A district court held that BLM's EISs associated with the Craters of the Moon and Pinedale resource management plans (RMPs) failed to adequately analyze impacts to the sage-grouse in violation of NEPA. The Craters of the Moon EIS did not discuss in any manner alternatives that reduced grazing short...

A district court, in a 279-page opinion, held that NOAA-Fisheries' 2009 biological opinion (BiOp) and reasonable and prudent alternative (RPA) addressing Central Valley Project and State Water Project impacts on Chinook salmon, steelhead, green sturgeon, and Southern Resident killer whales are a...

A Virginia appellate court held that under Virginia law, an insurer has no duty to defend or indemnify an energy company in an underlying lawsuit brought by a native Alaskan village for damages allegedly caused by global warming through the emission of greenhouse gases. The relevant policies onl...

The Seventh Circuit denied various states' motion to issue a preliminary injunction compelling the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to prevent the emigration of invasive silver and bighead carp through the Chicago Area Waterway System into Lake Michigan. The states presented sufficient evidence to d...

The Federal Circuit, in a breach of contract case involving the U.S. government's failure to dispose of spent nuclear fuels (SNF) produced at San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, held that certain indirect overhead costs incurred by an electric utility can be included in the utility's damages ...

The D.C. Circuit vacated the National Marine Fisheries Service's (NMFS') methodology for tracking bycatch in the fisheries off the Northeastern coast of the United States. The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, as amended by the Sustainable Fisheries Act, requires the NMF...

The Ninth Circuit held that a seafood processor association may not intervene in environmental groups' lawsuit challenging the National Marine Fisheries Service's program to preserve groundfish species off the coast of California, Oregon, and Washington. A lower court denied the association's m...

The Ninth Circuit upheld the denial of animal rights groups' motion to preliminarily enjoin DOI from rounding up, destroying, or auctioning off wild horses and burros in the Twin Peaks Herd Management Area on the California-Nevada border. The groups claimed that the large-scale removal of horses...

A West Virginia court overturned a city's ordinance banning the hydraulic fracturing of Marcellus shale. The city, characterizing the hydraulic fracturing process as a nuisance, argued that it has the authority to enact and enforce the ordinance pursuant to the rights given to the city by the "Home ...

A district court denied an energy company's motion to dismiss residents' tort law claims against it for damages stemming from its operation of natural gas compression stations. The residents alleged that the compressor stations cause harmful levels of noise pollution and emit large amounts of methan...