Synthesis of Environmental Impact Assessment to support planning of ecological compensation and decision-making: an introduction to research project

Abstract

Habitat changes are the key drivers of global biodiversity loss. However, land-use decisions that extensively affect the abundance and distribution of species are made at local scale. Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is a systematic process where the effects of major projects on their utilized environment are examined, and it leads either to implementation, modification or rejection of the planned project. Even though EIA process also includes a proposal for the follow-up program, monitoring of the impacts is not specifically required after project has been implemented. Lack of this information, for example, complicates the mitigation of impacts since the realized loss of natural values is unknown.

We will mainly use data on birds and the Siberian flying squirrel since they are essential part of the EIA process and national monitoring data is available. Material of the Finnish EIA projects and related reports and surveys will be gathered to produce a synthesis of what is currently known on the national EIA process and what should be changed. Next, we focus on projects that relate to the construction of roads, wind plantations, peat production fields and zoning, and where both pre and post-surveys have been conducted and compare their outcomes also to underlying regional trends within different groups of species. In addition, since data on the post-implementation period is limited, comparable surveys with those of EIA reports will be repeated on particular sites where projects have been implemented.

Our results provide more information and means to EIA authorities to more accurately assess forthcoming projects and their environmental impacts and to improve mitigation their harmful effects in advance. It is also possible to denote species susceptible to particular environmental changes, which helps planning and directing of ecological compensation.