A district court dismissed environmental groups' lawsuit challenging EPA's "authorization" of pollution trading and offsets outlined in its 2010 TMDL for the Chesapeake Bay. The groups wanted statements about offsets and trading in the Bay TMDL to be declared null and void. But the groups lack stand...
A district court dismissed a property owner's OPA claims against a nearby college for land and water contamination allegedly caused by heating oil that leaked from USTs on the college campus. The property owner brought claims under the CWA, OPA, RCRA, and state law. Based on the language and legisla...
The Eleventh Circuit upheld the dismissal of environmental groups' citizen suit against a coal mine for new source performance standard (NSPS) violations under the CWA. A citizen suit that alleges that a discharger violated its permit is subject to the general rule of notice and a 60-day waiting per...
The Sixth Circuit, in an unpublished opinion, denied a wildlife preserve's motion to preliminarily enjoin a mining company from constructing and operating a nickel and copper mine in Marquette, Michigan, and to compel the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to force a federal permitting request. The mining...
The Seventh Circuit held that a town may not assess stormwater management fees on Indian lands located within the town's borders. The town passed an ordinance allowing it to assess fees on all parcels of land in the town, including those owned by the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin, to pay for its stormw...
A district court held that litter and manure washed from a farmyard into navigable waters due to a precipitation event is an agricultural stormwater discharge and not a point source discharge, rendering it exempt from the CWA's NPDES permit requirement. The case involves a poultry farmer who operate...
A Wisconsin court held that the state environmental agency should have considered impacts on downstream water quality when it issued a state pollutant discharge elimination system permit to an industrial dairy processing plant. An environmental group challenged the permit, arguing that it would allo...
The Tenth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision denying an environmental group's motion to preliminarily enjoin the construction of an oil pipeline to run from Cushing, Oklahoma, to oil refineries along the Gulf Coast near Port Arthur, Texas. The group argued that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ...
A district court ordered EPA to conduct a necessity determination under CWA §303(c)(4)(B) in response to an environmental group's petition asking the Agency to establish water quality standards to control nitrogen and phosphorous pollution in the mainstem of the Mississippi River and the Northern G...
A district court upheld EPA's final TMDL for the Chesapeake Bay against challenges from farmer and home building groups. The TMDL—the largest ever developed by EPA—identifies the necessary pollution reductions of nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment across Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvani...