Environmental Impact Assessment Review

25 (2005) 227 238

www.elsevier.com/locate/eiar

Mandated monitoring of post-project impacts in

the Czech EIA
Martin Branis*, Stamatios Christopoulos
Institute for Environmental Studies, Faculty of Science, Charles University in Prague, Albertov 6,
128 43 Prague 2, Czech Republic
Received 1 March 2004; received in revised form 1 July 2004; accepted 1 September 2004
Available online 24 November 2004

Abstract

Altogether, 801 documents of consent (50% of all) issued under the EIA Act No. 244/1992 by the
competent authorities in the Czech Republic between 1993 and 2001 were studied. The aim of the
analysis was to find and characterize conditions prescribing to the developer to perform ex-ante and
ex-post monitoring of potential impacts of projects submitted for approval. It was found that each of
the studied documents (standpoints) contained on average three to four conditions prescribing to
collect data on various environmental factors during the preparation, implementation and/or
operation phase of the development in question. The number of monitoring conditions contained in
the standpoints issued by the Ministry of Environment as well as by the District Offices increased
during the period studied from about two to five per project indicating a growing interest in and/or
need to obtaining such data. Even though there is a good legal background for collecting monitoring
data from implementation and operation phase of new developments, the Czech EIA Act (similarly
as EIA acts in other countries) does not provide any practical background for this activity. Without
relevant institutional, personal and financial support the possibility to impose post-project
monitoring to the developer remains rather a challenge to, not advantage of the Czech EIA Act.
D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Environmental impact assessment; Post-project monitoring; Impact monitoring; Post-development

auditing; Post-auditing

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +42 221951902; fax: +42 224914803.

E-mail address: branis@natur.cuni.cz (M. Branis).

0195-9255/$ - see front matter D 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.eiar.2004.09.001
228 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238

1. Introduction

Post-auditing or post-project assessment represents a crucial point in testing the

predictive force of the environmental impact assessment procedure (EIA). Several
attempts have so far been made to analyse and evaluate the relation between proposed
environmental impact and real influence of new constructions in order to provide a
feedback link in environmental planning and management (Bisset, 1984; Bisset and
Tomlinson, 1988; Wilson, 1998; Wood, 2000; Wood et al., 2000; Stewart-Oaten and
Bence, 2001).
The best way to assess the predictive value of estimated (suggested, modelled,
calculated, etc.) impacts of a development is to compare an accurately composed
environmental impact statement (EIS) giving precisely formulated predictions with
detailed information coming out of a well designed monitoring system collecting data
throughout the whole process of preparation, construction and operation of the project in
question. However, environmental monitoring programmes are aimed at monitoring
compliance with standards rather than testing impact prediction. Long term monitoring of
important variables related solely to a certain development is not usually available because
there is no legal, financial or institutional support for this activity. Post-project audits and/
or project implementation monitoring are neither required by law nor routinely funded
anywhere in the world (with unique exceptions). Examples from the literature thus give
comparisons of projects for which baseline data were involved in the EIS with banythingQ
or bsomethingQ available at the time of the audit or before it (Buckley, 1991, 1992; Wood
et al., 2000).
The past and existing situation poses a question to government regulatory agencies
whether they actually have ability, resources and political will to fulfil their responsibilities
for controlling the environmental impacts of new developments. Knowing this gap
between pre- and post-project impact analysis, a logical act from the competent authorities
would be to indicate or prescribe (mandate) to the developer collection of relevant data
enabling monitoring of the project implementation and/or the post-project audit.
Having this in mind we researched the archives of the Czech Ministry of Environment
(MoE) whether the consent documents issued by the MoE and the other former competent
authority-regional district offices (DOs) contain a prescription or recommendation to the
developer to collect any type of information on changes in the environment caused by
implementation of the project in question.
In the past EIA Act No. 244/1992 (as well as in the amended Act No. 100/2001), the
official document bearing the decision concerning further project developmenta
consentis issued by either of the competent authorities. This consent document we
call a standpoint because it does not simply state byesQ or bnotQ to the project proposal. An
EIA standpoint reflects the results of the EIS, the EIS review and the public meeting
conclusions. According to Annex IV of the Act No. 244/1992, standpoints should have a
standard form bearing project identification data, description of the course of the projects
evaluation and its conclusions. Standpoints of disapproval should carry the reason(s) of
disapproval, while standpoints of approval contain conditions for project realization. The
standpoint including all this information enters a separate process given by the Building
and Construction Act No. 50/1976, which is the only and principal law according to which
 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238 229

all construction projects can be approved or disapproved. It should be borne in mind that
the EIA standpoint has no mandatory force. It is not legally possible to stop any project
development solely on the basis of a negative competent authority standpoint. This
outcome of the EIA act and procedure has bonlyQ a value of ban informationQ provided for
the Building and Construction Act procedure (for details on the Czech EIA, see
Rambouskova, 1993; Branis, 1994; Branis and Kruzkova, 1994; Branis and Madlova,
2000; Lipsky, 1996; Palerm and Sheate, 1996; Bellinger et al., 2000).
From 1992 to 2001, the competent authorities issued tens to hundreds of standpoints
every year. All the documents were archived and are available on request. The number of
standpoints by the end of 2003, when we started our analysis, totalled slightly more than
2000 items (some of the projects which entered the EIA procedure under the Act 244/1992
had to be processed according to the bold lawQ even though the new Act No. 100/2001 had
been in force for some time).
The main aim of this study was to analyze basic information included in the archived
standpoints, namely the number and type of conditions mandated by the competent
authorities to the developer. Special attention was paid to conditions prescribing
monitoring, i.e. systematic measuring and recording of data related to physical, social
and economic variables associated with development impacts (e.g. noise levels, air quality,
impacts on biota, etc.).

2. Data and methods

Hard copies of texts of standpoints were studied one by one in the MoE archive, since
they consist of data not included in the official electronic Information System of EIA (kept
and managed by the Czech Ecological Institute of the MoE) or any other electronic
database of the MoE.
The standpoint documents are numbered and classified in the archive of the MoE EIA
department according to date of issue and according to the Annex I and Annex II of Act
244/1992 under which the EIA was performed.
Standpoints issued in the period of 19922000 at the time of our research totalled of
1607. Subjects to our analysis were 455 standpoints issued under the competence of the
Ministry and 346 selected standpoints from those issued by different DOs. While the 455
documents analyzed comprise all of the standpoints issued by the ME during the 1992
2000 period, the 346 were selected regardless of the locality (there were 76 districts in the
Czech Republic before a new system of regionalization came in force in 2002) or sphere of
duties exchanged between the two competent authorities (MoE and DO). The DOs
standpoints were also from the same period of 19922000. Subject to research was every
third or every fourth standpoint met, depending on the total standpoints issued per year.
The selection was made according to official numbers of the documents.
The MoE standpoints were categorized into six major project categories: (1) extractive
industry (any project that has to do with extraction of ores, minerals, coal, etc.), (2) energy
(energy production and/or transmission), (3) chemical industry (production of chemical
substances, including toxics, pesticides, pharmaceuticals and paper), (4) transport
infrastructure (highways, first category roads, railways, tunnels, airports, water ways,
230 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238

ports), (5) waste (waste management and treatment, including radioactive waste) and (6)
other (shopping centres, supermarkets, storage and printing facilities).
Accordingly, the same was done for the DO standpoints. However, due to the nature of
the regional projects and due to tremendous heterogeneity of project types, standpoints
were divided into seven categories: (1) agriculture (land reclamation, amelioration, animal
production and cattle breeding facilities), (2) commercial facilities (shopping centres and
supermarkets), (3) energy (energy production or transmission), (4) transport infrastructure
(highways, first and second category roads, bridges, tunnels, etc.), (5) waste (waste
management and treatment with the exception of radioactive waste), (6) chemical industry
(production of chemical substances) and (7) other (extractive industry, cement production
facilities, printing industry, sport/recreation facilities, food industry, warehouses and other
projects).
The monitoring conditions, which were of principal interest for this study, were then
divided into subcategories according to the environmental parameters to be monitored:
noise, water, soil, air quality, biota, information on monitoring, maintenance, general and
other. Conditions regarding information on monitoring usually demanded that the
investors make available or publish the results or outcomes from the project monitoring
programmes or systems. Conditions regarding maintenance exhibit the demand to
periodically control machinery, or maintain in appropriate condition several project
variables or environment adjacent to the planned facility, such as trees, plants, green areas
and vehicles. Among general conditions for monitoring, we classified unspecified
requirements to monitor changes in the environment resulting from the project
implementation. Other conditions represent those not attributable to the above-mentioned
types of conditions.
Researched documents totalled 801, which was almost exactly 50% of existing
documents available by April 2001 and about 40% of all standpoints issued under the
period of validity of the boldQ EIA Act No. 244/1992 (after the New EIA Act No. 100/
2001 came in force about 400 projects had to be evaluated according to the boldQ act
because they were submitted for approval under its validity).

3. Results

The MoE issued only one standpoint in 1992, but from that time and forward the
number of projects submitted to EIA was significantly increasing until 1995. The big
jump in project proposal numbers from 1992 to 1995 was followed by a moderate
decline in the 19962000 period. As far as DOs are concerned, the path they have
followed is somewhat similar to that of the MoE. However, the number of standpoints
issued by different DOs per year could be two to four times the number of those issued
by the MoE (Table 1).
According to the EIS database, the most numerous category of projects assessed under
the competence of the MoE was transport infrastructure (total 136 projects) followed by
chemical industry (64), extractive industry (64), waste disposal facilities (59) and energy
industry and infrastructure (53). Seventy-four projects were classified under the category
botherQ.
 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238 231

Table 1
Standpoints (SPs) issued by MoE and DOs (19922000)
1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 Total
No. of SPs (MoE) 1 33 61 74 62 55 63 56 50 455
issued and studied
No. of SPs (DOs) 3/0 121/42 154/42 160/43 158/43 154/43 169/43 143/44 90/43 1,152/346
issued/studied

From the total number (1152) of standpoints issued in the studied period by the DOs,
one-third (346) was subjected to our analysis. From this sample, 87 projects were from the
commercial facility category (supermarkets, warehouses, etc.), followed by agricultural
projectsmostly large farms (69 projects), waste disposal facilities (32), transport
infrastructure (14), energy (10) and chemical industry (10). A large number of projects was
classified under the category other (124), which comprised a vide variety of projects as
extractive industry, cement plants, sport and recreational facilities, food industry, printing
industry, etc. Figs. 1 and 2 illustrate the numbers of the standpoints analyzed by year of
issue. (Note that year 1992 was omitted from the graphs since it featured only one
standpoint of the Annex I and 3 projects of the Annex II).
During the 9 years of the 455 project proposals studied, only 13 (3%) were not
approved by the MoE (Annex I). Among the 346 DO (Annex II) standpoints researched,
16 of disapproval were found, comprising 5% of the total researched standpoints. From the
29 (13+16) standpoints of disapproval recovered, 13 involve objections regarding severe
potential environmental impact, 6 contain objections expressed during public hearings, in
5 cases the assessment procedure and/or document was considered incomplete or
insufficient, 4 projects were in conflict with other environmental laws and for 1 negative
standpoint the reasons were not available.

Fig. 1. Number of MoE standpoints analysed by year and by category.

232 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238

Fig. 2. Number of DOs standpoints analysed by year and by category.

The number of conditions under which a project according to the competent authority
decision can be realized increased per standpoint during the period studied both for Annex
I and Annex II projects. From 1993, the total number of conditions per project rose from
about 12 to 30 and 10 to 23 conditions per project for the Annex I and Annex II projects,
respectively. Monitoring conditions followed a similar trend from about two in 1993 to
almost seven in 2000 for the Annex I and from two to four for the Annex II projects
(average number of conditions per standpoint is given on Figs. 3 and 4).

Fig. 3. Number of conditions per standpoint (MoE).

 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238 233

Fig. 4. Number of conditions per standpoint (DOs).

Out of the 442 MoE approved projects, 55 (12.4%) had no prescribed conditions for
monitoring. This number was lower for the 330 DO approved projects when only 30 of
them (9.1%) did not contain in the standpoint document any monitoring condition.
Within the Annex I projects, the highest total number of conditions was given to
transport infrastructure projects (approx. 24 per project), followed by extractive industry
(20), energy (15), waste facilities (14) and chemical industry (11). The botherQ category

Fig. 5. Number of conditions per standpoint by category (19932000, MoE).

234 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238

Fig. 6. Number of conditions per standpoint by category (19932000, DOs).

received on average about 17 conditions per project. Contrary to this, within the Annex II
projects, the transport infrastructure projects standpoints received the lowest total number
of conditions, while the highest number was requested from commercial facility projects.
As far as the monitoring conditions are concerned, monitoring was requested in the Annex
I projects most often from extractive industry (approximately 5 per project), transport
infrastructure (4), waste and other (3), chemical industry and energy (2). Interestingly, all

Fig. 7. Trend in request for monitoring according to the monitoring subject (MoE).
 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238 235

Fig. 8. Trend in request for monitoring according to the monitoring subject (DOs).

the Annex II projects standpoints contained on average almost identical number (34) of
monitoring conditions (Figs. 5 and 6).
When the monitoring conditions were divided according to the type of monitoring
activity, in the Annex I projects, the most frequent request was to monitor beverything
importantQ in the environment (=general monitoring) followed by specific requests to
monitor noise, water, soil and air quality. Increasing attention was paid to biological
monitoring. For the Annex II projects, the most frequent requirement was to periodically
control machinery, or maintain in appropriate condition natural objects potentially affected
by the existence or activity of the facility in question (maintenance). The second most
frequent request involved water and noise followed by recommendation to perform
general monitoring of important environmental variables (Figs. 7 and 8).

4. Discussion

As was already pointed out by Dipper et al. (1998), there are numerous institutional
problems which hinder monitoring and post-auditing EIA and there are also problems
associated with availability of monitoring data suitable for post-project auditing purposes.
However, very little information is given with respect to whether special monitoring
programmes can even be mandated to the developers or whether official monitoring
systems provide sufficient information for EIA audits. Buckley (1991, 1992) noted that
only a fraction of existing (between 1974 and 1982) Australian EISs could be audited
because of lack of adequate monitoring data. Scarce literature on this issue provides very
limited information about to what extent existing legislation in different countries allows
the competent authorities to require specific monitoring programmes for the project
implementation and operation phase. Wood and Scott (1998) mentioned that some EU
236 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238

member states require project implementation monitoring but give only an example of the
Netherlands. Problems in collecting appropriate data for EIA accuracy studies were
expressed also by Wood et al. (2000) who based their audits of 28 British projects not on
mandated or regular monitoring programmes but on information gathered from a
b. . .variety of individuals and institutions who were able to provide it.Q Well designed
post-project monitoring programmes and subsequent audits are rare in scientific literature
(e.g. Simons et al., 2001).
According to the results of this study, in the Czech EIA process, where the standpoint
may mandate project implementation and operation monitoring, there is a good
background for follow-up studies in the form of post-project audits. About 90% of all
studied consent documents contained at least one but on average approximately five
conditions to perform monitoring of environmental variables possibly affected by
construction or operation of a project. So why post-project analyses are so scarce and
why the predictive value of EIA cannot be so simply assessed in this country? The main
problem is not in the legal framework for imposing the conditions of monitoring to the
investor or owner of the proposed facility as in many countries but mainly in the lack of
expert institutional, personal and financial support for subsequent management of the
information required. This should undoubtedly involve (i) methodological framework
(how, how long, where and what exactly to monitor), (ii) supervision (quality control,
quality assurance), data management (storage, accessibility, maintenance) and namely (iv)
a programme for standard audit procedure which will use these data. Frankly speaking,
implementation of selective, flexible and continuous monitoring systems is not only out of
scope of responsible agencies, but is also extremely difficult and expensive for the
developer. So far, there is no simple and affordable database of monitoring actions
mandated (suggested) to developers in the Czech Republic (even though almost every
standpoint contains about five of them) let alone an integrated system described above.
There is also another problem connected with setting the monitoring conditions in the
standpoint. The Czech Building and Construction Law procedure need not necessarily
accept the recommendation to monitor suggested variables. For this (final) permitting
procedure, the binding requirement is that a development in question should not in any of
its activity exceed existing legal environmental pollution limits. Excess pollution in
developed countries is usually checked and penalised according to competencies of
specific governmental bodies and environmental regulations (e.g. emission or discharge
consents) and its monitoring does not require specific or bad hocQ monitoring systems.
There is however a large space for debate about post-auditing and the problem of
collecting data from project implementation and/or operation phase. As was mentioned
above, outcomes of EIA audits are excellent feedbacks for environmental management and
for the accuracy of EIA itself namely in controversial projects evoking high public
attention.
Discussion about systematic monitoring of project implementation and/or operation
should be opened namely because of current requests of even larger and more complex
monitoring. Article 10 of the EU SEA directive (2001/42/EC) states that: bMember states
shall monitor the significant environmental effects of the implementation of plans and
programmes in order, inter alia, to identify at an early stage unforeseen adverse effects, and
to be able to undertake appropriate action.Q In the second paragraph of the same article, a
 M. Branis, S. Christopoulos / Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (2005) 227238 237

recommendation is given that: b. . .existing monitoring arrangements may be used if

appropriate, with view to avoiding duplication of monitoring.Q It should, however, be
pointed out that programmes and plans usually cover large areas and regions for which
existing monitoring systems (at least for air and water quality) have been regularly offering
data in a standard form for decades. This is not the case for projects which may or may not
be situated near established monitoring points. In addition, many parameters will be
available neither for the purpose of SEA nor EIA. This is the case of, e.g., monitoring of
soil quality, fauna and flora or land use/land cover changes. Implementation of the new
SEA directive into national legislation will therefore bring similarly as in the EIA
procedure a need not only to establish new ad hoc monitoring systems (or significantly
extend the existing ones) but namely prepare and agree on a set of simple (well
measurable, internationally comparable) variablesindicators, organize centrally man-
aged and methodologically supported storage and dissemination of relevant information to
governmental and nongovernmental bodies including public entities. Finding financial
sources, experts and institutional capacities for this will be only one of the forthcoming
tasks.

Acknowledgement

We thank the staff of the EIA Department of the Czech Ministry of Environment for
assisting us with retrieval of the documents from the EIA standpoint database. The project
was supported by the Czech Ministry of Education Youth and Sports under the State
research scheme (grant no. MSM 113100007).

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