The Fourth Circuit vacated both an incidental take statement issued by FWS and a right-of-way permit issued by the National Park Service (NPS) for construction of a natural gas pipeline that intersects the Blue Ridge Parkway. Environmental groups argued that the take limits set by FWS in its Inciden...

The Fourth Circuit vacated and remanded BLM's decision granting a right-of-way through federal land for construction of a pipeline and the U.S. Forest Service's decision to amend the Jefferson National Forest Land Resource Management Plan to accommodate the right-of-way and pipeline construction. En...

A district court denied an environmental group's motion for summary judgment challenging DOJ's withholding of legal memos concerning the president's authority to shrink national monuments under the Antiquities Act. The group argued that DOJ had no reasonable justification for withholding the memos a...

A Minnesota appellate court affirmed a lower court ruling in favor of a county's zoning ordinance that bans all industrial-mineral mining, including silica-sand mining. A silica-sand mining company argued that the ordinance discriminated against its business. But the lower court disagreed, concludin...

The D.C. Circuit denied power companies' petitions to review FERC orders approving an exemption to the minimum offer price rule in the New England forward capacity market for a limited amount of qualifying renewable energy. The companies argued that the exemption for renewables created unjust, unrea...

A district court granted in part an environmental group's motion for summary judgment to compel EPA to act on its 2016 Plan for the 2008 eight-hour ozone NAAQS adopted by the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District and granted in part the Agency's motion requesting an extension on the dead...

The court holds that the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) did not act arbitrarily or capriciously in upgrading dioxin from the list of "reasonably anticipated" human carcinogens to the list of "known" human carcinogens. The upgrade was set forth in the HHS' Ninth Report...

The court affirms a district court decision denying a county's request for a preliminary injunction to prevent a city from continuing the expansion of its municipal water supply reservoir along the Nestucca River in Oregon. After the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers determined that the project would not...

The court upholds a district court's imposition of civil penalties and attorney fees against a city that allowed untreated or partially treated sewage and wastewater to discharge over a property owner's land and into U.S. waters. The city and property owner entered into a consent decree, but the cit...

A district court denied in part environmental groups' motion for summary judgment challenging BLM's and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' approval of a project to replace a wooden diversion weir with a concrete dam along the Yellowstone River. The groups argued that the agencies' EIS violated NEPA b...