Construction noise, BS 5228 and section 61 consent

Section 61 of the Control of Pollution Act 1974 lets a contractor apply for prior consent to the noise from construction works, before those works start. Get it, and the council cannot then serve a section 60 notice imposing different requirements on the same works. Skip it, and you are working on the council's terms rather than your own, usually at the point where a piling rig is already on site.

This regime runs alongside the planning permission rather than inside it. A planning condition controlling working hours does not give you a noise limit, and a section 61 consent does not let you work outside the hours the permission allows.

What BS 5228 predicts, and how

BS 5228 Part 1 is the code of practice for noise control on construction and open sites, and it is what every acoustic consultant in the country uses for this work. The method is straightforward in outline.

Take the sound power or sound pressure data for each item of plant, from the tables in the standard or from manufacturer data where it is better. Apply distance attenuation from the plant position to the receptor. Apply corrections for screening by hoarding, spoil heaps or the partially built structure. Apply an on-time percentage, because an excavator is not working continuously for ten hours. Combine the sources logarithmically to give a level at the façade, usually as an LAeq over a defined period.

The output is a predicted level for each phase at each sensitive receptor. Demolition, piling, bulk excavation, substructure, superstructure and fit out all produce different numbers, and presenting one number for the whole build is the fastest way to have the assessment sent back.

Where the works are close enough that the prediction is sensitive to a few metres, model the actual plant positions rather than an assumed site centre.

The ABC method and what significance means

Annex E of BS 5228 Part 1 sets out the method most authorities expect, generally called the ABC method. It works by categorising the existing ambient noise level at the receptor and then comparing the predicted construction level against a threshold value that varies with that category and with the time period.

The consequence is that the same construction activity can cross the threshold in a quiet residential street and fall well below it beside an arterial road. That is the point of the method, and it is why the baseline survey matters as much as the prediction.

Two things go wrong repeatedly. The first is a baseline measured at the wrong time, so a daytime ambient is applied to evening working. The second is a receptor chosen for convenience rather than for exposure, typically the front of a terrace when the works are behind it.

The thresholds themselves sit in the standard. Buy it or get your acoustician to state which category applies and why, rather than relying on a number copied from another report.

Section 60 notices, and why you want to avoid one

Section 60 of the 1974 Act lets the local authority serve a notice imposing requirements on how works are carried out. A notice can specify the plant that may or may not be used, the hours during which work may be carried out, and the level of noise that may be emitted from the site or at any specified point.

You have 21 days to appeal a section 60 notice to the magistrates' court. Contravening one without reasonable excuse is an offence.

Authorities serve them reactively, after complaints, and the requirements imposed reflect the complaint rather than your programme. A notice that bans percussive piling after 16:00 when your rig is booked for a fortnight of ten hour shifts is an expensive way to discover the regime exists.

Applying for section 61 prior consent

The application goes to the local authority before the works begin, from the person who intends to carry them out, which in practice means the principal contractor rather than the developer.

It has to contain particulars of the works and of the method by which they will be carried out, and the steps proposed to minimise noise resulting from them. In practice that means a document containing:

1. A description of the works, phase by phase, with dates.
2. The plant schedule for each phase, with sound power data.
3. The predicted levels at each identified receptor, calculated under BS 5228, with the assumptions stated.
4. The proposed hours for each activity.
5. The control measures, described specifically enough to be checked.
6. The monitoring proposed, with trigger levels and what happens when a trigger is exceeded.
7. The complaints procedure, with a named contact and a response time.

The authority has 28 days to deal with the application. If it does not consent within that period, or attaches conditions you cannot live with, there is a right of appeal to the magistrates' court. A consent protects against a subsequent section 60 notice for the same works, but it does not prevent an individual bringing statutory nuisance proceedings, and it does not override planning conditions.

Apply early. Three months before works start is sensible on a complex site, because the environmental health officer will want to negotiate the hours before granting.

Best practicable means, demonstrated rather than asserted

Best practicable means is a defined concept in the 1974 Act, taking account of local circumstances, the current state of technical knowledge and the financial implications. Environmental health officers assess it by looking for specifics.

What counts: selecting quieter plant and naming it, using an auger bored or continuous flight auger piling method in place of percussive driving where ground conditions allow, hoarding of a stated height and mass positioned between the plant and the receptor, acoustic enclosures on generators and compressors, broadband reversing alarms instead of tonal ones, no radios, and deliveries scheduled away from the most sensitive periods.

What does not count: a sentence saying that noise will be minimised so far as reasonably practicable. That phrase appears in almost every refused application.

A Noise Impact Assessment prepared for the planning application deals with the completed development and its plant. The construction phase assessment is a separate exercise with a different method, and the two should not be conflated in one document. Where vibration is also in play, the parallel assessment is covered in our note on construction vibration under BS 5228 and BS 6472.

How this sits with the planning conditions

Most permissions carry a condition requiring a construction environmental management plan to be approved before works begin. That plan should reference the section 61 application rather than duplicate it, and the hours in both documents must match. Where they do not, the tighter of the two applies in practice, because breaching either has consequences.

A Construction Management Plan is the right home for the wider controls: dust, mud, hoarding, deliveries, site welfare, community liaison. Noise limits and plant specifications belong in the section 61 document, because that is the instrument the council can enforce against.

One thing a planning condition cannot do is authorise a statutory nuisance, and our note on what a planning condition cannot fix explains where that line sits. Compliance with a consent is a strong defence in practice, but it is not an absolute one.

PlanScope drafts construction management documents from your project details, flagging site specific facts it cannot verify rather than inventing them. Councils expect a suitably qualified acoustician to produce the BS 5228 predictions and the section 61 application itself, and professional review of any draft is strongly advised.

This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.