What matters to me today is: CEQA and Climate — CliffsNotes Version.
I was privileged to be asked to pen a Practitioners’ Guide on evaluating climate issues under CEQA. In my three decades of practice, no area of land use law emerged so forcefully — or evolved so rapidly. Yet CEQA remains an imperfect vehicle for regulating climate change because the statute addresses localized impacts, while greenhouse gas emissions are global.
The seminal case remains Center for Biological Diversity v. Department of Fish & Wildlife (“Newhall Ranch”) (2015) 62 Cal.4th 204. There, the California Supreme Court outlined potential methodologies for evaluating greenhouse gas significance. Since then, however, courts have imposed increasingly rigorous scrutiny on climate analysis in EIRs.
Today, the most defensible approaches generally are: (1) consistency with a legally adequate and current Climate Action Plan; and (2) quantified consistency with statewide emissions reduction trajectories and California’s carbon neutrality goals. Courts increasingly reject purely qualitative policy arguments unsupported by measurable evidence.
Several themes now dominate CEQA climate practice: establishing a defensible baseline; adopting supported thresholds of significance; ensuring mitigation measures are enforceable and quantifiable; evaluating the legitimacy of offsets; and maintaining consistency between greenhouse gas analysis and VMT analysis.
Finally, practitioners must keep their eye on California’s ultimate target: statewide carbon neutrality by 2045 under the 2022 CARB Scoping Plan, California’s evolving decarbonization framework. Cautionary note here: the “Blueprint” Scoping Plan relies heavily on offshore wind and mechanized carbon removal through capture and sequestration as well as direct air capture. Though proven and scalable technologies, both face headwinds, political and regulatory.
That’s what matters to me today in 250 words or less. What matters to you? I’d really like to know.