Valued Ecosystem Components (VEC’s) In Thermal Power Plant Development

Define the Valued Ecosystem Components (VEC’s).

Valued Ecosystem Components and their Indicators

Selecting a proper site for Thermal Power Plant is important for its ensured prolonged efficiency and many factors are considered when choosing the site for development of such a plant. An improvised decision Support System for such plants helps decision makers to come up with several decisions on the site alternatives, at the level of initial study.

Geospatial information (GIS) comes in handy when evaluating a good location for coal related thermal power plants. In this case the provided maps will help in spotting the suitable sites. The sites are then ranked using a Site Suitability Index (SSI) and decisions are made according to it. In general, both the construction and operation of a power plant requires the availability of some amenities like water resources and the suitable soil type.

VECs are elements of the ecosystem that has an ecological, scientific, social and cultural importance among other importance. Their value can determine the basis of cultural ideas or scientific importance. The impact assessment will focus on the important elements.  These are some of the components that were observed in the study.

i. Physical Environment

There will be the release of impurities that can impact air quality in this particular area. Improvised light source should be at the sight for operation and workers’ health and safety purpose that will interfere with human and non-human operations. Noise will be produced as the construction and other operations take place and may disturb other human activities.

ii. Water source

The thermal power plant of 300 Mega Watts installed capacity needs almost 12 million m3 of water per year. There will be high impact on river & ground water which will increase Water needs for the through system which translates to  30 to 50 times more than that of a normal closed cycle system.

iii. Wildlife

The project site is a habitat for various animals including Pine Martein, Red Fox and Beaver. Land clearing activities and infrastructure might impact wildlife habitat.

iv. Aquatic resources

The construction and the operations at the project sight could affect access to recreational fisheries. This will affect the Northern part of project site like Bamoos Lake, Hare Lake and the Pic River and in the shores of Lake Superior. These may also affect the use of commercial fisheries near the project site.

v. Social Environment

The demographics of the area and other communities could change as a result of people moving towards these areas for the purpose of economic opportunities. As a result of these the cost and the need for housing in these communities might be affected as a result of the movement of the population for the same reasons of economic opportunities.

Potential water resource impacts and Mitigation Measures

The project requires water for various uses, which are; drilling operations, site construction and cleaning. The water sources of the project site are water from rainfall, water bodies like lakes and reservoirs, streams, rivers and groundwater.

Potential water resource impacts may be mitigated by:

• Minimizing water resources needs (e.g. by the recycling of used water);
• Distributing abstractions to various sources;
• Leading  abstractions in the direction of lower sections of catchments;
• Evading  abstractions from environmentally sensitive sources;

Regionally important ecological sites, like forested areas, major water bodies and wetlands, habitats of rare and endangered animals will be significantly affected. This will be as a result of clearing of the project site and creating other infrastructure such as roads and pathway etc.

Negative Impacts and Mitigation Measures

The areas will be located and measures taken to ensure that they are not threatened by project site. The measures will include avoiding, reducing or compensating for environmental impacts and to improve the ecological and community positive outcome of the project.

For air pollutions the process of incineration which involves combustion and used to control the emission of organic compounds will be used. It involves oxidation of material with combustible compounds exposed to heat that will release carbon dioxide and steam.

This Project is going to bring positive socio-economic benefits to the proposed region and will represents a very positive significant step in the further development of other infrastructure in the region. The Project will improve business activities, employment and learning chances which will later lead to economic empowerment and growth in the region.

Significant impacts are those that will be as a result of a direct interaction of the proposed project activities and the recipient habitat. A significant impact in this case is when the environmental activities like location clearing and preparing will adversely lead to relocation of people or animals that reside in this area.

Insignificant impacts on the other hand are those that are not a direct result of the proposed project, mostly produced away from or as a result of a complicated impact. In this case the aquatic life will experience the least impact from the proposed project.   

This program will clearly show the links between impacts found in the EIA report, indicators and limits (where necessary) and determination of aspects that will indicate the need for required changes.

This measure will be a condition for approval of the plan, together with any implementation of future projects. This will be included in design and the documents for the contract that will be prepared for other projects by the authorities. The concerned authorities will authorize the contractor to shortly suspend any construction on a given project if evidence will be presented to the department that the said contractor is not compliant on this measure.

For endangered and important plant species, the authorities shall come up with a monitoring program to ensure that any suggested action on important plant species meet required criteria that are accepted.

It ensures that the development of the plant is sustained with minimal negative environmental impacts. Effects on environment should be reduced by incorporating manageable measures in the project planning on the basis of predictions regarding environmental impacts on the account of project operations. There are three primary objectives that can be articulated in this assessment:

• EIA will anticipate the likely environmental impacts of the project.
• It presents these anticipations and options to the decision-makers involved in the project.
• It will find ways to reduce negative effects to curve the project so that it befits the local environment.

The main objective of EIA is to make sure that the development of the plant is sustained with minimal negative environmental impacts. Effects on environment should be reduced by incorporating manageable measures in the project planning on the basis of predictions regarding environmental impacts on the account of project operations. There are three primary objectives that can be articulated in this assessment:

• EIA will anticipate the likely environmental impacts of the project.
• It presents these anticipations and options to the decision-makers involved in the project.
• It will find ways to reduce negative effects to curve the project so that it befits the local environment.

Essentially we will define appropriate spatial familiar to the size of the Project to inspect required Project environment activities and determine the adverse effects. There will be several spatial scales that will be looked at in the EIA process, as required. These includes:

• SSA- The Site Study Area
• LSA- The Local Study Area
• RSA- The Regional Study Area

Monitoring programs

The SSA will be used as the starting point for the entire project and so this serves as the footprint of the project.

Figure 1: Map showing the Site Study Area of Marathon

The LSA will be explained differently for the purpose of impact assessment on the aquatic, terrestrial environments and atmospheric together with the socio-economic issues. This is for the reason that, these components will be differently influenced by the activities at the project site.

Figure 2: Map showing the Local Study Area of Marathon

The LSA on the environmental component in the atmosphere is seen as the claim and lease areas which determine the scope of the location, together with the adverse peregrinate ways for item distribution between the handling facility in Town of Marathon and the site. This boundary is based on other experiences in same circumstances that indicate the effects on the atmosphere are normally contained to locations proximate to the base of environmental pollutions.

The assessment of spatial boundaries for socio-economic effects somehow differ with the boundaries set for terrestrial, aquatic and atmospheric boundaries. The spatial boundary of socio-economic component of the assessment, will be done based on the people and communities found here and utilizes the area potentially affected by biophysical changes.

Temporal boundaries of the Project will be determined at the time of the single Project phases:

1. The first Phase  which will include Site Preparation,
2. The second Phase which will include Construction and Commissioning,

• The third Phase will be Operations.

1. The fourth and the last Phase will be decommissioning and Post Closure.

Pollution-free vehicles will be used in transportation and opportune infrastructure for trucks such as concrete or pitched road. There can be Separate access road for conveyance of materials like coal and diesel.

Creation of equipment to accord Acoustic enclosures and barrier shields with creation of sound barrier for personal protection. This will reduce the vulnerability.

The top soil will be stored and most probably reused with stored water with separate stacking of topsoil. Soil storage heap will be protected with dry vegetation to evade erosion, abstracting only vegetative cover from the concrete site on which construction activities has to be done.

Conclusion

When constructing a Thermal Power generating plant, the impacts on land, soil, air and social impacts are very significant and can at a lower level be avoided. These big factories are also said to emit a significant amount of chemicals and generate large quantity of fly ash which may affect the surrounding environment negatively. These factories also consume a substantial amount of water. After proper Environmental Impact Assessment is done, project implementation stage can commence.

References

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