IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wsi/jeapmx/v21y2019i03ns1464333219500145.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Of Smoke and Mirrors: (Mis)Communicating EIA Results of Solar Energy Projects in South Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Daniel S. Boshoff

    (Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management, School of Geo- and Spatial Sciences, North-West University, South Africa2Department of Geography, Environmental Management and Energy Studies, University of Johannesburg, South Africa)

Abstract

Environmental impact assessments (EIAs) and renewable energy developments are key instruments to achieving sustainable development goals. Additionally, environmental impact assessment reports (EIARs) are vital in communicating the findings of proposed developments to all stakeholders. Yet, the quality of EIARs does not always comply with criteria in a satisfactory manner, thereby compromising sustainability. The quality of 25 solar energy EIARs in South Africa was reviewed with an adapted Lee–Colley Review Package. Based on this review, 68% of EIARs were found to be satisfactorily conducted, whereas 80% of the overall scores were regarded as borderline quality grades. Interestingly, complex assessment tasks — determining impact significance, alternatives, mitigation measures and the communication of findings — were executed unsatisfactorily. The poor communication of environmental impacts to stakeholders is not only an obstacle for EIA processes but also for sustainable development mechanisms as a whole.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel S. Boshoff, 2019. "Of Smoke and Mirrors: (Mis)Communicating EIA Results of Solar Energy Projects in South Africa," Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management (JEAPM), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 21(03), pages 1-19, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:jeapmx:v:21:y:2019:i:03:n:s1464333219500145
    DOI: 10.1142/S1464333219500145
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S1464333219500145
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1142/S1464333219500145?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Huang, Shi-Zheng, 2022. "Do green financing and industrial structure matter for green economic recovery? Fresh empirical insights from Vietnam," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 61-73.
    2. Xu, Nuo & Kasimov, Ikboljon & Wang, Yanan, 2022. "Unlocking private investment as a new determinant of green finance for renewable development in China," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 198(C), pages 1121-1130.
    3. Vincent D. Choji & Isaac T. Rampedi & Lee-Ann S. Modley & Ayodeji P. Ifegbesan, 2022. "An Evaluation of the Quality of Environmental Impact Assessment Reports in the Mobile Telecommunications Infrastructure Sector: The Case of Plateau State in Nigeria," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(19), pages 1-23, October.
    4. Zhang, Dongyang & Mohsin, Muhammad & Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad, 2022. "Does green finance counteract the climate change mitigation: Asymmetric effect of renewable energy investment and R&D," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wsi:jeapmx:v:21:y:2019:i:03:n:s1464333219500145. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Tai Tone Lim (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.worldscinet.com/jeapm/jeapm.shtml .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.