The construction sector consumes significant quantities of energy and contributes substantially to greenhouse gas emissions. It is imperative that the sector considers a renewable component to its energy procurement. The sector has adopted various policy instruments such as impact assessment and...

Germany and the United States are amongst the leading countries regarding installed renewable energy capacity and are steadily adding new facilities. As balancing the strive for a low carbon energy supply with other environmental interests, such as biodiversity conservation, becomes more...

Despite the central role of valued ecosystem component (VEC) selection to project impact assessment (IA) and cumulative effects assessment (CEA), little is known about what influences it. To potentially improve the efficacy of CEA, a look into the "black box" of VEC selection is warranted. An...

Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is assumed to be an important instrument to support decision-making in Brazil. Although not mandatory, nearly 35 SEAs, of which one third are devoted to energy plans and programmes (oil, gas, hydroelectricity and biofuel), have been prepared over the past...

Natural ecosystems, including forest ecosystems, continue to be degraded or converted at an alarming rate. To complement or substitute regulatory approaches to ecosystem management, market-based instruments such as "payments for ecosystem services" (PES) have been introduced and are gaining...

Explosives manufacture in South Africa is a major component of the chemical and mining industry, and as an important producer of hazardous chemicals it is also a potential contributor to significant environmental impacts. Environmental authorisation of explosives manufacturing activities is...

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2007, 2012:11) warned that the mega deltas in South Asia (e.g. the Ganges Brahmaputra Meghna River Basin) will be at great risk due to increased flooding, and the region's poverty would reduce the capacity of the inhabitants to adapt to...

The paper describes major developments of environmental impact assessment (EIA) in China since 2003 when its EIA law became effective, with emphasis on those aspects not sufficiently touched upon by most researchers so far. These range from threshold-based categorization, evolution in scoping,...

This article examines two experiences with strategic environmental assessment (SEA) in Australia, one complete the other in progress. The first applied SEA to a plan for a liquefied natural gas hub precinct on the National Heritage listed Kimberley coast of Western Australia, and the second...

In response to the establishment of universally-accepted principles about sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR), corporations are now producing Sustainability Reports (SRs). Corporations are expected to document their positive and negative impacts on society. However, the...