What happens when the sources give different results?

They do not conflict; they add up. Each source gives its own outcome for the plot, and the plot takes the most serious one. The project takes the most serious plot. A clean result from one source never softens a finding from another, and the page names which sources decided the outcome.

What does 'Verification needed' mean?

A record was found, but the protection terms cannot be settled from the record alone — for example a protected area without a recorded class, an international designation, or a community-land claim. It counts as a finding: it is included in the count and the filter, and it names what to confirm with the authority.

Site sensitivity screening that ends in a clear outcome, not just a flag

Site sensitivity screening tells you how much attention a site deserves before anyone travels to it. The usual output is a sensitivity level or a set of flags. ERWAY Legality Assessment instead ends in one of five outcomes per site — Prohibited, Restricted, Verification needed, Informational or No findings — with the strictest of six tiers behind it and the source that produced it named.

The five outcomes are ordered, worst first, and a site takes the worst of what its sources found. 'Verification needed' counts as a finding: it goes into the count, the filter and the 'decided by' line, because a record that needs confirming is not the same as no record. Three check states are kept separate from the outcome on every source — checked with findings, checked without findings, not checked yet — so a site whose checks are still queued is never treated as clean. The full outcome scale is on the outcomes section of the product page; the screening tool page shows how the sites get there.

Five outcomes

Prohibited: converting land for production here is legally prohibited. Restricted: use is subject to a permit or conditions. Verification needed: a record was found and the terms are not settled by the record alone. Informational: a record exists but carries no legal restriction. No findings: no record in any source — and only once every available source has answered.

Six tiers

Tier 1 is a strictly protected area — a national park, a natural World Heritage site, a biosphere core zone. Tier 2 is recognised Indigenous land or a mixed World Heritage site, where conversion needs the community's documented consent. Tier 3 is a restricted-use area: sustainable-use areas, community lands, buffer zones, official wetlands. Tier 4 is an internationally designated site or its surroundings; tier 5 water, resource or species protection; tier 6 a weak signal such as a forestry designation or an outer band.

Where sensitivity screening is asked for

A factory or plant site before the option is signed; a wind or solar site before the acceleration-area map is checked; a supplier's farms before the contract; a project site before the lender's screening. Each of those readers wants the same thing — a short list of sites that need a document, a permit or a consent — and the outcome per site gives it to them without a score to argue about.

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Site sensitivity screening that ends in a clear outcome, not just a flag

Five outcomes

Six tiers

Where sensitivity screening is asked for

Frequently asked questions

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