Environment Impact Assessment and Pollution Control Policy

Principles

1. The aim of this policy is to provide for a precautionary system of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) which facilitates Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) and moves towards "no waste" pollution outcomes.

2. Planning for ESD requires recognition of the inherent constraints of the natural environment (e.g. air, water, biodiversity). These constraints can be identified through resource inventory or base-line studies.

3. Such studies should attempt to understand the natural constraints on development (such as areas of significant habitat), with the information incorporated in local and regional planning instruments.

4. It should be mandatory for this information to be taken into account by proponents during the early stages of formulating development proposals. Moreover, the discretionary powers of decision-makers to approve a development which violates the constraints laid down in the relevant planning instrument should be limited.

5. Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) should be prepared by a panel (including but not exclusively comprised of experts) under the supervision of a public body.

6. While the costs of preparation of EIS must be born by the proponents, it is essential that the consultants be chosen independently of the proponents and be answerable to a panel that is not dominated by the proponents or their allies.

7. This contrasts with the present system where consultants are employed to prepare EIS by the proponent of development, so it is unlikely that a no-development option would be recommended or even considered in these circumstances.

8. Decision-making structures and institutions must incorporate mechanisms for public participation.

9. These structures and institutions should also incorporate mechanisms for cooperative regional decision-making to encourage a bio-regional approach to planning.

Detail

The Greens NSW:

10. Oppose present assumptions about the right to pollute;

11. Will maintain Local government responsibility for planning at the local level, with decision making being carried out within a framework of national air, water and noise quality standards;

12. Believe the power to approve developments should reside solely with local government but the power to refuse developments should be held by both the local government and the State Government, with the State Government having the right to veto socially or environmentally unacceptable developments;

13. Will amend the Heads of Consideration in Section 79C of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act (1979) to require consent authorities to consider the development record of the applicant or operator of a proposed development;

14. Will amend Section 79C of the Act to require consent authorities to consider the cumulative impacts of a development that would result from its construction and/or operations in combination with those of previous developments;

15. Will ensure development proponents bear the onus of establishing that their proposals would result in levels of pollution which fall within air and water quality standards;

16. Will ensure provision of infrastructure, technology and policy to remedy existing pollution would take precedence over the demands for new measures created by new development;

17. Will adopt a prosecutions policy in respect of breaches of the Protection of the Environment Operations Act 1997 due to siltation of water courses caused by earthworks associated with logging operations, urban development projects and other major sources of watercourse pollution;

18. Support a phasing out of the 'licence to pollute' system under the Protection of the Environment Operations Act 1997;

19. Support community "right to know" legislation which would make details on National Pollutant Industry (NPI) easily accessible to the community;

20. Will lobby the Government of the day to amend the Protection of the Environment Operations Act 1997 to allow 3rd party merit appeal rights for the issue, review or amendment of licences and allow more public participation and transparency regarding the granting, renewing or altering of licences;

21. Will seek to amend State legislation to enshrine the following principles:

• 21.1 The purpose of any EIS must be stated clearly, that is whether it is to form the basis of a decision on whether or not a project is to proceed (a go/no go decision) or whether it is merely to provide guidelines for the construction and operation of a project that has already been approved;
• 21.2 The EIS should be prepared independently of the proponent, by consultants who are chosen independently of the proponent or its allies;
• 21.3 A public inquiry should be mandatory for all large projects and for any project about which a high level of public concern has been expressed (for example, through a prescribed number of signatures on a petition);
• 21.4 Public participation should be genuine and effectual and should continue right throughout the process. Public participation must have a major influence on the outcome;
• 21.5 The merits, as well as the procedural issues of each EIS ,should be open to legal challenge;
• 21.6 A degraded environment should be seen as a constraint against further detrimental impact, not as an opportunity to down play the new impact's significance;
• 21.7 Proponents must not be allowed to evade responsibility for environmental care through transferring issues from the EIS to an "Environmental Management Plan" or similar instrument;
• 21.8 Monitoring must be based on adequate baseline studies and monitoring regimes must be ongoing (i.e. not a once-off activity) and must include penalties for non-compliance;
• 21.9 If a project which has been approved has worse environmental, social or economic impacts than were predicted in the EIS, a threshold number of signatures on a petition should warrant the calling of a public inquiry; and
• 21.10 Consultants may be called to justify their forecasts and they should be subjected to penalties at law if their forecasts are found to have been made falsely or misleadingly. The important principle of accountability must be built into the preparation of an EIS.