A Texas appellate court upheld a state railroad commission order requiring a company to obtain a permit to receive and store oilfield waste consisting primarily of oil-based drill cuttings—bits of rock and soil that are byproducts of the drilling process—that it would then recycle into road base...
The court holds in a Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) §113 contribution action that plaintiff, the successor-owner/operator of a battery breaking facility, is liable for 75 percent of the cleanup costs and that defendant-battery suppliers are liable for...
The court holds that a county's action to quiet title to real property used by the United States as a wildlife management area on Matagorda Island in Texas is time barred. The federal government condemned a portion of Matagorda Island for use as a bombing and gunnery range, and in 1982 the U.S. Fish...
The court holds that a corporation's contingent claims for environmental cleanup costs associated with real property it purchased from a potentially responsible party (PRP) that filed for bankruptcy are claims for reimbursement and contribution and, therefore, may be disallowed if the bankruptcy cou...
The court dismisses a property owner's Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), Federal Water Pollution Control Act (FWPCA), and state common-law claims against prior owners of the property and a state agency for r...
Editors' Summary: Until recently, the regulation of chemical carcinogens and the regulation of radiological carcinogens developed independently. Different governmental agencies operating under different statutory directives were responsible for addressing the dangers from these carcinogens. As a result, different policies and practices were developed. This Article explores these differences and the record on resolving them. It first examines the history of federal regulation of chemical and radiological carcinogens and summarizes EPA's approach to risk assessments for them.
In New York v. SCA Services, Inc., the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York rejected the notion that a transporter cannot be an arranger under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). This Dialogue reviews the parties' arguments and the court's opinion. It then analyzes the impact this case will have on transporters.
Editors' Summary: Since 1910, the federal government has played a role in regulating pesticides. At first, the motive was to fight fraud, but as pesticides became more sophisticated and as environmental concerns grew, the government's regulatory efforts became more comprehensive. Now, near the dawn of bioengineered pesticides, with society confronting and reevaluating environmental risks, and with agencies facing fiscal challenges, pesticide regulation continues to evolve. It is a field of concern to the pesticide industry, of course, but in U.S.
Editor's Summary: In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its most recent pronouncement on the executive foreign affairs preemption doctrine in American Insurance Ass'n v. Garamendi. In this Article, Kimberly Breedon argues that lower courts are prone to overbroad applications of Garamendi because the Court assumed the presence of three elements when it developed the standard for executive foreign affairs preemption of state law: (1) formal source law; (2) nexus to a foreign entity; and (3) indication of intent by the executive to preempt the state law under challenge.
The court holds that potentially responsible parties (PRPs) compelled to initiate a hazardous waste site cleanup are precluded from joint and several cost recovery from other PRPs under Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) §107(a), and, thus, are limited to...