Sierra Club v. EPA

After the Ninth Circuit vacated the underlying permit in a <a href="https://climatecasechart.com/case/sierra-club-v-epa-3/">separate proceeding</a>, the parties filed a stipulation of voluntary dismissal because EPA’s decision to extend the deadline in the underlying permit for commencing construction no longer had any legal effect.

Sierra Club and three other environmental organizations petitioned the Ninth Circuit for review of EPA’s <a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2013-07-09/pdf/2013-16334.pdf">decision</a> to extend the deadline for commencing construction of the 600-MW natural gas-fired Avenal Energy Project in the San Joaquin Valley in California pursuant to a PSD permit issued in 2011.  A challenge to the 2011 permit—which did not require implementation of greenhouse gas controls because the permit application was submitted before GHG requirements became effective and because EPA failed to act in a timely manner on the application—was also <a href="https://climatecasechart.com/case/sierra-club-v-epa-3/">pending</a> in the Ninth Circuit.  The Ninth Circuit held oral argument in that action on October 8, 2013.  In announcing the challenge to the construction deadline extension, the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the environmental organizations bringing the lawsuit, <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2013/avemal-09-06-2013.html">said</a> that the exemption from the deadline was “contrary to decades of EPA precedent” and was based on Avenal’s “specious claim that it could not obtain financing for the project due to the existing litigation.”