White House Gives Agencies Guide to Weigh Climate in Permits (1)

The White House on Friday released its long-awaited guidance telling agencies how to consider the climate impacts of proposed projects.

As a whole, the new instructions could provide a legal backbone to agency permitting decisions, clearing up ambiguity over whether a given agency went far enough in analyzing a proposed project’s effect on the climate.

The Council on Environmental Quality’s guidance recommends that agencies make sure the depth of the analysis they undertake is proportional to a project’s impact. But the document also gives agencies clearance to undertake less detailed analyses for projects that ...