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Environmental News |
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Federal Council of Environmental Quality (CEQ) Environmental Justice |
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On February 18, 2022, the Biden Administration, via the CEQ, rolled out a beta version of a Climate and Environmental Justice Screening Tool (CEJST). In Executive Order 14008, President Biden directed the CEQ to create a Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool. The purpose of the tool is to help Federal agencies identify disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution. The current version of the tool provides socioeconomic, environmental, health and climate information to inform decisions that may affect these communities. The tool identifies disadvantaged communities through publicly-available, nationally-consistent datasets.
The tool will provide information for the Justice40 Initiative. The goal of the Justice40 Initiative is to provide 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain federal investments in seven key areas to disadvantaged communities. These seven key areas are: climate change, clean energy and energy efficiency, clean transit, affordable and sustainable housing, training and workforce development, the remediation and reduction of legacy pollution, and the development of critical clean water infrastructure.
The methodology for the CEJST can be found here and data is downloadable. It is a huge dataset and we have pulled out the Pennsylvania data (see below button). This is the link to identifying the 2020 Census Reference Map that allows you to identify census tracts by state and county and work with the Pennsylvania data. Note the CEJST does not include race as a factor in deciding where to devote resources. Administration officials have indicated that excluding race will make projects less likely to draw legal challenges and will be easier to defend, even as they have indicated in the past that race has been a major factor in terms of who experiences environmental injustice.
On a related note, EPA also released on February 18th, an update to its EJSCREEN tool, which is used by Federal and state agencies for a broad array of screening, outreach, and analytical purposes. EJSCREEN and CEJST complement each other – the former provides a tool to screen for potential disproportionate environmental burdens and harms at the community level, while the latter defines and maps disadvantaged communities for the purpose of informing how Federal agencies guide the benefits of certain programs, including through the Justice40 Initiative.
Should you have concerns or comments, contact Josie Gaskey.
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