Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Filed 03/31/2009). The City of Newport News sought to meet the regional
water supply need by constructing the King William Reservoir. Although
there was substantial project-specific environmental analysis (including sev-
eral iterations of a NEPA EIS and Clean Water Act alternative analyses) there
was no comprehensive SEA of a water supply PPP on a regional basis. After
more than 20 years and US $55 million in development costs, the project
was canceled. The project had a history of opposition due to such environ-
mental issues as significant impact on migratory fish; loss of aquatic habitat;
flooding of Native American cultural sites; loss of substantial acreage of bor-
dering vegetated wetlands, Native American subsistence fishing, and defen-
sible water needs projections. The final blow to the project, which resulted
in the City abandoning the proposal, came when the U.S. District Court for
the District of Columbia ruled that NEPA and Clean Water Act procedural
requirements were not met by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which was
the federal agency taking action by issuing the necessary permits for the
proposed King William Reservoir. The issues cited by the court in the rul-
ing included accurate and timely water demand projections, evaluation of
alternatives, and magnitude and mitigation of wetland impacts. Based on
the ruling, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers estimated that it would take a
minimum of two years and US $2 million to issue another supplemental EIS
to address the deficiencies. Based on the Corps' projection of time and money
plus the history of opposition, the City abandoned the reservoir project.
Newport News is currently in the process of reassessing the regional water
supply situation (City of Newport News, Office of the City Manager, 2009).
Specifically, they have initiated a new water supply needs assessment and
committed to include interviews with all major regulators and stakeholders.
They will even evaluate potential consequences of climate change and the City
is committed to close coordination with the Regional and State Water Supply
Plan, which was under development at the time the City decided to reevaluate
their water supply program. Once they have completed the needs assessment,
they are committed to evaluating alternatives for both the supply side and the
demand side (i.e., water conservation) including a full range of environmen-
tally desirable measures identified during the previous 20 plus years of plan-
ning and development for the King William Reservoir. This new approach
and commitment by the City of Newport to develop a long-term water supply
plan incorporates many of the aspects of an SEA.
In addition to a broader and more comprehensive approach, efficiency
and consistency are other major advantages of SEA. As with tiering and
programmatic environmental documentation under NEPA, using SEA pro-
vides an opportunity to address overarching and common issues once and
not repeat the treatment of these issues for every environmental analysis
for each individual project. In the example used above for a U.S. national
policy of energy self-suficiency, the alternative methods of surface coal min-
ing common to all or most mining operations could be addressed in the SEA
to inform decision makers as they determined the advisability and extent of
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