@ericdo I believe your outdoor unit is too large to meet Permitted Development, regardless of where it is sited. The LG HM121M.U33 is listed as being 1.239 × 1.450 × 0.404 = 0.73 m^3, which significantly exceeds the PD cut-off of 0.6m^3.

Posted by: @chickenbig

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 @ericdo I believe your outdoor unit is too large to meet Permitted Development, regardless of where it is sited. The LG HM121M.U33 is listed as being 1.239 × 1.450 × 0.404 = 0.73 m^3, which significantly exceeds the PD cut-off of 0.6m^3.

 

I also had this thought but, if you look at the drawings, the depth is the overall depth however the main bulk of the unit is only 330 deep.  Thus its possible, but not certain, that it does in fact fit within 0.6cu m.  

@ericdo

I suggest that you also ask the local authority if these, what would appear to be very stringent, noise restrictions apply equally to all your neighbours, and if they are indeed complying.

Posted by: @ericdo

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5. The LA has already demonstrated (by doing sound measurement in my neighbours house) that I am causing a nuisance. They supplied their noise measurements and calculations. At the end of it all they said"

"Please note that the noise monitoring in the residential garden has not been undertaken at this stage. However, I have sufficient evidence to indicate that the noise is amounting to statutory nuisance. Since the application require planning permission, if mitigation solution can be achieved via planning, service of abatement notice may not be necessary in public interest. However, service of abatement notice may have to be considered to avoid delays."

This is prima facie at variance with the independent report you posted (however the latter only considered interior noise not exterior noise).  I would ask the LA to produce the evidence, under FOI or a subject access request if necessary, so you can compare.

Posted by: @ericdo

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" If you are going for express consent the LA cannot refuse solely on the basis that it is retrospective. They have to judge it in exactly the same way as a new application."

 

They have told me clearly that the decision criteria have been impacted because of the noise complaint

 

The second point is fair, the complaint is a legitimate representation in relation to an application

I don't think the law says expressly that a retrospective planning application must be judged against the same criteria, the point is that it doesn't differentiate which is generally held to amount to the same thing.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1990/8/section/73A

https://www.planningdirect.co.uk/home/planningappeals/affordable-planning-applications/retrospective-planning-applications

Posted by: @ericdo

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I don’t think the neighbour will withdraw the EH complaint and even if they do - I'm still faced with the planning complaint

 

Noted, so you need to focus on the law as well as doing whatever is reasonable to ensure that your neighbours aren't actually harmed.

Posted by: @ericdo

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The actual planning app is here (somehow the address got messed up. Which is why you could not find it)

21/P/01334

By your own admission you haven't complied, so the LA has a hold over you

Its too late to appeal their condition notwithstanding that it is unachievable and thus could well be deemed unreasonable if you were to appeal (additional noise must increase the noise, the amount may be tiny but it will be an increase, their condition requires no increase and is thus not capable of being met nor is it actually consistent with (a quick read of..) their local plan or the presumption in favour of sustainable development inherent in the NPPF)

("The mitigation should ensure that the Air Source Heat Pump installed and operated in connection with the carrying
out of this permission shall be so enclosed and/or attenuated such that the noise emitted does not increase the residual equivalent continuous noise level as measured according to British Standard BS4142:2014 + A1:2019 at any nearby
residential property or noise sensitive premises (this must include a correction factor for any particular tonal quality and intermittency factor.")

Posted by: @ericdo

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From reading all our your very helpful and valuable comments it seems I should

a) Not go down the enclosure route

b) Continue to look at ~25m of piping to move the ASHP to my garage side of the house

c) Continue to look at a legal option to overturn the planning condition based on the fact that they used EH law to determine a Planning law. 

a - agreed

b - possibly

c - waste of time, the only route to overturn a planning condition is an appeal and I believe you are timed out (feel free to check if I'm right).  I suppose you could still JR it (which tests if they have followed a correct process) but the probability of success is very small.

What you need to do IMHO is

1. seek, from your LA, the evidence they have on the basis of which they claim you are causing statutory nuisance, i n order to determine whether you are in fact at risk of an enforcement notice for statutory nuisance (the noise report suggests no, but you need their side as well).  Then reassess

2. get planning consent for something that is actually doable and then do it, even if doing so requires an appeal against a new application, which it may judging by what has happened to date.  Its unlikely (but not impossible) that the LA will enforce on planning grounds while there is a live application/live appeal.

Finally if you do need more noise calcs why not go back to the people who produced the report you shared here.  Its logical, concise and easy to understand, plus they have done half the work already.  However I am not sure that they can produce a useful BS 4142 report unless you have some sort of sane target, which the current condition does not give you.

For what its worth my LA put a not dissimilar unachievable condition on my application.  I've been arguing with them ever since, slowly teasing out what they really mean and getting concessions.  The neighbour had a similarly unachievable condition for their swimming pool heat pump, I think they probably realised this and so they asked us if it was causing us any grief (which it wasn't). 

I get the impression that some local authorities don't actually yet know how to deal with this stuff, and are making up policy on the fly.  I also get the impression that they don't currently have the intellectual or technical knowledge (or time) to do a particularly sound job of the novel complexities, which is not surprising given that the Government has been systematically stripping them of cash for the past 14 years and thus they are unable to recruit sufficient people of the highest calibre.  Of course if you are as rich as our chancellor and prime minister you just hire expensive consultants to sort it out for you, so don't have to rely on the staff in local government quite so much.  Public services do matter, despite what our national government tells us!

@ericdo would you be prepared to post your LAs noise measurements and calculations.  I'm interested to compare with my own case and also for yours as their conclusion as you state it is at variance with your noise consultants conclusion.  Do your neighbours sleep with their windows wide open?

Posted by: @jamespa

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Posted by: @chickenbig

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 @ericdo I believe your outdoor unit is too large to meet Permitted Development, regardless of where it is sited. The LG HM121M.U33 is listed as being 1.239 × 1.450 × 0.404 = 0.73 m^3, which significantly exceeds the PD cut-off of 0.6m^3.

 

I also had this thought but, if you look at the drawings, the depth is the overall depth however the main bulk of the unit is only 330 deep.  Thus its possible, but not certain, that it does in fact fit within 0.6cu m.  

 

Thanks for checking. The listed dimensions are bigger that the measured ones. I am fairly comfortable that the measured dimensions including fan grill, but excluding piping fall into the 0.6cu m (from THERMA V (AWHP) R32 Monobloc S leaflet_(for End-user) (lg.com))

IIRC the first planning enforcement officer who came and measured it was ok with volume, but not ok with distance to fence. 

The volume is important if my next step is to move it under PD. I am inclined to put in full Lawful Development Certificates application to make 100% sure this time.

Posted by: @ericdo

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The volume is important if my next step is to move it under PD. I am inclined to put in full Lawful Development Certificates application to make 100% sure this time.

Sensible if you go this route for planning.  

However please remember that the existence of planning consent (express or pd) is not a defence against an eh enforcement.

You also need to understand the ehos position, which prima facie is inconsistent with the expert noise report you posted.  You mentioned he shared his measurements and calculations,  perhaps these provide a clue?

Posted by: @jamespa

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What you need to do IMHO is

1. seek, from your LA, the evidence they have on the basis of which they claim you are causing statutory nuisance, i n order to determine whether you are in fact at risk of an enforcement notice for statutory nuisance (the noise report suggests no, but you need their side as well).  Then reassess

2. get planning consent for something that is actually doable and then do it, even if doing so requires an appeal against a new application, which it may judging by what has happened to date.  Its unlikely (but not impossible) that the LA will enforce on planning grounds while there is a live application/live appeal.

1. I've attached the correspondence that I had with the EH Person. (names etc removed) This was all via e-mail. The criteria she used clearly was not BS 8233 against which planning asked me to do the assessment. Statutory noise nuisance seems pretty subjective. 🙁 If you are interested in the XLS, then let me know. Based on this they have a pretty strong case 

Tonight I got a very aggressive letter from the head of Planning Enforcement telling me that she was going to move forward with enforcement action if I did not submit the mitigation design for a discharge condition:) (and also reminding me that "It would also be open for Regulatory Services to consider serving a noise abatement notice, should they  believe you are not taking reasonable steps to reduce the noise levels to an appropriate level.")

2. This thread over the past few days has been incredibly helpful to me. As a result I have decided my best course of action is to move the AHSP next to my garage with all the associated trench digging and piping. I will request a Lawful Development Certificate this time.

Posted by: @chickenbig

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By the way, what size is the currently installed pipework under the concrete? I just wonder whether moving the outdoor unit further down that fence is possible; far enough away that MCS-020 applies (the wooden fence probably does not count as substantial from a noise perspective). One could bodge together an overground pipe run, provided UV resistant pipe insulation is used. Your heat pump requires 34.5 litres/min of flow, suggesting an internal diameter of about 28mm for a 1m/s flow.

Other members of the forum might be able to provide pressure drop calculations to see whether your existing pipe plus some cheap 32mm MLCP might do the job! Assuming the use of 19mm Armaflex HT (0.042 W/mK) with a temperature difference of 55 degrees (very much worst-case as plastic pipe insulates better than copper) I guesstimate heat loss at 3.14 * 0.032 * 0.042/0.019 * 55 = 12W/meter of pipe run. So to put the outdoor unit 15m down the garden you'd be looking at 360W of losses on the coldest day.

thanks @chickenbig My current piping is 28mm copper. Do you have any links on how to calculate the correct pipe size? I found this Pressure Drop (heatpumps.co.uk) but am not clear on how to read it

My current line of attack is to move the ASHP to other side of garage. A more detailed measurement suggests 28m of pipe needed. This will be buried. That Armaflex HT looks like the business..

Perhaps I should start a different threads purely focussing on this solution? I wish there was a magic fairy consultant who could just come a sort it all out for me

@ericdo

Well that's interesting.  At 20dB(A) the room in which the eho has done the measurements is extremely quiet.  And 27dB(A), the level she says is reached when the ashp is on, is below WHO/BS levels deemed acceptable.  I would be willing to bet that there are loads of gas and oil boiler flues that are way more noisy than that and my house inside is at about the 30dB(A) level which I believe is not uncommon.  Of course the on/off nature makes it worse, dare I say therefore that the obvious mitigation is a bit of continuous white noise!

The question is, has the eho really got a case.  Its a very important question because if she has then many people can't heat their homes with an ashp and a fair few can't heat their homes with gas or oil either.  Nor can my neighbour have his ventilation fan in his bathroom.   I'm struggling to see that this would be reasonable, but I don't know the case law on noise nuisance.

It's also interesting that she prefers enforcement via planning, perhaps he is not so sure of his grounds?

It's in a way a pity that you have definitely violated planning rules, it would have been very instructive to test the ehos case further as it has massive implications if in reality a judge would be likely to find in his favour.

I would appreciate if you could post the 15day spreadsheet as well, it has a direct impact on my situation and, if your eho has really got a case, that of many others too.

As you have recognised you need to fix the planning issue as you are definitely vulnerable there so you will probably never find out if the eho is right or not.

PS.  My understanding of statutory nuisance is that it is based on the law of tort, which would probably mean that actual harm must be caused not theoretical harm.  So the eho argument 'they could use the room as a bedroom (even though they don't) may not wash!

PPS a further problem with the ehos position is that its un knowable.  You cannot possibly know what the bacground noise level is inside your neighbours house.  This means that the only way to guarantee you don't increase it is to be well below the exterior background, even though that may be hopeless overkill and technically infeasible.  I have a feeling my eho takes the same view hence the impossible to meet stance of my lpa.  This really needs testing in the courts!

@ericdo  Would you mind if I share your eho position and the background on another forum, without anything which could identify the location or even the Borough Council involved.  Setting aside the fact you did not comply with planning, the position of your eho means that a very large number of people are not 'safe'. 

My hope and suspicion is that she doesn't have a case and is hiding behind planning to avoid having to disappoint a complainant, but if she does then the conclusions are very serious indeed to the point that they would need legislation to solve.  It would mean that many people who believe they have done the right thing, and have fully complied with all the legislation, are at risk if they get a cantankerous neighbour and a eho like yours.  The implications are massive.