Council on Environmental Quality

Updated Principles and Guidelines for Water and Land Related Resources Implementation Studies

The Principles and Guidelines for Water and Land Related Resources Implementation Studies (P&G) are the rules that govern how Federal agencies evaluate proposed water resource development projects. 

Federal water planning has been guided by a process that has remained largely unchanged for over twenty-five years. The first set of "Principles and Standards" was issued in September 1973 to guide the preparation of river basin plans and to evaluate federal water projects.  Following a few attempts to revise those initial standards, the current principles and guidelines went into effect in March 1983.
 
In the Water Resources Development Act of 2007, Congress instructed the Secretary of the Army to develop a new Principles and Guidelines for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (section 2031).  In an effort to modernize the approach to water resources development, the Obama Administration is expanding the scope of the Principals and Guidelines to cover all Federal Agencies that undertake water resource projects, not just the four agencies (i.e., U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Reclamation, Natural Resources Conservation Service and the Tennessee Valley Authority) which are subject to the current Principles and Guidelines.

Last year, we completed a draft report aimed at modernizing the nearly 30-year-old rules that guide Federal investments.   This report focused on updating the Principles & Standards, an important first step to modernizing the P&G.

The draft report emphasized that water resources projects should maximize sustainable economic development, avoid unwise use of floodplains, and protect and restore natural ecosystems, among other important points.

In December 2009, we released our draft to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and to the Federal Register for public comment for review and public comment.  The report resulting from the NAS review was released on December 2, 2010.  A copy of this report can be found on the NAS website.

The 2009 proposal constitutes a draft of the Principles & Standards (P&S), the first Chapter of the Principles and Guidelines, which establishes the National water resources planning policy and framework for the planning process.  The draft P&S, consistent with the Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) of 2007, emphasized that water resources projects should maximize sustainable economic development, avoid the unwise use of floodplains, and protect and restore natural ecosystems as well as other important changes in an effort to modernize the planning process.

The revised Principles and Standards include a number of important changes that modernize the current approach to water resources development in this country, which include:

  • Achieving Co-Equal Goals: The Administration's proposal reiterates that federal water resources planning and development should both protect and restore the environment and improve the economic well-being of the nation for present and future generations. While the 1983 standards emphasized economic development alone, the new approach calls for development of water resources projects based on sound science that maximize net national economic, environmental, and social benefits.
  • Considering Monetary and Non-Monetary Benefits: The revised Principles and Standards shift away from the earlier approach to project selection.  Specifically, this revised version will consider both monetary and non-monetary benefits to justify and select a project that has the greatest net benefits – regardless of whether those benefits are monetary or non-monetary.  For example, the monetary benefits might capture reduced damages measured in dollars while the non-monetary benefits might capture increased fish and wildlife benefits, or biodiversity.
  • Avoiding the Unwise Use of Floodplains: The new Principles and Standards represent significant progress in the way we manage our floodplain resources. The decision to modify water resources and floodplains will be based on evaluations of the services gained and lost by such an action.   Only those actions that provide a net benefit will be further pursued or recommended for construction.  For the first time such evaluations must give full and equal consideration to nonstructural approaches that can solve the flooding problem without adversely impacting floodplain functions.
  • Increasing Transparency and "Good Government" Results: The revised Principles and Standards are intended to promote the transparency of the planning and implementation process for water resource development projects in this country.  The proposed changes were made to deliver "good government" results for the American people.  It is expected that the use of best science, peer review, and full transparency will ensure that projects undergo a more rigorous study process, which should inform authorization and funding decisions.

Moving forward the interagency work will focus on the development of the "Guidelines" which lay out the detailed methodology for conducting implementation studies under this new Principles and Guidelines.  The interagency process to develop the Guidelines began earlier this year and will likely take more than a year to complete.

Each agency will develop its own "Procedures" to outline how the new Principles and Guidelines apply to their agency-specific missions. These Procedures will be developed soon after the Guidelines are completed.

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