As part of the Trump Administration’s ongoing efforts to accelerate the permitting process for oil pipelines and other large infrastructure projects, the White House released on Thursday a plan to cut the timelines for such projects by omitting the assessment of a project’s climate impact. The new plan is proposed by the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), and if it becomes law, it could be the first major amendment to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in forty years. “The proposed rule seeks to reduce unnecessary paperwork and delays, and to promote better decision-making consistent with NEPA’s statutory requirements,” Reuters quoted a CEQ fact sheet about the proposed rule it has seen. Under the new proposal, federal permitting agencies and regulators would not be obliged to assess and factor in the impact on climate of major infrastructure projects, including oil pipelines. The Administration is pushing to have […]