IEMA’s Impact Assessment Network is delighted to have published A Roadmap to Digital Environmental Assessment.
This new publication is a continuation of IEMA’s call for greater adoption of digital techniques in our Proportionate EIA Strategy (2017) and builds on the recommendations in our Primer for Embracing Innovation and Digital Working (2020).
During the past two decades, various stakeholders from the government, academia, industry, local authorities, regulators and the public have been united in calling for shorter and more accessible environmental assessment reports.
However, most of these stakeholders have also made it clear that they do not want to see a reduction in environmental protection. Therefore, the challenge over recent years has been how to achieve a proportionate level of assessment and reporting, without reducing the quality of assessment as a tool for environmental protection.
As the number and depth of the assessments has improved over time, the resulting length and complexity of reports has, arguably, become a barrier to stakeholder engagement. The growing consensus between planning and impact assessment professionals is that better use of digital tools and smarter use of data could make it easier to share information, avoid inefficiencies such as duplication and facilitate more effective monitoring.
This document provides a roadmap to help IEMA’s members on their journey towards digital environmental assessment, assisting organisations by using a digital maturity matrix to establish their current level of digital maturity, and to guide them towards appropriate next steps in their digital evolution.
Visit www.bit.ly/digitalEIA to read the full report
