Ruling Bolsters Push For Stricter NEPA Reviews Of 'Connected' Projects

摘要

A recent appellate ruling finding that the administration erroneously "segmented" its National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review of a major natural gas pipeline project, and failed to consider the projects' cumulative impacts, is bolstering environmentalists' efforts to require strict NEPA reviews of "connected" projects, such as the impact of liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants on upstream gas drilling and coal mine approvals on power plant emissions. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled June 6 in Delaware Riverkeeper Network, et al. v. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) that FERC violated NEPA in segmenting its review of the Northeast Project, failing to adequately consider that the project was in conjunction with three "connected, contemporaneous, closely related and interdependent" pieces of a broader pipeline plan in the eastern United States. Senior Judge Harry Edwards, who authored the opinion with concurring opinions by the other two judges hearing the case, also said FERC failed to provide a "meaningful" analysis of the cumulative impacts of the projects to show the impacts would be insignificant.