Methods of habitat reports’ evaluation

Abstract A building investment, especially in nature valuable areas, is almost always inseparable with a bigger or smaller environmental interference. For a few years there are legal regulations created to protect these areas. One of them is the requirement to conduct a habitat evaluation and to prepare a habitat report if there is a indication of significant impact on the Natura 200 site. The quality of such a report is crucial for completion an investment in a chosen localisation as well as for shortening a preparation stage with respect to environmental requirements. A defective report can result in a agreement refusal of investment completion conditions of an investment by an authorised body, and can be a reason for protests of a community which is affected by the planned investment. A well-made report, on the other hand, results in a smooth acceptance of the project without the need for consultation of the investor with the proceeding body and saving the cost of correction of a defective documentation. An review of the literature done by the authors and the talks carried out with the staff making an assessment of reports of an impact on Natura 2000 sites showed the lack of common use in practise of a formalised set of criteria of evaluation of such documents. The aim of the study was to prepare a set of evaluation criteria for reports on environmental impact on Natura 2000 sites. The set was tested on already made reports and it showed their basic omissions and disparities. The set prepared can be used by an investor in the course of making a report. It can be also a useful tool for a verifying clerk while evaluating a report for its completeness and adequacy. On the basis of the prepared set of evaluation criteria, a procedure was proposed allowing an impartial verification of reports. As a result of analyses made, a procedure was worked out which is presented in the diagram concluding this paper.


Introduction
Reports of an impact on Natura 2000 sites¹ have existed in the Polish legal system since 2005, when amendments of the Parliamentary Act of May 18 -Law of nature protection came into force (This Act introduced a new category of undertakings which require conducting an assessment of an impact on environment -the undertakings which can considerably a ect Natura 2000 sites). These are documents required while assessing an impact on Natura 2000 sites of all new building investments which may a ect considerably the species of ora or fauna under protection. The impact of a proposed project on a Natura 2000 site should be considered in the case when: • an investment was classi ed to the undertakings which can considerably a ect natural environment² (which completion requires a prior decision for an investor on environmentally-related condition³); • an investment of lower technical parameters legally excluded from the undertakings which may considerably a ect the environment and which must be preceded with an analysis of their possible impact on Elżbieta Hanna Szafranko: Faculty of Geodesy, Geospatial and Civil Engineering, Heweliusza 4 Str., 10 -724 Olsztyn, Poland; Email: elasz@uwm.edu.pl Jan Tyburski: Foreign Language Department, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Poland, Obrońców Tobruku 3 Str.,  Olsztyn, Poland 1 In Natura 2000 sites in Poland not the entire area is protected but given habitats and rare species. There is no ban list. But an investor cannot conduct investments which may negatively a ect protected plants and animals. When compared to national parks or reservations they have an advantage of the possibility of investment but meeting the requirements of nature protection.
2 The classi cation of undertakings with respect to their negative impact to the environment was made in the Decree of the Council of Ministers of 9 Nov. 2015. The decree (similarly to the previous ones of 2010 and of 2004) distinguishes two basic categories of undertakings which may considerably a ect the environment -the undertakings for which a preparation of report on the impact on the environment is or can be required. 3 In the environmentally-related conditions the requirements of natural protections are determined, among those are these concerning Natura 2000 sites, which must be observed in the course of completion and use of a building investment.
Natura 2000 sites. The analysis is made on the stage of issuing a decision on the condition of construction and a building permit.
A report of an impact on Natura 2000 sites is a specialist study prepared by experts from di erent elds, constituting a basis to determine a degree of all impacts, which can result from completion of a construction project on a given Natura 2000 site and its integrity with other sites included in the European ecological network. A report should present all the analyses made on an impact of an object on the environment and their results indicating the possibility of occurring considerable impacts. It ful ls the function of a kind of a summary of all the activities done to determine the probability of occurrence of given impacts. Thus it allows to make an appropriate administrative decision on acceptance or refusal of a planned investment. And the superior goal of an investor is to disclose of all the impacts and to propose methods and technologies which minimise the harmfulness of an investment. A veri cation of a report on an impact of a construction project to the environment should be conducted in the most objective way possible and ought to be comparable for di erent regions of the country. In practise of assessing an impact on Natura 2000 sites though, there is a lack of a coherent set of criteria for an assessment of documentation being a basis for evaluation. Presently an individual assessment and the competence of administrative sta is the basis of an evaluation. The aim of the research was to work out criteria of habitat reports' evaluation in the case of SFRs. The research done in the eld of veri cation of environmental documentation prepared for the needs of the assessment of an impact on the environment is limited. In references (Engel, 2009, Assessment of plans and projects . . . ), main stages of the assessment of an impact on Natura 2000 sites were analysed as well as the main documents accompanying these stages were indicated, and among these a report of an impact on Natura 2000 site. In reference (Lai, Zoppi, 2017), an identi cation of valuable nature habitats in Sardinia was done and in reference (Haest et al., 2017), the potential of image spectroscopy was shown in the identi cation of habitants included in the European ecological of Natura 2000. In reference (Rak, 2014), the methods of the predicting the likely impacts of projects used in Poland were presented, whereas in reference (Mora-Barrantes et al., 2016), the possibility of using a method for the assessment of an impact on the environment of university building projects in Costarica was analysed. In references (Wärnbäck, Hilding-Rydevik, 2009; Gerlée, Kaim, 2011) the most popular methods of cu-mulative e ects were discussed, as a compulsory part of the assessment of an impact on Natura 2000 sites in icted by single building investments. In references (Kowacki, Czopek, 2014;Harasymiuk, 2018) the question of the most common shortcomings in habitat reports was addressed, but the research concerned di erent kind of construction projects (roads, SFRs).
The problem of quality of reports of an impact of construction projects on Natura 2000 sites is crucial from the viewpoint of a possibility of shortening the stage of investment preparation with respect to environmental requirements. A defective report can be a reason for refusal of the completion condition of an investment by an authorised body or be a reason for protests of a community, which can be a ected by the results of an investment completion. A wellmade report, on the other hand, results in a smooth acceptance of the project without the need for consultation of the investor with the proceeding body and saving the cost of correction of a defective documentation. In this paper an analysis of such reports was made with respect to their content as required by the Parliamentary Act of of November 8, 2008, its amendment and the practise of their preparation. Later, these reports were evaluated with appropriate methods, after reviewing the methods used to support the decision-making processes (

Materials and methods
The study was initiated with a review of the literature, among these of the legal regulations pertaining to an assessment of an impact on Natura 2000 sites, as well as eight reports prepared by investors and handed in the years of 2014 -2017 in one of Regional Headquarters of Environment Protection. The study was enhanced with interviews with three fully quali ed experts who deal practically with conducting assessments of an impact of Natura 2000 sites. This survey helped to identify the key elements of habitat reports and their importance. To the evaluation of analysed reports on an impact on Natura 2000 sites, the criteria were worked out by the authors. Then, the reports were assessed using the method of point scalarisation and the weight-point evaluation.

Results and discussion
In the world there were or are the following ways of verication of the documentation prepared for the assessment of an impact on the environment: 1. Indication of a report maker (the method was used in Poland in the early stage of the procedure of assessing an impact on the environment -the body indicated to the mover who in a given case was to make a report); 2. Obligation of applying to an accredited executor of an environmental documentation (the method used in the developing and post-communist countries -up to 2005 also in Poland, where there was a list of experts solely authorised to prepare such documentation); 3. Asking for assistance by the body which makes a decision on the correctness of the documentation to an independent consulting body (e.g.. to the Committee for Assessment of Impacts on the Environment in Poland and the Netherlands).
In evaluation of reports on the impact of construction projects on Natura 2000 sites in Poland a method of individual assessment is used. Such reports are subject to verication by Regional Headquarters of Environment Protec-tion⁴ -the bodies specialised in controlling of investmentbuilding processes with regard to environment protection. The veri cation of reports is done with the aim to determine if the information presented in them are: • according to the decision of the scope of the report issued by the proper administratively Regional Director of Environment Protection, • according to the Parliamentary Act of November 8, 2008 on providing information about the environment and its protection, public participation in environmental protection and environmental impact assessments, • su cient to make a decision of acceptance of ful lling a building investment.
This situation calls for preparing criteria of reports' evaluation ensuring the possibility of foreseeing and of compatibility of the veri cation process. In the proposed set of criteria, prepared by the authors, there are these formal and the substantial ones.

. Defying the criteria of evaluation
The formal criteria concern two groups of issues: completeness and professionalism of execution. Criterion A.1. "Completeness of the report" is to determine whether a report contains the required number of copies (both in electronic and printed versions). Criterion A.2. "Professionalism of the report" is to determine whether the authors of a report are authorised for making it. • were identi ed with regard to the character and estimated with respect to the scale all the signi cant impacts during construction work, exploitation and demolition of a building (not only direct, indirect and ac-cumulated, but also secondary, short-, medium-, and long-term ones, permanent and temporary ones), • information was included emphasising the fact which of the impacts will not be a problem while completion of the project, and which can have an in uence on the integrity and coherence of a Natura 2000 site, • to the estimation of the scale of the main impact sucient data was used and whether its source was clearly determined.
Criterion B.5. "Characteristics of activities curbing the identi ed impacts on the goals and subjects of protection of a Natura 2000 site" should indicate whether the proposed restricting measures are appropriate for the identied impacts. Criterion B.6. "Characteristics of the prognosis methods of the impact of a project and the methods of conducting eld studies" should allow to determine whether in the report: • the methods applied for forecast of the character and scale of the impact of an object were identi ed and described, • the methods applied in eld studies were identi ed and described.
Criterion B.7. "Presentation of information" is aimed to determine whether the report: • has a clear structure and a logical order, • is concise, comprehensive and objective, • has a table of content at the beginning of the document, • avoids presenting useless information (not needed for taking a decision on the matter of the procedure), • e ectively uses diagrams, pictures and photographs to support the information presented in the text, • deals with each subject using reliable sources of information, • contains a clear explanation of complex issues, • contain a non-technical summary devoid of a technical jargon.
Each habitat report should be assessed individually and independently by two experts. In the case of clear di erences in scoring, the report should be analysed during a panel meeting of appropriate experts with participation of the proper department director for assessment of an impact on the environment. The experts should present their evaluation in writing and based it on the scoring system giving points for ful lment of each criterion together with a justi cation of their verdict.

. Evaluation of chosen reports with the point scalarisation method
For the need of making an exemplary analysis eight habitat reports were chosen. Criteria of the group A (formal requirements) and of the group B (substantial evaluation) were applied. The criteria A1 and A2, according to the proceeding description, have the characteristics of a barrier which means that defective reports must be directed to correction before they will undergo a substantial evaluation. Accordingly the zero -one method of evaluation was applied, in which 1 means acceptance and 0 -failure in meeting formal requirements. Because of their speci c character, reports should be analysed individually in the rst stage of evaluation. The evaluation of meeting these criteria is conducted according to the formula (Szafranko, 2017) (1): Where: On -the nal evaluation of meeting formal requirements, refers to a n-report, the maximal value is 1, O A -the evaluation of meeting A1 criteria, (equals 1 or 0), O A -the evaluation of meeting A2criteria, (equals 1 or 0). It means that only when both A1 and A2 criteria are met, a report can be forwarded for further analysis. The criteria of the B group have the characteristics of factors, which means that the level of their ful lment can be graded. The scale of the evaluation of criteria ful lment is presented in Table 1.
As the rst one an evaluation applying the scalarisation method was conducted. The formula of the evaluation of a report is as follows (2): Where: c ij -the value of C j criterion expressed in points for the V i variant; F i -global evaluation of the W i variant The data presented in Table 2 shows that one of the evaluated reports did not meet formal requirements (a statement on the author's quali cation was missing). Also partial evaluations in the substantial part showed a lack of the required elements ( rst of all variant options and the information of the used methods). Another defect of the reports was inadequate information, they referred to the data which is irrelevant for an assessment of an impact of SFRs (but they contain references to the main characteristic features of production processes). They also showed an inner incoherence and contradictions, undermining reliability of their ascertainment. As a result of the formal evaluation, one report had to be directed to correction while the other ones were subject to further evaluation. In the second stage of the evaluation points were given for meeting de ned partial criteria. The results of the analysis showed that the best prepared was report number 8. Its high score was due to the greater number of maximal points gained in partial evaluations. The lowest score got report number 3 as it was given the lowest values (Table 3).

. Evaluation of chosen reports with the weight-point method
The results of the scores are subject to changes when weight will be ascribed emphasising importance of individual criteria (Szafranko, 2017). In the next analysis the weight-point method was used. The formula of the calculation of this method is as follows (3): Notation: c ij -the value of C j criterion expressed in points for the V i variant; w j -weights The weights were determined according to a three-degree scale in which 1 stands for the lowest value, 2 the average one and 3 the highest. The estimation of the signi cance of the criteria was made on the basis of the experts' opinion and then a normalisation of the weights was carried out in such a way so that to make their total value equal to 1. Table 4 shows the procedure of determining the value of a priority vector and Table 5 the evaluation procedure of the reviewed reports. The analysis of the reports conducted with the point scalarisation method and the weight-point method shows the way of veri cation for the best-and the worst-prepared reports. Taking into account the experts' viewpoint allowed to determine fundamental factors for the quality of the prepared documentation. These factors used as criteria in calculations give the opportunity for a reliable assessment. The result obtained both with the point method (Table 2) and the weight-point method ( Table 5) con rms that report number 8 was best-prepared. It was also indicated by the statistics of the scores (Table 3). On the basis of the scores the minimal threshold values for reports' evaluation can be determined. Points Criteria Complete characteristics Partial characteristics, but allowing a further decision procedure Partial characteristics, but allowing a further decision procedure after making small complements Partial characteristics, allowing a further decision procedure after making signi cant complements Partial characteristics, not allowing a further decision procedure Lack of characteristics

B.
Presentation of information X C. . Total score X The nal score of the evaluated reports X

Conclusion
Considering the fact that a habitat report is the basis for issuing a accepting decision of completion of a proposed project in the area or close to the area of the most precious natural values, it should be reliable and professional. The individual method used commonly in veri cation of such reports does not ensure the comparability and recurrence of the evaluation process. The conducted evaluation of habitat reports con rmed the need for formalisation of the evaluation criteria of such a reports. The criteria proposed by the authors may constitute an auxiliary tool in the riddance process of defective environmental documentation, both by o cials and investors. The presented method enables to make a diagram showing the procedure proposed by the authors which can be useful in reviewing environmental documentation, especially in Natura 2000 sites. The diagram is presented in Figure 1.
Initial analysis of evaluated habitat reports, searching significant features Bringing up to date of criteria list, defining evaluation criteria Final report evaluation -establishing minimal threshold for

Report evaluation
First evaluation stage -analysis of the "Barrier" type criteriariddance of reports failing formal criteria Second evaluation stage -analysis of the "factor" type criteria -giving point for fulfilment Figure 1: Diagram of activities using the de ned criteria and the proposed methods.