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National Park Service Act
This act was established in order to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations. -
Soil Conservation Act
United States federal law that allowed the government to pay farmers to reduce production so as to conserve soil and prevent erosion. -
Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, Rodenticide Act
The 1947 law assigned the United States Department of Agriculture responsibility for regulating pesticides. This legislation ensured quality pesticides by protecting farmers and consumers from fraudulent and/or unadultered products by manufacturers and distributors. -
Clean Air Act
This act was designed to control air pollution on a national level. It provided funds for federal government research of air pollution. Enabled the federal government to increase its activities enforcing interstate air pollution transport. -
Fish and Wildlife Act
Establishes a comprehensive national fish, shellfish, and wildilfe resources policy with emphasis on the commercial fishing industry but also with a direction to administer the act with regard to the inherit right of every citizen and resident for fish for pleasure. It directs a program of continuing research, extension,a dn informatino serivces on fish and wildlife matters. -
Price-Anderson Act
Governs liability-related issues for all non-military nuclear facilities constructed in the United States before 2026. -
Wilderness Act
This act recognized wilderness as “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.” In all it gave a legal definition of the term "wilderness." -
Land and Water Conservation Act
This act was created to provide funds and matching grants to federal, state and local governments for the acquisition of land and water, and easements on land and water, for the benefit of all Americans -
Water Resources Planning Act
Established governing bodies that would overlook the creation and protection of water resource locations. It was amended a few times, but ultimately viewed as a failure, the act was terminated in favor of newer ideas. -
Water Quality Act
It orders the states to develop water quality standards and come up with plans to meet them. It focuses on the ecological health of waterways for fishing and swimming. Prior to this act, the focus is only on drinking water and human health. -
Species Conservation Act
This act was created to conserve certain species in the wildlife. However, this was later amended and named the Endangered Species Act of 1973. -
Freedom of Information Act
Allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure procedures and grants nine exemptions to the statute. -
National Trails System Act
The Act established the Appalachian and Pacific Crest National Scenic Trails and authorized a national system of trails to provide additional outdoor recreation opportunities and to promote the preservation of access to the outdoor areas and historic resources of the nation. -
National Environmental Policy Act
This act was created to promote the enhancement of the environment and established the President's Council on Environmental Quality. -
Clean Water Act
It is the primary federal law in the United States governing water pollution. Its objective is to restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters by preventing point and non point pollution sources, providing assistance to publicly owned treatment works for the improvement of wasterwater treatment, and maintaining the integrity of wetlands. -
Marine Mammal Protection Act
This popular act protects all marine mammals, including cetaceans (whales, dolphins, and porpoises), pinnipeds (seals and sea lions), sirenians (manatees and dugongs), sea otters, and polar bears within the waters of the United States. -
Endangered Species Act
It was designed to protect critically imperiled species from extinction. This act serves as the enacting legislation to carry out the provisions oulined in The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. -
Renewable Resources Planning Act
An analysis of present and anticipated uses, demand for, and supply of the renewable resources, with consideration of the international resource situation, and an emphasis of pertinent supply and demand and price relationship trends. -
Safe drinking water act
Principal federal law in the United States intended to ensure safe drinking water for the public. Set standards for drinking water quality and oversee all states, localities, and water suppliers who implement these standards. -
CITES
This is a multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals. Its aim is to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten the survival of the species. -
Federal Land Policy and Management Act
This act governs the way in which the public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management are managed. Congress recognized the value of the public landds, declaring that these lands owuld remain in public ownerhsip. -
Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning Act
This act authorized long-range planning by the U.S. Forest Service to ensure the future supply of forest resources while maintaining a quality environment. -
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act
Protected human health and the natural environment from the potential hazards of waste disposal. Reduced the amount of waste generated, through source reduction and recycling. -
National Forest Management Act
the primary statute governing the administration of national forests and was an amendment to the Forest and Rangeland Renewable Resources Planning Act of 1974, which called for the management of renewable resources on national forest lands. The law was a response to lawsuits involving various practices in the national forest, including timber harvesting. -
Soil and Water Conservation Act
Requires USDA to periodically prepare a national plan for soil and water conservation on private lands based on an inventory and appraisal of existing resource conditions and trends. -
Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act
Primary federal law that regulates the environmental effects of coal mining in the United States. SMCRA created two programs: one for regulating active coal mines and a second for reclaiming abandoned mine lands. -
Arctic Coservation Act
This act makes it unlawful, unless authorized by permit, to take native mammals or birds, enter specially designated areas, introduce nonindigenous to Antarctica, use of discharge designated poolutants, discharge wastes, import certain Antarctica items into the United States. This act is a ruling for all U.S. citizens, coporations, and certain persons who participate in U.S. government expeditions visiting or operating in Antarctica. -
Environmental Education Act
Congress found that "thrests to human health and environmental quality are increasingly complex, involving a wide range fo conventional and toxic contaminants in the air and water and on the land." -
Energy Tax Act
The objective of thi slaw was to shift from oil and gas supply toward energy conservation; this, to promote fuel efficiency and renewable energy through taxes and tax credits. This law gave and income taxe credit to private residents who use solar, wind, or geothermal sources of energy. -
Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act
This is a United States federal law designed to clean up sites contaminated with hazardous sustances and pollutants. It authorizes federal natural resource agencies, states and Native American tribes to recover natural resource damages cased by hazardous substances, though most states have and most often use their own versions of CERLA. -
Low Level Radioactive Policy Act
This very important act contains three principles: (1) state responsibility for providing LLW disposal capacity; (2) encouragement of interstate compacts for the exercise of this responsibility; and (3) the right of regional compacts to prohibit disposal at their regional facilities of LLW generated in non-compact states. -
Fish and Wildlife Conservation Act
Authorizes financial and tehnical assistance to the States for the development, revision, adn implementation of conservaton plans and programs. -
Nuclear Waste Policy Act
Established a comprehensive national program for the safe, permanent disposal of highly radioactive wastes. -
International Environmental Protection Act
Amended the natural resource provisions of the 1961 Foreign Assistance Act by authorizing the President to assist other countries in wildlife and plant protection efforts in order to preserve biological diversity. -
Food Security Act
This act allowed lower commodity price and income supports and established a dairy herb buyout program. This 1985 farm bill made changes in a variety of other USDA programs. -
Emergency Wetlands Resources Act
The act allocated funds from the Land and Water Conservation Fund fot eh purchase fo wetlands by the Secretary of Interior. Included in this plan was a requirement for all states to include wetlands as part fo their Comprehensive Outdoors Recreation plan. -
Montreal Protocol
This protocol was designed to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of numerous substances that are responsible for ozone depletion. -
Ocean Dumping Ban Act
Prohibits all municipal sewage sludge and industrial waste dumping into the ocean. -
Madrid Protocol
This protocol is a treaty that allows a trademark owner to seek registration in any of the countries that have joined the Madrid Protocol. -
Pollution Prevention Act
United States created a national policy to have pollution prevented or reduced at the source wherever possible. The Pollution Prevention Act focused industry, government, and public attention on reducing the amount of pollution through cost-effective changes in production, operation, and raw materials use. -
Lacey Act
This act bans trafficking in illegal wildlife. It was later amended to include plants and plant products such as timber and paper. -
Waste Reduction Act
Collected and disseminated all regarding reduction of toxic chemical emissions across all media, to assist States in providing information and technical assistance about source reduction, and for other purposes. -
California Desert Conservation Act
Designated 69 wilderness areas as additions to the National Wilderness Preservation System withing the California Desert Conservation Area, the Yuma District, the bakersfield District, and the Clifornia Desert District of fhte Bureau of Land Management. -
Food Quality and Protection Act
Standardizes the way the EPA manages the use of pesticides. It mandated a health-based standard for pesticides used in foods. -
Kyoto Protocol
This protocol is an international treaty, which extends the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that commits State Parties to reduce greenhouse gases emissions.
