Anthropogenic changes in topographic relief: applications in environmental impact assessment

Abstract

Indicators of topographic relief change arc proposed for environmental monitoring, and environmental impact assessment (EIA). Changes in relief pattern reflect human impact on the land surface due to small- and large-scale development projects. Landform diversity, relief resilience and impact-response approaches allowing measurement of changes in relief pattern are described. These approaches are based on a number of integrated environmental indices that may be used together or separately to assess anthropogenic alteration of landscape elements. Several examples their practical use are given in the paper. Other possible applications of geoindicator measures for different EIA techniques are briefly described.