Neal McAliley Interviewed in the Washington Examiner: “NEPA: What It Is and Why It Is Central to the Permitting Reform Debate”

Neal McAliley was interviewed in a Washington Examiner article titled “NEPA: What It Is and Why It Is Central to the Permitting Reform Debate.” The article discusses how the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) has become the center of debate as Congress seeks to speed up and simplify developers’ ability to obtain federal approvals for projects.

NEPA is widely considered the first major environmental law in the U.S. and requires all federal agencies to consider and review the environmental effects of proposed projects requiring federal approval. “Before this law, there really wasn’t anything that required an evaluation of environmental effects in general,” said McAliley. “Unlike other laws like the Endangered Species Act or Clean Water Act, or various other laws that may affect federal decisions, this one is broad brush.”

Members of Congress want to pass legislation that would establish meaningful reforms to the permitting process, and while there is a consensus that reforms are needed, McAliley warned that some might be focusing on the wrong part. “People have blamed NEPA for allowing project opponents blocking projects through lawsuits, but it is actually a tiny percentage of all the cases,” he said, explaining that research has found less than 1% of all NEPA actions are subject to a court challenge.

A 2019 study by researchers at the University of Utah found that only one in 450 NEPA decisions, out of 1,499 published between 2001 and 2013, prompted litigation. “NEPA litigation is really not the key issue when it comes to permit reform,” McAliley said. “If only less than 1% of all approvals, NEPA documents, are challenged in court, how can you say the litigation is the issue?”

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