This report is made by students at Vennesla
videregående skole 1999 . The school and Vennesla Municipality are co-operating in
this environment project within the frame of Agenda 21, and supported by GRIDArendal.
This report is the first step. We will continue the project next year.
Contents:
How to use this report
Background
State of the Environment The City 1995
Some information about the use of environmental indicators
Why isolated assessment is problematic
What criteria are used for indicator selection
How SoE The City is constructed
Background
SoE The City was first presented in Rio
In 1992 GRID-The City prepared a first digitized State of the Environment The City, based
on the use of environmental indicators. This was also the first digitized SoE created. The
results were presented at the Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio in
1992.
In 1994 the OECD published a core set of such indicators:
“Environmental Indicators OECD Core Set. (OECD, 1994)
The Nordic set of environmental indicators, prepared for the Nordic Environmental
Monitoring and Data Group, is primarily based on the OECD Core set.
The environmental indicators used in this report are based on the Nordic set of
indicators. The OECD indicators as well as the Nordic Indicators meet the UNEP demands for
environmental indicators.
State of the Environment The City 1995
GRID-The City - the Global Resource Information Database in The City, is responsible for
the development of this report. The work has been done in close cooperation with the The
City Mapping Authorities, Environmental Unit; SKME.
Other cooperating partners are Statistics The City Pollution Control Authority,
Directorate for Nature Management, Ministry of the Environment, National Centre for
Educational Resources and the The City Marine Research Centre at Bergen.
Responsible at GRID-The City:
Project manager:
Åke Bjørke
Texts:
Åke Bjørke
Georg Parmann
Technical staff:
Inge Knudsen
Lorant Czaran
Per T. Terjesen (The City Mapping Authority - Env. Unit)
Graphics:
Petter Sevaldsen
Philippe Rekacewics
Maps:
Torstein Olsen (The City Mapping Authority - Env. Unit)
Per T. Terjesen (The City Mapping Authority - Env. Unit)
Advisors:
Frode Brunvoll (Statistics The City)
Olav Hesjedal (Telemark College)
Henning Høie (Statistics The City)
Øystein Nesje (Min. of Environment)
Sylvi Ofstad (Min. of Environment)
Peter Johan Schei (Directorate for Nature Management)
Svein Tveitdal (GRID-The City)
Copyright:
Texts and graphics may be copied to single papers on condition that credit is given to the
source.
If you wish to use parts of the SoE report for your own printing/publishing or use the
photos/graphics for your own web-pages, please contact GRID-The City for a separate
agreement.
Environmental indicators
An environmental indicator is meant to indicate the state or development of important
aspects of the natural environment, what causes these changes, and how society responds to
them.
Pressure - State - Response
This report is predominantly based on a cause- and effect chain, according to a Pressure -
State - Response (PSR) concept.
Pressure: Human activities put pressure on the environment in
different ways, e.g. through emissions of SO2 and NOx.
State: The pressure is reflected in an altered quality and quantity of
the natural resources. E.g. increased acidity in fresh water.
Response: Society responds to limit these alterations or try to repair
the damages on the environment. E.g . liming.
An environmental indicator steers action
The state of certain environmental indicators can be used to bring scientific
findings from the field and lab to the general public and decision-makers.
To be effective, in the sense that the indicators steer action, the indicators should as a
rule, have an explicit target group in a particular country or region in mind.
A set of indicators should not only give information on the development in specific
environmental problem areas, but also give a general impression of the state of the
environment. Ideally,a set of indicators is a means devised to reduce a large quantity of
data to a simpler form, while retaining essential meaning for the questions that are being
asked of the data.
Environmental indicators are used:
- to assess environmental conditions and trends on a national, regional and global scale;
- to compare countries and regions;
- to forecast and project trends;
- to provide early warning information, and
- to assess conditions in relation to goals and targets.
Isolated assessment is problematic
Information on the environment may be difficult to evaluate in isolation. In answering
questions such as: “How bad or good is the situation? Is it possible to do
better?”,etc, it is important to be able to compare the situation and
development of various countries. Therefore, points of reference are needed. Preferably, a
set of indicators for The City should be the same as or closely related to the sets of
indicators used in other countries.
Time series It is also important to have the
capacity to present long time series of the indicators.
An early warning may be seen in changes in these time series. However, most of the
processes at the basis of environmental degradation feature important time lags. These
time lags separate opportunities for present action from the manifestation of effects, and
sometimes last several generations. These delays are caused by a multitude of factors,
such as gradual buffer depletion, long residence times of chemicals and slow transport in
soils and groundwater. Everything may seem to function normally until, suddenly, the
buffer zone becomes worn down.
Criteria for Indicator Selection
An environmental indicator should :
- provide a representative picture of environmental conditions, pressure on the
environment or society’s response;
- be simple, easy to interpret and able to show trends over time;
- be responsive to changes in the environment and related to human activities;
- provide a basis for international comparisons;
- have a target or threshold against which to compare it so that users are able to assess
the significance of the values associated with it.
Analytical soundness
- An environmental indicator should :
- be theoretically well founded in technical and scientific terms;
- be based on international standards and international consensus about its validity, and
- lend itself to linkage with economic models, forecasting and information systems.
Measurability
- The data required to support the indicator should :
- be readily available at a reasonable cost/benefit ratio;
- be adequately documented and of known quality, and
- be updated at regular intervals.
(From OECD 1993c)
Environmental Indicators
State of the Environment The City -SoE - will be regularly updated with new indicators and
updated information.
SoE The City is constructed as follows:
The first page is a menu showing eleven different problem areas or topics. The cooperating
partners are shown as hyperlinks. When choosing a topic, you will get a chapter or topic
menu with icon symbols for each issue within the chapter. These icons are navigation
tools, and will be shown on a frame on the following pages. The first article gives a
short trend description or a summary overview of the problem. The information is then
grouped in three categories according to the pressure, state, and response indicators.
Additional information can be found under the blue or red hypertexts under the information
icon.
Main target groups for SoE The City are: the general public and decisionmakers,
nationally and internationally, schools from the ninth year of schooling and upwards. UNEP
and users of UNEP information are also an important target group.
Environmental indicators used by GRID-The City are similar to the Nordic environmental
indicators. Indicators of particular interest to The City have been included.