Conducting the Environmental Impact Analysis and Assessment - Environmental Impact Analysis: Process and Methods - page 166

TABLE 5.1
Environmental Resources Eliminated from Detailed Evaluation in the U.S. Coast
Guard DCR EIS

Environmental Resource Preliminary Evaluation Conclusion

Geology, topography, soils,
hydrology, and
floodplains

The purpose and need are limited to ship board activities and
thus there are no potential ground disturbing activities

Air quality Potential air quality implications of the loading/unloading

process of all dry cargo, so overwhelm any implications of just
DCR alone that any effects on air quality from DCR
management alternatives would be de minimis

Noise Noise impacts occur when sound levels exceed thresholds of

noise-sensitive receptors, and all DCR alternatives involve
shipboard activities where there are no noise-sensitive
receptors and there is high ambient noise. Thus no noise
impacts will occur.

Potential hazardous
material

By definition, hazardous materials are excluded from the DCR
management rulemaking thus none are involved with any of
the alternatives.

Land use and housing Any proposed activities are shipboard focused, so no land-use

alterations or implications are envisioned.

Cultural resources All activities to address the purpose and need would occur in

the open water shipping lanes of the Great Lakes, and a survey
of the lanes demonstrated there were no submerged historic
resources.

Visual and aesthetic
resources

Alternatives under consideration involve only shipboard
activities where there are no visual or aesthetic resources.

Land-based traffic Alternatives under consideration involve only shipboard

activities, and no land based transportation resources would
be involved.

Water-dependent
recreation

Any activities will occur at marine terminals or in active
shipping lanes, which are devoid of water-dependent
recreation.
Population and services Only vessels in transit or at port are involved, and these will not
affect populations in the study area.
Source: U.S. Coast Guard. Final Environmental Impact Statement: U.S. Coast Guard
Rulemaking for Dry Cargo Residue Discharges in the Great Lakes. 2008.

It is imperative that the environmental impact analysis team conduct a
thorough and comprehensive search of available literature and other infor-
mation on the affected environment before embarking on or even designing
an original data collection effort. Compliance with this axiom not only makes
common sense, improves the quality of the analysis, and has been proven
effective overtime, but it embodies several benefits for the project proponent
and many other stakeholders. Typically, the data collected or required of pri-
vate entities for environmental purposes by government agencies and for
academic research is of a longer duration than one-time data collection for