Exaggeration is not unusual, but not truthful
From an Article by Laurence Hammack, Roanoke Times, July 10, 2023
The federal appeals court has ordered the Mountain Valley Pipeline not to resume construction in the Jefferson National Forest.
Late Monday afternoon, a three-judge panel of 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay of construction while it considers arguments that Congress violated the separation of powers doctrine when it passed a law expediting completion of the controversial project.
The brief order came from Chief Judge Roger Gregory and Judges Stephanie Thacker and James Wynn. The same three judges have set aside nearly a dozen permits issued to Mountain Valley over the past five years.
The case involved a challenge, filed by The Wilderness Society, of a provision in the Fiscal Responsibility Act, which suspended the federal debt ceiling to avoid a government default.
Tucked into the larger law was language ordering federal agencies to issue all remaining permits to Mountain Valley and stripping the Fourth Circuit of its jurisdiction to hear any legal challenges of the approvals.
The Wilderness Society argued that because the law was unconstitutional, the Fourth Circuit should continue to hear its case, which challenges a U.S. Forest Service permit that allows the pipeline to cross through 3.5 miles of the national forest in Giles and Montgomery counties.
There had been no decision by 5 p.m. Monday on a second request for a stay — which if granted would affect a much larger portion of a 303-mile pipeline that runs from northern West Virginia, through the New River and Roanoke valleys, to connect with an existing pipeline near the North Carolina line.
In that case, also pending before the Fourth Circuit, a coalition of environmental groups led by Appalachian Voices contests a finding by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that endangered species would not be jeopardized by the buried, 42-inch diameter pipe.
Since the Fiscal Responsibility Act was passed in early June, construction crews have started to return to the unfinished portions of the pipeline, which Mountain Valley hopes to have in operation by the end of the year.
“We are reviewing the court’s decision and will have additional comment to follow in the coming days,” company spokeswoman Natalie Cox wrote in an email late Monday.
Construction of the pipeline has come in fits and starts since it began in the winter of 2018, mostly due to government permits being set aside by the Fourth Circuit. Many of the three-judge panel’s decision have been based on environmental concerns about a project that has been cited more than 400 times with violating erosion and sedimentation control regulations.
Monday’s decision came just hours after lawyers for the joint venture of energy companies building the natural gas pipeline argued in court papers that both legal challenges should be dismissed.
Any challenge to the law’s constitutionality should be made not to the Fourth Circuit but to a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., attorney George Sibley wrote. “Congress’s message was crystal clear: If you want to challenge Section 324 [the portion of the law that fast-tracked Mountain Valley], you must do so in the D.C. Circuit,” Sibley wrote.
It was not clear when the Fourth Circuit might rule on the arguments made by the Wilderness Society, Appalachian Voices and the other environmental groups who say Congress violated the Constitution by asserting its power over that of the courts.
But before granting a stay, the court had to find in favor of the Wilderness Society on four factors, including whether it had made a strong showing that its legal challenge will ultimately be successful.
Spencer Gall, an attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center who represents The Wilderness Society, argued in court papers that it was likely to prevail — and that it faced “irreparable harm” if a stay was not granted. “In sum, a stay would protect the public interest in forestalling unlawful environmental harm and would not impair any other public interests,” Gall wrote.
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Mountain Valley Pipeline Construction Blocked by Fourth Circuit
From an Article by John Woolley, Bloomberg Law, July 10, 2023
Construction of a portion of the Mountain Valley Pipeline in Virginia’s Jefferson National Forest was temporarily blocked by the Fourth Circuit on Monday pending an environmental group’s petition to review the Bureau of Land Management’s decision granting a permit to the controversial energy infrastructure project.
It’s unclear whether the panel has the authority to block construction after Congress authorized project permits and explicitly limited judicial review as part of debt limit negotiations last month.
Mountain Valley Pipeline’s developers and several government agencies opposed the Wilderness Society’s motion to stay construction, arguing the court lacked jurisdiction as a result of Congress’s ratification of the project in the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023.
Environmentalists claim the court does have jurisdiction because their claims fall under the Administrative Procedure Act and allege violations of environmental statutes.
Southern Environmental Law Center represents the Wilderness Society. The respondents in that case, including the Bureau of Land Management and US Forest Service, are represented by the Justice Department. Mountain Valley Pipeline LLC is represented by Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP.
“We are reviewing the court’s decision and will have additional comment to follow in the coming days,” Natalie Cox, a spokeswoman for the pipeline’s developer Equitrans Midstream Partners, said in an emailed statement.
The case is Wilderness Soc’y v. Bureau of Land Mgmt., 4th Cir., No. 23-1592, 7/10/23.
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/business-and-practice/mountain-valley-pipeline-construction-blocked-by-fourth-circuit-1
Manchin Fumes as Federal Court Halts Mountain Valley Pipeline Construction
>>> From an Article by Kenny Stancil, Common Dreams, July 11, 2023
One climate advocate applauded the court for giving communities “a measure of reprieve” by stopping construction of the pipeline in Jefferson National Forest.
A three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit on Monday temporarily blocked the construction of a section of the Mountain Valley Pipeline that runs through Jefferson National Forest, pending a conservation group’s petition to review the federal government’s authorization of the fossil fuel infrastructure development.
“Time and time again, Mountain Valley has tried to force its dangerous pipeline through the Jefferson National Forest, devastating communities in its wake and racking up violations,” Ben Tettlebaum, director and senior staff attorney at The Wilderness Society, said in a statement. “We’re grateful that the court has given those communities a measure of reprieve by hitting the brakes on construction across our public lands, sparing them from further irreversible damage while this important case proceeds.”
Work on unfinished portions of the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) was fast-tracked last month via the debt ceiling agreement that President Joe Biden, shunning his options for unilateral action, forged with House Republicans who took the global economy hostage.
Construction of the $6.6 billion fracked gas project—pushed hard by the GOP and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), a coal profiteer and Congress’ top recipient of Big Oil money—has been halted by courts for years due to concerns about the harms it would unleash on people and ecosystems in Virginia, West Virginia, and beyond.
But Section 324 of the so-called Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 required federal authorities to approve all of MVP’s outstanding permits, prohibited judicial review of those permits, and said only the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has jurisdiction to hear challenges to the provision’s constitutionality.
Citing Section 324, MVP’s developers and multiple government agencies filed motions last month to dismiss lawsuits against the pipeline. On behalf of The Wilderness Society, the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) filed a brief opposing those motions on June 26, arguing that Section 324 is unconstitutional because it violates the separation of powers.
In response to the stay issued by the Fourth Circuit on Monday, Mountain Valley Pipeline LLC said: “This is not the court to hear that claim. Congress, in plain terms, gave the D.C. Circuit ‘exclusive jurisdiction’ to hear such claims… Congress’ message was crystal clear: If you want to challenge Section 324, you must do so in the D.C. Circuit.”
In a similar vein, Manchin asserted that the Fourth Circuit lacks jurisdiction over MVP permits, rendering its new order unlawful.
But as The Wilderness Society and SELC explained last month, their two cases against the pipeline challenge “defective approvals by the United States Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management allowing the MVP to cross the Jefferson National Forest in Virginia and West Virginia.” Because both lawsuits predate the passage of Section 324 and allege violations of several environmental laws as well as the Administrative Procedure Act, the groups argued, the Fourth Circuit does have jurisdiction.
“Mountain Valley could not build their pipeline in compliance with the law, so they appealed to Congress to interfere with the courts, skirting both our legal system and Constitution,” Chase Huntley, vice president of Strategy and Policy at The Wilderness Society, said two weeks ago. “The MVP rider buried in the Fiscal Responsibility Act attempts to ram through the pipeline, forcing it onto communities who have spoken out against its devastating impacts for nearly a decade.”
“Because bedrock environmental laws stood in the pipeline’s path, Mountain Valley convinced Congress to reach beyond its powers and decide in Mountain Valley’s favor, circumventing the courts,” said Huntley. “We’re fighting to make sure our challenge to the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management’s approvals for the pipeline to cross the Jefferson National Forest has its rightful day in court.”
The Wilderness Society and SELC weren’t the only organizations to take action last month. Lawyers from the Sierra Club, Appalachian Mountain Advocates, and the Center for Biological Diversity filed a companion response opposing identical motions to dismiss another MVP case. That brief was submitted on behalf of 10 environmental groups—Wild Virginia, Appalachian Voices, Indian Creek Watershed Association, Preserve Bent Mountain, Preserve Giles County, West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, West Virginia Rivers Coalition, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Sierra Club, and the Center for Biological Diversity.
In a Tuesday morning statement, Equitrans Midstream—which holds the largest interest among MVP stakeholders and plans to manage the pipeline once operational—said it was “disappointed” with the Fourth Circuit’s stay and claimed the judges exceeded their authority.
“We are evaluating all legal options, which include filing an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court,” the company said. “Unless this decision is promptly reversed, it would jeopardize Mountain Valley’s ability to complete construction by year-end 2023.”
MVP is one of several new fossil fuel projects being built or considered in the U.S. despite mounting evidence of the worsening climate crisis—and in direct conflict with the international scientific consensus, which has long warned that increasing the extraction and combustion of coal, oil, and gas will exacerbate deadly planetary heating.
As extreme weather disasters continue to wreak havoc across the U.S. and the world, Biden is facing growing pressure to declare a national climate emergency, which advocates say would unlock additional powers his administration could use to rein in the fossil fuel industry and ramp up clean energy production. Congressional Republicans, meanwhile, are currently trying to preempt the president from making such a move.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/court-halts-mountain-valley-pipeline