Government
Council on Environmental Quality Rules to Implement NEPA Reviews Are Officially Rescinded
Administration finalizes 'interim' mandate for agencies to develop regulations assessing project environmental impacts, despite federal inconsistency concerns
The $2.4B Uinta Basin Railway project to transport crude oil from Utah to the Gulf Coast received a boost when the US Supreme Court ruled last May that the Surface Transportation Board’s environmental review was sufficient.
The Trump administration has made final an "interim" rule issued last February that rescinds all White House Council on Environmental Quality regulations governing how agencies conduct project environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act.
The final rule, published in the Jan. 8 Federal Register, does not eliminate requirements of NEPA, enacted in 1970, and all agencies must develop regulations to undergo the project review process within their scope by the end of February 2026.
The council released the interim rule last year in response to President Donald Trump’s desire to speed approvals for projects where NEPA reviews are required—particularly for projects that align with the current administration’s push to develop fossil fuel infrastructure, as well as to comply with a May 2025 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that narrowed the scope of what is required under those reviews to impacts that are directly foreseeable and proximate, rather than those that have downstream potential.
Some observers say they do not expect to see significant changes in how environmental impact statements and less comprehensive environmental assessments are prepared, but others suggest there will be confusion as agencies use different definitions or procedures to create their own regulations.
Several larger agencies have already released and finalized updated implementation regulations, including the Agriculture, Transportation, Interior, Defense and Energy Depts., as well as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Mark Sudol, a senior advisor at Washington, DC environmental permitting consultant Dawson & Associates and a former Corps regulatory program chief, says he does not expect wide disparities in guidelines developed by each agency. The Corps’ regulations, released July 3, mainly conform to last year’s Supreme Court decision in Seven Counties Infrastructure v. Eagle County, Colo., and to President Donald Trump’s "Unleashing American Energy" executive order issued on Jan. 20, 2025.
The most significant change in the new Corps regulations is removal of a definition for what constitutes a “major federal action” that would trigger an environmental impact statement, Sudol says, clarifying that comprehensive environmental reviews are required when projects are expected to have a “significant impact.”
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“This decision is not really going to affect the Corps of Engineers very much at all,” he told ENR.
In August 4 formal comments to the U.S. Transportation Dept. following its release of a final rule in July, Prianka Sharma, vice president and counsel for regulatory affairs at the American Road and Transportation Builders Association, said the rule included “welcome process improvements” to the agency’s use of categorical exclusions, including relying on definitions developed by other agencies, and codifying procedures for adopting new exclusions. “These updates help streamline reviews for lower-impact projects and reflect a commitment to smarter resource allocation,” she wrote.
Eric Beightel, former executive director of the Federal Permitting Council, notes that there could be disparities among agency regulations. “It's a bit of a hodge-podge across government, which is exactly what the [council] regulations were intended to avoid by providing overarching direction to the agencies," he said in an email. "I've not yet seen any notable examples of interagency confusion, but I anticipate that such confusion will happen sooner or later.” Beightel is now federal strategy director for Environmental Science Associates in Washington, D.C.
In the final rule, the council says it has taken steps to “ensure consistency and efficiency across agency implementation of NEPA in the absence of [its] regulations” and that it is in the process of publishing revised guidance in consultation with agencies that have already revised their NEPA implementing rules.
