ELR Citation: 55 ELR 20069
No(s). 24-1094 (D.C. Cir. Jun 6, 2025)

The D.C. Circuit denied environmental groups' challenges to FERC's decision to grant a company's request to extend its construction deadline for a 75-mile extension to the Mountain Valley Pipeline. The groups argued FERC's finding of "good cause" to grant the extension and its refusal to revisit its prior assessments of market need and environmental impacts were arbitrary and capricious. The appellate court held FERC reasonably found the good cause standard was satisfied because the company made reasonable efforts to advance its project by focusing on the most pressing and immediate problem—resuming construction on the main pipeline—and that its determination that the relevant circumstances did not change enough for it to revisit its underlying findings was both supported by the record evidence and reasonable. It denied the petitions for review.