Understanding the 2023 CEQ NEPA Guidance on Consideration of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Climate

Description

On January 9, 2023, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) issued their interim guidance document National Environmental Policy Act Guidance on Consideration of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Climate Change. The interim guidance was made effectively immediately upon its release, and should be used for any new NEPA reviews starting on or after January 9, 2023. Federal agencies also have the option to use it on NEPA reviews already underway prior to that date. The document updates a previous CEQ guidance document on climate change that was released in 2016, but that was rescinded less than a year later in 2017. While many of the key recommendations made by CEQ on how to approach climate change analysis in NEPA reviews in the 2016 guidance remain in this new version, there are many key revisions, updates, and incorporation of important new information and detail in this January 2023 version. Key topics covered in the new guidance include:

  • Effectively and appropriately including climate change science information in NEPA reviews

  • Recommended methods for analyzing direct and indirect GHG emissions from proposed actions

  • Factors to consider in deciding whether to quantitatively or qualitatively analyze GHG emissions in NEPA reviews

  • Recommendations on whether to use some type of proxy or tool to place GHG emissions from proposed actions in context (such as the federal government’s social cost of carbon tool)

  • How to best incorporate analysis of the effects of climate change on the proposed action and other resources affected by the proposed action

  • Incorporating climate change considerations into formulating alternatives and development of mitigation measures.

  • Whether NEPA reviews for certain types of actions should have more or less detailed climate change analysis and consideration

Objectives

Upon completing this workshop, participants will be able to:

  • Comprehensively interpret how CEQ recommends federal agencies incorporate climate change information and analysis of GHG emissions and climate change in their NEPA reviews

  • Effectively address both direct and indirect impacts to climate change that a proposed action may trigger, as well as impacts caused by climate change that may affect the proposed action and resources affected by the proposed action

  • Develop a strategy to most effectively organize and present needed information and analysis on GHG emissions and climate change in a NEPA document

Audience

Participants for this training generally include resource specialists, team leaders, project managers, decisionmakers, attorneys, writers and editors, and other agency professionals who already have some NEPA experience and need to understand this important guidance document that directs federal agencies on how to most effectively include climate change considerations in their NEPA reviews.

Process

This is an interactive workshop designed to build an overall understanding of the content and implications of CEQ’s 2023 NEPA Guidance on how best to incorporate climate change and GHG emissions analysis in NEPA reviews. This workshop consists of a carefully designed combination of the following:

  • 60% Lecture

  • 30% Discussion

  • 10% Exercises and Case Studies

Materials

Participants will receive the following:

  • Presentation handouts

  • Student reference manual