Planning your development
During the early stages of your development, you'll likely be planning site water supplies and wastewater solutions. At this time, we encourage you to understand our services and apply for a capacity check for your site. This will help you to understand any necessary reinforcement timeframes for increasing capacity.
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Notification of proposed works
Here, you can find helpful information for filling in the notification form for proposed plumbing works.
Drainage and water searches
If you need to locate pipework for a new development in Stodmarsh or construction in Kent, we can provide either commercial or residential searches.
LandSearch
LandSearch can provide drainage and water searches for residential and commercial property - making planning your development that bit easier. You can also access sewer and water maps.
Water neutrality
Learn more about water neutrality in the Sussex North Water Resource Zone and how you can achieve it.
Build out form
Once the Local Planning Authority has approved planning for your development, you will need to submit your build-out rate information if capacity has been deemed an issue.
This information will enable us to assess the impact of your development on our network. Should the network need upgrades, we will design the most appropriate solution within 24 months of planning being granted.
Completing this form will assist us with this process. We'll also use the information to determine whether part of the development can connect before any reinforcement is necessary.
Planning topics
You can find our statements about specific planning topics and geographical areas of our network below.
Housing development in our region can affect the levels of nitrogen and phosphate in the wastewater we treat.
Strict permits from our regulators govern nutrient removal. So, we must consider the impact that any local development will have on our ability to operate to our expected standards.
For more information, please read our position statement for nitrates in the Solent.
If you're a member of the Local Planning Authority (LPA) and want to understand how we respond to planning consultations and how this relates to our obligations as a water and sewerage company, please read through our briefing note for LPA’s on Infrastructure Provision.
To prevent environmental harm and safeguard the special water environment in Chichester Harbour, we have worked with the Environment Agency to provide a joint position statement on managing new development in the Apuldram catchment. We prepared this statement with the involvement of the Chichester Water Quality Group.
We assess planning policy consultations, including Local Plans, by taking into account our guiding principles. These are in line with the National Planning Policy Framework. You can find out more by reading our Local Plans Guiding Principles.
Natural England has issued guidance on achieving nutrient-neutral development in the Stour region. This is to reduce the impact of additional nutrients arising from new homes. Following the guidance, we have prepared a position statement on nitrates in the Stour. Find out more about nutrient removal in our Stodmarsh FAQs.
In the Sussex North water resource zone we have identified a risk to optimising the operation of our existing groundwater abstraction at Hardham. This risk comes from the uncertainty about how much additional supply would be delivered given the environmental impact on groundwater abstraction.
To help understand this uncertainty and what it means for new developments, we have prepared a position statement for the Sussex North Water Supply Zone.
Due to the potential odour nuisance from Waste Water Treatment Works, no sensitive development should be located within the 1.5 OdU odour contour of the WWTW.
Developers will need to employ a specialist consultant to carry out an Odour Assessment. This assessment will need to be to a specification that has been agreed in advance with ourselves to identify the 1.5 OdU contour. To discuss and agree on the Scope of the odour assessment please contact us.
You can also find details of our odour assessment charges here.
If you're building within a source protection zone, you’ll need to ensure you protect the public underground water supply sources. You can do this by contacting the Environment Agency and ourselves to discuss your proposals.