Human activities have a major impact on fauna and flora. This evidence can, however, divide society on some controversial projects and more widely when it comes to quantifying this impact. But then how to quantify our environmental impact reliably and objectively?

Quantifying our environmental impact on species: what are we talking about?

It is a question of quantifying the effect of a change in the landscape on the capacity of living beings to reproduce, to feed, to survive, to move. In a word: to live. The environmental impact can be negative, such as the construction of a highway or commercial area. But it can also be positive, such as the removal of a dam on rivers or the establishment of hedgerows in agricultural plains.

Avoid - Reduce - Compensate

The consideration of biodiversity must be integrated as soon as possible in the design of a plan, program or project (whether in the choice of the project, its location, or even in the reflection on its desirability).

The goal Environmental Consultants is to minimize the negative impacts on biodiversity:

At first, avoiding environmental impact.

If it is not possible to avoid then reduce the impacts that cannot be avoided.

Finally, by compensating for the residual impacts that the first two steps did not allow to eliminate.

Identification of environments

Local and regional authorities must identify the areas in which biodiversity is the richest or the best represented and where species can perform all or part of their life cycle (species' habitat). In addition, local authorities must identify the spaces that allow the movement of species between these habitats, called corridors. All habitats and travel zones form an ecological network.

The challenge of quantifying the impacts of a project, program or plan on species

Quantifying our environmental impact on living beings in a reliable and objective way is not easy. Most of the Flora and Fauna Reports Sydney is based on the observation (presence or absence) of species with stakes in the territory concerned and on expert opinion.

However, the presence of a species gives relatively limited information about its ability to maintain itself over time. Experts' opinions suffer from a lack of standardization and can be seen as somewhat objective during the consultation between several stakeholders of a project.

Of course, there are more advanced methods to track the movements of species on a territory, thanks to sensors placed on individuals. But these expensive methods are difficult to operate at large scales and are not applicable to all species.

Ideally, it would be necessary to be able to follow the evolution of the species over time, according to several management scenarios, then to choose the best impossible in the real world. But if the empirical test is impossible, another solution can be considered: simulate the life of the species!