The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed in part and vacated in part the Montana high court's ruling in a lawsuit concerning cleanup actions across a 300-square-mile Superfund site in Butte. Landowners whose properties are located within the site brought trespass, nuisance, and strict liability claims under ...

The U.S. Supreme Court held, 6-3, that the "functional equivalent of a direct discharge" of pollutants requires a CWA permit, and remanded for consideration of whether a discharge of pollutants into groundwater that later discharged into the Pacific Ocean meets this standard. Environmental groups ar...

A district court vacated EPA's 2017 directive that prohibited scientists in receipt of certain EPA grants from serving on the Agency's federal advisory committees. An environmental group argued the directive should be vacated and remanded following the court's previous ruling that granted summary ju...

A district court vacated a nationwide permit reissued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that allowed for construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline across waterways. Environmental groups argued the reissuance violated the ESA by failing to initiate programmatic consultation. The court found that dec...

A district court denied summary judgment to an environmental group in a lawsuit concerning the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration's (PHMSA's) obligations under the Mineral Leasing Act (MLA) to inspect all pipelines on federal lands annually. The group argued the agency failed to ...

A district court upheld a CWA §404 permit the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers granted to authorize the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) to discharge dredge-and-fill materials into nearby waters during construction of a light rail project, known as the Purple Line project, that would connect subur...

A district court granted in part and denied in part environmental groups' motion for summary judgment in a challenge to EPA's approval of an Oklahoma program regulating the disposal of coal combustion residuals. The groups argued that EPA failed to perform its statutory duty under RCRA to develop an...

A district court held that NMFS violated the ESA by approving a U.S. lobster fishery without adequately considering the fishery's impact on the endangered North Atlantic right whale. Conservation groups argued the agency violated the ESA by failing to include an incidental take statement (ITS) in it...

The D.C. Circuit vacated FERC's refusal to allow a natural gas pipeline company to impose incremental-plus rates to cover the costs of an expansion project. The company argued that FERC should have approved the incremental-plus rates and that its failure to do so was arbitrary and capricious. The co...

The Kansas Supreme Court held unlawful a rate design approved by the Kansas Corporation Commission under which utilities charged residential customers generating their own electricity from a renewable source (DG customers) a higher price than they charged non-DG customers. The utilities argued that ...