1. INTRODUCTION

Background

1.1 The project site is located at the mostly undeveloped hillside above the residential development at Po Shan Road and adjacent to the trimmed back slope on the site of the catastrophic 1972 Po Shan Road failure. Previous studies had been carried out and results indicated that the natural hillside above Po Shan Road is affected by high groundwater level and unfavourable geology. Sub-surface drainage measures by means of sub-horizontal drains had been installed in 1984-85. These measures have been successful in lowering the main ground water table, thus improving the stability of the slopes such that large-scale failure have not occurred in the last twenty years.

1.2 The objective of the Project “Landslide Preventive Works at Po Shan, Mid-levels – Design and Construction (Natural Terrain Risk Mitigation Works)” under Contract CE 28/2004 (GE) is to carry out detailed design and supervision of landslide preventive works on local repair of the hillside to minimize slope deterioration and shallow instability.

1.3 The proposed landslide preventive works would be constructed to protect the existing residential developments at the toe of the project site.

1.4 The scope of works of this Project includes the installation about 700 numbers of soil nails and about 60 numbers of raking drains on the natural terrain within the concerned area. The length of the soil nails is about 20m with a spacing of 2m horizontally and 3m vertically; the length of raking drains is about 10m with a spacing of 5m horizontally and 15m vertically.

1.5 The Project is anticipated to complete in 10 months after the commencement of construction.

1.6 According to the Environmental Permit (EP-235/2005/B) and the EM&A Manual of the Project, there is a need of an EM&A programme including air quality, noise, ecology, and landscape and visual monitoring.

1.7 ENSR Asia (HK) Ltd. (ENSR) was employed by the Contractor, China State – China Railway Joint Venture, as the Environmental Team (ET) to undertake the Environmental Monitoring and Audit (EM&A) works for the Project. In accordance with the EM&A Manual of the Project, environmental monitoring of air quality, noise, ecology, landscape and visual and environmental site inspections would be required for this Project.

Scope of Report

1.8 This is the first monthly Environmental Monitoring and Audit (EM&A) Report under the Contract CE 28/2004 (GE) – Landslide Preventive Works at Po Shan Road, Mid-Levels – Design and Construction (Natural Terrain Risk Mitigation Works). This report presented a summary of the environmental monitoring and audit works, list of activities, and mitigation measures proposed by the ET for the Project in April 2008.

Project Organization

1.9 The project organization is shown in Appendix A. The key personnel contact names and numbers are summarized in Table 1.1

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Table 1.1 Contact Information of Key Personnel

Party	Position	Name	Telephone	Fax
CEDD	Senior Engineer	Jerry Ho	2760 5700	2714 0247
ER (MGS)	Resident Engineer	Andrew J. Westmoreland	3188 0400	3188 0775
	Assistant Resident Engineer	S. F. Chau	3188 0400	3188 0775
IEC (ENVIRON)	Independent Environmental Checker	David Yeung	3743 0788	3548 6988
Contractor (CCJV)	Project Manager	Eddie Tang	3188 0538	3188 1710
	Safety and Environmental Officer	Ken Fong	3188 0538	3188 1710
ET (ENSR)	ET Leader	Alex Chan	3105 8525	2891 0305

Summary of Construction Works

1.10 The Contactor has carried out major activities in the reporting month. Details of the works undertaken in this reporting period are listed below:

- Test Nails (5 nos.) for Pull Out Test at Portion A1 (i.e. from Row A to Row P);

- Permanent Nails installation at Portion A1; and

- Site Clearance for soil nail setting out to Portion B2 (i.e. from Row X to Row AK).

1.11 The general layout plan of the Project site showing the contract area is shown in Figure 1.1. The construction programme is provided in Appendix B.

1.12 The mitigation measures implementation schedule are presented in Appendix C.

Summary of EM&A Programme Requirements

1.13 The EM&A programme required environmental monitoring for air quality, noise, ecology and landscape and visual and environmental site inspections for air quality, noise, ecology, landscape and visual and waste management. The EM&A requirements for each parameter described in the following sections include:

- All monitoring parameters;

- Monitoring schedules for the reporting month and forthcoming months;

- Action and Limit levels for all environmental parameters;

- Event / Action Plan;

- Environmental mitigation measures, as recommended in the Project EIA study final report; and

- Environmental requirement in contract documents.