Environmental Management

The cost of carrying out an environmental impact assessment can be a significant part of the planning and design cost of a development project. Notoriously, the EIA costs are difficult to predict at the outset of the project. This uncertainty is mainly due to an initial lack of knowledge of the environmental baseline conditions on the development site. As the project progresses, site knowledge increases gradually and new costs may emerge while some risks may reduce. Particularly in the current economic climate, there is a need to have a clear understanding of the costs and the risks of the environmental impact assessment at an early stage in the project.

The first step to effective cost management of an environmental impact assessment is to carry out a thorough EIA scoping study. The outcome of the EIA scoping study should be a clear understanding of the basic site characteristics and the likely environmental risks and sensitivities. It should also provide a clear programme on how to address the issues that have been identified in the further environmental impact assessment.

Following a carefully undertaken EIA scoping study, uncertainties remain. These uncertainties are however much more manageable. For instance, during the EIA scoping study it was identified that no important archaeological features have been recorded in the wider area around a site. The following step that is proposed is to carry out a geophysical site survey. Depending on the outcome of the survey there may be a requirement to carry out an intrusive investigation in the form of an excavation.

There are three uncertainties that will determine the final cost for archaeological work as part of the environmental impact assessment. Firstly there is the uncertainty about the exact cost to carry out the geophysical survey. The error margin on this should be relatively small as it is a fairly defined activity. The second uncertainty relates to whether or not the results of the survey indicate the need of further work. This is a yes or no issue, where the uncertainty relates to the chance that further work is required. Finally, the third piece of uncertainty relates to the cost of the intrusive investigation should this be required.

A system that is based on the Monte Carlo cost forecasting system is ideally suited to deal with these kind of uncertainties. The outcome of the Monte Carlo cost forecasting system is typically a series of potential project costs together with the probability that each of these costs will not be exceeded. Thus, employing a combination of a rigorous EIA scoping study and the use of the Monte Carlo cost forecasting methodology are essential tools in the effective cost management of environmental impact assessments.

Environmental resource management is the most important major a young person can have today because it is essential to handle the growing population, growing demand, and the new options of an ever-changing world. One reason that resource management is important is because it will manage the increasing population of the world. As the world’s population continues to increase, adding as many as one and a half billion people in the next twenty years, the global environment will continue to become more strained. The resources such as water and land will become more scarce, and they need to be used in the most efficient way possible to achieve maximum benefit. The world needs an efficient method to handle the power needs of large populations, especially as there is a global shift in energy usage that has its focus away from fossil fuels. It will be increasingly important in the near future to discover a way to efficiently power global commerce while having minimal effect on the environment.

Resource management will also be important to handle the rising demand of the world’s population. As the population grows, more resources will be needed to supply the needs of each person and forward the economy. The idea of consumerism that has been prevalent in America since the 1950’s has spread across the world, and has caused a greater demand for goods and products. In order to meet the needs of the economy, it is essential to be able to handle the resources needed and be able to distribute them efficiently.

Environmental resource management is also important because it will greatly assist in handling the new options that will be available in the future. As technology improves, there will be more efficient methods to distribute and harness the earth’s resources, as well as possibly using the resources of something outside the planet. A resource manager needs to be able to adapt to the new changes and be able to decide which resources to use and how to use them. Discovering new resources and new ways to handle resources is essential to handling the rapid growth of a changing world.

Handling new options, growing demand, and growing population are all reasons that environmental resource management is the major and career best suited for handling problems now and in the future. Although the future of the world is uncertain, it is important to be able to adapt to the changes that will inevitably occur. The world’s resources are limited, and it will become increasingly important to handle them correctly.