A Washington appellate court affirmed a lower court decision holding the state transportation agency liable to two utilities for contribution costs incurred at the Thea Foss Waterway, a Superfund site, under the state's Model Toxics Control Act (MTCA). The agency argued that the lower court erred in...

A district court held that the current owner of a service station may be held liable under CERCLA for the actions of its predecessor and therefore dismissed the owner's motion for summary judgment. The owner's predecessor allegedly generated and then disposed of waste oil at the site between...

A district court dismissed a city's CERCLA §107(a) suit against the United States to recover past and future response costs incurred at the former Schilling Air Force Base area in Salina, Kansas. CERCLA §113(h) bars challenges to ongoing response actions being taken under §104. Here, the ...

A district court held that utilities who sold used transformers to a scrap metal company in the 1970s are not liable under CERCLA or the Connecticut Environmental Protection Act. After Connecticut's environmental department discovered PCB contamination on the property, the current owner of t...

The Ninth Circuit upheld EPA's determination that a California SIP that imposes limits on motor vehicle emissions for years 2009 and 2012 are adequate for purposes of the state's transportation plans and projects. Although EPA’s overall approval process of the SIP is still underway, th...

The Ninth Circuit upheld, on statutory and constitutional grounds, California's vessel fuel rules as they apply to vessels located more than three miles off the California coast. The rules, which seek to reduce air pollutants affecting the state of California, require ocean-going vessels to ...

A district court held that the former owner of contaminated property may be held liable under tort and the New York Navigation Law for failing to report or prevent the spread of that contamination. There are triable issues of fact as to whether the owner “caused or contributed to the disc...

A district court dismissed a county's RCRA action against the former owner of contaminated property, but held that the former owner was liable to the county under CERCLA. The county purchased the property, a former rifle lens manufacturing plant, from the former owners. The property was then...

The Fourth Circuit reversed a lower court decision that an insurance company was obligated to pay the sums a landfill owner had incurred and was likely to incur in response to an EPA cleanup order. The insurance company issued the landfill owner a standard comprehensive general liability ins...

A California court ordered the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to set aside its "functional equivalent document" that evaluates the environmental consequences of its climate change scoping plan and to enjoin implementation of the scoping plan until the agency complies with its obligati...