Energy & Environmental Legal Institute v. Epel
The Tenth Circuit upheld on constitutional grounds Colorado's mandate that 20% of the electricity that generators sell to Colorado consumers come from renewable sources. A conservative energy group claimed that the renewable energy standard will harm out-of-state coal producers in violation of the C...
American Farm Bureau Federation v. United States Environmental Protection Agency
The Third Circuit upheld EPA's TMDL plan for the Chesapeake Bay against challenges from farmer and home building groups. The TMDL—the largest ever developed by EPA—identifies necessary pollution reductions of nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment across Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, V...
Alaska Eskimo Whaling Comm'n v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
The Ninth Circuit granted in part and denied in part a petition challenging an NPDES permit authorizing oil and gas exploration facilities' discharge of 13 waste streams into the Beaufort Sea. The petition was filed by the Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission, which represents Alaska Native villages tha...
Public Service Co. of Colorado v. City of Boulder
A Colorado court upheld a city's decision to create a local electric utility. An electric company argued that the city council exceeded its authority when it created the utility. But the company missed the 28-day deadline for challenging quasi-judicial decisions. When the city declared that the cond...
Ladra v. New Dominion, LLC
The Supreme Court of Oklahoma held that a woman injured in a 2011 earthquake may go forward with her suit against two energy companies for allegedly causing the quake due to hydraulic fracturing operations. A lower court dismissed the case, concluding that the Oklahoma Corporation Commission has exc...
Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition v. McCarthy
A district court dismissed environmental groups' CWA citizen suit against EPA for failing to respond in writing to their administrative petition seeking withdrawal of West Virginia's NPDES permit program, but held that the groups may go forward with their claim that the Agency's failure to timely re...
Alaska Wilderness League v. Jewell
The Ninth Circuit upheld the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement's (BSEE's) approval of oil spill response plans for an oil company's leases in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas on Alaska's Arctic coast. Several environmental groups claimed that BSEE's approval was arbitrary and capricious un...