Latest news with #WhiteHouseCouncilonEnvironmentalQuality
Newsweek
4 days ago
- Business
- Newsweek
Permitting Reform Can Ensure a Lasting Manufacturing Renaissance
For manufacturing to continue growing our economy, creating jobs and developing the best products in the world, the United States must update its permitting laws and procedures. Permitting delays and associated costs make it harder for manufacturers to compete and win in the global economy. To fulfill President Donald Trump's plan to build America into a manufacturing powerhouse, permitting reform needs to go hand-in-hand with the administration's industrial strategy, which also includes tariffs on steel, tax cuts, and deregulation. Construction workers are pictured. Construction workers are pictured. Getty Images Bold actions are needed to fix the generational difficulties of building in the U.S. The administration has taken strong steps to alleviate the issues, such as the permitting technology action plan and the move to drastically cut approval times for energy projects. However, this requires a comprehensive, whole of government approach. The solutions must come from Congress and the administration to ensure certainty that cannot be wiped away with a new administration. Any reforms should do the following: —Ensure Regulatory Certainty Constantly shifting regulations are a nightmare for compliance and raise costs for all manufacturers. For instance, under the prematurely revised particulate matter (PM2.5) standard, the compliance level shifted from a tough but achievable number to an aspirational goal that is impossible or implausible for manufacturers to achieve. If the revised standard remains, economic growth will stall, as under the revised standard, the naturally occurring background levels of airborne particulate matter may put much of the country into non-attainment, meaning no construction permits will be issued. Manufacturing thrives on certainty, ensuring that regulations are achievable and stable helps manufacturers plan long-term and make positive investment decisions. —Streamline the Paperwork and Process Obtaining permit approvals for critical infrastructure projects often takes years. Before the 2023 debt ceiling deal, the White House Council on Environmental Quality issued a report stating that environmental impact statements, which are mandated under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), took on average four and a half years. The mandatory studying of potential environmental impacts under NEPA takes longer than building a new steel mill. Streamlining the permitting process and reducing the endless required studies can ensure America is able to take advantage of incoming investment opportunities. —Reform Litigation and Case Review NEPA is the most litigated federal environmental statute. There are few limits to who can sue and when they can sue, which can dramatically delay the time to begin construction. Tightening limits on who can litigate and expediting review of cases is vital to ensuring swift adjudication. Putting a stop to endless delay tactics through the courts will help more projects break ground and bring much needed economic growth. —Create an Approval "Shot Clock" Manufacturing depends on access to our nation's plentiful natural resources. However, restrictions on the development of these resources are hindering our ability to strengthen domestic supply chains and making manufacturing more reliant on raw material imports. The National Mining Association reports that Australia and Canada, two countries with environmental protections that are arguably more stringent than those in the United States, have mine permitting processes that last two to three years on average, whereas in the U.S. the permitting process averages seven to 10 years. Creating a shot clock for approvals can dramatically expedite much needed projects. —Expand One Federal Decision One manufacturer reported lengthy delays of up to an entire year for the issuance of permits by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers due to the failure of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to complete the informal consultation required for confirming no adverse project impacts under the Endangered Species Act. For an entire year, potential workers sat on the sidelines and a community lost out on economic opportunity waiting on informal paperwork that should not have taken longer than 90 days to complete. Having a single point of contact for all federal permitting decisions can ensure that no project waits years for an agency without primary jurisdiction to act. Permitting affects every aspect of our lives—from our economic security to our national security. If we fail to modernize existing processes, we risk falling behind international competitors. However, if we create lasting solutions that make the federal process more efficient, we can make America a global manufacturing powerhouse again. Philip K. Bell is president of the Steel Manufacturers Association. The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
Yahoo
01-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Federal judge delivers stunning blow that could put Americans' health at risk: 'Will further harm communities already struggling'
The United States is likely to see an uptick in dangerous environmental pollution thanks to the loss of regulatory measures keeping it in check. In February, a federal judge struck a major blow against environmental protections by declaring that the White House Council on Environmental Quality lacks the authority to issue regulations, Reuters reported. It is the latest in a series of judicial decisions weakening the federal government's ability to protect Americans from pollution. The decision concerns the CEQ, a body established by the 1969 National Environmental Policy Act. Under that act, the council is to perform environmental reviews for projects that require federal permits or receive federal funding. NEPA reviews can delay projects by years, but they help ensure that construction and development don't harm the very communities they're performed in. Since a 1977 executive order by President Jimmy Carter, the CEQ has also established environmental regulations for other federal departments to follow. That is, until now. In February, U.S. District Judge Daniel Traynor of North Dakota ruled on a suit filed by 20 Republican-led states. The suit alleged that the CEQ had overstepped its authority with a new rule intended to revise the environmental review process, which would have increased building costs. Traynor ruled that the CEQ never had the power to create regulations in the first place, only to advise the president. This is despite the fact that CEQ and NEPA activities have frequently come before the court, including the U.S. Supreme Court. "The truth is that for the past forty years, all three branches of government operated under the erroneous assumption that CEQ had authority," Traynor wrote in his decision. "But now everyone knows the state of the emperor's clothing, and it is something we cannot unsee." Traynor's baffling decision will damage the CEQ's ability to regulate federally funded development, industry, and infrastructure projects. It will lead to more pollution, which is already a large enough problem. "The court's ruling will weaken environmental reviews and will further harm communities already struggling with polluted land, air, and water," Jan Hasselman, a lawyer for Earthjustice, said in a statement, per Reuters. Do you worry about air pollution in and around your home? Yes — always Yes — often Yes — sometimes No — never Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. While some of the damage is already done, you can help curb it in the future. Vote for pro-climate candidates who will protect the public from dangerous air, water, and soil pollution. Also, you can use your purchasing power to make it clear to companies that you support clean, eco-friendly policies. Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
Yahoo
07-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
How a Trump effort to cut environmental red tape could backfire
For roughly half a century, a little-known body called the White House Council on Environmental Quality has been in charge of overseeing implementation of the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, a 1970 statute widely considered the 'Magna Carta' of environmental law. Congress passed the law at a time when Cleveland's Cuyahoga River was on fire and yellow smog blanketed American cities. In an attempt to prevent such calamities, NEPA requires that any big infrastructure project funded or authorized by the federal government must account for its environmental impacts before it's permitted to go forward. Now, when cities and states build federally funded roads, a developer erects an offshore wind farm, or an oil company builds a new refining unit on the Gulf Coast, NEPA applies. This sweeping requirement created a need for coordination within the government. Given the number of federal agencies involved and the potential for larger projects to require authorization from multiple departments — a pipeline, for example, might require sign-off from the Department of Transportation, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and the Environmental Protection Agency — Congress created the Council on Environmental Quality, or CEQ, and housed it within the White House in part to oversee NEPA implementation across the federal government. Since then, CEQ has been a central clearinghouse for interpreting the landmark law. In the years after its creation, the council issued rules that set forth requirements for public comment, defined key terminology, and laid out when projects required extensive analysis. The rules ensured uniformity in how agencies applied the law, and they were left largely untouched for roughly five decades. Last month, the Trump administration unraveled those rules, and with them the council's central role in implementing NEPA. By issuing a new interim rule, the White House is proposing to rescind CEQ's guidance and instruct federal agencies to develop their own individual guidelines. The White House's rule is expected to be finalized in the coming months, at which point every agency, from the Bureau of Land Management to the U.S. Forest Service, will be expected to develop its own standards and processes for determining whether a project complies with NEPA requirements, a process that could take years. Their interpretations could also be challenged in court, creating further uncertainty about what standards now apply for getting nearly any infrastructure project approved by the feds. In an echo of the Trump administration's refrain that extraordinary measures are required to curb government inefficiency, the unraveling of CEQ is intended to 'expedite and simplify the permitting process' for important projects, according to Trump's executive order. But experts who spoke to Grist anticipate that it will have the opposite effect. 'It's chaos,' said Deborah Sivas, director of the environmental law clinic at Stanford University. 'No business would run this way. If you're a developer, you're like, 'What the heck? What even applies? How do I go about doing this right?'' Complying with NEPA involves preparing lengthy environmental assessments, a process that is time-consuming and resource-intensive. The average time to complete the NEPA process is three years, and the average Environmental Impact Statement, one type of assessment reserved for larger projects, is more than 1,200 pages long. As a result, reforming NEPA has become a priority for prominent lawmakers in both parties. (Many Democrats in particular worry that the process hampers efforts to build renewable energy infrastructure.) But simply throwing out a longstanding, centralized playbook for agencies to follow will create uncertainty and slow the process down, at least in the short term, according to Justin Pidot, a law professor at the University of Arizona who was the general counsel at CEQ during the Biden administration. 'It's a huge mistake,' said Pidot. 'It's going to be very resource-intensive for them to do all these new procedures, and there's going to be more uncertainty, and the permitting process is going to be harder and more complex. And all that is going to be happening at a time when there are fewer federal employees with less expertise.' CEQ's authority was largely unquestioned over its 50-year lifespan, but two court cases in the last year seemed to indicate a change in opinion among some legal scholars. In November, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in a case deciding whether federal agencies had adequately considered environmental impacts when developing plans to regulate tourist flights over national parks. In their ruling, the judges suggested that CEQ did not have the authority to issue binding regulations in its implementation of NEPA. Then, in February, a district court in North Dakota came to a similar conclusion. Since CEQ is an office within the White House and not an agency created by Congress, the court ruled that CEQ did not have the authority to issue binding regulations. 'The two cases definitely started going down that pathway of questioning or calling out what authority CEQ actually had,' said Jennifer Jeffers, senior counsel at the law firm Allen Matkins. 'I don't think that many people had foreseen this because it had been a longstanding practice and had not been a source of contention until quite recently.' Still, the most significant blow to the office's authority came only with Trump's executive order. While it's unclear how quickly agencies will produce their own NEPA-related rules and what it will mean for project developers, Jeffers said she expects the current requirements will continue to apply for projects in the pipeline as long as they are not inconsistent with the executive order. The irony is that even Trump's favored constituencies, like the fossil fuel developers he says will restore U.S. 'energy dominance,' are left to wonder what new rules they'll be forced to navigate when seeking federal permits in the future. 'It is not a good way for this administration to accomplish what this administration wants to accomplish,' said Pidot. This story was originally published by Grist with the headline How a Trump effort to cut environmental red tape could backfire on Mar 7, 2025.
Politico
07-02-2025
- Politics
- Politico
‘BACK TO PLASTIC!': Trump says he'll reverse Biden initiative to phase out plastic straws
President Donald Trump said Friday he would sign an executive order next week to undo a Biden-era plan to phase out plastic straws by 2027. 'BACK TO PLASTIC!' Trump wrote on his social media site Truth Social. Paper straws, he continued, 'don't work.' Republicans and Democrats butted heads over straws last summer when the Biden administration announced the federal government, which was the world's largest buyer of consumer goods, would phase out single-use plastics across its buildings. Trump's social media post Friday didn't address other single-use plastic goods, but they could also potentially make a return to government buildings as well. The 83-page report issued by the Biden administration also called for stronger regulations on plastics manufacturing. The squabble over straws and other single-use plastics is a microcosm of a larger debate over whether the federal government should mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Over 90 percent of plastic is derived from fossil fuels that, when combusted, release large amounts of carbon dioxide and fuel climate change, according to the report. The explosion of global plastic production in the past decades has heightened concerns among Democrats about the possible consequences of an untempered climate. 'Tackling plastic pollution and its associated impacts will require unprecedented action at every stage of the plastic lifecycle — from reining in the pollution from petrochemical production that is poisoning communities and driving climate change, to reorienting infrastructure to ensure dramatic increases in recycling and reuse, to investing in innovative materials to replace the pervasive use of plastics in our society,' wrote Brenda Mallory, the then-chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, and Ali Zaidi, the then-White House national climate adviser, in the report. The Biden-era announcement came on the heels of a cultural shift that prompted some in the hospitality industry to switch from plastic to paper straws to help consumers reduce their ecological footprint. Some blue states and jurisdictions also passed laws either outright banning or disincentivizing single-use plastics.
Yahoo
07-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'BACK TO PLASTIC!': Trump says he'll reverse Biden initiative to phase out plastic straws
President Donald Trump said Friday he would sign an executive order next week to undo a Biden-era plan to phase out plastic straws by 2027. 'BACK TO PLASTIC!' Trump wrote on his social media site Truth Social. Paper straws, he continued, 'don't work.' Republicans and Democrats butted heads over straws last summer when the Biden administration announced the federal government, which was the world's largest buyer of consumer goods, would phase out single-use plastics across its buildings. Trump's social media post Friday didn't address other single-use plastic goods, but they could also potentially make a return to government buildings as well. The83-page report issued by the Biden administration also called for stronger regulations on plastics manufacturing. The squabble over straws and other single-use plastics is a microcosm of a larger debate over whether the federal government should mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Over 90 percent of plastic is derived from fossil fuels that, when combusted, release large amounts of carbon dioxide and fuel climate change, according to the report. The explosion of global plastic production in the past decades has heightened concerns among Democrats about the possible consequences of an untempered climate. 'Tackling plastic pollution and its associated impacts will require unprecedented action at every stage of the plastic lifecycle — from reining in the pollution from petrochemical production that is poisoning communities and driving climate change, to reorienting infrastructure to ensure dramatic increases in recycling and reuse, to investing in innovative materials to replace the pervasive use of plastics in our society,' wrote Brenda Mallory, the then-chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, and Ali Zaidi, the then-White House national climate adviser, in the report. The Biden-era announcement came on the heels of a cultural shift that prompted some in the hospitality industry to switch from plastic to paper straws to help consumers reduce their ecological footprint. Some blue states and jurisdictions also passed laws either outright banning or disincentivizing single-use plastics.
