A district court held BLM violated NEPA when it approved 13 oil and gas leases covering 19,788 acres in the Santa Fe National Forest without considering the leases' impacts on climate change. BLM decided an EIS was not warranted based on its FONSI. But BLM failed to take a hard look at the impacts o...

A district court ordered EPA to issue federal implementation plans fully resolving interstate transport obligations under the CAA's "good neighbor" provision for the 2008 ozone NAAQS. EPA conceded that it missed the deadline to do so under the Act. The Agency also acknowledged that it was feasible t...

The Tenth Circuit refused to stay pending interlocutory appeal a lower court order staying BLM's waste prevention rule, which was issued to reduce the venting, flaring, and leaking of natural gas emissions during oil and gas production activities on onshore federal land. California, New Mexico, and ...

The D.C. Circuit upheld amendments EPA made to its CAA regional consistency regulations that allow regional offices to act counter to national policies when ordered to do so by federal circuit courts. EPA issued the amended regulations in 2016 in response to the D.C. Circuit's decision in National E...

The court upholds a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Environmental Appeals Board decision finding a textile mill operator liable and imposing penalties against him for failing to prepare and implement a spill prevention control and countermeasure (SPCC) plan and for discharging oil into a naviga...

The court holds that a 1989 administrative agreement between a Pennsylvania environmental agency and the owner and operator of a pulp and paper mill that modified the color limits contained in the mill's 1984 national pollutant discharge elimination system (NPDES) permit was invalid and, therefore, ...

The court affirms a district court decision granting summary judgment in favor of the United States and ordering a commercial marina in Puerto Rico to remove piers and structures it built without the necessary permits in violation of the Rivers and Harbors Act. The marina sought after-the-fact permi...

The court holds that a state health department properly denied an application for a permit to construct and operate a medical waste facility. The facility failed to provide two state agencies with the pre-siting notice that the state medical waste siting act required before the legal advertisement o...

A district court denied motions to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the federal designation of over 1.8 million acres in the Sierra Nevada mountains as critical habitat for three amphibian species. Associations representing California ranchers and farmers who are no longer able to graze livestock on th...

The Second Circuit affirmed a lower court decision that CERCLA preempts state tort law claims brought by residents living near the Onondaga Lake Superfund site. The owner of the site undertook remedial action pursuant to a federal consent decree. The residents argued, on a state tort law theory, tha...