Biodiversity Inclusive Environmental and Social Impact Assessments for the Hydropower Sector – Armenia

Register for the EBRD’s workshops delivered by Golder in partnership with Fishtek, and TBC to learn about undertaking Environmental and Social Impact Assessments for the hydropower sector.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD) Sustainable Energy Initiative, Energy Sector Strategy, and more recently the Green Economy Transition (GET) approach all promote the scaling up of sustainable energy investments by the Bank in its operating countries. For example, the GET approach seeks to increase the volume of the EBRD’s “green financing” by up to 40 per cent by 2020.

Whilst green, these projects can still come at an environmental cost – especially to sensitive biodiversity. Biodiversity conservation and sustainable management of living natural resources, as outlined in the EBRD’s Performance Requirement 6, is paramount to the EBRD and must therefore be weighed against the economic and social benefits of these projects to ensure compliance with the EBRD’s Environmental and Social Policy (2014).

Golder Associates UK Ltd. (Golder) is supporting the EBRD by developing and delivering sector capacity building training specifically targeted at developing biodiversity inclusive Environmental and Social Impact Assessments (ESIA) for the hydropower sector. Specifically, this Project includes the development and implementation of capacity building workshops in Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan

To be involved in this capacity building training register for Golder’s free workshop to learn about biodiversity specific legislation, hydropower best practices, and other biodiversity issues specific to the hydropower sector.

The objectives of these workshops are to enable participants to both acquire technical understanding of the issues, and to adopt specific behavioural skills for decision making, collaborating with different stakeholders, and working as part of integrated teams.

In developing these training events Golder has received technical support from Fishtek Consulting and the Biodiversity Consultancy. Fishtek Consulting is a specialist fisheries consultancy offering a range of technical services, including fisheries impact assessments, hydro-power studies, fish pass design/fabrication and fisheries mitigation technology. The Biodiversity Consultancy has delivered real-world solutions to emerging biodiversity issues for over a decade. Their involvement with projects is often long-term, giving them key experience of implementing international standards (such as EBRD Performance Requirement 6) through the project development cycle.

Agenda topics:

International Finance Institution (IFI) Biodiversity specific legislation and/or conventions;
Hydropower Good Industry Practices and Initiatives, with an emphasis on biodiversity inclusive ESIAs;
The Mitigation Hierarchy, Strategic Catchment Planning, Biodiversity Offsets, Ecological Flows and fish migration; and
Management of biodiversity Issues specific to the Hydropower sector.

In order to create a bespoke learning experience for delegates we will be hosting two training sessions in each country. Delegates will be divided into two groups as follows:

Public Sector (regulators): 15th October 2018 at 10:00 hrs – 17:00 hrs.

Hydropower sector regulators training 1 full day session in each country: Relevant government authorities / ministries (including protected area managers) responsible for EIA Screening, approval, permitting and monitoring of HPPs welcomed.

Private Sector (players): 16th October 2018 at 10:00 hrs – 17:00 hrs.

Hydropower sector players training 1 full day in each Country: Local consultants, biodiversity scientists and experts, Civil Society Organizations focused on biodiversity conservation welcomed.

Lunch, tea and coffee will be provided for all sessions. There is no cost to delegates for receiving this training.

Training will be translated in English, Armenian and Russian as required.

Delegates will be selected on a first come first served basis.

The deadline for registering your interest in this event is October 1^st, 2018. Please email hydro-training@Golder.com