Press Release

December 10, 2024

• Justices’ inquiries indicated Utah railway project analysis was thorough and sufficient
• Amicus brief by the Alliance urges the court to clarify NEPA’s scope for lower courts
• Questions remain on the court’s interest in issuing a broad ruling

DENVER – Today, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments regarding Seven County Infrastructure Coalition and Uinta Basin Railway, LLC v. Eagle County, Colorado et al. Western Energy Alliance and the American Forestry Resource Council (AFRC) submitted an amicus brief in support of the petitioners. The case involves important National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) issues regarding how NEPA is applied to energy, natural resource, and infrastructure projects that are in the public interest and how courts should properly determine the scope of NEPA analyses.

“We were pleased that the Supreme Court was willing to take on a NEPA case—the first in about two decades—and wrestle with some of the stickiest issues in oral arguments today. NEPA has become weaponized over time to severely delay or halt energy projects, no matter how protective they are,” said Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Alliance. “Rather than informing federal agency decision making and properly mitigate any impacts, as was the original intention of NEPA, it has become a source of endless delay and spiraling costs, which severely constrains economic growth in the nation and the ability to get things done.

“While I should not try to make any predictions on how the court will rule, I was struck by a few things while listening to the live audio today. One is that the line of questioning seemed to indicate that the justices thought the analysis for the Uinta Basin railway satisfied NEPA requirements on reasonably foreseeable impacts. After consulting with 27 federal, state, tribal, and local agencies; specifying 91 mitigation measures; and obtaining an additional 56 voluntary actions, the Surface Transportation Board met the standards of NEPA.

“While the judges may determine that the D.C. Circuit was wrong to overturn the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the railway project, they seemed much more reluctant to take on the larger issue of providing some guardrails around NEPA analyses. The petitioners strongly encouraged the court to clarify that the scope of NEPA should be limited to the jurisdiction of the agency and focused on the proximate time and space impacts of the project, but it is unclear if the court will provide a clear test that lower courts and agencies can use. Western Energy Alliance, in our amicus, strongly encouraged the court to do so and we will be disappointed if the ruling is too narrow to apply beyond the 88-mile rail line.

“It was also good to hear questions from both conservative and liberal justices indicating they took the page limits and timeframes Congress imposed in the Builders Act seriously. The hearing today should give agencies the courage they need to stick to those limits so that NEPA documents better inform the public and the agencies,” concluded Sgamma.

# # #