Recent Projects

On April 30, CEQ revised its implementing regulations for the National Environmental Policy Act that undergird how federal agencies conduct environmental review of proposed projects. Consistent with federal caselaw, CEQ’s regulations emphasize the need to consider climate change and environmental justice impacts in environmental review, among other key revisions. These revisions are also consistent with suggestions that Policy Integrity has offered through our scholarship, reports, and comments on ensuring careful consideration of climate change and environmental justice in federal permitting. In addition, CEQ implemented several of Policy Integrity’s suggestions to enhance its cost-benefit analysis for this rulemaking.

The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) recently published Phase One of the Environmental Justice Scorecard (Scorecard), which evaluates federal agencies' progress on advancing the Justice40 Initiative, implementing and enforcing environmental and civil rights laws, and institutionalizing environmental justice. CEQ sought public feedback on the Scorecard’s usability and potential qualitative and quantitative metrics to improve future iterations of the Scorecard. The Institute for Policy Integrity submitted comments recommending several changes to enhance transparency, accountability, and comprehensiveness.

Earlier this year, the Council of Environmental Quality (CEQ) published interim guidance on analyzing climate change effects under the National Environmental Policy Act in which it endorsed using the social cost of carbon in environmental analysis. In this supplemental comment letter, we suggest that CEQ specifically endorse the Environmental Protection Agency’s newly-updated climate-damage values when it finalizes the interim guidance.

In July, the Council on Environmental Quality proposed revisions to the implementing regulations under the National Environmental Policy Act. The Proposed Rule reflects a more holistic approach to informing agency decisions with a robust and balanced analysis of environmental impacts. In our comment letter, we suggested improvements to the proposal that would help ensure robust and balanced treatment of environmental impacts in NEPA reviews.

In January, the Council on Environmental Quality published interim guidance providing best practices to federal agencies on the consideration of climate change in environmental reviews conducted under the National Environmental Policy Act. The guidance provides helpful direction to agencies on assessing how proposed actions and their alternatives (1) will contribute to climate change through their greenhouse gas emissions; and (2) will potentially be affected or have their environmental consequences exacerbated by climate change impacts. Our comment commends CEQ on its thorough guidance and provides recommendations to strengthen both areas. 

Policy Integrity submitted comments on White House Council on Environmental Quality's Environmental Justice Scorecard on behalf of the Environmental Justice Health Alliance (EJHA) and Coming Clean. EJHA and Coming Clean are made up of grassroots environmental justice groups, health organizations, environmental groups, community and neighborhood organizations and many more constituencies united in working towards a healthy, just and equitable present and future. The comments were also signed on to by over 20 grassroots organizations from around the country.

The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) recently released interim guidance on Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration (CCUS) to assist federal agencies with regulation, permitting, and associated activities. We filed comments urging CEQ to update the guidance document with additional targeted recommendations for agencies on monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) programs; project prioritization; and other topics.

We submitted comments encouraging the Council on Environmental Quality (“CEQ”) to expand its legal and economic justification for its proposal to restore several key provisions to the regulations implementing the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”) that were revised improperly in 2020. Our comments also suggest regulations and guidance that would promote the public welfare and enhance agency consideration of greenhouse gas emissions, climate risk, and environmental justice.

The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) proposed changes to the regulations implementing the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a decades-old statute that requires federal agencies to analyze the environmental impact of actions. We submitted comments explaining how the proposed rule runs afoul of the statute, drastically limiting agencies’ abilities to consider various effects and implement NEPA procedures. We also submitted joint comments detailing how the provisions would undermine analysis of climate effects, and encouraging CEQ to promote the use of the social cost of greenhouse gases.

The Council on Environmental Quality is proposing to revise its National Environmental Policy Act guidance on the consideration of greenhouse gas emissions. We submitted comments explaining how the draft guidance makes vague and misleading statements with respect to when and how agencies must analyze the greenhouse gas emissions associated with their project approvals. We encourage CEQ to correct errors and align the guidance with federal caselaw and existing regulations.