Are environmental impact statements imperfect

[Doug Yanega]

Roger Kendrick wrote:

>Perhaps there should be a legal requirement for EIA (EA...depends which
>country!) contractees to be associates or members of specified institutes,
>such as the Institute of Ecology & Environmental Management, or at least have
>passed appropriate levels of species identification programmes run by such
>organisations as national museums and institutes.

While many of us agree with you, and would love to see this in practice,
the simple fact is that there would - if this happened - be almost NO ONE
left with the skills necessary to do such work, relative to the amount that
needs to be done. Everything would come to a grinding halt, as the average
time to complete an impact study would be about 10 years (9 of them just on
a waiting list), and the developers would scream bloody murder (and
justifiably so, really).
        The USFWS here gives ID tests to people before they issue permits
to do Quino Checkerspot survey work, and even these tests  - which do weed
out at least the totally incompetent - are a poor substitute for field
experience. Identifying a pinned specimen is quite different from knowing
host plants, habitat, and being able to ID something on the wing from 50
meters away. Make the test more stringent, and there would be about a dozen
qualified people left for all of Southern California, several of whom are
not in a position to do survey work on a full-time basis.
        Hard to imagine how to resolve the need for competent people with
the shortage *of* competent people, when there's no practical way to train
more.

Peace,


Doug Yanega        Dept. of Entomology         Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California - Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521
phone: (909) 787-4315 (standard disclaimer: opinions are mine, not UCR's)
           http://insects.ucr.edu/staff/yanega.html
  "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
        is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82