Environmental Impact Assessment - Mining and the Environment: From Ore to Metal - page 96

jurisdictions, approval of the environmental impact assessment is a prerequisite for envi-
ronmental approval of the proposed project. Secondly, the EIA documentation becomes a
legal document. Stated management and monitoring measures become compliance require-
ments for mine operation. Thirdly, the EIA documentation is an important reference for
future reviews of the mining operation. If unforeseen environmental impacts do surface,
government authorities will i rst refer to the original EIA documentation. Have these
impacts been addressed in the EIA? If so, has the mining company stringently followed
'all' commitments made in the EIA to mitigate impacts? Disputes caused by environmental
impacts do end up in courts, in which case lawyers dissect documents word by word. And
so will anti-mining activists. Most major mining companies understand the importance of
clearly written documents and apply signii cant efforts including legal reviews of each doc-
ument before submittal to government authorities or other third parties such as banks.
Lastly, some government ofi cials will eventually read the entire documentation, irre-
spective of length. This will not necessarily happen during the EIA approval process, but
at later mine reviews, or mine inspections. Commitments made, even vaguely, may sud-
denly become important, and costly to implement ( Case 2.6 ).

The EIA documentation
becomes a legal document.

Major mining companies
understand the importance of
clearly written documents.

Format and Content

Most EIA references listed in this chapter will provide useful guidance on the content of
the EIA documentation. In some cases the legislation of the host country will provide the
mandatory format. Formats may differ from country to country, or organization to organ-
ization, but most have similar requirements in respect to the minimal content of an EIA.
There is the need to describe the existing environment to provide baseline or benchmark
data. This baseline, when compared to the results of monitoring, facilitates future identi-
i cation of changes that have occurred following mine development. This information can
then also be used to assess the accuracy of the EIA predictions (Beanlands 1983, 1988).
There is also the need to elaborate on the full range of proposed actions and activities
that may adversely affect the environment. It is perhaps this step more than any other that
requires the involvement of the mining company in the EIA preparation, since no other
institution or group has all of the necessary information.
The discussion of the predicted affects is, of course, the key section of the EIA docu-
ment, and should comprise the bulk of the text. Often it does not. The EIA should dis-
cuss the range of environmental effects, considering simple, complex, direct and indirect

CASE 2.6
The Moment of Maximum Leverage

There is a common perception that once the EIA is
completed and the project is approved and fi nanced, the
project documentation fi nds its way into the archives and
is never read again.
Wrong. In most jurisdictions, the EIA represents a
legally binding document. One example is the construc-
tion of a second transverse levee for the Freeport tailings
deposition area in Papua, Indonesia, based on a brief refer-
ence as an optional measure in an otherwise voluminous

EIA, that was picked up by government offi cials during a
routine mine audit. Another example is the word-by-word
review of the original EIA for the Minahasa Gold Mine
in Indonesia during the Buyat Bay court case (and the
questioning of the EIA team leader) 10 years after EIA
approval.
It is for this reason that bigger companies increasingly
prefer to produce two EIAs - one, reviewed (and often
controlled) by lawyers line by line, to fulfi l Government

requirements with minimum commitments and a second
more comprehensive document (sometimes termed EHSIA -
Environmental, Health, and Social Impact Assessment) to
fulfi l the company's policy or other requirements. At least
one US. based company has prepared separate EIAs on the
same project - one to conform with host country require-
ments, the other using the format of the US. NEPA regula-
tions. The jury on the benefi ts of producing two separate
EIAs is still out.