From impact assessment to effective management plans: learning from the Great Brak Estuary in South Africa

In 1990, the environmental impacts of an upstream dam on the Great Brak town and estuary were assessed and a management plan and monitoring programme were devised. In a recent review of the monitoring results, planned water releases and interventions in the form of timely mouth breaching were found to have ensured that, although the estuary's abiotic functioning has altered, its biotic health has not deteriorated over the last ten years. The lessons learned are captured in the revised management plan of 2004, which exhibits a clear shift to explicit communication plans and operational procedures, indicating that the initial environmental impact assessment (EIA) products were rudimentary. We argue that learning-through-doing and active public participation in the Great Brak case are essential ingredients in the adaptive management that is fundamental to successful EIA follow-up.     

Owl meets beehive: how impact assessment and governance relate

This article analyses the complex relationship between impact assessments (IAs) of all types (such as comprehensive, regulatory, economic, social or environmental IAs) and their governance environment, using an analytical framework based on the concepts of governance styles and metagovernance. It is argued that each governance system builds on specific values, traditions and history and produces specific mixtures of hierarchical, network and market styles of governance (with or without an explicit metagovernance approach). Although governance can be considered as a non-normative perspective on polity and politics, the normative dimension of governance practice results in, for example, conflicting convictions about which type of knowledge or ‘evidence’ is valid for IA processes. This is particularly relevant because IAs have an important role in improving the knowledge base of governance. The concrete governance system in a specific country or other administrative entity influences the design and governance of IA systems positively or negatively, which leads to a variety of challenges. The conclusion is drawn that understanding the governance context and its dynamics can help improving IA governance.     

Project splitting in environmental impact assessment

Abstract

This paper discusses project splitting in environmental impact assessment (EIA), investigating the current state of knowledge through literature, legislation, case-law and practice, discussing problems and providing solutions. The focus is on Spain, but many of the conclusions are applicable worldwide. Project splitting is a much more common practice than generally accepted. The main efforts have been focused on preventing salami-slicing as a mechanism to avoid the EIA, but it is a much more complex problem, with different ways of splitting and reasons for doing so. Measures to avoid this practice should include strengthening the strategic environmental assessment, a greater involvement of the approval authority, specific prohibitions in regulations, using case-by-case examinations instead of thresholds, compulsory scoping and avoid the exclusion of project parts during the EIA.     

Environmental impact assessment and strategic environmental assessment in the UK after leaving the European Union

Abstract

The United Kingdom has voted to leave the European Union and, until the terms of the ‘Brexit’ are negotiated, this has led to considerable uncertainty over the future practice of environmental impact assessment (EIA) and strategic environmental assessment (SEA) in the UK. Here we show that multiple obligations exist outside the scope of the EU which mean that EIA and SEA will continue to be required in the long term, but that their future compliance with the Directives remains unclear. We consider three scenarios for Brexit and present the implications of each; these are: signing up to the European Economic Area (EEA) Agreement; membership of the European Free Trade Association, but not EEA, or negotiate a separate agreement. The implications of no longer being subjected to the obligations of the Directives under some scenarios are discussed and include opening the door for increasing diversity of application across the regions of the UK, and the probability of raised screening thresholds so as to reduce the burden of assessment on developers.     

浅谈生活垃圾卫生填埋场选址中应注意几个问题

生活垃圾卫生填埋场多处于农村或城乡结合部,其选址涉及多方面因素,不仅要分析其是否符合相关政策、规划、规范、标准等要求,而且还要紧密结合所选场址各方面特征因素,全面分析其可能存在的影响,尤其应关注对农村、农业和农民的影响,并提出解决办法。本文结合环评实践,阐述选址中应该注意几个问题。     

3S技术在环境影响评价中的应用

随着信息技术的不断发展和多学科的不断融合,3S(GIS、RS、GPS)技术以其强大的功能为环境影响评价工作提供了强有力的支持,文章介绍了3S技术的基本功能及其现阶段在环境影响评价中的应用,并对其应用前景做了展望。     

Habitat's habitus: Nature as sense of place in land use planning decision-making

Nature has a variety of meanings attributed to it through representation. The meanings become contested in planning decision-making, as the same site may be represented differently by different actants. I identify representations of nature in selected Environmental Impact Assessment processes in Western Australia, emphasising the role of science in influencing outcomes.     

Development of a reactive puff model for simultaneous consideration of plume dispersion and plume chemistry

To comprehensively assess and understand the environmental impacts of air pollutants emitted from large-scale point sources, the complex, non-linear photochemistry inside the plumes should be considered together with atmospheric turbulent dispersion of the air pollutants. For this purpose, a reactive puff model that can consider both atmospheric turbulent dispersion and photochemical reactions was developed in this study. The model’s performance was evaluated by comparing the model-predicted concentrations with the ship-plume chemical concentrations measured from the Intercontinental Transport and Chemical Transformation (ITCT) 2K2 field campaign. This comparison study confirmed the ability of the developed reactive puff model to capture the major characteristics of both plume dispersion and photochemical reactions. Based on these findings, the reactive puff model was applied to a Korean power plant (Hadong) as a case study. This article is dedicated to Professor Chang Kyun Choi for celebrating his retirement from the School of Chemical and Biological Engineering, Seoul National University.     

5类电缆性能测试的基本指标

结构化布线工程的最后一步是对布线系统的测试和评估，电缆的性能测试经常被忽视，基本指标有：近端串扰，综合近端串扰，衰减串扰比，等效远端串扰，综合等效远端串扰，回波损耗，延迟抖动等。     

Book Reviews

In a recent guest editorial for Society and Space, Vera Chouinard noted ‘how the working class and other disadvantaged groups, like the disabled, are often curiously absent from the landscapes represented in postmodern cultural geographies of the city.