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  NOAA Environmental Check List for Proposed Actions*

  Date:

  Name:

  Project Number:

  Detailed project description: (please be as specific as possible; include
  breakdown of tasks, scope of project, schedule (for example, date
  construction begins, duration of activities, completion date), budget,
  points of contact, and any permits required ):
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CONDITION FOR PROPOSED ACTIONS Present
Yes No Need Data
1. Is the action likely to be inconsistent with any applicable Federal, State, Indian tribal, or local law, regulation, or standard designed to protect any aspect of the environment?

Consider whether the action is likely to have effects that would be inconsistent with such authorities as:
  • EPA's solid waste management guidelines;
  • Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) noise standards;
  • A State Implementation Plan (SIP) under the Clean Air Act;
  • Executive Order 11988 (Floodplain protection);
  • Executive Order 12072 (Development in central business areas);
  • Executive Order 13006 (Priority use of historic properties);
  • A State's Coastal Zone Management Plan; or
  • Applicable state, Indian tribal, or local environmental protection, historic preservation, noise control, visual impact, or social impact control ordinances.

Also consider whether the action is likely to need a permit under the Clean Air Act (CAA), Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA), or another authority related to environmental protection, and whether it might affect environmental resources held in trust for Indian tribes by the U.S. Government, such as lands or other resources to which tribes have rights by treaty.

      
2. Is the action likely to have results that are inconsistent with locally desired social, economic, or other environmental conditions?

Consider whether the action is likely to:
  • Change traffic patterns or increase traffic volumes;
  • Have access constraints;
  • Affect a congested intersection;
  • Result in housing workers or others more than one-quarter of a mile from public transit;
  • Require substantial new utilities;
  • Be inconsistent with existing zoning, surrounding land use, or the official land use plan for the specific site and/or the affected delineated area;
  • Be regarded as burdensome by local or regional officials or the public, because of infrastructure demands (e.g., sewer, water, utilities, street system, public transit);
  • Change the use of park lands;
  • Change the use of prime farm lands;
  • Change the use of a floodplain;
  • Alter a wetland;
  • Be located on or near a wildlife refuge, a designated wilderness, a wild and scenic river, a National Natural Landmark, a National Historic Landmark, designated open space, or a designated conservation area;
  • Be located on or near an area under study for any such designation;
  • Be located on or near any other environmentally critical area; or
  • Have adverse visual, social, atmospheric, traffic, or other effects on such a critical area even though it is NOT located on or near the area.

      
3. Is the action likely to result in the use, storage, release and/or disposal of toxic, hazardous, or radioactive materials, or in the exposure of people to such materials?

Consider whether the action is likely to result in the use, storage, release, and/or disposal of toxic materials such as fertilizers, cleaning solvents, or laboratory wastes, or of hazardous materials such as explosives.

Also consider whether the action:

  • Involves a facility that may contain polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) electric transformers, urea formaldehyde, or friable asbestos.
  • Would be on or near an EPA or State Superfund, or priority cleanup site.
  • Involves construction on or near an active or abandoned toxic, hazardous or radioactive materials generation, storage, transportation or disposal site.
  • Involves construction on or near a site where remediation of such materials has occurred
  • Involves use of a site that contains underground storage tanks (USTs), as evidenced by historical data or physical evidence such as vent pipes or fill caps.
  • Involves water pipes and/or water supply appurtenances that contain lead in excess of EPA standards.
  • Involves a facility or water supply that may contain radon in excess of the EPA action level.
You may need to conduct a background historical study and field inspection to determine whether it is likely that hazardous, toxic, or radioactive materials are present. Historical data such as chains of title and tax records can reveal whether activities have taken place there that could have released hazardous, toxic, or radioactive materials into the site, and whether USTs are likely to be present. Field inspection may reveal evidence of USTs such as vent pipes or fill caps, and evidence of site contamination such as stressed vegetation, soil surface stains, suspicious drums, cans, and other possible waste containers, or ponds, pits, sumps or ditches with suspicious odors or smells.

     
4. Is the action likely to adversely affect a significant aspect of the natural environment?

Consider whether the action is likely to:
  • Affect an endangered or threatened species, or its critical habitat;
  • Affect a species under consideration for listing as endangered or threatened, or its critical habitat;
  • Alter a natural ecosystem;
  • Affect the water supplies of humans, animals, or plants;
  • Affect the water table;
  • Involve construction or use of a facility on or near an active geological fault;
  • Result directly or indirectly in construction on slopes greater than 15%;
  • Result in construction on or near hydric soils, wetland vegetation, or other evidence of a wetland; or
  • Result in construction on or near any other natural feature that could affect the safety of the public, or the environmental impacts of the action.

      
5. Is the action likely to adversely affect a significant aspect of the sociocultural environment?

Consider whether the action is likely to cause changes in the ways members of the surrounding community, neighborhood, or rural area live, work, play, relate to one another, organize to meet their needs, or otherwise function as members of society, or in their social, cultural, or religious values and beliefs. Is the action likely to:
  • Cause the displacement or relocation of businesses, residences, or farm operations;
  • Affect the economy of the community in ways that result in impacts to its character, or to the physical environment;
  • Affect sensitive receptors of visual, auditory, traffic, or other impacts, such as schools, cultural institutions, churches, and residences; or
  • Affect any practice of religion (e.g., by impeding access to a place of worship)?
Give special attention to whether the action is likely to have environmental impacts on a minority or low income group that are out of proportion with its impacts on other groups. Consider, for example, whether the action is likely to:
  • Result in the storage or discharge of pollutants in the environment of such a group;
  • Have adverse economic impacts on such a group;
  • Alter the sociocultural character of such a group's community or neighborhood, or its religious practices; or
  • Alter such a group's use of land or other resources.

Also consider possible impacts on historic, cultural, and scientific resources. Think about whether the action is likely to have physical, visual, or other effects on:

  • Districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects that are included in the National Register of Historic Places, or a State or local register of historic places;
  • A building or other structure that is over 45 years old; A neighborhood or commercial area that may be important in the history or culture of the community;
  • A neighborhood, commercial, industrial, or rural area that might be eligible for the National Register as a district; A known or probable cemetery, through physical alteration or by altering its visual, social, or other characteristics; A rural landscape that may have cultural or esthetic value;
  • A well-established rural community, or rural land use;
  • A place of traditional cultural value in the eyes of a Native American group or other community;
  • A known archeological site, or land identified by archeologists consulted by GSA as having high potential to contain archeological resources; or
  • An area identified by archeologists or a Native American group consulted by GSA as having high potential to contain Native American cultural items.
Particularly in rural areas, give special consideration to possible impacts on Native American cultural places and religious practices. For example, consider whether the action likely to alter a place regarded as having spiritual significance by an Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian group, impede access to such a place by traditional religious 		     
6. Is the action likely to generate controversy on environmental grounds?

Consider first whether your action is likely to be controversial in any way. If so, consider whether this controversy is likely to have an environmental element. For example, the decision to locate an agency in a central business area may be controversial to employees who will have to commute from the suburbs, but this is not an environmental issue unless it can be reasonably argued that commuting will generate air pollution or have some other impact on the natural or sociocultural environment.

Environmental controversies can be about a host of things: impacts on historic buildings, archeological sites, and other cultural resources; impacts of traffic or parking on a community or neighborhood. To avoid missing a controversial issue that should be addressed under NEPA, be sure not to interpret the word "environmental" too narrowly.

      
7. Is there a high level of uncertainty about the action's environmental effects?

Consider first whether there is anything you don't know about the action's potential impacts, and then think about whether what you don't know has any significance. For example, when considering an outlease in a Federal facility, you might not know whether there are archeological sites in the vicinity. If the outlease would result in major ground disturbance, this uncertainty should be resolved before proceeding with the project. If the outlease will not result in ground disturbance, there may be no need to resolve your uncertainty.

     
8. Is the action likely to do something especially risky to the human environment?

Find out whether there is some possible effect of your action that, while improbable, would be so serious IF it occurred that further review is appropriate. For example, you want to acquire land in a non-sensitive area (See 5.4(d)) that is generally unlikely to have adverse effects on the environment, but if there is an environmentally sensitive area downstream from the land you want to acquire, and use of the land might have the potential to cause pollution as groundwater flows through the sensitive area, then you must conduct further review.

     
8. Is the action part of an ongoing pattern of actions (whether under the control of GSA or others) that are cumulatively likely to have adverse effects on the human environment?

Consider whether the action is related to other actions with impacts that are individually insignificant but that may, taken together, have significant effects. For example, is the action:
  • Part of an ongoing pattern of development that could collectively change the quality of the human environment, such as suburbanization, "gentrification," or urban renewal?
  • Part of an ongoing pattern of pollutant discharge, traffic generation, economic change, or land-use change in its locality that could collectively affect human health or the condition of the environment?
      
9. Is the action likely to set a precedent for, or represent a decision in principle about, future GSA actions that could have significant effects on the human environment?

To answer this question, you must look forward and outward, and consider the possibility that what is done with your particular action will pave the way for future actions that could have serious environmental consequences. For example, you decide to issue a permit for the running of an all-terrain vehicle race across a particular surplus military installation. Because of the character of the particular installation, it might be possible to answer "NO" to CATEX Questions A through I, but if your decision to issue a permit were taken as a precedent for allowing such races across ALL surplus military installations, or as a decision in principle by GSA that such permits are appropriate, then a higher level of review of the action may be in order.

     
10. Is the action likely to have some other adverse effect on public health and safety or on any other environmental media or resources that are not specifically identified above?

This question is designed to allow you to address any potential environmental effects that may be of concern but don't fall into any of the other categories. It implies that everyone is fallible, and that times change, so that effects that are not recognized as serious today may be so identified in the future.

     

* Checklist adapted from PBS NEPA Deskguide, October 1999.

The checklist is not complete until all "NEED DATA" issues have been resolved and all blocks are checked either "YES" or "NO." Checking a single block to "YES" does not necessarily mean that an EA must be prepared; it may be possible to resolve the "YES" answer in another way. For example, disposal of real property to a State agency for historic monument purposes invariably involves historic properties, and thus may affect an aspect of the sociocultural environment. However, it is probably safe to assume that the process of review under Section 106 of the NHPA will be sufficient to ensure that such effects are not adverse. So rather than completing an EA, you would ensure that your proposed action complies with Section 106 and its implementing regulations.

Resolve all "NEED DATA" issues and complete the checklist, attaching all supporting documentation. In the "Conclusions" section, circle the conclusion reached. Add the names of the relevant program staff and representatives below the signature blocks; then sign and date them.

 Conclusions (Circle One):

1. The action is categorically excluded and requires not further environmental review.

2. The action is categorically excluded but requires further review under one or more other environmental authorities.

3. The action requires an environmental assessment.

4. The action requires an environmental impact statement.

_______________________________   _____________
Signature of Principal Investigator               Date

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