The Fifth Circuit reversed a lower court decision that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must bear all the costs of deauthorizing the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet (MR-GO), instead holding that the Corps' cost-sharing formula with the state of Louisiana was reasonable. The Corps has completed buildin...

The Supreme Court of California held that the state may enter and conduct environmental and geological studies and testing on more than 150 privately owned properties in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta that the state might seek to acquire for construction of two new tunnels to deliver fresh water f...

The Fifth Circuit, in an unpublished opinion, directed the Louisiana Supreme Court to define the meaning of "good faith" as it pertains to an underlying whistleblower suit. A deckhand working for a tugboat company alleged he was repeatedly ordered to dump oil and otherwise violate environmental laws...

A New Jersey appellate court affirmed a lower court decision that dismissed as untimely shop owners' lawsuit against a town for injuries they allegedly suffered due to chemical vapors emanating from leaking USTs. Although the USTs belonged to the dry cleaner next door to the plaintiffs' shop, the ta...

The D.C. Circuit held that Alaska may not block any efforts by the United States to take tribal land into trust within Alaskan state borders. In 1971, the United States settled land claims staked by descendants of Alaskan aboriginal tribes. DOI interpreted that settlement as barring it from taking l...

The Ninth Circuit held that Washington state's management of barrier culverts, which allow streams to flow underneath roads, violated various Native American treaties from the 1850s and ordered the state to correct them. The "Stevens Treaties" were entered into in 1854-1855 between Native American t...

A district court held that West Virginia law preempts a county's ban on wastewater disposal wells. The ordinance effectively outlaws horizontal drilling anywhere in the county. It establishes a general, countywide ban on all storage of wastewater except for temporary storage of wastewater at drillin...