NY Environmental Siting Law and Part 617 Regulations

New York State amended the Environmental Conservation Law on January 11, 2023, with the amendment effective on January 11, 2025. Specifically, the existing New York State Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, Chapter 106 of the Laws of 2019 (CLCPA or Climate Act), was amended to include an environmental justice requirement. Therefore, beyond the existing Article 75 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (75-0103 through 75-0119) Chapter 7, sections 7(2) and 7(3) requirements, permit applications and renewals for all major permits must include additional environmental analysis in environmental justice areas. The amendment also grants the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) the authority to deny permit applications and renewals if the unmitigated climate change burden in an environmental justice area is too great.

In order to incorporate the ECL amendments into regulations, on January 29, 2025, NYSDEC released draft amendments to the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) regulations 6 NYCRR Part 617 to incorporate SEQRA-related provisions from the January 11, 2023 amendments to the CLCPA Law. The public comment period was open from January 29, 2025 through May 7, 2025. The amendments to Part 617 were officially adopted on April 24, 2026 and took effect on June 12, 2026.

What Are the Changes?

The new amendment to the ECL increases the requirements placed on the state agency and departments, including NYSDEC, in summary, as follows:

• The law directs NYSDEC not to issue a permit, modification, or renewal if it determines that the project will cause or contribute more than a de minimis amount of pollution and thus place a disproportionate pollution burden on the disadvantaged community.
• The law directs NYSDEC to require, as a condition of an applicable permit, actions to implement any appropriate operational changes that would reduce the pollution burden on the disadvantaged community, only if such actions are reasonable and practicable, as determined by the department.

The updated regulations add items to the short and long Environmental Assessment Forms (EAFs), which the state uses to determine the level of environmental impact of a proposed project. Some of the EAF additions include:

• Projects located within, or within one half mile of, a disadvantaged community.
• Projects that will cause direct or indirect impacts from a specific permit, a specific project, or a thermal treatment of waste that may affect a disadvantaged community.
• Projects that are vulnerable to future physical climate risks, such as sea level rise and 100- and 500-year flooding, as well as other projects that increase the vulnerability of human or ecological communities.
• Projects that increase air emissions by certain amounts of carbon monoxide (CO), oxides of nitrogen (NO_x), particulate matter (PM₁₀, PM_2.5), volatile organic compounds (VOCs), sulfur dioxide (SO₂), CO₂ equivalents, or other hazardous air pollutants; or heat sources capable of producing more than 20 million BTUs per hour.

Walden staff have spent significant resources researching these legal, regulatory, and technical issues, and have developed all necessary calculations for all fuel types and types of equipment to complete this required analysis. Contact Walden at 516-559-6976 to get started with your CLCPA analysis and disadvantaged communities report today. Our sustainability and solid waste experts are prepared to walk you through all regulations pertaining to your facility application.