Zachary Arnold’s proposal of a policy framework to prevent coastal industrial disasters is quite timely, coming as it does after the 2017 hurricane season on the East Coast, followed by the equally devastating wildfire season in the West. Arnold suggests that imposing financial assurance mandates (FAMs), such as minimum insurance coverage, would induce coastal industries to proactively manage climate adaptation, and thus, proactively manage risk. Arnold points out that government at all levels—local, state, and federal—could do more.

Zachary Arnold’s article on financial assurance mandates (FAMs) highlights an important issue of growing urgency: the exposure of industrial facilities—-many with toxic products or by-products—to risks of flooding exacerbated by sea-level rise and storm surge.

Financial assurance mandates (FAMs) may help induce coastal industries to invest in climate change adaptation. FAMs require companies to prove that they can pay for the liabilities they may incur—whether by drawing on their own resources or by bringing in a third party, such as an insurer or surety, to pick up the tab. FAMs are familiar tools whose strengths have been demonstrated in practice as well as in theory.

The Environmental Law and Policy Annual Review (ELPAR) is published by the Environmental Law Reporter in partnership with Vanderbilt University Law School. ELPAR provides a forum for the presentation and discussion of some of the most creative and feasible environmental law and policy proposals from the legal academic literature each year.

The illicit and illegal use of water to grow marijuana is an environmental problem that has plagued the recently legalized crop for decades. Because growing marijuana has consistently been a more visible crime than theft and diversion of the water used, the industry’s environmental crimes have largely been ignored until recently.

Reducing the United States’ greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80% from 1990 levels by 2050 will require multiple legal pathways for changing its transportation fuel sources. The Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) authors characterize transforming the transportation system as part of a third pillar of fundamental changes required in the U.S. energy system: “fuel switching of end uses to electricity and other low-carbon supplies.” The goal is to shift 80%-95% of the miles driven from gasoline to energy sources like electricity and hydrogen.

The Brasilia Declaration of Judges on Water Justice, adopted at the eighth World Water Forum in Brasilia on March 21, 2018, recognizes that water justice involves environmental stewardship, intergenerational equity, sustainable ecological systems, customary rights, the prevention and precautionary principles, the in dubio pro natura principle, the internalization of external environmental costs (including the polluter-pays and the user-pays principles), good governance, holistic approaches involving integration of environmental factors, and procedural water justice.

This Comment analyzes Union of Concerned Scientists v. Pruitt by providing relevant background and then examining the four specific claims put forth in the suit. Ultimately, based upon this analysis, the Comment concludes that Pruitt’s conflict-of-interest policy is arbitrary and capricious. As such, the conflict-of-interest policy contained in Pruitt's October 31, 2017, directive should be vacated, declared arbitrary and capricious, remanded to the Agency for coherent explanation, and any Agency actions based upon it enjoined.

This Comment provides background on the evolution of the expanded reach of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) take prohibition as interpreted in multiple FWS policies, and the contradictions inherent in those policies. To illustrate the problems with FWS’ mutating interpretation of the MBTA, the Comment focuses on oil and gas development on public lands. While the discussion here primarily addresses protections afforded to raptors, the MBTA covers nearly every bird species in the United States.

Efforts to conduct buyouts of at-risk properties are an increasingly popular resilience tool, especially in response to massive flooding losses in recent years and the financial predicament of the National Flood Insurance Program. Calls for buyouts increased after Superstorm Sandy, with both New York and New Jersey dedicating funds to voluntary buyout programs. In some communities, an exclusive focus on the vulnerability of individual properties may lead to an implementation that causes harm to neighborhoods and communities.