Solenex LLC v. Jewell

334 F. Supp. 3d 174
CourtCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
DecidedSeptember 24, 2018
DocketCivil Case No. 13-0993 (RJL)
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 334 F. Supp. 3d 174 (Solenex LLC v. Jewell) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Solenex LLC v. Jewell, 334 F. Supp. 3d 174 (D.C. Cir. 2018).

Opinion

RICHARD J. LEON, United States District Judge

Plaintiff Solenex LLC ("Solenex"), the holder of a federal oil and gas lease in Montana, brings suit against the Secretary of the Interior, the Secretary of Agriculture, the Director of the Bureau of Land Management, the Chief of the Forest Service, and several other subordinate federal officials (collectively, "federal defendants" or "the Government") relating to the Government's *177cancellation of its lease after suspending all oil and gas drilling and extraction activity on that lease for more than thirty years. See First Amend. Compl. [Dkt. # 73] ¶¶ 3-13, 99-115. Plaintiff seeks declaratory and injunctive relief, including that this Court vacate the cancellation and reinstate the lease, based on federal defendants' alleged violations of the Administrative Procedure Act ("APA"), 5 U.S.C. § 551 et seq. See First Amend. Compl. ¶¶ 116-158. Before this Court are the parties' Cross-Motions for Summary Judgment. See Pl.'s Motion for Summary Judgment [Dkt. # 89] ("Pl.'s Mot."); Defs.' Cross-Motion for Summary Judgment [Dkt. # 93] ("Defs.' Mot."). For the following reasons, the Court GRANTS the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment and DENIES the defendant's cross-motion for summary judgment.

BACKGROUND

I. Regulatory Landscape

Plaintiff Solenex seeks declaratory and injunctive relief for federal defendants' alleged violations of the Administrative Procedure Act ("APA"), 5 U.S.C. § 551 et seq. , by cancelling the Solenex lease after holding it in suspension for more than thirty years. Plaintiff raises several independent reasons for finding that federal defendants acted unlawfully: (1) federal defendants lack authority to cancel the lease both because the Secretary exceeded his authority and because his cancellation was arbitrary and capricious, (2) the cancellation is time barred by a statutory limitations period or, alternatively, the doctrine of laches, (3) defendants are estopped from cancelling the lease by a pattern of conduct treating the lease as valid, and (4) the lease was properly issued in compliance with NEPA and the NHPA. A brief overview of these is in order.

First, plaintiff argues that the Department of Interior's ("Interior") authority to administratively cancel a lease is limited under the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 ("MLA"). 30 U.S.C. §§ 181 - 287. The MLA governs the Secretary of Interior's (hereinafter "the Secretary") authority to issue leases for "[a]ll lands subject to disposition under this Act which are known or believed to contain oil or gas deposits." Id. § 226(a). Pursuant to the MLA, the Secretary may also cancel those leases if the lease is (1) "in violation of the MLA, unless the current leaseholder is a bona fide purchaser," id. § 184(h)(1), (h)(2); (2) "when a lessee has violated the statute, regulations, or the lease itself, id. § 188(a); or (3) "where the lessee is in violation of lease provisions after at least 30-days' notice" and the lease is a non-producing lease, id. § 188(b). Interior has also promulgated its own regulations allowing for administrative cancellation of leases under certain conditions. See 43 C.F.R. § 3108.5. Namely, that the Secretary can cancel leases for either (1) the lessee's failure "to comply with any of the provisions of the law, the regulations issued thereunder, or the lease" after notice and 30 days to cure, 43 C.F.R. § 3108.3(a), or (2) the agency's determination that the lease was "improperly issued." Id. § 3108.3(d).

As asserted by federal defendants, one of the ways in which a lease can be "improperly issued" and therefore subject to administrative cancellation is by non-compliance with either the National Environmental Policy Act ("NEPA") or the National Historic Preservation Act ("NHPA"). Defs.' Mot. at 27-29. NEPA requires that agencies take a "hard look" at the environmental consequences, Robertson v. Methow Valley Citizens Council , 490 U.S. 332, 350, 109 S.Ct. 1835, 104 L.Ed.2d 351 (1989), of "major Federal actions" that "significantly affect [ ] the quality *178of the human environment." 42 U.S.C. § 4332(C) ; 40 C.F.R. §§ 150.3, 1501.4(c).1 Nevertheless, an "agency is not constrained by NEPA from deciding that other values outweigh the environmental costs." Robertson, 490 U.S. at 350, 109 S.Ct. 1835. NHPA, for its part, requires that the agency "take into account the effect of [an] undertaking on any historic property." 54 U.S.C.

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Bluebook (online)
334 F. Supp. 3d 174, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/solenex-llc-v-jewell-cadc-2018.