Opinion ID: 801892
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Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Commission’s Obligations Under NEPA

Text: The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (“NEPA”), 42 U.S.C. § 4321 et seq., requires federal agencies such as the Commission to examine and report on the environmental consequences of their actions. NEPA is an “essentially procedural” statute intended to ensure “fully informed and wellconsidered” decisionmaking, but not necessarily the best decision. Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. NRDC, 435 U.S. 519, 558 (1978). Under NEPA, each federal agency must prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (“EIS”) before taking a “major Federal action[] significantly affecting the quality of the human environment.” 42 U.S.C. § 4332(2)(C). An agency can avoid preparing an EIS, however, if it conducts an Environmental Assessment (“EA”) and makes a Finding of No Significant Impact (“FONSI”). See Sierra Club v. Dep’t of Transp., 753 F.2d 120, 127 (D.C. Cir. 1985); see also Theodore Roosevelt Conservation P'ship v. Salazar, 616 F.3d 497, 503–04 (D.C. Cir. 2010) (explaining NEPA procedures in detail). The issuance or reissuance of a reactor license is a major federal action affecting the quality of the human environment. See New York v. Nuclear Regulatory Comm’n, 589 F.3d 551, 553 (2d Cir. 2009). 8 The parties here dispute whether the WCD itself constitutes a major federal action. To petitioners, the WCD is a major federal action because it is a predicate to every decision to license or relicense a nuclear plant, and the findings made in the WCD are not challengeable at the time a plant seeks licensure. The Commission contends that because the WCD does not authorize the licensing of any nuclear reactor or storage facility, and because a site-specific EIS will be conducted for each facility at the time it seeks licensure, the WCD is not a major federal action. To the Commission, the WCD is simply an answer to this court’s mandate in Minnesota to ensure that plants are only licensed while the NRC has reasonable assurance that permanent disposal of the resulting waste will be available. The Commission also contends that the WCD constitutes an EA supporting the revision of 10 C.F.R. § 51.23(a), and because the EA found no significant environmental impact, an EIS is not required. We agree with petitioners that the WCD rulemaking is a major federal action requiring either a FONSI or an EIS. The Commission’s contrary argument treating the WCD as separate from the individual licensing decisions it enables fails under controlling precedent. We have long held that NEPA requires that “environmental issues be considered at every important stage in the decision making process concerning a particular action.” Calvert Cliffs' Coordinating Comm., Inc. v. Atomic Energy Comm'n, 449 F.2d 1109, 1118 (D.C. Cir. 1971). The WCD makes generic findings that have a preclusive effect in all future licensing decisions—it is a pre-determined “stage” of each licensing decision. NEPA established the Council on Environmental Quality (“CEQ”) “with authority to issue regulations interpreting it.” Dep’t of Transp. v. Public Citizen, 541 U.S. 752, 757 (2004). The CEQ has defined major federal actions to include actions with 9 “[i]ndirect effects, which are caused by the action and are later in time or farther removed in distance, but are still reasonably foreseeable.” 40 C.F.R. §§ 1508.8, 1508.18; Public Citizen, 541 U.S. at 763; see also Andrus v. Sierra Club, 442 U.S. 347, 358 (1979) (holding that the CEQ’s NEPA interpretations are entitled to substantial deference); accord CTIA-Wireless Ass’n v. FCC, 466 F.3d 105, 115 (D.C. Cir. 2006). It is not only reasonably forseeable but eminently clear that the WCD will be used to enable licensing decisions based on its findings. The Commission and the intervenors contend that the site-specific factors that differ from plant to plant can be challenged at the time of a specific plant’s licensing, but the WCD nonetheless renders uncontestable general conclusions about the environmental effects of plant licensure that will apply in every licensing decision. See 10 C.F.R. § 51.23(b). Petitioners’ argument continues by suggesting that the WCD lacks an EIS and must be reversed on that basis. Not necessarily. No EIS is required if the agency conducts an EA and issues a FONSI sufficiently explaining why the proposed action will not have a significant environmental impact. Public Citizen, 541 U.S. at 757–58. Though we give considerable deference to an agency’s decision regarding whether to prepare an EIS, the agency must 1) “accurately identif[y] the relevant environmental concern,” 2) take a “hard look at the problem in preparing its EA,” 3) make a “convincing case for its finding of no significant impact,” and 4) show that even if a significant impact will occur, “changes or safeguards in the project sufficiently reduce the impact to a minimum.” Taxpayers of Michigan Against Casinos v. Norton, 433 F.3d 852, 861 (D.C. Cir. 2006) (internal quotation omitted). An agency’s decision not to prepare an EIS must be set aside if it is “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” Public Citizen, 541 U.S. at 763 (quoting 5 U.S.C. § 706(2)(A)). 10