Birckhead v. FERC

Petitioners sought review of FERC's decision authorizing the construction and operation of a new natural gas compression facility in Davidson County. The DC Circuit denied the petition and held that FERC did not violate the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by failing to adequately assess alternatives to the proposed action. In this case, the environmental assessment reflected that the Commission considered twelve alternatives and evaluated each with respect to eighteen different environmental factors.Despite the court's misgivings regarding the Commission's decidedly less-than-dogged efforts to obtain the information it says it would need to determine that downstream greenhouse gas emissions qualify as a reasonably foreseeable indirect effect of the project, the court held that petitioners failed to raise this record-development issue in the proceedings before the Commission. Accordingly, the court lacked jurisdiction to decide whether the Commission acted arbitrarily or capriciously and violated NEPA by failing to further develop the record in this case. View "Birckhead v. FERC" on Justia Law