The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) has proposed its first set of changes to the ways federal agencies regulate an enormous range of activities, including oil and gas development, under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
The White House CEQ said these changes are important steps to restoring community safeguards during environmental reviews for a wide range of Federal projects and decisions. The proposed changes would roll back three revisions that the CEQ made in 2020 under President Trump. More rollbacks are promised.
“The basic community safeguards we are proposing to restore would help ensure that American infrastructure gets built right the first time, and delivers real benefits – not harms – to people who live nearby,” said CEQ Chair Brenda Mallory. “Patching these holes in the environmental review process will help reduce conflict and litigation and help clear up some of the uncertainty that the previous administration’s rule caused.”
Chad Whiteman, vice president for environment and regulatory affairs at the U.S. Chamber’s Global Energy Institute, said that by rolling back some of the most important updates to our antiquated permitting process, the Biden Administration’s new proposed NEPA rule will only serve to slow down building the infrastructure of the future.
"Important projects that address critical issues like improving access to public transit, adding more clean energy to the grid and expanding broadband access are languishing due to continued delays and that must change," Whiteman added. "We continue to advocate through our broad Unlock American Investment coalition for efficient and common sense decision-making from the executive branch and Congress on permitting.”
The White House CEP proposed rule would make the following three changes to the 2020 NEPA rules:
- Restore the requirement that federal agencies evaluate all the relevant environmental impacts of the decisions they are making. This proposed change would make clear that agencies must consider the “direct,” “indirect,” and “cumulative” impacts of a proposed decision, including by evaluating a full range of climate change impacts and assessing the consequences of releasing additional pollution in communities that are already overburdened by polluted air or dirty water.
- Restore the full authority of agencies to work with communities to develop and analyze alternative approaches that could minimize environmental and public health costs. This proposed change would give agencies the flexibility to determine the “purpose and need” of a proposed project based on a variety of factors, and to work with project proponents and communities to mitigate or avoid environmental harms by analyzing common sense alternatives. The 2020 NEPA rule limited federal agencies’ ability to develop and consider alternative designs or approaches that do not fully align with the stated goals of the project’s sponsor, often a private company.
- Establish CEQ’s NEPA regulations as a floor, rather than a ceiling, for the environmental review standards that federal agencies should be meeting. This proposal would restore the ability of Federal agencies to tailor their NEPA procedures, consistent with the CEQ NEPA regulations, to help meet the specific needs of their agencies, the public, and stakeholders.
CEQ will hold online public meetings for the proposed rulemaking Oct. 19 and Oct. 21, with registration for the meetings available via www.nepa.gov. Public comments on the proposed rule must be received by Nov. 22.
