The Targeted Operations to Remove Catastrophic Hazards Act streamlines environmental reviews and management processes across federal lands to accelerate hazardous fuel reduction, utility maintenance, and land restoration efforts.
Doug LaMalfa
Representative
CA-1
The Targeted Operations to Remove Catastrophic Hazards Act aims to significantly speed up federal efforts to reduce wildfire fuel and manage hazards on public lands. It streamlines environmental reviews for fuel reduction, expands the authority for local governments and tribes to manage timber sale revenue for restoration, and accelerates vegetation management around electrical utility lines. Overall, the bill prioritizes rapid hazard removal and forest resilience over traditional, lengthy regulatory processes.
TORCH Act Fast-Tracks Wildfire Cuts: Expands Fuel Breaks to 10,000 Acres, Waives Key Environmental Reviews for Power Lines
The aptly named Targeted Operations to Remove Catastrophic Hazards Act, or the TORCH Act, is essentially an administrative fast-pass for wildfire mitigation and utility maintenance on federal lands. The central theme of this bill is speed, achieved by significantly expanding the size of projects that can be done quickly and by creating new shortcuts around environmental review laws for specific activities.
The NEPA Fast Lane: Cutting Down the Red Tape
For anyone who’s ever waited years for a government project to get off the ground, the TORCH Act introduces several new "categorical exclusions"—which are basically pre-approved waivers for the lengthy environmental studies required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). One new exclusion (SEC. 101) allows the Forest Service to quickly remove "high priority hazard trees"—those likely to fall and damage property or hurt people—within 300 feet of a major road or recreation spot. This can cover projects up to 3,000 acres, provided the work doesn't involve building new permanent roads or touching protected wilderness areas.
Another major exclusion (SEC. 302) is designed specifically for utility companies maintaining power lines. This fast-track approval covers vegetation management and maintenance along electric utility rights-of-way. Here’s the kicker: for this specific utility work, the bill explicitly waives compliance with the Endangered Species Act and the National Historic Preservation Act. If you live near federal land, this means power line clearing can happen much faster, but it also means that the usual checks designed to protect sensitive species or cultural sites are temporarily suspended for this work.
Bigger Cuts, Faster Sales
The bill dramatically increases the scale of forest management projects. It raises the maximum size for certain wildfire resilience projects and protective fuel breaks from 3,000 acres to a massive 10,000 acres (SEC. 104, SEC. 105). This means agencies can now thin forests across an area roughly the size of a small city under the same streamlined review process previously reserved for much smaller projects. For people who rely on healthy ecosystems, this is a significant shift, allowing large-scale timber removal that avoids the full environmental scrutiny normally associated with projects of this size.
On the economic side, the bill also speeds up how the government can sell timber during emergencies. It raises the limit on the value of federal timber the Secretary of Agriculture can sell without a formal appraisal from $10,000 to $50,000 (SEC. 102). In times of extreme risk—like after a major windstorm or during a massive insect outbreak—this allows for quicker disposal of damaged timber, but it also means the government can sell off up to fifty grand worth of federal assets without the usual market valuation process.
Less Consultation for Land Management
Title IV of the TORCH Act focuses on reducing administrative friction in land planning. It exempts the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from having to restart the lengthy Endangered Species Act (ESA) consultation process when they update their land management plans, provided the only reason for the update is a new species listing or critical habitat designation (SEC. 401). This is a big deal for environmental advocates and conservationists. If a new species is listed, the agency doesn't automatically have to re-evaluate how its existing land use plan affects that species, unless new information explicitly shows an adverse impact. This shifts the burden of proof and could potentially delay protections for newly listed endangered species.
Who Benefits from the Changes?
Electric utility companies clearly benefit from the ability to manage vegetation near their lines quickly and without the usual environmental review hurdles (SEC. 302). Forest Service and BLM officials gain significant flexibility and speed in implementing large-scale fuel reduction projects. Local governments and Indian Tribes also get a win, as the bill explicitly includes tribes in the “Good Neighbor Authority” agreements and clarifies that timber sale revenue from these agreements must be reinvested directly into other restoration work (SEC. 201).
Ultimately, the TORCH Act is a trade-off: it prioritizes speed and scale in reducing wildfire hazards and ensuring power grid reliability by streamlining environmental regulations. For the average person, this could mean safer roads and fewer power outages, but it comes at the cost of reduced public and environmental oversight on large-scale land management decisions.