Army Corps Easement Process and Dakota Access Pipeline Easement Status Page: 1 of 3
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CRS INSIGHT
Army Corps Easement Process and Dakota Access
Pipeline Easement Status
February 2, 2017 (IN10644)
Related Author
* Nicole T. Carter
Nicole T. Carter, Acting Section Research Manager (ncarteracrs loc gov, 7-0854)
The Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) is a 1,172-mile pipeline system to transport oil from North Dakota to Illinois. The
pipeline's developer is pursuing a route that would cross under the Missouri River on federally owned land in North
Dakota at the Lake Oahe project of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps). Public debate and litigation over the
pipeline has raised questions for Congress regarding the Corps process for granting pipeline easements to cross federally
owned, Corps-managed land (hereinafter referred to as Corps land), including the scope of impacts considered,
especially oil spill risks and tribal impacts. Below is a discussion of both the Corps' process for approving pipeline
easements and the DAPL easement request specifically.
Easement Process and DAPL Easement Status
Figure 1 shows the Corps' decisionmaking process for evaluating requests for private oil or gas pipelines to cross Corps
land and non-Corps land with a Corps real estate interest (e.g., private lands with a federal flood or other flowage
easement). As shown in Figure 1, the process may consist of both
* a Corps permission to alter a Corps civil works project (shown in grey) and
* a Corps easement to cross Corps land or a consent to cross non-Corps land with a Corps real estate interest
(shown in beige).
In July 2016, the Corps provided permission for DAPL to alter the Corps' Lake Oahe project, subject to certain
conditions being included in a final easement. This permission moved the easement request into the first beige box in
Figure 1. Under the Obama Administration, the Corps' position was that its permission to alter the Lake Oahe project
did not grant DAPL an easement to cross the federal lands at Lake Oahe. On December 4, 2016, the Assistant Secretary
of the Army (Civil Works) issued a statement that the agency would "not grant an easement to cross Lake Oahe at the
proposed location based on the current record." On January 18, 2017, the Corps published a Notice of Intent to prepare
an environmental impact statement (EIS), pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA; 42 U.S.C. 4321),
in connection with the requested easement for the pipeline to cross Lake Oahe. The notice indicated that the EIS would
analyze alternative crossings of the Missouri River, oil spill risks, and various tribal impacts. On January 24, 2017,
President Trump issued a presidential memorandum directing the Corps to consider both rescinding or modifying its
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Carter, Nicole T. Army Corps Easement Process and Dakota Access Pipeline Easement Status, report, February 2, 2017; Washington D.C.. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc958647/m1/1/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.