Guidance on Integrating Climate Change and Biodiversity into ...

ForewordThe need for action on climate change and biodiversity loss is recognised across Europe and aroundthe world. To make progress towards combating and adapting to climate change, and halting theloss of biodiversity and the degradation of ecosystems, it is vital to fully integrate these issues in theplans, programmes and projects implemented across the EU.It is widely recognised that climate change has enormous economic consequences. The evidencegathered in The Stern Review: The Economics of Climate Change (2007) shows that ‘ignoring climatechange will eventually damage economic growth.’ The Review also points out that ‘the benefits ofstrong and early action far outweigh the economic costs of not acting.’ The Commission’s WhitePaper − Adapting to climate change: Towards a European framework for action (2009) tackles thisevidence and includes a commitment that ‘… the Commission will work with Member States andstakeholders setting guidelines and exchanging good practice, to ensure that account is taken ofclimate change impacts when implementing the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) andStrategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) Directives and spatial planning policies.’ It alsoencourages Member States to adopt ecosystem-based approaches, including green infrastructure.The Commission’s EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change, to be adopted in 2013, will build onthe White Paper.The loss of biodiversity has become one of our main environmental challenges. Its impact on thedelivery of ecosystem services, the society and economy as whole is increasingly recognised,including in the international study by TEEB (2010) of The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity— Mainstreaming the Economics of Nature: A synthesis of the approach, conclusions andrecommendations. To address this challenge, Member States have committed themselves to halt theloss of biodiversity and ecosystems by 2020 and to restore them in so far as feasible.This <strong>Guidance</strong> on Integrating Climate Change and Biodiversity into Strategic EnvironmentalAssessment is a response to the above commitments. Most of the projected impacts of climatechange are believed to have adverse effects on biodiversity. Since climate change and biodiversityloss — like so many other environmental issues we face — are closely interrelated, they are coveredin the same guidance.It is clear that ‘business as usual’ will neither achieve our climate change nor our biodiversityobjectives. The time has come to make sure that we employ all available tools to tackle these globalthreats. Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) and Strategic Environmental Assessments (SEAs)are legally required and systematic tools, and as such they are well suited to systematically tacklethe problems.As Jose Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, said at the Athens BiodiversityConference in 2009 − ‘The success of our climate change policy will also be measured by the successof our efforts in stopping the loss of biodiversity.’ Our aim is that this guidance will help the impactassessment community to better integrate these considerations into their work, stepping up globaland EU action to combat biodiversity loss and climate change.<strong>Guidance</strong> on integrating climate change and biodiversity into SEA 3