Summary of the National Environmental Policy Act and Implementing Regulations - Environmental Impact Analysis: Process and Methods - page 16

Minor modifications, not affecting the underlying purpose and need for the
programs, could have been made during planning if NEPA had been inte-
grated into the process. Similarly, the adverse impacts could have been at
least partially mitigated with plans and programs put in place to address the
unintended and unanticipated consequences such that they were not issues
for the following decades.
NEPA, and specifically the EIS hard look requirement and the public input
mandate, made drastic changes to the longstanding practice of decisions
based solely on an agency's mission and eventually in the culture of many
federal agencies. The constraints of limiting NEPA (and thus environmental
protection) to only federal actions and considering environmental implica-
tions when making a decision were eventually accepted and even embraced
by many agencies. It has evolved to represent little or no constraint on the
agency missions as the culture changed. As federal agencies that embraced
NEPA became more and more involved in actions that could have far reach-
ing environmental impacts, there has been a major reduction of adverse
environmental impacts and unintended environmental consequences from
federal actions. Unfortunately, NEPA and environmental analysis in general
have been viewed in some agencies as only an after-the-fact effort to com-
ply with a regulation. In these cases the environmental protection has been
constrained but as discussed later (Section 3.7 of the topic), it has been left
to the federal courts to painfully and slowly force realistic environmental
consideration by federal agencies.

2.2 Contents of NEPA

Procedures developed for NEPA and the evolution of these procedures,
both through practice and court decisions, form the original basis for the
environmental analysis process as it currently exists and as it is addressed
in this topic. Thus the NEPA scope and procedures are summarized in
this section of the topic. They are presented to convey several messages:
a historic perspective; the foundation of an objective approach to envi-
ronmental analysis; a starting point for most international and individual
state environmental analysis requirements; and the legal and procedural
requirements necessary for a NEPA document and procedure to withstand
litigation.
NEPA is truly landmark legislation. Its passage was driven by knowl-
edgeable and influential people with a strong and legitimate concern over
ongoing environmental degradation. In turn, NEPA instigated the passage
of new regulations and legislation in the United States which promoted
protection and enhancement of natural resources and quality of life. NEPA
accomplished these protections and enhancements partially by providing