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The International Association for Impact Assessment (IAIA) is an international association of professionals involved with impact assessment, including both social impact assessment and environmental impact assessment. [1] [2] [3]
The United States' National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) was signed into law on 1 January 1970. It requires federal agencies to integrate environmental values into their decision-making processes by considering the environmental impacts of their proposed actions and reasonable alternatives to those actions. To meet NEPA requirements, U.S. federal agencies prepare a detailed statement known as an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). It was the enforcement of this piece of legislation that provided the impetus for the creation of IAIA.[ citation needed ]
In 1980, Charlie Wolf, Fred Rossini, and Alan Porter chaired an all-day session on integrated impact assessment for the American Association for the Advancement of Science's (AAAS) annual conference in San Francisco.[ citation needed ]
During one of the sessions at the 1980 AAAS conference, Rossini, Porter, and Wolf discussed creating an impact assessment association. The discussion continued over dinner in Chinatown. At the end of the meal, fortune cookies were served. The piece of paper inside Wolf's cookie read "you will do well to expand your business" – and the decision to begin the International Association for Impact Assessment was made. The intent was to bring together all who were responsible for and figuring out how to conduct assessments which would meet the NEPA requirements for Environmental Impact Assessment.[ citation needed ]
IAIA was incorporated in 1980 in the state of Georgia, US, where Porter lived and worked. Its first meeting was held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in January 1981. Porter was the first executive director, serving from 1981 to 1988. Maurie Voland of Belhaven, North Carolina, US, took over as executive director in 1988 and served in a part-time position until 1995. The headquarters of IAIA moved to North Dakota State University (NDSU) in Fargo, North Dakota, in 1995, when the board appointed Rita Hamm as its executive director. In 1999, the IAIA Headquarters moved off of the NDSU campus to its current independent location at 1330 23rd Street South, Suite C, Fargo, North Dakota, US.[ citation needed ]
The IAIA headquarter operates with six full-time employees.[ citation needed ]
IAIA has members from over 120 countries, and anybody can join as a member and/or renew membership online. [4] Individual membership costs $55 for students and $110 for other individuals. [5] Membership comes with a subscription to the IAPA Journal and the IAIA Newsletter, as well as other benefits.
IAIA has affiliates in over ten countries, including Cameroon, [6] Poland, Germany, [7] Ghana, Italy, [8] South Korea, [9] Mozambique, [10] New Zealand, [11] Nigeria, [12] Portugal, [13] South Africa, [14] Spain, [15] and Canada (multiple affiliates). [16]
IAIA publishes Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal , a quarterly journal comprising peer-reviewed research articles, professional practice articles, and book reviews of recently published titles. [17] IAIA also publishes a newsletter and other downloadable publications. [18]
The Annual Conference of the International Association for Impact Assessment has been held around 40 times.
The IAIA has been cited by United States Government agencies in their evaluation of the impact of various activities. For instance, the United States Department of Energy and the United States Environmental Protection Agency both list the IAIA as a non-profit organization to consult for environmental impact assessment. [3] [19] IAIA prepared a monograph on social impact assessment for the National Marine Fisheries Service in 1993/1994. [20] Delaware Health and Social Services cited an IAIA paper in its fact sheet on health impact assessment. [21]
The World Health Organization lists the IAIA among the "Other organizational links" in the arena of impact assessment. [2] WHO and IAIA also co-sponsored a conference on health impact assessment. [22] Experts from the International Association for Impact Assessment also played an important role in designing the World Bank's Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) materials. [23]
Environmental laws are laws that protect the environment. Environmental law is the collection of laws, regulations, agreements and common law that governs how humans interact with their environment. This includes environmental regulations; laws governing management of natural resources, such as forests, minerals, or fisheries; and related topics such as environmental impact assessments.Environmental law is seen as the body of laws concerned with the protection of living things from the harm that human activity may immediately or eventually cause to them or their species, either directly or to the media and the habits on which they depend.
North Dakota State University is a public land-grant research university in Fargo, North Dakota. It was founded as North Dakota Agricultural College in 1890 as the state's land-grant university. As of 2021, NDSU offers 94 undergraduate majors, 146 undergraduate degree programs, 5 undergraduate certificate programs, 84 undergraduate minors, 87 master's degree programs, 51 doctoral degree programs of study, and 210 graduate certificate programs. It is classified among "R1-Doctoral Universities – Very High Research Activity".
Environmental protection is the practice of protecting the natural environment by individuals, groups and governments. Its objectives are to conserve natural resources and the existing natural environment and, where it is possible, to repair damage and reverse trends.
The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) is a division of the Executive Office of the President that coordinates federal environmental efforts in the United States and works closely with agencies and other White House offices on the development of environmental and energy policies and initiatives.
The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is a United States environmental law that promotes the enhancement of the environment and established the President's Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ). The law was enacted on January 1, 1970. To date, more than 100 nations around the world have enacted national environmental policies modeled after NEPA.
An environmental impact statement (EIS), under United States environmental law, is a document required by the 1969 National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for certain actions "significantly affecting the quality of the human environment". An EIS is a tool for decision making. It describes the positive and negative environmental effects of a proposed action, and it usually also lists one or more alternative actions that may be chosen instead of the action described in the EIS. Several U.S. state governments require that a document similar to an EIS be submitted to the state for certain actions. For example, in California, an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) must be submitted to the state for certain actions, as described in the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). One of the primary authors of the act is Lynton K. Caldwell.
The Environmental Quality Improvement Act of 1970 is a United States environmental law which was passed to work in conjunction with the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). One of the two major purposes of the Act was to authorize the creation of an Office of Environmental Quality to provide the professional and administrative staff needed for the Council on Environmental Quality. The second major purpose was to "assure that each Federal department and agency conducting or supporting public works activities which affect the environment shall implement the policies under existing law". To accomplish these purposes, the act gave more responsibilities to the chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality in his new role as director of the Office of Environmental Quality.
Environmental Impact assessment (EIA) is the assessment of the environmental consequences of a plan, policy, program, or actual projects prior to the decision to move forward with the proposed action. In this context, the term "environmental impact assessment" is usually used when applied to actual projects by individuals or companies and the term "strategic environmental assessment" (SEA) applies to policies, plans and programmes most often proposed by organs of state. It is a tool of environmental management forming a part of project approval and decision-making. Environmental assessments may be governed by rules of administrative procedure regarding public participation and documentation of decision making, and may be subject to judicial review.
Social impact assessment (SIA) is a methodology to review the social effects of infrastructure projects and other development interventions. Although SIA is usually applied to planned interventions, the same techniques can be used to evaluate the social impact of unplanned events, for example, disasters, demographic change, and epidemics. SIA is important in applied anthropology, as its main goal is to be able to deliver positive social outcomes and eliminate any possible negative or long term effects.
Environmental planning is the process of facilitating decision making to carry out land development with the consideration given to the natural environment, social, political, economic and governance factors and provides a holistic framework to achieve sustainable outcomes. A major goal of environmental planning is to create sustainable communities, which aim to conserve and protect undeveloped land.
Health impact assessment (HIA) is defined as "a combination of procedures, methods, and tools by which a policy, program, or project may be judged as to its potential effects on the health of a population, and the distribution of those effects within the population."
The Chernobyl Forum is the name of a group of UN agencies, founded on 3–5 February 2003 at the IAEA Headquarters in Vienna, to scientifically assess the health effects and environmental consequences of the Chernobyl accident and to issue factual, authoritative reports on its environmental and health effects.
Environmental issues are disruptions in the usual function of ecosystems. Further, these issues can be caused by humans or they can be natural. These issues are considered serious when the ecosystem cannot recover in the present situation, and catastrophic if the ecosystem is projected to certainly collapse.
Monsanto Co. v. Geertson Seed Farms, 561 U.S. 139 (2010), is a United States Supreme Court case decided 7-1 in favor of Monsanto. The decision allowed Monsanto to sell genetically modified alfalfa seeds to farmers, and allowed farmers to plant them, grow crops, harvest them, and sell the crop into the food supply. The case came about because the use of the seeds was approved by regulatory authorities; the approval was challenged in district court by Geertson Seed Farms and other groups who were concerned that the genetically modified alfalfa would spread too easily, and the challengers won. Monsanto appealed the district court decision and lost, and appealed again to the Supreme Court, where Monsanto won, thus upholding the original approval and allowing the seeds to be sold.
Charles H. Eccleston is a former employee of the United States Energy Department (DOE), and later the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) who was convicted for attempting to breach protected computer systems. Eccleston, a U.S. citizen who had been living in Davao City in the Philippines since 2011, was terminated from his employment at the NRC in 2010. He was detained by Philippine authorities in Manila, Philippines, on March 27, 2015, and deported to the United States to face U.S. criminal charges. He initially came to the attention of the FBI in 2013 after he entered a foreign embassy in Manila and offered to sell a list of over 5,000 e-mail accounts of all officials, engineers and employees of a U.S. government energy agency. He said that he was able to retrieve this information because he was an employee of a U.S. government agency, held a top secret security clearance and had access to the agency's network. He asked for $18,800 for the accounts, stating they were “top secret.” When asked what he would do if that foreign country was not interested in obtaining the U.S. government information he was offering, he stated he would offer the information to China, Iran or Venezuela, as he believed these countries would be interested in the information. On February 2, 2016, he pled guilty to one count of "attempted unauthorized access and intentional damage to a protected computer". In his guilty plea, he admitted scheming to cause damage to the computer network of the DOE through e-mails that he believed would deliver a computer virus to particular employees. He was incarcerated as inmate number 68974-112 and was released on July 15, 2016.
The Environmental Protection Agency, is an agency of Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, established by EPA Act 490 (1994). The agency is dedicated to improving, conserving and promoting the country’s environment and striving for environmentally sustainable development with sound, efficient resource management, taking into account social and equity issues. It oversees the implementation of the National Environment Policy. EPA Ghana's mission is to manage, protect and enhance the country’s environment and seek common solutions to global environmental problems. Its mission is to be achieved through an integrated environmental planning and management system with broad public participation, efficient implementation of appropriate programs and technical services, advice on environmental problems and effective, consistent enforcement of environmental law and regulations. EPA Ghana is a regulatory body and a catalyst for change to sound environmental stewardship.
The Responsibly And Professionally Invigorating Development Act of 2013 is a bill that would aim to expedite the review process required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for construction projects that are partly or fully financed with federal funds or require permits or approvals from federal regulatory agencies. It was to do so by establishing specific deadlines for environmental reviews, which sometimes go on so long that they can delay a project for years.
The North Dakota Library Association (NDLA) is a professional association for librarians, library staff, and library supporters that represent school, public, academic, and special libraries located in North Dakota, United States. "The purpose of this organization is to exercise professional leadership and to promote library services and librarianship." The North Dakota Library Association was formed on January 18, 1906. The association has humble beginnings – at the 1909 conference, there was only 18 members. There are currently over 300 NDLA members.
Leslie E. Wildesen was an American archaeologist best known for her work in policy-making. As the first woman archaeologist in the United States Forest Service and the first regional archaeologist in the Pacific Northwest, she wrote the first guidebook used by a government agency for the management of cultural resources. Throughout her career, she made great strides in public involvement in archaeology, collaboration with Native American tribes, protection of Native American burials, and environmental policy implementation. She developed numerous training programs regarding the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and environmental law.
Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal is a scientific journal in the area of impact assessment, published by Taylor and Francis. The journal is associated with the organization International Association for Impact Assessment. It is edited by Thomas Fischer from University of Liverpool.
