United States v. PPG Industries, Inc., No. 2:24-04771 (D.N.J. Apr. 11, 2024). Under a proposed consent decree, a settling CERCLA defendant must design and implement the components of the remedy selected for the Riverside Industrial Park Superfund Site in Newark, New Jersey, that relate to waste material, sewer water, soil gas, and soil/fill material; pay a total of $3,000,000 for past response costs; and pay for future response costs.
EPA entered into a proposed administrative settlement agreement under CERCLA for past response costs associated with the Chemical Recycling Inc., Superfund Site in Wylie, Texas.
United States v. Abex Aerospace, No. 2:16-cv-02696 (C.D. Cal. Mar. 29, 2024). Under a third amendment to a proposed consent decree, additional settling CERCLA defendants must pay $20,500,000 toward cleanup of environmental contamination at the Omega Chemical Corporation Superfund Site in Los Angeles County, California.
United States v. Intercontinental Terminals Co., LLC., No. 4:24-cv-01207 (S.D. Tex. Apr. 2, 2024). Under a proposed consent decree, a settling CERCLA defendant must pay $6,645,000 to restore, replace, rehabilitate, or acquire the equivalent of those resources injured by the releases of hundreds of thousands of barrels of a mixture of petrochemical products and firefighting foam and water into the environment as a result of a fire that ignited at a terminal facility in Deer Park, Harris County, Texas.
United States v. Kyocera AVX Components Corp., No. 1:24-cv-305 (W.D.N.Y. Apr. 1, 2024). Under a proposed consent decree, a settling CERCLA defendant must perform remedial action at the Olean Wellfield Superfund Site in the City of Olean, the Town of Olean, and the Town of Portville, New York, and reimburse EPA for its past and future costs regarding the remedial action.
Concerned by methane’s potent climate-altering emissions, a growing number of states and municipalities have embraced the phaseout of natural gas as a tool to mitigate climate change. But in April 2023, the California Restaurant Association successfully petitioned the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to overturn the city of Berkeley’s ban on natural gas infrastructure in new buildings. The three-judge panel found the ban preempted by the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act, and in January 2024, the Ninth Circuit denied Berkeley’s petition for rehearing.
Over the last three decades, numerous studies have concluded that African American, Hispanic, Native American, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, and working-class White communities are disproportionately exposed to environmental harms and risks. More recent studies have concluded that although the adverse effects of climate change are being felt throughout the United States, they are not evenly distributed. This Article explores how several states have initiated climate justice litigation to address this issue.
On October 7, 2023, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the most far-reaching corporate climate disclosure (CCD) requirements in the United States. This so-called California Climate Accountability Package consists of the Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act (Senate Bill (SB) 253), which requires certain companies to disclose greenhouse gas emission data, and the Climate-Related Financial Risk Act (SB 261), which requires certain companies to disclose climate-related financial risks.
EPA entered into a proposed administrative settlement agreement for remedial investigation addendum/focused feasibility study under CERCLA associated with the Smeltertown site near Salida, Colorado.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management proposed to hold offshore wind lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico for multiple lease areas using a multiple-factor bidding auction format.