A district court dismissed an animal rights group's lawsuit seeking to compel USDA to enforce the general Animal Welfare Act (AWA) regulations with respect to the mistreatment of birds and to promulgate new AWA regulations that are specific to birds. Although the group successfully demonstrated orga...
Pennsylvania's highest court struck down Act 13, which pertains to oil and gas operations in the Marcellus Shale, as unconstitutional. The Act repealed Pennsylvania’s Oil and Gas Act and replaced it with a codified statutory framework regulating oil and gas operations in the Commonwealth. Among ot...
The Second Circuit held that it lacks jurisdiction to review an electric company's suit challenging the constitutionality of Vermont's Electrical Energy Generating Tax. The company owns a nuclear power plant that is the sole entity taxed under the scheme, which imposes a charge on electricity produc...
A district court held that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has until August 1, 2014, to revise its plan for protecting whales, dolphins, porpoises, seals, and sea lions from U.S. Navy warfare training exercises along the coasts of California, Oregon, and Washington. The court previously...
The D.C. Circuit vacated a FERC decision allowing a power company to use a regional transmission organization's (RTO's) transmission lines in order to join another RTO network. The two RTOs involved in this case had entered a joint operating agreement that allowed both RTOs to use the other's transm...