Description: Challenge to EPA’s conditional exclusion from RCRA’s hazardous waste definition for carbon dioxide streams injected into Underground Injection Control Class VI wells.
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Carbon Sequestration Council v. EPA
Case Documents:
Filing Date Type File Action Taken Summary 06/02/2015 Opinion Download Opinion issued dismissing case. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that petitioners did not have standing to challenge EPA’s determination. EPA’s determination concerned a new class of wells—Class VI wells—established by EPA under the Safe Drinking Water Act specifically for carbon dioxide injection. The D.C. Circuit said that one petitioner—a company that captured and compressed carbon dioxide for use in enhanced oil recovery or injection in another class of well—had no plans to use the type of well governed by the challenged rule. Therefore, neither the company nor the organization of which it was a member had standing. A second organization that relied on a member for representational standing also did not have standing because its member company was not directly regulated by the challenged rule but was merely concerned that the rule portended regulation of its enhanced oil recovery operations. 08/28/2014 Brief Download Opening brief filed by petitioners. The Carbon Sequestration Council, Southern Company Services, Inc., and the American Petroleum Institute filed their opening brief. They argued that Congress did not intend for EPA to assert authority over supercritical fluids or, in the alternative, that EPA’s assertion that supercritical fluids and uncontained gases were subject to RCRA was not reasonable or deserving of deference. The petitioners do not challenge the conditional exclusion of carbon dioxide as a hazardous waste under RCRA. 05/08/2014 Statement of Issues Download Statement of issues filed. See below. 05/06/2014 Order Download Order issued consolidating proceedings See below. 04/02/2014 Petition for Review Download Petition for review filed. Two petitions were filed in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals seeking review of EPA’s final regulation under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) that created a conditional exclusion for hazardous carbon dioxide streams from the definition of “hazardous waste,” provided that the streams meet certain conditions, including that they be captured from emission streams and be injected into Underground Injection Control Class VI wells for purposes of geologic sequestration. Petitioners argued that EPA improperly interpreted “solid waste” to include carbon dioxide as a supercritical fluid. The American Petroleum Institute believed that this interpretation could be used to draw other supercritical fluids such as methane or propane into RCRA’s jurisdiction. The proceedings were consolidated on May 6, 2014. -
American Petroleum Institute v. EPA
Case Documents:
Filing Date Type File Action Taken Summary 05/05/2014 Statement of Issues Download Statement of issues filed. See above in summary of petition for review for Carbon Sequestration Council v. EPA. 04/03/2014 Petition for Review Download Petition for review filed. See above in summary of petition for review for Carbon Sequestration Council v. EPA.