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The White House this morning finalized regulations to speed up renewable energy development across the country. The "NEPA Phase 2" rule implements last year's bipartisan debt ceiling deal by establishing one lead agency to handle environmental reviews, setting deadlines and page limits, and requiring agencies to consider climate impacts during the review process.
"We are making reforms in this rule that will help speed infrastructure and permitting, but without losing sight of the environmental and health benefits we need to protect," said Brenda Mallory, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Conservation groups also praised the reforms.
“Importantly, by facilitating upfront problem-solving, these updated regulations provide clean energy project sponsors with greater certainty and clarity,” said Earthjustice President Abigail Dillen. “When people who have the most at stake are engaged with each other at the outset, and there is a good faith effort to identify and solve problems from the start, the end results are better, with good projects moving forward faster.”
House kicks off anti-conservation week
Meanwhile, the U.S. House of Representatives plans to vote on a series of bills this week that would reverse some of the Biden administration's biggest conservation accomplishments. One bill up for a floor vote would repeal the Bureau of Land Management's new Public Lands Rule, which puts conservation on equal footing with drilling and mining. Another would abolish the 20-year ban on mining around Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. The White House released statements opposing the House bills.
Kaden McArthur with Backcountry Hunters and Anglers told Field & Stream that the bills would hurt fish and wildlife across the country.
“We are deeply discouraged to see the House of Representatives take politically charged action to overturn conservation achievements widely applauded by hunters and anglers,” McArthur said. “With limited time left before the end of this Congress, lawmakers ought to be focused on passing bipartisan policies like Recovering America’s Wildlife Act (RAWA), that further the conservation of our wild places and wildlife, rather than walking back these actions taken by the Department of the Interior.”
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Yellowstone bison are about as tolerant a bison as you can find. They’re used to having a lot of people around. But even they have their limits.”
