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Another CD-5 suit filed against Corps Center for Biological Diversity claims violation of Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act, National Environmental Policy Act Kristen Nelson Petroleum News
The approval by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of ConocoPhillips Alaska’s CD-5 development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska has drawn another court challenge. The Center for Biological Diversity said in a June 5 statement that it was challenging the agency’s approval of the development.
“We’re deeply concerned that this project could kick the door open for industrial development in the reserve’s priceless habitat for caribou, birds and other wildlife,” Deidre McDonnell, a senior attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement.
An earlier suit, filed against the Corps in late February by Trustees for Alaska on behalf of seven residents of Nuiqsut, subsistence hunters and fishers, cited plaintiffs’ concern that the development would harm their way of life.
Drill site, bridge, road CD-5, or Alpine West, includes a new drill site in NPR-A, a bridge across the Nigliq Channel of the Colville River carrying a crude oil pipeline from CD-5 to the Alpine field processing facilities and three smaller bridges. The plan requires fill in 58.5 acres, including six miles of road.
The Corps issued a Section 404 permit for Alpine satellite CD-5 in December 2011, but that was after denying that permit in 2010 based on objections from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, both of whom opposed the bridge over the Nigliq Channel. In early 2010 the Corps said there were less environmental damaging practicable alternatives, specifically a pipeline under the Nigliq Channel using horizontal directional drilling.
The State of Alaska and the state’s congressional delegation objected to the Corps’ 2010 denial and ConocoPhillips appealed the decision.
In the December 2011 approval the Corps said the ConocoPhillips’ proposal “with special conditions” had been determined to be the least environmentally damaging practicable alternative, “based on other environmental consequences of pipeline monitoring, leak detection, and spill response.” The Corps also said ConocoPhillips’ proposal for road access to CD-5 “is the only alternative that would provide year round spill response access.”
LEDPA dispute In its suit the Center for Biological Diversity argues that ConocoPhillips’ plan “was not the least environmentally damaging practicable alternative” (LEDPA). In reversing its original decision, the Corps in its “decision green lights the first oil development within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (Reserve) and would connect the Reserve with existing oil infrastructure outside its boundaries,” the complaint states.
Plaintiffs call for a supplemental environmental impact statement, arguing that “the Corps failed to conduct a site-specific analysis as required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), instead relying on a nearly nine-year-old analysis conducted before ConocoPhillips made its current proposal.” The Center for Biological Diversity also said the Corps failed to consult with the National Marine Fisheries Service to ensure the project would not jeopardize whales and seals listed under the Endangered Species Act.
The Center for Biological Diversity is a national nonprofit conservation organization; it said in its filing that it has been actively involved in protecting Alaska’s wildlife since the early 1990s, and has been involved in protection of wildlife resources in NPR-A since 1998.
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