SustainabilityA-Test Inception report: progress to date and future tasks

Within the framework of the project, SustainabilityA-Test, an appraisal will be made of the methods and techniques (hereafter referred to collectively as tools) that may (can) be used in sustainability-related impact assessments in support of policy at various stages of development. The intrinsic qualities of the tools that are used in addressing aspects of sustainable development will be analysed, together with other relevant tool characteristics such as financial aspects and data and time requirements. The ultimate aim of the project SustainabilityA-Test is to improve the scientific basis of the application of tools in (sustainability) impact assessments. This report provides an overview of the activities carried out during the first phase of the project, the most important of which were:

• The development of an overview and a preliminary evaluation of the tools that are to be evaluated at later stages during the course of the project;
• The development of an evaluation framework for the evaluation of tools
• this evaluation framework also describes the aspects of sustainable development in more concrete terms
• The design of a concrete working plan for the second phase of the project: the case study.

In this phase of the project, the tools will be analysed on the basis of an actual case study which is set up around a European directive on biofuels and a regulation on energy crop premiums.