42 U.S.C. § 4344: Duties and functions

Summary

Help the President prepare the Environmental Quality Report and give advice on environmental matters. Collect up-to-date, reliable information about current and future environmental conditions. Study that information to see if trends could interfere with national environmental goals, and send studies to the President. Review federal programs to see how they affect those goals and recommend changes. Develop and recommend national policies to improve environmental quality for conservation, social, economic, health, and other national needs. Do investigations, studies, and research, and track changes in nature, including plants and animals, and the causes of those changes. The Council must report to the President at least once each year on the state of the environment. It must also provide any studies, reports, or policy and legislative recommendations the President asks for.

Title 42, §4344

The Public Health and Welfare, Source: USLM XML via OLRC

It shall be the duty and function of the Council—

(1)to assist and advise the President in the preparation of the Environmental Quality Report required by section 4341 of this title;

(2)to gather timely and authoritative information concerning the conditions and trends in the quality of the environment both current and prospective, to analyze and interpret such information for the purpose of determining whether such conditions and trends are interfering, or are likely to interfere, with the achievement of the policy set forth in subchapter I of this chapter, and to compile and submit to the President studies relating to such conditions and trends;

(3)to review and appraise the various programs and activities of the Federal Government in the light of the policy set forth in subchapter I of this chapter for the purpose of determining the extent to which such programs and activities are contributing to the achievement of such policy, and to make recommendations to the President with respect thereto;

(4)to develop and recommend to the President national policies to foster and promote the improvement of environmental quality to meet the conservation, social, economic, health, and other requirements and goals of the Nation;

(5)to conduct investigations, studies, surveys, research, and analyses relating to ecological systems and environmental quality;

(6)to document and define changes in the natural environment, including the plant and animal systems, and to accumulate necessary data and other information for a continuing analysis of these changes or trends and an interpretation of their underlying causes;

(7)to report at least once each year to the President on the state and condition of the environment; and

(8)to make and furnish such studies, reports thereon, and recommendations with respect to matters of policy and legislation as the President may request.

Notes & Related Subsidiaries

Editorial Notes

References in Text

section 4341 of this title, referred to in par. (1), was omitted from the Code.

Executive Documents

Transfer of Functions

So much of functions of Council on Environmental Quality under par. (5) of this section as pertains to ecological systems transferred to Administrator of Environmental Protection Agency by Reorg. Plan No. 3 of 1970, § 2(a)(5), eff. Dec. 2, 1970, 35 F.R. 15623, 84 Stat. 2086, set out under section 4321 of this title.

§4344 Duties and Functions