Why Assess Environmental
Impacts?
Environmental impact assessment
 A formal process process for
identifying the likely effects of
particular activities or projects on the
environment, and on human health
and welfare
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Why did EIA start?
 By the early 1960s in the US and other
industrial countries, it was clear that
something was wrong
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“30 Years of Environmental Progress,” USEPA, 2000.
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Cuyahoga River burns in 1966 (3rd time). Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.
“30 Years of Environmental Progress,” USEPA, 2000.
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Environmental crisis in the
industrial economies
 1952 “killer fog” kills 4,000 in London
 1963 Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring
documents the negative effects of DDT
 1966 Cayahoga River in Ohio catches
fire
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What was happening?
 Looking back from today, the causes
were obvious:
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Population Growth
Natural Resource Pressures
Urbanization
Industrialization
Unrestrained profit motive
 These forces were all combining to
create unprecedented environmental
damage
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EIA was one policy response in
industrialized countries
 IN 1970, the US legislature passed the
National Environmental Policy Act
(NEPA).
 NEPA required EIA for US Government
projects. Mandated public input.
 Now over 200 similar requirements worldwide
 Other responses included regulation of
industrial activity, international treaties
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Why should developing countries
care about EIA?
 Easy answer: Donor requirements.
 In the early 1970s, several Pakistani workers
died as a result of negligent pesticide
management procedures on a USAID project.
 USAID was sued by an environmental PVO,
and adopted environmental review
procedures to comply with NEPA (“Reg 216”)
 Almost all donor agencies now have
similar procedures
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Why should developing countries
care about EIA?
 The difficult answer: Because the
environmental crisis faced by most
developing countries is at least as
serious as that of the industrialized
countries in the 1960s and 70s.
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Lower levels of industrialization
BUT. . .
High population growth and urbanization
Use of hazardous substances
Environmental degradation due to poverty
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Land degradation and desertification:
satellite photo shows topsoil blowing
off SW African coast, from Angola to
S. Africa.
NASA
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Chemical pollution: obsolete pesticides in Mozambique.
U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization
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Deforestation: trees cleared for planting in Guinea.
U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization
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Environmental crisis in the
developing world
 1984 Methyl isocyanate cloud from
Union Carbide plant accident in Bhopal,
India kills 2,000+
 Cities with worst air quality:
Developing country megacities
 Millions of deaths/year from
environmental conditions—particularly
poor sanitation
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EIA supports sustainable
development
 Like medicine, the first principle of
development should be to “first, do no
harm.”
 In its history, the development profession
has often not fulfilled this basic mandate
 The environment is complicated—without
EIA, it is difficult to know when harm will
come
 EIA should also be proactive.
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 EIA is critical to ensure that the
environment will support vital
ecosystem services upon which all
human subsistence and economic
activity depends.
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The role of EIA in conservationoriented projects
 EIA is was developed to assure that
the environmental consequences of
economic/social development projects
were adequately considered.
 So. . .Is EIA necessary if the goal of
the project is environmental in nature?
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The role of EIA in conservationoriented projects
YES!
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The role of EIA in conservationoriented projects
 Because EIA is:
 a tool for considering secondary effects
 environmental, social and economic
 essential to gathering baseline information
for the project
 . . .and to assessing results
 The result: The separation between
EIA and project development becomes
indistinct.
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