiversity to be created elsewhere and the ‘BNG units’ (as they are called) sold to the developer in order for the planning consent to be achieved.
The regime is underpinned by a complex and burdensome administrative regime, whereby a number of key steps have to be taken to demonstrate the integrity of the planning solution.
There are six main reasons why golf clubs are the perfect host for a BNG project which were outlined in an article by Stphen Cirell in Golf Business Monthly in December of 2025.
