Rose Acre Farms, Inc. v. NC Department of Environment & Natural Resources
A North Carolina court held that the state's environmental agency has the authority to require an egg farm to obtain a NPDES permit to prevent airborne pollutants from reaching state waters. The egg farm does not make any direct discharges into state waters, but ammonia and other pollutants may ente...
American Road & Transportation Builders v. Environmental Protection Agency
The D.C. Circuit dismissed a road building association's lawsuit challenging EPA regulations for nonroad engines and vehicles. The regulations pertain to CAA §209(e), which preempts certain state regulation of nonroad engines. The association petitioned EPA to amend those regulations to broaden the...
Sierra Club v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency
A district court, in a 114-page opinion, held that a regional planning agency violated the California Environmental Quality Act when it approved the expansion of a ski resort near Lake Tahoe. The evidence fails to support the agency's finding that a reduced alternative was not economically infeasibl...
Natural Resources Defense Council v. EPA
The D.C. Circuit ordered EPA to repromulgate two final rules it issued under the CAA concerning the implementation of the NAAQS for fine particulate matter (PM). Environmental groups challenged EPA's decision to issue the rules pursuant to the general implementation provisions of Subpart 1 of Part D...
Banning Ranch Conservancy v. Newport Beach, City of
A California appellate court affirmed a lower court decision denying a conservation group's petition seeking to vacate a city's certification of an environmental impact report (EIR) for the development of a park. The group argued that the EIR wrongly defined the project to exclude pending residentia...