ELR Citation: 52 ELR 20031
No(s). 20-1132 (D.C. Cir. Mar 11, 2022)

The D.C. Circuit granted in part an environmental group's petition to review FERC's decision authorizing a new natural gas pipeline and compressor station in Massachusetts. The group argued, among other things, that FERC's EA failed to account for reasonably foreseeable indirect effects of the project, particularly greenhouse gas emissions attributable to burning the gas to be carried in the pipeline. The court found that the end use of the transported gas was reasonably foreseeable and that FERC invoked nothing more than a mere possibility of offsetting reductions. It granted the group's petition with respect to these indirect effects, and remanded to FERC to perform a supplemental EA that either quantifies and considers the project's downstream carbon emissions or explains in more detail why it cannot do so.