Environmental plan ignores impact on Texas
The Trump administration continued its march to unravel critical environmental protections that Texans, and all Americans, count on last week when it took aim at the half-century-old National Environmental Policy Act, the first and most fundamental modern conservation law.
This law, often called the “Magna Carta” of our environmental protections, embodies the simple, but essential, idea that federal decision-makers should look before they leap when planning or approving major infrastructure projects like pipelines, highways, bridges, reservoirs and levees.
The administration’s proposal would roll back virtually every facet of the law’s requirements, including eviscerating the public’s right to be heard. It would completely eliminate environmental review for many types of projects, make it harder for the public to provide input, place arbitrary time limits on project reviews and severely limit the types of impacts that can be looked at. For example, the proposal expressly eliminates the requirement that the government consider a project’s “cumulative impacts,” which could include things like pollution or land loss or other incremental but harmful changes over time. Importantly, in these times of crippling drought and flood inducing storms, it could eliminate consideration of climate impacts.
It simply does not add up to take climate and other large-scale impact assessments out of the equation for federal decision-makers. Whether it’s the proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline, the proposed North Houston Highway Improvement Project or plans to build a storm barrier on the Texas coast, these projects must be considered in the context of the future conditions we will be facing.
This last example, known to Houstonians as the Coastal Spine, is especially instructive because input from the public through the National Environmental Policy Act has led to proposed changes in this U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project that will better satisfy the needs of coastal communities and better protect local fish and wildlife.
The Coastal Spine project has grabbed headlines since its inception because the Upper Texas Coast and the Galveston Bay ecosystem are incredibly important to Texas. It is the site of major oil and gas activity, and its rich biological diversity supports fisheries and other wildlife in the Gulf of Mexico. Additionally, millions of people call this area home and rely on the upper coast for their livelihoods. With a price tag in the tens of billions of dollars, the project faces intense scrutiny.
The project got underway when Hurricane Ike slammed into Galveston Bay in September 2008. The original plan to protect the Texas coast, however, did not fully evaluate long-term and cumulative impacts to the Galveston Bay system, in particular how changes in water quality and salinity would impact critical fisheries. In its initial plan, the Corps proposed a series of levees and seawalls that would have harmed birds such as piping plovers and red knots, as well as the many species of sea turtles that frequent the bay. The National Environmental Policy Act provides the means for the affected residents to provide vital input.
As a result of widespread public feedback from area residents, commercial fishing interests, conservation groups and others, the Army Corps of Engineers is completely eliminating from its plan the barrier levee originally proposed along Galveston Island and the Bolivar Peninsula. Instead the Corps is investigating an engineered dune and beach system, which has the potential to better mimic a natural system. The Corps is continuing to hold open houses to keep the dialogue flowing with residents, and once they release an updated draft plan that includes the new dune feature, expected to be in fall 2020, a second public review and comment period will open.
This is just one example of how the National Environmental Policy Act strengthens federal decision-making and makes it more responsive — and of what could be lost through the Trump administration’s proposed shortcuts.
The president and his aides have argued for their policy changes by saying too many projects spend years tied up in red tape. In fact, the vast majority of projects undergo fast-tracked environmental review or are excluded from National Environmental Policy Act process entirely.
When President Nixon signed the National Environmental Policy Act into law on Jan. 1, 1970, he called it a fitting moment — the first day of a new decade — to reflect on the challenges facing the environment.
Half a century later, the National Environmental Policy Act has done much to address these challenges to our water, wildlife, way of life and natural world. But there is still much work to do, which makes President Trump’s decision at the dawn of this decade to drill into this foundational, bedrock environmental law tragically misguided.