Lancashire Environment 2002
Introduction
'Lancashire Environment 2002' is a state of the environment report for the County. It reveals how conditions have changed over time and whether key environmental factors are deteriorating or improving.Where possible, there is a particular emphasis on highlighting change since 1991 when the first Lancashire Green Audit state of the environment report was published. 35 environmental indicators are presented in this report, many of which update the key data from the 1991 Audit.
Executive SummaryThis report reveals that overall Lancashire's environment has improved over the last decade. Of 35 indicators, 17 show movement in the right direction. There has been a spectacular improvement in the quality of Bathing Waters and the area of woodland in the county has increased by 23%.
We have greatly improved our recording and designating of the most important environmental assets - there are now twice as many designated wildlife sites and twice as many designated heritage sites, and there are over 400 Countryside Stewardship schemes.
But these indicators only tell part of the story. We do not have the monitoring systems in place to reveal whether many of these assets are getting better or worse. We have very little information about individual species and habitats and it will be a key priority to establish monitoring systems for the most important of these identified in the Lancashire Biodiversity Action Plan.
New landscape designations for the County are an important step forward but we now need to develop new indicators to monitor how the landscape is changing.
Considerable challenges remain in several areas. Household waste production has continued to rise at such a rate as to cancel out rises in recycling and recovery rates, although the Municipal Waste Management Strategy has set challenging targets to deal with this.
There has been a general improvement in the cleanliness of Lancashire's rivers but many parts of the County still experience problems. In the lowland areas agricultural run off into watercourses is having a harmful effect. These areas contain the majority of the county's ponds which may also be suffering, although we do not have the information to monitor pond quality. The Leeds - Liverpool Canal, a major tourism asset, does not contain water of good quality along any of its length in Lancashire.
Despite improvements in the last decade, Lancashire still has the lowest percentage woodland cover of any County in the country. Sixty per cent of the County's woodland is found in two districts - Lancaster and Ribble Valley and eight of the districts have less than 4% woodland cover, below half the average figure for England.
In line with national trends, the volume of traffic has risen dramatically in the last decade with all major routes showing large increases. The busiest stretch of motorway in the County, the M6 east of Preston has seen a 69% increase in the number of vehicles per day.
Emissions from road traffic are now the major source of greenhouse gases in Lancashire. Falls in emissions since 1990 have been entirely due to the move away from coal fired power stations nationally to less polluting fuels. Energy use in homes has increased by 15%.
Current monitoring of air quality in the County shows that there are no identified problem areas at present. Less coal burning at power stations and in homes has led to falls in levels of some pollutants. There is however a need to improve the monitoring network particularly in the light of projected increases in traffic and traffic related emissions.
The quality of housing continues to be a problem, particularly in the towns of East Lancashire where up to a quarter of the housing stock is classed as being below the standard for comfortable living. These towns have also seen low growth rates in the extent of their urban areas with the highest growth rates being seen in the central Lancashire districts of Chorley, Preston and South Ribble.
Complaints to district councils about noise have risen sharply with over three quarters of those now being about noisy neighbours.There is a lack of further indicators to measure the quality of local environmental conditions, such as litter, graffiti or vacant land.We will now be looking at how these issues can be measured.The indicator on the location of pollution sources does show that those people who live in the most deprived areas may be more exposed to pollution from a number of sources.