[Code of Federal Regulations]
[Title 32, Volume 1, Parts 1 to 190]
[Revised as of July 1, 1998]
From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access
[CITE: 32CFR188.4]

[Page 989]
 
                       TITLE 32--NATIONAL DEFENSE
 
              CHAPTER I--OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
 
PART 188--ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS IN THE UNITED STATES OF DoD ACTIONS--Table of Contents
 
Sec. 188.4  Policy.

    (a) The Department of Defense must act with care to ensure to the 
maximum extent possible that, in carrying out its mission of providing 
for the national defense, it does so in a manner consistent with 
national environmental policies. Care must be taken to ensure that, 
consistent with other considerations of national policy and with 
national security requirements, practical means and measures are used to 
protect, restore, and enhance the quality of the environment, to avoid 
or minimize adverse environmental consequences, and to attain the 
objectives of:
    (1) Achieving the widest range of beneficial uses of the environment 
without degradation, risk to health and safety, or other consequences 
that are undesirable and unintended;
    (2) Preserving important historic, cultural, and natural aspects of 
our national heritage, and maintaining, where possible, an environment 
that supports diversity and variety of individual choice;
    (3) Achieving a balance between resource use and development within 
the sustained carrying capacity of the ecosystem involved; and
    (4) Enhancing the quality of renewable resources and working toward 
the maximum attainable recycling of depletable resources.
    (b) The Department of Defense shall: (1) Assess environmental 
consequences of proposed DoD actions that could affect the quality of 
the environment in the United States in accordance with enclosure 1 and 
40 CFR parts 1500-1508.
    (2) Use a systematic, interdisciplinary approach that will ensure 
the integrated use of the natural and social sciences and environmental 
considerations in planning and decisionmaking where there may be an 
impact on man's environment.
    (3) Ensure that presently unmeasured environmental amenities are 
considered in the decisionmaking process;
    (4) Consider reasonable alternatives to recommended actions in any 
proposal that would involve unresolved conflicts concerning alternative 
uses of available resources;
    (5) Make available to States, counties, municipalities, 
institutions, and individuals advice and information useful in 
restoring, maintaining, and enhancing the quality of the environment; 
and
    (6) Utilize ecological information in planning and developing 
resource-oriented projects.