Environmental Impact

Environmental impact assessment is a tool used in environmental policy that allows the proposal of development options compatible with environmental preservation and conservation of natural resources.

Over the past few decades, environmental impact assessments have become one of the principal tools to restore, prevent and mitigate damages to the environment and to renewable resources, while evolving with the purpose to guarantee a preventative focus that offers public certainty with regard to the environmental viability of diverse development projects.

The evaluation of environmental impact has its judicial bases in decrees that establish the General Law of Ecological Equilibrium and Environmental Protection (Ley General del Equilibrio Ecológico y la Protección al Ambiente, LGEEPA). In Article 3, LGEEPA defines environmental impact as “environmental modification resulting from the actions of man or nature”. As such, Article 3 indicates that the environmental impact assessment is “the document by which it is made known, based on study, the environmental impact, significant and potential, that a work or activity would generate, as well as the way in which to avoid or attenuate such an impact in the case that the impact is negative.”

Environmental impact assessments are geared towards effecting detailed analyses of diverse development projects and of the site where they will be realized, with the purpose of identifying and quantifying the possible environmental impacts that could result from the development. In this manner, it is possible to establish the environmental feasibility of a project (environmental cost-benefit analysis) and in such cases, to determine the conditions for its execution as well as the measures to prevent, mitigate or reduce to a minimum potential negative environmental impacts.

Lorax has realized environmental assessments studies for more than 30 projects in distinct areas, among them: industrial projects, tourism developments, changes in land use, aquaculture projects, coastal developments, the creation of artificial reefs, residential developments, general communication routes, energy distribution and storage projects, as well as rocky material extraction.

The services that Lorax offers in this area include: environmental project evaluations and the integration of environmental impact assessments, environmental cost-benefit studies, expertise in environmental impact studies and training courses.

The main services provided by the company in the field of environmental risk are:

  • Environmental impact studies
  • Environmental baseline studies
  • Dispersion dispersion simulations
  • Development of environmental management and monitoring programs

Risk Assessments

Some industrial activities pose potential threats to the environment and to the population at large due to the fact that their processes may involve the storage, transport or transformation of significant volumes of dangerous substances.

In accordance with Article 147 of General Law of Ecological Equilibrium and Environmental Protection (Ley General del Equilibrio Ecológico y la Protección al Ambiente, LGEEPA), those who realize dangerous activities must generate and present to the Secretary an environmental impact assessment.

The complexity of an environmental impact assessment depends on the proposed activity itself. There are diverse methods for the identification and prioritization of risks; the selection of these depends on the type of environmental impact study corresponding to the particular activity. The most common methods are:

  • Check List
  • What if?
  • Failure, Mode, Effects Analysis
  • Hazard and Operability Analysis
  • Fault Tree Analysis
  • DOW Index

A portion of the information contained in an environmental impact assessment is the evaluation of risks and consequences, in which the potential areas affected are determined by mathematical simulation models for the identified and prioritized risks. Lorax realizes simulated risk analyses utilizing the programs: PHAST, ARCHIE and ALOHA. 

Through the realization of risk analyses, information is obtained with regard to the probability of accidents occurring, whether as a the result of explosions, fires, leaks or hazardous material spills, in addition to determining possible affects radii outside of the corresponding infrastructure, the severity of those possible effects with respect to the affected radii and the security measures to be implemented to prevent such accidents. 

In this field, Lorax offers the following services:

  • Risk assessments
  • Workplace risk assessments
  • Mathematical simulations of affected radii
  • Determination of security measures
  • Preparation of accident prevention programs.
Services