Conservation Law Foundation v. Gulf Oil LP

In Conservation Law Foundation’s (CLF’s) citizen suit alleging that Gulf Oil Limited Partnership violated federal environmental laws by failing to prepare a bulk petroleum storage terminal in New Haven for the impacts of climate change, the federal district court for the District of Connecticut granted CLF’s motion to amend its complaint to remedy deficiencies identified by the court when it dismissed certain counts under the Clean Water Act and all counts under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act for failure to plausibly allege standing. In its earlier decision, the court concluded that CLF’s allegations regarding the “longer-term impacts” of climate change were not sufficient to establish Article III standing, which requires an imminent risk of harm. Although the court found that most of CLF’s proposed new allegations still pertained to climate change’s longer-term impacts, the court ruled that other assertions in the proposed amended complaint and its attachments adequately alleged standing, “albeit just barely.” The court found that the proposed allegations plausibly suggested that a Category 1 or 2 hurricane could be expected to strike the terminal “at virtually any time” and that there was “a substantial risk that such a storm will cause the discharge of pollutants from the Terminal.” The court said these allegations, “coupled with [CLF’s] allegations that climate change is continually increasing the risk that a severe storm will cause a discharge of pollutants from the terminal,” were sufficient to plausibly suggest a substantial risk of harm to CLF’s members in the near term. The court denied CLF’s request to assert a new Clean Water Act claim alleging that Gulf Oil caused or contributed to an exceedance of water quality standards. The court found that CLF failed to show good cause to add this new count.