West Virginia's highest court held that individuals' lawsuit against a power company for injuries they allegedly incurred due to their exposure to coal combustion waste may go forward in the West Virginia courts even though the vast majority of plaintiffs live outside the state. Of the 77 named plai...

The Eleventh Circuit held that a developer is entitled to a charitable deduction on its 2006 tax return for granting a conservation easement on an 82-acre parcel of property that contained a bald eagle nest. The developer valued the parcel at $25.2 million on the assumption that the property's highe...

A district court held that New York may seek response costs and natural resource damages under CERCLA in connection with a contaminated industrial site in Long Island, a portion of which was listed on the NPL in 2011. The state's past response actions at the site were consistent with the national co...

A district court dismissed a company's declaratory judgment action concerning its liability for cleanup costs that EPA incurred at the Hudson Oil Refinery Superfund site in Cushing, Oklahoma. The company owned and operated the site from 1943 to 1977, when it sold the refinery to the current owner. I...

A district court held that the owner of a contaminated property that was once the site of a paper mill may not seek response costs from a company that had purchased the assets of the prior owner of the mill. The owner argued that the company was liable under CERCLA under a de facto merger theory of ...

A district court dismissed a city's RCRA action against two power and gas companies concerning a methane gas leak from natural gas pipelines and waste oil contamination from a former manufacturing gas plant. Because methane gas does not meet the definition of "solid waste" under RCRA, the city canno...

The Washington Supreme Court held that a local initiative to create a "Community Bill of Rights" which, among other things, would give the Spokane River its own water rights, including the rights to sustainable recharge, sufficient flows to support native fish, and clean water, may not be placed on ...

A district court held that a 2014 settlement agreement between a spinoff company, the U.S. government, an energy company, and its parent bars over 4,300 individuals from bringing Pennsylvania tort claims arising from the operation of a wood treatment plant formerly owned and operated by the spinoff'...

The Supreme Court of Alabama reversed and remanded a lower court decision dismissing a coastal property owner's lawsuit against an oil company for alleged trespassing and property damage stemming from the company's response actions following the Deepwater Horizon disaster in 2010. After the spill, h...