A California court held that federal mining law preempts a state law that effectively bans the use of any vacuum or suction dredge mining in streams and rivers on federal lands. Under Cal. Fish & Game Code §5653, the use of any vacuum or suction dredge equipment by any person in any river strea...

A district court, in a 199-page opinion, struck down a local county ordinance banning oil-and-gas drilling, including hydraulic fracturing, within Mora County, New Mexico. Portions of the ordinance essentially provide that corporations have no federal constitutional rights. For example, the ordinanc...

The Court of Federal Claims held that a company that funded construction of an open-loop biomass facility to provide steam for a chicken rendering plant's electricity needs is entitled to reimbursement costs under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARAR), but only for costs associated with ...

A district court struck down California's sales ban on foie gras—a delicacy made from fattened duck liver. Foie gras producers and sellers argued that the federal Poultry Products Inspection Act (PPIA) preempts the ban, Cal. Health & Safety Code §25982, and the court agreed. The PPIA expressl...

The Ninth Circuit upheld a lower court decision affirming the U.S. Forest Service's decision to implement the Little Slate Project, a 2,598-acre timber thinning sale within the Nez Perce National Forest. Environmental groups asserted that the Forest Service and FWS violated the National Forest Manag...

A district court upheld BLM's approval of a temporary public art project over the Arkansas River by New York-based artist Christo. The project would consist of 5.9 miles of steel cables, anchored on the riverbanks between 8 and 25 feet above a 42-mile stretch of the Arkansas River, over which fabric...

A Pennsylvania court held that the state legislature acted within its constitutional authority when it gave itself the power to transfer money out of a special account, funded by oil and gas revenue from state lands, that had been set aside for conservation projects; but that the state's Department ...

A district court dismissed an environmental group's NEPA and Wilderness Act lawsuit challenging the U.S. Forest Service's approval of a proposed utility-scale wind farm project in the Green Mountain National Forest in southern Vermont. The groups sought declaratory and injunctive relief to permanent...