18 August 2026
- Full Defra statutory credit price schedule re-verified live against the GOV.UK guidance (updated 2 June 2026): A1 £42,000, A2 £48,000, A3 £66,000, A4 £125,000, A5 £650,000, hedgerow £44,000, watercourses £230,000, all unchanged since 2023.
- Added a how-to-buy section and FAQ to the statutory credit price page: statutory credits are sold only by Natural England on behalf of Defra through the GOV.UK service, no agent may buy on your behalf, initial checks take about 4 weeks (up to 8 weeks), verified against the GOV.UK buy statutory biodiversity credits guidance.
6 August 2026
- The amending regulations laid on 13 July 2026 are now in force. Confirmed live and verified against the 14 July 2026 Defra announcement: the 0.2 ha small-sites exemption, the removal of the self and custom build exemption, and the biodiversity gain hierarchy change allowing developments over 0.2 ha to go straight to off-site delivery in the first instance.
- Added the temporary development exemption: development permitted for a period of 5 years or less (aggregated across earlier grants for the same temporary development) is exempt where the whole development is temporary and no onsite priority habitat is impacted.
25 July 2026
- Statutory biodiversity credit tiers reconciled to the current GOV.UK schedule: Tier A2 £48,000, A3 £66,000, A4 £125,000 per credit (A1 £42,000 and A5 £650,000 unchanged).
- Small-sites 0.2 ha exemption and the removal of the self and custom build exemption dated to the regulations laid on 13 July 2026, in force for applications made on or after 6 August 2026.
21 June 2026 (launch baseline)
- Statutory Biodiversity Metric v4.0 (JP039) arithmetic implemented in plain TypeScript.
- Defra statutory credit prices loaded from the 2 June 2026 GOV.UK schedule.
- Off-site unit price bands sourced from the February 2026 Biodiversity Units UK market report.
- NSIP extension copy live for the 2 November 2026 commencement date.
- Small-sites 0.2 ha exemption copy reflecting the April 2026 Defra consultation response.
Planned next updates
- Refresh off-site unit price bands when the Q3 2026 Biodiversity Units UK market report publishes.
- Update brownfield-consultation page when Defra publishes the consultation response.
- Land the named MCIEEM reviewer byline when sign-off is in place.