The Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal of activists' lawsuit challenging the construction of a 20-mile, high-speed rail project in Honolulu, Hawaii. The activists claimed that DOT, the Federal Transit Administration, and the city violated NEPA and §4(f) of the Department of Transportation Act (DOT ...
A district court rejected a group of mid-Atlantic states' claims that projects undertaken by an energy company at three of its coal-fired power plants in Pennsylvania violated the CAA's prevention of significant deterioration and new source performance standards requirements. The states sought an in...
The Ninth Circuit refused to rehear a case in which it previously ruled that environmental groups lacked standing to compel the Washington State Department of Ecology and other regional agencies to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from the state's five oil refineries under the CAA. One of the judge...
The D.C. Circuit denied a road building association's petition for review challenging EPA's CAA §209(e) regulations, which preempt certain state regulation of nonroad engines. In general, §209(e) preemption reaches nationwide. California, however, may adopt certain otherwise preempted regulations ...
A district court held that the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) violated NEPA and the ESA in approving certain operations at a fish hatchery on Oregon's Sandy River. NMFS regulations provide an exemption for the otherwise unlawful take of anadromous fish caused by a hatchery's artificial pro...
The Ninth Circuit held that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management's (BOEM's) EIS analyzing the environmental effects of proposed oil and gas development leases in the Chukchi Sea of the northwest coast of Alaska violated NEPA. Although the EIS properly took account of incomplete or unavailable infor...
The D.C. Circuit vacated EPA's new source review (NSR) rule for Indian country, which established a federal implementation plan (FIP) covering all Indian country nationwide except where EPA had already approved a tribal NSR program or expressly authorized a SIP to be enforced. Because SIPs did not o...