The government has issued a technical correction to the Stonestreet Green Solar development consent order, effective 6 February 2026. It updates the list of certified documents so regulators and the developer are working from the same playbook, notably on the operational surface water drainage strategy and the Environmental Statement’s Landscape and Views figures. Those documents anchor how the scheme handles runoff and how its visual effects are judged and enforced over its lifetime. (infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk)

Stonestreet Green is a nationally significant solar-plus-storage project near Aldington, Kent. Development consent was granted on 23 October 2025, with an export capacity capped at 99.9MW. The applicant, EPL 001 (a subsidiary of Evolution Power), says the scheme could power around 42,000 homes each year. These facts frame why accurate paperwork matters: certified documents become the legal yardstick for delivery. (gov.uk)

The Planning Act 2008 allows ministers to correct errors or omissions in a DCO’s decision documents within the legal challenge window, ensuring the instrument reflects the evidence actually examined. That mechanism exists precisely to avoid ambiguity in the ‘documents to be certified’, which are the texts inspectors, councils and communities rely on when checking compliance. (publications.parliament.uk)

Two changes are central here. First, the certified Outline Operational Surface Water Drainage Strategy is clarified, fixing the version and date that bind the project during operation. Second, the Environmental Statement’s Chapter 8 ‘Landscape and Views’ figure pack is explicitly referenced, ensuring the visualisations and viewpoint figures used at examination are the same ones certified in law. In the Planning Inspectorate’s examination library these materials appear as 7.14 ‘Outline Operational Surface Water Drainage Strategy’ and ES Volume 3 Chapter 8 ‘Landscape and Views Figures 8.1–8.11.4 (Part 1 of 2)’, including the later REP4-012 filing. (infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk)

Why drainage precision matters: surface water run-off management shapes flood risk, water quality and long-term maintenance. The Environment Agency-backed SuDS Manual update highlights that sustainable drainage delivers multiple environmental benefits when designed and implemented to evidence-based standards. Independent research supported by JBA Trust and CIRIA reaches similar conclusions, pointing to wider gains for amenity and biodiversity alongside flood mitigation. Getting the certified version right means those measures are enforceable. (gov.uk)

Visual accuracy is governance, not garnish. The Landscape Institute’s guidance stresses that photomontages and viewpoint figures must fairly represent what people will perceive in the field and be produced through transparent, replicable methods. Certifying the exact figure set used at examination helps planning authorities and communities judge whether mitigation-planting, heights, fencing-performs as modelled. (landscapeinstitute.org)

This is also a forward-looking fix. From May 2026 the government intends to commence Biodiversity Net Gain requirements for nationally significant infrastructure projects. With BNG coming into scope, document precision on drainage, habitats and landscape baselines becomes even more important so that measurable uplift can be tracked against the certified evidence base. (gov.uk)

For residents and local authorities, the Planning Inspectorate’s case file remains the most reliable dashboard: it shows which versions were submitted at each deadline and which are now certified. For Stonestreet Green, the library records the Outline Operational Surface Water Drainage Strategy through successive versions and the Chapter 8 figure pack, including REP4-012. Anyone checking compliance can point to those specific references. (infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk)

For project promoters, there’s a practical lesson. Treat certification as a quality gate: freeze versions at decision, cross-check document numbers and dates against the examination library, and publish a single-page ‘certified documents index’ for construction teams and subcontractors. That discipline reduces on-site errors and avoids avoidable disputes later when requirements are discharged. (gov.uk)

Zooming back out, this is how environmental governance should work in the energy transition: when paperwork and reality drift, the state uses a light-touch legal tool to realign them. The scheme still promises low-carbon power in Kent, but now the drainage standards and the visual evidence that underpin it are easier to verify-by regulators, by the community and by the developer’s own site teams. (stonestreetgreensolar.co.uk)