US Supreme Court to consider reviving key approval for Utah oil railway
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to consider whether to revive a key approval by federal regulators for a $1.5 billion Utah crude oil railway that was challenged by environmental groups and a local community.
The justices will hear an appeal by the Uinta Basin Railway's backers of a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that tossed out a permit issued by the U.S. Surface Transportation Board for the 88-mile project.
The railroad would give shippers of crude oil and other commodities an alternative to trucking through the Uinta Basin in eastern Utah.
The challengers claimed that the board pushed approvals through despite it having "dubious" economic benefits, but "certain" environmental impacts — including climate harms from the increased production of oil and risks to endangered fish.
A three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit in August 2023 concluded that the board violated the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to fully consider the railway's potential impacts on the environment, wildlife and the Colorado River.
Lawyers for the railway project — a public-private partnership that includes a seven-county Utah infrastructure coalition, investor DHIP Group and rail operator Rio Grande Pacific Corp — then asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case.
They asked the justices to consider whether the National Environmental Policy Act requires an agency to study environmental impacts "beyond the proximate effects of the action over which the agency has regulatory authority."
They said in their petition seeking Supreme Court review that the federal appeals courts were divided on that issue, with five holding that an agency's environmental review of a project can stop when it has no statutory authority over a particular environmental effect of a proposal.
But the D.C. Circuit is among two appeals courts that have instead required an agency to review any impact of a project that could be reasonably foreseeable, according to the petition.
Keith Heaton, director of the Seven County Infrastructure Coalition, in a statement said the counties' coalition was optimistic about the Supreme Court's decision to review the case.
"This project is vital for the economic growth and connectivity of the Uinta Basin region, and we are committed to seeing it through," he said.
Wendy Park, a lawyer with the Center for Biological Diversity, which has challenged the project, in a statement called the Supreme Court's decision to review the case "disappointing," but said the D.C. Circuit's ruling should stand.
"The proposal for the Uinta Basin Railway cut corners from the start but federal laws are now catching up with this climate and environmental catastrophe," she said.
The case is Seven County Infrastructure Coalition, et al, v. Eagle County Colorado, et al, U.S. Supreme Court, No. __.
For Seven County Infrastructure Coalition and Uinta Basin Railway LLC: Jay Johnson of Venable LLP.
For Eagle County: Nathaniel Hunt of Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell.
For the environmental groups: Wendy Park of the Center for Biological Diversity.
For the United States: Elizabeth Prelogar of the U.S. Department of Justice
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US approvals for $1.5 billion oil railway in Utah partially vacated