Environmental Planning & Assessment Caucus

Vision

The Environmental Planning & Assessment Caucus’ (EPA Caucus) members share a common vision of truly effective environmental assessment (EA) in Canada, including the integration of EA into development planning.

What We Do

Through face-to-face meetings and regular communication, the Caucus allows its member groups to bring forward a strong public interest analysis of the many facets of environmental planning and assessment in this country. Among other things, this allows Caucus members to inform the environmental community about developments and issues connected with the Impact Assessment Act and its regulations and allows member groups to fit local initiatives into larger policy contexts.

The strong communication between diverse member groups located in all regions of Canada and the energy, knowledge and "on the ground" experience of its members make the Caucus the most substantive and dynamic network of environmental assessment expertise in Canada today.

Winter 2024 In-Person Meeting

In February, the Environmental Planning and Assessment Caucus convened for an in-person meeting in Ottawa, Ontario. During this gathering, caucus members engaged in timely discussions, taking advantage of the occasion to discuss proposed amendments to the Impact Assessment Act. We had the pleasure of welcoming representatives from the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada to exchange lessons and discuss priorities in environmental assessment.

The meeting fostered a collaborative environment, reinforcing the caucus's commitment to promoting effective EA in Canada. Our next virtual meeting will be held on March 25 from 3-4 PM EDT. For more information on the EPA Caucus, please email outreach@rcen.ca.

Latest Caucus Submission - Feb. 28th 2023

In December, the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada released a draft policy setting out the framework for regional assessments (RA). RCEN’s EPA Caucus responded to the call for comments, providing overarching recommendations to address key areas of concern, including on cumulative effects, sustainability and public participation.

As the Caucus set out to the Agency, done well, RAs can lead to better understandings of project impacts, lead to more publicly accepted visions of regional futures, and ensure more efficient project-level assessments processes. However, done poorly, RAs jeopardize the ability of project-specific impact assessments to work effectively to address project impacts in a sustainable and contextualized way. The Caucus' submission also endorsed an earlier letter by a number of IA experts, which called for the full revision of the draft policy in light of its lack of meaningfully attention to cumulative effects and sustainability. 

Submission to the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada Regarding the Draft Policy Framework for Regional Assessment under the Impact Assessment Act