By Ginny Boone and Samir Qadir. P.E., CC-P

Early in the new year, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) released its National Environmental Policy Act Interim Guidance on Consideration of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Climate Change. This guidance builds upon the previous Final Guidance released in 2016, reflecting improved climate science of recent years as well as the increased urgency felt by major decision makers to include climate change considerations in federal planning.

Here are some key takeaways from the 2023 Interim Guidance.

1. Disclosing Lifetime and Annual GHG Emissions. Recommends that NEPA preparers disclose best estimates of lifetime and annual GHG emissions associated with a project, including gross GHG emissions increases and decreases as well as the net change. In addition, the Interim Guidance emphasizes the importance of clearly defining the “lifetime” of the project and the consideration of GHG emission reduction measures. The Interim Guidance also provides for instances where a detailed analysis of lifetime GHG emissions is not warranted, such as minor, temporary GHG impacts associated with the construction of renewable energy projects.

2. Presenting the Social Cost of GHG Emissions. Introduces the social cost of GHG emissions (SC-GHG), defined as a measure of the cumulative monetary damages resulting from the climate effects of GHG emissions. Once GHG emissions have been quantified for each alternative, the 2023 Interim Guidance recommends that the NEPA document should, if possible, also provide the best available estimate of the SC-GHG for each alternative. The SC-GHG allows readers to compare alternatives using a standard monetary metric (US dollars). The most recent guidance for federal agencies on estimating SC-GHG was published in 2021. An Interagency Working Group is currently developing revised guidance. See the August 2022 issue of PHE Pulse for more information on SC-GHG.

3. Considering Climate Goals and Commitments. Recommends that NEPA preparers consider the project in the context of existing climate action goals or commitments. Agencies should consider how each alternative will support or detract from existing climate change goals or agreements, including international agreements such as the Paris Agreement, or stated regional, tribal, or agency-specific climate goals.

4. Analyzing Upstream and Downstream Effects. Defines indirect effects to generally include reasonably foreseeable emissions related to a proposed action that are upstream or downstream of the activity resulting from the proposed action. As an example, the Interim Guidance states that where the proposed action involves fossil fuel extraction, “the reasonably foreseeable indirect effects of such an action likely would include effects associated with the processing, refining, transporting, and end-use of the fossil fuel being extracted, including combustion of the resource to produce energy.” [Emphasis added]

5. Bounding the Effects Analysis. Where uncertainties may be present about the use of the resource extracted for energy generation or other purposes, the Interim Guidance states that an upper bound should be provided by assuming that all of the available fuel resources will be extracted and combusted to provide energy. In the context of fossil fuel extraction or transportation projects, this is sometimes referred to as a “full burn” assumption.

6. Conducting Substitution Analysis for Energy Sources. Actions that result in a change to energy resources, and therefore affect the overall energy market, should be subject to a substitution analysis to determine how the overall energy market could shift with the implementation of a given alternative. Per the Guidance, agencies “should not simply assume that if the federal action does not take place, another action will perfectly substitute for it and generate identical emissions, such that the action's net emissions relative to the baseline are zero.” [Emphasis added]

7. Considering Environmental Justice Concerns. Highlights environmental justice concerns as they relate to climate change. Although environmental justice was discussed in the 2016 Final Guidance, the inclusion of environmental justice as a separate section in the 2023 Interim Guidance suggests a larger focus on these issues moving forward. Agencies are expected to be aware of the potential impacts of climate change on vulnerable communities. The Interim Guidance directs agencies to use the scoping process to identify such communities and engage them early in the scoping and project planning process to understand their climate change-related risks and concerns.

The comment period for the 2023 Interim Guidance closes on March 10. Following the comment period, the Interim Guidance will either be published as-is or revised in response to comments received. Moving forward, federal agencies will likely be expected to continue giving increased attention to GHG emissions and climate change effects during the NEPA process. CEQ’s Interim Guidance provides a useful roadmap for NEPA preparers to incorporate the analysis of climate change effects into their documents.

Potomac-Hudson Engineering, Inc. (PHE) has been providing environmental consulting services to government and private sector clients for 35 years. Our expertise includes environmental planning and analysis and environmental compliance, with a focus on GHG emissions and climate change. We have conducted GHG and social cost of GHG analyses for large and small infrastructure projects, including commercial energy projects.

Samir Qadir, P.E., CC-P is an Associate Principal and senior engineer at PHE, working on topics related to sustainability, environmental planning, and compliance. He has worked on lifecycle GHG emissions and social cost of carbon calculations for several major infrastructure projects. If you have questions related to GHGs, climate change, and NEPA, contact him at samir.qadir@phe.com..

Ginny Boone is an environmental scientist at PHE, working on NEPA documentation and GIS..

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March 2023 – Updates to CEQ’s NEPA and Climate Change Guidance – Seven Key Takeaways!