In what’s beginning to feel like déjà vu, Cardinal-Hickory Creek’s last unconstructed mile again is subject to a preliminary injunction.  

Last week, U.S. District Judge William Conley granted conservation groups’ preliminary injunction request, preventing American Transmission Co., ITC Midwest and Dairyland Power Cooperative from finishing the 102-mile, 345-kV line’s final stretch through a wildlife refuge.  

The injunction halts the land exchange of more than 35 acres in Grant County to add to the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge for almost 20 acres of the existing refuge in Clayton County, Iowa, to be cleared for the line.  

The Driftless Area Land Conservancy, Wisconsin Wildlife Federation and National Wildlife Refuge Association filed the latest lawsuit on the controversial line earlier this month, charging that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Rural Utilities Service and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated three federal laws when they approved permits and greenlit the land exchange to assemble the final mile-long stretch of the 102-mile, $650 million transmission line through the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife and Fish Refuge. (See Conservation Groups File Another Lawsuit to Stop Cardinal-Hickory Creek’s Last Mile.)  

The parcel swap was OK’d by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and set to occur March 22, with ITC and Dairyland positioning construction equipment near the refuge’s edges.  

Conley said he would like to see documents that give more insight into the lead-up to the land deal’s approval. The conservation groups said Conley implemented a “stopgap measure to prevent irreversible destructive activity in the refuge while he awaits an administrative record.” Attorneys for both sides will have 30 days to submit briefs.  

In a statement, Driftless Area Land Conservancy (DALC) Executive Director Jennifer Filipiak said her organization is thankful for the judge hitting “the pause button.”  

“DALC has consistently maintained that it is inappropriate to cross a National Wildlife and Fish Refuge with this massive transmission line. The transmission companies did not evaluate alternative crossings outside of the refuge in their environmental impact statement, and we should not set a precedent that a simple land swap is all it takes to plow through a national treasure,” Filipiak said.  

Environmental Law and Policy Center Executive Director Howard Learner, representing the conservation groups, said he’s confident the groups will prevail. In a statement, Learner said FWS shouldn’t be free to “create statutory loopholes with a land exchange.” He warned of a “dangerous precedent for running more massive high-voltage powerlines through other protected National Wildlife Refuges.”  

Learner argued in front of Conley last week that FWS didn’t offer the public the opportunity to comment on its February finding that the land exchange wouldn’t significantly affect the refuge.  

However, Reade Wilson, a U.S. Department of Justice attorney representing FWS, responded that the agency wasn’t obligated to solicit public opinion on the no-impact decision.  

ITC Midwest and Dairyland Power Cooperative criticized the injunction and said Cardinal-Hickory Creek is “a backbone project for the Midwest’s regional power grid that is necessary to improve grid reliability, lower consumer electricity costs and enable renewable energy to be brought to market, resulting in a significant reduction in carbon emissions.” 

American Transmission Co. has built and energized its eastern portion of the line.  

The two developers also repeated their assertion the wild refuge will be better off — and larger — because of their land offer of prime habitat. 

“This latest lawsuit, which is misguided at best, only serves to delay completion of this important energy infrastructure and further increase costs to customers. The plaintiffs have raised meritless arguments in multiple cases, all of which have been rejected. This is just another attempt by plaintiffs to sideline this critical 345-kV tie between Iowa and Wisconsin,” ITC Midwest President Dusky Terry said in a statement.  

ITC and Dairyland pointed out that the Cardinal-Hickory Creek project has survived multiple lawsuits in state and federal court from the same conservation groups seeking to stop construction.  

“The co-owner utilities have successfully navigated no less than three separate injunctions, won appeals before the Wisconsin Supreme Court and received three different favorable opinions from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit,” ITC and Dairyland wrote in a statement.