A district court held that the state of Texas cannot challenge the listing of the golden-cheeked warbler as endangered under the ESA. The state brought a lawsuit against FWS alleging that the agency unlawfully dismissed a petition to delist the golden-cheeked warbler. The petition provided evidence ...

The California Supreme Court held that the charges a California city must pay to a local water district for groundwater conservation activities do not require voter or property owner approval. By statute, charges for pumping groundwater for nonagricultural uses generally must be at least three times...

The Ninth Circuit upheld a lower court's dismissal of a tribe's NEPA challenge to a DOI guidance that did not consider its interest when allocating the water rights of the Colorado River. The tribe contended that it was unlawfully excluded from DOI 2001 and 2008 guidances that outlined how water is ...

A district court held that an insurance company cannot back out of an insurance policy because a policyholder entered into a voluntary environmental cleanup agreement. The policyholder agreed to sell its land and allowed the buyer to do an environmental assessment. When contamination was discovered,...

A California appellate court reversed a lower court's judgment that directed a state water resources agency to file a report of waste discharges in violation of the state water quality law. An environmental organization alleged that the agency failed to institute measures to mitigate the flow of con...

A district court held that an energy company must follow additional safety measures operating the Dakota Access pipeline while the environmental impacts of the project are being studied. In an earlier decision, the court held that the Dakota Access pipeline could continue to operate while the Army C...

The court holds a parent company liable for contribution under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) as a successor corporation to a chemical company that owned and operated an industrial facility in Ohio from 1926 until 1946. The current owner of the fac...

The court holds that a trustee, on behalf of a trust created for the cleanup of a contaminated industrial site, may seek contribution from other potentially responsible parties (PRPs). The PRPs, who are grantors to the trust, argued that the trust has not incurred response costs as required by the C...

The court affirms an appellate court's holding that a county ordinance and health board rules attempting to regulate swine farming are preempted by state law, but reversed the appellate court's holding approving a zoning ordinance that required swine farm operators to obtain a permit through complia...

The court holds that the U.S. Forest Service's (Forest Service's) decision to issue special use permits to motorized commercial fishing boats on the Rogue Wild and Scenic River (WSR) did not violate the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act (WSRA) or the National Forest Management Act (NFMA), but that the Fore...