Sierra Club v. United States Army Corps, No. 14-5205 (D.C. Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CaseSierra Club filed suit against the government seeking to set aside several federal agencies' regulatory approvals relating to the Flanagan South pipeline and to enjoin the pipeline's construction and operation in reliance on any such approvals. The district court denied preliminary injunctive relief and entered summary judgment in favor of the agencies and Enbridge. The court held that the federal government was not required to conduct National Environment Policy Act, 42 U.S.C. 4321-4370h, analysis of the entirety of the Flanagan South pipeline, including portions not subject to federal control or permitting; the court rejected Sierra Club’s Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. 1251-1387, challenge to the Corps’s verifications of Flanagan South’s water crossings under Nationwide Permit 12 because the Corps was authorized to conduct its review on a regional rather than nationwide basis, and the Corps’s District Managers adequately supported their verification decisions; and the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Sierra Club’s motion to supplement and amend its complaint, because the proposed new allegations would not have affected the dispositive legal analysis. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.
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