Environmental Methods Review: Retooling Impact Assessment for the New Century Alan L. Porter and John J. Fittipaldi, Editors For information about this publication, contact Army Environmental Policy Institute, International Association for Impact Georgia Institute of Technology, Assessment, PO Box 5256, 430 Tenth Street NW, Suite S-206, Fargo, ND, 58105-5256 USA Atlanta, Georgia 30318-5768 Published: Fargo, North Dakota, USA: The Press Club, March 1998 This report reflects the views of its authors, who are solely responsible for its content. The findings of this report are not to be construed necessarily as the opinions or views of any organization cited, quoted, or mentioned in this document. The findings are not to be construed as an official position of the Department of the Army or the International Association for Impact Assessment, unless designated by other authorized documents. Reproduction and dissemination of the contents of this document for educational purposes are encouraged by AEPI and IAIA, with proper attribution of the material to the contributing authors, AEPI and IAIA. Environmental Methods Review: Retooling Impact Assessment for the New Century Table of Contents INTRODUCTION Alan L. Porter and John J. Fittipaldi PERSPECTIVES ON THE FIELD 1 Implementing Policy Through Procedure: Impact Assessment and the National Environmental Policy Act [Lynton K. Caldwell] 2 The Army’s Interest in Impact Assessment Methods Review: Relevance and Efficiency [Ron D. Webster and John J. Fittipaldi] OVERVIEWS 3 Ex-post Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Environmental Assessment [Barry Sadler] 4 Improving the Quality of EISs [Ralf C. Buckley] 5 Progress of Environmental Impact Assessment and Its Methods in China [Wei Li, Huadong Wang, and Liu Dongxia] 6 Methods for Effective EIA Practice [Lawrence W. Canter] 7 The Concept of Environmental Sustainability [Robert Goodland] STRATEGIC ASSESSMENTS 8 Strategic Environmental Assessment [Ralf C. Buckley] 9 Strategic Environmental Assessment [Robert Goodland] 10 Cumulative Environmental Impacts [Ralf C. Buckley] 11 Cumulative Effects Assessment [Carolyn T. Hunsaker] 12 Environmental Assessment (EA) of Policies [John Bailey and Stephen Renton] 13 Technology Assessment: Wanted—Dead or Alive! [A. Thomas Roper and Alan L. Porter] PROCESSES 14 Methods for EIA: Selecting a Model and Approach [Ronald D. Webster] 15 The Environmental Overview as a Realistic Approach to Strategic Envrionmental Assessment in Developing Countries [A. Lex Brown] 16 Decision-Scoping [A. Lex Brown] 17 NEPA and Ecological Management: An Analysis with Reference to Military Base Lands [Robert Keiter and Robert Adler] 18 Use of Geographic Information Systems in Impact Assessment [Elsa M. João] 19 Post-Project Impact Assessment and Monitoring [Anne Shepherd] 20 Triggering and Technical Quality of EIA: The Tourism Testbed [Ralf C. Buckley and Jan Warnken] 21 Improving Environmental Decision-Making into the 21st Century: The Army National Guard’s Environmental Compliance Assessment System Marches Onward [Edward S. Dlugosz and Carl A. Scott] 22 Training Approaches in Environmental Technology Assessment (EnTA) [Christian Holger Strohmann] RISK ASSESSMENTS 23 Ecological and Human Health Risk Assessment: A Guideline Comparison and Review [Terese A. Gabocy and Timothy J. Ross] 24 Risk Communication in Environmental Assessment [Linda Rahm-Crites] DOMAIN-ORIENTED IMPACT ASSESSMENTS 25 Social Assessment [C. NicholasTaylor, Colin G. Goodrich, and C. Hobson Bryan] 26 Economic and Fiscal Impact Assessment [F. Larry Leistritz] 27 Valuation of Nonmarket Goods and Services for Environmental Assessment [Steven J. Taff and Jay A. Leitch] 28 Climate Impacts and Adaptations Assessment [Roslyn Taplin] 29 Public Health in Environmental Assessments [Reiner Banken] 30 Health care Technology Assessment [Clifford S. Goodman] 31 Ecological Impact Assessment [Jo Treweek and Pete Hankard] 32 Environmental Justice Impact Assessment—Key Components and Emerging Issues [Cory H. Wilkinson] MODELS IN ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT 33 Selecting Computer Models and Input Parameters for Analysis of Environmental Impacts [Diane Meier] 34 Source Term Estimation and Atmospheric Dispersion [Joseph H. Shinn] 35 Framework for Assessing the Effects of Radioactive Materials Transportation [Julie N. Zoller] Introduction Alan L. Porter and John J. Fittipaldi Methods This volume is about “methods”—the tools and techniques of environmental assessment (EA) and impact assessment (IA). It seeks to set forth “what’s new and important” in methods to conduct particular facets of EA/IA. The stance is that of an annual review—pointing the reader to the frontiers of the state of the art of good practice, with a review of recent contributions to the literature and to case applica- tions of note. The title reflects an amalgamation of methods pertinent to environmental issues. “Retooling for the new century” suggests that new emphases warrant improved methods. In particular, efforts to accomplish sustainable development demand enriched IA integrated with environmental management systems. This volume keys on the IA methods. Specific interest in furthering methodological development traces back to shared concerns of John Bailey and Alan Porter from 1994—namely, that attention and resources need to be invested in improving the tools of EA/IA. The primary aims of this volume are to: • Provide guidance to practitioners within the Army and other member services, military contractors, and others concerned with environmental impact assessment (EIA) and other forms of impact assessment • Offer current thinking on how to address important methodological issues • Highlight recent developments in concepts and applications • Identify key resources in the field. Secondly, the volume alerts students—especially graduate students—and faculty to methodological issues deserving of research attention. The volume presents wide-ranging, diverse perspectives. Their common thread is a focus on the “how to” of EA and IA. We expressly invite readers to peruse “alien” IA domains. We believe the field is ripe for cross-fertilization of approaches. For instance: • Health care technology assessment bespeaks key elements of strategic environmental assessment (SEA). • Environmental technology assessment [bridging technology assessment (TA) and EA] is addressed by Strohmann and Roper/Porter. • Gabocy shows intersecting ecological and health facets of risk assessment (RA). • Shinn and Meier raise data and modeling issues with wide implications in EA and IA. • Brown’s “environmental overview” and “decision- scoping” offer exciting new approaches that could dramatically enhance EIA and SEA processes. • SEA (i.e., assessment of programs, plans, or policies) undertones and overtones pop up repeatedly (check the index!). 2 Introduction This is an experimental volume. If it is well received, it may be worthwhile to repeat it on a regular basis, perhaps with a rotating focus (e.g., IA methods one year; other environmental analysis tools another year; developments in adjacent domains in a third year). The editors expressly invite suggestions on how to enhance its usefulness, topics to be covered, and nominations of potential future contributors. Here are selected messages delivered by the papers. The papers are clustered into seven sections according to their focus. Perspective on the Field This special paper shares the insights of the man most recognized with crafting the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) on the motivations for the Act, its intents, and its results. Lynton Caldwell provides perspective on over twenty-five years of NEPA. Neither the declared principles nor the substantive sections of NEPA have been meaningfully implemented. NEPA has been treated as procedural legislation, amplified by the Council on Environmental Quality guidelines which were then elevated to regulations having the status of law in 1978. However, in this guise NEPA has probably had the greatest international impact of any American law. Caldwell summarizes six key lessons from the U.S. experience. Overviews This section offers five papers which, by their nature, stretch across our other sections. The first two reflect upon the performance of EA in developed economies, the third presents a contrasting view of recent changes in Chinese EA practice. The fourth paper provides a marvelous overview of the methods—the tools—available to perform EA and IA. “Sustainable development” is a refrain heard often these days, in general and in the papers of this volume. Goodland’s paper poses critical environmental sustainability concepts which can guide various EA approaches, especially strategic environmental assessment (SEA), to support sustainable development. The International Study on the Effectiveness of Environmental Assessment is a landmark effort to assess the state of the field involving many participants from a number of countries over the past several years. Directed by Barry Sadler, initiated and supported prominently by the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency, and facilitated by IAIA, this study reviews EA practice and offers suggestions on improvement. Barry Sadler’s paper here presents the organizing concepts behind this assessment. Barry Sadler presents a framework for the evaluation of EA along multiple dimen- sions. He clarifies the purposes of such evaluation in terms of anticipated improvements in EA practice. The organizing concepts seek to triangulate among policy, practice, and performance. He details principles