Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division Secures Key Victories for Energy Infrastructure

Unleashing American Energy was one of President Donald J. Trump’s first actions, and it includes infrastructure like pipelines and oil and gas export facilities. Recently, the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division (ENRD) secured four wins in court that underpin the intentions of the president’s executive order.

The Dakota Access Pipeline crosses Lake Oahe in North Dakota. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is currently preparing a supplemental environmental impact statement which the District Court for the District of Columbia ordered for the pipeline’s easement. Last year, the Corps was sued again to shut down the pipeline while they work on that statement, but ENRD last month was granted its motion to dismiss that lawsuit.

In the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, a Tennessee pipeline company was essentially allowed to go ahead and build a pipeline to deliver natural gas to the Tennessee Valley Authority for a new gas power plant. The court denied a petition for review of the Corp’s permit to the company and upheld its reliance on Tennessee’s certification of the project under the Clean Water Act’s Section 401.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a published decision affirming the Corps decision to issue a permit for a proposed expansion of an oil-export facility in Texas. The court held that the Corps thoroughly analyzed the effects of issuing the permit and properly assessed the project’s scope.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals denied plaintiffs’ petition for review of a Department of Energy (DOE) action to authorize exporting liquefied natural gas from a proposed terminal on the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska. The gas is to come from Alaska’s north slope and would be transported to the terminal via a proposed pipeline across the state. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission had previously authorized where the project’s facilities would be, and DOE authorized and reaffirmed exporting the gas. This development will help unleash Alaska’s extraordinary resource potential, in keeping with the administration’s directive.