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In a setback for the Trump administration, a federal judge in Montana temporarily halted construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline late on Thursday on the grounds that the U.S. government did not complete a full analysis of the environmental impact of the TransCanada Corp project and failed to justify its decision granting a permit for the 1,200-mile long project designed to connect Canada’s tar sands crude oil with refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast. The ruling came in a lawsuit that several environmental groups filed against the U.S. government in 2017, soon after President Donald Trump announced a presidential permit for the project.

The judge, Brian Morris of the U.S. District Court in Montana, said President Trump’s State Department ignored crucial issues of climate change in order to further the president’s goal of letting the pipeline be built. In doing so, the administration ran afoul of the Administrative Procedure Act, which requires “reasoned” explanations for government decisions, particularly when they represent reversals of well-studied actions.

Morris wrote that a U.S. State Department environmental analysis “fell short of a ‘hard look’” at the cumulative effects of greenhouse gas emissions and the impact on Native American land resources. He also ruled the analysis failed to fully review the effects of the current oil price on the pipeline’s viability and did not fully model potential oil spills and offer mitigations measures.

However, the decision does not permanently block a pipeline permit. It requires the administration to conduct a more thorough review of potential adverse impacts related to climate change, cultural resources and endangered species. The court essentially ordered a do-over.

Morris, a former clerk to the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, was appointed to the bench by President Obama.

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Canada, U.S. governments watching, but not intervening, in coal mine pollution controversy

July 31, 2018

Canada, U.S. governments watching, but not intervening, in coal mine pollution controversy

U.S. officials accused Canada of omitting information on selenium pollution flowing from B.C.’s Elk Valley into Montana waters

The U.S. State Department is not going to intervene in a dispute that has split the International Joint Commission (IJC), despite a letter from U.S. commissioners charging that their Canadian counterparts are refusing to publish data showing the full effects of selenium pollution flowing from B.C. coal mines into Montana.

A State Department official told The Narwhal that there are “no plans to weigh in at this time,” and, instead, both the U.S and Canadian federal governments are urging IJC representatives to work out their differences.

The International Joint Commission, which operates at arm’s length from government, has a mandate to prevent disputes over water quality in transboundary waters and is made up of three representatives from the U.S. and three from Canada.

It is hoped commissioners will reflect on more than a century of collaborative history, said the State Department official.

“The U.S Department of State and Global Affairs Canada hold bilateral meetings every six months to discuss a full range of transboundary water issues. Together we have discussed the issue of mining and potential transboundary impacts at every meeting for the past several years and the two governments continue to seek opportunities for collaboration,” he said.

John Babcock, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada, did not directly address the letter from the U.S. commissioners, but said addressing selenium pollution from Teck Resources’ five open pit coal mines in the Elk Valley is a priority.

“Reducing the release of harmful substances found in coal mining effluent discharged into the Elk River and the transboundary Kootenay River basin remains a matter of key importance for Canada,” he said in an emailed response to questions from The Narwhal.

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“Environmental Extremism” or Necessary Response to Climate Emergency? Pipeline Shutdown Trials Pit Activists Against the Oil Industry

March 22, 2018

“ENVIRONMENTAL EXTREMISM” OR NECESSARY RESPONSE TO CLIMATE EMERGENCY? PIPELINE SHUTDOWN TRIALS PIT ACTIVISTS AGAINST THE OIL INDUSTRY

AN ACTIVIST IN Montana was sentenced on Tuesday in a case that has become both a touchstone for industry-friendly legislators pushing to increase penalties for pipeline protest and a measure of the U.S. legal system’s ability to recognize the emergency presented by climate change.

On October 11, 2016, while the Dakota Access pipeline protests were in full force, climate activists approached above-ground valve sites on five tar sands pipelines in Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, and Washington state. After calling the pipeline companies to give warning, they turned the valve wheels in a coordinated attempt to stop the flow of tar sands oil.

Tuesday’s sentencing hearing tested a Montana court’s willingness to apply the severe penalties already available for use against pipeline protesters. For halting the flow of oil through Enbridge’s Express pipeline for several hours, Leonard Higgins, a 66-year-old retired information technology manager for the state of Oregon, faced a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $50,000 fine for charges of misdemeanor trespass and felony criminal mischief. Higgins was sentenced to three years’ probation and $3,755 in restitution to the pipeline company.

“I’m relieved and actually a bit bewildered. It’s unexpected to me. I came very much prepared and expecting to do some jail time at least,” Higgins told The Intercept. “This is a case where both in terms of the severity of the charges and the large amount of claimed damages, I think they were using it to chill the possibility that others might do similar protest.”

Enbridge had initially claimed more than $200,000 in losses, a figure later reduced to $25,630, including $16,000 worth of replacement chains to secure valves along the pipeline against future tampering.

“The courts and the juries are not hammering individuals in the way these corporations would like to see, so they attempt to use the restitution process to grossly inflate their damage numbers with hope that threatening the citizen with $200,000 might chill others from committing similar acts,” said Lauren Regan, Higgins’s attorney.

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Not on This Land: A Western Tribe Takes a Stand and Says No to Big Coal

November 18, 2015

Not on This Land: A Western Tribe Takes a Stand and Says No to Big Coal

The Northern Cheyenne are opposing a proposed railroad that would cut through their ancestral lands to haul Montana coal to the Pacific coast for export. An e360 video reports on the Cheyenne’s fight against the railroad and the extraordinary coalition of tribal people and ranchers who have joined together to stop the project.

With coal development on three sides of their Montana reservation, the Northern Cheyenne know the changes that coal can bring to the landscape. So when a rail line was proposed that would carry coal from yet another huge open-pit mine planned near their border, the Northern Cheyenne decided to oppose it.This e360 video, produced by The Story Group, tells the story of an unlikely alliance between the Cheyenne and local ranchers who are seeking to block the

Tongue River Railroad, which would run alongside the reservation and carry coal from the planned Otter Creek mine to rail lines that connect to Pacific ports. The tribe’s long fight against the railroad is coming to a head, with a decision by the federal Surface Transportation Board expected in the spring.

“This is our homeland,” tribal councilman Conrad Fisher tells the filmmakers. “It’s the cultural landscape, it’s the social landscape, it’s the spiritual landscape. Essentially, it’s the fabric of who we are as Cheyenne people.”

Watch the video.

On the Value of Water and the Pain of Drought in the American West

August 14, 2015

On the Value of Water and the Pain of Drought in the American West

Drift boats carry fly fishermen down the Madison River, in southwestern Montana. Click image to enlarge.

ENNIS, Montana — As roads go, the shoulder of Route 249, which flanks the broad bottomlands of the Madison River, is an inspiring path for a run.

On a recent evening in late July, the route was particularly splendid. Golden-hour sunlight burnished the Madison Range with a honeyed glow, illuminating one of those Big Sky views that stirs wealthy urbanites to peruse ranch listings and learn horsemanship.

I set off on a long out-and-back up the valley, but after 15 minutes I stopped running. It was not for lack of breath: sprinklers caught my eye.

As the road doglegged, one of the great conflict zones for water use in the American West sprawled before me. Beyond, just out of sight, was the Madison River, where drift boats carried fly fishermen along some of the country’s best trout habitat. In the river’s floodplain were rows of alfalfa, one of the thirstiest field crops. The scene was nearly silent, interrupted only by the occasional songbird and the sprinklers, which swung left and right in a 180-degree arc, their swishes and tuts sounding like a roomful of typists reproducing an endless novel.

Value of Water

Agriculture and rivers. These are two of the chief contestants on the West’s water stage. Farming, which uses, on average, at least 80 percent of the water that humans pull out of streams and aquifers, has slayed many a river. Irrigators on the Gallatin River, a neighbor to the Madison, for instance, have the legal right to dry up the waterway, according to Peter Brown of the Gallatin Valley Land Trust.

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Yellowstone River Oil Spill Threatens Drinking Water in Montana

January 20, 2015

Yellowstone River Oil Spill Threatens Drinking Water in Montana

Bottled water is being provided to residents of Glendive, Montana, after oil from True Companies’Poplar pipeline system leaked into the Yellowstone River.

Dawson County has received complaints of odor in drinking water from people who use the municipal water system, according to a posting on the Montana government site. A water sample from the system showed elevated levels of volatile organic compounds, predominantly benzene, Bill Salvin, an outside spokesman for True Companies, whose Bridger Pipeline LLC operates the Poplar system, said in an e-mail.

As much as 1,200 barrels of oil leaked from the pipeline Jan. 17 and much went into the river, according to Dave Parker, a spokesman for Montana Governor Steve Bullock. The governor’s office declared an emergency in Dawson and Richland counties along the river and as many as 50 workers from the company and federal, state and local agencies are investigating the leak.

The 12-inch crude line carries as much as 42,000 barrels a day from near the Canadian border to Baker, Montana, according to Salvin, the outside spokesman, who works for Signal Bridge Communications, Inc. The section of the pipeline that is shut after the leak needs regulator approval to be restarted and the line mainly carries oil from the Bakken formation in North Dakota and Montana, according to Salvin.

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