A district court dismissed a scuba diving school's Clean Water Act citizen suit against a drainage district for discharging pollutants into a lake in violation of its national pollutant discharge elimination system permits. The school argued that due to water quality degradation stemming from the pe...

The Indiana Supreme Court held that an agreed order for environmental cleanup between a manufacturing company and the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM) is an agency action governed by the Indiana Administrative Orders and Procedures Act, not a contract that will support a claim f...

The Fourth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision denying a motion to dismiss environmental groups' National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) claim against the director of the South Carolina Department of Transportation concerning the construction of a bridge. The director argued that the claims aga...

The First Circuit held that the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act (WSRA) does not preempt state statutes governing the management of state-administered rivers. A group of canoeists filed suit claiming that Maine's statute governing the Allagash Wilderness Waterway is preempted by the WSRA. Specifically, th...

A district court held that automobile manufacturers and trade associations may not go forward with their lawsuit seeking to preempt Rhode Island's adoption of the California greenhouse gas emissions standard for new motor vehicles. The manufacturers' and associations' claims are barred by the doctri...

A California appellate court held that the owner of a contaminated site may not intervene in an action between the prior owner and its insurer over coverage for the contamination. California law generally prohibits third parties from suing an insurer when they are not in contractual privity, and the...

The Fifth Circuit reversed a lower court decision dismissing homeowners' negligence suit against a company for erroneously determining that their home was not located in a flood zone. Based on that determination, the homeowners were not required to obtain flood insurance under the National Flood Ins...

The Ninth Circuit reversed a lower court's grant of summary judgment for defendants on landowners' negligence claim stemming from the sale of property containing a disused mercury mine, but affirmed the grant of summary judgment on the landowners' contribution, breach of contract, and fraud claims. ...

The Eleventh Circuit held that a district court did not err in denying a coal mine operator's motion to dismiss an environmental group's Clean Water Act (CWA) claim filed against it for discharging pollutants into U.S. waters in violation of its national pollutant discharge elimination system permit...

The Ninth Circuit affirmed the dismissal of a school district's Clean Air Act (CAA) claim seeking to halt the construction of an 810-megawatt power plant approximately 1,100 feet from an elementary school. Because the district's action was brought in an inappropriate forum under an inapplicable CAA ...