Abstract
Environmental impact assessments (EIAs) are still developing approaches to address the issue of climate change. The aim of the study is to examine how recent EIAs in Canada have approached the issue of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions when evaluating each individual project's contribution to and impact significance on climate change. Twelve EIAs performed under national legislation in Canada were analyzed. Canada developed approaches to GHG emissions more than a decade ago, and it is now common to assess the emissions and propose some mitigation in EIAs. Large emitters have proposed some substantial measures, typically the latest technologies, to reduce emissions. However, other proposed ideas may still be ambiguous and hard to examine in terms of real effects. Furthermore, there were many ambiguous and/or inconsistent definitions of GHG emission levels as well as significance of GHG emission impacts. The expressions of GHG emission amounts using percent are potentially misleading. In response to these situations, we suggest the use of clear and reasonable evaluations and definitions of GHG emissions as well as their significance.
Introduction
Climate change is one of the most serious environmental issues globally, possibly causing drastic changes to everyone's lives. The latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC Citation2013) documented that the mean temperature of the Earth's surface increased by 0.89°C between 1901 and 2012. Furthermore, the temperature would increase by 1.0–3.7°C in the period 2081–2100 in comparison with 1986–2005 (IPCC Citation2013). Considering its serious impact, many researchers have called for early actions against this issue (e.g. Stern Citation2006). The main reason for climate change is greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by various human activities, such as burning fossil fuels and deforestation (Karl & Trenberth Citation2003). In this regard, regulating and improving human activities and lifestyles are important to tackle this issue.
At an international level, the Kyoto Protocol was adopted in 1997, urging developed countries (listed in its Annex I) especially to implement measures to reduce GHG emissions (UNFCCC Citation1997). Since the Kyoto Protocol came into force in 2005, the Annex I countries have struggled to meet their commitments. Generally, implementable measures can be classified into two types: mitigation and adaptation. Mitigation refers to reducing the causative factors of climate change, whereas adaptation refers to changing our societies and their ecosystems to be able to adapt to climatically altered environments (Pielke Citation1998).
Environmental impact assessments (EIAs) are designed to evaluate various influences of certain projects on the environment so that these projects, ideally, will have negligible effects on the environment (Rosenberg et al. Citation1981). Environmental impacts of projects due to GHG emissions are only realized at the level of global climate, and it is challenging to incorporate such impacts into EIAs (Benidickson Citation2013).
Recently, guidelines and best practices for how EIAs should consider climate change have been produced. For instance, Byer et al. (Citation2012) recommended that each EIA assess not only the potential impacts of each project on climate change but also vulnerability of the project to a changing climate. These two ideas correspond to mitigation and adaptation respectively.
Linking the GHG emissions from an individual project to their impact on climate change is difficult (committee on climate change and environmental assessment in Canada 2003; hereafter CCCEAC) (Figure (a)) because of the tremendous uncertainties associated with climate change as well as a huge gap in scale between the global climate and each project (Slotterback Citation2011). In this sense, each individual project's contribution to climate change is insignificant and essentially impossible to estimate. For example, it is not possible to predict quantitatively how much the global temperature would increase due to GHG emissions from a project. It is therefore challenging to motivate people and organizations to mitigate the contribution to GHG emissions at the project level, and there may be differing views on the degree to which and how GHG emissions should be assessed and controlled in each project. Reviewing previous EIAs could help understand these views and may identify reasonable and practical approaches to GHG emissions at the project level. Several previous studies investigated this issue of mitigation with environmental policies or sustainability appraisals at regional scales (Posas Citation2011a, Citation2011b; Slotterback Citation2011; Wende et al. Citation2012). As well, Sok et al. (Citation2011) and Watkins and During (Citation2012) investigated this issue at project scales, but their approaches were unique (e.g. focusing on terminology use in EISs or questionnaire survey).
The main aim of this study was to identify how recent EIAs at the project level have approached the issue of GHG emissions. In the study, EIAs undertaken in response to national EIA regulations in Canada were examined. This is because Canada has much experience with EIAs (Robinson Citation1992) and has incorporated both GHG mitigation and adaptation into EIAs earlier than other countries (Agrawala et al. Citation2010). Some guidelines relevant to the issue of GHG emissions are also available in Canada (CCCEAC Citation2003, Nova Scotia Environment Citation2010). Such guidelines are important for controlling impacts of GHG emissions on climate change (Sok et al. Citation2011). In the following sections, we first introduce the Canadian EIA system. Subsequently, case studies of mitigation of GHG emissions are analyzed. Finally, possible solutions and suggestions to address detected problems are discussed. Particularly, as mentioned later, the current evaluation of impact significance and possible improvements to it are pursued. This is because the process of determining impact significance has still not been fully studied and agreed among stakeholders, despite the fact that it is the most central concept in EIAs, a threshold being influential on final decisions of these assessments (Lyhne & Kørnøv Citation2013; Murphy & Gillam Citation2013).
Current national EIA system in Canada
The Canadian federal government began its EIA program under the ‘environmental assessment and review process’ in 1973 (Robinson Citation1992; Doelle Citation2008). In 1995, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act was proclaimed, and the Canadian environmental assessment agency (CEAA) was established to deal with its administration. The act requires proponents to prepare EIAs that describe the necessity of, alternatives to, and environmental impacts of each proposed project, and also to implement public involvement. The Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, which was amended in 2012 (Benidickson Citation2013; CEAA Citation2013a), applies to the construction of various facilities (e.g. power stations, dams, mines and highways) (CEAA Citation2013b). For instance, construction of any power stations burning fossil fuels with a production capacity of 200 MW or more in Canada would be assessed under the Act (CEAA Citation2013b). According to this amended Act, EIA analysis results from proponents are evaluated through either a report by a federal authority or a panel review (Benidickson Citation2013). Furthermore, the Act urges the responsible authority for each project to consult other relevant authorities (Benidickson Citation2013). Consequently, opinions of relevant provincial governments are also considered, if necessary.
Guidance to proponents on how to address GHG emissions in federal EIAs in Canada is provided by the CCCEAC (Citation2003) which recommends that assessors conduct the following steps: (i) scoping, (ii) identifying GHG emissions, (iii) assessing identified GHG emissions, (iv) identifying mitigation measures and (v) follow-up including monitoring. Specifically, the third step requires comparisons between estimated GHG emissions and total GHG emissions in an industry/province/country. If the estimated GHG emissions are judged as ‘medium or high emissions’ (CCCEAC Citation2003, p. 9), then the EIA should move to the fourth step referring to jurisdictional policies and/or controls. The CCCEAC (Citation2003) introduced some examples of mitigation, such as emission credit trading, best practices of industries and making GHG management plans.
Analyses of the approach to GHG emissions in Canadian EIAs
Materials and methods
We collected the latest cases of EIAs prepared under national regulations in Canada to determine how they have approached GHG emissions. With each EIA, basic information was extracted, such as project name, project type, proposed location and proposed date. Second, EIA coverage of GHG emissions was surveyed, including assessment methods, main sources of GHG emissions, estimated quantities of GHG emissions, comparisons of the values with national and/or regional inventories and proposed mitigation. Finally, responses by agencies and final decisions by the Minister of Environment were examined as well. Here, responses by agencies consisted of opinions on whether they agree or disagree with proponents’ ideas and suggestions or requests about mitigation.
More specifically, we targeted all the EIA projects which were listed as ‘EA completed’ on CEAA's website (Citation2013c) as of November 2013. Incomplete EIAs which were still under way were not used here. According to the CEAA (Citation2013c), these EIAs are principally those subjected to the new law (The CEAA 2012). However, this list also included a few EIAs that started under the former act and continued under the transition provisions of the amended act (CEAA Citation2013c). Thus, we examined EIAs which were assessed mostly after 2012, although a few earlier EIAs were also investigated. Yet, the amendment in 2012 did not change essential approaches to GHG emissions, and therefore we treated any cases before/after 2012 equally in the following analysis. Documents of environmental impact statement (EIS) and/or agency's response (e.g. comprehensive study report) were available for most EIAs but not all. The EIAs whose documents were unavailable in CEAA (Citation2013c) at all were precluded from the data-set. Exceptionally, only one case (New Bridge for the St. Lawrence) was a screening assessment performed by Transport Canada, which was its proponent and the responsible authority, under the former CEAA. Thus, this case used different terminologies and methodologies of EIA process from those of other cases. Herein, we regarded its assessment reports as its EIS, and an agency's response was extracted from its screening report.
As a consequence, while 17 Canadian cases were found, EISs or other documents of 12 cases were available for the study. A case-study number was then assigned to each project (e.g. C1) in Tables and , and this number would be used to refer to certain projects in the following text. In the following subsections, the analysis results of EISs, the national agency responses, and the other stakeholder responses are given in order.
Table 1 GHG assessments in environmental impact statements of the projects which were already completed under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act 2012 in Canada.
Table 2 GHG assessments of the projects which were already completed under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act 2012 in Canada.
Use of the guideline of CCCEAC (Citation2003)
Nine of the 12 reviewed projects in Canada approached GHG emissions with a quantitative assessment for both construction and operation phases (Table ). This result suggests that assessing GHG emissions has become common in Canadian EIA probably thanks to CCCEAC (Citation2003). In support of this, each EIS cited CCCEAC (Citation2003) in four (C1–C3 and C9) out of seven cases whose EISs could be available to read (C1–C3, C5, C8, C9 and C11). Such EISs briefly introduced the basic policy of CCCEAC (Citation2003) and then documented the actual GHG emission assessment.
Definition of GHG emission levels
However, CCCEAC (Citation2003) used the three terms ‘small’, ‘medium’ and ‘large’ emissions, without any numerical definitions (Murphy & Gillam Citation2013). Consequently, these words were defined differently among the reviewed EISs, possibly confusing assessors. For instance, a technical data report written by the proponent of C1 stated that there is no available strict definition of low-, medium- and high-intensity emitters. Likewise, the EISs of C3 and C9, which cited CCCEAC (Citation2003), could not give any clear definitions of different levels of emissions, concluding subjectively that their projects’ GHG emissions would be ‘not large’ and ‘very small’ respectively. Exceptionally, the three levels described by CCCEAC (Citation2003) were defined in the EIS of C2 by numerical values (on a tonnes of CO2e per annum basis) of less than 105, greater than 105 and less than 106 and greater than 106. Furthermore, EISs which did not quote CCCEAC (Citation2003) used other adjectives to show the intensity of GHG emissions (e.g. ‘negligible’ in C5) or defined three levels (e.g. low, moderate and high emissions in C11) differently from the case of C2.
How to show GHG emission amounts?
Overall, most cases compared estimated GHG emissions with those of Canada or their host provinces, concluding that these projects would emit only a fraction of the Canadian and provincial emissions (e.g. < 1%; Table ). Such a statement may be true, but they do not necessarily mean that the emissions are not environmentally influential. Also, the small fraction may be just due to comparisons with too large amounts of emission inventories. For instance, the EIS of C2 stated that GHG emissions in operation phase would be 451,000 CO2e t/yr with the largest effort of mitigation, which corresponds to only 0.07% of Canada's annual GHG emission. However, the same amount is equal to around 10% of the annual GHG emission in Iceland, which emitted 4,542,000 CO2e t in 2010 (Statistics Iceland Citation2012). Here, we call this phenomenon ‘a scale trick’.
‘Significance’ and ‘non-significance’
After comparing GHG emission estimates with national and/or provincial emissions, most of the EISs (five out of seven) mentioned whether such impacts were significant or not. However, three proponents (C1, C2 and C9) among the four citing CCCEAC (Citation2003) emphasized, by repeating, the fact that it is not possible to assess the impact of GHG emissions from each project on climate change, as depicted in Figure (a). These proponents explicitly stated that it is not possible to assess the significance of such an impact, but curiously they could somehow conclude that the GHG emission impacts of their projects are unlikely to be significant. For instance, the EIS of C9 gave the following statement:
It is not possible to conclude with certainty that a given source of GHG has a measurable cause-and-effect relationship on local, regional, or global climate. As such, the incremental contribution of the Project to national or global GHG emissions cannot be linked to specific changes in global climate. Therefore, Project effects on climate have been assumed to be not significant, and are not discussed further in the EIS. (p. 2–53 of the EIS of C9)
Furthermore, the EIS of C11 initially admitted a possibly significant impact of GHG emissions but ended with the conclusion that the impact of the project on total air quality was ‘low’. This is possibly because impacts on air quality, other than GHG emissions, may have been estimated to be light, but still the possibly significant impact of GHG emissions was not logically denied. Hence, the rationales for judging of ‘non-significance’ in these EISs were generally ambiguous and/or inconsistent.
Mitigation measures
Seven reviewed EISs mentioned some implementable measures against emissions. In addition, proponents of two other projects (C4 and C10) are likely to have suggested mitigation measures, although these are just guessed based on comprehensive study reports, but not EISs. However, six of these nine cases concluded with just assessing, monitoring and/or prescribing best available technology economically achievable (BATEA). Examples of BATEA here were no-idling and low speed limits for vehicles used for construction and/or operation of projects. EISs of five cases in the current study mentioned this concept. Nonetheless, the effect of such ‘eco-driving’, for instance, can be greatly varied depending on drivers’ efforts as well as traffic crowdedness (Barth & Boriboonsomsin Citation2009). The review panel of C9 stated that speed limits for vehicles may be difficult to enforce. In this sense, these EISs seem to just assess impacts and note some well-known mitigational platitudes but not to address the issue substantially and substantively.
Given the fact that CCCEAC (Citation2003) proposed various mitigation measures, including not only best practices and monitoring but also emission credit trading and compensatory measures, only some of them have been commonly considered in most EIAs. GHG offset by buying carbon credits or carrying out other projects was mentioned only in the EIS of C8.
National agency's responses to EISs
CEAA or review panels agreed with the conclusions of assessing GHG emissions in all the reviewed EISs, although two projects were not approved to proceed due to other problems (Table ). Relevant statements were quoted from reports by CEAA or panels as original as possible, but some statements were paraphrased due to their length. Similarly with EISs, comprehensive study reports and panel reports compared estimated GHG emissions with national and/or provincial emissions. Almost all the examined cases, other than C5, then concluded that estimated GHG emissions were small and/or not significant.
However, it was not necessarily clarified how they could reach the conclusion of ‘not significant’. In other words, there were various and inconsistent ways of using terms and definitions among different cases. First, many adjectives were found to express the degrees of estimated impacts without explicit definitions: ‘very small’ (C1 and C9), ‘relatively small’ (C4), ‘minor’ (C6), ‘low’ (C10), and ‘negligible’ (C12). Exceptionally, the comprehensive study report of C10 gave four levels of impacts, such as ‘Very low’, ‘Low’, ‘Medium’ and ‘High’ with their definition. For instance, ‘low’ was explained as that which ‘affects a specific group or important habitat for one generation or less within natural variation’ (p. 152 of the comprehensive study report of C10). Second, the definition of ‘significance’ was not precisely offered in most reports. In the report of C10, there was a definition of ‘significant adverse effect’ by five requirements, any of which should be met for a finding of significance (e.g. ‘the duration of the adverse effect is long-term (greater than 15 years)’ (p. 160 of the report)). Furthermore, interestingly, the comprehensive study report of C6 defined ‘significance thresholds on climate’ as ‘change in total provincial GHG emissions greater than 0.1% or change in local or regional mean surface air temperature greater than 1°C (p. 67 of the report), although there was no scientific rationale for this definition. Nevertheless, such specific definitions have rarely been seen in EIAs as of yet. If we then apply the definition of ‘significance thresholds on climate’ by C6 to the other cases, at least impacts of GHG emissions from C1, C4 and C7 would be judged as significant.
Other stakeholders’ responses to EISs
Exceptionally, in the response to the EIS of C11, CEAA mentioned that the provincial government was concerned about the impact and that the proponent should make efforts to consider a more environmentally friendly option (CEAA Citation2013d). The main sources of GHGs from the project were likely to be activities linked to energy consumption. In the EIS, two main alternatives were quantitatively examined, i.e. the use of diesel generators and hydroelectric supply by power line. The latter was far more environmentally friendly, but the first alternative was chosen in C11, mainly because of the high initial cost associated with the construction of a power line compared with that of the other. It means that the proponent prioritized cost saving rather than the assessment result. Although the opinion of the provincial government did not lead CEAA to disapprove this project finally, there is no doubt that this opinion partly influenced CEAA's response to the EIS, because the comprehensive report mentioned much about this issue, calling for further consideration of the other alternative.
As well, in the case of C9, the GHG emissions were requested by hearing participants to be offset in the future. This fact was documented in the panel report, but there were no concrete suggestions as to how to implement this offset.
In other investigated cases, reports by CEAA or panels did not explicitly mention such opinions from the public, including provincial governments, in their reports. This result indicates that there were few opinions from the public and other intervenors or that such opinions were unimportant in national EIA processes.
Proposals for the future approach to GHG emissions in EIAs
Based on the aforementioned analysis of Canadian EIAs, we offer some suggestions to improve the approach to GHG emissions.
Uses and definitions of GHG emission levels
From a national viewpoint, any project data with larger emissions than 50,000 t CO2e/year have been required to report their GHG emissions data (Sametz et al. Citation2012). Also, those in Alberta with larger than 105 t CO2e/year are regarded as ‘large emitters’ and required to reduce their emissions (Sametz et al. Citation2012). The threshold of 105 t CO2e/year has also been used historically to define large final emitters in Canada, whereas another threshold of 106 t CO2e/year was proposed by Murphy and Gillam (Citation2013). Likewise, to prevent any unnecessary confusion in EIAs, CCCEAC (Citation2003) could be revised with precise quantitative definition of the three terms (‘small’, ‘medium’ and ‘large’). However, we admit that determining specific thresholds to define these terms is difficult in terms of science, because impacts of GHG emissions increase continuously with increases of emissions. In other words, there are no known thresholds. Simultaneously, CCEA as well as established panels could use adjectives for GHG emissions in a coherent way in their reports. In line with this, Watkins and During (Citation2012) also reported inconsistent use of words which were relevant to carbon and GHG in EIAs, suggesting use and thorough definition of fewer words.
Scale trick
If we compare an estimated emission with an emission of a larger jurisdiction, for instance, the fraction would be more likely to be expressed as small. Irrespective of whether intentionally or unintentionally done, such a trick may possibly entail a kind of framing effect, which can change people's decision-making using different expressions of essentially the same information (Tversky et al. Citation1981). Wang and Johnston (Citation1995) and Shimizu and Udagawa (Citation2011) tested to which degree each person makes a risky decision about a certain group's life/death-related issue, by changing the group's scale (6, 60 or 600 persons). They then found that people were more likely to take a risky decision with smaller groups, naming it ‘the effect of contextual group size’. As such, influences of different scales on decision-making were confirmed by experimental psychology.
Any amounts smaller than 100 are not appropriate to be expressed with percent, given the fact that percent is defined based on 100 (Parker & Leinhardt Citation1995). In this respect, numerical information provided by proponents in EISs should be carefully interpreted. Regional targets (e.g. 10% decrease of GHG emissions (Nova Scotia Environment Citation2010)) are useful to be compared with estimated GHG emissions in each EIA, because such targets at small scales can also avoid the scale trick. Moreover, to enable readers to understand such impacts more accurately and easily, proponents could show the impacts in more diverse ways (e.g. showing costs to offset GHG emissions). The importance of such an effort (i.e. increasing understandability) was emphasized in an international guideline about this issue as well (Byer et al. Citation2012).
Linking between estimated GHG emissions and global climatic goals
Current EIAs tend to be approved using the most environmentally preferable technologies. However, even if some projects adopt the most environmentally friendly methods and technologies, some of them still may emit large amounts of GHGs. These cases may counteract some policies and plans relevant to climate change (Figure (b)). Here, it is important to distinguish ‘technically irrelevant linking between project impact and climate change (Figure (a))’ versus ‘addressable linking between relevant policies or plans and mitigation in each project.’ Ideally, relevant policies and plans may be rooted in the worldwide common climate goal (e.g. stabilizing the climate with the temperature increase up to 2°C) (IPCC Citation2013), and then mitigation of GHG emissions of projects should be linked with these policies and plans (Figure (c)). However, due to various constraints in each project, it may be difficult to design projects to reduce GHG emissions below certain values which are consistent with regional targets. If proponents find huge inconsistencies between estimated GHG emissions versus relevant policies/plans, for example, it seems sensible that they consider some compensatory measures to fill the gaps (IEMA Citation2010). In this way, it seems possible to link mitigation to GHG emissions in each project versus the final goal of climate stabilization (Figure (d)). Each province has a specific target of GHG emission reduction, and GHG emissions from new projects are likely to be influential on such regional goals or plans rather than national ones. Thus, like the case of C11, each provincial government might need to check whether approaches to GHG emissions in EIAs are consistent with their targets more seriously than federal agencies, and their opinions should be explicitly written in comprehensive reports by CEAA or review panel reports. Many proponents emphasized the technical difficulty of assessing impacts of GHG emissions from each project on climate change, but this cannot be an excuse for not considering and implementing analysis of the contribution of GHG emissions from each project and comparing them with global targets to stabilize climate change (Figure (d)).
Approach to ‘significance’
Although such consideration of relevant policies/plans was recommended by CCCEAC (Citation2003) already, this guideline did not say anything about ‘significance’ of GHG emissions. This might be why many proponents gave conclusions of ‘not significant emission’ subjectively and arbitrarily. Therefore, we would like to consider the definition of ‘significance’ in this issue here. According to Lawrence (Citation2007), there are three impact significance determination approaches: technical approach, collaborative approach, and reasoned argumentation approach. Herein, the technical approach is to judge ‘significance’, quantitatively, mainly based on scientific analysis and knowledge, whereas the collaborative approach is to do so qualitatively based on community knowledge and perspectives. However, both of these approaches lack the strengths of the other approach. A third approach, called reasoned argumentation, integrates both technical and community knowledge, facts and multiple perspectives in qualitative and quantitative fashions (Lawrence Citation2007). Reasoned argumentation is, in our view, a much stronger approach than the other two.
The most basic technical/scientific information in GHG emission assessment is absolute amounts of estimated GHG emissions. All mitigation measures and/or compensation measures which proponents propose should be considered here. Also, absolute amounts could be compared with some thresholds, like the aforementioned instance of ‘large emitters (>105 t CO2e/year)’ in Alberta (Sametz et al. Citation2012). It should be noted, however, that the threshold of 105 t CO2e/year does not have any scientifically special meaning. It means that evaluation of this amount by using such thresholds is just an arbitrary reference.
Meanwhile, Lawrence (Citation2007) proposed that government contributions, such as policies and standards, could also be available as input information in the reasoned argumentation approach. In this sense, consistencies or inconsistencies between pre-existing policies/targets and estimated emissions, as mentioned in the previous subsection, could be useful to determine ‘significance’ as well. Nonetheless, evaluating significance of GHG emission impacts based on just relations to regional inventories/targets could also lead to unfair evaluations among regions (provinces) which emit different amounts of GHG. This could be serious in Canada, where neither GHG emissions nor emission reduction targets are evenly distributed among the provinces (Tang Citation2011).
Furthermore, CCCEAC (Citation2003) recommended assessing GHG emissions in comparison with emitters in the same industry, but it did not give concrete methods. In this regard, some foreign EIAs have already ideas of evaluating GHG emissions by calculating CO2e amount per product unit. For instance, several thermal power plants are or will be renewed in Japan. Due to their lower carbon dioxide emission intensity per generated electricity compared with that of pre-existing plants, the Japanese Ministry of the Environment claimed in its EIAs that the operation of the new plant should be prioritized so that the total amount of CO2 emissions can be minimized (e.g. refreshing thermal power plant of Nishi-Nagoya (JME Citation2013a)). Likewise, kg CO2e divided by iron ore and bauxite or copper concentrate was used in an Australian life cycle assessment (LCA) of mining and mineral processing (Norgate & Haque Citation2010). Therefore, such ‘eco-efficiency’ (GHG emissions per product unit) could be a good measure to assess GHG emissions in comparison with similar projects of the same industry.
As such, the current recommendation by CCCEAC (Citation2003) could be useful for determining ‘significance’ in GHG emissions from technical perspectives. However, as aforementioned, community knowledge and perspectives should also be collected to make a final decision.
Mitigation measures
Finally, proponents should clarify how to implement effective BATEA more concretely in their EISs. In parallel with these, to tackle the uncertainty, it would be worthwhile for proponents to publicize their efforts to implement BATEA after their projects are initiated. Furthermore, watchdog groups and/or authorities, possibly including CCEA, could do spot checks without prior notifications to confirm mitigation measures including BATEA are actually realized in each project (Sok et al. Citation2011). In contrast, BATEA is common, and it appears that relatively easy options have been selectively considered. In other words, compensatory measures which need budgets have been less popular. In this regard, CCCEAC (Citation2003) could develop its guideline to include the details of the latest compensatory measures for ‘significant’ emitters. For instance, a few other countries have been approaching this issue by asking proponents to consider and/or introduce new technologies (e.g. Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) in recent Japanese EIAs (JME Citation2013b)). Cormos (Citation2012) reported that plants of integrated gasification combined cycle can capture 90% of generated carbon by CCS. So, various advancing approaches to GHG emissions could be shared in such guidelines.
Conclusion
Canada has developed approaches to GHG emissions for more than a decade, and it is now common to assess the emissions and propose some mitigation in EIAs. The guideline about GHG emission mitigation by CCCEAC (Citation2003) was cited by more than half of the examined EISs. Large emitters have then proposed some substantial measures, typically the latest technologies, to reduce emissions. However, other proposed ideas may still be ambiguous and hard to examine in terms of real effects. In the future, more efforts in research and proponents’ actions will be needed to ensure the implementation of BATEA.
Furthermore, there were many ambiguous and/or inconsistent definitions of GHG emission levels as well as ‘significance’. The expressions of GHG emission amounts using percent were also tricky. In response to these situations, this study suggested to introduce clear and coherent definitions and more understandable expressions. As well, multiple proponents emphasized that it is not possible to assess the impact of GHG emissions from each project on climate change. However, linking between relevant policies/plans and mitigation in each project is crucial to achieve worldwide goals to stabilize the climate. We should not confound this linking and the technically irrelevant linking between project impact versus climate change. Using regional inventories and/or targets could be useful to overcome the technically irrelevant linking.In addition, average emission intensity per product unit in the same industry could be useful for determining the impact significance of GHG emissions. To summarize our idea, we provide a diagram as to how to address this issue in Figure , referring to the Figure 3 in Lawrence (Citation2007). A similar idea has been already proposed in CCCEAC (Citation2003), but it is also true that this idea has not been fully realized accurately in actual EIAs. Revisiting such ideas in consideration of how to define ‘significance’ will possibly improve the current situation which we found in this study.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the editors as well as anonymous reviewers for their advice on our earlier manuscript. The views and opinions expressed in this article represent solely those of the authors and do not represent the views of any organization.
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References
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