‘This is a wonderful book that should be on the desk of every architect and planner. It shows how

Step 10: Apply External Assessment
Assessment [Chapter 7]
Although an eco-design report may be prepared, a public environmental impact assessment may still 
be required for significant projects. In theory, the above self-assessment should make this largely 
redundant. However, if a decision to approve the project is subject to a sustainability assessment, 
then ecological waste and opportunity costs should be considered. Unavoidable impacts could be 
compensated for by remediating other significant aspects of the built environment, but remediation 
should not justify increased negative impacts. Buying land and not developing it may offset harm, 
but it is not really net positive. Conversely, if the benefits of projects were weighed against the costs 

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Positive Development
of inaction, Positive Development projects would be favoured. Some considerations include:
•
The public value and purpose of the development itself, and how it affects existing
development, should be assessed – as development has high opportunity costs (ie removes
resources from other potentially better developments).
• 
Where appropriate, embodied and ecological waste should be assessed and quantified. 
Compensation for any unavoidable waste could be achieved by adding value to the ecology 
and generating positive off-site ecological and social impacts. 
• 
Mechanisms for community-based critiques of assessments (or counter-plans) should be
established where appropriate. Decision authorities should provide written explanations on
significant land-use and resource decisions in terms of their sustainability.
• 
Developers should demonstrate that there is no built-up area, building or urban dead space 
that can meet their requirements before green field sites are approved. Eco-retrofitting and
recycling opportunities should always be considered.
• 
If economic benefits are claimed to outweigh ecological factors, assessments should consider 
the quality, not just the quantity, of jobs that the development will generate. When projects
are approved based on job generation, the jobs do not always materialize.
• 
The waste entailed in existing construction and demolition does not appear in the public
balance sheets as they are paid for by developers. They should be considered even if they are
not analysed in great detail in the case of a small project. 
• 
Assessments do not usually assess the context before and after a development. They assess
the relativity of development options. We should assess the overall positive and negative 
impacts of existing and proposed development as if neither existed previously.
• 
While assessments often discuss the ‘no development’ option, they do not measure the bene- 
fits of eco-services provided, or their loss after development, or the irreversibility of possible
decisions and losses of future options.