NEPA: How Environmental Activists Hold Things Up

Intellectual Takeout just launched a new section in the library under Environmental Law on the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). With NEPA published, we'll be moving away from environmental law topics, focusing a bit more on climate change, and then moving on to economics.

As stated in the Act, the purposes of NEPA are:  "To declare a national policy which will encourage productive and enjoyable harmony between man and his environment; to promote efforts which will prevent or eliminate damage to the environment and biosphere and stimulate the health and welfare of man; to enrich the understanding of the ecological systems and natural resources important to the Nation; and to establish a Council on Environmental Quality." To achieve the purposes the act requires environmental impact studies be performed before any federal action takes place, which includes military and transportation projects.

Environmental activists have become adept at using the act to slow or prevent transportation projects, mining and lumber harvesting, and even military projects. How successful? Well, last year the United States Supreme Court had to overturn lower court rulings based on NEPA because those rulings prevented the U.S. Navy from using mid-frequency active sonar in its submarine training exercises. Really. The U.S. Navy had to shut its sonar down in submarines if a marine mammal was spotted within 2,200 yards (1.25 miles).

Now, what gets interesting about NEPA is that some limited-government folks have realized that reducing the power of federal agencies is next to impossible currently (hopefully, our generation will change that). Nonetheless, the same tactics the environmental activists use with NEPA could be applied to other issues to actually reduce the power of government or to at least "stack the deck" against various federal and state agencies. Essentially, limited-government activists would try to get NEPA-like regulation passed at the federal and state level that would make government action on various issues (think taking homes) very difficult. It's an interesting idea.

One last thing to watch with NEPA is how "shovel-ready" transportation projects for the current federal stimulus bill may not be quite so "shovel-ready." NEPA can add 4 to 6 years on to a transportation project. Let's hope this recession is over in 4 to 6 years.