My take, for what it’s worth:

The Order deals with those documents that should/should not be added to the Administrative Record (AR), and thus considered by the Court. The Order was a mixed bag for LAC.

Firstly, the Court ordered that certain documents previously withheld by the BLM (“deliberative materials”) must be added to the AR (or alternatively “logged”). We don’t know if there is anything prejudicial in these documents, but only the Plaintiffs can benefit from this order.

The Plaintiffs sought access to contracts and communications between the BLM and their consultants. It appears the Plaintiffs were fishing for evidence of conflicts of interest between the BLM, LAC, and various consultants. The Court saw through this, and disallowed it. A significant win for BLM/LAC.

LAC sought to add the groundwater Monitoring Plan to the AR, even though it postdates the ROD. Given that the issue is whether the BLM acted reasonably in issuing the ROD, the Court ordered the Plan should not be added to the AR, because it could not have been considered by the BLM in making their decision. A slap-down for LAC.

The Plaintiffs sought letters from NDOW and NDEP to the BLM to be added to the AR. Those letters supposedly expressed concern about the environmental impacts of the Project. The BLM argued those concerns were either summarised in the EIS, or were not relevant to the federal permitting process. The Court ruled that the letters were relevant because the BLM would have considered them in making their decision. A small win the Plaintiffs.

The BLM has 30 days to add these documents to the AR. I suspect they will do that very promptly. It is possible the Plaintiffs might find cause to file an amended complaint based on these documents. Hopefully that does not give reason to delay the hearing.

Whilst the Court sided mainly with the Plaintiffs, it is once again clear that Judge Du is working through these issues diligently and rationally, as we would expect. I have a high level of confidence that she gets to the right answer.

Just a reminder – I am not a lawyer. DYOR.