Source: http://www.velj.org/elrs/pipelines-protests-and-general-permits
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 07:19:11+00:00

Document:
Although one might logically assume that a crude oil pipeline traversing thousands of miles across the United States would require an extensive federal appraisal and permitting process, that assumption would be incorrect. Domestic oil pipelines require no general approval from the federal government. For example, DAPL needed almost no federal permitting of any kind because “99% of its route traversed private land.” However, when construction activity occurs in waters of the United States, meaning in federally regulated waters such as Lake Oahe, the Corps needs to permit the activity under the Clean Water Act (CWA) or the Rivers and Harbors Act or sometimes both.
Section 404(e) of the CWA has been the provision primarily used by the Corps to issue general permits. Nationwide permits (NWP) are a type of general permit that are issued or reissued every five years by the Corps headquarters, whereas regional permits are issued by an individual Corps District for a specific geographical area. NWPs authorize small-scale activities that are “similar in nature and result in no more than minimal individual and cumulative adverse environmental effects.” Because NWPs pre-approve categories of activities upfront, there is considerably less federal involvement upon commencement of an individual project. Indeed, in most cases project proponents can commence their activities without ever notifying the Corps. Some of the NWPs, including NWP 12, require the project proponent to submit a Pre-Construction Notification (PCN) to the relevant Corps District Engineer who then confirms whether or not the proposed activities qualify for NWP authorization. If the District Engineer determines that the proposed activity qualifies, he/she then issues a verification letter to the project proponent. It is important to note that the District Engineer is merely verifying that the activity is one that was already pre-authorized by the Corps when they promulgated the NWP reissuance.
NWPs are designed to streamline the permitting process and are often considered to be more cost-efficient and cost-effective for both the Corps and the individual or business seeking the permit. Although NWPs can have important benefits when used for their intended purpose, some of the NWPs, NWP 12 in particular, are often used by the oil and gas industries as a way to fast-track the permitting process by avoiding project-specific environmental review and by skirting around a more comprehensive public participation process. The oil and gas industries circumvent stricter federal regulations by evading the National Environmental Policy Act’s (NEPA) “hard look” review which requires federal agencies to analyze the environmental consequences of all “major Federal actions significantly affecting the quality of the human environment.” If the federal action is one that would significantly affect the environment, the level of federal involvement and regulation is substantially elevated.Although NEPA review applies only to major federal actions and imposes obligations only on federal agencies, “it is well-settled that ‘federal involvement in a non-federal project may be sufficient to federalize the project for purposes of NEPA.’” In other words, it is possible for the Corps to have “sufficient control and responsibility” over a project to warrant them having authority to control portions of a project that would normally be out of their jurisdiction. The district engineer makes the determination as to whether the scope of the Corps involvement warrants them to federalize the entire project. For example, if a pipeline spans 100 miles and 40 miles of the project fall within federal control, the district engineer can determine the scope of the project gives the Corps sufficient control to warrant federalizing all 100 miles of the project, even if the other 60 miles were done by private action.
The Corps justifies the expansive nature of NWP 12 by requiring the project proponent to submit a PCN to the Corps District Engineer (DE). The DE will then review the PCN and determine if the proposed action “will result in more than minimal individual or cumulative adverse environmental effects or may be contrary to the public interest.” On its face, requiring the DE to perform an extra layer of review may alleviate concerns about the open-ended nature of NWP 12. However, the review is based solely on the discretion of the DE and whether he/she determines there will be cumulative effects. The PCN verification of the Gulf Coast Pipeline is an example of the considerable amount of discretion granted to the Corps. The Gulf Coast Pipeline passes through three Corps' districts; Galveston, Fort Worth, and Tulsa and even though all three districts issued verification letters, none of the letters “provide a reasoned basis for any cumulative impacts analysis.” As District Judge Martinez’s dissent points out, the verification letters issued by the three districts attempted to circumvent the analysis by “simply stat[ing] the legal standard and then recit[ing] that it made a ‘determination’ that such criteria were satisfied.” Even though the DE and the Corps provided no specific findings as to why authorizing the use of NWP 12 2,227 times wouldn’t have a cumulative effect, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals approved the Corps use of discretion in verifying NWP 12.
The malleability of NWP 12 is seen, once again, in its application permitting the Dakota Access Pipeline. DAPL is not similar to the Gulf Coast Pipeline and Flanagan South Pipeline in the sense that the Corps didn’t seemingly abuse its authority by granting the use of NWP 12 thousands of times, rather the application of NWP 12 in DAPL’s context is offensive in the sense that it approved the pipeline even though the Tribe alleged it was not adequately consulted as required under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservations Act (NHPA).
The Corps claimed, and District Court Judge Boasberg agreed, that the Corps “made a reasonable effort to discharge its duties under NHPA prior to promulgating NWP 12” and that “the Corps’ effort to speak with those it thought be concerned was sufficient . . . .” This “reasonable effort” to consult the Tribe included the Corps sending a notification letters containing information pertaining to its proposed NWPs, as well as the Corps holding listening sessions and workshops with tribes, and eventually the Corps sending letters to the Tribe inviting them to begin consultations. The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP), the federal agency that promulgates the regulations used to implement Section 106, wrote five letters to the Corps questioning the adequacy of the tribal consultations. The EPA and Department of Interior also wrote letters to the Corps questioning their use of NWP 12 and the adequacy of tribal consultations. The ACHP’s final letter states that it believes the “findings made by the Corps are premature, based on an incomplete identification effort, which was not sufficiently informed by the knowledge and perspective of consulting parties . . . .” Despite all the objections from the Tribe and three other federal agencies, the Corps and Judge Boasberg emphasize that the Corps’ efforts were reasonable “given the nature of the permit.” In other words, because NWP 12 is broad and over inclusive then apparently the Corps’ consultation requirements can be viewed in the same way.
This article has attempted to highlight a fundamental problem with how the United States permits domestic oil pipelines. The controversy surrounding the Dakota Access Pipeline has the potential to have both negative and positive implications. The most obvious potentially negative consequence is that the Sioux Tribe may, once again, lose sites of cultural significance at the hands of the U.S. government. However, a positive outcome that has emerged from this whole fiasco is that it has created a national dialog regarding not only nationwide permits and pipelines, but more importantly, how we, as citizens, view and understand the rights of Native Americans.
 Energy Transfer, Overview, http://www.daplpipelinefacts.com/about/overview.html (last visited Oct. 10, 2016).
 Indian Entities Recognized and Eligible To Receive Services From the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs, 80 Fed. Reg. 1942-02, 1946 (Jan. 14, 2015).
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe v. Army Corps of Engineers, No. 16-1534, 2016 WL 4734356, at *6 (D.D.C. Sept. 9, 2016).
 Reissuance of Nationwide Permits, 77 Fed. Reg. 10,184 (Feb. 21 2012).
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at * 6.
 Michael L. Lawson, Dammed Indians: The Pick-Sloan Place and the Missouri River Sioux, 1944-1980, 50-52 (1994).
 Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief at 1, Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356 (Jul. 27, 2016) (No. 1:16-cv-01534), 2016 WL 4033936.
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at *26.
 Dep’t of Justice, Joint Statement from the Department of Justice, the Department of the Army and the Department of the Interior Regarding Standing Rock Sioux Tribe v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (2016). https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/joint-statement-department-justice-department-army-and-department-interior-regarding-standing.
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at *1.
 33 U.S.C. § 1344(e)(1) (2012).
 U.S. Army Corps of Eng’rs, About national and regional permits, http://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/Missions/Regulatory/Nationwide.aspx (last visited Oct. 22, 2016).
 Reissuance of Nationwide Permits, 77 Fed. Reg. at 10,186.
 33 C.F.R. § 330.1(e)(1) (2013).
 Reissuance of Nationwide Permits, 77 Fed. Reg. at 10,184.
 See generally Eric Biber, The Permit Power Revisited: The Theory and Practice of Regulatory Permits in the Administrative State, 64 Duke L.J. 133 (2014).
 Industry attorneys and environmental consulting firms have highlighted the strategic benefits of utilizing NWP 12 as a way to construct pipelines with minimal federal regulatory interference. See, Robert E. Holden, E&P Wetlands Compliance Strategy: Nationwide Permits, Law360 (Oct. 9, 2014) http://www.law360.com/articles/585584/e-p-wetlands-compliance-strategy-nationwide-permits; John Kusnier, What Pipeline Companies Should Consider When Planning Projects, North American Oil & Gas Pipelines, (July 19, 2013) http://napipelines.com/pipeline-companies-planning-projects/; Lowell M. Rothschild, The Importance Of Keystone To NWP 12, Law360 (Aug. 29, 2012) http://www.law360.com/articles/371356/the-importance-of-keystone-to-nwp-12.
 Citizens Alert Regarding the Env’t v. EPA, 259 F.Supp.2d 9, 15 (D.D.C. 2003).
 For a more detailed discussion of NEPA and its statutory goals, see Robertson v. Methow Valley Citizens Council, 490 U.S. 332 (1989).
 Citizens Alert Regarding the Envt, 259 F.Supp.2d at 15 (quoting Macht v. Skinner, 916 F.2d 13, 18 (D.C. Cir. 1990)).
 33 C.F.R. Part 325, app. B (7)(b)(2) (2013).
 U.S. Army Corps of Eng'rs, Decision Document: Nationwide Permit 12 (2012), http://www.usace.army.mil/Portals/2/docs/civilworks/nwp/2012/NWP_12_2012.pdf [hereinafter Nationwide Permit 12].
 U.S. Army Corps of Eng’rs, 2012 Nationwide Permits, Conditions, and Definitions, with corrections (2012), http://www.usace.army.mil/Portals/2/docs/civilworks/nwp/2012/NWP2012_corrections_21-sep-2012.pdf (emphasis added) [hereinafter 2012 Nationwide Permits, Conditions, and Definitions].
 Sierra Club, Comments on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Proposal to Reissue and Modify Nationwide Permit 12, (2016), https://www.nwf.org/~/media/PDFs/Global-Warming/Tar-Sands/NWP-12-Comments_FINAL_080116.ashx.
 Sierra Club v. Bostick, 539 Fed. Appx. 887, 898 (10th Cir. 2013) [hereinafter Gulf Coast Pipeline].
 Sierra Club v. Army Corps of Eng’rs, 803 F.3d 31, 39 (D.C. Cir. 2015).
 See 40 CFR § 1508.25(a) (2010) (requiring connected and cumulative actions to be analyzed together unless they would have independent utility).
 2012 Nationwide Permits, Conditions, and Definitions, at 45.
 Nationwide Permit 12, at 2.
 Reissuance of Nationwide Permits, 77 Fed. Reg. at 10260.
 Gulf Coast Pipeline, at 900.
 See 33 C.F.R. pt. 325, app. B (7)(b).
 See generally, Lindsay M. Nelson, The Gulf Coast Pipeline: A Stealthy Step Toward the Completion of the Keystone XL Pipeline Project, 44 Cap. U. L. Rev. 429 (2016).
 Gulf Coast Pipeline, at 899 (emphasis added).
 Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief at 36-8, Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356 (Jul. 27, 2016) (No. 1:16-cv-01534), 2016 WL 4033936.
 See generally, 36 C.F.R. § 800.2 (2016).
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at *2.
 36 C.F.R. § 800.1(a) (2016).
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, WL 4734356, at *2.
 Quechan Tribe of Fort Yuma Indian Reservation v. U.S. Dep’t of the Interior, 755 F. Supp. 2d 1104, 1108-9 (S.D. Cal. 2010).
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at *19 (emphasis added).
 The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, Dakota Access Pipeline Project 1 (May 19, 2016).
 Environmental Protection Agency, Additional Comments on Dakota Access Pipeline Draft Environmental Assessment (March 11, 2016); Department of the Interior, Letter to the Corps (March 29, 2016).
 The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, Dakota Access Pipeline Project at 1.
 Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, 2016 WL 4734356, at *19.

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