The federal district court for the Northern District of California ruled that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM’s) approval of land management plans designating route networks for off-highway vehicles (OHVs) in the Western Mojave Desert did not comply with the Endangered Species Act, Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and NEPA in some respects. Among the claims addressed by the court were challenges to the assessment of greenhouse gas emissions in the final supplemental environmental impact statement. The court rejected a contention that BLM excluded greenhouse gases from its air quality report, finding that the report did address greenhouse gases and only excluded greenhouse gases not attributable to the OHV route network. The court also found that BLM appropriately incorporated climate modeling for a broader area that included the Western Mojave planning area. The court agreed with the plaintiffs, however, that BLM failed to analyze greenhouse gas impacts among alternatives. The court also found that a “no population growth” assumption that impacted the greenhouse gas analysis was unsupported and arbitrary and capricious.

Challenge to federal defendants' management of the West Mojave Planning Area of the California Desert Conservation Area.

Center for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Bureau of Land Management

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California Court Found Problems with Climate Analysis for Off-Highway Vehicle Networks in Western Mojave Desert

Filed

United States of America

California

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California Court Found Problems with Climate Analysis for Off-Highway Vehicle Networks in Western Mojave Desert

Policy instrument

Risk

Impacted group

Just transition

Renewable energy

Fossil fuel

Greenhouse gas

Economic sector

Adaptation/resilience