The U.S Forest Service unveiled a new plan to skirt a major environmental law that requires extensive review for new logging, road building, and mining projects on its nearly 200 million acres of public land. The proposal set off alarm bells for environmental groups, according to Reuters.

The proposed changes, released by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), affect how new projects comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a decades-old law that requires detailed analysis prior to approval for any project that could significantly affect an ecosystem. One of the revisions, for example, would eliminate the requirement for a thorough environmental study before permitting mining on blocks of land up to one square mile in size, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The USDA says that eliminating some impact studies and reducing the number of redundant environmental reviews will allow it to repair roads, trails and campgrounds quickly. It also claims that shedding the red tape will allow the agency to take proactive steps to mitigate the threat of wildfires, according to the USDA's press release.

"We are committed to doing the work to protect people and infrastructure from catastrophic wildfire," said Sonny Perdue, secretary of the USDA, in the agency's statement. "With millions of acres in need of treatment, years of costly analysis and delays are not an acceptable solution — especially when data and experience show us we can get this work done with strong environmental protection standards as well as protect communities, livelihoods and resources."

Environmental groups, however, quickly refuted Perdue's statement and criticized the plan, pointing out that the proposal will cut the public out of the decision-making process and damage public lands.

"This is clearly consistent with the Trump administration's desire to reduce government and to cut the public out of the process of managing a public asset," said Susan Jane Brown, an attorney for advocacy group Western Environmental Law Center, as The Washington Post reported. "To try to draw a line between climate change-induced wildfire and the need to cut the public out of the process of wildland management is disingenuous."