A federal appeals court this week handed a win to environmental groups that are fighting a mid-Atlantic natural gas expansion project.
On Tuesday, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rebuffed a gas infrastructure developer’s bid to stop a quasi-judicial state agency from reviewing approvals for a project designed to enhance an existing pipeline network in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line had claimed that the federal Natural Gas Act blocked Pennsylvania’s Environmental Hearing Board from reviewing the permits for the company’s Regional Energy Access Expansion project. The company had argued that the matter belongs before a federal court instead.
“As a matter of law, however, none of those methods of preemption apply here, and so the District Court correctly denied Transco’s motion for a preliminary injunction,” said Judge Peter Phipps, writing the opinion for the 3rd Circuit.