Editors' Summary: Early this year, the Fifth Circuit, in Sierra Club v. Sigler, became the first court of appeals to interpret CEQ's "worst case" regulation for EISs. The rule requires agencies to perform a worst case analysis where significant scientific uncertainty or gaps in information exist concerning the environmental effects of a project. Because the rule is unique and only recently promulgated, it is unclear what types of projects are included within the rule or how broad the analysis must be.

Editors' Summary: On December 30, 1982 a federal district judge handed EPA's hazardous waste program an unexpected setback. He dismissed an EPA complaint seeking to use RCRA §7003 to force the operator of a closed landfill and the owner of the land on which it is located to abate chemical pollution leaking from the dump into the groundwater. The decision in United States v. Waste Industries was the first to reject the Agency's application of §7003 to an inactive waste disposal site.

In the midst of the chaos prevailing at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), one major environmental accomplishment received too little notice. On March 3, 1983, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the American Iron and Steel Institute, and EPA filed a settlement agreement¹ with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit resolving all legal challenges to water pollution effluent guidelines for the steel industry.

Editors' Summary: On March 24, 1983, the Environmental Law Institute held a press conference announcing the release of ACID RAIN IN EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA: NATIONAL RESPONSES TO AN INTERNATIONAL PROBLEM, authored by Gregory Wetstone and Armin Rosencranz. Mr. Wetstone prepared this summary of the major findings of the book for ELR Dialogue, based on his press conference remarks.

On February 17, 1983, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) issued its second analysis of Clean Air Act sanctions for nonattainment areas. Like the first report, which was reprinted at 12 ELR 30019, the current CRS paper was authored by Robert Meltz and is published in the Administrative Materials section of this month's issue of ELR, 13 ELR 30001. In this paper, Mr.

Editors' Summary: Commercial bankruptcy threatens to become a recurring impediment to the enforcement of hazardous waste laws. Last November, a federal district court ruled it had no jurisdiction to hear a RCRA and CERCLA enforcement action against Johns-Manville Sales Corporation, a bankrupt. The Comment reviews and criticizes the decision and suggests an alternative analysis to be applied in environmental bankruptcy cases.

Editors' Summary: On January 7, 1983, the D.C. Circuit decided Duquesne Light Co. v. Environmental Protection Agency, turning back sweeping industry challenges to EPA's Clean Air Act §120 noncompliance penalty regulations. The Comment reports that the rules' broad coverage and narrow exemptions, streamlined administrative procedures, and methodology for calculating penalties equal to the economic benefits of delayed compliance all survived the court's scrutiny. The court remanded the rules on only three relatively minor, though not insignificant, points.

Editors' Summary: On February 7, 1983, the California Supreme Court issued an eagerly awaited decision on the application of the public trust doctrine to the appropriation of the waters feeding Northern California's Mono Lake by the City of Los Angeles. In a significant victory for environmentalists who seek to stop what they see as the draining of the unique ecological resource to slake the excessive thirst of the Southern California megalopolis, the court held that under California law the public trust must be taken into account in such appropriation decisions.

Editors' Summary: Section 404 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, the Corps of Engineers' dredge and fill permit program, is once again the focus of legislative and administrative reform efforts. Legislative reforms include proposed bills to return the Corps' jurisdiction to traditionally navigable waters and to limit permitting time to 90 days. Administrative reforms have been more concrete. In July 1982, the Corps issued amendments to its regulations in response to the goals of the President's Task Force on Regulatory Relief.

Editors' Summary: Almost 40 years ago, in First Iowa Hydro-Electric Cooperative v. Federal Power Commission, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Federal Power Act preempted almost all state controls on hydroelectric development. Over the last 10 years, though, court decisions and statutes have afforded the states increasing power to regulate areas concurrently under federal control. In this Article, Mr. Arnold examines First Iowa in light of these trends.