Search Results
Use the filters on the left-hand side of this screen to refine the results further by topic or document type.

<i>Garamendi</i>'s Unspoken Assumptions: Assessing Executive Foreign Affairs Preemption Challenges to State Regulation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Editor's Summary: In 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its most recent pronouncement on the executive foreign affairs preemption doctrine in American Insurance Ass'n v. Garamendi. In this Article, Kimberly Breedon argues that lower courts are prone to overbroad applications of Garamendi because the Court assumed the presence of three elements when it developed the standard for executive foreign affairs preemption of state law: (1) formal source law; (2) nexus to a foreign entity; and (3) indication of intent by the executive to preempt the state law under challenge.

<i>Waterkeeper Alliance, Inc. v. EPA</i>: Why It Is Important

Editors' Summary: On February 28, 2005, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit vacated and remanded portions of EPA's concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFO) rule. The ruling was not a win for either side of the debate, as it requires permitting authorities to review and incorporate nutrient management plans into their permits, but prevents EPA from requiring CAFOs to apply for permits based solely on their potential to discharge pollutants to U.S. waters.

Bouchard Transp. Co. v. Updegraff

The court holds that a district court erred in ruling that Florida is entitled to Eleventh Amendment immunity in a limitation of liability proceeding, but it correctly dismissed the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA) and Florida Pollution Discharge Prevention Act claims brought against the owners of th...

Bayou Liberty Ass'n v. Corps of Eng'rs

The court holds that an environmental group is not entitled to a preliminary injunction suspending a proposed retail development's construction permit and ordering the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) addressing the development's impact on flooding. The...

Bragg v. Robertson

The court upholds as reasonable and fair a settlement agreement in a citizen suit challenging the federal government's failure to perform Federal Water Pollution Control Act (FWPCA) duties concerning mountaintop mining in West Virginia. The agreement purported to settle environmental groups' claims ...

Driscoll v. Adams

The court holds a landowner liable under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (FWPCA) for discharging polluted stormwater without a permit into a stream on his property that flows into ponds on his neighbors' property. The discharges occurred when the landowner was harvesting timber and developin...

Chlorine Chemistry Council v. EPA

The court holds that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) violated Safe Drinking Water Act §1412(b)(3)(A)'s statutory mandate to use the best available evidence when it implemented the chloroform maximum contaminant level goal (MCLG). During rulemaking for the chloroform MCLG, EPA ostensi...

Arizona v. California

The U.S. Supreme Court holds that a Native American tribe's and U.S. claims to additional water rights from the Colorado River are not precluded by a previous Court decision or by a 1983 consent decree entered into by the United States and the tribe. The tribe's and the government's present claims a...

Barstow, City of v. Mojave Water Agency

The court holds that a trial court erred in resolving water right priorities in an overdrafted basin with a "physical solution" that relies on the equitable apportionment doctrine but does not consider the affected owners' legal rights in the basin. Landowners who had overlying water rights in the M...

Chemical Waste Management, Inc. v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency: When Does a Waste Escape RCRA Subtitle C Regulation?

Congress enacted the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) in 1976, to regulate management of solid and hazardous waste. RCRA Subtitle C regulates hazardous waste management and Subtitle D governs nonhazardous, solid waste. In 1984, Congress passed the Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments (HSWA), significantly amending and expanding RCRA Subtitle C. HSWA added to RCRA the Land Disposal Restriction (LDR) Program, or land ban, which bars land disposal of hazardous wastes that fail to meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA or the Agency)-promulgated treatment standards.