The court holds that assessment costs for hazardous waste site cleanup are not sufficient to ripen a claim for response costs under §107(a) of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). The court first considers the merits of generator and transporter defend...

The court modifies its earlier opinion holding that the Environmental Protection Agency correctly approved an Arizona state implementation plan (SIP) provision imposing variable emission limitations on copper smelters, 15 ELR 20216, to clarify that the SIP had not been submitted or approved under th...

The court holds that a motion for attorneys fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA) made after the trial court issued a permanent injunction but eight months before the judgment became final was timely. EAJA requires motions to be made "within 30 days of final judgment," but the court cons...

The court rules that a reclamation performance bond required as a condition of obtaining an Ohio strip mining permit is not an excise tax entitled to priority treatment under the Bankruptcy Code. The court first holds that the bankruptcy and district courts below correctly ruled that the requirement...

The court holds that a state agency is not a person within the meaning of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act's (SMCRA's) employee protection provision, §703. After initially ruling that it has subject matter jurisdiction over the action, the court analyzes the relevant statutory languag...

The court holds that the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) does not bar judicial review of roadless area development plans on Alaska national forest lands and that an environmental impact statement (EIS) covering a five-year timbering plan for part of southeastern Alaska is no...

The court rules that the Clean Air Act gives the district courts exclusive jurisdiction over claims that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) should have promulgated more stringent federal state implementation plan (SIP) provisions, instead of partially disapproving inadequate SIP revisions. St...

The Court holds that a bankruptcy trustee may not abandon a hazardous waste site when such abandonment would violate reasonable state health and safety laws. The Court notes that before enactment of the Bankruptcy Reform Act in 1978, the courts had judicially limited the trustee's power of abandonme...

The court holds that, on their face, provisions of the New Jersey Solid Waste Management Act designed to protect the waste disposal business from infiltration by organized crime by subjecting license applicants to disclosure, investigation, and fingerprinting requirements do not violate the federal ...

In Round III of the ongoing review of the Secretary of the Interior's Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (SMCRA) regulations, the court sustains in part and remands in part regulations concerning hydrology and geology permitting, coal mine waste, unsuitable lands, revegetation, siltation str...