The D.C. Circuit upheld the dismissal of a CAA citizen suit challenging EPA's failure to take action to prevent the construction of three proposed pollution-emitting facilities in Kentucky. The lower court held that there was no mandatory duty to act and granted EPA's motion to dismiss for lack...
A California appellate court dismissed a mobile home park owner's complaint challenging a city's environmental impact report (EIR) for a planned railroad grade separation project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Below, the county transportation authority intervened in the ...
The D.C. Circuit vacated an EPA guidance document addressing obligations of regions still in nonattainment of the 1997 one-hour ozone NAAQS. The guidance binds EPA regional directors and thus qualifies as final agency action. As such, it amounts to a legislative rule issued in violation of the ...
The Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal of an environmental group's CAA claim challenging an air quality district's method for offsetting emissions increases in its new source review permit program. The district's regulation, contained in the state's EPA-approved SIP, requires that most increase...
A California appellate court held that an insurance company has no duty to defend or indemnify a cosmetics company in an underlying action alleging that it violated Proposition 65, the California Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. The Proposition 65 claim being asserted against the compa...
A district court held that EPA need not issue endangerment findings under the CAA for marine vessels and nonroad vehicles and engines, but it denied the Agency's motion to dismiss environmental groups' request for an endangerment finding with respect to aircraft engines. EPA argued that the CAA prov...
A Texas appellate court reversed and remanded a $550,019 judgment awarded to property owners in their suit against a neighboring convenience store for damages stemming from a leaking UST. The evidence was legally sufficient to show that the gasoline migrated from the store's property to the plai...
A Wisconsin appellate court held that real estate agents may be held liable to the purchasers of their client's property for failing to disclose that a landfill next to the purchased property was a Superfund site. The purchasers learned that the landfill was a Superfund site shortly after closin...
California's highest court upheld a regional water board's issuance of a NPDES permit authorizing a power plant to draw cooling water from an adjacent harbor and slough. An environmental group filed suit, claiming that the permit did not satisfy the "best technology available" requirement of CWA...