SCOTUS Refocuses NEPA Review in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado

On May 29, 2025, in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the D.C. Circuit’s invalidation of the Surface Transportation Board’s approval of an 88-mile railway connecting Utah’s Uinta Basin to the national freight network. The ruling carries major implications for how federal agencies and project proponents approach environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

Source: Final EIS for the proposed Uinta Basin Railway

The Court’s decision reinforces a more deferential posture toward agency discretion in NEPA cases, emphasizing the procedural (rather than substantive) character of the statute and narrowing the required scope of environmental review to focus on the “proposed action” itself. This shift is particularly relevant to project proponents who face litigation challenging the sufficiency of an environmental impact statement (EIS) based on indirect or speculative environmental effects.

The Issue Before the Court

The Surface Transportation Board prepared a comprehensive EIS analyzing the construction and operation of the Uinta Basin Railway. While the EIS addressed numerous impacts—including effects on wetlands, wildlife, land use, air quality, and recreation—it noted, but did not fully analyze, the potential environmental consequences of upstream oil drilling and downstream refining that could result from expanded oil transport enabled by the railway.

The D.C. Circuit vacated the Board’s approval, concluding that it had failed to take the required “hard look” under NEPA at these foreseeable, indirect impacts. Specifically, it faulted the Board for not conducting a more extensive evaluation of increased oil drilling in the Uinta Basin and refining activities in Gulf Coast states. See Eagle Cty. v. Surface Transp. Bd., 82 F.4th 1152 (D.C. Cir. 2023).

Majority Opinion: Project-Based Review and Substantial Deference

Writing for the Court, Justice Kavanaugh reversed (joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Thomas, Alito, and Barrett). He held that the D.C. Circuit misapplied NEPA by failing to defer to the Board’s reasonable judgment about the scope and detail of the EIS. The Court underscored three key principles:

1. NEPA is procedural, not substantive. It requires agencies to prepare a detailed statement addressing significant environmental effects and feasible alternatives, but does not dictate the outcome. NEPA “does not mandate particular results, but simply prescribes the necessary process.” Slip op. at 6.

2. Agency discretion in defining the scope of the EIS is entitled to substantial deference. Courts should not “micromanage” agencies’ decisions about the breadth of their NEPA analyses. “The only role for a court is to confirm that the agency has addressed environmental consequences and feasible alternatives as to the relevant project.” Id. at 9 (internal quotes omitted).

3. The focus must remain on the “proposed action.” Environmental effects from projects that are “separate in time or place” and beyond the agency’s regulatory control fall outside the required scope of NEPA review. “[T]he fact that the project might foreseeably lead to the construction or increased use of a separate project does not mean the agency must consider that separate project’s environmental effects.” Id. at 3 (emphasis in original).

The majority explicitly rejected a “but-for” causation standard: “[A] mere ‘but for’ causal relationship is insufficient to make an agency responsible for a particular effect.” Id. at 18 (internal citations omitted).

Concurring Opinion: A More Statutory Approach to NEPA Limits

Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, concurred in the judgment but emphasized a different rationale. Rather than focusing on agency discretion or the risk of judicial overreach, the concurrence concluded that NEPA did not require review of oil drilling and refining impacts, because the Board lacked the legal authority to reject the railway project based on those consequences.

Under Public Citizen, NEPA does not require analysis of environmental effects if the agency has no power to prevent or mitigate them. The Board, as a federal railroad regulator, could not lawfully deny the project to prevent oil-related emissions. Thus, it bore no responsibility under NEPA for analyzing them. See Slip op. (Sotomayor, J., concurring) at 11.

The concurrence also cautioned against policy-driven analysis: 

I agree with the Court that the Surface Transportation Board would not be responsible for the harms caused by the oil industry, even though the railway it approved would deliver oil to refineries and spur drilling in the Uinta Basin. I reach that conclusion because, under its organic statute, the Board had no authority to reject petitioners’ application on account of the harms third parties would cause with products transported on the proposed railway. The majority takes a different path, unnecessarily grounding its analysis largely in matters of policy.

Id. at 1.

Key Takeaways

Points to consider for those navigating the environmental review process:

• Clarify the “proposed action” early. The Court’s emphasis on NEPA’s textually mandated focus on the “project at hand” makes it critical to define the scope of action in a defensible way.

• Document jurisdictional boundaries. Agencies should explain in the record when potential impacts fall outside their authority to regulate or control.

• Don’t overextend the EIS. The Court explicitly discouraged including distant or speculative impacts to avoid “delay upon delay.” Slip op. at 13.

• Build a reasonable record—not an exhaustive one. “Even a deficient EIS does not necessarily require vacating an agency’s project approval, absent reason to believe that the agency might disapprove the project if it added more to the EIS.” Id. at 2–3.

A Shift in Judicial Posture on NEPA

This ruling reflects a broader reorientation in the Court’s administrative law doctrine. The majority criticizes “overly intrusive (and unpredictable) review in NEPA cases” and seeks to bring judicial oversight “back in line with the statutory text and common sense.” Id. at 12.

"When a party argues that an agency action was arbitrary and capricious due to a deficiency in an EIS, the reviewing court must account for the fact that NEPA is a purely procedural statute." Id. at 9. The NEPA "Hard Look" review is still valid. The Court’s deference under NEPA is procedural and factual—related to how thoroughly an agency considered environmental effects—not to how it interprets legal provisions.

For developers, public agencies, and infrastructure advocates, this means courts may now be less receptive to claims that agencies failed to evaluate cumulative or indirect effects that are tenuously related to the federal action under review.

Still, the concurring opinion reminds us that NEPA's reach remains contingent on the specific statutory authority of the reviewing agency. This keeps the door open to more expansive NEPA analysis where an agency possesses broader regulatory discretion under its authorizing statute.

As always, rigorous administrative records, clearly defined project boundaries, and well-supported explanations will remain key to defensible agency decisions.

For additional legal updates and analysis on environmental review, permitting, and infrastructure projects in Hawaiʻi and beyond, visit HawaiiLandUseLaw.com.