PORTLAND, Ore. — In a win for conservation groups, a federal judge blocked the U.S. Forest Service from relying on a decades-old exemption to approve large logging projects without environmental review. A trio of environmental groups — Oregon Wild, WildEarth Guardians and GO Alliance —  sued the Forest Service in 2022, accusing it of failing to determine whether applying categorical exclusion 6 — an exemption meant for small, low-impact activities intended to reduce fire hazard, also known as CE-6 — to approve three large-scale commercial thinning projects would have no significant impact. U.S. District Judge Michael McShane initially found the claim to be time-barred, but the Ninth Circuit disagreed and sent the challenge back to the lower court. The conservation groups described the application of the exclusion as a “bureaucratic loophole” that authorizes massive commercial logging projects and sidesteps environmental analysis and public comment. McShane agreed, vacating the exclusion in a ruling released late Tuesday.