2.1 Origins and History of Environmental Assessment (EA) – Table 1

Table 1. Important recorded events in the human-environment relationship since 1960 (excerpt from Holden, 2005)

1960	Soviet engineers begin large-scale irrigation using rivers flowing to the Aral Sea, the world’s fourth largest lake.  Within 40 years the lake would almost disappear, possibly the greatest hydrological change yet engineered by humankind	1987	First appearance of the word biodiversity in the scientific literature (by E.O Wilson, USA)
1962	Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, USA, warns of dangers of pesticide to wildlife.  This best-seller inspired a whole generation of environmentalists.	1987	Ice core from Antarctica, taken by French and Russian scientists, reveals close correlation between CO2 and temperature over the last 100,000 years.
1968	Satellite remote sensing starts.  Pictures of Earth from deep space, Apollo 8 mission, USA; followed in 1972 by Earth Resources Satellite ERTS-1 carrying multi-spectral sensors, later called Landsat.	1987	Montreal Protocol signed, an agreement to phase out CFCs.
1969	In the USA, the Advanced Research Project Agency (ARPA) begins the ARPANET.  Soon, global communication by e-mail and Internet would become possible.	1987	United Nations World Commission on environment and Development produce Brundtland Report, dealing with definitions of sustainability.
1970	Establishment of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), USA	1988	Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) is established.
1971	Formation of Greenpeace.  A group of activists sail their small boat into a US bomb-test zone near Alaska to draw attention to the environmental dangers of nuclear war.  Now Greenpeace is a large non-governmental organisation at the forefront of the campaign for a safer world.	1990	IPPCs first Scientific Assessment Report, linking greenhouse gas emissions to warming.
1971	Swedish scientists demonstrate long-range transport of sulphur as the cause of acidification of Swedish lakes, and predict that acid rain will damage fresh-water ecosystems and forests.	1992	Implementation of the International Geosphere Biosphere Programmes (IGBP) to predict the effects of changes in climate, atmosphere composition and land use on terrestrial ecosystems; and to determine how these effects lead to feedbacks to the atmosphere.
1972	In the UK, publication in The Ecologist of A Blueprint for Survival, warning of the extreme gravity of the global situation and criticizing governments for failing to take corrective action.	1992	Earth Summit, Rio de Janeiro.  Leaders of the world’s nations meet in Rio and set out an ambitious agenda to address the environmental, economic and social challenges facing the international community.  Heads of state sign the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
1972	Publication of The Limits to Growth by the Club of Rome, dealing with computer simulation of global environmental change.	1997	Kyoto Protocol, international agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
1972	First international conference on the environment, Stockholm, leading to the establishment of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP).  Acid rain is widely publicised, especially in relation to forest decline, but since then the developed world has been moving to low-sulphur fuels.	1997 – 1998	Particularly severe El Niño causes drought and widespread forest fires in Indonesia, Malaysia, Brazil and Mexico.  In SE Asia the fires affect 10,000 km2 of forest.
1972	The anchovy fishery of Peru collapses because of over-fishing and bad weather.  Other fish stocks decline sharply, and management of marine resources becomes an important issue.	1998	The warmest year of the century, and probably of the millennium.
1973	Organisationof Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) restricts the supply of oil, forcing the price to rise five-fold and threatening the global economy.	2000	International Corel Reef Initiative reports that 27% of the world’s coral reefs are lost, mainly a consequence of climate warming.
1979	James Lovelock proposes the Gaia hypothesis.	2000	Failure of nations to agree on the implementation of the Kyoto protocol.
1985	Farman, Gardiner and Shanklin, a British team working in the Antarctic, report thinning of stratospheric ozone, attributable to CFCs.	2002	World Summit on Sustainable Development, Johannesburg.
1986	Nuclear accident at Chernobyl, USSR, creates radioactive fallout everywhere in the northern hemisphere, reminding people that environmental problems cross political boundaries.  The expansion of nuclear power in the West falters.