CE-457 (Environmental
Engineering – V)
Environmental Engineering &
Development Projects
2.0 Credit Hours
Prof. Dr. Sudip K. Pal
&
Prof. Dr. Asiful Hoque
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Course content
• Environment and Development Projects;
Environment and Sustainable Development;
Environmental policies and legislation;
Environmental implications; EQS, EIA, ESIA,
Development projects proposal – GOB and
Donors’ funded perspectives
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Course Outcomes (COs)
These are the specific skills and knowledge a student gains
from completing the course. Examples for an
"Environmental Development and Impact" course include:
•Explaining the principles and processes of Environmental
Impact Assessment (EIA)
•Predicting the environmental consequences of various
development projects
•Discussing the role of stakeholders, including the public, in
the environmental assessment process
•Understanding the background and importance of EIA in
environmental planning.
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Mapping COs to POs
The COs of the course are mapped to the broader POs to
show how specific learning within the course contributes
to the overall goals of the program.
For instance, the COs related to understanding EIA
principles and predicting project impacts directly feed into
the PO of Problem-Solving and Technical Knowledge
(PO-3, PO-7).
Similarly, the COs on public participation and discussing
case studies contribute to the POs of Societal
Responsibility and Communication (PO-6, PO-12).
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Lecture 2 - 4
The Environment and
Development
Dr. Sudip K Pal
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Definition
• WCED (World Commission on Environment &
Development) – known as ‘Brundtland Commission’
defined Environment as “Where we all live” and
Development as “What we all do” in attempting to
improve our lot within that adobe
• Sustainable Development – the development that meets
the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their own needs
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• In a summary, environment is the Physico-
chemical, biological and social surroundings of
human being and sustainable development is a
process of change in which the exploitation of
resources, the direction of investments, and the
orientation of technological development and
institutional changes are all in harmony and
enhance both current and future potential to
meet human needs and limitation
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Development
• It is the process of transforming natural resources
endowment of the planet to meet the needs and
aspiration of human population. The most
fundamental law governing our planet’s finite
resources states that matter can neither be created
or destroyed, however it can be reshaped or
transformed. The process of taming and
transformation of natural raw matter into products
and services as well as enhancing the growth in
quantity and quality of products and services need
energy, human endeavor and technology
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Environment
• The environment is thus the sum of all social,
biological, physical and chemical factors
which compose the surrounding of human
being and living organism.
• Environment as a productive system provides
basic supports that are required for flourishing
all forms of lives, materials that are harvested,
energy that is harnessed, services for
trasportation.
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• Physical Resources
- Infrastructures
- Industries
- Power generation
- Settlements
- Mining
- Transport and communication
- Tourism
• Biological Resources
- Agriculture
- Fisheries and aquaculture
- Forestry and Plantation
- Live stocks
- Pasturing
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Environment and Development:
The Basic Issues
• The concept of sustainable development, and
linkages between the environment
• Sustainability: a development path is sustainable
‘if and only if the stock of overall capital assets
remains constant or rises over time’
• Environmental accounting: the preservation or
loss of valuable environmental resources should
be factored into estimates of economic growth and
well-being
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• NNP* =GNP –Dm –Dn – R –A
• NNP*: sustainable net national product
• Dm: depreciation of manufactured capital assets
• Dn: depreciation of environmental capital:
monetary value of environmental decay over a
year
• R: expenditure required to restore environmental
capital (forests, fisheries etc.)
• A: expenditure required to avert destruction of
environmental capital
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Population, Resources, and the
Environment
• Perception that there is a limited population size
which can be sustained with the earth’s finite
resources
• Potential for new technologies may alleviate the
strain on the resources
• Growing populations in the LDCs have led to
land, water, and wood shortages in rural areas, and
sanitation and water crisis in urban areas
• Increasing population contributes to accelerated
degradation of resources
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Poverty and the Environment
• There exists a relationship between environmental
destruction and high fertility which are both out
growths of absolute poverty
• Preventing environmental degradation is linked to
providing institutional support to the poor
• Insecure land rights, lack of credit and inputs and
absence of information often prevent poor from
marking resource augmenting investments which
would help preserve the environment
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Growth versus the Environment
• Question of whether or not it is possible to achieve
growth without environmental damage
• The worst environmental damage by the richest
billion and poorest billion of the world
• Therefore idea that increasing incomes of the poor
would decrease environmental damage
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Rural Development and the
Environment
• Land in LDC are already being overworked
by the existing population
• Increased accessibility of agricultural inputs
and introduction of sustainable methods of
farming are need to decrease destructive
patterns of land use
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Urban Development and the
Environment
• Rapid population increase and rural-urban
migration has led to increasing urban population
growth
• Strain on existing urban water supplies and
sanitation facilities, high costs of urban crowding
• Resulting in health hazards as circumstances allow
for epidemics and health crises
• Research reveals that urban environment tends to
worsen at a faster rate than urban population size
increases so that the marginal environmental cost
of additional residents rises over time 17
Ecosystem of Environment
• The living organisms derive substances from non-
living resources. Under natural conditions plants,
microorganisms and animals together with air,
water, soil, minerals and sun shine form a
harmonious system.
• The dynamic equilibrium of the system maintained
through interactions and interrelationship of the
biotic and abiotic components
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Ecosystem of Environment
ABIOTIC COMPONENT
• Sunlight
•The people play the most •Land
important role in the •Air
manipulating and •Water
restructuring the natural •Soil
•Minerals
environment when seen •Chemicals
from the perspective of
environment as a source of
material, energy and Producers Decomposers
services and as a receptor
of human impacts BIOTIC COMPONENT
• Humans
•Animals
•Plants
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THE ENVIRONMENT
Natural Environment
Physico – chemical component
Settlements Food
Air
Infrastructures
Land Shelter
Industry
Water
Mining
Soil Clothing H
Energy Supply
Minerals
Water supply Energy U
Sunlight
Chemicals Agriculture Transport M
Producer Forestry A
Fisheries Commerce
Aquaculture
N
Decomposer Recreation
Pasturing
Live stocks Health
Forest
Plants Forest Products Culture
Fish Fishing
Wildlife Wildlife
Microbes 20
BIOLOGICAL COMPONENT
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•With science & technology, man is able to improve the carrying
capacity of the environment to a value k’
▪The increment of k to k’ is achieved mainly through resources
development which include adding value to resources,
enhancing the regeneration of renewable resources and
exploration and development of hidden resources.
▪However, the carrying capacity is not unlimited and hence,
there are risks in attaining population close to maximum
carrying capacity.
▪It is evident in literature that the earth’s total resources with
present development potentials can sustain an absolute
maximum of 16 to 18 billion. Moreover, a widely diverse
condition prevail among developed and developing countries.22
Sustainable Development &
Conceptual Model
• The environment with its biotic and abiotic
components provides basic resources that
support production-consumption activities
of population and assimilates the residues
during these activities
• Based on Brundtland’s report, a conceptual
model can be made to study the various
activities in a graphical format 23
• Total resources at time t, Rt consist of
renewable resources (RR) and non-
renewable resources (NRR).
• The development efforts representing
production, regeneration and value addition
using natural resources are supported by the
technological and institutional inputs from
Population (Pt).
• The resources available for consumption of
the population are derived directly from the
natural resources and products from
resources development 24
Effect of Waste on Environment
• The use of environment as a sink for wastes
generated is potential threat to SD
• Many of the adverse environmental effects of
wastes are not confined in a locally rather they
spill over geographical boundaries.
• Take an example….
• ----the most alarming threat to the environment
is the increase in the discharge of toxic wastes.
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• Environmental Problems
• Theory of Environmental
Policy
• Environmental Policy in
Bangladesh
• The environmental costs are sometimes passed
on to future generation through over
exploitation of resources, and damages to
resources bases.
• This kind of roll of mechanism is a kind of
environmental debts the present generation
borrows from past generation and passed to
future generation
• Paying off environmental debts by future
generation is a threat to their freedom in
spending their income and against the
principle of intergeneration equity
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The UN Initiatives
• In 1972, UN Conference on Human
Environment in Stockholm, Sweden – first
comprehensive attempt to articulate the
interrelationship between the quality of
environment, the growing world population
and world economic growth to sustain it
• It recognized the national and international
actions are required….
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UN Conference on Environment and
Development (UNCED) held in June 1992
in Rio de Jeneiro, Brazil known as ‘Earth
Summit’ adopted:
• The Rio Declaration
• The forest Principles
• The Framework Convention on Climate
Change
• The Convention on Biodiversity
• The agenda 21
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Role of Engineers in SD
• Some of the key aspects of SD include
efficient use of energy, switching over to
renewable resources, and efficient use of
resources through innovative process
design, waste minimization, reuse of
materials and recycle of wastes, clean up of
mess --- which are traditionally the
professional responsibility of the engineers
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Key points to be learnt
• The high rate of population growth,
environmental damages by development
activities, over exploitation of natural
resources and pollution of environment
beyond the assimilation capacity of the
environment are principal factors affecting
sustainability…
• Hence,
• Population growth must be controlled
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• The environmental impacts of development
activities should be assessed…
• The consumption of NRR should be
compensated by the increase RR
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Traditional Economic Model of
the Environment
• Privately Owned
Resources
• Static Efficiency in
Resource Allocation
• Where total net benefit is
maximized when the
marginal cost of
producing/extracting one
more unit of the resource
is equal to its marginal
benefit
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• Common Property
Resources and
Misallocation (11.3)
• Potential profits or scarcity
rents will be competed away
• Misallocation or resources
under a common property
system
• Implication of model is the
where possible privatization of
resources will lead to an
efficient allocation of resources
• Example: relationship between
the returns to labor on a given
piece of land
• Scarcity rent: Green area
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Economic Solutions
• Allow scarcity rent to be collected
• Tradable rights to pollute:
– Individuals incorporate externalities
• SMC=Private marginal cost+pollution=MR
– Requires a cap to constrain individual and
world wide totals
– Should all countries be required to participate?
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Core principles
•Balancing competing demands: Environmental resource
allocation must navigate trade-offs between immediate
economic use and the preservation of resources for future
generations.
•Ensuring sustainability: The goal is to optimize resource
use to prevent environmental damage and resource
depletion, making sure that present needs are met without
compromising the ability of future generations to meet their
own needs.
•Considering multiple criteria: Allocation decisions are
influenced by a combination of economic efficiency
(maximizing benefits for a given cost), social equity (fair
distribution), and environmental integrity.
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Allocation methods and tools
•Market-based approaches: Resource allocation can rely
on market principles like supply and demand, where
resources flow to their most valued uses based on consumer
preferences.
•Government policies: Governments use policies and
regulations to manage resource use, which can include
setting quotas, taxes, or providing incentives.
•Decision support models: These are used to inform
allocation decisions, particularly for public funding. For
example, models can use multiple criteria analysis (MCA)
to weigh factors like natural resource assets and threats
when distributing funds to different regions
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Static vs. dynamic allocation
•Static efficiency: This approach is used when time is not
a primary factor, as in the case of renewable resources like
solar energy. It measures efficiency at a single point in
time.
•Dynamic efficiency: This is used for non-renewable or
depletable resources like oil and coal, where the allocation
decision today affects what is available in the future. The
goal is to balance the present value of net benefits over
time, ensuring that a fair share is left for future generations
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