Environmental Impact Statement for Training and Exercises at Airfields in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands

About the Project

The proponent for DAF’s proposal is Headquarters Pacific Air Forces (PACAF). To ensure military personnel are prepared to respond to a variety of operational scenarios, PACAF conducts training and exercises that emphasize flexibility, mobility, and the ability to operate from multiple locations. PACAF’s Agile Combat Employment (ACE) concept of operations employs a distributed approach that enables forces to maneuver between multiple locations, sustain operations from dispersed sites, and continue generating combat capability under a range of conditions.

Training in realistic environments is essential to practicing these concepts, testing logistics and command-and-control processes, and strengthening coordination with Joint, allied, and partner forces. These activities help ensure personnel are prepared to deploy and operate safely and effectively when needed. The airfields on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota represent a range of operational environments, from established commercial airports to expeditionary airfields. Their proximity to one another and the Mariana Islands Range Complex allows personnel, aircraft, equipment, and support resources to move efficiently among multiple locations, creating realistic opportunities to practice distributed operations and allowing proposed training activities to be integrated with existing ones.

The proposed training and exercises would help PACAF maintain readiness while supporting its mission to respond to operational requirements throughout the Indo-Pacific region. The EIS will evaluate the potential environmental impacts of the proposed activities and inform agency decision-making.

Proposed Action

The DAF proposes to conduct aircraft training and exercises at airfields in the CNMI, including Saipan International Airport (GSN), Tinian International Airport (TNI), Tinian North Field (North Field), and Rota International Airport (GRO).

The Proposed Action includes conducting up to 8 weeks of training and exercises annually at each CNMI airfield, consisting of up to 1,200 fixed-wing and 320 rotary-wing operations. A training and exercise event could require up to 1,000 personnel; support services; utilities; and pre- and post- training activities.

Key elements associated with the Proposed Action with the potential to affect environmental resources at and surrounding CNMI airfields include:

• Aircraft operations by fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft.
• Receipt, storage, and distribution of jet fuel.
• Personnel increases on Saipan, Tinian, and Rota prior to, during, and following a training or exercise event.
• Temporary placement of expeditionary support infrastructure including Life Support Areas, equipment staging areas, expeditionary fuel storage, chaff/flare assembly areas, and munitions storage.
• Support services for training and exercises, including firefighting, security, waste management, utilities, and other logistical support.

Alternatives to the Proposed Action

The DAF is considering one alternative to the Proposed Action, called Alternative 1, which would involve conducting aircraft operations at GSN, TNI, North Field, and GRO at an intensity that is approximately 20 percent greater than the Proposed Action Alternative. This increase would provide PACAF with the flexibility to accommodate modern military training and exercises, which have become increasingly complex to reflect the evolving security environment and operational demands.

The No Action Alternative is being considered for analysis as a baseline for comparison to the Proposed Action’s and Alternative 1’s impacts. Under the No Action Alternative, DAF would not improve its ability to conduct distributed operations in support of the ACE concept, exercise movement and sustainment across multiple operating locations, or enhance operational readiness and responsiveness in the Indo-Pacific.