A federal judge has ruled against a massive 5,000-well project in Wyoming involving two Oklahoma oil and gas companies.
Continental Resources and Devon Energy, based in Oklahoma City, along with Anschutz Exploration of Colorado were involved in the Converse County Oil and Gas Project that was nullified in a decision by U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan in Washington, D.C.
She ruled the U.S. Bureau of Land Management fell short in its 2020 review of the drilling project by dismissing alternatives to the development across an area the size of Delaware. The oil companies contended the environmental laws were irrelevant in the approval of the project, arguing “the political process” governs the development, the companies argued in court papers.
It was the same argument made late last year by Harold Hamm, founder of Continental Resources during a visit with Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon.
The judge had stopped the drilling in 2024 as part of a 3-year old lawsuit by the Powder River Basin Resource Council and Western Watersheds Project. The groups alleged the energy companies were skirting the court’s 2024 temporary injunction.
As reported by WyoFile, Judge Chutkan ruled the BLM violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it dismissed a development alternative that would have restrained the rate of drilling.
“Contrary to BLM’s representation,” Chutkan wrote, “a slower pace of development is not inconsistent with the agency’s stated purpose and need for agency action.”
The Petroleum Association of Wyoming disagreed with the judge’s decision.
“The Petroleum Association of Wyoming believes the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia’s decision to vacate the entire Converse County Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) is flawed. The ruling ignores the United States Supreme Court’s 8-0 decision that narrowed the scope of NEPA reviews in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado last May,” said Ryan McConnaughey, the organization’s vice president and spokesman.
“The ruling is a blow to the creative work of balancing development and conservation in Wyoming that will limit future collaborations if left standing. It is definitive proof that the federal mineral management system is broken. Thankfully, sensible resource development in the Powder River Basin will continue via other permitting avenues,” he added. “Anti-development organizations will accept nothing short of a complete ban on development of federal minerals. At a time of renewed instability in the Middle East, we should be strengthening our national security and economy through domestic production – not turning away from the natural resources with which we are blessed here at home. It is time for common-sense permitting and judicial reforms that will once again allow investment in production and infrastructure.”