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The Trump administration announced a proposal to weaken how federal agencies will handle environmental reviews for energy and infrastructure projects. The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) was signed into law 50 years ago, and directs agencies to evaluate and mitigate the environmental impacts of development. Importantly, the law requires extensive consultation with local communities before projects can proceed.
The new proposal would allow agencies to forego or weaken NEPA reviews and ignore the climate impacts of fossil fuel development. The new regulations will also redefine what constitutes a "major federal action" to exclude privately funded projects with little government funding or involvement, making it easier to approve and construct projects like oil and gas pipelines. In addition, the proposed changes would restrict the allowable time for completing environmental impact reviews to two years and limit what constitutes the environmental "effects" of a given action.
The Trump administration is already losing more cases than it's winning in court for conducting inadequate environmental analyses, so it's not surprising they would seek to undermine the law itself, though it is likely the changes they are proposing will also be challenged in court. The proposed changes to NEPA are expected to be published in the Federal Register today, opening up a 60-day public comment period.
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Weakening our nation’s bedrock environmental law will only help drilling and mining corporations at the expense of local communities, clean water, and wildlife. For three years, the Trump administration has done everything in its power to shut the public out, ignore the impacts of climate change, and ram new drilling and mining projects through the permitting process. Today’s announcement blatantly continues their track record of doing the oil and gas industry’s bidding.”
