Leopold mari xscope9/13/2023 ![]() In this case, an impact of significant magnitude may not actually be important to the environment in question.Īs outlined by the original authors, the matrix provides a structured framework for practitioners of environmental impact assessment to systematically rank potential significant environmental cause-and-effect relationships. The example given by author Luna Leopold is of a stream that significantly alters the erosion patterns in a specific area, which may be scored highly in terms of magnitude but may not be necessarily significant, provided the stream in question is swift-moving and transports large amounts of sediment regardless. While a proposed development may have a large impact in terms of magnitude, the effects it causes may not actually significantly affect the environment as a whole. Magnitude can be measured more tangibly in terms of how much area is affected by the development or how severely, however, the importance is a more subjective measurement. Measurements of magnitude and importance tend to be related, but do not necessarily directly correlate. The magnitude (from -10 to +10) is inserted on the top-left diagonal and the importance (from 1 to 10) is inserted on the bottom-right diagonal. Where an impact is expected, the appropriate cell of the matrix is split diagonally from the top right corner to the bottom left corner in order for the magnitude and importance of each interaction to be recorded. In practice, only a select few (25-50) of these interactions are likely to be of sufficient importance to be thoroughly considered. The system consists of a grid of 100 rows representing the possible project activities on the horizontal axis and 88 columns representing environmental factors on the vertical axis, for a total of 8800 possible interactions. ![]() An Example Showing the Location of Magnitude and Importance Values in a Leopold Matrix Cell ![]()
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