Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
activities with the potential to change the landscape and generate significant
environmental impacts than were envisioned when NEPA was enacted and
thus fell under the environmental policy goal and were subject to environ-
mental analysis requirements specified in the act.
NEPA also became more of a force as the ambiguous language of envi-
ronmental requirements by federal agencies was clarified. Specifically, the
Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) Regulations (see Section 2.3 of this
chapter for a discussion of the regulations) promulgated to implement NEPA
and NEPA litigation history defined federal agency responsibility under
NEPA. The intent of the regulations and multiple decisions by the courts have
concluded that the agencies must take a “hard look” at the environmental
implications of their actions, include the consideration of the implications in
their decisions, and for every action provide to the public full and transpar-
ent documentation of the process used. Although not a mandate overriding
an agency's mission, this interpretation did place a specific and challengeable
requirement on each agency to consider environmental implications before
they took action.
Also the requirements for federal agencies to “ include in every recommen-
dation … and other major Federal action …, a detailed statement by the respon-
sible official on (i) the environmental impact of the proposed action ” (42 U.S.C. 4332
Sec.  102), evolved into a forcing function and specific (and initially consid-
ered onerous) requirements for all federal agencies. NEPA regulations pro-
mulgated by CEQ made it clear that preparation of the “detailed statement,”
which we now know as the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was to be
a transparent process. Not only was a full disclosure of the detailed state-
ment and all information supporting the statement required, but also agen-
cies were to actively solicit input and review from the public and concerned
organizations. These requirements changed the decades-old culture in most
agencies where decisions were made in isolation by senior bureaucrats with
only the goals and interests of the specific agency considered in the deci-
sions. Many such decisions and subsequent federal agency actions, such as
the development of the interstate highway system or “harnessing” of the
Tennessee River by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), had permanent
and irreversible impacts on the environment. In the case of the interstate
highway systems, the impacts were not only limited to construction, but
also created massive changes in land use patterns, including facilitating an
exodus to the suburbs. Yet these changes were not analyzed, documented,
considered publicly, or presented to the people most directly affected by the
action for their input before the decision to construct the highways was final-
ized. In all likelihood, if NEPA had been in place prior to the planning and
implementation of the TVA or the interstate highway system, these activities
would have still taken place. However, they would most likely have been
substantially different from their current form. But perhaps more impor-
tantly, the adverse and unanticipated consequences of these and similar
large-scale federal programs could have been identified early in the process.
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