Obinna Emmanuel Ukanwa (AUTHOR)
Department of Architecture, Imo State University, Owerri, Nigeria
Corresponding Author’s Email: emmanuelukanwa6@gmail.com
ABSTRACT: Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is widely recognised as a key instrument for integrating environmental considerations into development planning. However, its effectiveness within the built environment is often constrained when implementation emphasises procedural compliance over multidisciplinary knowledge integration. Consequently, environmentally significant development-performance variables may receive insufficient attention despite their implications for sustainability outcomes. This paper develops a multidisciplinary framework for strengthening Environmental Impact Assessment within warm-humid climatic contexts. The study adopts a conceptual-review approach supported by an illustrative thermal-performance case study from Owerri, Nigeria. Literature was synthesised from Environmental Impact Assessment, environmental management, building physics, sustainable development, urban climatology and climate-responsive design. The Owerri case utilised 1,602 paired attic–indoor temperature observations to demonstrate how environmental conditions influence building performance and how performance outcomes may generate broader environmental consequences. The paper advances a bidirectional interpretation of EIA that recognises reciprocal interactions between environmental conditions, development performance and sustainability outcomes. Building thermal performance is employed as an illustrative environmental variable demonstrating the need for multidisciplinary expertise in environmental assessment. The findings show that environmentally significant relationships frequently emerge at the intersection of architecture, engineering, building physics, planning and environmental science, yet may remain underrepresented within fragmented assessment processes. The study contributes to EIA theory by reconceptualising environmental assessment as a multidisciplinary knowledge-integration platform and proposes a framework for strengthening collaboration, sustainability-oriented decision-making and climate-responsive development within the built environment.
Keywords: EIA; Multidisciplinary assessment; Thermal performance; Sustainability; Climate-responsiveness; Systems theory