[CPEO-BIF] California: Climate Change and Development

[Lenny Siegel <lennysiegel@gmail.com>]

California Establishes Ground Rules for Assessing Climate Change Impacts 
for Development Projects


Heather S. Bowman, Jennifer Hernandez, and Abigail Leah "Abby" Ramsden
Holland & Knight "Environment"
June 23, 2008

On June 19, 2008, the Governor's Office of Planning and Research (OPR) 
released a Technical Advisory explaining how impacts and mitigation 
measures from climate change and "greenhouse gas" (GHG) emissions should 
be addressed in environmental impact reports prepared for residential, 
commercial and industrial development and other projects under the 
California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). This guidance will likely 
influence environmental impact analyses prepared under the National 
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and similar state statutes.

The new guidance expands on existing California climate change 
legislation aimed at enforcing GHG reductions (AB 32), and requiring 
consideration of GHG issues in environmental analysis documents for a 
broad spectrum of projects (SB 97).

The Advisory begins by providing a background on the science of climate 
change and how it arises in the CEQA context. CEQA does not prescribe 
thresholds of significance for any given environmental impact; instead, 
the statute encourages public agencies to adopt their own thresholds. 
This determination presents a particular challenge in the framework of a 
climate change analysis, where science continues to evolve and effects 
are measured on a global scale. As a result, OPR has asked the Air 
Resources Board (ARB) technical staff to recommend a method for setting 
thresholds that will encourage a consistent approach statewide. In the 
meantime, this Advisory provides informal guidance for lead agencies 
attempting to make and mitigate a GHG threshold of significance 
determination.

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.hklaw.com/id24660/PublicationId2411/ReturnId31/contentid51663/

--


Lenny Siegel
Executive Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
a project of the Pacific Studies Center
278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org



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