Opinion ID: 3038513
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: analysis

Text: The majority’s reasoning is inconsistent with the requirements placed on agencies by NEPA and by our case law interpreting NEPA. The “hard look” standard requires, not just that the Corps express its preference not to reach a situation in which all MCR dredge is disposed of in deep water, and develop a management and monitoring plan intended to accomplish this preference, but that the Corps analyze the impacts of such a potential outcome, even if the Corps hopes to avoid it. Lands Council instructs that cumulative-effects analysis under NEPA “requires the Final Environmental Impact Statement to analyze the impact of a proposed project in light of that project’s interaction with the effects of past, current, and reasonably foreseeable future projects.” Lands Council v. Powell, 395 F.3d 1019, 1027 (9th Cir. 2005) (emphasis added) (citing 40 C.F.R. § 1508.7). It is not “appropriate to defer consideration of cumulative impacts to a future date. NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS 10127 NEPA requires consideration of the potential impact of an action before the action takes place.” Neighbors of Cuddy Mountain v. United States Forest Serv., 137 F.3d 1372, 1380 (9th Cir. 1998) (emphasis in original) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). That the Army Corps has provided for deep-water disposal of all dredged material from the Mouth of the Columbia River Project (even as a “worst-case” scenario) and has sought authorization of a site with sufficient capacity for this potential outcome demonstrates that such an outcome is “reasonably foreseeable.” The impacts of disposal of all dredged materials from the MCR Project and channeldeepening into the deep-water site should, therefore, have been analyzed under NEPA. The majority’s assertion that because the Corps was aware of potentially adverse impacts and tried to avoid them, it need not study or quantify those impacts, is simply inconsistent with this standard. The EIS must “include a useful analysis of the cumulative impacts of past, present and future projects. This means a discussion and an analysis in sufficient depth and detail to assist the decisionmaker in deciding whether, or how, to alter the program to lessen cumulative impacts.” Muckleshoot Indian Tribe v. United States Forest Serv., 177 F.3d 800, 809-10 (9th Cir. 1999) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). In Muckleshoot, this court found that the agency’s cumulative effects analysis “f[e]ll short” of the required “useful analysis” where the agency “merely indicat[ed] the amount of land to be exchanged, for example, and whether the land would be subject to commercial harvest, followed by an optimistic conclusion.” Churchill County v. Norton, 276 F.3d 1060, 1080 (9th Cir. 2001) (citing Muckleshoot, 177 F.3d at 811). The Army Corps’ analysis of the cumulative effects of deep-water disposal of MCR Project and channel-deepening dredged material is analogous to the analysis rejected by this court in Muckleshoot. The Corps’ statement of a preference against deep-water disposal is analogous to providing this court with an “optimistic conclusion.” This does not constitute a “useful analysis.” 10128 NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS Although the majority asserts correctly that an agency need not “engage in the most exhaustive environmental analysis theoretically possible”; it just has to take a “hard look.” Maj. Op. at 10090. Nonetheless, what is required to satisfy that standard must be applied in a manner consistent with the purpose of NEPA. Klamath-Siskiyou, 387 F.3d at 993 (citing Churchill County, 276 F.3d at 1072). First off, it is important to identify at what the agency must take a hard look. The Army Corps asks us to find that the agency’s dismissal of a highly likely consequence of its proposed project, without any assessment of its consequences, satisfies the “hard look” standard. This is inconsistent with the mandate of NEPA, a statute that requires agencies “to put on the table, for the deciding agency’s and for the public’s view, a sufficiently detailed statement of environmental impacts and alternatives so as to permit informed decision making.” Id. at 1027. Here, the Corps tells us that there won’t be a problem. Although the agency admits the adverse consequences will be profound, it hasn’t studied what will happen if the “worst-case” scenario comes to pass, the Corps asks us to trust it. That is not the standard. The Army Corps has failed to take the required “hard look” at the cumulative impacts on coastal erosion of dumping large quantities of the dredged materials from the Mouth of the Columbia River and those from channel deepening into the proposed deep-water disposal site. NEPA analysis must include an answer to the question posed by Appellant: What would be the impact on coastal erosion if all or substantial quantities of the material dredged from the Mouth of the Columbia River Project and the channel-deepening project were disposed of in the deep-water site? NEPA requires the Corps to answer this question because it is a “reasonably foreseeable” outcome. Talking around that possible outcome, explaining why that is not the preferred outcome, planning to minimize this outcome, all the while taking steps that would bring this possibility to fruition, make clear that the Corps has not met its obligations under NEPA. We should remand for the agency to undertake further NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS 10129 study. Instead, the majority allows channel deepening and authorization of the deep-water disposal site to proceed, even without an understanding of the cumulative effects on coastal erosion of a “reasonably foreseeable” future project. III. OTHER SIGNIFICANT IMPACTS OF CHANNEL DEEPENING: TOXICITY AND SALINITY NEPA requires the Army Corps to evaluate the direct and indirect impacts of channel deepening and disposal of the dredged material, considering all “relevant factors.” 40 C.F.R. §§ 1502.16, 1508.8; Rybacheck v. U.S. Envtl. Prot. Agency, 904 F.2d 1276, 1284 (9th Cir. 1990).
Northwest Environmental Advocates challenges the sufficiency of the Army Corps’ analysis of the effects of channel deepening on the river’s toxicity.8 NWEA asserts that, in its analysis of the impact of channel deepening on levels of toxins in the Columbia River, the Corps failed to draw adequate samples from the sides of the riverbed, which as the channel 8 The toxicity of the Columbia River is much in the news. The federal government recently reached a limited agreement with a Canadian mining company, Teck Cominco, that is believed to be responsible for a century’s worth of pollution of the stretch of the Columbia between the Canadian border and the Grand Coulee Dam. Although the agreement requires Teck Cominco to fund a short-term study of human health and the environment of Lake Roosevelt, tribal stakeholders and the State of Washington are expressing reservations and concern that the agreement will allow Teck Cominco to walk away from what they believe is the company’s obligation to pay for its pollution of the Columbia. Pollution Study Ordered: Teck Cominco Pact Targets Fouling of Columbia, Karen Dorn Steele, The Spokesman Review (June 3, 2006). In fact, this court just held that a lawsuit seeking to hold Teck Cominco liable under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) could proceed because, although Teck Cominco is a Canadian company, it released hazardous substances into the United States. Pakootas v. Teck Cominco Metals, Ltd., No. 05-35153 (9th Cir. July 3, 2006). 10130 NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS is deepened may erode into the deepening channel, mobilizing whatever toxins they contain. The majority holds that there is no need to test sediments from the channel sides for two reasons: (1) because they will not be affected by dredging, and (2) because any material vulnerable to side-slope adjustment is previously-dredged material which must be toxin free. The record refutes this. In its Biological Opinion, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries identified the Columbia River’s toxicity to be “among the highest levels measured in estuarine sites in Washington and Oregon.” Biological Opinion at 36. These high levels of toxicity, just short of lethal, pose a serious threat to juvenile salmonids dependent upon the estuary, not to mention the potential adverse effects on humans and other species. The Army Corps explained the problem of “side-slope adjustment” noting that After the initial deepening the riverbed would begin to adjust to the new channel depth. Riverbeds adjacent to the deeper dredge cuts will degrade as bedload is deflected down the cut slope and into the navigation channel. This process will continue for 5- 10 years before the side-slopes reach equilibrium with the channel hydraulics. Sand eroded from these sides will become part of the active bedload transport on the riverbed. FSEIS, Exh. J at 9. By this process, channel deepening may re-suspend contaminants that had been isolated in the side slopes of the riverbed. Despite this concern, the Army Corps failed to test the toxicity of a sufficient number of sediment samples taken from outside the navigation channel, analyzing primarily samples collected within the channel. The Corps, therefore, has almost no data from which to analyze the impacts of sideslope adjustment on the overall toxicity of the river during NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS 10131 and after channel deepening; without that data, the Corps cannot effectively analyze the impact of channel deepening not only on juvenile salmonids dependent upon the estuary, but other users of the river. The Corps claims a database of 4,000 sediment samples from the Columbia River system. However, there are several problems with this database from the standpoint of an adequate NEPA analysis. First, only 586 of the 4000 samples have been tested for toxicity. Second, the sample set is very old. Many samples pre-date the 40-foot channel depth. Only 40 samples, taken from just 4 sites, were taken later than 2000, and none of these are from side-slope areas.9 Salmon runs are at perilously low levels. The last thing that salmon need is another ladder to climb, so to speak. The Corps’ failure to thoroughly analyze toxicity in the side-slope sediment renders its NEPA analysis incomplete — the agency has not considered all “relevant factors” associated with the direct and indirect impacts of channel deepening on river toxicity.
Appellant also points to the Army Corps’ inadequate analysis of the impacts of channel deepening on the salinity of the Columbia River estuary. Salinity has a tremendous impact on the estuary’s health. Like levels of toxins in the river, the salinity of the estuary is a matter of vital importance to the juvenile salmon which must rest and readjust in the estuary before transitioning from fresh water to salt water in the 9 Following its assertion that side-slope sediment need not be tested, the majority holds, in the alternative, that the Corp has in fact tested side-slope sediments. It bases this holding on a pathetic sample size — two samples from outside the navigation channel. To hold that two samples from outside the navigation channel, when dredging is planned for more than one hundred miles of the Columbia, satisfies NEPA standards borders on the absurd. 10132 NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS ocean. The administrative record documents that deepening the Columbia River channel over the past century and other changes to the structure of the river have “likely caused the largest changes in salinity intrusion and density stratification” in the estuary. Salmon at River’s End: The Role of the Estuary in the Decline and Recovery of Columbia River Salmon, NMFS Technical Memorandum at 99 (2001). At issue is the accuracy of the Army Corps’ models for measuring impacts of channel deepening on salinity. Contrary to the majority’s assertion, NWEA does present a “cogent challenge” to the old model, the WES model, a challenge supported by the record. NOAA Fisheries warned the Corps not to use its older salinity model because of the imprecision of its measurements of salinity in the shallow areas that are favored by salmonids: The WES model used to evaluate change in salinity intrusion was not validated nor designed to assess impacts in the shallow, side channel habitat used by salmon. In other words, an analysis is needed of whether the model would predict current conditions to determine credibility of its ability to predict future conditions. WES was not asked to conduct such an assessment, and commented that — if such valida- tion were needed — a new model would have to be developed. Notes from NOAA Fisheries meeting to “Clarify Science Issues for Columbia River Channel Deepening Project,” (Oct. 6, 2000). Heeding this admonition, the Corps developed a new model for measuring salinity, the Oregon Health and Sciences University/Oregon Graduate Institute (OHSH/OGI) model. NWEA argues that the Corps rushed development of this new salinity model and used it only to evaluate the accuracy of the older model. Furthermore, the Corps appears to have NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS 10133 employed the new salinity model too hastily, before its accuracy had been verified. The developers of the model expressed concern about reliance on its results given the uncertainty surrounding them.10 However, the Corps relied on the findings based on this highly uncertain new model to conclude that salinity would increase in the shallows by less than .5 ppt (parts per thousand) and that this would have no impact. The district court apparently relied, not on evidence within the record, but upon its own Google search about the Corps’ salinity model. The Corps relied upon a model admittedly fraught with uncertainty to reach its conclusion that the channel deepening would produce no adverse impact on the salmonids from salinity in the estuaries. I suggest that studies employing an older, inadequate model followed by complete reliance on an untested model does not constitute the “hard look” required by NEPA. IV. CONCLUSION Fundamentally, the majority takes an ostrich’s head-in-thesand approach to reviewing the agency’s analysis, settling for the Corps’ explanation without undertaking the required review of its decision making. It is true, we are not permitted to substitute our judgment for the reasoned decision of the agency. Neither, however, are we permitted to rubber-stamp the agency’s decision of what factors must be considered and what factors need not be considered without taking a detailed look at whether the agency’s reasoning is sound. Here, it is not. 10 Uncertainty as to the accuracy and adequacy of the model is compounded by the impacts of climate change on the Pacific Ocean and Columbia River — how will now-certain rising of sea level impact salinity of the estuarine lower Columbia River? We don’t know because the Corps has not considered this significant factor. 10134 NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS The “hard look” here went awry. The Corps, as it must, acknowledged profound consequences from erosion if large quantities of sand are removed from the littoral system. Anyone familiar with the Washington coastline has seen the devastation from past erosion (consequences the Corps admits were caused by its own past bad practices). The Corps acknowledges that it has designated a deep-water disposal site to hold huge quantities of dredge spoils, but has no plan of mitigation if that site is used for its intended purpose. Nor does the Corps analyze when and how much erosion is likely to occur—only that it will be profound and devastating. Its analysis of increased toxicity that may result from dredging is completely inadequate, as is its analysis of possible changes in salinity. Last, but certainly not least, the economic analysis is highly suspect. My bottom line is that the Corps has substantially more work to do. Hence my dissent.