Opinion ID: 805481
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Project Purpose and Alternatives Analysis

Text: [1] Congress created NEPA “to protect the environment by requiring that federal agencies carefully weigh environmental considerations and consider potential alternatives to the proLEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS 8513 posed action before the government launches any major federal action.” Barnes v. U.S. Dep’t of Transp., 655 F.3d 1124, 1131 (9th Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks omitted). Specifically, an EIS under NEPA must “inform decisionmakers and the public of the reasonable alternatives which would avoid or minimize adverse impacts or enhance the quality of the human environment.” 40 C.F.R. § 1502.1; see also 42 U.S.C. § 4332(2)(C)(iii) (an EIS shall include “a detailed statement [on] alternatives to the proposed action”). NEPA regulations describe the alternatives analysis as “the heart of the environmental impact statement.” 40 C.F.R. § 1502.14. The analysis “present[s] the environmental impacts of the proposal and the alternatives in comparative form, thus sharply defining the issues and providing a clear basis for choice among options by the decisionmaker and the public.” Id. [2] The scope of an alternatives analysis depends on the underlying “purpose and need” specified by the agency for the proposed action. City of Carmel-By-The-Sea v. U.S. Dep’t of Transp., 123 F.3d 1142, 1155 (9th Cir. 1997); 40 C.F.R. § 1502.13 (“The [EIS] shall briefly specify the underlying purpose and need to which the agency is responding in proposing the alternatives including the proposed action.” (emphasis added)). The agency need only evaluate alternatives that are “reasonably related to the purposes of the project.” Westlands Water Dist. v. U.S. Dep’t of Interior, 376 F.3d 853, 868 (9th Cir. 2004) (internal quotation marks omitted). The League challenges the EIS’s statement of purpose and need, as well as the range of alternatives that the Service considered. We review the purpose and need, along with the choice of alternatives, under a “reasonableness standard” or “rule of reason.” Id. at 866, 868. We first determine whether the statement of purpose and need was reasonable, and then whether the range of alternatives considered was reasonable in light of that purpose and need. See id. at 865, 868. 8514 LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS
[3] “[T]his court has afforded agencies considerable discretion to define the purpose and need of a project.” Friends of Southeast’s Future v. Morrison, 153 F.3d 1059, 1066 (9th Cir. 1998). “However, this discretion is not unlimited.” Westlands, 376 F.3d at 866. Because they determine the range of reasonable alternatives, an agency cannot define the purpose and need of a project in unreasonably narrow terms. See Nat’l Parks & Conservation Ass’n v. Bureau of Land Mgmt., 606 F.3d 1058, 1070 (9th Cir. 2010). “ ‘[A]n agency may not define the objectives of its action in terms so unreasonably narrow that only one alternative from among the environmentally benign ones in the agency’s power would accomplish the goals of the agency’s action, and the EIS would become a foreordained formality.’ ” Friends of Southeast, 153 F.3d at 1066 (quoting Citizens Against Burlington, Inc. v. Busey, 938 F.2d 190, 196 (D.C. Cir. 1991)). The statement of purpose in the Project’s EIS provides: The primary purpose of the proposed project is to reduce risk to the site by reducing stand densities, and lowering susceptibility to catastrophic loss to insects, disease, and fire. By integrating the need to reduce risk to the site with the research goals of the PNW Research Station, treatments would be imple- mented in such a way that pertinent research ques- tions regarding long-term sustainability of ponderosa pine and mixed conifer forests in a changing climate can be answered. The EIS identifies two needs for the Project. First, “[t]here is a need to address the risk of a severe insect epidemic or catastrophic fire.” Second, “[t]here is a need to provide operational scale research opportunities through a series of thinning and fuel reduction treatments applied across the landscape.” The EIS explains that this second need “comes generally from LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS 8515 the establishment record for the Experimental Forest, and specifically from the study plan.” The EIS then lists the six research questions from the Study Plan that the Project is designed to address. [4] In assessing the reasonableness of a purpose and need specified in an EIS, we must consider the statutory context of the federal action. See Westlands, 376 F.3d at 866 (“Where an action is taken pursuant to a specific statute, the statutory objectives of the project serve as a guide by which to determine the reasonableness of objectives outlined in an EIS.”). Here, two statutes inform the Project’s purpose and need. The Organic Act gives the Service authority to “make provisions for the protection against destruction by fire.” 16 U.S.C. § 551. The Research Act gives the Service authority to carry out in experimental forests any research experiments that it “deems necessary.” Id. § 1642(a). One of the five major areas of research identified in the Research Act is “protecting vegetation and other forest and rangeland resources . . . from fires, insects, [and] diseases.” Id. § 1642(a)(3). The EIS’s dual purpose and need of risk reduction and research opportunities comes directly from these statutory authorities. The League argues that the EIS states “an unreasonably narrow purpose and need” and incorporates “rigid implementation” of the Study Plan. The League contends that, as a result of the narrowness of the stated purpose and need, only a single alternative — the Study Plan — could satisfy them. However, the statement does not incorporate the specifics of the Plan’s proposed experiment. Rather, the statement refers to the Plan because it contains an extensive discussion of the research objectives and working hypotheses behind the six study questions. See Muckleshoot Indian Tribe v. U.S. Forest Serv., 177 F.3d 800, 812-13 (9th Cir. 1999) (per curiam) (statement of purpose and need “appear[ed] too narrow” when read in isolation, but was ultimately reasonable because it “expressly incorporate[d]” broader objectives). 8516 LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS As in Muckleshoot, some language in the EIS, when read in isolation, suggests that the statement of purpose and need contemplates implementation of the Study Plan. For example, the EIS asserts that it compares the alternatives “for their ability to implement the study plan.” The EIS also rejects a proposed alternative on the ground that it “would not meet the purpose and need of implementing the study plan.” When read in context, however, these and similar statements were directed to the six research questions and objectives described in the Plan, rather than to any rigid implementation of the specifics of the Plan. Thus, the first sentence excerpted above reads in full that the EIS compares the alternatives “for their ability to implement the study plan and answer the specific research questions.” (Emphasis added.) Moreover, the stated purpose and need could not have required “rigid implementation” of the Study Plan, as the League maintains, because Alternative 2, the preferred alternative that the Service ultimately selected, removed forty-nine acres of logging from the Plan’s proposed design in response to conservation groups’ concerns about a sensitive cinder butte in the northeast section of the Project area. Alternative 3 deviated even further from the Plan by removing an additional 372 acres in order to reduce the potential impact on spotted owl habitat. The League bases its challenge in part on an argument that the Service created the Study Plan “prior to initiating the NEPA process.” NEPA regulations require that an agency “integrate the NEPA process with other planning at the earliest possible time.” 40 C.F.R. § 1501.2. Here, the Service began the NEPA process nearly a year before the Plan was finally approved. As described above, in April 2008 the Service sent a scoping letter to interested parties and published a notice of intent to prepare an EIS in the Federal Register. A few months later, the Service hosted a field trip in the Unit to discuss the proposed Project with interested parties and then modified its proposal as a result of these discussions. In reviewing an EIS’s statement of purpose and need, the “ ‘touchstone for our inquiry’ ” is whether the resulting alterLEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS 8517 natives analysis “ ‘fosters informed decision-making and informed public participation.’ ” Westlands, 376 F.3d at 868 (quoting California v. Block, 690 F.2d 753, 767 (9th Cir. 1982)). Based on the record before us, we conclude that the purpose and need in the challenged EIS adequately informed decisions by the Service and participation by the public. [5] In sum, given the purpose of the Research Act, the Project’s location in an experimental forest, and the “considerable discretion” we afford agencies in this area, Friends of Southeast, 153 F.3d at 1066, we agree with the district court that the EIS’s statement of purpose and need is reasonable.
[6] NEPA regulations require that an EIS “[r]igorously explore and objectively evaluate all reasonable alternatives” to the proposed action, including alternatives “not within the jurisdiction of the lead agency.” 40 C.F.R. § 1502.14(a), (c). “The existence of a viable but unexamined alternative renders an environmental impact statement inadequate.” Natural Res. Def. Council v. U.S. Forest Serv., 421 F.3d 797, 813 (9th Cir. 2005) (internal quotation marks omitted). However, “the EIS need not consider an infinite range of alternatives, only reasonable or feasible ones.” Westlands, 376 F.3d at 868 (internal quotation marks omitted). An agency need not consider alternatives that “extend beyond those reasonably related to the purposes of the project.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). The agency must also “briefly discuss” the reasons why it eliminated any alternatives from detailed study. 40 C.F.R. § 1502.14(a). The EIS considers in detail a no-action alternative and two action alternatives: Alternative 1 contemplates no action; Alternative 2 would log 27 to 29 million board feet of timber on 2,554 acres; and Alternative 3 would log 23 to 25 million board feet on 2,182 acres. Both action alternatives would divide the Project into approximately 20 units, each of which 8518 LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS would be treated to one of five levels of thinning: (1) no thinning (the control units); (2) thinning to UMZ; (3) thinning to 75 percent of UMZ; (4) thinning to 75 percent of UMZ with creation of small openings; and (5) thinning to 50 percent of UMZ. The EIS also briefly describes six additional alternatives that it excludes from detailed consideration because they would not meet the Project’s dual purpose and need. [7] In another context, an EIS analyzing in detail two action alternatives that differed only in proposed acreage would likely be inadequate. See, e.g., Muckleshoot, 177 F.3d at 812-13 (“[T]he Forest Service failed to consider an adequate range of alternatives [where t]he EIS considered only a no action alternative along with two virtually identical alternatives.”). But we agree with the district court that the special circumstances of a research project in an experimental forest “necessarily narrowed consideration of alternatives.” As the district court observed: The Pringle Falls Experimental [F]orest is, by design, intended to facilitate management, insect, and disease research in ponderosa pine forests east of the Cascades. While the requirements of NEPA still apply, the necessary range of alternatives and hard look are strongly informed by the research objectives of the Forest itself. The Forest Service simply cannot entertain every alternative without regard for elements that are unique to the research forest that accounts for protecting against a major disturbance event that would destroy the ability to carry out ongoing long-term research in the area, or preclude important future research opportunities. The League argues that the Service failed to consider in detail a reasonable alternative that would have retained, either throughout the Project area or within the Eastside Screens, all trees greater than 21 inches in diameter. The League argues that such an alternative would be consistent with the need to LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS 8519 reduce the risk of wildfire and beetle infestation, as well as with the need to provide operational scale research that addresses the Service’s scientific objectives regarding the effects of removing small trees. The EIS explains that the Service briefly considered the League’s proffered alternative, but eliminated it from detailed study because modeling indicated that retaining all trees greater than 21 inches in diameter would not achieve the targeted stand densities and thus not fulfill the Project objectives. [8] In its briefing to us, the Service justifies its rejection of the League’s proffered alternative on two grounds. First, the Service contends that the proposed 21-inch-diameter-limit would not achieve the Project’s risk-reduction purpose. The EIS’s risk-reduction purpose refers to “thinning to the UMZ or below.” The EIS notes that retaining all trees greater than 21 inches in diameter would result in densities “above the recommended UMZ.” Under our prior case law, agencies need not consider in detail proposed alternatives that fail to meet specifically identified targets or densities. See, e.g., Carmel, 123 F.3d at 1155-57 (upholding a statement of purpose and need for a highway project that included a specific level of desired traffic service). [9] Second, the Service contends that the 21-inchdiameter-limit alternative would not fulfill the research purpose of the Project. The Service maintains that the diameterlimit alternative would not yield statistically valid comparative data among the areas specified for different densities of logging. The EIS explains that “leaving all, or more, of the larger trees than is proposed in the study plan would provide biased results that would be considered questionable.” Given the research purpose of the Project and its location in an experimental forest, the EIS does not have to consider in detail an alternative that would not provide the research data that the Service seeks to obtain. The League also argues that the EIS fails to consider in detail an alternative that would retain all trees greater than 12 8520 LEAGUE OF WILDERNESS DEFENDERS v. USFS inches in diameter. However, the EIS expressly rejects the 12inch-diameter-limit alternative because it would not achieve the risk-reduction purpose of the Project. The EIS explains that “[t]hinning only the smallest trees would not reduce stand density enough to reduce the risk of insect and disease-caused mortality.” Accordingly, the EIS does not have to consider this alternative in detail. [10] In sum, the EIS only needs to consider in detail alternatives that would address both of the Project’s stated purposes and needs by meaningfully reducing the risk of beetle infestation and wildfire while attempting to answer the six research questions. See Ariz. Past & Future Found., Inc. v. Lewis, 722 F.2d 1423, 1428 (9th Cir. 1983) (“Alternatives that do not accomplish [both] purposes of the project may properly be rejected as imprudent.”). The League has failed to identify a “viable but unexamined alternative” that would satisfy both these goals. Natural Res. Def. Council, 421 F.3d at 813. Accordingly, we hold that the range of alternatives considered in the EIS is reasonable.