ELR Citation: 52 ELR 20106
No(s). 21-CV-13-SWS and 21-CV-56-SWS (D. Wyo. Sep 2, 2022) (Skavdahl, J.)

A district court affirmed DOI’s decision to postpone oil and gas lease sales in the first quarter of 2021 in response to the president’s issuance of Executive Order No. 14008 pausing new lease sales on federal lands. The state of Wyoming and industry groups challenged DOI’s decisions to postpone and/or cancel lease sales in both the first and second quarters of 2021, arguing they violated the Mineral Leasing Act (MLA), FLPMA, and NEPA. The court found that only Wyoming had standing to challenge the first-quarter postponements, and that DOI did not postpone the sales because the agency decided to stop holding quarterly lease sales pursuant to E.O. 14008, but rather to ensure NEPA compliance with several then-recent federal court rulings that negated previously authorized sales. It concluded that the postponements did not violate the MLA’s requirement to hold quarterly lease sales because the involved lands had not satisfied NEPA requirements and thus were not “available,” that they did not violate FLPMA because they did not permanently remove the lands from being considered for leasing, and that the state’s NEPA claim failed because its premise that DOI implemented a nationwide policy suspending lease sales was not supported by the record.