On August 21, 2024, Sierra Club and several community and environmental groups filed a lawsuit against the Louisiana Department of Energy and Natural Resources (LDNR), challenging the Coastal Use Permit for Commonwealth LNG. The permit authorizes the liquefied natural gas (LNG) export project to construct a massive methane gas liquefaction, storage, and export terminal on the Gulf of Mexico in wetlands that provide critical flood prevention and other vital ecological functions to local communities and the environment. The lawsuit argues that LDNR failed to consider the project’s environmental justice and climate change impacts, alongside the cumulative impacts of other export facilities already in the area.
If built, the Commonwealth LNG project would generate greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to operating 14 new coal-fired power plants or 13 million new gasoline powered vehicles. Last month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected FERC's licensing approval for this same project, because FERC failed to properly assess the cumulative and direct environmental and health impacts that would result from air pollution emitted by the facility. The LDNR Coastal Use Permit is another example of improper agency permitting for this ill-conceived project.
This case is one of several brought by Sierra Club and partners challenging LDNR's continued issuance of Coastal Use Permits for Louisiana LNG projects and pipelines. In each of these permit approvals, LDNR has ignored the thousands of acres of wetlands that would be destroyed as a result of project construction and operation, and the accompanying worsening effects of climate change. Louisiana's wetlands are rapidly disappearing, and the continued authorization of wetland modification and destruction directly contradicts scientific evidence calling for the protection of these critical ecosystems to avert climate catastrophe and endangerment to frontline communities.
Sierra Club Environmental Law Program attorneys Rebecca McCreary and Eric Huber were essential in developing this lawsuit. Former Environmental Law Program attorney, Lisa Diaz, wrote the comments that are now the basis of this lawsuit. Sierra Club is represented in this case by Clay Garside from Waltzer Wiygul & Garside LLC.