The Nickel Report

On May 1, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) published the final Phase 2 rule overhauling the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) implementing regulations. The final rule, titled the “Bipartisan Permitting Reform Implementation Rule” (Phase 2 Rule), will apply to all actions starting the NEPA processes beginning after July 1, 2024, and the agencies have discretion to apply to NEPA reviews that are currently underway.

With the growing emergence of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) laws, companies selling products in the United States must increasingly plan for the end of a product’s life. EPR programs shift waste-management responsibilities that have traditionally been handled by consumers or state and local governments to the “producer” of the product.

Most existing EPR programs in the United States target packaging materials, especially plastic packaging. So far, four states have finalized EPR legislation for packaging: Maine, Oregon, Colorado, and California.[1] Each of these states is currently in the process of developing a regulatory program. In 2023, several additional states introduced EPR legislation, signaling that other states may soon follow.

On October 7, 2023 California Governor Gavin Newsom signed two landmark climate disclosure laws aimed at making major companies publicly disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and report on their climate-related financial risks. The first, the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act (SB 253), will require all business entities with an annual revenue exceeding $1 billion to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions in a format accessible to the public. The second, SB 261, will require all business entities with annual revenue exceeding $500 million to publish a report on their “climate-related financial risks” on their websites. These first-in-the-nation laws are broader than the proposed SEC climate disclosure rule and reach more than just California-based entities.