Planning report costs in the UK usually land somewhere between £250 and £12,000 per report in 2026, and most applications need more than one. A householder extension with no constraints may need none at all; a nine-unit scheme in a flood zone can easily run to five separate technical reports and a four-figure bill before a single drawing is submitted.
This guide sets out indicative 2026 price bands for the five technical reports that trigger most often on UK planning applications — daylight and sunlight, flood risk assessment, air quality assessment, energy statement and sustainability statement — plus what drives each price, what the whole bundle costs for four realistic scheme types, and where the fees are avoidable. Every figure below is a market range, not a quote: two identical-looking sites can sit in different bands depending on constraints.
Planning report costs UK 2026: the quick answer
The table below is the short version. All figures exclude VAT and cover the planning stage only — Building Regulations compliance work is normally quoted separately.
| Report | Small scheme | Larger / complex scheme | What triggers it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight & sunlight | £500 – £1,200 | £3,000 – £8,000+ | Neighbouring windows affected, or new habitable rooms to assess |
| Flood risk assessment | £300 – £900 | £2,500 – £12,000+ | Flood Zone 2 or 3, site over 1 ha, or surface water risk |
| Air quality assessment | £400 – £1,500 | £1,500 – £4,000+ | AQMA, busy road frontage, significant traffic or dust generation |
| Energy statement | £250 – £600 | £2,500 – £5,000+ | New dwellings, major schemes, most London applications |
| Sustainability statement | £750 – £1,200 | £3,000 – £4,000+ | Local list requirement, new build, or BNG/BREEAM triggers |
Two points that catch applicants out. First, these are consultant fees only — the council's own planning application fee is separate and is covered further down. Second, the number of reports you need is set by your local planning authority's validation list, not by national policy alone, so the same scheme can cost different amounts in two neighbouring boroughs.
How much does a daylight and sunlight report cost?
Expect roughly £500 to £2,500 for a straightforward residential scheme, with larger or contested cases running well into four and five figures. The variable that moves the price most is the number of neighbouring windows in scope: a rear extension affecting two windows is a fundamentally smaller modelling job than a five-storey block surrounded by flats.
- Single rear or side extension (one or two affected neighbours): £500 – £1,000
- Loft conversion or single new dwelling: £600 – £1,200
- Small block of flats or office-to-residential conversion: £1,200 – £3,000
- Larger or multi-storey residential scheme: £3,000 – £8,000+
- Major or contested development needing rebuttal evidence: £8,000 – £20,000+
Work is judged against BRE BR 209 (2022 edition) and, for internal daylight in new homes, BS EN 17037. A report that only runs VSC and ignores no-sky line or APSH is cheap for a reason — it will not answer the questions a case officer asks. Our full breakdown is in how much a daylight and sunlight report costs in the UK.
How much does a flood risk assessment cost?
A site-specific flood risk assessment for a small application typically costs £300 to £900. The jump comes when hydraulic modelling enters the picture: bespoke modelling on a Flood Zone 3 site can add £10,000 or more on its own.
- Householder extension, low-complexity site: £300 – £600
- Single new dwelling or small change of use: £400 – £900
- Minor scheme (2–9 dwellings) with a drainage strategy: £750 – £2,500
- Major scheme (10+ dwellings), or Flood Zone 3 with modelling: £2,500 – £12,000+
- Infiltration testing for SuDS design (add-on): £1,000 – £3,000
The biggest hidden cost is discovering late that a drainage strategy is needed as well. A flood risk assessment answers "is this site safe?"; a drainage strategy answers "where does the water go?" — and many validation lists want both. See drainage strategy vs flood risk assessment and our FRA cost guide, or check your zone first with the free flood zone checker.
How much does an air quality assessment cost?
Air quality is the report with the widest spread, because "air quality assessment" covers everything from a two-page screening note to full dispersion modelling. Typical 2026 bands:
- Screening statement: £400 – £800
- Simple air quality assessment: £750 – £1,500
- Detailed assessment with dispersion modelling: £1,500 – £4,000+
- Construction dust assessment (IAQM method, often bundled): £500 – £1,500
- Air quality chapter within an EIA: £4,000 – £10,000+
The cost risk here is timing rather than price. If a council asks for baseline monitoring before determination, that adds three to six months of survey time plus equipment and laboratory costs on top of the fee — which is why establishing early whether your site sits inside an Air Quality Management Area matters more than shopping the fee. Detail in our air quality assessment cost guide.
How much does an energy statement cost?
Energy statements are usually the cheapest of the five, from around £250 for a single dwelling, because the modelling reuses a SAP calculation the project needs anyway.
- Single dwelling or householder scheme: £250 – £600
- Small residential (2–9 units): £500 – £1,500
- Major residential (10+ units): £1,500 – £3,500
- London major schemes (Policy SI2 compliance): £2,500 – £5,000+
- Non-domestic or mixed-use element (add-on): £750 – £2,500
Two warnings. An EPC is not an energy statement, and paying for one when the council asked for the other wastes both fee and time — see EPC vs energy statement. And in London, the fee is rarely the main number: a shortfall against the 35% on-site carbon reduction target is settled through a carbon offset contribution that can dwarf the consultant's invoice. Our carbon offset calculator gives an order of magnitude, and the energy statement cost guide has the full picture.
How much does a sustainability statement cost?
Sustainability statements typically run £750 to £4,000+. They tend to cost more than energy statements despite being less numerical, because they pull together several separate strands — water efficiency, biodiversity net gain, urban greening, materials and sometimes BREEAM — each with its own evidence trail.
- Householder and single-dwelling schemes: £750 – £1,200
- Small residential (2–10 units): £1,000 – £2,000
- Medium and mixed-use schemes: £1,500 – £3,000
- Major and London schemes: £3,000 – £4,000+
As with energy, the statement fee is not the whole cost of compliance. Delivering 10% biodiversity net gain may require off-site units or statutory credits priced far above any report — and the 2026 exemption changes decide whether it applies to you at all. Check with the BNG exemption checker before budgeting, then read the sustainability statement cost guide.
What does the whole bundle cost? Four worked scenarios
Individual figures are less useful than the total. These four scenarios assume every listed report is actually triggered — many are not, which is the single biggest lever on your budget.
| Scheme | Reports likely triggered | Indicative total (ex VAT) |
|---|---|---|
| Householder rear extension, unconstrained site | Often none; a daylight report if a neighbour objects | £0 – £1,000 |
| Single new dwelling on an infill plot | Daylight, FRA, air quality screening, energy, sustainability | £2,400 – £4,700 |
| Nine-unit scheme with drainage strategy | All five, FRA including SuDS design | £4,200 – £10,500 |
| London major, 10+ units | All five at major-scheme depth | £12,500 – £33,000 |
For the major-scheme row, treat carbon offset contributions and off-site biodiversity units as a separate budget line entirely. They are compliance costs, not report fees, and they are frequently larger.
Council fees are separate — and went up in April 2026
Technical reports sit on top of the application fee you pay the council. Fees in England are now indexed annually to CPI; the uplift applied on 1 April 2026 was 3.8%, taking the standard householder application fee to £548. Full current rates are in the Planning Portal fee schedule for England, and our planning application fee calculator works out yours by development type. Fee structures differ in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
What actually drives the price of a planning report?
Six factors explain most of the variation between quotes for what looks like the same job:
- Scheme scale and unit count — the strongest single driver across all five disciplines.
- Constraints on the site — a flood zone, an AQMA, a conservation area or a dense urban context each deepens the assessment required.
- Modelling depth — screening versus detailed assessment is often a 3–5× cost difference, particularly for air quality and flood risk.
- Local plan policy load — London schemes carry Policy SI1, SI2 and G5 obligations that simply do not exist elsewhere.
- Neighbour sensitivity — objections and rebuttal work turn a fixed-fee report into an open-ended one.
- Programme — expedited turnaround is almost always charged at a premium.
How to reduce planning report costs without weakening your application
The savings that matter come from scoping, not from haggling:
- Read the validation list first. Your council publishes a local list of required documents. It is the definitive specification — commissioning against a guess is how applicants buy reports they never needed. The checklist generator is a useful starting point.
- Screen the constraints before you commission. Free postcode checks for flood zone, AQMA, green belt and site constraints are on our free planning tools page. A five-minute check can remove a £1,500 line item.
- Ask for pre-application advice on scope. A modest pre-app fee that confirms only three reports are needed rather than five pays for itself immediately.
- Commission early, not after refusal. Post-refusal appeal work is the most expensive way to buy any of these reports.
- Design out the problem. Setting a rear extension back slightly, or specifying better fabric, can remove the need for mitigation evidence altogether.
- Bundle where it makes sense. Energy and sustainability statements share source data, and an FRA plus drainage strategy from one team avoids duplicated site work.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need all five reports for a house extension?
Almost never. Most householder extensions in unconstrained locations need drawings, forms and the application fee only. Reports are constraint-triggered: a flood zone, an AQMA, an affected neighbouring window, or a specific local list requirement. See do you need an FRA for a house extension and do you need an energy statement for an extension.
Are these prices per report or for the whole application?
Per report, excluding VAT, and excluding the council's application fee. The scenario table above gives realistic all-in totals for the technical reports.
Why do quotes for the same report vary so much?
Usually because they are not the same report. A screening statement and a detailed dispersion-modelled assessment are both "air quality assessments". Before comparing prices, compare scope: which tests, which standards, how many receptors, and whether responses to consultee comments are included.
Do report costs differ across the UK?
Consultant rates vary modestly by region, but policy is the real difference. London applications carry additional obligations that add cost, and flood risk policy differs by nation — England applies the NPPF, while Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland use their own frameworks.
Is a cheap report a false economy?
It can be. The expensive failure is not a slightly higher fee — it is an invalidated application, a delayed determination, or a refusal that has to be appealed. Judge on scope and standards compliance rather than headline price.
When should I commission each report?
Once the design is settled enough that massing, footprint and unit count will not change, but before submission. Flood risk and air quality can be screened at feasibility stage, because either can change the design fundamentally.
Key takeaways
- Individual planning reports typically cost £250 to £12,000 in 2026, with daylight and flood risk at the top of the range for complex sites.
- A single new dwelling needing all five reports usually totals £2,400 – £4,700; a London major scheme can reach £33,000.
- The council application fee is separate — £548 for a householder application in England from 1 April 2026, after the 3.8% CPI uplift.
- Your local validation list, not national policy alone, decides how many reports you need — read it before commissioning anything.
- Carbon offset payments and biodiversity net gain units are compliance costs, not report fees, and are often far larger.
- The reliable saving is accurate scoping. Screening constraints early removes whole line items; haggling on fee rarely does.
How Fortress Associates can help
We produce all five of these reports in-house, which removes the coordination cost of running five separate consultants against one submission deadline.
Our daylight and sunlight reports are delivered in 4–5 working days to BRE BR 209 (2022) and BS EN 17037, with no advance payment. Our flood risk assessment is a free, site-specific report generated in minutes from live Environment Agency data, following the EA's FRA template (March 2025) with a SuDS drainage strategy to CIRIA C753 — it covers applications in England. Our air quality assessment is also free and ready in minutes, built from live Defra background maps, AQMA boundaries and DfT traffic data, following EPUK/IAQM criteria, IAQM dust guidance (v2.2, 2024) and Defra LAQM.TG(22), for every UK local authority.
Our energy statement is free and covers the Part L 2021 baseline on the SAP 10.2 notional-building method, then the full Be Lean, Be Clean, Be Green hierarchy with CO₂ savings at each stage — including London Plan Policy SI2's 35% target and carbon offset position for London sites. Our sustainability statement is free too, covering water efficiency against the 110 l/p/d standard, 10% biodiversity net gain under the Environment Act 2021, urban greening and BREEAM where required.
See all our services, or get in touch with your postcode and scheme description and we will tell you which reports your application actually needs before you spend anything.
Sources & further reading
- GOV.UK — Fees for planning applications
- Planning Portal — Application fees, England, from 1 April 2026 (PDF)
- GOV.UK — National Planning Policy Framework
- BRE — BR 209 Site Layout Planning for Daylight and Sunlight (2022 edition)
- GOV.UK — Flood risk assessment for planning applications
- GOV.UK Planning Practice Guidance — Air quality
- Institute of Air Quality Management — Guidance
- Defra UK-AIR — Air information resource
- GOV.UK — Approved Document L (conservation of fuel and power)
- GOV.UK — Understanding biodiversity net gain
- Greater London Authority — The London Plan
Need help with a UK planning project?
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