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You are here: Home | Environmental Review Process and Documents ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW PROCESS AND DOCUMENTS
The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process is intended to assist the Surface Transportation Board (the Board) and the public in identifying and assessing the potential environmental consequences of a proposed action before a final decision on the proposed action is made. The Board’s Section of Environmental Analysis (SEA) is responsible for ensuring that the Board complies with NEPA and related environmental statutes. SEA’s analysis is separate and distinct from any analyses the Applicant (ARRC) or MSB have done to date.
The first stage of the EIS process is scoping. Scoping is an open process for determining the scope of environmental issues to be addressed in the EIS. As part of the scoping process, SEA published in the Federal Register and mailed to the public on February 12, 2008, the Notice of Availability of Draft Scope of Study for the EIS, Notice of Scoping Meetings, and Request for Comments. The Draft Scope of Study for the EIS is available on this Web site. SEA also prepared and distributed to the public a fact sheet that introduced ARRC’s Port MacKenzie Rail Extension, announced SEA’s intent to prepare an EIS, requested comments, and gave notice of six public scoping meetings to citizens; elected officials; Federal, state, and local agencies, tribal organizations, and other potentially interested stakeholders. For more information on the public scoping meetings see the Public Involvement page. The scoping comment period concluded on March 21, 2008.
The Final Scope of Study was published in the Federal Register on Friday, July 17, 2009. The public may view the final scope on this Web site, on STB’s main Web site at www.stb.dot.gov, or at libraries in the project area.
SEA is preparing a Draft EIS for the proposed Port MacKenzie Rail Extension. The Draft EIS will address those environmental issues and concerns identified during the scoping process. It will also contain SEA’s preliminary recommendations for environmental mitigation measures. The Draft EIS will be made available upon its completion for review and comment by the public, government agencies, and other interested parties. SEA will prepare a Final EIS that considers comments on the Draft EIS. In reaching its decision in this case, the Board will take into account the Draft EIS, the Final EIS, and all environmental comments that are received.
SEA invited the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers – Alaska District, U.S. Coast Guard, and U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Railroad Administration to participate in this EIS process as cooperating agencies on the basis of their special expertise or jurisdiction by law.
Port MacKenzie EIS milestones and documents
Documents Available Now:
Documents Available in the Future:
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