United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana Judge Martin Feldman on June 24 denied a request by the federal government to stay a preliminary injunction issued earlier that week that prohibits the Obama administration from enforcing a six-month deepwater drilling moratorium. According to the court documents, the "defendants' motion to stay pending appeal is hereby denied for the same reasons given" in the June 22 order.
On May 27, Department of Interior Secretary Salazar ordered a moratorium on drilling of new deepwater wells for six months amid ongoing investigations into the April 20th Deepwater Horizon rig disaster and subsequent oil spill. Additionally, the 33 deepwater wells in the Gulf of Mexico that were being drilled at that time were required to cease operations.
The moratorium impacts wells being drilled in water depths of 500 feet or greater.
Several companies, including Hornbeck Offshore Services, The Bollinger Entities, and The Bee Mar Deepwater Vessel Companies, filed suit to have the drilling ban overturned.
Feldman said, "After reviewing the Secretary's Report, the Moratorium Memorandum, and the Notice to Lessees, the Court is unable to divine or fathom a relationship between the findings and the immense scope of the moratorium."
"While the implementation of regulations and a new culture of safety are supportable by the Report and the documents presented, the blanket moratorium, with no parameters, seems to assume that because one rig failed and although no one yet fully knows why, all companies and rigs drilling new wells over 500 feet also universally present an imminent danger."
He continued, "On the record now before the Court, the defendants have failed to cogently reflect the decision to issue a blanket, generic, indeed punitive, moratorium with the facts developed during the thirty-day review."
"The plaintiffs have established a likelihood of successfully showing that the Administration acted arbitrarily and capriciously in issuing the moratorium," the ruling read.
Immediately after the June 22 ruling, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said the government would appeal the ruling to the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.
In response to the June 22 ruling, the American Petroleum Institute said it "welcomed" Feldman's decision.
"The administration acted appropriately in its immediate step to inspect every rig in the Gulf following the Deepwater Horizon explosion," API's statement read. "Those inspections were necessary to assure Americans that offshore operations were safe and subject to appropriate oversight."
API went on to say that the initial moratorium was a "reaction to concerns about the safety of offshore oil and natural gas operations."
"However, an extended moratorium would have had a tremendous impact on the nation's energy security—and cause significant harm to the region of the country that was already suffering from the spill—without raising safety or improving industry procedures."
API said that with the ruling, "industry and its people" can get back to work to provide Americans with the energy they need, "and do it safely and without harming the environment."
In his ruling, Feldman granted Salazar 30 days, rather than 21, to report compliance with the court's order.
A motion by the plaintiffs' in the case to enforce the preliminary injunction was denied as premature. Meantime, Feldman granted "the intervenors' motion requesting disclosure of financial interests."
"The Court's most current Financial Disclosure Report will be released by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts as soon as their security protocol on the release of federal judges' Financial Disclosure Reports has been satisfied," Feldman's ruling read.
Salazar said in a statement following the ruling that the Department of Justice will appeal Feldman's ruling.
Salazar said "to impose a moratorium on deepwater drilling was and is the right decision" to protect the Gulf Coast communities and environment.
"We see clear evidence every day, as oil spills from BP's well, of the need for a pause on deepwater drilling. That evidence mounts as BP continues to be unable to stop its blowout, notwithstanding the huge efforts and help from the federal scientific team and most major oil companies operating in the Gulf of Mexico," his statement read.
"The evidence also continues to mount that industry needs to raise the bar on blowout prevention, containment, and response planning before deepwater drilling should continue. Based on this ever-growing evidence, I will issue a new order in the coming days that eliminate any doubt that a moratorium is needed, appropriate, and within our authorities," said Salazar.
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