The Oregon Supreme Court upheld the Department of Environmental Quality's issuance of a permit for the discharge of certain pollutants resulting from suction dredge mining. A mining association argued that because suction dredge mining did not add anything to navigable waters that was not already th...
A district court denied Oklahoma's motion to preliminarily enjoin EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers from enforcing their 2015 Clean Water Rule. The state sought to enjoin the 2015 Rule from being enforced until a final judgment was entered in the case. But the court found the potential harm f...
A district court granted states' and industry groups' motion for summary judgment in a challenge to EPA's and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' 2015 Clean Water Rule. The states and groups argued that the final rulemaking violated the notice-and-comment requirements under the APA because the rulemak...
A district court stayed a constitutional challenge to the Washington Department of Ecology's decision to deny a coal company a CWA §401 certification for construction of a coal export facility along the Columbia River. The company argued that the Department violated the Commerce Clause by denying t...
The Fifth Circuit vacated portions of a 2015 EPA rule that set new effluent limitation guidelines (ELGs) for legacy wastewater and combustion residual leachate that are discharged from steam electric power plants. Environmental groups argued that the Agency arbitrarily set the ELGs using an older, l...
A state high court affirmed a lower court's summary judgment for the Montana Department of Environmental Quality in a challenge to the Department's issuance of a NPDES general permit for discharges from municipal separate storm sewer systems (MS4s). An environmental group challenged the permit, argu...
A district court granted Washington's and environmental groups' motion for summary judgment in a challenge to the state's decision to deny a coal company a CWA §401 certification for construction of a coal export facility along the Columbia River. A railroad company, which planned to provide rail s...
A district court denied Ohio's and Tennessee's motion to preliminarily enjoin EPA's 2015 Clean Water Rule that clarified the definition of "waters of the United States" under the CWA. The states challenged the validity of the rule, arguing it extended the scope of the CWA beyond the reach of the sta...
A district court granted in part and denied in part an environmental group's motion for summary judgment in a challenge to the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration's (PHMSA's) approval of two spill response plans for an oil pipeline that crosses Michigan's Straits of Mackinac. The ...
A district court granted EPA's motion to dismiss a CWA lawsuit seeking to require the Agency to publish New York's water quality standards. The Agency asserted that environmental groups lacked subject matter jurisdiction to bring the suit because EPA had a discretionary, rather than nondiscretionary...