On March 29, President George W. Bush's Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) released guidance to agencies that explains in greater detail how to implement the president's recent environmental order. On Jan. 24, Bush issued Executive Order (E.O.) 13423, Strengthening Federal Environmental, Energy and Transportation Management. The order replaced five detailed environmental orders, issued by President Bill Clinton, with vaguer, less aggressive provisions that broaden agency exemptions and consolidate power in executive offices. Bush's E.O. did establish some specific goals, including that by 2015, "energy intensity" should decrease by 30 percent, water consumption should shrink 16 percent, and the federal fleet's gas consumption should be down 16 percent. However, the new executive order lacked much of the specificity and detail from the previous orders it replaced. The five earlier E.O.s utilized more than thirty-seven pages to detail requirements and activities associated with the stated environmental and energy goals. The new E.O. covered the same issues in just five pages, consisting of instructions that were more generic and vague than those contained in the previous orders. Now the CEQ has released a 50-page guidance document to help fill in some of the blanks. The CEQ's Instructions for Implementing Executive Order 13423 cover organization and oversight as well as details for energy and water management, building materials, greener products, toxic materials, fleet management, and more. However, many of these goals merely replicated ones established by Clinton's orders, differing primarily in their target dates. For instance, the gas consumption goal is no different from the one established under Clinton's E.O. 13149 issued in 2000, but the new order allows almost twice as much time and uses a much older baseline. While the instructions provide greater detail and context to the executive order, it is clear that additional guidance and goals will be developed in future years by the Steering Committee and Workgroups outlined in the instructions. A change evident in E.O. 13423 and reinforced by the CEQ instructions is the shift of authority and control for these environmental and energy goals to executive offices such as CEQ and the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Previously, agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Department of Energy (DoE) oversaw such programs. While the instructions reserve an elevated position for these agencies, that role is advisor to the executive offices. The problem with such a shift of authority is that executive offices are more politically controlled and have much less accountability and transparency than the more public agencies. There was also great concern that the new executive order would eliminate the requirement that federal facilities report toxic pollution under the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), because it revoked a Clinton executive order establishing the requirement without explicitly restating the provision. However, the CEQ guidance clarifies that the TRI reporting requirement remains in place. Another troubling change implemented through E.O. 13423 is new loopholes for compliance that designate entire projects exempt from the E.O. due to security reasons. The National Intelligence Director and an agency head with "law enforcement activities" have the discretion to exempt projects from complying with this E.O. when they determine there is danger of "unauthorized disclosure." Previously, waiver and exemptions could be applied for, but the process required justifications and approval. Though it maintains some energy efficiency reduction goals, the new executive order does not improve upon them and, in some instances, lowers obligations. Additionally, the order shifts responsibility for these goals away from objective agencies with expertise in energy and the environment to political executive offices with more limited accountability. The following E.O.s were revoked:

• E.O. 13101, Greening the Government Through Waste Prevention, Recycling, and Federal Acquisition (9/14/98-Clinton)
• E.O. 13123, Greening the Government Through Energy Efficient Energy Management (6/3/99-Clinton)
• E.O. 13134, Developing and Promoting Biobased Products and Bioenergy (8/12/99-Clinton)
• E.O. 13149, Greening the Government Through Federal Fleet and Transportation Efficiency (4/21/00-Clinton)
• E.O. 13148, Greening the Government Through Leadership in Environmental Management (4/21/00-Clinton)