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El Paso, Texas v. Trump
A district court granted a motion to preliminarily enjoin the Trump Administration from using military funds to build portions of a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. El Paso County and a nonprofit group argued that the president's proposed plan for funding border barrier construction—diver...
Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc. v. Perry
The Ninth Circuit affirmed a district court order directing DOE to publish four energy conservation standards in the Federal Register. Environmental groups and states argued that an agency regulation known as the error-correction rule imposed upon DOE a nondiscretionary duty to publish the standards...
Demoruelle v. Kucharski
A district court dismissed a lawsuit brought by a Hawaiian resident alleging that an early start to a county construction project harmed two endangered species—the Hawaiian hawk and Hawaiian hoary bat—in violation of the ESA. The resident argued that the county violated its EIS by allowing const...
Center for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
A district court denied a motion for summary judgment against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Customs and Border Protection for failure to disclose under FOIA information related to construction of a wall along the Mexican border. An environmental group argued the agencies improperly withheld i...
Flowing Water, Flowing Costs: Assessing FERC’s Authority to Decommission Dams
This year, 2019, marks the 20th anniversary of the removal of the Edwards Dam, one of the first functioning hydroelectric dam to be decommissioned and removed in the United States. It was also the first to be removed under the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC’s) asserted power to compel such a removal without compensation, an assertion raising legal questions that have yet to be fully resolved. As our hydroelectric infrastructure continues to age, these questions may again come to the forefront.
EPA’s Existing Authority to Impose a Carbon “Tax”
A number of bills have been introduced in recent years to put a price on carbon via a federal carbon tax. These proposals generally proceed from the implicit assumption that the federal government in general, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in particular, does not already have such authority. That is incorrect. Under a federal statute that has been on the books since 1952, EPA could impose a carbon “tax” any time an administration in power is willing to do so.
Center for Biological Diversity v. United States Environmental Protection Agency
The Fifth Circuit dismissed environmental groups' challenge to EPA's issuance of a CWA general permit authorizing discharges from oil and gas facilities operating in the Gulf of Mexico. Environmental groups argued that EPA violated NEPA by failing to prepare an adequate EIS before issuing the permit...
Oregon Cattlemen's Association v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
In an unpublished opinion, the Ninth Circuit reversed the denial of an environmental group's motion to intervene in a lawsuit challenging EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' 2015 Clean Water Rule. The court found that the group had a practical interest in the rule and that this interest was no...