[Code of Federal Regulations]

[Title 45, Volume 3]

[Revised as of October 1, 2005]

From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access

[CITE: 45CFR641.14]



[Page 195-196]

 

                        TITLE 45--PUBLIC WELFARE

 

                 CHAPTER VI--NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION

 

PART 641_ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT PROCEDURES FOR PROPOSED NATIONAL 

SCIENCE FOUNDATION ACTIONS IN ANTARCTICA--Table of Contents

 

Sec. 641.14  Definitions.



    As used in these procedures, the term:

    (a) Action means a project, program or other activity, including the 

adoption of an official policy or formal plan, that is undertaken, 

authorized, adopted or approved by, or subject to the control or 

responsibility of NSF, the decommissioning of a physical plant or 

facility, and any change in the scope or intensity of a project, program 

or action.

    (b) Antarctica means the area south of 60 degrees south latitude.

    (c) Antarctic environment means the natural and physical environment 

of Antarctica and its dependent and associated ecosystems, but excludes 

social, economic and other environments.

    (d) Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting means a meeting of the 

Parties to the Antarctic Treaty, held pursuant to Article IX(1) of the 

Treaty.

    (e) Comprehensive Environmental Evaluation or CEE means a study of 

the reasonably foreseeable potential effects of a proposed action on the 

antarctic environment, prepared in accordance with the provisions of 

Sec. 641.18, and includes all comments thereon received during the 

comment period described in Sec. 641.18(c). A Comprehensive 

Environmental Evaluation shall constitute an environmental impact 

statement for purposes of the Executive Order.

    (f) Environmental Action Memorandum means a document briefly 

describing a proposed action and its potential impacts, if any, on the 

antarctic environment prepared by the responsible official when he or 

she determines that a proposed action will have less than a minor or 

transitory impact on the Antarctic environment.

    (g) Environmental document means an initial environmental evaluation 

or a comprehensive environmental evaluation.

    (h) Environmental review means the environmental review required by 

the provisions of this part, and includes preliminary environmental 

review and preparation of an environmental document, and review by the 

parties to the Protocol, and committees established under the Protocol 

for that purpose, and the public, as applicable.

    (i) Executive Order means Executive Order 12114, Environmental 

Effects Abroad of Major Federal Actions, 44 FR 1957.

    (j) Initial Environmental Evaluation or IEE means a study of the 

reasonably



[[Page 196]]



foreseeable potential effects of a proposed action on the antarctic 

environment, prepared in accordance with the provisions of Sec. 641.17.

    (k) Preliminary environmental review means the environmental review 

described in Sec. 641.15(a).

    (l) Protocol means the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the 

Antarctic Treaty, adopted on October 4, 1991, in Madrid, at the fourth 

session of the Eleventh Special Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting 

and signed by the United States on that date, and all annexes thereto.

    (m) Responsible official means the Director of the Office of Polar 

Programs, or any NSF employee(s) designated by the Director to be 

principally responsible for the preparation of environmental action 

memoranda or environmental documents under this part.

    (n) Treaty means the Antarctic Treaty signed in Washington, D.C., on 

December 1, 1959, T.I.A.S No. 4780.



[57 FR 40339, Sept. 3, 1992, as amended at 59 FR 37438, July 22, 1994]