Monitoring

New to BNG monitoring? Start here.

Under Biodiversity Net Gain, Local Planning Authorities have to ensure that many habitats are monitored for at least 30 years.

But what does this mean for LPAs in practice?

BNG monitoring is new, complicated, and still evolving.

The video below gives a brief introduction, cutting through the complexity to explain the key things you need to know and do.

Intro video: What Biodiversity Net Gain monitoring means for LPAs

In the video below, learn how BNG monitoring works, the role of Local Planning Authorities, and what to do now to get ready.

What BNG monitoring involves

Under BNG, many habitats must be monitored over a 30-year period to check they are delivering the gains that were promised. This is underpinned by direct monitoring – someone visiting the habitats to survey them – which is usually the responsibility of the landowner or their agent. The LPA’s role is largely indirect: reviewing the reports that come in, and taking action if a habitat is not progressing as it should.

Getting ready

There are three things an LPA can do now to prepare: decide your local monitoring policy – how often you expect reports, and which habitats you expect to be monitored; work out your monitoring fees, so the work is funded; and set up a data-management system to keep track of it all. Mycelia is built to help with that last step.

How to work with monitoring in Mycelia

Mycelia’s monitoring tools let you set cases up for monitoring and manage them over their 30-year life. They are based on a great deal of research, with input from many LPAs and the wider ecology community. The videos below walk through the main tasks, and the text under each explains the same steps if you would rather read than watch.

Setting up a case for monitoring

When a case is ready to move into monitoring – for example, once you have been told construction is complete – you set it up from the case’s Monitoring tab. Mycelia brings the habitats across from the Biodiversity Metric automatically, so there is very little to enter by hand.

Starting monitoring

Open the case and go to its Monitoring tab, then start monitoring for the case. Mycelia sets up all of the habitats from the Biodiversity Metric, and you choose the first year of the 30-year monitoring period.

Choosing which habitats are monitored, and on what schedule

Mycelia automatically suggests which habitats to monitor, based on the government guidance described below. If you are happy with the suggestions, there is nothing more to do. To change anything, use the dropdown beside each habitat to put it on a different schedule, or to set it to “not monitored”.

The monitored habitats timeline

The habitats you have chosen appear on the Monitored habitats timeline, which shows the years you expect monitoring data for each one. These can differ from habitat to habitat, depending on the schedule each one is using.

Tracking the progress of a case

Once a case is being monitored, you record how its habitats are doing as monitoring evidence arrives, year by year, across the 30-year period.

Recording the evidence you receive

When a monitoring report comes in, save it to the case’s files so there is a full record. Then, on the Monitored habitats timeline, record each habitat for that year as on track or as having concerns, based on the evidence in the report.

Adding notes and looking closer

You can add a note to any habitat to explain your decision – for example, why you have recorded a concern, or what further information you have asked the applicant for. If you need more detail, open an individual habitat to see all of its BNG data in one place.

Adding and editing monitoring schedules

A monitoring schedule sets the years in which you expect monitoring data for a habitat. Mycelia provides a sensible default, and you can create your own to match your local policy, or to monitor particular habitat types more or less often.

Where to manage schedules

Schedules are managed under Settings, in Organisation settings, in the Habitat monitoring schedules section. The default schedule is available to every case.

Creating and editing schedules

To add a schedule, give it a name and choose the years in which monitoring should happen; a preview shows you which years would be required. You can edit any schedule, including the default – if a schedule is already in use, your changes apply to all the habitats on it. You can also choose which schedule applies by default.

Applying a schedule to a habitat

On a case’s Monitoring tab, the schedules you have set up appear in the dropdown beside each habitat, so you can apply the right one to each.

How Mycelia suggests which habitats to monitor

When you set up a monitoring case, Mycelia automatically suggests which habitats should be monitored. (You can also see these suggestions at Assessment stage, in the “Habitats to be secured” section of the case overview page.)

These suggestions are based on government guidance, which you can find here. The guidance sets out which on-site habitats should be considered “significant”, meaning that they should be secured and monitored. (Under the Environment Act 2021, all off-site habitats must be secured and monitored.)

Based on this guidance, Mycelia automatically sets the following habitats to be monitored:

• All off-site habitats.
• All on-site creations of habitats with medium or higher distinctiveness.
• Any on-site enhancement where the resulting habitat has medium or higher distinctiveness, or its condition or distinctiveness increases as a result of the enhancement.

If you are happy with the automatic suggestions, there is nothing further for you to do. If you want to adjust which habitats are monitored, you can use the drop-down menus on the case’s Monitoring tab.

Further resources on monitoring

Monitoring fee calculator

You can charge developers for your monitoring costs. It’s vital to get this right, so you don’t end up with unfunded costs. We’ve published a free monitoring fee calculator, along with guidance and a video walkthrough.

See the monitoring fee calculator

Government guidance

If you’d like to read the government guidance on BNG, the key places to look are:

• Planning practice guidance – Biodiversity Net Gain
• Defra – Biodiversity Net Gain: what Local Planning Authorities should do
• Defra – Make on-site biodiversity gains as a developer
• Defra – Enter a legal agreement for Biodiversity Net Gain

Give us your feedback

BNG monitoring is new and everyone is working it out, based on evolving guidance and practice. We want the best outcomes for nature and for everyone involved in BNG, so we’re aiming to contribute – through what we build in Mycelia, and the resources and guidance we produce.

Mycelia’s current monitoring functionality is just the start. We’d love your feedback, to help us shape further updates. If you have questions or feedback, please get in touch (mycelia-support@verna.earth).