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

Heading: The Majority’s Flawed Analysis of Cumulative

Text: Impacts The majority concludes that the Corps has adequately considered the cumulative impacts on coastal erosion of deepwater disposal of sediment dredged as part of both the Mouth of the Columbia River (MCR) Project and the channeldeepening project at issue here. It bases its determination on (1) the Corps’ assurance that it has considered those cumula10116 NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS tive impacts; (2) the Corps’ treatment of deep-water disposal as allowable, although the least preferred option; (3) changes made to disposal practices for the Mouth of the Columbia River Project to maximize the amount of sediment retained in the littoral cell; and (4) plans to monitor and manage sediment disposal in the future to prevent coastal erosion. Maj. Op. at 10083-88. The documents cited by the majority reveal that the Corps has proposed a deep-water disposal site large enough to receive all of the dredged material from both projects although the Corps alleges it would prefer to keep material in the littoral cell; that the agency plans not to employ the deepwater disposal site for a large volume of dredge disposal unless necessary. As the majority tells us, the record explains the volume the Corps expects to dispose in deep water by reference to the expected capacity of Site E and the North Jetty Site, both disposal sites within the littoral system, and the dispersion of material from those two sites. That is, the volume of dredged material that the Corps plans to place in deepwater disposal depends upon how much Site E and the North Jetty Site can accommodate in any given year. If Site E and the North Jetty Site do not disperse sediment as quickly as anticipated, a clear possibility that the Corps acknowledges, the volume of material that would be disposed in the deepwater site would increase accordingly. This demonstrates that the volume of material to be disposed in the deep-water site is uncertain, dependent upon several variables. Despite this uncertainty and the probability that the deep-water disposal scenario will not play out as it hopes, the Corps has failed to undertake broader cumulative-effects analysis that would result from dumping significant volumes of sand into a deepwater site outside the littoral cell. The majority attempts to distinguish this case from our decision in Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center. v. Bureau of Land Management, 387 F.3d 989 (9th Cir. 2004) that the Bureau of Land Management did not sufficiently consider the cumulative impacts of several timber sales. The majority finds central to the holding in that case the fact that a single project NORTHWEST ENVIRONMENTAL ADVOCATES v. NMFS 10117 was subdivided and those sub-parts were analyzed separately from one another. Maj. Op. at 10089-90. In focusing on this factor, the majority overlooks an important commonality between Klamath-Siskiyou and this case: the Forest Service’s cumulative effects analysis looked only at the effects of the particular project at issue, failing to account for the “combined effects that can be expected as a result of undertaking [multiple timber sales] and other foreseeable projects, in addition to [the project at issue.]” Klamath-Siskiyou, 387 F.3d at 996. Although the majority opinion finds that the Corps’ analysis did look at the cumulative impacts of deep-sea disposal of all material dredged from the Mouth of the Columbia River Project, what it concluded was that it would be as devastating as indeed it would. What it doesn’t do is detail what the erosion would cause. Apparently, it thinks nothing could mitigate it because the record is devoid of any such analysis.