EIA BASIC

CONCEPTS

NEPA 1970
SEMINAL LEGISLATION
Magna carta for the environment in United States.
Project planning and decision making should include 3 Es.n
Three significant terms
1. Environmental inventory
2. Environmental impact assessment
3. Environmental impact statement.

Environmental inventory: is a complete

description of the environment as it exist in an
area where a proposed action is being
considered.
Compiled from a checklists of descriptors for the
physical-chemical , biological, cultural,
socioeconomic environment.
physical-chemical: soil , geology, topography,
surface water, ground water resources, water
quality, air quality and climatology.

Biological: flora, fauna of the area, threatened

and endangered species, general biological
features and stability of ecosystem.
Cultural environment: historic and archeological
sites and aesthetic resources such as visual
quality.
Socioeconomic environment: population trend,
population distribution, educational system,
economic indicators of human welfare,
transportation networks and other

DEFINITION( EIA)
Activity designed to identify and predict the impact of a
project on bio geo physicochemical environment and on
human health so as to recommend appropriate legislative
measures, programs, and operational procedures to
minimize the impact.
Exercise to be carried out before any project or major
activity is undertaken to ensure that it will not in any away
harm the environment on a short-term or long-term basis.

An impact can be defined as any change in the physical,

chemical, biological, cultural or socio-economic
environmental system as a result of activities relating to
a project.
EIS: The environmental impact statement (EIS) provides
documentation of the information and estimates derived
from the various steps in the EIA process.

LCA- LAND CLEARANCE ACTIVITY

EIA in INDIA
EIA in India was started in 1976-77
when the Planning Commission asked the then
Department of Science and Technology to examine the
river-valley projects from the environmental angle.
subsequently extended to cover those projects, which
required approval of the Public Investment Board.
These were administrative decisions, and lacked the
legislative support.

The Government of India enacted the

Environment (Protection) Act on 23rd May 1986.
To achieve the objectives of the Act, one of the
decisions taken was to make EIA statutory
After following the legal procedure, a
notification was issued on 27th January 1994
and subsequently amended on 4th May 1994,
10th April 1997 and 27th January 2000 making
environmental impact assessment statutory for

The MoEF recently notified new EIA legislation

in September 2006. The notification makes it
mandatory for various projects such as mining,
thermal power plants, river valley, infrastructure
(road, highway, ports, harbours and airports)
and industries including very small
electroplating or foundry units to get
environment clearance.

PURPOSE OF EIA
Provide information for decision-making on the
environmental consequences of proposed actions; and
Promote environmentally sound and sustainable
development through the identification of appropriate
enhancement and mitigation measures.

SALIENT FEATURES
a) The EIA procedure identifies the possible positive and negative
impacts to the environment resulting from a proposed project. These
impacts are identified over both "short-term" and "long-term" time frame;
(b) The EIA provides for a plan, which upon implementation, will reduce
or offset the negative impacts of a project resulting in a minimum level of
environmental degradation.' This minimization may be a result of
implementation of a project alternative or project modifications or
environmental protection measures, which simply reduces the number or
magnitude of negative impacts. The plan may also result in utilization of
positive impacts for enhancement measures which offset negative
impacts
(

c) To measure the level of plan implementation and the

degree of effectiveness of the above environmental
protection provisions, the EIA provides a monitoring
programme. This programme will be also designed so
that it identifies the parameters of uncertainty and
measures the related impacts.

Objectives of EIA
Immediate objectives of EIA are to:
Improve the environmental design of the proposal;
Ensure that resources are used appropriately and efficiently;
Identify appropriate measures for mitigating the potential
impacts of the proposal; and
Facilitate informed decision making, including setting the
environmental terms and conditions for implementing the
proposal.

Long term objectives of EIA are to:

Protect human health and safety;
Avoid irreversible changes and serious damage to the
environment;
Safeguard valued resources, natural areas and
ecosystem components; and
Enhance the social aspects of the proposal.

core values on which the EIA

process is based
Integrity: The EIA process should meet internationally accepted
requirements and standards of practice.
Utility: The EIA process should provide the information which is
sufficient and relevant for decision-making.
Sustainability: The EIA process should result in the
implementation of environmental safeguards which are
sufficient to mitigate serious adverse effects and avoid
irreversible loss of resource and ecosystem functions.

Guiding principles of EIA good practice

Principle
Practical application
s

Purposive

EIA should meet its aims of informing decision making and ensuring an appropriate level of
environmental protection and human health.

Focused

EIA should concentrate on significant environmental effects, taking into account the issues
that matter.

Adaptive

EIA should be adjusted to the realities, issues and circumstances of the proposals under
review.

Participati EIA should provide appropriate opportunities to inform and involve the interested and affected
ve
publics, and their inputs and concerns should be addressed explicitly.
Transpare EIA should be a clear, easily understood and open process, with early notification procedure,
nt
access to documentation, and a public record of decisions taken and reasons for them.
Rigorous

EIA should apply the best practicable methodologies to address the impacts and issues
being investigated.

Practical

EIA should identify measures for impact mitigation that work and can be implemented.

Credible

EIA should be carried out with professionalism, rigor, fairness, objectivity, impartiality and
balance.

Cost and benefits of EIA

Major benefits of the EIA process for project
sponsors to be
Cost-saving modifications in project design.
Reduced time and costs of approvals of
development applications
Increased project acceptance.
Avoided impacts and violations of laws and
regulations.

The benefits to local communities from taking part in

environmental assessments include:
A healthier local environment (forests, water sources, agricultural
potential, recreational potential, aesthetic values, and clean living in
urban areas).
Improved human health.
Maintenance of biodiversity.
Decreased resource use.
Fewer conflicts over natural resource use.
Increased community skills, knowledge and pride.

Limitations of EIA
Environmental considerations may be set aside in favor of what
are felt to be more important considerations.
Predicted adverse effects on the environment might lead to
strict conditions being imposed to avoid these effects or remedy
any adverse effects, or perhaps lead to the complete
abandonment of a proposal.
EIA cannot be regarded as a means of introducing an
environmental veto power into administrative decision-making
processes.
Decisions that are unsatisfactory from an environmental point of
view can still be made, but with full knowledge of the
environmental consequences.

Outcome of the EIA process provides advice to the decisionmakers and it does not provide a final decision.
The EIA procedures cannot be expected to stop a proposal,
although this is an outcome that some members of the general
community and environment groups may expect.

COST
Difficult to determine the cost of EIA.
Major projects typically require a large number of investigations and
reports.
The world bank notes that the cost of preparing an EIA rarely
exceeds one per cent of the project costs and this percentage can be
reduced further if local personnel are used to do most of the work.
The total cost of an EIA might range from a few thousand dollars for
a very small project, to over a million dollars for a large and complex
project, which has a significant environmental impact and requires
extensive data collection and analysis.

TIMEFRAME
Although many proponents complain that EIA causes
excessive delays in projects, many of these are caused by
poor administration of the process rather than by the process
itself. These occur when:
The EIA is commenced too late in the project cycle;
The terms of reference are poorly drafted;.
The EIA is not managed to a schedule;
The technical and consultative components of EIA are
inadequate; and
The EIA report is incomplete or deficient as a basis for
decision making.

Most projects merely require screening and might take

only an hour or two of work.
Where further EIA work is necessary, the time taken
can range from a few days or weeks, for a small
irrigation or a minor infrastructure project, to two years
or more for a large dam or a major infrastructure
project.
The costs and time involved in eia should decrease as
experience is gained with the process and there is a
better understanding of the impacts associated with
different types of projects and the use of appropriate

Steps in EIA process

Screening is done to see whether a project requires

environmental clearance as per the statutory
notifications. Screening Criteriaare based upon:

Scales of investment;
Type of development; and,

Location of development.

A common approach (e. g. the World Bank uses a similar version of this
approach) is to classify projects into different types of impact category, such
as:
Category 1 - projects not expected to result in any significant adverse
impacts and which do not require additional environmental study.
Category 2 - projects which are likely to cause a limited number of
significant adverse impacts unless appropriate mitigation action is taken.
These impacts and the means of mitigating them are reasonably well
understood and it is expected that such projects will require only limited
environmental study and the preparation of an appropriate mitigation plan.
Category 3 - projects likely to cause a range of significant adverse impacts,
the extent and magnitude of which cannot be determined without a detailed
study

EIA Procedure
Divided into two complementary tasks or subreports
(i) The Initial Environmental Examination (lEE)
(ii) the Full-Scale Environmental Impact
Assessment (EIA).

Certain proposals require an extended screening

process which in effect becomes a preliminary EIA
approximate to a Category 2 study.
Also called initial environmental evaluation (IEE), this
process is used when the requirement for EIA cannot
be reasonably determined by the application of the
screening procedures described previously.

Initial Environmental
Examination (lEE)
Reviewing the environmental integrity of projects.
Can be used for project screening to determine which
projects require a full-scale EIA.
Can be carried out within a limited budget.
Full-scale EIA is not required, then, any environmental
management parameters. such as, environmental
protection measures or a monitoring programme can
be adapted to complete the EIA for such a project.

Full-scale EIA is required, lEE can be of great help as a

mechanism to determine and identify key issues that merit full
analysis in EIA and to designate the issues that deserve only a
cursory discussion.
lEE is a means of providing the most efficient and feasible
preparation of adequate environmental management plans
with or without the requirement of a full scale EIA. Therefore,
for most Industrial Development Projects, lEE is desirable
simply from the economic point of view.

SCOPING: This step seeks to identify, at an early stage, the key,

significant environmental issues from among a host of possible
impacts of a project and all the available alternatives.

Defining scope of a EIA

I. Important issues and concern,
2. Areas of less concern for the present acts, and
3. Regulations requirement.

Purpose of Scoping is to identify

The important issues to be considered in
an EIA;
The appropriate time and space
boundaries of the EIA study;
The information necessary for decisionmaking; and
The significant effects and factors to be
studied in detail.

Objectives of scoping:
Inform the public about the proposal;
Identify the main stakeholders and their concerns and values;
Define the reasonable and practical alternatives to the proposal;
Focus the important issues and significant impacts to be
addressed by an EIA;
Define the boundaries for an EIA in time, space and subject
matter;
Set requirements for the collection of baseline and other
information; and

Terms of reference
Scoping is completed when the detailed studies required in the EIA have been specified and
involves preparing Terms of Reference (ToR) or an equivalent document.
Preparation of the ToR is the responsibility of the proponent, or in some cases the responsible
authority.
This document sets out what the EIA is to cover, the type of information to be submitted and
the depth of analysis that is required.
It provides guidance to the proponent on how the study should be conducted and managed.
As far as possible, a ToR should be a consensus document, reflecting an agreement among the
main stakeholders, including the public, on the matters to be assessed. If this is not possible,
the next best outcome will be a ToR that is based on a systematic and transparent scoping
process.
The ToR should not be considered a fixed or rigid document.

ToR includes
The proposal and its practicable and reasonable alternatives
(including the

No action option);
The significant issues and impacts to be investigated;
The type of information to be collected and/or studies to be
carried out

(E.G. Baseline study); and

The requirements and timelines for completion and submission of
the report.

BASELINE DATA COLLECTION

Baseline data describes the existing environmental
status of the identified study area.
The site-specific primary data should be monitored
for the identified parameters and supplemented by
secondary data if available.

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Baseline data

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IMPACT PREDICTION
Impact prediction is a way of mapping the environmental consequences of
the significant aspects of the project and its alternatives.
Environmental impact can never be predicted with absolute certainty and this
is all the more reason to consider all possible factors and take all possible
precautions for reducing the degree of uncertainty.

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Assessment of Alternatives, Delineation of Mitigation

Measures and Environmental Impact Assessment
Report
For every project, possible alternatives should be identified
and environmental attributes compared.
Alternatives should cover both project location and process
technologies.
Alternatives should consider no project option also.
Alternatives should then be ranked for selection of the best
environmental option for optimum economic benefits to the
community at large.

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Once alternatives have been reviewed, a mitigation plan should be

drawn up for the selected option and is supplemented with an
Environmental Management Plan (EMP) to guide the proponent
towards environmental improvements.
The EMP is a crucial input to monitoring the clearance conditions and
therefore details of monitoring should be included in the EMP.

An EIA report should provide clear information to the decision-maker

on the different environmental scenarios without the project, with the
project and with project alternatives.
Uncertainties should be clearly reflected in the EIA report.
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Public Hearing
Law requires that the public must be informed and consulted on a
proposed development after the completion of EIA report. Any one
likely to be affected by the proposed project is entitled to have access
to the Executive Summary of the EIA. The affected persons may
include:
bonafide local residents;
local associations;
environmental groups: active in the area
any other person located at the project site / sites of displacement

People are to be given an opportunity to make oral/written

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Decision making
Decision making process involves consultation between the
project proponent (assisted by a consultant) and the impact
assessment authority (assisted by an expert group, if
necessary).
The decision on environmental clearance is arrived at through a
number of steps including evaluation of EIA and EMP.

MONITORING THE CLEARANCE CONDITIONS

Monitoring should be done during both construction and operation
phases of a project.
This is not only to ensure that the commitments made are complied
with but also to observe whether the predictions made in the EIA
reports were correct or not.
Where the impacts exceed the predicted levels, corrective action
should be taken.
Monitoring will enable the regulatory agency to review the validity
of predictions and the conditions of implementation of the
Environmental Management Plan (EMP).

Auditing
This follows monitoring and involves comparing actual
outcomes with predicted outcomes, and can be used to
assess the quality of predictions and the effectiveness
of mitigation. It provides a vital step in the EIA learning
process.

Strategic environment
assessment(SEA)
Strategic Environment Assessment (SEA) refers
to systematic analysis of the environmental
effects of development policies, plans,
programmes and other proposed strategic
actions.
extends the aims and principles of EIA upstream
in the decision-making process, beyond the
project level and when major alternatives are
still open.