A district court upheld a surface coal mining permit issued to a company even though the cotenant objected to any mining on the property. The company cotenant conveyed the right to enter and surface mine coal to an affiliate, but the other cotenant did not consent to surface mining. Nevertheless, th...
A district court denied motions to dismiss environmental groups' lawsuit challenging Executive Order 13795, “Implementing an America-First Offshore Energy Strategy,” which reversed President Obama’s withdrawal of 128 million acres in the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans from future oil and gas leasi...
A district court held that BLM violated NEPA by failing to adequately consider climate change in the resource management plans (RMPs) for Buffalo, Wyoming, and Miles City, Montana, both located within the coal-rich Powder River Basin. BLM's EISs failed to consider any alternative that would decrease...
A district court granted California cities' motions to remand their climate change tort actions against oil and gas companies back to state court. Although their state law claims raise national and perhaps global questions, they should not have been removed to federal court. Removal based on federal...
The D.C. Circuit upheld EPA's 2012 regional haze rule, which seeks to restore air quality and visibility in certain national parks and wilderness areas to what they would be under natural conditions. The rule requires states to impose best available retrofit technology (BART) on certain stationary p...
The D.C. Circuit granted in part and denied in part petitions concerning EPA's NESHAPs for industrial boilers. The first challenge raised by environmental groups concerned regulations that indirectly control a group of organic pollutants by limiting carbon monoxide emissions as a proxy for the targe...
The court grants in part and denies in part a steel company's and city's motions for injunctions against one another in a case involving the parties' liability for cleanup under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). The company filed suit against the cit...
The court affirms a district court decision that a water district's operation of a pump station without a national pollution discharge elimination system (NPDES) permit violates the Clean Water Act (CWA) but vacates the court's injunction prohibiting the district from operating the station. The cour...
The court affirms a district court holding that a village's sign ordinance did not violate the First Amendment as it contained permissible restrictions on the number, size, and location of signs on residential property, the duration for which signs may remain on residential property, and the presenc...
The court affirms an individual's conviction under the Clean Air Act (CAA) for knowingly causing the removal of asbestos-containing materials without complying with the applicable work-practice standards. The court first holds that the district court did not err in instructing the jury that the indi...