Irishplanningnews.ie

Since the issuing of notices to quarry owners and operators there has been a lot of queries about substitute consent, what it involves and what needs to be done next.

The first decision that needs to be made if the Council have directed an owner/operator to apply to An Bord Pleanala for substitute consent is if the Council’s decision needs to be challenged. The owner/operator has 21 days from the notice to seek a review and this stops the clock in terms of the substitute consent deadline (12 weeks). The reason for seeking a review would want to be very solid as there is a risk that the Board could decide that the Council’s decision to require a substitute consent application was wrong. This could ultimately lead to the closure of the quarry.

If the decision is to proceed with making a substitute consent application to An Bord Pleanala then further decisions need to be made about seeking a pre-planning meeting with An Bord Pleanala (no fee), scoping of the remedial EIS (significant fee) and the need to extend the 12 week period. The latter requires a genuine reason for an extension. The key issue is not to miss the deadline whether it be 12 weeks or the extended version as this would be fatal in terms of the application.

Local Authorities across the country have recently completed issuing notices to quarry owners.  These notices will inform the owners to either seek substitute consent from An Bord Pleanala or that they will be the subject of enforcement action by the council who will seek to close the operation.  Quarry owners have the right to seek a review of the Council’s decision within 21 days from An Bord Pleanala. The substitute consent process is subject to a tight timeframe of 12 weeks given that a remedial EIS or Appropriate Assessment will be required to be completed as part of the application. These notices arose from significant changes to the planning acts and are an effort to retrospectively address situations where development which was likely to have a significant impact on the environment was never actually assessed at the time.  The implications for quarry owners are serious as many face closure.  The benefit for those quarry owners that manage to go through the process and come out the far side is that there will be far less operators to compete against.