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Federal enviro review process gets mixed reactions at N.M. hearing
APRIL REESE, GREENWIRE 8/02/05
RIO RANCHO, N.M.—The federal government's primary environmental review law yesterday was criticized as cumbersome and costly by industry group witnesses at a House Resources Committee hearing in New Mexico, an area that has seen intense controversy over natural gas drilling and other activities on federal lands.
But other witnesses praised the National Environmental Policy Act for providing critical public input on federal decisionmaking and preventing unnecessary damage to natural resources.
NEPA requires an environmental review process before development projects can be approved on federal properties or federally funded. But a House Resources panel has been tasked with evaluating whether that process as now followed may be in need of revision. NEPA has been widely criticized by the energy industry for delaying much-needed domestic drilling because of the act's sometimes lengthy study periods and public reviews. Task Force Chairwoman Cathy McMorris (R-Wash.) said NEPA has led to widespread lawsuits, delayed economic development projects and costs taxpayers money. McMorris: "The question before this task force is 'can we do better for our economy and for our environment?'"
The hearing—overseen by McMorris and Reps. Tom Udall of New Mexico (D), Raul Grijalva of Arizona (D), Chris Cannon of Utah (R)—is the fourth in a series being held across the country. It comes as President Bush prepares to sign an energy bill that would provide myriad incentives for oil and gas companies to increase domestic production, much of it on federal land subject to the NEPA process.
"The sad fact of the 30-plus years' history of NEPA implementation has shown that the permitting process associated with NEPA compliance is vastly longer and more cumbersome than it needs to be," said Duane Zavadil, vice president for government and regulatory affairs for the Bill Barrett Corp. in Denver, during the congressional panel hearing, adding that the law "invites costly litigation."
And NEPA-related problems have grown worse in recent years, said David Brown of BP America's Rocky Mountain office.
"I have seen a trend of increased complexity, voluminous texts and rising costs," he told the task force.
It is taking more time to receive approval for a drilling project, even as new technologies have greatly reduced environmental effects, added Richard Fraley, a vice president for Burlington Resources, which extracts natural gas in the San Juan River Basin in New Mexico and Colorado.
NEPA has also caused headaches for ranchers and the timber industry, requiring elaborate reviews for small improvements to ranching operations and tying up salvage logging projects in burned areas, witnesses said.
But several panelists cautioned that without the law, the public would have no say in the federal decisionmaking process, and ecologically important lands across the intermountain West would not be as well protected as they are today.
"Since its conception, NEPA has been our best and brightest weapon against the destruction we saw before its passage," said Joanna Prukop, New Mexico's secretary of energy, minerals and natural resources.
Rancher Tweeti Blancett, whose family runs cattle in the San Juan Basin in northern New Mexico, told the panel that oil and gas development has ravaged their federal grazing allotment.
Martin Heinrich, a city councilman for the city of Albuquerque, N.M., who has been involved in the debate over protection of the endangered silvery minnow in the Rio Grande, called NEPA "an important avenue of communication" between local government and the federal government. For instance, a controversial drinking water project for the city of Albuquerque that underwent NEPA review ended up being improved because of it, he said.
Recommendations from witnesses at Monday's hearing included requiring federal agencies to cooperate more closely with state governments; strengthening the socioeconomic analyses conducted under the act; involving stakeholders throughout the NEPA process, not just during comment periods; and creating a central "NEPA coordination office" to handle large projects.
Congress recently included some directives in the energy bill aimed at streamlining the NEPA process. The bill, which President Bush is expected to sign into law Monday, directs the secretary of Interior to set deadlines for processing leases and drilling applications "in accordance with the best management practices." It also directs Interior to apply the "categorical exclusion" option in NEPA to energy projects under certain circumstances, such as when the surface disturbance is less than five acres or when a new well will be in the same area where drilling has occurred within the previous five years.
The NEPA task force plans to hold two more hearings, at least one of which will be in the Southeast, before deciding in September whether to make recommendations to Congress on changes to NEPA, McMorris said.
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