much more remains to be done to make the policy of the act a living reality in all the major decisions of the Federal Government that significantly affect the environment, an important start has been made. This is a big job, and responsibility for carrying out the policy of the act will require support from all three branches of our Government the executive branch agencies, the Congress, and the courts— as well as from the public.

First, let me give you 10 specifics as to our progress with the environmental impact statement requirement:

1. The President on our recommendation gave detailed policy guidance on the act in his Executive Order 11514 of March 5, which directed all agencies to comply with the environmental impact statement requirement, assigned our Council responsibility for issuing guidelines on that requirement, and established our policy that all agencies must "develop procedures to insure the fullest practicable provision of timely public information and understanding of Federal plans and programs with environmental impact in order to obtain the views of interested parties."

2. We issued guidelines on the environmental impact statement procedure at the end of April after consulting over 20 agencies, and published them in the Federal Register of May 12 (35 F.R. 7391).

3. In response to our guidelines, 19 Departments and agencies, about half of which have significant amounts of activity to which the section 102(2) (C) procedure would apply, have established procedures providing for compliance with the environmental impact statement requirement. We have furnished these procedures to you and you have printed them. We have already mailed out over 600 of these to interested members of the public.

4. There have now been approximately 300 draft and final "102" statements submitted to our Council, and in November the rate of receipt of these statements approximated 100 a month. In our latest public listing of these statements there were 201 final environmental impact statements from 13 Departments and agencies. In addition, nine agencies have agreed to our listing 62 of their draft statements. All of these statements are available to Congress and the public from the responsible agencies.

5. We accelerated by 10 months the requirement in section 103 of the act that agencies review their authority, regulations, policies, and procedures to identify deficiencies or inconsistencies which would prohibit full compliance with the act. All the principal agencies affected have now replied and we have made copies of these "103" reports available to your staff. There appear to be no significant deficiencies or inconsistencies that will prevent agencies from complying with the act's requirements, including those in section 102.

6. As suggested in your conference report on the act, we have issued a memorandum identifying what we regard as those Federal agencies with "jurisdiction by law or special expertise" to make impact statements. This memorandum also has been published in your hearings and circulated to the public.

7. We have visited the major agencies concerned and given extensive briefings to the staff leadership on the priority and importance of full compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act. In every case we have met a desire to comply with the act.

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8. We have made oral or written comments from time to time to various agencies designed to help improve the quality of their procedures and environmental impact statements. These have included comments on a number of individual draft impact statements. Our very limited staff, by working around the clock and with great individual statements we receive, but any systematic review must await an increase in our staffing. At this time, we are awaiting congressional action on our fiscal 1971 appropriation.

9. We have taken the initiative to keep the public informed on our steps to implement the act by periodic mailings which now reach over 600 conservation and environmental groups, and other persons in the press, Congress, and the agencies who have asked to receive this material. Most recently, by notice in the Federal Register we have invited public comments and suggestions as to changes in our guidelines.

10. We have interpreted our mandate broadly in order to give the National Environmental Policy Act maximum impact. For example, we recently filed a memorandum with the Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service pointing out the application of the act to public interest litigation to protect the environment. The Commissioner, in announcing his recent favorable decision on this question, acknowledged in particular the assistance of our memorandum. We have taken steps to bring the Council into policy decisions taken by the Department of Justice in litigation arising under the act. We have helped bring the message of the act's policy to agencies of the Government which had not previously considered that their actions had environmental implications such as the Interstate Commerce Commission, whose freight rate decisions can have great significance for our efforts to promote recycling of junked automobiles and, I might add, for other recycling objectives.

It is on the basis of such efforts as the 10 listed above that we say an important start has been made with implementation of the act.

I would like to revert now to my earlier comment that successful implementation of the act will require the support of all three branches of the Federal Government-including Congress and the judiciary as well as the executive branch.

I have listed 10 specifics as to action we have taken to give strong support to full implementation of the act. What is not generally realized by the public amidst press reports of specific problem areas is the very considerable turnaround the act and our efforts have effected on agency procedures. The Corps of Engineers, for example, on September 25 issued new rules on the preparation of environmental impact statements which should do as much as procedure can to protect environmental values.

I am submitting a copy for the record.

Mr. DINGELL. Without objection, that will be inserted at the point which you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the staff, agree is appropriate.

(See p. 453, Appendix A, for document mentioned.)

Mr. TRAIN. You will note that under these procedures, not only draft environmental statements but also preliminary draft statements are available to interested citizen groups. I hope that in your hearings

you will bring out the very important proenvironmental elements the Corps has built into its procedure.

I also would draw your attention to the very significant impact the act has had on the AEC. The Commission is in the process of publishing new regulations-I believe these were published last Friday-that reflect the fact that NEPA has given AEC jurisdiction to consider other environmental factors than radiological health and safety in its licensing program and which give full opportunity for evaluation of the environmental aspects of nuclear plants. Again, the draft environmental impact statements are available to the public. I hope you will bring out these very responsive developments in your hearings with the Commission.

We are just beginning to have test cases on congressional response to the National Environmental Policy Act. As I am sure you are aware, the Senate and House Public Works Committees held up action on the current rivers and harbors bill until section 102 statements were received on the Corps of Engineers projects involved. There can be no more persuasive message to the agencies of our Government than a congressional practice of not acting on their proposals until there has been satisfactory compliance with NEPA. I would like to note also that as the pressure for compliance with NEPA grows, there may be a temptation in some committees of Congress to tailor separate and special environmental impact analysis procedures for the programs they are interested in. This appears to be happening with respect to the highway program, and there have been a number of initiatives to write a separate Environmental Policy Act for the Corps of Engineers. We would hope that Congress will remain persuaded of the wisdom of generally applicable environmental policy legislation and of holding all Government operations to the same high standard. Undoubtedly, your committee and the Senate Interior Committee will have something to say on this subject.

Having touched on the responsibilities of the executive branch and the Congress for the successful implementation of NEPA, I would like to refer briefly to the work of the courts, which have already had over 20 cases involving NEPA. The majority of the decisions appear to our Council to be sound. The act has been found to expand the range of factors to be considered in a Government licensing action to include environmental factors (Zabel v. Tabb, 5th Cir., July 16, 1970). The environmental impact statement requirement can be enforced by an environmental group's application for an injunction. (Wilderness Society v. Hickel, (D.C., D.C., April 23, 1970); Texas Committee on Natural Resources v. U.S. (W.D. Tex. 1970); Sierra Club v. Resor (D.C., Arizona, 1970).) On the other hand, there is as yet only one appellate decision, and there are many cases awaiting decision. I would suggest that we need to watch the process of judicial interpretation of the act closely to see if there is any need for clarification of the law.

The final factor in implementation of the act I would like to touch on is the matter of public information. You will find attached to my statement a copy of my recent letter to your chairman pointing out that our policy is the fullest practicable disclosure to the public of environmental information in advance of decision or action. As to

what sort of rule or rules should apply, let me draw your attention to the following statement in our letter:

Our view is that the National Environmental Policy Act is so general in its language, so innovative in its procedures and so all-embracing in the range of Government activities included that, rather than make new across-the-board requirements, we should evolve appropriate procedures for the various major categories of activity involved. For example, in the case of proposals for. or reports on, legislation, there would not seem to be a reason why the public should see an environmental impact statement before Congress does. In other administrative actions we can often build on existing requirements for hearings or notice to the public. In still other cases (for example GSA land purchases), advance disclosure of the Government's purchase intentions would probably prejudice chances for economical purchase.

The Council believes strongly that the public should be brought into the decision-making process as it affects the environment to the fullest extent practicable. It was at our recommendation that Section 2(b) of Executive Order 11514, quoted above, was adopted. Our guidelines have instructed all agencies to develop procedures for the implementation of Section 2(b). Most agencies have now done so. In response to our initiative, a number of agencies (such as the Corps of Engineers, Atomic Energy Commission and Federal Power Commission) are making draft environmental impact statements available to the public at, or prior to, the time of public hearings.

The Council's interim guidelines provide for review of the Section 102(2) (C) guidelines this coming December and the issuance of such supplements as may then seem necessary. We intend to solicit public comment and suggestion as part of this review process. Likewise, we would naturally be greatly interested in the views of those Committees and Members of Congress closely associated with the development of the legislation in question.

Mr. DINGELL. Without objection, the full text of your response and the original letter from the Chair to you on this matter will be inserted in the record. (See p. 1, app. A.)

Mr. TRAIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I expect that we will review the proposed revisions in our guidelines in due course with your staff. One possibility that would be appropriate in many cases would be a rule that, with respect to administrative actions as contrasted with legislative proposals or reports-all draft environmental impact statements should be made available to the public at the same time they are circulated for comment. There would have to be some specifically enumerated exceptions for such cases as the GSA land purchase or Department of Defense or State Department national security matters.

As I have mentioned, we are ourselves conducting a thorough review of our own guidelines, agency procedures and agency performance. We will follow your hearings closely, and in January we hope to make a further report on our findings. We have also, as I have noted, invited agency and public comment on changes in our guidelines. At this point, while these reviews have yet to be received, I am not able to say whether changes in the act itself are necessary. We have had about 6 months of growing agency compliance, perhaps a half dozen lower court decisions and one court of appeals ruling, a period when many agency actions were the completion of processes well advanced prior to passage of the act, and we and the interested committees of Congress were evolving policy on rules for implementing the act.

It seems to us that what we need to do at the moment is to complete our review of proposals to revise our guidelines, to check agency performance and procedures, to institute such new rules as are necessary and to invite the support of the agencies, the Congress, the courts and

the public to make the act work. I leave open the question of amendment of the act and am, of course, most interested in hearing your views.

I believe the hearings which this committee has scheduled should provide a very constructive body of information and discussion for the guidance of our Council as well as the Congress.

I thank you.

Mr. DINGELL. Chairman Train, the Chair wishes to commend you for a very fine statement and for the fine job you and the Council have been doing. I would like to echo the comments you have made that these are intended to be constructive hearings, first of all to gather information and, second, to try to find out if the agencies are complying with the provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act and, third, how the act may be improved.

It is, of course, our purpose to work with you openly and fully and frankly and fairly in the carrying out of these goals which you have so admirably begun.

Mr. Pelly?

Mr. PELLY. Mr. Chairman, I want to associate myself with your expressed admiration for this progress report. I think the report speakes for itself.

I can only say that, as I observe changes on the local level and see such remarkable changes as we have now in the Corps of Engineers, with their new policy of protection of the environment, I feel very optimistic that we are now headed in the right direction.

I certainly feel that there must be some real recognition on the part of some of the agencies now that they are a part of this whole program. I noted over the weekend, for example, that we are taking certain chemical or biological warfare supplies and keeping them out of the State of Washington and the State of Oregon. I know Mr. Dellenback will know what I am talking about. We are sending them out to Johnston Island. This indicates that, at long last, the military is recognizing this environmental problem.

Also, last Saturday all Members of the Congress, I think, received a report from the Navy on their dumping of oil, and we are watching that situation carefully.

I certainly want to commend the members of the Council and you, Chairman Train, for your fine report, and look forward hopefully to a further followup when the 92d Congress convenes, when we may be called on for some changes.

In any event, I hope you get budget support so you can keep up with all these reports that are coming in. I think you will have probably to work out some system for compiling the data that you get. Maybe we will even have legislation before too long on that score.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. DINGELL. Thank you, Mr. Pelly.

Mr. Karth?

Mr. KARTH. I have no questions at this time, Mr. Chairman. Thank

you.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Dellenback?

Mr. DELLENBACK. I appreciate the statement very much, Mr. Train. I think the thing that runs all the way through your statement, and particularly your letter to the chairman, which I have had a chance to