Section 102(2)(C) of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) provides that preliminary environmental impact statements, along with the comments of appropriate federal, state, and local agencies "shall be made available to the President, the Council on Environmental Quality and to the public . . ." CEQ in its Revised Guidelines for §102 Statements, issued April 23, 1971, 1 ELR 46049, requires that draft environmental impact statements be made available to the public at least 90 days prior to an administrative action and that final statements, with agency comments, be made public at least 30 days prior to action. Groups and individuals concerned about the environmental consequences of proposed federal agency actions thus have at the very least an opportunity, and at the most, a mandate to review environmental impact statements critically and inject their special insight into agency decisionmaking processes. The importance of private comments on agency "§102 statements" has not been overlooked in CEQ's Revised Guidelines tht implement the provisions of §102(2)(C) of NEPA and provide for the submission of draft and final impact statements "together with all comments received thereon by the responsible agency from Federal, State, and local agencies and from private organizations and individuals . . ." CEQ Guidelines, 1 ELR 40051. In CEQ's eyes, at least, the comments of private environmentalists are of equal dignity with those of other federal agencies.

In many cases, the thrust of private comment on §102 statements may be directed toward the involved agency, ensuring that the agency has the full benfit of all available material relating to a proposed project in order that a more complete assessment of that project's environmental consequences may proceed within the agency itself. In other cases, however, the course the agency intends to pursue is already evident and the purpose of comment on impact statements may be to focus public or congressional attention on environmental values that may have been overlooked altogether or accorded only minimum weight by the agency. These purposes are not mutually exclusive. Well-reasoned comment on a deficient draft impact statement may influence not only the lead agency, but its sister agencies that may wish to comment on the project, or that may have jurisdiction over certain portions of it despite the prediliction of the lead agency to proceed. Nor must recourse to public comment be the only avenue invoked by the aggrieved citizen or group. Formal or informal administrative proceedings may be pursued simultaneously, or, if the matter has already been the subject of final administrative determination, thoughtful and well-publicized comment may make the group or individual's resort to the courts more comprehensible to the public at large. Such action offsets the likelihood that if the project is sufficiently large, the public will already have been amply apprised of its benefits by spokesman for government or industry.