The U.S. Supreme Court last week ruled in favor of a controversial Utah railway project that critics say erodes the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, a bedrock of environmental law for the past half century.
The case centered on a proposed 88-mile railway that would connect the oil fields of northeastern Utah to a national rail network that runs along the Colorado River and on to refineries on the Gulf Coast.
The waxy crude oil is currently transported by truck over narrow mountain passes. Project proponents said shipping the fossil fuel by rail — on as many as 10 trains daily — would be quicker and revitalize the local economy by quadrupling the Uinta Basin’s oil production.
In 2020, the Seven County Infrastructure Coalition applied to the U.S. Surface Transportation Board for approval of the railroad’s construction. Under NEPA, the board was required to conduct an Environmental Impact Statement, or EIS, to evaluate possible harms from the project and consider how they could be mitigated.
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