New!Delta | Theme 5
The overriding purpose of Theme 5 is to bring together the relevant experience at a European level and to develop a common science-based methodology and toolkit for cause-effect assessment that can be applied to projects and plans or activities in two demonstration projects, one being a proposed plan or project and the second an on-going activity. Without agreement on how to assess the potential impacts of proposed developments or ongoing activities, it is difficult to reach agreement on the predicted impacts or the potential significance of those impacts.
The component parts of Theme 5 are depicted below:
During 5.1, undertaken in the first half of 2005, a review of methods used to assess cause effect was undertaken, which looked at examples from both Environmental Impact Assessments (i.e. EIA Directive) and Appropriate Assessments (i.e. Habits and Birds Directives). The review also looked at specific plans and projects and the relative success of the proposals. A workshop was also held with English Nature, to discuss their experiences of the Habitats Directive and its interaction with the ports industry.
Following the completion of 5.1, a methodology for assessing cause effect has been developed as part of 5.2, drawing from the experience of ABPmer, the literature review and further discussions with English Nature (http://www.english-nature.org.uk) and Royal Haskoning (http://www.royalhaskoning.com). The methodology has been drafted as a web enabled system and presented here – it will be subject to amendments as part of 5.3 and 5.4. To ensure that the resulting methodology is workable and applicable to end users, input at such an early stage is considered key, to gain feedback to assist in its development. The first workshop to discuss the draft methodology was held in July 2005, with further workshops planned during the lifetime of the project.
