Opinion ID: 597401
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Events Preceding FERC's Grant of a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity

Text: 3 In November 1986, TN Gas, an interstate pipeline operator, filed an application with FERC for a certificate of public convenience and necessity to construct and operate a natural gas pipeline and a metering station. TN Gas needed the pipeline extension in order to provide gas to Providence Gas, a local distribution company whose projected need for gas would soon exceed its current supply, and could not construct or operate it without a certificate. 15 U.S.C. § 717f(c)(1)(A) (1988). The proposed route for the new pipeline extended north of petitioners' land in Cranston, Rhode Island. 1 FERC published a notice of the TN Gas application in the Federal Register on December 8, 1986. That notice apprised the public that the proposed pipeline would be approximately thirty-six miles long, connecting TN Gas's existing pipeline in Worcester County, Massachusetts to [Providence Gas's proposed pipeline in] Cranston, Rhode Island. Notice of Application, 51 Fed.Reg. 44,118, 44,120 (1986). It also informed interested parties that an attendant metering station was to be built at Cranston, Rhode Island and that they could oppose TN Gas's application by intervening in the FERC proceeding or filing a protest on or before December 23, 1986. Id. at 44,120-21. 4 On March 13, 1987, FERC issued a Notice of Intent to Prepare an Environmental Assessment and a request for comments on the propriety of the proposed route and on the project's environmental impact. FERC mailed the notice and request for comments to all parties that had intervened in the proceedings as of that date and to federal, state and local environmental agencies. It also published the notice in the Federal Register. See 52 Fed.Reg. 8,510 (1987). Sometime later that year, TN Gas began considering alternative routes for the pipeline, one of which would traverse petitioners' properties and would require the placement of a metering station in the southeast corner of the Moreau property. In May 1988, TN Gas formally proposed that route to FERC by filing a map specifically identifying petitioners' properties and the route across it. 5 In the interim, on November 30 and December 17, 1987, TN Gas contacted petitioners to see if they could negotiate the acquisition of an easement across their properties for the pipeline and some property from the Moreaus for the metering station. Petitioners refused to grant either. The Moreaus also informed TN Gas that their property, the historic Thomas Baker Farm, dated back to the pre-Revolutionary War era and was therefore entitled to protection under the National Historic Preservation Act, 16 U.S.C. § 470 et seq. (1988). On these occasions and subsequent meetings in 1988, petitioners refused to sell and proposed alternate routes. 6 FERC issued an Environmental Assessment of the Providence Project (EA) and a request for comments thereon on November 15, 1988. Although it mailed the EA to 179 parties and state and local agencies in Rhode Island, FERC did not publish the EA or notice thereof in the Federal Register and did not serve either upon petitioners, who still were not parties to the proceedings. In the EA, FERC concluded, contrary to the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) recommendation, that with specified mitigation measures, the pipeline project would not constitute a major Federal action significantly affecting the quality of the human environment. Providence Project Environmental Assessment [299 U.S.App.D.C. 172] t 50 (Nov. 1988). Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), 42 U.S.C. § 4321 et seq. (1988), that conclusion allowed FERC to avoid having to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS). See 42 U.S.C. § 4332(2)(C). Shortly thereafter, on January 19, 1989, FERC published another notice in the Federal Register, which reflected changes in the sales service to Providence Gas. See Notice of Amendment to Application, 54 Fed.Reg. 2,202 (1989). 7