Modified EIA for a mechanical project – An innovative method to make the projects Eco –friendly

Abstract

Environmental Impact assessment (EIA) is an assessment of the possible impact–positive or negative–that a proposed project may have on the natural environment. The purpose of the assessment is to ensure that decision makers consider the ensuing environmental impacts to decide whether to proceed with the project. In general EIA is used to identify the environmental impacts of projects of larger magnitude all over the world owing to their social impacts. Smaller projects which will also affect the environment persistently are normally taken as low key issue in EIA such as Small and medium industries but they are creating permanent environmental degradation owing to their operation methods. Educational institutions are one among the industries where the focus is to be shifted because of the irincessant environmental impacts and resource consumption. Normal procedure of EIA cannot be applied to small scale industries (Arquiaga et al. 1992) and educational institutions because of its tediousness, slight modifications are to be made in order to make the whole process simple and applicable to any size of project or operation. This paper gives an insight into EIA, methods of doing EIA, discusses its applicability and also suggests changes to be made in the EIA process to make it applicable to small sized projects.