More and cleaner energy is needed to support economic growth and poverty alleviation in our client countries. As production and distribution technology evolves, the menu of options for satisfying these huge needs is opening up and the choice is now much broader than in the 70's or 80's when there were few options outside the mammoth energy infrastructure using three or four possible sources of energy, most of them fossil.
The application of Environmental Assessment to energy and power projects helps integrate this menu of options through an analysis of alternatives and identify, mitigate and monitor the residual negative environmental and social impacts of the selected alternative. Project location may be a concern for many of the remaining large energy infrastructure projects, especially for their potential impacts on neighboring communities and natural habitats. In-country Environmental Assessment capacity has often been built in large utilities or in Ministries of Energy/Power, which is viewed as good practice. Making this capacity sustainable and linking it to the general environmental management institutional framework in our client countries helps facilitate and speed up future Environmental Assessment processes in the World Bank's pipeline and current projects.
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