United States Ninth Circuit

In a petition for review challenging the Beaumont Permit issued by the EPA under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System provisions of the Clean Water Act, authorizing the discharge of oil and gas exploration facilities of 13 waste streams into marine waters of the Beaufort Sea in accordance with the conditions set forth in the permit, the petition is: 1) granted in part n one issue on which the EPA admitted error in the record, and remanded to the EPA for a determination regarding whether the discharge of non-contact cooling water into the Beaufort Sea will cause unreasonable degradation of the marine environment because of the effect of such discharge on bowhead whales, including deflection from their migratory paths; but 2) denied in all other respects because the EPA's issuance of the permit was otherwise supported by the record evidence, did not reflect a failure to consider an important respect of the problem, and was not otherwise arbitrary or capricious.

Appellate Information

• Decided 06/29/2015
• Published 06/29/2015

Judges

• Canby

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel