In order to manage California wilderness areas to preserve their natural and untrammeled character, as required by the Wilderness Act, federal land management agencies should adopt interpretations of the Act that allow prescribed burning and Indigenous cultural burning in areas where it existed pre-colonialism.
Understanding the nearly impossible task of containing contaminants from Superfund sites, it is imperative to find solutions in anticipation of disasters that scientists project will only increase in magnitude and frequency. This Comment proceeds in six parts. Part I identifies the challenge of increasing natural disasters and their impact at Superfund sites, which are toxic havens. Part II identifies efforts that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and other federal agencies have taken to make Superfund sites more climate-resilient.
This Comment focuses on energy developments offshore. Part I recognizes OCSLA’s purpose of balancing energy needs with protection of marine animals, coastal beaches, and wetlands. Part II discusses examples of presidential use of OCSLA §12(a) authority to protect (withdraw from leasing) portions of the OCS temporarily or permanently, including challenges to President Biden’s recent withdrawal of the East Coast, West Coast, and part of the Gulf of Mexico and Bering Strait from future oil and gas leases.
The Comment shows the importance of EJ and cumulative impact governance coming from municipalities by highlighting a specific case study that has worked: San Francisco.
Four myths are distorting the national debate over permit reform. First, it is misconceived as a singular issue, with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) at its center. Second, reformers assume that federal reviews and permitting cause most project delays and failures. Third, there is a widespread belief that environmental laws are routinely weaponized against new infrastructure through obstructive litigation. Fourth, critics assert that environmental procedures and standards must be sacrificed to enable timely climate action.
This Comment looks at the background of national scenic trails and lawmakers’ intent for the experiences these trails should provide, analyzes the difference in meaning between the terms and concepts of “on” and “along,” and considers the width of adjacent management areas that lawmakers implied with the use of the latter term. It also examines the management implications of these interpretations, and where agencies and nonprofit trail management partners may go from here.
A number of facilities intended for permanent sequestration of carbon dioxide are being developed in the United States. Several will be located on or near the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, making them easily accessible to ships. Meanwhile, in Europe there is substantial interest in capturing carbon dioxide from industrial operations, but currently inadequate sequestration facilities, and growing interest in shipping carbon dioxide for sequestration in the United States. This Article reviews the main U.S.
The relationship between the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights regime under the World Trade Organization is complex. The manner in which intellectual property rights (IPRs) pertaining to genetic resources (GRs) and associated traditional knowledge (ATK) are handled is the main source of this dissonance.
Since passage of the early natural resource protection laws and regulations in the United States decades ago, legal, technical, and economic practitioners have been challenged with understanding the ever-changing and ever-evolving environmental law and policy landscape. Riveting changes have advanced the position of natural resources and related matters of conservation and biodiversity across domestic and international agendas, in corporate, government, and public interest agendas, and in the lives of everyday citizens.
The United States has historically valued free access to most public lands. But federal land management agencies also rely on users’ fee dollars to support critical operations. This tension between “free access” and “user pays” has been an important feature of public land law since the late 1800s. The primary statute at issue is the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act (FLREA), which authorizes fees at some sites while mandating free access at others.