On June 24, 2026, EPA issued a news release announcing reforms to the way it implements the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). EPA predicts the changes will “make environmental reviews faster, clearer, and more predictable so America can build more, without lowering a single environmental standard.”

According to the news release, “NEPA has been turned into a weapon to delay and block the very projects communities need — roads, bridges, energy, and water infrastructure — burying them under years of paperwork and litigation while delivering little for the environment in return.”

Fewer Pages, Less Time, and More CEs
The news release highlighted several important aspects of the proposal. Projects must still comply with environmental requirements; the protections are not changed, only the process. The environmental impact statement (EIS) must be 150 pages or less; extraordinarily complex actions can be up to 300 pages. EPA must finish the EIS within two years. The NEPA analysis will be limited to the proposed action and its reasonably foreseeable effects; speculative or indirect effects will not be within the scope. EPA will have “a fast, straightforward process” for establishing new categorical exclusions (CEs) and adopting the CEs of other agencies. Actions that meet CEs will typically not require an EIS or an environmental assessment.

Align with Other Agencies
The proposal will “harmonize EPA’s reforms with those underway across the federal government.” This will align EPA’s procedures with “the Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Interior, Energy, Defense, and Transportation, as well as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — as part of the Trump Administration’s whole-of-government push to streamline permitting and deliver efficient, timely environmental reviews.”

To see the news release https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/epa-proposes-commonsense-nepa-reforms-get-america-building-again