SEA IN THE CONTEXT OF LANDTUSE PLANNING

limited research that has been carried out on SEA in the country has furthermore to a largedegree been carried out under the auspices of the Planning Agency (Jónsdóttir, 1998;Bjarnadóttir, 1999; Theodórsdóttir, 2003; Theodórsdóttir and Elmarsdóttir, 2003). It can bespeculated that this close relationship with physical planning has contributed to the planningand procedural focus of the introduction of SEA, rather one of environmental protection, ifthe responsibility had been placed with another agency or institution. Yet anothercharacteristic of the Icelandic SEA implementation is the clear and declared separation ofSEA from EIA, both the legislation and process. This is stressed by the parliamentarycommittee, and included in the SEA Act. In a previous proposal for legal implementation ofSEA in the Icelandic legislation there were some suggestions of implementing including theSEA requirements in the Planning Act, but at a later stage it was decided to introduce SEA ina separate act. The linkages between the planning system and the way that SEA will fulfil theexpectations expressed by politicians and officials in the early phases of the SEA introductionremains to be seen. Will SEA be integrated into existing planning processes, exist in parallelor even change those?5.9 Issues for further studyThe issues that are worth a further study are the way that the way current land use planning isaffected by the SEA demands at the municipal level. Will the SEA demands strengthen theimportance and the attention paid to municipal planning or do they add further requirementsthat the municipalities are not able to fulfil? Even, do the new requirements complicate theplanning system even further, resulting in a larger part of the planning process being laid outto planning consultants and separated from the work carried out by local authority?Furthermore, how will the introduction of the SEA directive affect the relation between thedifferent levels, i.e. do the changes that are potentially foreseen at the national level as a resultof the SEA introduction, affect the way that planning is conducted at the municipal level, e.g.in terms of more strategic guidance?78