You will learn
A pile of documents, made simple
Ask anyone new to desk studies what worries them, and the answer is often the documents. Acts, regulations, policies, British Standards, guidance notes. It looks like a mountain.
The good news: you do not need to read them all, and you certainly do not need to memorise them. You need to know why they exist, what kind of document each one is, and which few matter for a desk study. That is this lesson.
- Explain why a desk study draws on so many documents.
- Describe the four layers of documents: law, policy, standards and guidance.
- Name the main UK documents behind a desk study, and know how to find the equivalents wherever you work.
Why it matters
Five people, five worries
Back at Brindlemere Yard, the developer applies for permission to build 36 homes. Before long, five different people want answers about the ground:
The planning officer
“Is this site suitable for homes at all?”
The council’s contaminated land officer
“Could anyone be harmed by what is in the ground?”
The building control inspector
“Will the new homes be protected from contaminants in the ground?”
The people running the construction work
“Will the workers digging the foundations be safe?”
The design engineer
“What ground am I designing the foundations for?”
Each of these people works to a different document. That is why the pile is so big: the ground affects many people, and each one is protected by its own rules.
The UK adds two more reasons. It has a long industrial history, so a lot of land has been used before and may hide old works, fuel tanks or waste. And the four nations of the UK (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland) each set some of their own rules.
The point
The documents are not there to make life hard. Each one protects someone different. Once you know who a document protects, it stops being a mystery.
The idea, in plain words
The four layers
Almost every document you meet fits into one of four layers. Each layer has a different author and a different strength.
Acts and regulations. You must comply. Breaking the law can lead to enforcement or prosecution.
How decisions are made, for example whether to grant planning permission. Policy decides what you will be asked for.
Agreed good practice. Codes of practice mostly use should: they recommend. They become requirements when a law, policy or contract calls them up.
The practical how-to. It is advice, but if you do something different, you are expected to explain why.
Key words
Act: a law passed by Parliament.
Regulations: detailed legal rules made under an Act.
Code of practice: a standard that gives recommendations for doing something well.
Shall, should, may: in standards, shall is a requirement, should is a recommendation and may is a permission.
The idea, in plain words
The handful that matter in the UK
Here are the main documents behind a UK desk study, sorted into the four layers. For each one, the question is simple: what does it mean for my desk study?
Law
Defines “contaminated land” in law and who must deal with it. Councils inspect their areas for it. Your desk study asks: could this site be contaminated land?
FreeHealth and safety in construction. The client must give designers and contractors pre-construction information, including known hazards on the site. A desk study is often a key part of it.
FreeNew buildings must protect the people in them from contaminants in the ground. In England, Approved Document C explains how to meet this.
FreePolicy
Covers England. Sites must be suitable for their proposed use, taking account of ground conditions, land instability and contamination. Adequate site assessment information, prepared by a competent person, should be available. The current version was published in 2026.
FreeEach council has its own local plan. Councils often attach conditions to a planning permission, for example asking for a desk study and ground investigation before building starts.
FreeWales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own planning policies. The idea is the same.
Standards
The main UK code for ground investigation. It starts with the desk study and site reconnaissance (the walkover), and explains why they come first.
PaidThe contamination side of the investigation, from setting objectives to reporting. Revised in 2026. The NPPF glossary names it as an established procedure.
PaidThe European standard for geotechnical design, used in the UK. A new generation was published in 2024, and the older version is due to be withdrawn in March 2028.
PaidGuidance
From the Environment Agency, last updated in 2025. Its first tier, the preliminary risk assessment, is a desk study, a site walkover and a first conceptual site model. That is almost exactly what this course teaches.
FreeMining, unexploded bombs, radon, flooding, heritage and wildlife each have their own guidance. You will meet it in Lessons 3 to 5, only when you need it.
Mostly freeHow to get the paid standards
You can buy them from BSI, the UK’s national standards body. Many employers have a subscription. University and college libraries often give access, some professional institutions include it as a membership benefit, and some large public libraries offer it too. Start with the free documents: they explain the reasons, and the standards explain the method.
The idea, in plain words
How the layers work together
The documents are not separate rules. On a real project, they hand over to each other like a relay:
The NPPF says the site must be suitable, so the council asks for site assessment information.
The desk study is written following BS 5930, BS 10175 and the first tier of LCRM.
Its findings feed the CDM pre-construction information, so the workers know the hazards.
The designers use it to plan the ground investigation and design to Eurocode 7.
In the background, Part 2A is the safety net. The NPPF says that land cleaned up for development should, as a minimum, not be capable of being determined as contaminated land under Part 2A.
A “competent person”
The NPPF says site assessment information should be prepared by a competent person: someone with a recognised relevant qualification, enough experience of the type of problem, and membership of a relevant professional organisation. A course on its own does not make you one, but this is the knowledge such a person uses every day.
On our site
Adding “Scope and approach”
A desk study states which documents it follows, and why. It does not explain each document. Here is the next section of our report.
Brindlemere Yard: Desk Study Report (fictional example)
2. Scope and approach
This desk study has been prepared to support a planning application for 36 homes. It is intended to provide the site assessment information described in policy P2 of the National Planning Policy Framework.
The study follows the recommendations for desk study and site reconnaissance in BS 5930:2015+A1:2020, and BS 10175:2026 for land potentially affected by contamination. It forms the preliminary risk assessment (Stage 1, Tier 1) of the Environment Agency’s Land Contamination Risk Management guidance.
The study is based on publicly available records and a site walkover. No intrusive investigation has been carried out.
Notice how short it is
Three short paragraphs: why the study exists, what it follows, and what it is based on. A reader can see at once that you know the rules, without wading through them.
Only list what you actually followed
In report reviews, one of the most common problems is text copied from another project: a standard cited for work nobody did, or a lagoon or chalk described on a site that has neither. Reviewers notice, and it damages trust in everything else in the report. Write your scope for this site, every time.
Your turn
Find the rules for your site
Wherever you are
Every country has these four layers, even if the names are different. To find yours, search for:
- Law: your country’s environmental law, especially anything on contaminated land, and its construction health and safety law.
- Policy: national or local planning rules that mention ground conditions, contamination or unstable land.
- Standards: your national standards body, and its code of practice for ground investigation.
- Guidance: advice from your environmental regulator or national geological survey.
If your country has no standard of its own, engineers often follow an established international or foreign standard, and say so clearly in the report.
Task (15 minutes)
For the site you chose in Lesson 1, fill in one document for each layer, with one sentence on what it means for your site:
| Layer | Document | What it means for my site |
|---|---|---|
| Law | ||
| Policy | ||
| Standards | ||
| Guidance |
Then write your own “Scope and approach” section, like ours, in three short paragraphs.
In the UK, check which nation your site is in first. Planning policy and building rules differ between England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Quick check
Five quick questions
This is not a test. It simply shows you whether you are ready for Lesson 3. Choose an answer to see the explanation.
Key points
What to take away
- There are many documents because the ground affects many people, and each one is protected by its own rules.
- Documents sit in four layers: law (must), policy (what you will be asked for), standards (agreed good practice, mostly “should”) and guidance (the practical how-to).
- In the UK, the core handful are Part 2A, CDM 2015, Building Regulations Requirement C1, the NPPF, BS 5930, BS 10175, Eurocode 7 and LCRM.
- Your report states which documents it follows, briefly. It does not repeat them.
- Every country has the same four layers. Learn to find them, not to memorise them.
Where to read more (free)
- Environmental Protection Act 1990, Part 2A (legislation.gov.uk)
- The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (legislation.gov.uk)
- Approved Document C: Site preparation and resistance to contaminants and moisture (GOV.UK)
- National Planning Policy Framework, Chapter 17, including policy P2 (GOV.UK)
- Land Contamination Risk Management (LCRM) (GOV.UK)
Up next: Lesson 3
Site history: what the land used to be. Old maps and past uses, and how to read the story of a site through time.