40 C.F.R. § 1502.4 : Protection of Environment — COUNCIL ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY — NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY ACT IMPLEMENTING REGULATIONS — ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT — Major Federal actions requiring the preparation of environmental impact statements

(a) Agencies shall define the proposal that is the subject of an environmental impact statement based on the statutory authorities for the proposed action. Agencies shall use the criteria for scope (§ 1501.9(e) of this chapter) to determine which proposal(s) shall be the subject of a particular statement. Agencies shall evaluate in a single environmental impact statement proposals or parts of proposals that are related to each other closely enough to be, in effect, a single course of action.
(b) Environmental impact statements may be prepared for programmatic Federal actions, such as the adoption of new agency programs. When agencies prepare such statements, they should be relevant to the program decision and timed to coincide with meaningful points in agency planning and decision making.
(1) When preparing statements on programmatic actions (including proposals by more than one agency), agencies may find it useful to evaluate the proposal(s) in one of the following ways:
(i) Geographically, including actions occurring in the same general location, such as body of water, region, or metropolitan area.
(ii) Generically, including actions that have relevant similarities, such as common timing, impacts, alternatives, methods of implementation, media, or subject matter.
(iii) By stage of technological development including Federal or federally assisted research, development or demonstration programs for new technologies that, if applied, could significantly affect the quality of the human environment. Statements on such programs should be available before the program has reached a stage of investment or commitment to implementation likely to determine subsequent development or restrict later alternatives.
(2) Agencies shall as appropriate employ scoping (§ 1501.9 of this chapter), tiering (§ 1501.11 of this chapter), and other methods listed in §§ 1500.4 and 1500.5 of this chapter to relate programmatic and narrow actions and to avoid duplication and delay. Agencies may tier their environmental analyses to defer detailed analysis of environmental impacts of specific program elements until such program elements are ripe for final agency action.

40 C.F.R. §1502.4

85 FR 43363, 9/14/2020