Distilling and applying criteria for best practice EIA follow-up

Elise Pinto, Angus Morrison-Saunders, Alan Bond, Jenny Pope, Francois Retief

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Abstract

Follow-up is an essential component of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) if the success of EIA in improving the sustainability of a project once implemented is to be determined. This paper aims to establish universally-applicable criteria for EIA follow-up to evaluate project performance once assessed and underway. A suite of 24 criteria is derived from EIA follow-up best practice principles published by the International Association for Impact Assessment. The criteria are categorized according to the five dimensions of EIA follow-up: monitoring, evaluation, management, communication and governance. Posed as questions, the criteria support qualitative assessments of EIA follow-up performance for a project. Through application of the criteria to a case study currently under construction (the Shell Cove Marina project in eastern Australia), we found they provided an effective basis for a document review process delivering a short but informative account of the follow-up performance of the case study. The more robust evaluation of some of the criteria, particularly in the governance category, would require supplementary techniques such as interviews.
Original languageEnglish
Article number1950008
JournalJournal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management
Volume21
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jun 2019

Keywords

  • EIA follow-up
  • best practice
  • monitoring
  • evaluation
  • management
  • communication
  • environmental performance
  • governance

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