The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission refused to reconsider its approval of construction activities for Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co. LLC's 1.7-Bcf/d Atlantic Sunrise expansion project that will provide access to Marcellus Shale supplies.
A March 1 FERC order denied a rehearing request from the Sierra Club and other groups. The commission said it was appropriate to permit Transco to proceed with construction, even as the groups contested the project's certificate order.
"The [Natural Gas Act] explicitly states that, unless the commission grants a stay of the order, a request for rehearing shall not operate as a stay of the commission's order," FERC staff said in the order.
The Sierra Club said it will appeal the matter to a federal court.
The Sierra Club had tried to argue that because cumulative impacts associated with downstream greenhouse gas emissions were not included in the commission's environmental review, FERC should revoke authorizations for the project and its construction. The group based its argument on a federal court's August 2017 decision that vacated the approvals for another gas transportation project, the three main components of the Southeast Market Pipeline developed by Enbridge Inc., NextEra Energy Inc., Williams Partners LP, Duke Energy Corp. and others. In the decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit found FERC should have analyzed greenhouse gas emissions from downstream power plants in its environmental review of the pipeline project.
FERC staff said this point was "outside the scope of this rehearing" and was a "belated challenge" to the certificate order.
"[The commission] can try blocking the judicial process all they want, we aren't going away and will continue to fight this dangerous pipeline for as long as they continue to build it," Sierra Club campaign director Kelly Martin said on March 2.
Sierra Club spokesman Doug Jackson said the group will file briefs with a federal appeals court between March 5 and March 9.
FERC approved the project on Feb. 3, 2017. On Feb. 10, 2017, the Sierra Club asked the commission to reconsider its approval and to stay the project. FERC has denied this request and other petitions for rehearings. Commission staff authorized Transco, a Williams Partners subsidiary, to begin construction on the approximately $3 billion project in September 2017. The project is comprised of about 200 miles of greenfield pipeline in Pennsylvania, and compressor stations and other facilities in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. (FERC docket CP15-138)
