The new administration in Washington D.C. gutted the regulations overseeing the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, a key function for public participation and community protection on major actions proposed for federal lands.
The action, announced this week, poses many questions about what the future holds for permitting at a time of great uncertainty about the federal government’s role in project development on federal lands.
GBWN and other community advocates must now weigh the impacts of regulatory change for ongoing federal matters involving Nevada and Utah.
The effort continues an ongoing ideological ping-pong about the intent and role of NEPA that usually switches from one administration to the next. Inevitably, this shift from the Trump Administration will wind up in court. But it creates a major vacuum as countless projects across the west undergo and prepare for environmental review.
The assumed goal of the current regulatory effort is to speed up federal permitting by limiting procedural hurdles for project proponents. This could pose constraints on how the public, scientists, attorneys and others engage on projects that involve natural resources overseen by the federal government.
The process to gut the NEPA regulations began with an executive order earlier this month from the Trump Administration that asked the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), which has statutory oversight of NEPA, to revoke all of its existing regulations for NEPA.
This tact follows a recent ruling from a federal judge in North Dakota that vacates CEQ’s ability to create the overriding regulations. Public interest addvocacy groups appealed that decision. But the decision was enough to propel this week’s action.
President Nixon, who signed the NEPA bill, created the executive order tasking CEQ to create regulations. Plaintiffs in the North Dakota case challenged the legality of CEQ’s rulemaking authority granted by the Nixon-era executive order.
Our organization participates in NEPA-driven projects to ensure that the voices of rural communities are heard, the science is sound, information comes to light, and regulators give impacts a “hard look.” We are engaging in NEPA right now on the dangerous White Pine Pumped Storage project. We have uplifted concerns about hydrology from tribal and agricultural communities on projects like the Las Vegas Pipeline and the Cedar City Pipeline. We have defended water supplies on the Colorado River via NEPA.
No matter your political colors, you want a sound NEPA process when there is a major action proposed for your community or near a place you hold dear. I have heard unlikely supporters of NEPA say: I hated this law until I needed it.
This new regulatory universe will likely give agencies such as the Bureau of Land Management the ability to create their own regulations rather than relying, as has been the case for decades, on CEQ rulemaking authority.
We will be watching what happens and keep you informed.
This effort doesn’t dismantle the law. But it will inevitably change the implementation. And, of course, lead to more lawsuits and uncertainty.
