DWPA Application Areas Must Encompass Seaward Pipelines: One Deepwater Port Per Properly Drawn Area

I. Introduction

This petition for review arose under the Deepwater Port Act of 1974 (“DWPA”), a statute enacted in the aftermath of the 1973–1974 OPEC oil embargo to both promote and regulate deepwater ports—offshore terminals used to import/export oil or natural gas and reduce nearshore tanker traffic.

The petitioner, Citizens for Clean Air & Clean Water in Brazoria County (“Better Brazoria”), challenged the Maritime Administration’s (“MARAD”) 2025 Record of Decision (“ROD”) approving Intervenor Texas GulfLink, LLC’s application for a crude oil deepwater port off the Texas coast. The core dispute was statutory: whether the “application area” that triggers the DWPA’s “one deepwater port per application area” constraint must include the port’s proposed offshore pipelines.

The practical stakes were substantial. If pipelines must be included, Texas GulfLink’s properly drawn application area would intersect with the pipeline of another permitted project (SPOT), creating an impermissible overlap and forcing the agency into the DWPA’s “national interest” selection framework for competing ports.

II. Summary of the Opinion

The Fifth Circuit first confirmed Better Brazoria’s associational standing based on a member’s concrete, localized injuries tied to the proposed tank farm/pipeline impacts. On the merits, applying de novo statutory interpretation under Loper Bright Enters. v. Raimondo, the court rejected MARAD’s narrowed, circle-only application area and held that pipelines are part of the “deepwater port site” that must be encompassed. Because Texas GulfLink’s lawful application area would intersect with SPOT’s pipeline, MARAD’s approval was “not in accordance with law” and had to be set aside under the APA.

III. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited

• Citizens for Clean Air & Clean Water in Brazoria Cnty. v. U.S. Dep't of Transp., 98 F.4th 178 (5th Cir. 2024)
  This earlier Fifth Circuit decision (involving SPOT) was used primarily on standing. The court analogized the present petitioner’s member declaration to the declaration found sufficient there, reinforcing that proximity to and use of specifically affected areas supports injury-in-fact in DWPA/NEPA-type challenges.
• Center for Biological Diversity v. United States Department of Transportation, 180 F.4th 796 (5th Cir. 2026)
  A contrasting standing case. The court distinguished it because the challengers there failed to identify any member using project-affected waters/areas in a concrete way. Here, the member’s home location and detailed concerns tied to the specific facility/pipeline corridor met the Fifth Circuit’s demanded specificity.
• Green Valley Special Util. Dist. v. City of Schertz, 969 F.3d 460 (5th Cir. 2020) (en banc)
  Cited for the court’s independent obligation to confirm Article III jurisdiction, even absent a party challenge.
• Tex. Democratic Party v. Benkiser, 459 F.3d 582 (5th Cir. 2006) and Hunt v. Wash. State Apple Advert. Comm'n, 432 U.S. 333 (1977)
  Provide the three-part test for associational standing (member standing; germaneness; no need for individual participation).
• Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (1992) and Summers v. Earth Island Inst., 555 U.S. 488 (2009)
  Used to frame injury, traceability, redressability, and the requirement that plaintiffs show plans to use specific affected sites—critical to the court’s standing determination.
• Loper Bright Enters. v. Raimondo, 603 U.S. 369 (2024)
  This is the interpretive pivot. The court expressly declined deference to MARAD and emphasized de novo determination of the “best” reading of the DWPA, consistent with Loper Bright’s instruction that courts must exercise independent judgment under the APA.
• Park 'N Fly, Inc. v. Dollar Park & Fly, Inc., 469 U.S. 189 (1985)
  Invoked for the baseline textualist approach: begin with statutory language and assume ordinary meaning expresses legislative purpose.
• Dep't of Agric. Rural Dev. Rural Hous. Serv. v. Kirtz, 601 U.S. 42 (2024) and Sturgeon v. Frost, 587 U.S. 28 (2019)
  These cases supply the principle that statutory definitions are “virtually conclusive,” with deviation allowed only if applying the definition would be incompatible with the statute’s scheme or destroy major purposes. That doctrine directly underwrote treating “pipelines” as part of the “deepwater port.”
• RadLAX Gateway Hotel, LLC v. Amalgamated Bank, 566 U.S. 639 (2012)
  Cited to cabin the Government’s “general/specific canon” argument. The court explained the canon only resolves contradictions between general and specific permissions/prohibitions; it does not allow ignoring a statutory definition merely because it appears in a definitions section.
• D. Ginsberg & Sons, Inc. v. Popkin, 285 U.S. 204 (1932) and Jones v. Hendrix, 599 U.S. 465 (2023)
  These authorities supported the anti-superfluity and harmonization approach: courts should give effect to every clause and read provisions in harmony rather than at cross-purposes.
• Brown v. Gardner, 513 U.S. 115 (1994)
  Cited for the consistent-usage canon: identical terms are presumed to carry the same meaning throughout the statute, undermining the Government’s attempt to separate “deepwater port” from “deepwater port site.”
• Data Mktg. P'ship, LP v. U.S. Dep't of Lab., 45 F.4th 846 (5th Cir. 2022); Chamber of Com. v. SEC, 88 F.4th 1115 (5th Cir. 2023); Texas v. United States, 50 F.4th 498 (5th Cir. 2022); Tex. Corn Producers v. EPA, 141 F.4th 687 (5th Cir. 2025)
  These remedial precedents anchored the court’s choice of vacatur as the default and its refusal to apply remand-without-vacatur. The court treated the defect as early, structural, and not readily curable, defeating the “serious possibility” of agency substantiation on remand.

B. Legal Reasoning

1. Standing: concrete, localized injury tied to project effects

Although uncontested, standing was examined as a jurisdictional prerequisite. The court found associational standing because a member (AJ Jinkins) described site-specific, imminent harms linked to the proposed tank farm/pipeline (flooding/well contamination risk, noise/light/industrialization, property value, traffic and road deterioration). This satisfied injury-in-fact and also traceability/redressability because vacating the ROD would prevent construction under the challenged approval.

2. Statutory interpretation after Loper Bright: the “best reading” controls

The court framed the merits as a pure question of statutory meaning reviewed de novo. It emphasized that MARAD’s prior rationale—derived from its reading of text and legislative history—did not earn interpretive deference; the court’s task was to apply “all relevant interpretive tools” and adopt the best reading.

3. Textual chain: “application area” must “encompass” the “deepwater port site,” and “deepwater port” includes “pipelines”

The operative statutory hook was 33 U.S.C. § 1504(d)(1), requiring an application area “encompassing the deepwater port site.” The court gave “encompass” its ordinary meaning (surround/enclose). It then treated the DWPA’s definition of “deepwater port” as controlling: 33 U.S.C. § 1502(9)(B) expressly “includes all components and equipment, including pipelines … seaward of the high water mark.” Therefore, the “deepwater port site” necessarily includes the seaward pipeline components; an application area that omits them violates the statute.

4. Harmonizing § 1504(d)(1) with § 1504(d)(2): minimum and maximum, not “unfettered discretion”

The Government and Texas GulfLink leaned on § 1504(d)(2) (“any reasonable geographical area”) and the statute’s maximum circular-zone cap to argue MARAD could draw any reasonable area within the cap—potentially excluding pipelines. The court rejected this as creating superfluity by nullifying § 1504(d)(1)’s mandatory “encompassing” requirement. Instead, it read the provisions together:

• Minimum: The area must encompass the entire deepwater port site (including seaward pipelines).
• Maximum: The area cannot exceed the circular zone described in § 1504(d)(2).
• Discretion within bounds: MARAD may choose a reasonable area inside the maximum so long as it satisfies the minimum.

5. Rejecting attempts to redefine “deepwater port site”

The Government argued that “deepwater port site” differs from “deepwater port,” and that structural vs geographic phrasing shows distinct meanings. The court found no “material difference” that could override the statutory definition and treated “site” as simply denoting the location where the defined deepwater port (including pipelines) will exist.

6. Purpose-based objection addressed without rewriting the definition

Respondents argued that requiring pipelines in application areas would undermine the DWPA’s purpose “to promote the construction and operation of deepwater ports,” because offshore pipeline crossings are common. The court answered narrowly: the DWPA does not bar crossings with the Gulf’s general pipeline web; it only triggers the “one deepwater port per application area” limitation when a deepwater port’s pipeline would intersect another deepwater port’s pipeline. Given the relative sparsity of deepwater ports, applying the definition would not “destroy” the statute’s major purposes—and in any event Congress set the balance via minimum/maximum area rules.

7. Remedy: vacatur, not remand without vacatur

Because MARAD approved Texas GulfLink using an unlawfully drawn application area and that error was foundational to the licensing process (potentially affecting whether competing applications must be compared under the “clearly best serves the national interest” standard), the court set aside the ROD under 5 U.S.C. § 706(2). Applying Fifth Circuit remedial doctrine, it held this was not a “rare case” warranting remand without vacatur: the deficiency was serious and not plausibly curable by post hoc substantiation.

C. Impact

• Constrains MARAD’s application-area design: In the Fifth Circuit, application areas must include all seaward pipeline components of the proposed deepwater port. Agencies cannot avoid DWPA competition procedures by drawing “vanishingly small” circles around the loading point.
• Increases the likelihood of “competition” determinations under the DWPA: Where offshore pipeline routes overlap between proposed deepwater ports, MARAD must treat them as within a shared application area and engage the statute’s “national interest” selection mechanism (33 U.S.C. § 1504(i)).
• Post-Loper Bright signal: The opinion exemplifies how regulated parties and challengers can expect courts to independently select the “best reading,” even when agencies cite text, legislative history, and prior practice to justify a changed approach.
• Litigation and project planning effects: Developers will need to treat offshore pipeline routing as a threshold legal risk factor for DWPA licensing (not merely an engineering/permitting detail), because routing can determine whether the project is disqualified absent a competitive selection outcome.

IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

• “Application area” (DWPA): A geographic zone the agency publishes when an application is filed. The DWPA uses it to ensure only one deepwater port is licensed per area and to trigger a call for competing applications.
• “Deepwater port” includes pipelines: Under 33 U.S.C. § 1502(9)(B), the port is not just the offshore platform/buoys—it also includes equipment like pipelines located seaward of the high water mark.
• “One deepwater port per application area”: If two proposals fall in the same application area, MARAD must choose which “clearly best serves the national interest” under statutory factors (§ 1504(i)).
• Standing (associational): An organization can sue if at least one member has a concrete, particularized injury caused by the approval and likely redressable by a favorable court decision, and if the claim/relief doesn’t require members to participate individually.
• Vacatur vs. remand without vacatur: Vacatur wipes out the agency action; remand without vacatur leaves it in place while the agency reconsiders. The Fifth Circuit treats vacatur as the default unless defects are likely curable and vacatur would be highly disruptive.
• Key interpretive canons used: (i) give effect to every clause (avoid superfluity); (ii) harmonize provisions; (iii) respect statutory definitions as controlling; (iv) consistent usage across a statute.

V. Conclusion

This decision establishes a clear Fifth Circuit rule for DWPA licensing: an “application area” must encompass the full “deepwater port site,” and because a “deepwater port” statutorily includes seaward pipelines, those pipelines must be included in the application-area description. The immediate consequence is vacatur of Texas GulfLink’s approval because its properly drawn application area would overlap with SPOT’s pipeline, triggering the DWPA’s single-port-per-area constraint. More broadly, the opinion tightens statutory compliance at the front end of DWPA licensing and demonstrates a post-Loper Bright judiciary willing to override agency line-drawing where statutory text and definitions compel a different outcome.