Judge: Agency’s Actions In ‘Insufferable’ Fracking Permit Case Were ‘Arbitrary’

Mealey's ( September 13, 2022, 1:52 PM EDT) -- WASHINGTON, D.C. — A federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Sept. 9 ruled that the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) lacked the authority to rescind a hydraulic fracturing lease and said it acted in an “arbitrary and capricious manner” when it disapproved a hydraulic fracturing operator’s application for a permit to drill in a case that the judge called “insufferable.”...