The Court of Federal Claims held that the U.S. government is liable for costs an oil company incurred cleaning up contamination stemming from the production of aviation gasoline at its Baytown, Texas, and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, refineries during World War II. In the early 1940s, the company's prede...

The court affirms in part and reverses in part a district court decision upholding U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) regulations that govern damage to land, structures, and certain water supplies caused by mining subsidence. The court first holds that a regulation establishing a rebuttable presu...

The court affirms the dismissal of a land trust's action alleging that a coal company that owned the mineral rights to a tract of the trust's land violated the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) and other federal and state laws. The trust alleged that the company's failure to comply ...

The court upholds some provisions and strikes down other provisions of an Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) interim final rule that required a surface mining permit applicant to disclose all environmental violations it incurred at its mining operations. The court first holds...

The court holds that the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement's (OSM's) denial of a surface mining permit to a company was not a taking. The company's mining plan would invade the rock strata overlying an aquifer that supplies a local community with drinking water. The court first ho...

The Sixth Circuit affirms a district court judgment upholding the Interior Board of Land Appeals' (IBLA's) decision that a mining company violated federal Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) regulations requiring the elimination of cliff-like rock walls known as "highwalls" at its sur...

The court holds that the citizen suit provision of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA), §520(f), provides a federal cause of action for the recovery of damages resulting from violation of state regulations that are a part of the state's surface coal mining and reclamation regulat...

The court upholds a U.S. Department of Interior Board of Land Appeals (IBLA) determination that a company's failure to file a stipulation of entry rendered its mining claims null and void ab initio. When the Secretary of the Interior opened certain lands to mining claims in 1954, he required that a ...

The court holds that bankruptcy discharges a state environmental agency's environmental liability claims against an oil company believed to be the successor to the owner of an abandoned oil site where hazardous substances had been released. The court first holds that the state agency's environmental...

The court holds unripe for review the Interior Board of Land Appeals' (IBLA's) ruling that the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) lacks jurisdiction to order a mining company to reduce acid mine drainage seeping from a mining operation in West Virginia. The IBLA ruled that th...