Workshops

A series of workshops organised by the FIDIC Task Committee on the Environment, ENVTC, were held at the FIDIC conference in Oslo which generated a new sense of unity and determination.

What can we do as consulting engineers?

Previous to the conference, a number of questions were formulated by the Task Committee on Environment, ENVTC, and sent to the participants These questions raised issues on our activities as a profession, as individuals and as environmental specialists and even on the conduct of work of consulting engineers.

The workshop, which drew a large attendance, led to the following major conclusions:

Consulting engineers as capable professionals in contributing to a sus tainable environment are too 'invisible'. They should better in form political leaders, institutions and the public. Our associations on all levels should become more active in policy-making.

Our profession can attain a much higher profile by putting its excellent capabilities and experience to better use. However, it would be presumptuous to think that consulting engineers could or should assume leadership in protecting the environment. FIDIC and the national associations must help to improve the transmittal of environmentally relevant experience, particularly with respect to the needs in less developed countries and in Eastern Europe.

Double-loyalty is a new problem. Consulting engineers must be more aware of the potential gap between that which is in the interests of a sustainable environment and that which fulfils the client's short-term requirements. We should learn to educate the client to see that it is also in his interests to choose or invest in the environmentally better project.

Rolf Sägesser, for the ENVTC

Liability

The workshop on liability was led by Harald S Kobbe, a prominent Norwegian attorney. Mr Kobbe first summarised the status of exposure to environmental liability by consulting engineers and future trends. This was followed by roundtable discussions of two hypothetical case histories.

Legal action against consulting engineers was rare until after World War II. Environmental liability litigation against engineers has become quite common in the United States. By contrast there have been no law suits in Norway involving environmental issues in the last six years. The difference in frequency and severity of litigation against engineers does not appear to result from major differences in legal principles of tort law. Instead the differences seem to result from differing public attitudes and permissible practices in the courtroom.

Looking ahead, Kobbe predicts that environmental liability suits against engineers may become more uniform and more frequent throughout the world. This could result from adoption of similar environmental laws and regulations, a greater public awareness of environmental problems, and a greater expectancy that polluters (and their engineers) should be held financially accountable for adverse environmental impacts.

If the legal principles proposed in the WCED report, Our Common Future, were adopted, engineers might be held liable for activities that were not known to be harmful at the time the engineers did their work. Thus, the engineer might be expected to predict future problems rather than being held to the standard of care that existed at the time that services were provided to clients.

Kobbe recommended that engineers and their clients stay familiar with legal and regulatory trends. In addition he felt it would make financial as well as legal sense to design all facilities with sustainable development in mind.

Donald V Roberts, for the ENVTC

Quantifying the environmental impacts of projects

As a general observation it could be stated that participants had no advanced experience of the topic. The majority could, however, refer to normal cost/benefit analysis and technology assessment in general. The problem arose particularly when it came to the question how to quantify the value of undisturbed nature and the quality of human life. Here the difference in attitudes between the developed and the undeveloped countries comes into focus.

The basis for any possible quantification must be an accurate description of not only the short term environmental effects of a particular project but also the long term effects. To describe long term effects it is important to identify not only first order consequences but higher order consequences also. Hence before quantification can start, the possible effects must be evaluated. The Environment Impact Assessment concept was believed to fulfil that purpose.

The workshop gave a clear message: Educational training, particularly concerning reproducible methods of quantification methods, will be needed in the near future. Seminars and conferences on the topic were requested.

Lars-Eric Janson, for the ENVTC

FIDIC Policy Statement on Consulting Engineers and the Environment

Basis of the discussions in this workshop was the draft of a policy statement worked out by the Environment Task Committee, ENVTC. A further list of questions originated from the discussions during the ENVTC sessions.

During the well attended workshop there was general support for the idea of issuing a FIDIC Policy Statement regarding the environment. The substance of the submitted draft was also generally accepted.

The main conclusions of the discussions can be summarised as follows:

• A "code of conduct" should include a clause regarding the consulting engineers' responsibility towards the environment.
• The need for better education was emphasised.
• There was a general agreement on the need for political activities but very differing opinions on how to do it.
• t was recommended that engineers should aim at leadership in achieving sustainable development. - The phrase "Or even refuse to be associated with a project" should be included in the policy statement as it was considered an ultimate action, which could be necessary in extreme situations.

Heinrich Becker,for the ENVTC

Environmental challenges as viewed by less developed countries

The workshop addressed the issues related to Environment and Development in the Third and Fourth Worlds. During the discussions, which followed the presentations by FIDIC members from Africa, Asia and Latin America, it became clear that at the bottom of today's global environmental crisis and its future doom perspectives, there is a complex of problems such as: population explosion in low per-capita regions; inadequate and insufficient investment in those regions; inefficient and old-fashioned schemes for development and a persistent growth in demand for energy and raw-materials, wasteful life styles in the affluent industrialised world which is exported as "the solution for development" to the "will be affluent regions of tomorrow".

It was emphasised that there is a need for further research efforts for the assessment of costs and benefits of sustainable development, since industrialised nations enjoy a disproportionately large share of the benefits associated to present unsus tainable development. Furthermore, while global environmental threats may produce 'no winners' in the long run, there are fears among responsible leadership in LDCs that in the medium term the poor nations may bear a disproportionate share of the costs.

Thus, present day traditional trade rules and free market forces must be reviewed to get beyond the purely "economistic"' definition of costs, benefits, and risks, and seek a fundamentally new approach that explicitly includes economic, cultural, environmental and social-political costs, benefits and risks in a comprehensive integrated assessment framework.

Finally, all participants recognised that consulting engineering firms must prepare for designing the new approaches and implement sustainable solutions to the pressing problems of the next decades, both in developing and developed societies.

Carlos Costa Ribeiro, for the ENVTC

Environmental Aspects of Projects: The World Bank Procedures.

The Bank has issued guidelines (Operational Directive, Oct 1989) for bank staff on Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). The objectives of the World Bank Environmental Programme are:

• To promote integration of environ mental protection and natural resources management concerns
• To assure that the bank supported operations are planned, implemented and operated in an environmentally sound manner.
• To promote investments for improved environmental protection and natural resources management.

The EIA is a management tool for proceeding information. The borrower has the responsibility for preparing the EIA. However, the bank may assist in providing funds for the consultants who may under take the work.

It is up to the Bank Task Manager to make sure that an adequate EIA is in fact prepared. Also many borrowers, as well as multi- and bi-lateral agencies, require EIA on projects.

 To avoid the EIA becoming un necessarily comprehensive the bank specifies that the sophistication of analysis should correspond to the significance of the impact in question. Projects are screened into the following categories:

• A: Projects with diverse and significant impact require preparation of  the development process into an EIA.
• B: Projects with specific environ mental impact require limited EIA only.
• C: Projects with no significant environmental impact normally do not require EIA.
• D: Projects with environmental focus may or may not require EIA.

The Bank's Environmental Programme will: promote inter-agency coordination; involve affected group and organisations; strengthen environmental capabilities; promote sector and financial intermediary lending and set up environmental advisory panels.

Henning Therkelsen, for the ENVCTC

| FIDIC 1990 |