FERC, D.C. Circuit Reject Recent Challenges To Gas Pipeline Development

Landowners and environmental groups are bringing increasingly sophisticated challenges to gas pipeline projects and sometimes succeed in delaying development, but in recent cases they have ultimately lost on the merits. The latest setback for pipeline opponents came in July in Gunpowder Riverkeeper v. FERC, where the D.C. Circuit rejected an environmental group's challenge to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ("FERC") order approving a gas pipeline expansion project.^[1] Recent FERC orders have also consistently found that new projects will benefit the public despite environmental groups' concerns.

Pipelines have responded to steady demand for expansion of gas infrastructure with proposals for numerous new and expanded projects. In particular, shippers require additional capacity to support conversions from coal to gas-fired generators, as well as to move liquefied natural gas ("LNG") to export facilities. In deciding whether to authorize construction