LOCAL ENVIRONMENT ISSUES

Introduction

Environmental for major Construction Sites provides a useful source document to help prepare and implement a environmental management plan for major constructions sites. The purpose to provide developers, contractors and government agencies involved with commissioning or constructing freeways, major roads or major development projects with:

• · information how to avoid and minimize environmental impact, which is preferable to the less cost-effective option of controlling or treating discharges to the environment, or undertaking remedia action.
• information on the likely impact of construction activities on the environment and how this is to be assessed
• guidelines for undertaking risk assessment and management
• a clear statement of environmental performance objectives for each segment of the environment
• suggested best practice environmental measures to meet the performance objectives based on available experience
• provide contractors and developers with a framework within which due diligence obligations can be met and environmental damage can be avoided.
• .Once a site has been selected, it is necessary to conduct an environment assessment that identifies which parts of the environment may be vulnerable to damage from construction

activities.

Making a risk assessment is a useful way in which to approach this aspect of site management. Environmental risk deals with the probability of an event causing an undesirable effect. There are three elements to consider when defining risk1. They are:

• a time frame over which the risk or risks are being considered
• a probability of the occurrence of one or more events
• a measure of the consequences of those events.

1. Investigate the local environmental issued of concern to the construction industry.

If urban environmental problems are defined and pursued too broadly, then almost all urban development initiatives can be labeled environmental. For example, Einstein’s oft-cited definition of the environment as ‘everything that is not me’, could be used to designate anything from better shopping facilities to better televisions as urban environmental improvement.

But if urban environmental problems are defined too narrowly, many of the generalizations noted in the introductory paragraph

cease to be true. For example, defining urban environmental problems as ‘the degradation of urban water, air and land’ excludes many of the environmental health problems suffered predominantly by the poor, as well as the extra-urban impacts that threaten regional and global sustainability.

While both very broad and very narrow usage are common in the literature, when people complain of ‘environmental problems’ they are typically referring to damage to the physical environment, mostly caused by other people, and usually with harmful consequences for human welfare, either now or in the future. So common sense suggests that urban environmental problems are threats to present or future human well-being, resulting from human-induced damage to the physical environment, originating in or borne in urban areas.

This definition includes:

• Localized environmental health problems such as inadequate household water and sanitation and indoor air pollution.
• City-regional environmental problems such as ambient air pollution, inadequate waste management and pollution of rivers, lakes and coastal areas.
• Extra-urban impacts of urban activities such as ecological disruption and resource depletion in a city’s hinterland, and emissions of acid precursors and greenhouse gases.
• Regional or global environmental burdens that arise from activities outside a city’s boundaries, but which will affect people living in the city

2. Describe the characteristic of the local environmental issues of concern and the mechanisms by which they occur.

Growing urbanization means more consumption and need of different products. The production of these needs water and creates more pollutants. In developing countries where the urbanization is occurring most rapidly the technology is not high enough to take responsibility of water treatment and clean production. Many Western companies produce their products in developing countries because of more flexible environmental law and cheaper production costs. This puts extra pressure on the environment of the developing countries (Varis 1998, Vakkilainen and Varis 1999).

Problems to food production

Plants need water, solar energy and nutrients to grow. Humans can only change few things to help plants to product more, the amount of water and fertilizer. In the areas where these are needed there is also often uncertainty of water supply and lacking of capital for fertilizers. Water and food availability is closely linked together because of the enormous need of green water. For example, each ton of grain needs 1000 tons of water for successful growth (Allan 1997, Varis 1997b).

The quality of water is often threatened in poor areas due to domestic and industrial wastes. Agriculture as well produces numerous side effects to water resources, including erosion, leaching of nutrients, accumulation and wash off of pesticides and heavy metals, increased salinity due to evaporation losses and spearing of various diseases such as schistosomiasis and malaria (Vakkilainen and Varis 1999, Varis 1997b).

Until now the increasing of the fertilizers have helped to produce bigger yields. The population growth is nowadays so fast that increasing use of fertilizers is not enough. The next step in producing more food will be different crops and irrigation methods, like drip irrigation and water saver plants (Vakkilainen and Varis 1999, Varis 1997b).

Pollutants to air, soil and water

Even the industrialized countries, with higher standards of living and greater numbers of cars, produce far more air pollution and greenhouse gases than developing countries, they can reduce environmental hazards by using technology such as smokestack scrubbers, emission systems, and wastewater treatment plants. Developing countries do not have this new technology or capacity to do so. The consumption is far lower but the expensive energy-efficient or clean-up technologies are economically impractical for these countries. For these reasons environmental problems occur more often in developed countries (ENCARTA 2001).

Air pollutants

In many cities the air is already so polluted that it has been causing illnesses and premature deaths among elderly people and children. Studies show that disease rate rises when the air pollution level increases. Air pollutants are also harmful for water and environment, for example, by causing acid precipitation and acidity of waters. Most of the ambient air-pollution in urban areas comes from the fossil fuels industry, motor vehicles, heating and electricity generation. In some cities the main air polluter is the domestic heating. Many people heat their houses with firewood and cheap coal. This kind of heating method will decrease in the future. Although, new heating methods can be even worse polluters. Instead of carbon dioxide the emissions can include various toxic and carcinogenic chemicals, heavy metals, trace organic chemicals and fibers, photochemical pollutants, lead and carbon monoxide, which are much more harmful to human health (HABITAT 1996).

(percentage of population using solid fuels, proportion of vehicles using diesel and unleaded gasoline, frequency of exceeding national air quality standards in Malaysia)

According to 2000 data, about 29 percent of the population used solid or biomass fuels for their cooking and heating needs. Only 11 percent of the vehicles still use diesel while 89 percent have been using unleaded gasoline. Emissions from mobile and stationary sources are the most significant sources of pollution. Emissions from mobile sources contribute 80.4 percent of the total load, followed by emissions from stationary sources such as industrial fuel consumption (9 percent), industrial processes (1.2 percent), power stations (8.8 percent), domestic fuel (0.2 percent) and open burning at solid waste dumping sites (0.4 percent).

Traffic

Almost all cities have changed to motorized road vehicles, which has increased the use of fossil fuels and increased greenhouse-gas emissions. This explosive growth in the number of road vehicles is a big problem in many cities. Many city centers have major difficulties trying to cope with the chaotic automobile traffic. The traffic jams are extremely bad in many cities and transport traffic in the city area at least during the rush-hours is really slow. The pollution is high due to constant traffic and causes respiratory diseases to city habitants (HABITAT 1996).

Failed or non-existing urban planning is the main reason for these traffic problems. Rapid population growth has surprised the capabilities of many cities. Many urban plans have failed in practice because they have been over-ambitious considering the capabilities. The reasons for this kind of failure include the lack of proper legal and administrative framework, inadequate technical skills and financial resources (HABITAT 1996).

Traffic Congestion in Malaysia

The opportunity to drive from Kuala Lumpur to Penang on the second day of Hari Raya was really terrified to see the volume of traffic on the PLUS north-south highway all the way from KL to Penang. Imagine how it would be over the weekend after the Hari Raya holidays.

The highway itself was congested with cars and this became worse towards the evening. All the R&R areas – restaurant jejantas(Sg.Buloh),Tapah, Sg.Perak and Gunung Semanggol were similarly over-crowded with people and cars.

Just wonder what will it be like ten years from now when the increased in population would result in a two-fold increase in the number of cars. Can we cope by building more highways? If we keep building more and more highways and roads to cater for the ever increasing population of cars and motorcycles, soon our country would become a land of roads and highways with hardly any space for the cultivation of food.

The main problem here is too many motor vehicles on the road resulting in congestion and whatever measures we take to reduce road accidents will be futile. Minor human errors are inevitable however careful one is while on the road. Although the error is minor but the result can be fatal as is the case in the majority of the accidents on our roads.

There are numerous steps that we can take to reduce accidents and the mortality associated with them. The one most important measure is to reduce the number of vehicles on our roads at all times particularly during festive seasons .Some of the ways to do this are:

1. Avoid unnecessary travel especially during festive time. The people must be educated to discourage traveling during festive period. Family visits can be done throughout the year, why cramp into the two or three days.
2. Not to give extended leave for festivals
3. Avoid granting extended school holidays for major festivals. The recent adjustment of school holidays for deepavalli and raya was unnecessary and an abuse of privilege.
4. Seriously consider improving and upgrading our public transport system. Intra-city and inter city public transport system must be enhanced. These must be safe, efficient and affordable. It is pointless to have campaigns to promote the use of public transport when we do not have an efficient system on the ground.
5. To have separate lanes for motor cyclists in all major towns and cities.

Unless the government consider these measures very seriously and take steps to implement them immediately, lives will continue to be lost in this battlefield of ours called ROADS.

Water pollutants

The lack of sanitation and sewage treatment is the biggest factor regarding water pollution. Local water bodies are used as a dumping ground for untreated water from urban areas or industries. Chemical discharge is also a widespread problem. On a positive note, many countries have introduced legislation to combat the problem (UNEP 1999).

Many rivers in developing countries are more like open sewers than rivers. Most of the centers in these regions do not have drains or even service to collect the garbage. Fisheries are often damaged and destroyed by liquid effluents from city-based industries. Thousands of people may lose their livelihood, because of a large city situated close to the world’s productive fishing regions. The cities that are close to the coast often dump untreated sewage to the sea. Most of the coastal cities have serious problems with dirty, contaminated beaches and water which is a serious health risk to the bathers and for the whole city (HABITAT 1996).

Water pollution (frequency of exceeding national water quality standards, drinking water quality standards)

The estimated number of water pollution sources for 2002 was 13,540 comprising mainly of sewage treatment plants, agro-based industries, manufacturing industries and animal farms. About 53 percent of the total number of sources was domestic sewage facilities (7,126 sources), followed by manufacturing industries (5, 137 or 38 percent), pig farms (807 sources or 6 percent) and agrobased industries (470 sources or 3 percent). Of the total number of effluent sources identified, Johor had the highest number (1 675, 29.9 percent), followed by Selangor (1 485, 26.5 percent), Perak (573, 10.2 percent) and Perlis had the least number (14, 0.25 percent).

River Pollution in Malaysia

Rivers in Malaysia generally appear to have high organic pollution loads and high SS concentrations. However, because water pollution status is published as an index (WQI), we were unable to obtain accurate information about concentrations of river pollutants over recent years for this research. Nor could we get a precise picture of the severity of river pollution in Malaysia. In moves to solve these water pollution problems, Malaysia is putting sewerage services in place to dea with household wastewater which is a leading source of pollution. Unlike sewerage systems in Japan, the projected wastewater treatment systems will handle household wastewater only. In 1993, Malaysia passed the Sewerage Service Act, paving the way for privatizing the sewerage systems. The task of privatization was undertaken by Indah Water Konsortium Sdn. Bhd., which aims to deliver services to 79 percent of the population within the year 2000. In regard to marine pollution, 794 samples were collected and analyzed from 226 locations in 1997. Of these, 87 monitored locations, or 34 percent of the total, were found to have contaminant levels exceedin the Proposed Marine Interim Standards. Oil and grease exceeded the limit (0 mg/l), as did total suspended solids (50 mg/l), and coliform bacteria (100 MPN/100ml). Detected copper levels were above the Proposed Marine Interim Standard (0.1 mg/l) in Sarawak, and mercury and arsenic exceeded the limits (0.001 mg/l and 0. 1 mg/l, respectively) in Negeri Sembilan. In 1996 the Malaysia government began monitoring groundwater in the Malay Peninsula with the aim of preventing possible contamination.

Solid waste

This is a big problem in rapidly growing cities where it is really hard to keep up with the waste production. In the big cities the daily amount of waste can be enormous and hard to handle. In the lower-income countries the amount of waste is not so big but the problems have more to do with the collection system. The agencies that are responsibility for the collection and disposal of solid wastes are often understaffed and underfunded. Also the lack of equipment, like collection trucks, makes the service inefficient. Because many cities also have poor sanitation, wastes contain a lot of faucal matter. The risk from the uncollected waste is obvious for small children playing in the streets and for waste pickers (Kasarda and Parnell1993, HABITAT 1996).

Many city authorities face enormous challenges managing solid waste mountains. The collection and disposal of the solid waste needs effective co-operation with vendors and collectors. In developing countries it is normal that less than one-half of the solid wastes are collected. Even the city provides waste service it is often spatially concentrated, leaving some parts of the city unserved (Ogu 2000).

Solid waste (generation of municipal solid waste, proportion of recyclables)

In 2001, about 6.378 million tons of solid waste were generated. There are 170 recycling centers throughout the Malaysia.

Noise

In the urban environment there are many sources of noise. The most serious sources are aircrafts, industrial operations, highway traffic and construction activities. Current noise levels harm hundreds of millions people and create serious health treats to tens of millions. Sleep disturbance, loss of hearing, stress, poorer work performance and increased anxiety are effects from noise. The noise levels that the inhabitants have to suffer, varies between cities and also between different areas in the city. Especially in every mega-city people are under constant stress from noise, which has harmful effects on their health and level of living (HABITAT 1996).

3. Evaluate the ways in which technology and legislation have developed to address these issues.

In Malaysia, anyone proposing a new development project is obliged to carry out a number of procedures to evaluate the project's effects on the environment before implementation. The procedures are mandatory conditions for obtaining permission to operate a factory, and no new projects can get underway without completing these procedures. The first procedure is the completion of environmental impact assessment (EIA).

If the proposed project comes under one of 19 categories of activities prescribed under the Environmental Quality (Environmental Impact Assessment) Order 1987, the project proponent must prepare an EIA report in accordance with the stipulated procedures, submit it to the Director General of the Department of Environment (DOE), and obtain approvals.

If the proposed project is not a prescribed activity subject to EIA, Site Suitability Evaluation or Pre-Siting Evaluation is required to assess whether the site of the proposed factory or project is compatible with other land use in the area, particularly in regard to residential zones. Evaluation is required even when planning to site a factory in an industrial estate.

The DOE carries out the evaluation by checking the development plan against environmental laws and regulations. In terms of both size and industry type, most factory construction projects undertaken by Japanese companies are required to complete only Site Suitability Evaluation. In addition, depending on where the factory is to be located, a hazardous industry which may potentially generate waste that is injurious to health, such as a petrochemical plant, must submit a separate environmental risk analysis to the DOE.

This provision applies to projects that require facilities to handle dangerous chemical substances. The project proponent carries out an environmental risk analysis of the facility and the proposed methods of handling the dangerous substances, and receives risk assessment of the project from the DOE. These procedures are required not only for new projects, but may also be required for factory expansion and other such activities.

Environmental Impact Assessment System

EIA requirements apply to 19 categories of activities, such as airport construction, coastal reclamation, industries, and construction of waste treatment and disposal facilities, as prescribed in the schedule appended to the Environmental Quality (Environmental Impact Assessment) Order 1987. This order also sets forth the size and scope of the prescribed activities in each category. In general, these activities are large-scale development projects that potentially have severe impacts on the environment. Of the prescribed activities, those in the industry category are most relevant to plant construction by Japanese companies. EIA requirements apply to factory and plant construction projects, exceeding a

specified size, in seven types of industries:

(1) chemical,

(2) petrochemical,

(3) non-ferrous,

(4) nonmetallic,

(5) iron and steel,

(6) shipbuilding, and

(7) pulp and paper.

The EIA covers not only the likely environmental impact of the proposed project, but also evaluates aspects such as whether the best possible options have been selected for the project, and whether the project incorporates appropriate pollution control measures.

Prescribed Activities Subjected to EIA

1. Agriculture

(a) Land development schemes covering an area of 500 hectares or more to bring forest land into agricultural production.

(b) Agricultural programmes necessitating the resettlement of 100 families or more.

(c) Development of agricultural estates covering an area of 500 hectares or more involving changes in type of agricultural use.

2. Airport

(a) Construction of airports (having an airstrip of 2,500 meters or longer).

(b) Airstrip development in state and national parks.

3. Drainage and Irrigation

(a) Construction of dams and man-made lakes and artificial enlargement of lakes with surface areas of 200 hectares or more.

(b) Drainage of wetland, wild-life habitat or of virgin forest covering an area of 100 hectares or more.

(c) Irrigation schemes covering an area of 5,000 hectares or more

4. Land Reclamation

Costal reclamation involving an area of 50 hectares or more.

5. Fisheries

(a) Construction of fishing harbours.

(b) Harbour expansion involving an increase of 50 per cent or more in fish landing capacity per annum.

(c) Land based aquaculture projects accompanied by cleaning of mangrove swamp forests covering an area of 50 hectares or more.

6. Forestry

(a) Conversion of hill forest land to other land use covering an area of 50 hectare or more

(b) Logging or conversion of forest land to other land use within the catchment area of reservoirs used for municipal water supply, irrigation or hydro power generation or in areas adjacent to state and national parks and national marine parks.

(c) Logging covering an area of 50 hectares or more.

(d) Conversion of mangrove swamps for industrial, housing or agricultural use covering an area of 50 hectares or more.

(e) Clearing of mangrove swamps on Islands adjacent to national marine parks.

7. Housing

Housing development covering an area of 50 hectares or more.

8. Industry

(a) Chemical : Where production capacity of each product or combined products is greater than 100 tones/ day

(b) Petrochemical -- All sizes

(c) Non-ferrous (Primary smelting) Aluminium -- all sizes

Copper -- all sizes Others -- producing 50 tonnes/day and above of product

(d) Non-Metallic Cement -- for clinker through out of 30 tonnes /hour and above Lime -- 100 tonnes/day and above burnt lime rotary kiln or 50 tones/ day and above vertical kiln.

(e) Iron and steel-- Require in iron ore s raw materials for production greater than 100 tonnes/ day; or Using scrap iron as raw materials for production greater than 20 tones /day

(f) Shipyards -- Dead Weight Tonnage greater than 5000 tonnes

(g) Pulp and Paper Industry --Production capacity greater than 50 tonnes/day.

9. Infrastructure

(a) Construction of hospitals with outfall into beachfronts used for recreational purposes.

(b) Industrial estate development for medium and heavy industries covering an area of 50 hectares or more.

(c) Construction of expressways.

(d) Construction of national highways.

(e) Construction of new townships.

10. Ports

(a) Construction of ports

(b) Port expansion involving an increase of 50 per cent or more in handling capacity

per annum.

11. Mining

(a) Mining of minerals in new areas where the mining lease covers a total area in excess of 250 hectares.

(b) Ore processing, including concentrating for aluminium, copper, gold or tantalum.

(c) Sand dredging involving an area of 50 hectares or more.

12. Petroleum

(a) Oil and gas fields development.

(b) Construction of off-shore and on-shore pipelines in excess of 50 kilometers in length.

(c) Construction of oil and gas separation, processing, handling and storage facilities.

(d) Construction of oil refineries.

(e) Construction of product depots for the storage of petrol, gas or diesel (excluding service stations) which are located within 3 kilo meters of any commercial, industrial or residential areas and which have a combined storage capacity of 60,000 barrels or more.

13. Power Generation and Transmission

(a) construction of steam generated power stations burning fossil fuels and having a capacity of more than 10 megawatts.

(b) Dams and hydroelectric power schemes with either or both of the following.

· dams over 15 meters high and ancillary structures covering a total area in excess of 40 hectares;

· reservoirs with a surface areas in excess of 400 hectares.

(c) Construction of combined cycle power stations.

(d) Construction of nuclear-fueled power stations.

14. Quarries Proposed

quarrying of aggregate, limestone silica quartzite, sandstone,

and decorative building stone within 3 kilometers of any existing residential or industrial area, or any area for which a license, permit or approval has been granted for residential or industrial development.

15. Railways

(a) Construction of new routes.

(b) Construction of branch lines

16. Transportation

Construction of Mass Rapid Transport projects.

17. Resorts and Recreational Development

(a) Construction of coasted resort facilities or hotels with more than 80 rooms.

(b) Hill station resort or hotel development facilities in national parks.

(c) Development of tourist or recreational facilities in national parks.

(d) Development of tourist or recreational facilities on islands in surrounding waters which are gazetted as national marine parks.

18. Waste Treatment and Disposal

(a) Toxic and Hazardous Waste

· Construction of incineration plant

· Construction of recovery plant (off-site)

· Construction of wastewater treatment plant (off-site)

· Construction of secure landfill facility

· Construction of storage facility (off-site)

(b) Municipal Solid Waste

· Construction of incineration plant

· Construction of composting plant

· Construction of recovery/ recycling plant

· Construction of municipal solid waste landfill facility

(c) Municipal Sewage

· Construction of wastewater treatment plant

· Construction of marine outfall.

19. Waste Supply

(a) Construction of dams, impounding reservoirs with a surface area of 200 hectares or more.

(b) Groundwater development for industrial, agricultural or urban water supply of greater than 4,500 cubic meters per day.

Impact assessment takes approximately three months for the preliminary assessment only. In 1997, a total of 414 cases of environmental impact assessment were conducted during the year, and most of these were completed at the preliminary assessment stage.

Further particulars about EIA procedures and an overview of how the EIA process is conducted are available in "A Handbook of Environmental Impact Assessment Guidelines," published by the DOE. In addition, "Specific Environmental Impact Assessment Guidelines" are being prepared for specific types of industries, and there are currently 16 different sets of guidelines available.

Registration of Environmental Impact Assessment Consultants

To improve the quality of EIA reports, Malaysia in 1994 initiated a registration system for consultants who carry out assessment. The purpose is to clarify the consultant's area of specialization, services, and scope of responsibility. The DOE registers consultants who pass a certain standard of expertise. As of 1997, 216 individuals and 63 consulting firms were registered. The current registration system is not based on laws. The DOE wants to have registration of consultants made mandatory under the law, and has submitted a proposed amendment to the Environmental Quality (Environmental Impact Assessment) Order 1987 to the Attorney General. The proposed amendment recommends incorporation of registration standards, rules of ethics for consultants, and criteria for revoking registration.

Site Suitability Evaluation

Site Suitability Evaluation is required for activities which are not subject to the EIA system. Whereas the EIA system emphasizes prevention of environmental impacts by large-scale development projects, Site Suitability Evaluation assesses whether a project will cause any environmental problems, particularly in relation to residential areas, in the vicinity of the proposed factory construction site. The aim is to encourage companies to select appropriate factory sites. The evaluation is carried out based on the DOE's brochure, "Guidelines for the Siting and Zoning of Industries." Any person wishing to build a factory is obliged to contact the DOE in regard to site suitability. On receiving an inquiry from a person proposing to build a factory, the DOE evaluates the site suitability in terms of the surrounding land use, the capacity for additional pollution load, problems of waste disposal in the area, and regulations regarding buffer zones stipulated in the guidelines. Depending on the assessor's opinion, the project proponent may be directed to change the proposed site of the factory. Under the guidelines' provisions regarding buffer zones, industries are classified into four categories:

(1) Light industry A,

(2) Light industry B,

(3) Medium industry, and

(4) Heavy industry.

The desirable buffer distance from residential areas is specified separately for each of these categories. For example, the provisions state that a buffer distance of 250 meters is desirable for Medium industry, a category of

industry that uses toxic and hazardous substances as raw material and generates some gaseous emission, industrial effluent, noise, odor and scheduled wastes. Since a high proportion of Japanese companies in Malaysia are assembly industries in the electrical and electronics sector, most companies will have to conduct only Site Suitability Evaluation as the required EIA procedure.

Evaluate ways Technology

Environmental technology is an all-inclusive term used to describe pollution control devices and systems, waste treatment processes and storage facilities, and site remediation technologies and their components that may be utilized to remove pollutants or contaminants from or prevent them from entering the environment. Environmental technology is utilized in many configurations and is applied to many environmental problems, including devices and systems used in environmental programs to duplicate environmental conditions for test purposes or to control, prevent, treat, or remediate waste in process discharges (e.g., emissions, effluents) or the ambient environment. Usually, this term will apply to hardware-based systems; however, it can also apply to general methods or techniques used for pollution prevention, source reduction, or containment of contamination to prevent further movement of the contaminants.

Incenarator Technology

This next generation of incinerators uses active combustion control and continuous emission monitoring to incinerate larger quantities of waste, using less fuel and generating less emissions, than current commercially incineration processes.

Potential Applications:

The present program is directed towards size reduction of present ship-board incinerators. However the technology is of general interest for commercial applications which require compact, efficient incinerator systems. These include portable incinerator units for on-site waste incineration, eliminating the storage and transfer costs associated with removing waste to central incinerating locations.

The concept of the compact incinerator is based on using resonant acoustics to increase heat transfer, mass transfer, and molecular mixing in the primary chamber. The efficiency in the secondary chamber will be improved by active combustion control with afterburning in acoustically stabilized periodic vortices.

For real-time monitoring of temperature fluctuations and continuous monitoring of hazardous exhaust species. For real-time control the sensor information is used via a controller to actively manipulate the critical physical incineration processes.

This continuous-control technology allows peak efficiency even as the type of waste and rate of feed vary, and also gives the flexibility to adjust the combustion processes as the environmental regulations and requirements that govern the incineration process are changed.

Conclusion

Major construction projects, such as roads and freeways, are important. During construction, however, such projects pose a significant risk to the environment, which must be addressed by developers and contractors.

Construction practices that fail to control pollution can cause damage to waterways and wetlands, kill fish, upset aquatic ecological systems and wildlife communities, and result in contamination of land and groundwater. The risk to the environment is particularly high when work is done near coastal areas, streams and creeks, or along a river valley.

When construction occurs near built-up areas, poor practices may result in air and noise pollution which may cause annoyance and affect the health of neighbouring communities. This document is designed to provide developers and contractors with guidelines on how to implement sound practices that minimise environmental impacts and eliminate health risks and nuisance to

residents near a construction site.

There are also sound economic reasons for implementing good environmental practices during major construction projects. Excessive sedimentation of waterways can cause flooding, require expensive dredging of navigation channels downstream or reduce the capacity of downstream water storage units, destroy valuable wetlands, and reduce commercial and recreational fishing.

On-site, loss of topsoil means importation of replacement topsoil at substantial cost. Where construction activities cause a nuisance, this places a cost on the community through loss of amenity. Construction sites are constantly changing, and systems need to be in place to modify control measures to maintain their effectiveness. Therefore, frequent inspection and monitoring is required to continually