1.4.2. Environmental assessments
In Russia, no significant progress in the procedure of environmental assessments has been reported in
recent years. The State Environmental Review (SER) continues to hold a central position in this process and
aims at verifying the project compliance with environmental laws and regulations. It results in a formal
decision by competent authorities stating whether the activity may start. Besides reviews performed by
competent authorities, independent environmental reviews can be carried out by non-governmental actors
at their expense. In some cases, environmental impact assessment (EIA) precedes the SER. The list of
facilities subject to mandatory EIA includes all large-scale energy, industry, and agricultural facilities.
Within the framework of EIA, potential negative impacts and concerns of the general public are studied
and measures to prevent and reduce adverse project impacts are developed. Although the need for a
differentiated approach is recognized, there are no screening criteria for the sites subject to environmental
assessment. Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) remains largely outside the scope of current
procedures.
The EIA/SER system is quite technocratic and implies little public involvement. Incentives to carry
out environmental assessments at the early stages of project preparation (see Box 2) hardly exist due to poor
development of procedures and oversight mechanisms, In addition, the public does not get any information
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