The court holds that the Eleventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does not bar a citizen group that was denied attorney fees by the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality from asserting a Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) claim against the state agency in federal court. The ...

The court holds that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was not constitutionally barred from considering a facility's boiler and industrial furnace (BIF) permit application while a federal government suit over the facility's alleged incineration of hazardous waste without a permit was pe...

The court holds that a federal statutory requirement that holders of unpatented mining claims pay $100 per claim in 1993 and 1994 or else forfeit their claims did not effect an uncompensated taking of claimholders' property in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The fee replac...

The court refuses to approve a proposed consent decree requiring the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to issue a notice of proposed revisions to its hazardous waste identification rule by August 15, 1995, and to issue its final rules by December 15, 1996. The court first holds that a state...

The court refuses to issue a writ of mandamus overturning a district court refusal to order the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) not to initiate enforcement action against hazardous waste generators for shipping material to petitioner hazardous waste treatment company, which lacks a Resour...

The court holds that the Secretary of the Interior must continue to process a mining company's patent application for mining lode claims to determine whether it is exempt from a statutory moratorium on expenditure of funds for processing patent applications. On September 30, 1994, Congress enacted t...

The court denies a union's request to compel the U.S. Department of Labor to promulgate an emergency temporary standard to protect mine workers from exposure to respirable coal mine dust. The court first holds that the union failed to satisfy its burden of showing that an emergency temporary standar...

The court dismisses a mining association's action challenging U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) regulations concerning the use of a computerized database programmed to identify links between surface mining permit violators and applicants, individuals, and corporations. The association argued tha...

The Sixth Circuit dismissed a miner's petition for writ of mandamus directing the Secretary of Labor to promulgate lower limits for the mount of dust and silica allowed in the air in mines. The Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977 authorizes the Secretary to promulgate mandatory air quality st...

A district court denied environmental groups’ motion for partial summary judgment with respect to their claim that the United States’ maintenance of the Suisun Bay Reserve Fleet violated EPA’s surface water criterion regulations promulgated pursuant to §4004(a) of RCRA. Althou...