Outdoor recreation is regarded as emphasizing sustainability through environmentally conscious branding, promoting healthy activities, and reinforcing appreciation for the natural world. Yet, the outdoor recreation sector has often failed to be representative of a variety of communities, especially non-white participants. On February 11, 2021, the Environmental Law Institute hosted a panel of experts that explored opportunities for improving diversity and inclusion in the outdoors and access to national parks, public lands, and outdoor recreation.

In 2015, the United Nations Member States, including the United States, unanimously approved 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030. The SDGs are nonbinding; each nation is to implement them based on its own priorities and circumstances. This Article argues that the SDGs are a critical normative framework the United States should use to improve human quality of life, freedom, and opportunity by integrating economic and social development with environmental protection.

In its Atlantic Richfield Co. v. Christian opinion, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the timing of judicial review in the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), as well as landowners’ status as potentially responsible parties for property within the boundaries of a Superfund site. The Court, however, left preemption issues raised by the parties for another day. This Article analyzes the opinion in light of the site’s long history, and offers insights on how it might affect the federal cleanup program going forward.

Many believe blockchain technologies (BCTs) will soon permeate our lives. In particular, they can be utilized to help tackle global climate change. This Article provides a baseline description of BCTs, and ways they can be utilized to reduce GHG emissions in electricity and energy generation; agriculture, forestry, and other land use; industry; and transport.

The U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund on April 23, 2020. Until then, there was a split among the circuit courts as to whether discharges to navigable waters through groundwater are regulated under the Clean Water Act (CWA). The impact of this issue could be widespread, possibly bringing many more water-related projects into the CWA process. As a result of the Court’s decision, the issue may require additional time to proceed through the regulatory process.

The COVID-19 pandemic is testing the balance between sustainability and human safety on a global scale. After more than six years of momentum for banning a variety of single-use plastic types, the pandemic brought many of these achievements to a standstill. On December 15, 2020, the Environmental Law Institute hosted a panel of experts that explored the pandemic’s repercussions for overconsumption of single-use plastics. This Dialogue presents a transcript of the discussion, which has been edited for style, clarity, and space considerations.

The production, transport, use, and disposal of industrial and consumer products may pose risks to human and environmental health. Product stewardship is the practice of characterizing and managing human health and environmental impacts throughout a product’s life cycle. Through risk assessment, companies can understand the intrinsic hazards of chemicals and quantify the likelihood (risk) that exposures may damage human health and the environment.

When the Internal Revenue Service began disallowing gifts of perpetual conservation easements for claimed failures of perpetuity requirements, it tumbled land trusts, landowners, and the U.S. Tax Court down the rabbit hole to a baffling land below. The Service’s drop into matters beyond valuation and into elements intended and necessary for easement durability and flexibility has caused a confusing array of Tax Court decisions.

Scientific communities and policy experts argue that marine protected areas (MPAs) will increase the potential of marine ecosystems to tackle climate change impacts. Yet to date, there has been little legal scholarship about how to design, manage, and implement climate-resilient MPAs. This Article underscores the importance of considering climate change in the design, planning, and implementation of MPAs, and identifies mechanisms for incorporating climate change elements into MPAs.

Salmon require cool temperatures to migrate and reproduce. The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires states to develop and implement water quality standards sufficient to produce fishable waters. Nearly a half-century after its 1972 enactment, the modern federal statute’s goal of fishable waters has yet to be achieved in the case of salmon streams.