How to search for Environmental Impact Statements (EIS)
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The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 requires that federal agencies prepare detailed analyses of any of their actions that significantly affect the quality of the environment. Environmental impact statements (EIS's) are the result of this requirement. EIS's have been produced, since 1969, on virtually every type of activity, from oil and gas development to scientific research in Antarctica, and from protection of wildlife habitat to construction of light rail lines. One of the world's largest collections of environmental impact statements is available for your use in the Transportation Library (University Library, 5th Floor, North Tower). Nearly all of the EIS's issued by federal agencies since 1969 are held, usually in draft as well as final form. Related documents such as environmental assessments, findings of no significant impact, records of decisions, supplementary reports, and maps are collected. A small collection of environmental impact statements issued by individual states and by foreign governments is also maintained. The collection is updated by weekly shipments from the Environmental Protection Agency EIS's can be searched in the Library catalog,
NUcat <http://nucat.library.northwestern.edu>.
The easiest way to search for them is to do a Guided Keyword search
where the term "EIS" must always be used in conjunction
with any other keywords. If you need to obtain a copy of an EIS in the
Transportation Library's collection through Interlibrary Loan, please
refer to our Document Delivery & Interlibrary
Loan service, which will include our polices, procedures and
fee schedule. The EIS collection is arranged on our shelves alphabetically by sponsoring federal agency, then alphabetically by state, then numerically by final EPA number. The first two digits of the EPA number indicate the year the report was issued. Multi-state EIS's are shelved by the sponsoring agency abbreviation and final EPA number only. This is an example of a search for an EIS sponsored by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in the state of Arkansas (AR):
EIS's are also listed on the EPA Office of Federal Activity's web site <http://www.epa.gov/compliance/nepa/index.html> by date of distribution. A keyword search for environmental assessment information can be completed by searching the Federal Registy at: http://www.epa.gov/fedrgstr/EPA-IMPACT/. Print indices for Environmental Impact Statements
available at the Transportation Library include:
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