ate. The EIS must examine and evaluate the development as a potential greenhouse gas contributor. It must also examine potential climate change effects on the proposed development".
More recently, in a November, 2009 terms of reference for an EIA of a cobalt, gold, bismuth and copper mine4
, the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board required the developer to describe annual carbon emisions over the life of the mine and describe any offsets proposed to mitigate carbon emissions. The Review Board also required descriptions of potential effects of climate change on the development: It required the developer to describe how geotechincal stability of all engineered structures at the mine will be ensured against a range of climate scenarios, and how climate change was considered in the development of the mine's closure and reclamation plan to ensure the long-term physical integrity of permanent structures.Footnotes:1
Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA). 2004. Arctic climate Impact Assessment: Impacts of a Warming Arctic. Cambrdige University Press. Available at .
2Koivurova, T. 2008. Transboundary Environmental Assessment in the Arctic. Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal 26(4): 265-275.
3 Gahcho Kué Environmental Impact Review Panel. October 5, 2007. Terms of Reference for the Gahcho Kué Environmental Impact Statement. Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board, Yellowknife, NT, Canada
4 Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board. November 30, 2009. Terms of Reference for the Environmental Assessment of Fortune Minerals Ltd. NICO Cobalt-Gold-Bismuth-Copper Project (EA 0809-004). Mackenzie Valley Environmental Imapact Review Board, Yellowknife, NT, Canada.
IAIA organized a conference focused on Cumulative Impact Assessment in Calgary, AB, Canada in November of 2008. The focus themes for this conference were: uncertainty (from a scientific perspective); institutional integration; and practice versus theory. Two major statements were made by conference organizers: 1) climate change is a Tragedy of the Commons where a common resource is threatened making it difficult to manage costs and benefits between stakeholders; 2) climate change is the BIG cumulative impact of our time. A single session focused on climate change with only two presentations made. One focused on the impact of GHG emission reductions from increasing the fuel efficiency of the US vehicle fleet, the other suggested that EIA focus initial efforts in broading the incorporation of climate change in the cumulative impact assessment component of EIA. Suggestions were made but prototype applications are needed, and not all jurisdictions even currently support cumulative impact assessment within their EIA process.
IAIA in conjunction with the World Bank, hosted a 2-day Symposium on November 2010 in
Washington, DC, on the topic of Climate Change and Impact Assessment.
See the background material including MDBs/IFIs' procedures/strategies, country procedures, good case studies, tools & resources and the background document providing the current “state of practice” details underlying the
Symposium’s main discussion points.
IA is based on establishing a baseline environmental and socio-cultural setting and superimposing the project or programme/policy scenario upon it. IA has not traditionally grappled with the prediction of future changes to the baseline setting, but in some cases major changes in the recent past are included in the description of the setting. Analysis is normally carried out in the assessment of impacts, but incorporation of climate change will require radical change when describing the background setting. Time scales become a more important component to be considered when assessments may precede construction or operational phases by many years.
In addition to describing changes in climate over the anticipated life of the project or programme/policy, the environmental setting will need to include issues such as:
- changes in migration patterns
- changes in biodiversity and distribution ranges of relevant species
- pot