Incorporating detectability of threatened species into environmental impact assessment.

There is now a substantial body of literature documenting the detectability of plants and animals under standard survey conditions. Despite the evidence that many flora and fauna species have detection probabilities of less than one, it is still the default assumption of most environmental impact assessment processes that if a species is present, it will be detected. Here we briefly review a number of existing studies that have estimated the survey effort necessary to detect animal species, based on what is known about their detection rates in standard surveys. We then propose a novel method, based on failure‐time analysis, for quantifying the detectability of and determining appropriate survey effort for plant species during flora surveys. We provide computer code for implementing the method in the Bayesian freeware WinBUGS. Methods for estimating detectability can be used to inform minimum survey requirements and have important applications in environmental impact assessment and monitoring.

Robust science underpinning legislation can create better outcomes for threatened species impacted by infrastructure projects

The Environmental and Social Impact Assessment: a further step towards an integrated assessment process

BackgroundSince the 1960s, environmental impact assessments (EIAs) and recently, social impact assessments (SIAs), have been conducted during the planning stages of large development projects to identify potential adverse effects and propose mitigation measures to ameliorate these impacts. EIAs and SIAs should outline all possible positive and negative effects of a proposed action or development on ecological and social systems, respectively, including biodiversity, flora and fauna, abiotic components (such as air quality), human health, security and wellbeing. The work outlined herein aims to generate a list of all possible direct and indirect effects of metal mining (including gold, iron, copper, nickel, zinc, silver, molybdenum and lead) along with the impacts of mitigation measures proposed, that are mentioned in EIAs and SIAs in Arctic and boreal regions of the following countries/regions: Canada, Alaska (USA), Greenland, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia.MethodsWe will conduct searches for environmental and social impact assessments in Swedish and English, and until theoretical saturation is reached (i.e. no new action-impact pathways are identified). We will perform searches of specialist websites (e.g. public repositories of environmental and social impact assessments) and Google Scholar. We will also contact relevant stakeholders (that have been identified in the wider 3MK project https://osf.io/cvh3u/) and make a call for additional information. Eligibility screening will be conducted at two levels: title and full text. Meta-data will be extracted from eligible studies including type of mining activity, location of mine, type of impacts, and planned mitigation measures. Findings will be presented narratively, in a searchable relational database and in an evidence altas (a cartographic map). We will produce a framework of different mining impacts and related mitigation measures from practitioners’ knowledge reflected in EIAs and SIAs. This framework will further form the basis of a multiple knowledge base on mining impacts and mitigation measures generated from different knowledges including scientific, Indigenous, and practitioners’ knowledge.

Environmental health impact assessment: evaluation of a ten-step model.

Environmental impact assessment practices of the federative republic of Brazil: A comprehensive review

Local participation is always beneficial for sustainable action and environmental problems resulting from urban implementation due to the failure of social and institutional change necessary for a successful transformation of rural life to urban life ahead of the rapid movement of the population. Despite good legal practice and comprehensive guidelines, evidence suggests that Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) or more broadly Environmental, Social and Health Impact Assessment (ESHIA) have not yet been found satisfactory in Nigeria, as the current system amounts to duplication of efforts and cost. However, ESHIA has been developed and integrated to help manage project activities, facilities, and operations sustainably, so that both economic and ecological profits are accrued (sustainable development) or ensure that any development project does not result in excessive deterioration of and/or the irreversible adverse effect on any component of the environment – a recite for sustainable development. A literature review was done by using a variety of search engines including Research Gate, Google Scholar, Academia, Mendeley, SSRN search strategy to retrieve research publications, “grey literature” and expert working group reports. The thrust of this study is to evaluate the potential benefits of ESHIA as a tool for sustainable environmental development. The evaluation and implementation of EIA are one of the strengths of these tools. Indeed, EIA is the first and foremost management tool employed to help mitigate adverse, potential, and associated impacts of proposed major developments in our environment. EIA is a regulatory requirement that is efficiently used to improve performance, project design, enhancing decision-making, and facilitating policy programs in a sustainable environment. An evaluation of the EIA systems reveals several weaknesses of the EIA system. These include the inadequate capacity of EIA approval authorities, deficiencies in screening and scoping, poor EIA quality, insufficient public participation, and weak monitoring and erratic government policies. Overall, most EIA study rarely meets the objectives of being a project planning tool to contribute to achieving sustainable development and mitigate the impact of the development project. The study recommends some directions for the future to ensure that entire content of the EIA are religiously implemented, review the existing EIA act, increase the expertise of EIA consultants, create a liaison office with an international organisation and with sister agency, ESHIA must enjoy Improved budgetary provision, time latitude, spatial contexts and methodological improvements for outcome measures to achieve results that are relevant to sustainable development by improving project design, enhancing decision making and facilitating policy programs.

Context With the ongoing biodiversity crisis and the continued loss of species, it becomes crucial to find practical solutions to monitor threatened animal populations for wildlife conservation and management. However, in practice, monitoring is especially challenging for elusive, rare, and wide-ranging species, where estimating abundance is often expensive and time-consuming. Alternatively, estimating occupancy (i.e. detection/non-detection data) may be less resource-intensive, while still providing useful information for monitoring population trends. Aims We aimed to describe a new field method, the random walk grid survey, to conduct a habitat selection study on elusive diurnal forest-dwelling primates. We explored how to improve occupancy estimates when detection probability is low and determined the minimal effort needed for reasonable estimates on the species habitat selection by using site-occupancy models. Methods We collected data to assess the northern pigtailed macaques’ (Macaca leonina) occupancy and detection probability using a random walk survey of degraded forest fragments in Sakaerat Biosphere Reserve in Northeast Thailand. We ran simulations to identify what is required for minimum survey efforts to obtain reasonable estimates of occupancy and detection probability on small or relatively large spatial scales, covering a small primate community in Southeast Asia. Key results Simulations showed that the probability of detecting macaques increased dramatically with an increased survey effort. However, compared with similar line-transect survey methods, the random walk grid survey was less time-consuming. Additionally, the occupancy and habitat selection estimates were similar to our knowledge of macaque distribution within the study area. Conclusions Our findings suggest that the new random walk grid survey method is effective to assess the elusive northern pigtailed macaques’ occupancy, and to provide reliable data on habitat selection where there is low macaque abundance and detection probability in a degraded forest fragment. Implications Our survey protocol could be used as a starting point to target high location occupancy to start habituation processes, but also for further intensive studies on primate behaviour and habitat use of primate communities. Finally, combining the random walk grid survey with automated recording devices (e.g. camera traps or passive acoustic surveys) could help improve occupancy and detection probability estimates for long-term monitoring programs and over large spatial scales.

Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and ManagementVol. 16, No. 03, 1401003 (2014) No AccessEDITORIAL — DISASTER AND RISK MANAGEMENT: THE ROLE OF ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENTThomas FischerThomas Fischer Search for more papers by this author https://doi.org/10.1142/S1464333214010030Cited by:6 Next AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsRecommend to Library ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail References J. Artset al., Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management 14(4), (2012). Link, Google Scholar Benson, C (2007). Environmental assessment. In Tools for Mainstreaming Disaster Risk Reduction, C Benson and J Twigg (eds), http://www.preventionweb.net/files/1066_toolsformainstreamingDRR.pdf: 79–89 . Google Scholar T. B. Fischer , Theory and Practice of Strategic Environmental Assessment — Towards a More Systematic Approach ( Earthscan , London , 2007 ) . Google Scholar Fischer, TB (2009). On the role(s) of (strategic) environmental assessment in "greening" decision making. University of Utrecht, Copernicus Lecture, 2 March. http://www.twoeam-eu.net . Google Scholar Fischer, TB and O Nadeem (2013). Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Curriculum for Higher Education Institutions in Pakistan. Pakistan: IUCN. http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/niap_eia_curriculum_for_hei_pdf . Google Scholar Gore, T and TB Fischer (2014). Uncovering the factors that can support and impede post-disaster EIA practice in developing countries: The case of Aceh Province, Indonesia. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eiar.2013.09.001 . Google Scholar Randall, J and E Jowett (2010). Green recovery and reconstruction toolkit — Environmental impact assessment tools and techniques. World Wildlife Fund, San Francisco. http://green-recovery.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Module-3-Content-Paper.pdf . Google Scholar FiguresReferencesRelatedDetailsCited By 6Integration of the Standalone ‘Risk Assessment’ Section in Project Level Environmental Impact Assessment Reports for Value Addition: An Indian Case AnalysisArjun Kumar A. Rathi26 January 2023 | Sustainability, Vol. 15, No. 3Assessing impact of salinity and climate scenarios on dry season field crops in the coastal region of BangladeshAna J.P. Carcedo, Leonardo M. Bastos, Sudhir Yadav, Manoranjan K. Mondal and S.V. Krishna Jagadish et al.1 Jun 2022 | Agricultural Systems, Vol. 200Assessing Impact of Salinity and Climate Scenarios on Dry Season Field Crops in the Coastal Region of BangladeshAna Carcedo, Leonardo M. Bastos, Sudhir Yadav, Manoranjan K. Mondal and S.V. Krishna Jagadish et al.1 Jan 2021 | SSRN Electronic Journal, Vol. 106Strategic Environmental Assessment for development programs and sustainability transition in the Colombian post-conflict contextJuanita Gallego Dávila, Juan Azcárate and Lone Kørnøv1 Jan 2019 | Environmental Impact Assessment Review, Vol. 74Tools for integrating environmental objectives into policy and practice: What works where?Hens Runhaar1 Jul 2016 | Environmental Impact Assessment Review, Vol. 59How is the Role of Ecosystem Services Considered in Local Level Flood Management Policies: Case Study in Cumbria, EnglandNazmul Huq and Alexander Stubbings12 January 2016 | Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management, Vol. 17, No. 04 Recommended Vol. 16, No. 03 Metrics History Published: 7 October 2014 PDF download

Environmental impact assessment (EIA) performance has remained of interest, and over the past ten years, the evaluation technique has evolved. Thailand implemented an EIA with a health impact assessment (HIA) as an environmental health impact assessment (EHIA), which necessitated investigating and developing these instruments; however, its implementation performance has been questioned. The main goal of this study is to comparatively assess how well EIAs and EHIAs are performed in projects in an area in Thailand. Six projects in various sectors that were implemented in Eastern Thailand were studied. The 162 residents (nine local authorities and 153 villagers) closest to the project completed a survey and evaluated the performance according to three aspects (i.e., substantive, procedural, and transactive), using a rating scale and evaluation checklists. The results were presented as a percentage of the total scores and interpreted according to the five scales. The overall performance reached a satisfactory level, albeit not significantly different between cases; however, it was pointed out that the shortcomings of EHIAs and EIAs, particularly their dependability, lack of public involvement, and the need for more transparency, could be addressed through the establishment of an open access database, which would help to simplify the assessment of all stages of EIAs and EHIAs.

Global Environmental Impact Assessment Research Trends (1973-2009)

H. A. Becker and A. L. Porter, Methods and Experiences in Impact Assessment (1986); W. Kennedy, ‘The Directive on Environmental Impact Assessment’, 8 Environmental Policy and Law 84 (1988); C. Klein-Chesivoir, ‘Avoiding Environmental Injury: The Case for Widespread Use of Environmental Impact Assessments in International Development Projects’, 30 Virginia Journal of International Law 517 (1990); R. Macrory, ‘Environmental Assessment: Critical Legal Issues in Implementation’, in D. Vaughan (ed.), EC Environmental and Planning Law (1990); W. Futrell, ‘Environmental Assessment: The Necessary First Step in Successful Environmental Strategies’, 10 UCLA Pacific Basin Law Journal 234 (1991); P. Sands and D. Alexander, ‘Assessing the Impact’, 141 New Law Journal 1487 (1991); N. Robinson, ‘International Trends in Environmental Impact Assessment’, 19 Boston College Environmental Affairs Law Review 591 (1992); R. Stewart, ‘Environmental Risk Assessment: The Divergent Methodologies of Economists, Lawyers and Scientists’, 10 Environment and Planning Law Journal 10 (1993); M. Yeater and L. Kurukulasuriya, ‘Environmental Impact Assessment Legislation in Developing Countries’, in Sun Lin and L. Kurukulasuriya (eds.), UNEP'S New Way Forward: Environmental Law and Sustainable Development (1995); P. Okowa, ‘Procedural Obligations in International Environmental Agreements’, 67 BYIL 275 (1996); UNEP, Environmental Impact Assessment: Issues, Trends and Practise (1996); J. Glasson, J. Chadwick and R. Therivel, An Introduction to Environmental Impact Assessment (1999, 2nd edn); J. Ebbeson, ‘Innovative Elements and Expected Effectiveness of the 1991 EIA Convention’, 19 Environmental Impact Assessment Review 47 (1999); K. Gray, ‘International Environmental Impact Assessment: Potential for a Multilateral Environmental Agreement’, 11 Colorado Journal of Environmental Law and Policy 83 (2000); J. Knox, ‘The Myth and Reality of Transboundary Environmental Impact Assessment’, 96 AJIL 291 (2002).

GreAT (Greener Air Traffic Operations) is a project funded by the European Commission under the H2020 framework programme. The overall objective is to reduce the fuel consumption and gas emissions during “gate-to-gate” flight phases through developing and assessing environment-friendly air traffic operational concept, adaptive airspace and green trajectory optimization technologies, and supporting avionic systems. Based on the scientific description of the impact of aviation emissions on the climate, the work within GreAT is seeking the key factors of the impact about aviation emissions on climate change characteristics by using sensitivity analysis, such as greenhouse gases, pollutant gases and condensation, and then select these factors as environmental impact assessment indicators, including fuel consumption, aviation emissions, air quality and greenhouse effect, establishing a calculation model for evaluation indicators using the fuel consumption model, gas emission model and climate change model. System analysis methods are used to build an aviation emission environmental impact (EIA) assessment index system structure, apply environmental impact assessment indicators, construct a general environmental impact assessment index system, and propose a comprehensive assessment method for aviation environmental impact. The following step in the project is the environmental impact assessment of air traffic operations to determine how green air traffic performs. According to the existing air traffic operation patterns, the flight characteristics and trajectory characteristics of the aircraft are determined, and the environmental impact assessment index system is used to evaluate the environmental impact under the air traffic operation plan and the impact and improvement effect on climate change.

Shasta salamanders (collectively, Hydromantes samweli, H. shastae, and H. wintu; hereafter, Shasta salamander) are endemic to northern California in the general vicinity of Shasta Lake reservoir. Although generally associated with limestone, they have repeatedly been found in association with other habitats, calling into question the distribution of the species complex. Further limiting our knowledge of the species' distributions is that they are only active or available for sampling on the soil surface for a small portion of the year, and detection probabilities for the species have never been estimated. We developed and implemented a survey protocol designed to estimate detection, availability, and occurrence probabilities from December 2019 through March 2020. We provide inference on Shasta salamander occurrence in portions of their range that have received little survey effort. We found that Shasta salamander occurrence was positively associated with the percent cover of embedded rock, and the species' availability (i.e., probability of being active on the soil surface during sampling) was positively related to relative humidity. The probability of occurrence of Shasta salamanders in our study area was low, and our winter-to-spring survey protocol was effective for estimating detection, availability, and occurrence probabilities in the study area and at specific sites. We suggest that conducting replicate surveys that quantify animal availability and detection probabilities will facilitate a better understanding of the habitat associations of Shasta salamanders and other rare species that might often be unavailable for detection.

In the European Union, the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Directive (2014/52/EU) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) Directive (2011/92/EU) emphasise the assessment of population and human health. The directives require health to be considered within Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA). To date, health is mainly considered in connection with negative environmental factors and in terms of risk assessments. The integration of health in EIA as well as SEA has not been investigated in a Danish context, and this study aims to address the missing knowledge. There is a need for a more comprehensive health assessment within EIA and SEA to comply with the EIA and SEA directives. An integration of health into EIA and SEA will ensure a sound examination of health determinants which can improve decision making and thus comprehensively promote and protect health. To establish the status of the inclusion of the assessment of impacts on health into EIA and SEA, a literature review was performed. In addition, a survey addressed to researchers and practitioners was conducted and analysed through a comparative analysis. The survey examined the needs of practitioners and researchers, focusing on the Danish context, regarding the inclusion of health into EIA and SEA. Enhanced intersectoral cooperation of the health and environmental sectors, more specific guidance documents, and underlying this, stronger political support, were identified among needs for more comprehensive health assessments.