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Based on the provisions of the Environmental Protection Law 2020, environmental impact assessment can be understood as the process of analyzing, evaluating, identifying, and forecasting the impacts on the environment of an investment project and proposing measures to minimize adverse environmental impacts.
Based on the provisions of Article 30 of the Environmental Protection Law 2020, investment projects that require environmental impact assessments include:
(i) Group I investment projects (projects with high risk of significant environmental impact), including:
– Projects in production, business, and services sectors with potential for environmental pollution on a large scale or high capacity; projects involving hazardous waste treatment services; projects importing scrap materials from abroad as production inputs;
– Projects in production, business, and services sectors with potential for environmental pollution on a medium scale but with sensitive environmental factors; projects not falling into the large-scale production, business, and services sectors with potential for environmental pollution but having sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects using land, aquatic land, or coastal areas on a large scale or on a medium scale but with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects for mineral exploitation, water resources with large-scale or medium-scale capacity, or with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects requiring land use change on a medium scale or larger but with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects requiring relocation, resettlement on a large scale.
(ii) Group II investment projects (projects with potential environmental impacts), including:
– Projects using land, aquatic land, or coastal areas on a medium scale or small scale but with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects for mineral exploitation, water resources with medium-scale capacity or with small-scale capacity but with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects requiring land use change on a small scale but with sensitive environmental factors;
– Projects requiring relocation, resettlement on a medium scale.
Note: Investment projects falling into the above categories are exempt from conducting environmental impact assessments if they are urgent public investment projects as prescribed by the laws on public investment.
Based on Article 32, Clause 1 of the Law on Environmental Protection 2020, the main contents of the environmental impact assessment report include:
– Origin of the investment project, investor, competent authority for project approval; legal and technical basis; methods used for environmental impact assessment and other methods (if any);
– Compliance of the investment project with national environmental protection planning, regional planning, provincial planning, regulations of environmental protection laws, and other relevant legal provisions;
– Evaluation of technology selection, project components, and activities of the investment project with potential adverse impacts on the environment;
– Natural conditions, socio-economic factors, biodiversity; environmental status assessment; identification of affected objects, environmental sensitive factors at the project implementation site; justification of the suitability of the selected project implementation site;
– Identification, evaluation, prediction of main environmental impacts, generated waste throughout the project stages on the environment; scale, nature of waste; impacts on biodiversity, natural heritage, historical-cultural relics, and other sensitive factors; impacts from land clearance, resettlement, relocation (if any); identification, evaluation of potential environmental incidents of the investment project;
– Works, measures for waste collection, storage, treatment;
– Measures to minimize other negative impacts of the investment project on the environment; environmental rehabilitation, restoration plans (if any); biodiversity compensation plans (if any); environmental incident prevention, response plans;
– Environmental management and monitoring program;
– Consultation results;
– Conclusion, recommendations, and commitments of the investor.
