GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colo.—Construction on a gas pipeline in some roadless forests in western Colorado can resume now that a federal appeals court has lifted an injunction that was blocking the work.
The 10th U.S. Circuit of Appeals in Denver lifted the injunction Wednesday, the same day that environmentalists opposing the pipeline argued for maintaining the injunction until their lawsuit is resolved.
The lawsuit by the Wilderness Workshop and other groups can still go forward but the 25.5-mile Bull Mountain natural gas pipeline likely will be built before it’s decided.
“It’s very disappointing to me,” Sloan Shoemaker of the Wilderness Workshop said Friday.
He said the three-judge panel that decided to lift the injunction will issue a written ruling explaining the decision. The groups say federal approval of the pipeline violates a 2001 rule banning new roads on nearly a third of the national forest land across the country.
“We look forward to seeing their ruling, to see what their arguments and rationales are,” Shoemaker said.
Attorneys representing the environmental groups will determine whether to pursue the issue further.
The route goes through parts of three roadless areas in the White River and Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnison national forests.
Robbie Guinn, a vice president with pipeline builder SG Interests, told the Glenwood Springs Post Independent, “The court felt that the secretary of the Interior had the authority to issue the permits necessary for other multiple uses like building pipelines through the inventoried roadless areas.”
Environmentalists see the pipeline as a key battle in upholding the 2001 road-building ban.
Federal officials have denied that any roads will be built in roadless areas during construction of the pipeline.
Attorney Robin Cooley of Earthjustice, representing the environmentalists, argued in court that a two-lane road is planned to provide access.
Shoemaker said the 2001 rule prohibits even temporary roads because of the potential impacts.
The roadless rule was passed in the waning days of the Clinton administration after more than two years of public hearings. About a third of the country’s 192 million acres of national forest lands was affected. The bulk of the land is in the West.
Some of the areas protected as roadless have trails and roads but generally are prized for their pristine qualities and are considered important as wildlife habitat, watersheds, scenic and recreation areas.
The rule has been entangled in the courts since its passage. It was overturned by a Wyoming federal court, reinstated by one in California and is again under review by the same Wyoming court that threw it out in 2003.
