WildEarth Guardians

Monday, December 5, 2005
Environmentalists, rancher challenge northwestern New Mexico pipeline

The administrative challenge by Tweeti Blancett and Santa Fe-based WildEarth Guardians also raised concerns about the pipeline's impact on livestock grazing
Contact: Santa Fe New Mexican

Farmington, NM - A rancher and an environmental group are challenging a proposal by the Bureau of Land Management to build an eight-mile pipeline through areas set aside for bald eagles and deer.

The administrative challenge by Tweeti Blancett and Santa Fe-based WildEarth Guardians also raised concerns about the pipeline's impact on livestock grazing.

They want the BLM to reroute the pipeline away from sensitive areas to lessen its impact on endangered species, wildlife and livestock.

The challenge asks the BLM's state director, Linda Rundell, to review the Farmington field office's decision to approve the pipeline, contending the approval violated the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

Hans Stuart, a spokesman for the BLM, said Monday the agency was still reviewing the request to take another look at the decision.

Some 37 areas of critical environmental concern for bald eagles exist in the BLM's Farmington district, providing winter habitat for 100 to 200 bald eagles each year. The pipeline would go through two buffer zones for areas of concern, and WildEarth Guardians said it documented bald eagles, a threatened species, over survey stakes for the pipeline route last month.

The pipeline also would go through a buffer zone on Carracas Mesa, which is protected as habitat for mule deer and elk, WildEarth Guardians said in a news release.

The BLM has said more wells have been proposed for the area, but Blancett and WildEarth Guardians questioned why.

"This federal agency seems to be going out of its way to harm our national symbol, the bald eagle," said Nicole Rosmarino, WildEarth Guardians' conservation director.

The challenge also said oil and gas operations limit forage available for livestock, but that the pipeline's environmental assessment failed to discuss those impacts.

The National Environmental Policy Act requires the evaluation of a reasonable range of alternatives and a discussion of environmental impacts, but the challenge said the BLM failed to do that. It said the agency also failed to consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as required.

The challenge also said the BLM is assuming the pipeline will be necessary because additional wells might be approved.

"It may be that those proposed wells will not be approved and there consequently will be no need for this pipeline," the challenge said.

Copyright 2005 Santa Fe New Mexican - Reprinted with permission