§161.8. General description of the Department's NEPA process. — Inbound Citations

(i) Environmental assessments are not required for actions which it is already known will require the preparation of environmental impact statements. For each major Departmental action which, in the view of the responsible action officer meets the criteria of this section, he shall, in cooperation with theOffice of Environmental Quality and Transboundary Issues, initiate steps to prepare an environmental impact statement. This will be accomplished by preparing a “Notice of intent” to prepare an EIS (see § 1508.22 of the CEQ Regulations). The Office of Environmental Quality and Transboundary Issues shall arrange for publication of the notice in the Federal Register (see § 1507.3(e) of the CEQ Regulations). The responsible action officer shall then apply the procedures set forth in § 161.8 of these regulations to determine the scope of the proposed EIS, and proceed to prepare and release the environmental impact statement in accordance with CEQ and Departmental regulations. If, however, the responsible action officer believes that the proposed action, though included within or closely similar to one which normally requires the preparation of an EIS, will itself have no significant impact, he should conduct an environmental assessment in accordance with the CEQ Regulations (§ 1508.9). If the assessment demonstrates that there will be no significant impact, he should prepare a “Finding of no significant impact” and provide for public review a notice of this finding in accordance with §§ 1501.4(e) and 1506.6 of the CEQ Regulations.