Environmental Management

Environmental Impact
Assessment (EIA)
 Environmental Impacts
• Environmental Impacts
• Definition and Purpose of EIA
• Applicable Legislation
• Process
 Environmental Impacts
Environmental Impact:-
any change to the environment, whether
adverse (examples?) or beneficial (examples?),
wholly or partly resulting from an organisation’s
activities, products, or services
 Definition and Purpose of EIA
• EIA is a systematic process to identify,
predict and evaluate the environmental
effects of development proposals prior to
major decisions being taken and
commitments made
• A broad definition of the “environment” is
adopted (see notes from lecture 1)
• Attention is given to prevent, mitigate, and
offset adverse effects from proposed
projects
Definition and Purpose of EIA…2
The purpose of EIA is to:-
– provide information for decision making on the
environmental consequences of proposed
projects

– promote environmentally sound and

sustainable development through the
identification of appropriate enhancement and
mitigation measures
 Applicable Legislation
• In South Africa formal EIA is required by the
following legislation and regulations:
– NEMA, Act 107 of 1998, Chapter 5
• There is also a variety of other regulatory
processes in other environmental, resources
or development related legislation that
intersect with the EIA process
ECA, Environmental Conservation Act (Act 73 of 1989)
Role Players in the EIA Process
 EIA Process
The Developer/Project Proponent:-
- must appoint an independent EAP
The EAP:-
- manages the environmental assessment
process and submits the required documents
(to the state) for authorisation
- deals on behalf of the applicant
- has no business, financial, personal or other
interest in the activity or application other than
fair remuneration
 EIA Process…2
The Specialists:-
- give input related to their field of expertise with
regards to status quo, possible impacts and
mitigation measures
The Public:-
- has the right to be involved and add comment
 EIA Process…3
• Who is the Competent Authority?
- procedure for identifying competent authority,
NEMA Section 24C
• Requirement to obtain environmental
authorisation is separate to the
requirements for other legislation e.g.
water use license, effluent disposal
license, etc.
• Implications on the speed of development?
 EIA Process…4
• Listing 1, Listing 2 or Listing 3 –
environmental authorisation from the
competent authority
• Depending on the type of activity
- Exemption
- Basic Assessment
- Detailed Scoping and EIA
 Listing Notices
• Listing 1: smaller scale activities
• Impacts generally known and manageable
• Less likely to have significant
environmental impacts
Basic Assessment
 Listing Notices…2
• Listing 2: larger scale/high risk activities
• Impacts not easily predictable
• Likely to have significant environmental
impacts
Full Scoping and EIA
 Listing Notices…3
• Listing 3: listing activities and sensitive
areas per province
Basic Assessment
Note the number of public participation processes
Note the number of public participation processes
 Scoping
• Most important stage of the EIA process
• Description of the activity
• Description of property/environment
• Identification of possible concerns or fatal
flaws
• Potential impacts
• Potential feasible alternatives (including
No-Go)
 Scoping…2
• Description of method of identifying
environmental issues and concerns
(may need specialist input)
• Public participation
• Plan of Study for EIA (to be approved)
• The appropriate time and space boundaries
of the EIA study (very important)
• Scoping report
 Activities Requiring BAs
Activities relating to:-
• construction of infrastructure for electricity
generation and distribution (activities 1, 10)
• mining (activities 2, 19, 20)
• agriculture and downstream industries
(activities 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
• construction of water infrastructure
(activities 9, 11, 12, 15)
• Other actions relating to water resources
(activities 18)
 Activities Requiring BAs…2
Activities relating to:-
• Hazardous materials
(activity 13)
• Building construction within particular areas
(activities 14, 16, 23, 24)
• Planting of vegetation on dunes
(activity 17)
• Establishment of cemeteries
(activity 21)
 Activities Requiring BAs…3
Activities relating to:-
• Construction of roads
(activity 22)
• GMOs and biodiversity
(activities 25, 26)
• Decommissioning activities
(activity 27)
• Expansion activities
(activities 38 – 55)
• Phased activities
(activity 56)
 Activities Requiring Scoping &
EIA
Activities relating to:-
• Construction of infrastructure and facilities for
electricity generation and distribution (activities
1, 8); nuclear energy (activities 2, 25);
dangerous goods (activities 3, 6); gas, oil or
petroleum products (activity 4); marine
telecommunication (activity 9)
• Construction of airports, runways and landing
strips (activity 7); railway lines (activity 11)
 Activities Requiring Scoping &
EIA…2
Activities relating to:-
• Construction of water infrastructure (activity 10)
• Aquaculture of a certain scale (activities 12, 13)
• Building construction of a certain type or scale
(activities 14, 15, 24)
• Alteration, extraction or removal of certain soils
(activities 16, 17)
• Route determination of roads (activity 18)
• Mining activities (activities 20 – 23)
 Significance of Potential
Impacts
• Nature – causes of the environmental effect
• Extent – local, regional, international
• Duration – short, medium, long, permanent
• Intensity – low, medium, high
• Probability – improbable, probable, highly
probable, definite
 Scoping and EIA
Scoping report may (be):-
- Accepted as is
- Require further alternatives
- Require amendments
- Rejected
 EIA
• Purpose:-
– address issues raised in scoping
– assess alternatives (comparative)
– assess identified impacts, determine
significance of impacts
– suggest mitigation measures
• Public participation
• Includes specialist studies
• Includes draft environmental management
plan (EMP)
 The EIA Report – Contents
• Executive Summary
• Policy, legal and administrative framework
• Project description
• Environmental and socio-economic baseline
• Environmental impact assessment
• Analysis of alternatives
• Environmental management/impact
mitigation plan
• Closure plan
• Environmental management and training
assessment
• Environmental monitoring plan
 Who Evaluates EIAs and How?
Authorities
- Competence, experience
- Expected to know everything about everything
- Work load
Approval
- Political interference or motives –
developmental focus
- DEA little or no authority over other government
departments
- Very few negative decisions (why?)
- Fragmentation of legislation
 EIA
Once environmental authorisation has
been issued, it can be:-
– appealed
– amended
– withdrawn
– suspended
 Purpose of EIA/BA
• Risk planning and management tool
– to identify and implement appropriate
management measures and controls
- to mitigate the anticipated environmental
and social impacts
• Regulatory requirement
• Demonstrates due diligence
 Purpose of EIA/BA…2
Critical:-
– Documents pre-development baseline
conditions against which subsequent
monitoring can be compared to confirm
the effectiveness of implemented
mitigation measures
Aspects of the Environment that
can be Impacted
Assessing Impacts
 Assessing Impacts

coal burning SO2 emission (air pollution)

coal burning SO2 emission acidification of lakes (water pollution)

Assessing Impacts…2
Mitigating Impacts
Mitigation Hierarchy
 Objectives of Mitigation

Lochner, 2005
 Objectives of Mitigation…2

Lochner, 2005
 Alternatives
Different means of meeting the purpose of
the activity:-
• location/site alternatives e.g.?
• activity alternatives e.g.?
• process alternatives e.g.?
• temporal alternatives e.g.?
• no-go alternative e.g.?
 Need and Desirability
Define need and desirability of the project:-
– is the project needed?
– how will it benefit the country/community etc.?
Important for assessment of alternatives
 EIA Case Studies
Procedure for conducting EIA in SA
• Stakeholder engagement
• Considering alternatives
• Investigating impacts
• EMP & monitoring
• (see case studies on wits.cle)
Challenges facing EIA in SA?
 Impact of EIAs
EIAs have been little more than a compliance exercise,
demonstrating that projects will satisfy existing
environmental regulations (Patel, 2009)

The likelihood or EIA achieving more far-reaching purposes,

such as preventing large-scale environmental degradation,
or contributing to sustainable patterns of development,
though difficult to ascertain, seems remote. (Jay et al., 2007)
 Challenges
• Provincial authorities not adequately staffed to
handle the large volume of applications
– a backlog of 12 months is not uncommon
• Professional staff spend too much time
processing applications
– leaving little time for monitoring/enforcing the
conditions of approval
• Developers often see EIAs as a barrier to
development
 Challenges…2
• Practitioners tend to aim for minimum regulatory
requirements only
– missing out on the spirit of the law
• Competitive bidding (for EIAs) can cause
developers to award tenders to consultants who
propose EIAs that cost the least and/or take the
shortest time
 Challenges…3
• Environmental consultants see developers as
their sole client because the developer pays
them
– consultants should merely be paid to facilitate a
process and provide information for decision-making:
they are not there to assist the developer to gain
authorization for the development
• Inappropriate engagement with poor,
disadvantaged, and rural communities
– for example, stakeholder engagement processes are
normally very Eurocentric (i.e. public meetings)
 Challenges…4
• The EIA team determines the significance of
impacts
– despite the views, concerns and values of different
communities being significant, they are not recorded
or taken into account
• EIA processes seldom include provision for
conflict resolution and review mechanisms for
the public
 Challenges…5
• The requirement for EIA is triggered too late
– the EIA process is triggered only once a development
proposal is put forward, and
– there is no incentive to consider other proposals or
even adequately consider the ‘no development’ option
• EIAs relating to the expansion of existing
operations generally focus on the potential
impacts of the expansion, and seldom take into
account existing environmental impacts
 Challenges…6
• The EIA regulations do not compel authorities to
consider the broader planning and
environmental context within which a proposed
development is to occur
• No provision for public participation in ensuring
the proponent sticks to the approved design and
procedures
• EMP’s not readily available to the public
How Can We Circumvent These
Challenges?
 2014 Class Exercise
Review EIA documentation on consultants
website such as
– Aurecon
– ERM
– Golder Associates
– SRK
 2014 Class Exercise

Review the example of one EIA and assess

the following:
– What activities prompted the need for the assessment?
– Are alternatives identified? Have all alternatives been
considered?
– Note the range of specialist studies undertaken – what
is your perspective on this?
– Note the methodology that was used to determine the
significance of the impacts. Is this adequate? For all
types of impacts?
– Report findings back to the class