A California court held that federal mining law preempts a state law that effectively bans the use of any vacuum or suction dredge mining in streams and rivers on federal lands. Under Cal. Fish…

A California appellate court upheld a lower court decision denying an environmental group's petition challenging a county's approval of a proposed surface mining operation on a 1,500-…

A district court upheld DOI's decision to withdraw more than one million acres of federal land adjacent to the Grand Canyon National Park from uranium mining. The withdrawal will close these…

The Ohio Supreme Court held that a mineral rights owner may be able to strip mine portions of a state wildlife area. The state and the mineral rights owner entered a contract granting the owner “…

The Ninth Circuit held that it lacks subject matter jurisdiction over environmental groups' citizen suit challenging the Montana Department of Environmental Quality's potential approval…

The Tenth Circuit held that an energy company may cross private property in order to develop new oil well sites under the property owner's surface estate as well as to access one of its…

A Michigan appellate court upheld the state environmental agency's decision to grant a groundwater discharge permit to a company in connection with its plan to develop an underground mine to…

A Michigan appellate court upheld the state environmental agency's decision to grant mining and discharge permits to a company to develop an underground mine to extract nickel and copper from…

A district court held that a mining company allowed excessive amounts of selenium to be discharged from one of its surface coal mine operations in violation of the CWA and SMCRA. The company'…

The Supreme Court of Utah dismissed an environmental group's lawsuit challenging the state's issuance of a discharge permit for a tar sands bitumen-extraction project in the Uintah Basin…