The Trump administration has confirmed it will appeal a district court ruling that ordered the Interior Department to end a set of policies delaying federal permitting for wind and solar projects on federal lands, calling the ruling “absurd.” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum lambasted the ruling during a hearing before the House Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday, saying that a single judge shouldn’t dictate how the agency sets its internal process for issuing federal permits. “The idea that a single judge could decide what the process that we’re supposed to go through internally to make sure that we’re complying with the law through a complex permitting process is absurd,” he said.
When asked if the administration would be appealing the ruling, Burgum said, “Absolutely.”
In April, a federal judge in Massachusetts issued a preliminary injunction in favor of a group of clean energy advocacy and trade groups that claimed the administration had unlawfully implemented policies preventing the development of renewable energy resources.
The policies in question were implemented last July via a memo from Burgum with the intent to “end preferential treatment for unreliable, subsidy-dependent wind and solar energy.”
