diff --git a/docs/README.md b/docs/README.md
index 337be3a..1149412 100644
--- a/docs/README.md
+++ b/docs/README.md
@@ -1,24 +1,29 @@
 # Compiling mdaencore's Documentation
 
 The docs for this project are built with [Sphinx](http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/master/).
-To compile the docs, first ensure that Sphinx and the ReadTheDocs theme are installed.
-
+To compile the docs, first ensure the correct environment is installed, as defined in the `docs/requirements.yaml`
 
 ```bash
-conda install sphinx sphinx_rtd_theme 
+conda env update --file=requirements.yaml
 ```
 
+If this is in a separate environment to your main development environment, you will need to reinstall `mdaencore`, from the parent directory, into this environment.
+Alternatively, you can update your development environment with the above yaml by providing the name of that development environment, though it's generally a better idea to keep them separate.
+
+``conda env update -n dev_env --file=requirements.yaml``
+
+Once the documentation tools and `mdaencore` are installed, you can use the `Makefile` in this directory to compile static HTML pages by
 
-Once installed, you can use the `Makefile` in this directory to compile static HTML pages by
 ```bash
 make html
 ```
 
-The compiled docs will be in the `_build` directory and can be viewed by opening `index.html` (which may itself 
-be inside a directory called `html/` depending on what version of Sphinx is installed).
+The compiled docs will be in the `_build` directory and can be viewed by opening `index.html` (which may itself be inside a directory called `html/` depending on what version of Sphinx is installed).
 
 
-A configuration file for [Read The Docs](https://readthedocs.org/) (readthedocs.yaml) is included in the top level of the repository. To use Read the Docs to host your documentation, go to https://readthedocs.org/ and connect this repository. You may need to change your default branch to `main` under Advanced Settings for the project.
+A configuration file for [Read The Docs](https://readthedocs.org/) (readthedocs.yaml) is included in the top level of the repository.
+To use Read the Docs to host your documentation, go to https://readthedocs.org/ and connect this repository.
+You may need to change your default branch to `main` under Advanced Settings for the project.
 
 If you would like to use Read The Docs with `autodoc` (included automatically) and your package has dependencies, you will need to include those dependencies in your documentation yaml file (`docs/requirements.yaml`).