Opinion ID: 597401
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Adjudicative Proceedings Before FERC and Events Leading Up to the Order Under Review

Text: 8 At the close of the comment period, FERC considered the comments that had been filed regarding the EA. On May 18, 1989, FERC denied requests for a formal evidentiary hearing, on the ground that the record presented no disputed issues of material fact, and issued TN Gas a certificate of public convenience and necessity pursuant to the Natural Gas Act (NGA), 15 U.S.C. § 717f(e) (1988). Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co., 47 Fed. Energy Reg. Comm'n Rep. (CCH) p 61,227 (1989). The certificate, however, was conditioned on TN Gas's satisfaction of twelve enumerated criteria, id. at 61,799-800, two of which are relevant here. Condition A, inter alia, required TN Gas to adhere to the proposed route as reported to FERC in several enumerated submissions, id., not including the May 16, 1988 submission, in which TN Gas formally proposed the route cutting through petitioners' property. In January 1990, TN Gas filed a motion asking FERC to include the May 16, 1988 submission in Condition A, but FERC has yet to rule on the motion. Condition L barred TN Gas from commencing construction until it received written permission to do so from the Director of FERC's Office of Pipeline and Producer Regulation (OPPR). Id. at 61,800. FERC ordered the OPPR Director not to issue such a letter until he had reviewed and approved cultural resource and mitigation plans and had reviewed comments on the project from the Rhode Island State Historic Preservation Officer (RISHPO) and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. Id. 9 Two months later, in July 1989, the Lawrences inquired as to the status of the FERC proceedings. FERC answered their inquiry in August by advising them of the conditional grant of the certificate of public convenience and necessity and by providing them with a copy of the EA. In November 1989, TN Gas sent the Moreaus and the Lawrences copies of the order approving its application for a certificate of public convenience and necessity. Having received and notified petitioners of the conditional certificate of public convenience and necessity, TN Gas filed a condemnation suit under 15 U.S.C. § 717f(h) (1988) in the United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island against petitioners and other neighboring landowners in December 1989. That suit ultimately proved successful. See Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co. v. 104 Acres of Land, 749 F.Supp. 427 (D.R.I.1990) (condemning the property TN Gas sought), appeal dismissed, No. 90-2216 (1st Cir. July 18, 1991). 10 On January 22, 1990, one month after TN Gas filed the condemnation suit, petitioners finally sought leave to intervene in the FERC proceedings. In that motion, they also moved for rehearing of the May 18, 1989 order, arguing that the route then under consideration, which traversed their property, should be abandoned in favor of specified routes that purportedly were environmentally superior. Although their intervention motion was considerably late, FERC granted it on September 29, 1990 and issued an order addressing petitioners' concerns. Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co., 52 Fed. Energy Reg. Comm'n Rep. (CCH) p 61,290 (1990). 11 Relying on a Supplemental Environmental Assessment which it had ordered its staff to prepare after receiving petitioners' motion, FERC sua sponte ordered that the pipeline be routed around the Lawrences' property. Id. That re-routing was to be accomplished, however, by almost doubling the length of the pipeline on the Moreau property. The new route, called the certificated route realignment alternative [299 U.S.App.D.C. 173] (CRRA), would utilize an existing water pipeline right-of-way, thereby avoiding a spring and reducing the amount of the Moreaus' land that would have to be cleared of vegetation. FERC concluded that the new route is the best resolution of the concerns raised by the concerned landowners as it avoids bisecting the Lawrences' property and reduces the potential for adverse impact on the Moreaus' property, without transferring substantial additional impact on other residences or landowners. Id. at 62,151. Still unhappy with the planned route, petitioners moved for a stay of the September 1990 order, which FERC denied, and for a rehearing of the stay denial, which FERC also denied. Tennessee Gas Pipeline Co., 54 Fed. Energy Reg. Comm'n Rep. (CCH) p 61,244 (1991). FERC did, however, grant petitioners' motion for a rehearing on the merits of the September 29, 1990 order and issued the order presently under review on November 8, 1991. 12 Shortly before that, TN Gas had received the cultural survey on which FERC had conditioned the certificate of public convenience and necessity. That survey corroborated the Moreaus' claims that their farm was eligible for protection under the National Historic Preservation Act, 16 U.S.C. § 470 et seq. TN Gas therefore moved, on July 8, 1991, for yet another route change. Instead of crossing the Moreau property, the new route would run adjacent to it down a public right-of-way, Natick Road, still without crossing the Lawrences' property. The metering station, which TN Gas had previously planned to build and operate on a part of the Moreau property, would be moved to a property north of the Moreau farm. Anxious to begin construction, TN Gas transferred the metering station and the Natick Road portion of the pipeline from its leg of the project to that of Providence Gas. Concluding that the pipeline project, as re-routed, would not adversely affect neighboring property, the OPPR Director gave TN Gas written permission to start construction of the pipeline, subject to a condition (which is not relevant here) that the RISHPO recommended. This Court denied petitioners' emergency stay motion on December 20, 1991, and TN Gas began construction immediately thereafter.