The D.C. Circuit, in an unpublished opinion, dismissed a petition challenging an EPA computer model that states must use to estimate motor vehicle emissions when developing their strategies to comply with the CAA. Kansas and Nebraska, as well as two nonprofit organizations, alleged that the model is...

The Ninth Circuit held that FDA properly withheld certain information concerning egg-production farms in Texas that was requested by an animal rights group under FOIA. FOIA Exemption 4 applies to “trade secrets and commercial or financial information obtained from a person and privileged or confid...

The Fifth Circuit upheld an individual's sentence and conviction for wire fraud, money laundering, and CAA violations for selling false renewable fuel credits. The individual represented to EPA and to fuel companies seeking to purchase renewable fuel credits that he manufactured renewable fuels when...

A district court held that FWS violated NEPA when it reissued two orders authorizing the killing of double-crested cormorants in certain states. FWS issued an EA and FONSI for the orders rather than an EIS. But the EA is insufficient to justify FWS' FONSI because FWS did not take the requisite “ha...

A district court remanded a portion of FWS’ addendum to a 2007 biological opinion concerning the incidental take of grizzly bears in the Grand Teton National Park. In 2007, FWS and the National Park Service (NPS) issued a joint 15-year management plan for bison and elk herds that migrate across th...

A district court held that FWS violated the ESA when it decided not to list the wolverine as a threatened species. FWS proposed to list the wolverine in 2013, but then changed course in 2014 and withdrew the proposal; this lawsuit followed. The court ruled against the agency, holding that FWS erred ...