SYMPOSIUM PROCEEDINGS
The international symposium “Celsius 1.5: Impact Assessment and Climate Change” was held 26-28 September 2022 in beautiful Cape Town, South Africa. Over 200 delegates from 21 countries shared their experiences and ideas during 17 engaging sessions, a gala dinner celebrating 30 years of IAIAsa, and a pre-symposium training course and workshop.
PRESENTATIONS
Download the final program for the full symposium schedule. After the symposium, speakers were invited to share their presentations with participants. Some are unable to be shared due to privacy or other issues, but below you will find a few highlights of the event organized by session. Many thanks to all the presenters for taking time to share their work.
Have a follow-up question on a presentation? Use the participants list (shared directly with delegates via email) to reach out to presenters directly to start a conversation.
SESSION 1: Climate risk management: Tools and methodologies
Identifying landslide hazards for environmental impact assessment and environmental planning
Presenter: Charles MacRobert
Summary: Increasing urbanization is resulting in development on steep ground raising landslide risk. This paper highlights areas at risk and presents investigative procedures and mitigation measures.
Using risk and vulnerability information in environmental assessments
Presenter: Gerard van Weele
Summary: Risk and Vulnerability maps can be generated at provincial scale, and hold potential to inform spatial and environmental planning processes.
Incorporating extreme weather into assessing climate changes
Presenter: Charles Kelly
Summary: The presentation reviews the nature of extreme weather events in the context of changing climates and discusses methods to include these events in assessment results and management plans.
SESSION 2: Mainstreaming climate change into impact assessment: GHG emissions
EIA as a tool for net-zero emission targets
Presenter: Luceth Khumbuzi
Summary: Enforcing climate change adaptation in impact assessment will help avoid and minimize GHG emissions associated with development projects.
Fostering a capable scientific base in achieving a low carbon economy
Presenter: Desmond Musetsho
Summary: Natural science professionals play a crucial role in responding to climate-related matters based on scientific evidence. It is the obligation of natural
science professionals to protect society and the environment.
SESSION 3: Low-carbon energy and transport
Systems-thinking in impact assessment for sustainability transitions
Presenter: Luanita Snyman-van der Walt
Summary: Background to green hydrogen and its potential decarbonization contributions, and how systems-thinking could help understanding hydrogen aspects and impacts to facilitate a sustainable transition to a lower-carbon economy.
Southern Africa’s energy transition: Renewables and green hydrogen
Presenter: Jana de Jager
Summary: Insight into decarbonization of the energy mix of Southern African countries by exploring the challenges and opportunities of renewable energy and green hydrogen.
SESSION 4: Resilient and low-carbon cities
The Journey to Net Zero Carbon
Presenter: Francois Retief
Summary: Net Zero Carbon commitments are changing the face of the built environment. This presentation explores the impact and opportunities for practitioners in the field.
A strategic approach for more resilient cities
Presenter: Bryony Walmsley
Summary: Greater use of Strategic Environmental Assessment is proposed to address the challenges posed by the nexus of climate change, informality and city development.
The City of Cape Town’s approach to climate change response
Presenter: Amy Davison
Summary: The presentation will provide an overview of the City’s Strategy and Action Plan, followed by a reflection on how impact assessment could help cities achieve their climate change response goals.
Carbon-Neutrality in Cape Town: Towards an Appropriate Local Context
Presenter: Adrian Stone
Summary: The presentation discusses some of the policy thinking in the City’s climate and energy planning and reflects on the role of impact assessment in managing risks and supporting climate actions.
SESSION 5: Mainstreaming climate change into impact assessment: General, Part 1
Climate change scenario analysis - mitigation and adaption opportunities
Presenter: Alex Hetherington
Summary: Climate change scenario analysis is an essential tool that assists in planning for the effects of climate change.
Desperately seeking inter-generational equity – IA unusual must prevail
Presenter: Nicholas King
Summary: IA needs reinvention if we are to attain the SDGs and other science-defined goals of sustainability, building resilience and achieving inter-generational equity. Every development decision must be based on its contribution to climate change mitigation, climate change adaptation, ecosystem restoration and inter-generational equity and justice.
SESSION 6: Climate change and the agricultural sector
The SmartAgri Plan: Practical approaches for climate smart agriculture-related land use planning and impact assessment
Presenter: Stephanie Midgley
Summary: This presentation addresses how an integrative framework utilizing the SDGs helps to integrate SIA and SEA for land and water planning and management, achieving fairer and more sustainable social and environmental outcomes.
SESSION 8: Community resilience, stakeholder engagement, and human rights
Using a human rights lens to inform more resilient social assessment
Presenter: Danielle Sanderson
Summary: Applying a human rights lens to social impact assessment provides an opportunity to identify more sustainable and adaptive measures for project-based impacts within the climate change imperative.
SESSION 9: Mainstreaming climate change into impact assessment: Case studies
Incorporating Climate Change Resilience Considerations in Development of Transboundary Water Storage Infrastructure: The Case of ZRA
Presenter: Mwelwa Sata-Haruperi
Summary: A presentation on how best to plan climate change initiatives to reducing the carbon footprint in development, implementation, and monitoring of Hydropower ESIAs.
Climate change into EIA: Perspectives from hydroelectric projects in Nepal
Presenter: Milan Dahal
Summary: Some recommendations for incorporating climate change into EIA of hydroelectric projects and improving future EIA practice in Nepal, based on a review of EIA reports.
Climate change specialist study for the Afghanistan Gas Project
Presenter: Gillian Petzer
Summary: The Afghanistan Gas Project underwent an environmental and social impact assessment. Airshed Planning Professionals (Pty) Ltd compiled the Climate Change Impact Assessment for the proposed project.
SESSION 15: Mainstreaming climate change into impact assessment: General, Part 3
Intersectionality of gender, climate change, and environmental impact assessment (EIA)
Presenter: Karen Shippey
Summary: Ensuring gender is actively included into EIA Climate Change considerations will begin to address ongoing injustice and systemic inequality which is exacerbated by climate change as pressure mounts on food security, water and energy availability and affordability and ecological systems. All
practitioners need to develop a lens which will actively seek to highlight and mitigate the impact specifically on vulnerable groups with a view to enhancing community resilience.
Using 2050 Emissions Pathways to inform development planning decisions
Presenter: Jody Brown
Summary: The 2050 Emissions Pathway Analysis is used to prioritize mitigation actions that need to be implemented to achieve the goal of being a net-zero province and inform decisions around development planning.
Blue carbon ecosystem responses to climate change in impact assessments
Presenter: Jackie Raw
Summary: BCE are vulnerable to climate change, but also provide resilience under certain conditions. Sustainable management and restoration of degraded BCE are needed to ensure the persistence of these ecosystems.
CLOSING PLENARY
Next steps on our way to 2050 and beyond
Presenter: Nicholas King