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Any plan or project that is likely to affect significantly the environment must be subject to an environment assessment before its approval or authorization. The need for environmental assessment of geophysical operations in offshore and onshore oil and gas extraction projects appears directly in Directive 2013/30/EU.
A simplified qualification methodology based on the environmental impact assessment of a planned operation was developed in order to provide scientifically based, comprehensible information on the environmental impact of the action.
The methodology assigns grades to the impacts of various project phases on the elements of the environmental systems based on the statements of the operation’s EIA. The grades are presented in an evaluation matrix (modified Leopold matrix) and the impact factors of the environment and the project phases can be derived from them. The mean value of the calculated factors gives the Project Impact Index which is a single value representing the overall environmental impact of the planned operation. A theoretical example was introduced to demonstrate the work of the developed method.