Environmental Impact Assessment

The primary objective of this course is to provide students with an understanding of the policies, procedures and techniques of environmental impact assessment. The course offers the theoretical and practical knowledge to use a range of techniques to assess the impacts of new or existing projects on the environment. It provides students with an understanding of how one goes about assessing environmental impacts and of the techniques that you can apply in various situations. It introduces students to environmental impact assessment issues such as understanding how laws work, quantitative and qualitative reasoning, interpreting graphs and tables, critical thinking and reading. Topics include an overview of environmental impact assessment; selection of scientific, engineering, and socioeconomic factors in environmental impact assessment; identification of quantitative and qualitative environmental evaluation criteria; application of traditional and other techniques for assessing impacts of predicted changes in environmental quality; approaches for identifying, measuring, predicting, and mitigating environmental impacts; modelling techniques employed in environmental impact assessment; environmental standards and the environmental impact assessment process; and methodologies for incorporating environmental impact assessment into management decision making. Students learn to prepare an environmental impact assessment, review and critically analyse an environmental impact statement. The course considers the operation of EIA procedures in Greece and in other, mainly European, countries and examines the relevant legal framework in Greece and other European countries.