The Iowa Supreme Court affirmed a lower court ruling that upheld the Iowa Utilities Board's approval of a 170-turbine wind project in northwest Iowa. Landowners argued that the project was located at a "single site" and thus should have required a certificate of public convenience, use, and necessit...
A district court granted in part summary judgment against EPA for failure to implement its 2016 Emission Guidelines and Compliance Times for Municipal Solid Waste Landfills. Eight states argued that the Agency failed to implement and enforce the guidelines by (1) failing to approve or disapprove exi...
A state court reversed the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation's approval of a water use permit for a proposed silver-copper mine in Montana's Cabinet Mountains. An environmental group argued that the Department ignored data in the mining company's permit application indicating ...
A district court denied an environmental group's motion for summary judgment in a challenge to NMFS' approval of a fishery management plan amendment that opened up a portion of the western Gulf of Maine to commercial and recreational fishing. The group argued that NMFS wrongly concluded that the ame...
The Ninth Circuit reversed a dismissal of a lawsuit brought by conservation groups to enjoin USDA from killing gray wolves in Idaho pending additional NEPA analysis. The groups argued before the district court that the agency violated NEPA by failing to prepare an EIS on its wolf management activiti...
A district court stayed a constitutional challenge to the Washington Department of Ecology's decision to deny a coal company a CWA §401 certification for construction of a coal export facility along the Columbia River. The company argued that the Department violated the Commerce Clause by denying t...
A district court denied an offshore drilling platform operator's motion to reconsider the court's previous ruling that barred the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) from issuing offshore drilling permits until it conducted further environmental review. Conservation groups had argued that BOEM'...
The Fifth Circuit vacated portions of a 2015 EPA rule that set new effluent limitation guidelines (ELGs) for legacy wastewater and combustion residual leachate that are discharged from steam electric power plants. Environmental groups argued that the Agency arbitrarily set the ELGs using an older, l...
The D.C. Circuit affirmed summary judgment for NMFS in a challenge to the agency's adoption of the 2016 Standardized Bycatch Reporting Methodology for fisheries in the northeastern United States. An environmental group argued that the 2016 methodology violated the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA) because ...
A district court granted in part a challenge to DOI's decision to lift a 2016 moratorium on new coal leasing on public lands. States and environmental groups argued that DOI's decision to lift the moratorium constituted a major federal action subject to NEPA review, and requested that the court orde...