Assessment of environmental impacts part two: Data collection

Intervention analysis is a relatively new branch of time series analysis. The power of this technique, which gives the probability that changes in mean level can be distinguished from natural data variability, is quite sensitive to the way the data are collected. The principal independent variables influenced by the data collection design are overall sample size, sampling frequency, and the relative length of record before the occurrence of the event (intervention) that is postulated to have caused a change in mean process level.For three of the four models investigated, data should be collected so that the post-intervention record is substantially longer than the pre-intervention record. This is in conflict with the intuitive approach, which would be to collect equal amounts of data before and after the intervention. The threshold (minimum) level of change that can be detected is quite high unless sample sizes of at least 50 and preferably 100 are available; this minimum level is dependent on the complexity of the model required to describe the response of the process mean to the intervention. More complex models tend to require larger sample sizes for the same threshold detectable change level.Uniformity of sampling frequency is a key consideration. Environmental data collection programs have not historically been oriented toward data analysis using time series techniques, thus eliminating a potentially powerful tool from use in many environmental assessment applications.     

The significance of environmental impacts: an exploration of the concept

Since environmental impact assessment (EIA) is concerned primarily withsignificant environmental impacts, the concept of impact significance deserves to be defined and applied rigorously. In this article use of the term over the past 15 years in EIA documentation is reviewed. Some recent attempts at elucidating the concept are summarized. Four perspectives on impact significance that emerged from a series of workshops on the ecological basis for EIA are presented. These perspectives include (a) statistical (related to problems of isolating project-induced changes from natural variation), (b) ecological (related to the importance of project-induced changes from a purely ecological perspective), (c) social (related to the acceptability of project-induced changes in important environmental attributes), and (d) project (related to whether project-induced changes will indeed influence project decision making). The following synthesis is proposed: Any exercise in judging the significance of an environmental impact should thoroughly consider (a) the importance of the environmental attribute in question to project decision makers, (2) the distribution of change in time and space, (c) the magnitude of change, and (d) the reliability with which change has been predicted or measured. The implications of considering these factors are discussed.     

Evaluation of environmental impacts of large scale physical development in central Galilee: Role of experts and policy makers

This article reports on the content and process used to evaluate environmental impacts caused by the development of 50 new settlements in the central Galilee region in northern Israel between 1978 and 1988. Some 60 different environmental and developmental factors and their interrelationships were identified. Selected physical changes that were defined as impacts were later evaluated. The evaluation method was based on intensive use of interviews with resource scientists and decision makers as experts. The data from interviews were used as the basis for factors identification, impact screening, and their rating. Experts used three types of criteria in the latter process: intensity of impact, the potential for its mitigation and compatibility with existing natural resource conservation, and environmental quality protection policy. Researchers concluded that reliance on experts with broad local experience eliminated the need for a more structured and detailed assessment method. The case study shows that experts provided creditable and reliable findings. They substituted the need for long periods of observation and largescale and costly data gathering, analysis, and evaluation.     

ISO 14 001 at the farm level: analysis of five methods for evaluating the environmental impact of agricultural practices

Faced with society's increasing expectations, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) review considers environmental management to be an ever more critical criterion in the allocation of farm subsidies. With the goal of evaluating the environmental friendliness of farm practices, France's agricultural research and extension services have built a range of agricultural/environmental diagnostic tools over recent years. The objective of the present paper is to compare the five tools most frequently used in France: IDEA, DIAGE, DIALECTE, DIALOGUE and INDIGO. All the tools have the same purpose: evaluation of the impact of farm practices on the environment via indicators and monitoring of farm management practices. When tested on a sample of large-scale farms in Picardie, the five tools sometimes produced completely different results: for a given farm, the most supposedly significant environmental impacts depend on the tool used. These results lead to differing environmental management plans and raise the question of the methods' pertinence. An analysis grid of diagnostic tools aimed at specifying their field of validity, limits and relevance was drawn up. The resulting comparative analysis enables to define each tool's domain of validity and allows to suggest lines of thought for developing more relevant tools for (i) evaluating a farm's environmental performance and (ii) helping farmers to develop a plan for improving practices within the framework of an environmental management system.     

Ecological effects monitoring in environmental impact assessment: What can it accomplish?

The premise that, strictly speaking, impact monitoring is impossible, is presented and discussed It is shown that a wide range of published objectives for environmental effects monitoring can be seen as special cases of the basic goal of reducing uncertainty in predictions. Monitoring in environmental-impact situations can only be used as a check on one of the two time series required to define impact. Four approaches to generating the other time series required in the difference calculation of impact are discussed, with the conclusion that the best approach relies on process-based simulation models. Impact analysts are encouraged to consider carefully what can and cannot actually be accomplished with environmental monitoring to assist impact detection.     

Who should prepare environmental impact assessments?

The practice of EIA preparation in a number of states and countries is reviewed in the light of the need to avoid bias, integrate the EIA with project design, and make the proponent pay. It is concluded that the best arrangement may be to make the proponent responsible for EIA preparation and to advise a number of constraints designed to improve the quality of the studies and reduce bias. First, the proponent should be required to select a consultant from a register of those known to be honest, unbiased, technically competent, and capable of working with a design team. Second, two steering committees should be established to identify key issues, specify data collection and modeling programs and methods, and ensure that the study stays on course.     

PROFILE: Integrating Sustainability and Environmental Impact Assessment

/ Environmental impact assessment (EIA) has been identified as an important instrument for facilitating sustainability. However, to do so requires the integration of sustainability into EIA theory and practice. The sustainability concept is a valid and important environmental management perspective. However, many issues and obstacles need to be addressed further if the concept is to be translated into practical strategies. Sustainability can potentially infuse EIA with a clearer sense of direction, an ethical foundation, a mechanism for establishing priorities and assessing choices, and a means of linking EIA to other environmental management instruments. Conceptually, EIA and sustainability can be integrated, but frameworks should be refined, adpated to context, and linked to related initiatives. Sustainability should be explicitly incorporated into EIA legislation, guidelines, and institutional arrangements. An experimental approach to testing, assessing, and sharing experiences is suggested.A framework is first presented that defines and characterizes the sustainability concept. A further framework is then described for integrating sustainability into EIA at the conceptual level. The integration of sustainability and EIA at the regulatory level is next addressed through an overview of sustainability initiatives in EIA requirements in Canada. The Canadian examples include many promising initiatives but these and other experiences will need to be monitored, shared, and integrated into comprehensive environmental management strategies. Finally, means of incorporating sustainability into each activity in the EIA planning process are identified.KEY WORDS: Sustainability; Environmental impact assessment     

Perception of the environmental impacts of current and alternative modes of pig production by stakeholder groups

The current industrial pig production model is in crisis, due to its association with environmental pollution, doubtful product quality and lack of animal well-being. In Bretagne (France), a region of intensive pig production, a survey of seven stakeholder groups concerned with pig production was conducted, as part of a research programme dedicated to the assessment of the environmental impact of different modes of pig production. A very large majority of pig producers (93%) and their suppliers (100%) considers pig farms as an asset for the region, whereas a majority of scientists (58%), activists (78%) and consumers (54%) sees it as a handicap. Differences among stakeholder groups are minor with respect to the perceived importance of environmental and social issues. Stakeholders agree on the relative level of responsibility of pig farms with respect to specific problems. For all groups unpleasant odours and water quality come first with respect to responsibility, for most groups soil quality comes second, followed by product safety and air quality. For a future improved mode of pig production, 76% of pig producers and their suppliers prefer to adapt the current model, for all other groups the majority prefers an alternative model. While pig producers and their suppliers prefer a slurry-based housing system, all other groups prefer a straw-based system. Pig producers see the slurry-based system as technically superior and associate the straw-based system with poor working conditions, whereas consumers associate the slurry-based system in the first place with poor water quality and associate the straw-based system with less pollution. These results will be of use in the research programme on the environmental impact of modes of pig production, as they indicate the environmental impacts to be considered and their relative importance. The results will also help in deciding which options should be assessed. It is concluded that the poor image of the current pig production model and its production practices with consumers does not seem compatible with a sustainable demand for pork products.     

Evaluation of the california environmental quality act

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) has evolved from a mini-NEPA, first enacted in 1970, into a procedural act that affects the approval process of all large developments in California. In 1990, California local governments produced over 1600 environmental impact reports and 30,000 initial studies under CEQA. Because of its widespread use, CEQA has periodically drawn the attention of the state legislature, most recently in 1993, when over 60 CEQA reform bills were introduced. This paper describes the CEQA process and evaluates its success at meeting its explicit and implicit goals. The research includes a statewide survey of CEQA practice, sent to the planning departments of all 513 local governments in California in 1991. Survey respondents agreed that CEQA helps in evaluating environmental impacts, reducing impacts, informing the public, and coordinating public agency review. It is effective in reducing the environmental impacts of individual projects, but is not as effective in improving environmental quality on an areawide scale. This research concludes that CEQA has led to positive outcomes and is not as deeply flawed as many of its critics claim. Still, CEQA as currently designed may not be the optimal vehicle for ensuring environmental quality.     

Environmental Impact Assessment and Management: An Underexplored Relationship

In this paper the existing body of theory is reviewed to highlight the need for further attention to be paid to the EIA/management relationship. In particular it is shown that the majority of the literature to date has concentrated on the influence of EIA leading up to and including the decision to proceed or not with the proposed action. Less attention has been paid to the extension of the influence of EIA beyond this point to inform the process of ongoing environmental management. This relationship is then explored by reference to the Western Australian EIA system. One of the strengths of this system is its focus upon the implementation and management of proposed developments. The outcome of EIA is generally an approval to proceed with the development subject to meeting a suite of environmental design and management objectives.     

Cumulative environmental change: Conceptual frameworks,evaluation approaches,and institutional perspectives

Cumulative environmental change or cumulative effects may result from the additive effect of individual actions of the same nature or the interactive effect of multiple actions of a different nature. This article reviews conceptual frameworks of cumulative environmental change and describes analytical and institutional approaches to cumulative effects assessment (CEA). A causal model is a common theoretical construct, although the frameworks vary in their emphasis on different components of the model. Two broad approaches to CEA are distinguished: one scientific and the other planning oriented. These approaches should not be interpreted as competing paradigms but rather different interpretations of the scope of CEA. Each approach can provide a distinct but complementary contribution to the analysis, assessment, and management of cumulative effects. A comparison of the institutional and legislative response to CEA in Canada and the United States shows that Canada is following the American example of incorporating the analysis and assessment of cumulative effects into regulatory actions and administrative procedures that also govern environmental impact assessment.     

Enforcement of mitigation measures resulting from environmental impact assessment

Until recently, relatively little attention has been paid to the problem of enforcing mitigation measures identified in environmental impact assessment. Present or proposed enforcement systems in the USA, New South Wales, South Australia, and Western Australia are described and discussed. Although the best enforcement system would depend on the local social, political, and legal systems, five universally desirable features are identified. First, a comprehensive coordinated monitoring and reassessment system is needed. Second, the agencies concerned must have adequate resources to do the work and incentives to carry it out well. Third, there must be the necessary legal powers. Fourth, provision must be made for changing the conditions based on experience. And fifth, the system should be equally effective against private companies and public authorities.     

The typography of environmental impact statements: Criteria,evaluation, and public participation

Guidelines for implementation of the National Environmental Policy Act state that environmental impact statements (EISs) shall use “appropriate graphics.” We examined one component of graphics, typography, identifying applicable criteria from the literature and applying them to 150 EISs prepared by seven agencies. We found that the EISs ranged widely in typographic quality. The average EIS met fewer than seven of ten criteria; 12% were considered unreadable. The results suggest that weak typography may seriously limit public review of EISs. Agencies are encouraged to make typography a serious component of their public participation programs.     

Including past and present impacts in cumulative impact assessments

Environmental concerns such as loss of biological diversity and stratospheric ozone depletion have heightened awareness of the need to assess cumulative impacts in environmental documents. More than 20 years of experience with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) have provided analysts in the United States with opportunities for developing successful techniques to assess site-specific impacts of proposed actions. Methods for analyzing a proposed action's incremental contribution to cumulative impacts are generally less advanced than those for project-specific impacts.The President's Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) defines cumulative impact to include the impacts of past, present and reasonably foreseeable future actions regardless of who undertakes the action. Court decisions have helped clarify the distinction between reasonably foreseeable future actions and other possible future actions. This paper seeks to clarify how past and present impacts should be included in cumulative impact analyses.The definition of cumulative impacts implies that cumulative impact analyses should include the effects of all past and present actions on a particular resource. Including past and present impacts in cumulative impact assessments increases the likelihood of identifying significant impacts. NEPA requires agencies to give more consideration to alternatives and mitigation and to provide more opportunities for public involvement for actions that would have significant impacts than for actions that would not cause or contribute to significant impacts. For an action that would contribute to significant cumulative impacts, the additional cost and effort involved in increased consideration of alternatives and mitigation and in additional public involvement may be avoided if the action can be modified so that its contributions to significant cumulative impacts are eliminated.Managed by Lockheed Martin Energy Research Corporation under contract DE-AC05-84OR21400 with the US Department of Energy.     

An approach to integrate impact scoping with environmental impact assessment

Impact scoping is the process of identifying important issues of a proposal and focusing the environmental impact assessment (EIA) on the high-priority issues. Although impact scoping in one form or another has been inherent to EIA for some time, documentation of its development and discussion of refinements to impact scoping processes have not been forthcoming. This article traces the development of impact scoping through time and highlights the need for such processes in EIA. A focused environmental assessment (FEA) approach to impact scoping that is suitable for implementation in an EIA is presented here and advantages of its use are delineated. FEA is a three-staged process that encourages impact scoping through progressive steps including impact identification, assessment and management planning. FEA combines a suite of EIA methods including: issues matrices, impact hypotheses, valued ecosystem components, and stakeholder participation sessions to effectively integrate impact scoping with EIA.     

Self-Organizing Maps for Integrated Environmental Assessment of the Mid-Atlantic Region

A new method has been developed to perform environmental assessment at regional scale. This involves a combination of a self-organizing map (SOM) neural network and principal component analysis (PCA). The method is capable of clustering ecosystems in terms of environmental conditions and suggesting relative cumulative environmental impacts of multiple factors across a large region. Using data on land-cover, population, roads, streams, air pollution, and topography of the Mid-Atlantic region, the method was able to indicate areas that are in relatively poor environmental condition or vulnerable to future deterioration. Combining the strengths of SOM with those of PCA, the method offers an easy and useful way to perform a regional environmental assessment. Compared with traditional clustering and ranking approaches, the described method has considerable advantages, such as providing a valuable means for visualizing complex multidimensional environmental data at multiple scales and offering a single assessment or ranking needed for a regional environmental assessment while still facilitating the opportunity for more detailed analyses.     

Territorial planning,environmental issues and social appraisal: some general implications of ‘new’ assessment methodologies

The paper attempts to conceptualise a range of problems arising from project appraisals. The author presents some general considerations concerning the role of social appraisal in territorial planning, the theoretical weaknesses of cost‐benefit analysis in assessing the effects of projects on territorial resources and some questions relating to assessment methodologies and the welfare foundations of social appraisal within planning practices. The author moves away from evaluation as a technical process towards one which also incorporates ‘practical’ knowledge in a process of argumentation.     

Treatment of risk in environmental impact assessment

Risk assessment and environmental impact assessment have developed as separate traditions. While environmental impact assessment is a broad field that includes all activities that attempt to analyze and evaluate the effects of human and related actions on the environment, risk assessment has been concerned with the relatively well-defined regulatory problems and employs formal quantitative analysis of the probability of specific undesired events, such as cancer. Risk analytic approaches, particularly the explicit treatment of uncertainty, can significantly contribute to environmental assessments. This article discusses the type and sources of uncertainty in environmental assessments, techniques for their quantification, and ways to use uncertainty estimates to calculate probabilities of effects or probabilities of exceeding environmental standards and to determine the need for mitigation or additional research.This article was presented at the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis, Task Force Meeting on Risk and Policy Analysis under Conditions of Uncertainty, Laxenburg, Austria, November 1985.     

几个涉外火电厂环境影响评价的探讨

近年来我们陆续承接了一些发展中国家电力工程中环境影响评价的招标，议标工作和世界银行（以下简称世行）在国内贷款项目的环境影响评价。本文就工作中所涉及的环境影响评价的深度和广度，执行标准，以及今后工作中有待加强的方面作了一些探讨。