New BNG Good Practice Guide Strengthens Nature in UK Developments

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The Future Homes Hub has recently launched a Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) Good Practice Guide, a comprehensive resource designed to support homebuilders in implementing biodiversity enhancements effectively across new developments. This user-friendly guide consolidates practical checklists, on-site workflows, and real-world insights from industry professionals to ease the process of BNG compliance and delivery.

Alongside the guide’s release, the Hub has formally established a Biodiversity Net Gain Implementation Board. Co-chaired by representatives from Defra and Berkeley Homes, the Board brings together developers, policymakers, and other stakeholders to address delivery challenges, promote collaboration, and ensure that biodiversity measures are integrated meaningfully into design and planning decisions.

The Hub’s initiative builds on earlier progress: following the mandatory introduction of BNG across England February 2024 for large sites and April 2024 for small sites all new planning applications must now demonstrate a minimum 10% net increase in biodiversity .As the requirement has gained traction, awareness of biodiversity’s role in development has risen, and a nascent market for biodiversity units has begun to emerge, creating incentives for habitat enhancement within planning schemes.

Further updates from the BNG Implementation Board, in their April 2025 quarterly meeting, highlight the Board’s ongoing work to align BNG with other evolving nature recovery policy areas and address compatibility issues where national planning policies intersect with biodiversity goals.

In tandem, the Homes for Nature commitment, developed in collaboration with RSPB, Action for Swifts, and Hedgehog Street, has been expanded to include apartment developments. The updated guidance now addresses high-rise schemes, recommending features such as nest bricks, hedgehog highways, pollinator planting, and sustainable urban drainage systems. Developers participating in the initiative—over 28 firms representing more than 100,000 new homes annually are expected to install hundreds of thousands of nature-enhancing elements across residential projects. These commitments go beyond baseline BNG regulations and encourage biodiversity-rich development that supports vulnerable urban wildlife.

By integrating the BNG Good Practice Guide, the Implementation Board’s strategic coordination, and voluntary initiatives like Homes for Nature, the Future Homes Hub is driving the homebuilding sector to deliver developments that benefit both people and nature. With mandatory BNG now in place and clarity in guidance improving, the sector is better equipped to promote biodiversity, embed ecosystem services in design, and ensure sustainable outcomes across UK housing supply.

What this means:

• Developers now have a clear, practical resource to navigate BNG requirements, reducing risk of delays and costly misunderstandings. The Good Practice Guide empowers both large firms and SMEs to implement biodiversity improvements from day one.

• Cross-sector coordination through the Implementation Board supports consistency, resolving policy conflicts and fostering shared learning across design, planning, and policy stakeholders.

• The Homes for Nature expansion to apartment buildings ensures that urban biodiversity considerations are no longer limited to ground-level developments, helping integrate wildlife-supportive features into all housing typologies.

• Collectively, these efforts signal growing maturity in the delivery of biodiversity alongside net zero goals, reinforcing the UK’s commitment to nature-positive housing.

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