The D.C. Circuit vacated a license renewal that FERC granted for a power plant on the Coosa River. Environmental groups argued that the agency violated the Federal Power Act, NEPA, and the ESA when it issued the power company's license. The appellate court agreed, finding that the EA and biological ...

The D.C. Circuit affirmed a lower court decision granting DOI's motion to dismiss an order compelling it to update the EIS for the federal coal management program. Environmental and community organizations claimed that the programmatic EIS (PEIS) for the program violated NEPA and the APA. They argue...

A district court held BLM violated NEPA when it approved 13 oil and gas leases covering 19,788 acres in the Santa Fe National Forest without considering the leases' impacts on climate change. BLM decided an EIS was not warranted based on its FONSI. But BLM failed to take a hard look at the impacts o...

A district court dismissed groups' NEPA and CWA claims against the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in connection with its approval of a 17-mile transmission line across the James River near historic Jamestown, Virginia. The Corps took a "hard look" at the project and properly determined that no EIS was...

A Federal Claims court held that the Surface Transportation Board (STB) temporarily took landowners' property without just compensation for use as an interim trail under the National Trails System Act. The landowners' predecessors-in-interest sold right-of-way easements to a railroad for operation o...