Living Rivers v. Hoffman

Three conservation groups challenged 130 oil and gas lease sales covering 175,357 acres of public lands in Utah for failing to consider indirect and cumulative greenhouse gas emissions and climate change impacts. The complaint asserted that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews for the lease sales, which were conducted between 2014 and 2018, considered no indirect greenhouse gas emissions other than carbon dioxide emissions from combustion and failed to analyze downstream emissions for non-carbon dioxide emissions and emissions that occurred after drilling but prior to combustion. The complaint also alleged that the NEPA reviews did not quantify cumulative emissions of other past, present, or reasonably foreseeable oil and gas lease sales but instead provided “only broad and generic statements regarding the nature of the climate crisis.”