DEVELOPMENT

The Environmental and Sustainability Impacts of Development

Abstract

Introducing environmentally sound technologies (ESTs) - whether creating new solutions for industries in developed countries, or transferring technologies to developing countries - should bring opportunities. But it can create risks too. The key to avoiding these is to understand the impacts the new technologies may have, and to explore alternatives before making significant investments. Environmental technology assessment is an important tool to help decision makers make informed choices. The Environmental and Sustainability Impacts of Development

Introduction

This paper discusses the relative uses of decision tools for secondary risks of capital projects. After introducing the term “secondary risks” of capital projects (notably social and environmental risks), the article dwells on the classic decision tool for this purpose, namely project-level impact assessment, and its shortcomings(Bonnell, 2000). It then outlines more complex decision tools: strategic impact assessment; multi-criteria decision analysis), and argues that these may complement project-level impact assessment, but are so complex and costly that managers need to be careful about where and when to apply them.

Tools and methods

The terms 'method' and 'tool' are currently used interchangeably to describe building environmental assessment techniques. It is difficult to attribute toomuch meaning to the use of these terms in the names of current assessment techniques since they are often selected based on seeking a distinct acronymrather than precise descriptive terminology. Similarly, the terms 'certification', 'rating' or 'labelling' are used, again often interchangeably, to indicate extended outputs from the assessment process(Lee, 2000).

These typically take the form of a singular, easily recognizable designation, e.g. 'Gold', 'Excellent' or the number of attained 'Green Globes'. To explore fully the current and future roles of building environmental assessment in this paper, it is necessary to define and use these terms more carefully and consistently:

Although the term 'assessment tool' is often used generically to describe all assessment techniques that have been crafted to assist in accomplishing a specific intention, it is used here to describe a technique that predicts, calculates or estimates one or more environmental performance characteristics of a product or building, e.g. operating energy use, greenhouse gas emissions or embodied energy.

There are a variety of tools, varying in complexity and having different underlying methodologies - the most important distinction being between those based on Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) principles and those that are not(Caspary, 2006). Most LCA-based environmental assessment tools such as the Athena Environmental Impact Estimator (developed by Athena SMI) and Envest (developed by BRE) are used as the basis of evaluating materials or other strategic design options.

Other types of methodologies applied in assessment techniques relate to scoring performance (e.g. aggregation of points; eco-efficiency-based) and to the derivation of weightings (e.g. expert consensus, Analytic Hierarchy Process, etc.). Tools can be purchased or accessed by design professionals or others and used as and when deemed appropriate by users.

'Assessment method' is used here to describe assessment as one of its core functions but which may be accompanied by third-party verification before issuing a performance rating or label, include reference to or ...