The Sixth Circuit dismissed as moot the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' (Corps') appeal of an injunction requiring it to accept contaminated material dredged from a waterbody connected to the Detroit River. A settlement agreement between Michigan and the city of Detroit required the city to dredge and...

The First Circuit held that neither the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) nor the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) waive U.S. sovereign immunity in a property owner's suit to recover monetary damages for its cleanup of past oil contamination on a former U.S. Navy base. RCRA contains no exp...

The D.C. Circuit dismissed as moot the U.S. Department of the Interior's appeal of a district court order that remanded for further rulemaking and temporarily suspended the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service's (NMFS) "no surprises rule." The government arg...

The court held that a district court erred in dismissing environmental groups' suit challenging the issuance of a permit to construct a power plant near Yellowstone National Park for lack of standing. The Montana Department of Environmental Quality issued the permit after the U.S. Department of the ...

The court holds that the Tucker Act's statute of limitations does not bar a development company's claim that U.S. Marine Corps munitions-handling operations at Blount Island, Florida, resulted in a temporary taking of the company's property without just compensation. The statute of limitations began...

The court holds that a phosphate mining company lacks standing to challenge a competitor's phosphate mining project under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The company had no environmental interests at stake. Rather, it challenged the project because it might become an alternative suppli...

A court dismisses a building owner's request for a declaratory judgment entitling it to indemnification for any damages or penalties it may be obligated to pay arising from asbestos violations that occurred during asbestos abatement work at its property. The owner claimed that the abatement company'...

A court dismisses a company's claims against the prior owners of its property for failing to remove drums, titanium grindings, and other metals from the site pursuant to a purchase agreement. The company also argued that the prior owners violated a state court order, issued in conjunction with a set...

The court dismisses a petition challenging a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule allowing the director of an approved state landfill to grant variances from EPA criteria for sanitary landfills. The environmental group challenging the rule lacks associational standing because none of its ...

A court reverses a lower court decision denying animal activists' motion to strike state employees' workplace violence protective orders under the state's anti-SLAPP statute. Following a nighttime protest at one of the employees' homes, a trial court issued temporary restraining orders against the a...