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Speaker Nancy Pelosi saw it differently: “This means more polluters will be right there next to the water supply of our children. That’s a public health issue,” she said.

The changes, which would affect the regulations that guide implementation of the law but not the law itself, are expected to appear in the federal register on Friday. There will be a 60-day window for public comment and two public hearings before a final regulation is issued, most likely in the fall.

Legal scholars and environmental groups, which are almost certain to sue to block the changes, said the proposals threatened to undermine the safety of communities by letting agencies ignore how rising sea levels might affect a given project as well as the consequences of higher emissions on the atmosphere.

Richard L. Revesz, a professor of environmental law at New York University, said he did not believe the changes would hold up in court. The Environmental Policy Act requires that all the environmental consequences of a project be taken into account, he said, and that core requirement cannot be changed by fiat.

“A regulation can’t change the requirements of a statute as interpreted by the courts,” Mr. Revesz said. In fact, he argued, it is more likely that federal agencies will be sued for inadequate reviews, “thereby leading to far longer delays than if they had done a proper analysis in the first place.”

Ms. Neumayr stressed that the changes did not prevent or exclude consideration of the impact of greenhouse gases; consideration would no longer be required.

Representative Raúl Grijalva of Arizona, chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, called the changes a giveaway to the fossil fuel industries.