A district court held that an aircraft company that filed cost recovery and contribution actions against the United States under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) for trichloroethylene contamination at an airport site in Kansas is precluded from recov...

A district court issued a preliminary injunction ordering the U.S. Navy to implement various mitigation measures to protect marine mammals from mid-frequency sonar used during training exercises off the southern California coast. The court previously enjoined the Navy's use of sonar for training exe...

The Ninth Circuit held that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers complied with the Clean Water Act (CWA) and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in issuing a mining company a dredge and fill permit for a major gold mining project in Nome, Alaska, that will place about 15,592,411 cubic yards of ...

On remand, a district court again dismissed a citizen suit against a municipal sewage district on res judicata grounds because a 2002 agreement with state regulators was “calculated in good faith” to address repeated sewer overflows into Lake Michigan. The state is in privity with the pl...

A district court denied a chemical manufacturer's motion to dismiss property owners' third-party contribution claims against it under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) for perchloroethylene (PCE) contamination at a former dry cleaning site. Under Unit...

A federal district court upheld California’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles, rejecting an industry association's challenge based on the preemptive effect of both the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) and federal foreign policy. Where the U.S. Environment...

The Eleventh Circuit upheld defendant's issuance of a general permit authorizing landowners engaged in "suburban development" in a large, contiguous area of the Florida Panhandle to discharge limited dredged and fill material into federal waters as a proper exercise of defendant's general permitting...

The Ninth Circuit reversed a lower court's grant of summary judgment for the U.S. Forest Service in a challenge to three prescribed burns in California that plaintiffs alleged violated the National Environmental Policy Act by establishing a categorical exclusion for all fuel reduction projects up to...

A district court denied a request by five conservation groups to block the Bureau of Land Management's (BLM) approval of roughly 90 new wells in a 2,000-well natural gas development southwest of Rawlins, Wyoming, based on the agency's evidence that it followed the National Environmental Policy Act p...

A federal district court ordered city officials to pay a property owner nearly $37 million for creating wetlands on a 25-acre parcel of undeveloped land tentatively zoned for residential development. Where evidence indicates a lack of ponded water on the property prior to the construction of a nearb...