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Biodiversity is a core issue in the quest to achieve sustainable development. Although Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) includes biodiversity as an environmental component to consider in decision-making, its inclusion remains a challenge. Since the beginning of SEA practice, several guides have been proposed to address this challenge, but evaluating their success remains problematic. This paper, therefore, aims to develop an easily applied, criteria-based approach for evaluating the biodiversity assessment that takes place within SEA. A test application of the evaluation framework, based on the International Best Practice Principles on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in SEA, demonstrates its success in identifying whether the main elements of biodiversity were considered in a SEA report. However, the criteria focus on inclusion or exclusion of specific details, rather than the substance of the biodiversity consideration, and so further studies need to develop evaluative approaches for the substantive inclusion of biodiversity in SEA practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teaching Impact Assessment (IA) is both important and challenging. In this context, international literature presents a set of Best Practice Principles for IA Teaching and Training. This paper proposes and applies a framework of 14 indicators to analyse the content of IA teaching. It focuses on the Brazilian Environmental Engineering Programs, and the methodological process involved examining the literature as well as content analysis. The framework application showed to be practical and objective. Results indicate that the capacity to incorporate the specifics of the IA system is a strength of IA teaching in Brazil. On the other hand, the results highlight many weaknesses, e.g. the focus on teaching only IA applied to projects (in spite of the many IA types present in IA literature and international practice), focus on impact assessment statement (instead of the whole IA process) and gaps related to study of alternatives, cumulative impacts and public participation. Suggestions to improve IA teaching in Brazil include presenting IA as a process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Early assessment of environmental issues is key for sound decision-making about licensing of offshore oil and gas exploration sites. In this paper, we recall the historical background of such early assessments in Brazil showing that a simple consultation process in place for the last 15 years was able to steer oil and gas exploration away from sensitive areas. A more structured SEA-type instrument was designed in 2012, but its actual contribution to the effectiveness of early assessments remains to be seen as the first assessment reports are still to be delivered. Recent changes in the institutional and political context in Brazil have enabled the new government to ignore both the established consultation process and the ongoing SEA-type process. This shift of orientation led to the inclusion of environmentally sensitive areas in bidding rounds in 2019. Following this government decision, various initiatives to preserve the recommendations from the previous consultation process have illustrated the relevance of environmental/impact assessment not only to ease decision-making processes but also as a tool to safeguard environmental protection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large-scale photovoltaic (LSPV) may cause significant changes in the environment and lead to detrimental impacts on the natural and anthropic environments. First, this paper reviews the scholarly literature to collect data regarding the different environmental impacts occurring during LSPV installation and operation. Secondly, methods used in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for LSPV are evaluated through a sample of 20 EIAs. This shows that there are flaws in the methodology used in the EIAs that support environmental licensing of LSPV. In this context, this work proposes a multicriteria approach that aims to convey the main environmental and socio-economic aspects of LSPV and assess impact magnitude and importance. The method is built on the needs to improve EIA for the licensing of solar projects in Brazil. The model offers a structured approach that incorporates detailed criteria that reflect direct and indirect impacts of both terrestrial and floating PV and is designed to provide the assessment magnitude and estimate scenarios according to different stakeholder's views. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to analyze a tiering scoping approach developed to identify critical multidimensional sustainability issues and impacts of a large infrastructure project: the land transport project linking northern Brazil with a new port on Guyana's coast. The Inter-American Development Bank awarded a technical assignment to develop the terms of reference of a country environmental assessment, a strategic environmental and social assessment and an environmental and social impact assessment of the project(s). The complexity of the issues at stake lead to the design of a tiered assessment process supported by wide-ranging participative sessions involving 170 individuals from Guyana and Brazil and from diverse sectors. The process identified ex ante conditionalities, critical factors for decision-making and valued socioenvironmental and governance components. Such complex and determinant planning initiatives for the future of a country need to be supported by comprehensive, well-sequenced scoping processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Empirical research dedicated to Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is mostly grounded on SEA systems guided by legal requirements, clearly stated procedures and systematic use of SEA to policy- and plan-making. Nevertheless, a considerable parcel of SEA practice is currently occurring in countries with no specific legislation or guidance to be followed, i.e. non-regulated SEA systems. Therefore, it is important to understand how SEA is performing in these countries and to establish whether related SEA systems are subject to the same premises and perspectives of effectiveness that have been reported in literature so far. The paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the state-of-practice in Brazil, based on best practice analysis of SEA reports and interviews, reporting empirical evidence regarding the use of SEA and its related timing, procedural performance and key players involved. Main findings reveal an isolated instrument, embroidered in a disperse and unclear framework, poorly coordinated and highly sensitive to circumstances. Provision of a structured system, indicating clear purposes of SEA, systematic procedures and stakeholder's responsibilities are suggested as potentially relevant measures to balance current system's flexibility, thus fostering SEA effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within the ample body of literature devoted to strategic environmental assessment (SEA) outcomes and the assessment of its effectiveness, it is accepted that the performance of SEA systems is influenced by contextual aspects. Procedural aspects, objectives, guidance, approach, timing, amongst others, are reported as key components of the different dimensions of SEA effectiveness but their linkage to SEA outcomes is yet to be adequately investigated. In this paper, contextual aspects and related outcomes of a non-mandatory SEA system were identified through systematic literature review and personal interviews with key actors of SEA, aiming at the identification of the influence of contextual factors on SEA effectiveness. The findings indicate three main aspects that may explain the lengthy process of introduction of SEA in plan- and policy-making in the country: (i) lack of proper SEA legislation, (ii) the influence of Environmental Impact Assessment practice and (iii) the influence of the environmental licensing culture. Nevertheless, SEA contributes to improving communication between stakeholders along the planning process and to providing a better level of information for lower tiers of decision-making. In spite of the minor influences on the nature of the strategic action, valuable lessons credited to SEA have been learnt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the use of risk assessment (RA) for analyzing the environmental suitability of natural gas pipelines and highlights RA's linkages with environmental impact assessment. The paper contends that RA is an essential tool when assessing the suitability of gas pipelines, and that risks associated with such proposed activities should be used as fundamental criteria to determine route selection. By doing so, fatality risks related to pipeline failures can be reduced. The paper also contends that the risk acceptance criteria adopted by the State of São Paulo are overly permissive when compared to other criteria used around the world. Therefore, the State should consider revising and strengthening its risk acceptance criteria to be up-to-date with international standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite being adopted worldwide, environmental impact assessment (EIA) is under pressure in many countries, while perceived (rightly or wrongly) as an ineffective and inefficient process. Strategic environmental assessment (SEA) is thought to help address some of EIA’s shortcomings, but it is absent in many jurisdictions and sectors. In this paper, we argue that multi-project EIA can, in some contexts, simultaneously deliver greater effectiveness and process streamlining. To illustrate our claim, we present a case study from offshore petroleum production in Brazil, where the development of the pre-salt giant reserves is being licensed through a multi-project EIA approach, in a non-SEA planning environment. The analysis provides interesting insights on the strengths and challenges of that strategy, focusing on five aspects of practice: cumulative impacts, efficiency, approach to authorizations, follow-up and political issues. Proper scoping was found to be essential to consistent EIA processes and shorter review times. Finally, we suggest that multi-project EIA approach should be revisited by practitioners and regulators to identify opportunities for deployment, especially in jurisdictions where strategic assessments are not in place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the implementation and enforcement of environmental licensing and environmental impact assessment (EIA) regulations and decisions in the context of the Rio 2007 Pan American Games in Brazil. The methodology includes detailed case study analysis involving document analysis and interviews with key stakeholders. The results demonstrate that implementation and enforcement of EIA and environmental licensing still have a long way to go in terms of being fully effective in Brazil. Despite this, in the scope of the case study, the results showed that implementation and enforcement of environmental licensing and EIA regulations and decisions seem to be undertaken according to relevant regulations in the context of the Pan American Village. Finally, recommendations for major sports events and for the Brazilian context to strengthen its regulatory framework for environmental licensing and EIA are developed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper looks at two questions underexplored in the corporate responsibility literature and of interest to impact assessment researchers. In low-income resource-rich communities with weak governance systems, what exactly does corporate commitment to sustainability achieve for the local community, and what is the role of government? The role of EIA? These are examined with reference to Vale's mining operations in Itabira, Brazil. Through the voices of key informants and review of documentation the authors analyse how well Vale has addressed community concerns as reflected in the 52 conditions attached to the Licença de Operação Corretiva (Corrective Operation Licence), which is part of Brazil's EIA process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]