Pollution prevention for business

Document Status

Current

Supplement

Core Supplement

Abstract

Discusses industrial and commercial pollution prevention. Covers: site drainage; deliveries and materials handling; storage; waste management; trade effluent; groundwater protection; training and emergencies.

History

Last updated: 12 February 2026 - Updated the 'Construction, inspection and maintenance' section, 'Work in, over or near a river, stream, lake or pond' subsection, to link to the new service for applying for a herbicide agreement online in England. Sourced from: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/pollution-prevention-for-businesses and converted to pdf. Whilst we endeavour to capture all updates it is subject to receiving alerts from the publisher and there may be formatting or punctuation changes applied to the html version that do not affect the text. Document type: guidance. First published: 12 July 2016. Published in conjunction with: Environment Agency.

Subjects

Publisher History

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is a UK Government department. They are committed to tackling climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and work to secure a healthy, resilient, productive and diverse natural environment. This work has formerly been carried out by the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Department of the Environment.


Information

NBS

NBS has produced specification systems and information products for construction industry professionals for more than 40 years. The National Building Specification is the recognised UK national standard and is used by over 5,000 organisations. NBS is part of RIBA Enterprises Ltd.

Accuris

We connect trusted knowledge to customers' workflows – mitigating risk, increasing efficiency and accelerating innovation For more than 60 years, leading R&D and engineering-intensive organizations have relied on us to achieve on-time, on-budget delivery of complex projects and new products. We deliver an unparalleled combination of technical content and Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies to surface answers from the vast universe of technical knowledge, both inside and outside the organization. In a single interface, we connect the dots between information scattered across many different sources, allowing technical professionals to make better, more informed decisions faster.