A New Day Dawning? Regional and Compensatory Mitigation on Public Lands

Abstract

As the Obama Administration continues to implement its “all-of-the-above” energy strategy, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) continues to grapple with its multiple responsibilities for this strategy. It has labored to support energy development and address its impacts on natural, cultural, historical, and scenic resources and values. Given the size and nature of most renewable (and conventional) energy projects and infrastructure needs, the impacts are likely to be great and enduring. Climate change’s impacts also will be cumulative and long-lasting. To help achieve its many and diverse policy objectives, DOI has developed a compensatory landscape-scale mitigation strategy, and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has developed a regional compensatory mitigation policy. The BLM has also begun developing Solar Regional Mitigation Strategies for its Solar Energy Zones (SEZ), which it delineated in the Final Solar Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement. DOI, the BLM, and other bureaus are taking bold steps toward landscape-scale mitigation. Implementation of the strategies in the field is still in the very early stages, and many questions are yet to be answered, or even posed. Importantly, these strategies are just one step - though an enormous one - towards achieving the overarching goals of compensatory mitigation. The question is whether these strategies will lead to better and more durable compensatory mitigation, while allowing critical infrastructure projects to proceed under transparent and consistent standards. This article examines the new policy initiatives, raising a number of questions about scope of authority and limits to ability to require offsite, remote mitigation, for example. It also makes predictions and prescriptions for the both land users and managers going forward.

Keywords: compensatory, mitigation, offsite, landscape-scale, regional, landscape-level, Interior, BLM, Bureau of Land Management, solar, renewable energy

JEL Classification: D8, D81, R5, R52, R53, R58, L7, L71, L72, L70, K32, K3, K2, K23