How heat network zoning interacts with planning permission

Heat network zoning and planning permission are often mentioned together, and they can sound like the same thing. They are not. Planning decides whether something can be built and how. Zoning decides where shared heat networks should go and which buildings in those places could be required to connect.

This explainer sets out where the two systems meet, what has been decided, and what has not.

Two separate systems

Planning permission in England is granted by local planning authorities under planning law. It covers the use of land, the design of buildings and their effect on the area. Councils set out their policies in a local plan and decide applications against it.

Zoning comes from a different law. The powers are in the Energy Act 2023, Part 8, Chapter 2 (sections 226 to 237)[source]. They allow the government to make regulations that set up heat network zones and connection requirements. The regulations themselves have this status: Not yet laid before Parliament[source].

The bodies are also different. A zone would be run by a zone coordination body. The government's policy describes how these are chosen: Set up by local government; the zoning authority can step in if councils cannot agree within 28 days[source]. That may be the same council that acts as planning authority, but the two roles are distinct and governed by different rules.

The point where they meet: new buildings

The clearest link is in the list of buildings that could be required to connect. One category is: New buildings that receive planning permission after the zone is designated[source].

The date matters. A building that already has planning permission when a zone is designated does not fall into the new-building category. A building that gets permission afterwards does. This gives developers a clear line: once a zone exists, any new scheme inside it should expect that it could be required to connect.

The point of tying the rule to planning permission is timing. New buildings are cheapest to connect when the connection is designed in from the start. Retrofitting a heat network connection after a building is finished costs more than including it in the design.

Even for new buildings, connection depends on more than the date of permission. The policy sets a condition on when any building can be required to connect: Only when the zone developer asks for it and the zone coordination body is confident the building can be connected in time[source]. A new building on the edge of a zone, far from any planned pipework, might never receive a notice.

What has not been decided

The government's final policy is in its response to the 2023 consultation: Published 21 January 2026[source]. It sets out the categories of building and the notice process. Several practical questions about how zoning and planning interact will only be settled by the regulations, or by guidance that follows them. These include:

• how planning authorities should take a designated zone into account when they decide applications
• what a developer should be able to show at the planning stage about a future connection
• how conditions on a planning permission might relate to a connection notice issued later under zoning

We will not guess at the answers. When the regulations are published, we will update this page and log the change in the changelog.

Local plans already point the same way

Many councils already encourage or require new developments to consider heat networks through their local plans. These policies predate zoning and sit entirely within planning law.

The government-funded zone opportunity reports for the 28 pilot places often refer to such policies. Carlisle's report, for example, notes that local planning policy already encourages a heat network at the planned St Cuthbert's Garden Village. Where a council's plan and a future zone point the same way, a developer is likely to face consistent expectations from both systems.

The difference is legal force. A local plan policy can be weighed against other considerations when a planning decision is made. A zoning connection requirement, once the regulations are in force, would be a separate legal duty with its own process, exemptions and penalties.

Conservation and physical constraints

Planning and zoning also overlap on historic buildings. Listed buildings and conservation areas are protected through the planning system. Zoning policy recognises this through an exemption ground: Conservation requirements, such as listed status, where connection is impossible or disproportionately costly[source].

A similar ground covers buildings that physically cannot be connected: Permanent physical features, such as the structure or ground conditions, that make connection impossible[source]. These grounds are part of policy, not yet law. How the zoning process would weigh them against planning protections is one of the details the regulations will settle.

Building the network itself

Heat networks need planning consent of their own for energy centres and other above-ground plant, and they need permission to dig up roads for pipes. In a zone, a zone developer would do this work. The policy describes how developers are chosen: Appointed through competition, with exclusive rights to develop a heat network in the zone delivery area[source].

How much of this would go through ordinary planning, and how much might be streamlined for zones, is not settled in anything we have seen published. Some councils working on early zones, such as Plymouth, have run public consultations on proposed zone boundaries. These are separate from planning applications and do not grant consent for any works.

Where things stand

For now, the planning system works as it always has. The number of zones designated in England: None yet[source]. No new building can yet be required to connect under zoning, whenever its planning permission was granted.

Once the regulations are in force and the first zones are designated, the planning permission date will become an important piece of information for anyone building in or near a zone. Our places tracker shows which areas are furthest along, and the zoning regulations page tracks the rules themselves.