Environmental Impact Assessment and Risk Analysis in Denmark

Abstract

Directives on Environmental Impact Assessment and Risk Analysis have only in recent years been adopted by the Danish Parliament as part of the process of European harmonization. A certain experience, however, has developed over the last decade on the basis of already existing legislation which is illustrated by two practical examples. In one case — a chemical pesticide plant — an ecotoxicological characterization of waste water was developed on the basis of extensive experimental studies on marine fish species and invertebrates. Indicator-organisms were chosen and pollution effect/no-effects were determined on the basis of acute and long-term tests on key species representative of the locality. Legally, requirements imposed on the factory concerning waste water treatment and good manufacturing practice now refer to a risk evaluation accepting zero or only insignificant changes in a dilution zone around the waste water discharge point. The area of the dilution zone is also defined as a result of the risk analysis. In the other case — the major bridge-tunnel constructions across the Danish straits — environmental impact assessments have only gradually been developed, and they are still presented at levels which gives rise to much public concern. Biological indicators are inadequately included in the assessments, and the results presented are uncertain because of the general situation of eutrophication and deterioration of environmental quality of the Danish parts of the Baltic Sea region. An undefined term of “insignificant physical changes” of the benthic zones around the planned constructions, or hydrological parameters, such as the official requirements of “unchanged exchange rate of the water flow through the straits”, so-called zero solutions, are, therefore, introduced as the over-all indicators for acceptable impacts, and these terms are therefore replacing the environmentally more appropriate biological and chemical indicators.