• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.171-188
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• 2003

Environmental Impact Assessment(ElA) in Korea has been used to improve environmental conservation and decision-making since environmental impact statement(EIS) was introduced in 1981 with the promulgation of the Environmental Preservation Act in 1977. which replaoed the Pollution Control Act legislated in 1%3. Together with a rapid growth of environmental perception as well as the diversification of development activities, however, it has recently bring about a strong demand for a new assessment process related to the strategic level of policies, plan, programs. In order to overcome such a limit in ElA system, Prior Environmental Review System(PERS) was introduced for assessment of administrative plans mainly concerned with development projects in 1993. In 1999. the regulations for PERS have been established by an amendment of the Basic Environmental Policy Act.Therefore the foundation of EIA system to integrate environmental concerns in planning processes and project works has been refonned. However the results of the execution of PERS were somewhat insuffident due to the institutional and technical matters. As the world's attention turns to sustainability and the considerations of cumulative effects, the concept of strategic envirorunental assessment(SEA) has taken on more significance and urgency and increasing number of countries and international organizations now undertake some form of SEA. The term SEA, however, is variously defined and understood, generally it means a formal process of systematic analysis of the envirorunental effects of development policies, plans, programmes and other proposed strategic actions. This process extends the aims and principles of EIA upstream in the decision-making process, beyond the project level and when major alternatives are still open. In this paper, we are discussing the significance of SEA and its relevance to EIA and the international trends and institutionalization of SEA. In conclusion we are discussing the comprehensive developing plan for SEA in Korea, then proposing a plan to make institutional arrangements for its application.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.25-35
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• 1995

The objective of the study is to produce preferential impact assessment factors for Environmental Impact Assessment by considering regional features and public participation in the initial stages of EIA. In order to produce preferential impact assessment factors, the study was carried out through theoretical research and a survey of public awareness as a ways to reflect public participation based on theoretical research. The survey of public awareness was conducted in the form of an interview to review the impact which the construction of atomic power plants at Hyo-am village, Jang-an, Kyungsang Province and Bi-hak village, Suhsang-myon, Ulsan-Kun will have on the surrounding environment: to reflect public participation on deciding preferential assessment: and to determine the extent of alternatives of the proposed project. As the result of the study, the following were identified as preferential assessment factors in the settlement and surrounding areas cultivation marine products, change of temperature of seawater due to flow of warm water, land use(negative), noise vibration during construction, existing plants, erosion accumulation, influx of manpower for construction(negative), recreation landscaping during construction and operation, change in flow of transportation during construction, the quality of seawater during construction and operation were produced as preferential assessment factors in both settlement area and neighboring areas. In the settlement area, the educational environment(negative & positive) and positive aspects of the influx of manpower for construction were also identified as preferential assessment factors.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.15-26
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• 1995

The objective of the study is to produce preferential impact assessment factors for Environmental Impact Assessment by considering regional features and public participation in the initial stages of EIA. In order to produce preferential impact assessment factor, the study was carried out through theoretical research and a survey of public awareness as way to reflect public participation based on theoretical research. The survey of public awareness was conducted in the form of an interview to review the impact which the construction of atomic power plants at Hyo-am village, Jang-an, Kyungsang Province and Bi-hak village, Suhsang-myon, Ulsan-Kun will have on the surrounding environment : to reflect public participation on deciding preferential assessment: and to determine the extent of alternatives of the proposed project. As the result of the study, the followings were identified as preferential assessment factors in the displacing settlement and surrounding areas: cultivation marine products, change of temperature of seawater due to flow of warm water, land use (negative), noise vibration during construction, existing vegetations, erosion sedimentation, influx of manpower for construction(negative), recreation landscaping during construction and operation, change in flow of transportation during construction, the quality of seawater during construction and operation were produced as preferential assessment factors in both displacing area and neighboring areas. In the displacing settlement area, the educational environment(negative & positive) and positive aspects of the influx of manpower for construction were also identified as preferential assessment factors.

• Journal of Korean Society of Rural Planning
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.99-117
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• 2019

Environmental impact assessment (EIA), which predicts, evaluates, and manages the influences on natural landscape, plays a role of monitoring natural resources for systematic management of natural landscape. However, the function of verification and correction of the system is still insufficient and feed-back, one of the most important features of EIA follow-up, has not been introduced in Korea's EIA system yet. As a procedure, it is required to check if the opinions of the evaluators are properly reflected to the outcomes of the project through a reviewing process after assessing environmental impacts of a development project. In reality, despite the awareness about the importance of follow-up inspection of the conformity with, the system mainly focuses on the agreement during the planning stage of the development project and fails to continuously manage after its completion. There have been various preceding studies related to prediction, evaluation, and management of environmental impacts on natural landscape for better management. They primarily dealt with the problems in the EIA process and suggested improvement measures, including directions for institutional development, step-by-step goals, and operation methods, to address the problems which arise in the EIA follow-up process. However, suggested measures are not actively applied with the focus only put on institutional operation, there are virtually no standardized methods to predict and assess landscape changes due to the development project and to manage landscape after the project. Against this backdrop, this study aims to explore the existing methods to analyze the impacts natural landscape and to establish a system where landscape management is continued after the development project. To this end, we will suggest reducing methods according to the predicted changes in landscape for post-project management of natural landscape. Characteristics of reduction methods by project type were examined through reviewing the guide to natural landscape rating and the importance of development project impacts on natural landscape by type of reduction was evaluated through questionnaire for experts. Evaluated types of reduction are classified and presented by characteristics of each development project and content of reduction type.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.15-28
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• 2023

In the Republic of Korea, the target project scope of the small-scale EIA is stipulated as the plan area above around 5,000~60,000m² depending on a type of project and classification of land use. Whereas, the lower limit of the corresponding local government EIA project is generally located above the small-scale EIA's limits, and overlapping ranges exist. This situation has been enlarged since road construction and district unit planning were included as the target projects for small-scale EIA in the "Enforcement Decree of the Environmental Impact Assessment Act", which was partially revised in November 2016, and the current consultation system needed discussion in that small-scale EIA is allowed to be done without gathering review opinions at the local level. In fact, projects subjected to local government EIA but consulted as small-scale EIAs may seem insignificant because of a small number of total cases; however, it is worth paying attention to the fact that a local government may not add a target project due to the small-scale EIA. This study suggested the three policy measures for improving small-scale EIA to enhance the effectiveness of local government EIA: supplementing the institutional arrangements to incorporate the review opinion from the local region in small-scale EIA, giving priority to local EIA for conducing the projects in overlapping ranges with partial amendments on EIA law regarding exceptions to local government EIA, including small target projects (not to be small-scale EIA targets) to the ordinance that are deemed necessary to be conducted as local government EIA. Even though a positive function of small-scale EIA has been confirmed, efforts should be made to improve the situation in which many projects within local governments are consulted without review from the region.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.93-111
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• 2020

Health Impact Assessment (HIA) in Korea is conducted for specific development projects within Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) system. However, as HIA is being carried out in the implementation stage of the development project, it sometimes has failed to take proper actions despite the significant adverse health impact. Considering an environment conflict regarding adverse health impact in developing industrial complex and the current application of HIA in EIA system, it is necessary to come up with an adequacy evaluation in the industrial complex development considering health impact. This study proposes an adequacy evaluation method considering health impact for the industrial complex development and embodies the method by applying it to actual cases. Referring to methodologies of US EPA's CalEnviroScreen 3.0 and US ATSDR's Public Health Assessment, this study proposed using indicators divided by community characteristic, background exposure and development burden as an adequacy evaluation method to consider health impact. Five indicators for community characteristic, three indicators for background exposure and seven indicators for development burden were selected through literature survey, and the weights for each indicator were calculated through Analytic Hierarchy Process's survey of experts related to HIA. Through a pilot application in the three government-led industrial complex development projects, the method was further elaborated by clarifying the evaluation data and subdividing the evaluation criteria for each indicator. Adequacy criteria of plan considering health impact could be presented in three ways to be linked to the government's policy stance on the industrial complex development criteria of total score, criteria of total score and community characteristic score, and criteria of total score and community characteristic allowed by development burden.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.15-28
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• 2010

Because deterioration of air quality and urban heat island directly harm health of citizens, Health Impact Assessment (HIA) and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for urban development projects needs to conduct analysis of their impacts objectively. This study aims to review appropriate methods for assessment of air quality used at each stage of urban development and to investigate prediction and assessment methods of urban heat island. In addition, by evaluating impacts of climate change following supposed urban construction performed in the central area of Korea on public health, it examines usefulness of HIA for urban construction. When urban heat island prediction and HIA method suggested in this study are applied to an imaginary city, they predict urban heat island properly and the impacts of climate changes on public health inside the city could be determined clearly by calculating life-climate index and bio-climate index related with thermal environment from the model.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.637-643
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• 2020

In this study, the information from environmental impact statements was converted into spatial data because environmental data from development sites are collected during the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process. Spatiotemporal big data were built from environmental spatial data for each environmental medium for 2,235 development sites during 2007-2018, available from public data portals. Comparing air-quality monitoring stations, 33,863 measurement points were constructed, which is approximately 75 times more measurement points than that 452 in Air Korea's real-time measurement network. Here, spatiotemporal big data from 2,677,260 EIAs were constructed. In the future, such data might be used not only for EIAs but also for various spatial plans.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.15-24
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• 2012

The purpose of this study is to understand the process and characteristics of social impact caused by development projects through research and analysis on issues presented during development projects carried out in Korea. Furthermore, on the basis this analysis, this study proposes possible improvement measure environmental impact assessment for minimizing social impact of development projects in the future. Issues related to development projects are generated mainly by the following three causes. Initial social impact can occur when a development project directly causes certain changes in natural, living and social environment. Operational problems related to assessment are another cause of social impact, and it can also occur when changes in natural and living environment work in tandem with social environment sphere. Social impact of development projects is not brought about solely by changes in social environment, but is the result of interaction of factors such as changes in social, natural, living environment and problems related to assessment or operation/management. As to why the current environmental impact assessment could not provide satisfactory solution to the issues mentioned above, this study suggests the following reasons: limitations of assessment method used in social environment category, difficulties in defining assessment criteria, limitations inherent in criterion referenced assessment method, insufficient issue-making in local community, and lack of participation on the part of local residents. Possible solutions for these limitations are as follows: 1) To identify local issues in social environment category through participation of local experts in scoping stage, 2) To adopt deliberative method for local participation, 3) To utilize social survey technique.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.789-799
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• 2012

The major causes of environmental and social conflicts were analyzed through the samples of the construction and the management for tidal power plant abroad and inland. Based on the results, the eco-friendly and socially acceptable policy instruments for decreasing the scope and intensity of the conflicts were explored. Regarding environment issues, it was found that the tidal power project resulted in decreasing in tidal range and area of intertidal zone and in damaging to tidal flat and wetland conservation area. Also there are the characteristic change of tidal current and biological effect, etc. The major environmental and social conflicts were resulted from the distrust of environmental results to environmental impact assessment and prior environmental review and the distrust of project feasibility study, and insufficient activities of public participation. In this study, introduction to joint fact-finding(JFF) was reviewed as the measure of minimizing environmental and social conflicts.