Land pollution

Contaminated Land

Local Authorities are required to inspect their areas and identify any land that may be contaminated by past or present activities. If the land poses a hazard to people or the environment action must be taken to restore the land.

Lewes District Council has produced a strategy to explain how contaminated land will be identified and dealt with. See the 'Relevant Documents' section on this page.

Part IIA of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 requires local authorities to inspect their areas and identify any contaminated land. A contaminated land inspection strategy must also be produced which explains how the local authority will carry out the inspection process.

Land is defined as contaminated land if there is source of contamination and a pathway for the contamination to reach sensitive receptors. Receptors are primarily people but also controlled waters (rivers, streams, lakes, ponds and aquifers) and ecological systems.

If the local authority is satisfied that land is contaminated it must serve a Remediation Notice on the person or business that caused the pollution. If they cannot be found, for example if the contamination is historic, then the owner or occupier becomes responsible. Whoever receives the Remediation Notice must do what is necessary to break the source-pathway-receptor relationship. This may not necessarily mean removing the contamination. Breaking the pathway or moving the receptors are ally ways of complying with a Remediation Notice.

The local authority must keep a public register of any land that is determined as contaminated, any Remediation Notices that are served and what action is taken to ensure the land is no longer contaminated under the terms of the Act.

The Contaminated Land Register is available from the Environmental Health Department, Southover House, Southover Road, Lewes. Please telephone Environmental Health on 01273 484494 or email ehealth@lewes.gov.uk

Contaminated Land Inspection Strategy >