In July, NACS filed an amicus brief on the Dakota Access Pipeline with four other trade associations representing the entire fuel supply chain, including oil producers, refiners, pipeline operators, fuel retailers and end users. The brief was in response to a District Court judge’s order to shut down pipeline operations, empty it and keep it closed while the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) conducts an environmental review.

Earlier in March, the U.S. District judge had ruled that the federal government had not studied the pipeline’s effect on the environment and ordered the ACOE to conduct a new environmental impact review.

The Dakota Access Pipeline is 1,172 miles long and runs underground from the shale fields in North Dakota through South Dakota and Iowa to an oil terminal in Illinois. The oil running through this pipeline is then either refined at a facility in Illinois or transferred to the Energy Transfer Crude Oil pipeline, which runs from Illinois to refineries in Texas. Since it began its operations in June 2017, the pipeline has transported about 500,000 barrels of oil per day. Before the pipeline, most of the oil had been transported by rail, which is more costly and less reliable than moving through pipelines.

A potential shutdown of the Dakota Access Pipeline until the ACOE’s completed environmental review will significantly disrupt the supply chain in the oil and gas markets. The environmental review will likely take more than a year to complete. Accounting for the shutdown process, emptying the pipeline and the time needed to complete the review, the Dakota Pipeline could potentially be inoperable for 18–20 months. The shutdown could cost an estimated $2 billion and reduce oil production in North Dakota by at least a third, mostly because of transportation constraints. A supply disruption would have such an impact on fuel prices and at the retail level that NACS advocated against it by filing an amicus brief.

After the NACS amicus brief and the other briefs in the case were filed, the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled that the Dakota Access Pipeline can remain open. In its ruling, the appeals court stated that it was up to the ACOE to decide if the pipeline should be permitted to continue operations while the environmental review is prepared. The ACOE will now decide whether to allow the pipeline to remain operational as it conducts its court-mandated review.