The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has released long-awaited guidance for public comment that officials say provides a framework for the agency to consider a broader range of benefits than just costs and economic development for proposed water resources projects.
Specific procedures of the Corps Agency, proposed earlier this month in the Federal Register, provides guidance on how to implement principles, requirements and guidelines for investments in water resources, setting out what the agency can and cannot do to evaluate its approaches and recommendations for related projects.
Known as PR&G and dating from 1983, the guidance was updated in 2014. But US lawmakers included users in annual appropriations bills that restricted the Corps from taking the next step toward implementing the guidance from 2012, even before the update was completed. As a result, the agency could not move forward with developing specific procedures to implement the updated guidance until the Water Resources Development Act of 2020 included language directing it to develop the procedures.
“Through these procedures, we will continue our efforts to modernize civil works programs by maximizing public benefits and ensuring that recommended projects achieve their water management objectives and better reflect community needs and priorities Michael Connor, Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works, said in a statement. “We are committed to integrating economic, environmental and social benefits into our planning and improving the Corps’ ability to build resilience in a wide range of communities, including rural, tribal and low-income areas.”
According to Todd Bridges, who founded the Corps Engineering with Nature program in 2010, the new procedures could mean big changes in how the agency conducts feasibility studies.
Corps engineers will no longer be hampered in their ability to value approaches with benefits that are more difficult to quantify numerically but still bring great benefits to the environment and communities, said Bridges, now a professor at the Systems Institute of Resilient Infrastructures from the University of Georgia. ENR.
“I think that opens the door to all kinds of approaches and options,” including environmental justice and nature-based solutions, he said.
Doug Lamont, a former official with the corps’ civil works program who is now a senior adviser at environmental consulting firm Dawson & Associates, said the procedures will give corps engineers more latitude to choose nonstructural solutions to problems.
He said the most cost-effective solution might be to build a flood wall in a community, but if it divided an area that functions as a cohesive community, a non-structural solution like levees and wetlands might be a better solution.
The National Waterways Conference, which represents industry and contractor groups involved in water projects, including port and dredging contractors, contractor associations, energy companies and others, is still reviewing the proposal but is initially “encouraged” by the emphasis of the Body’s procedures to be considered. multiple benefits in water resource projects, said Julie Ufner, president and CEO. “However, we want to ensure that the approach and methodology are consistent and predictable for non-federal sponsors who invest significant amounts of time and money in these essential projects,” he said.
According to Melissa Samet, legal director of water and coastal resources for the National Wildlife Federation, individual corps districts have their own approaches and practices that may not fully harmonize with the priorities of corps headquarters. “I think some Corps districts have been limited in the approaches they can use and the ways they value things. Hopefully, this [ASP] will help change that view.”
More guidance and training are essential to ensure procedures are adopted and applied correctly, Samet said. “It’s a big ship to turn, but I think we need to see change at every level in the agency,” he added.
The Corps will accept public comments on the proposal until April 15.
