The court holds that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA) preempts failure to warn claims brought by the purchasers of a container of chlorine tablets, but that FIFRA does not preempt their defective packaging and product design claims. The court first holds that the purch...
The court holds that shipping companies have a Fifth Amendment property interest in their single-hulled oil tankers. The companies brought suit against the United States alleging that their single-hulled tankers were effectively taken by the Oil Pollution Act requirement that all single-hulled vesse...
The court holds that plaintiffs in a toxic tort case produced sufficient evidence to show that a piece of furniture emitted levels of gaseous formaldehyde known to cause the type of injuries suffered by the plaintiffs' child. The court first holds that the plaintiffs produced substantial evidence of...
The court holds that material questions of fact preclude finding a timber company immune from Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) liability for the past and future cleanup costs of a chemical storage site allegedly contaminated, in part, by releases from th...
Over the past several years, considerable public and private efforts in this country have been directed at reducing the risk of cancer that human exposure to high levels of radon gas poses. These efforts appear to have succeeded in raising public awareness of radon and in increasing testing for radon. For the most part, however, these efforts have been directed toward homeowners and have not addressed the problem of radon in residential rental properties. Yet, in 1989, nearly 34 million homes—over one-third of all housing units in the country—were rental units.
Editors' Summary: It has become regular practice for federal legislators to insert into annual appropriations bills riders having little to do with the appropriations process. Last year, under the sponsorship of the Senate Majority and Minority Leaders, a bill that would have exempted recyclers from CERCLA "arranger" and "transporter" liability was almost enacted as a rider to the omnibus appropriations bill for fiscal year 1999. This Dialogue examines that rider and the changes it would have wrought to CERCLA.
Editors' Summary: One of the most important legal tools in the effort to remediate the nation's contaminated sites is state law that applies to such cleanups. In 1989, the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) conducted a study of this law, and last year, it completed its most recent update of that study. In this Article, two ELI Senior Attorneys discuss the results of that update as it concerns two key aspects of site remediation—voluntary and brownfield cleanup programs.
A more substantive precautionary principle of international law is evolving as new treaties articulate new measures of precaution in different contexts. Although there is considerable controversy over how to articulate or define a precautionary "principle" of law, the goal is to ensure that the mere lack of scientific knowledge about risks cannot justify a failure to take appropriate precautions. Where we have sufficient evidence of risk, we often take precautions, despite a lack of certainty about those risks.
The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), the Clean Water Act (CWA), and the Clean Air Act (CAA) represent federal regulatory regimes for protecting the environment. Although each statute initially places administrative responsibility in the hands of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), each encourages states, to varying degrees, to take primary responsibility for implementing the statutory regime.
In Environmental Federalism Part 1: The History of Overfiling Under RCRA, the CWA, and the CAA Prior to Harmon, Smithfield, and CLEAN, the history of judicial and administrative decisions relating to overfiling under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), the Clean Water Act (CWA), and the Clean Air Act (CAA) was analyzed. The history showed that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), with limited exceptions, generally was understood to have overfiling authority under RCRA, the CWA, and the CAA. The limited exceptions focused on two situations.