Protesters rally in front of the White House in March 2017. | Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images) ENERGY & ENVIRONMENT Judge tosses Trump’s Keystone XL approval over climate change

A federal judge ordered both the Trump administration and TransCanada to stop any work on the controversial Keystone XL pipeline on Thursday, saying President Donald Trump’s approval of the project last year violated several key environmental and administrative laws by ignoring facts about climate change.

Judge Brian Morris of the U.S. District Court for Montana ruled that the Trump administration almost completely ignored climate change in its analysis supporting the pipeline’s construction, a shift that unlawfully reversed the Obama administration’s 2015 decision rejecting the pipeline’s cross-border permit.


Morris, an Obama appointee, directed the Trump administration in his ruling to prepare a new environmental study before the pipeline can resume construction, leaving the door open to a renewed approval in the future.

“The [State] Department did not merely make a policy shift in its stance on the United States’ role on climate change. It simultaneously ignored” a critical part of the Obama administration’s stance on climate change and foreign relations, Morris concluded. Such a change would require a “reasoned explanation.”

“The Department instead simply discarded prior factual findings related to climate change to support its course reversal,” Morris added.

Morning Energy newsletter The source for energy and environment news — weekday mornings, in your inbox. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Morris identified a litany of other flaws that he said will require fixing before the pipeline can move forward.

The administration must incorporate new information about major oil spills that occurred between 2014 and 2017, including a significant incident involving the original Keystone pipeline, he wrote, and the Fish and Wildlife Service will need to update its analysis of impacts on wildlife in the wake of those major spills.

The State Department failed to take a "hard look" at the cumulative climate impacts of Keystone XL alongside the Alberta Clipper pipeline expansion, Morris said, and the analysis failed to review Keystone XL's impacts on "cultural resources" across more than 1,000 acres.

The government must also update the study to examine whether current oil prices affect Keystone XL's viability, he said.

He also blocked the federal government and TransCanada "from engaging in any activity in furtherance of the construction or operation of Keystone and associated facilities until the Department has completed a supplement to the 2014 [Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement] that complies with the requirements of" the National Environmental Policy Act and the Administrative Procedure Act.

Morris previously declined to vacate the Keystone XL permit over questions about the pipeline's path through Nebraska.