Environmental Assessment
Volume A-7
Introduction
EA Methods and Study Area
•
quantitative and qualitative evaluation of the significance of potential
effects, including reference to management objectives, baseline
conditions and the views of the proponent and stakeholders; and
•
characterization of potential residual effects and their consequences for
the environment.
Key to the mitigation strategy is the environmental and social design of the
project. The Dynatec engineering design team worked with the environmental
and social scientists during project planning to develop solutions to potential
environmental and social impacts. Mitigation techniques were thus developed
early in the design process to address potential effects to physical, biological and
social components. Many examples are included in analysis of alternative
sections, such as pipeline route alternative analyses (Volume C, Section 1).
Other examples occurred in many discipline areas, such as the feeding back of
initial plant air emissions results to the design team, with the result being
improved emissions technology and lower emissions.
7.1.1
Key Questions
One of the main purposes of an EA is to provide answers to questions that people
have about how a project could affect something that matters to them. To focus
the assessment and ensure that the EA clearly addresses the issues of concern,
questions have been formulated that capture the concerns relative to a particular
issue. In this report, those concerns are expressed as “key questions”, and they
form the basis of the investigations of potential project impacts. The process for
developing a list of key questions involves the development of a list of all
possible issues related to a project by means of consultation (Volume A,
Section 6) and the experience of the assessment team. These issues are then
refined into those that are relevant to the project. All issues are addressed, and
the appropriate mitigations developed.
An example of a key question is:
Air quality key question
What Effect Will Dust Emissions From the Mine
Have on Ambient Air Quality?
Key questions for the EA are provided for each project component in Volumes B
to F.
Ambatovy Project
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January 2006
