White House releases updated guidance on environmental reviews
The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) issued updated guidance to help federal agencies better assess and disclose climate impacts while conducting environmental reviews.
The guidance on the Consideration of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Climate Change is designed to deliver more certainty and efficiency in the permitting process for clean energy and other infrastructure projects. This interim guidance also seeks to improve transparency in reporting greenhouse gas emissions, provide specific recommendations for renewable and low greenhouse gas projects, and make projects more climate-smart and resilient.
“Disclosing and reducing emissions will ensure we’re building sustainable, resilient infrastructure for the 21st century and beyond,” CEQ Chair Brenda Mallory said. “These updated guidelines will provide greater certainty and predictability for green infrastructure projects, help grow our clean energy economy, and help fulfill President Biden’s climate and infrastructure goals.”
The new guidance replaces the 2016 emissions guidance, which was withdrawn by the previous Administration. It builds on the final “Phase 1” National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) rule issued in April 2022. It also builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s Permitting Action Plan, which outlines the Administration’s strategy for ensuring that Federal environmental reviews and permitting processes are effective, efficient, and transparent.
Specifically, the guidance updates the 2016 guidance consistent with developments in climate science, case law, and the urgency of the climate crisis; emphasizes a “rule of reason” that the depth of analysis should be proportional to a project’s impacts and clarifies that projects that will reduce GHG emissions can have less detailed GHG emissions analysis; clarifies best practices for analyzing climate change effects; recommends best practices for communicating and providing context for climate impacts, such as by noting relevant climate action commitments and goals and using the social cost of GHGs to generate monetary estimates of climate impacts; recommends that agencies mitigate GHG emissions to the greatest extent possible; advances environmental justice by encouraging agencies to meaningfully engage with affected communities and incorporate environmental justice considerations into climate-related analysis; and supports broad scale or programmatic approaches that can make later reviews more efficient.
The guidance drew praise from the American Clean Power Association.
“The guidance appropriately recognizes that agency resources and time should not be spent reviewing the relatively minor and short-term greenhouse gas emissions associated with construction of clean energy projects and infrastructure that will provide large net emissions reductions over the course of their life. We encourage the Administration and Congress to consider other such commonsense environmental review reforms to ensure permitting timeline delays do not serve as a barrier to deploying clean energy. Such delays represent one of the main roadblocks to deploying greater levels of clean, affordable, and reliable power for American consumers,” ACP officials said in a statement.
Abigail Ross Hopper, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), called it an important step forward.
“The interim guidance will enable clean energy developers to move forward with projects, particularly on federal lands, that not only reduce climate impacts from the power sector but that also create jobs and add economic benefits for communities in areas where solar projects are sited,” Hopper said.
The guidance will be available for public comment through March 10, 2023.
