The Ninth Circuit affirmed in part and vacated in part a district court's dismissal of a county's complaint in long-standing litigation over appropriation of water in the Walker River Basin. The county argued the public interest and maintenance of the public trust required that water flows reach Wal...
A district court denied a motion for preliminary injunction in a challenge to DOI's approval of a mine expansion in Montana. Conservation groups argued the Department's EIS failed to sufficiently consider the cumulative impacts of mining on local water resources, failed to consider a reasonable rang...
The D.C. Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part a lower court order vacating a Mineral Leasing Act easement issued by the Army Corps of Engineers for the Dakota Access Pipeline and directing the pipeline to be shut down. Native American tribes argued the Corps' issuance of the easement withou...
Salmon require cool temperatures to migrate and reproduce. The Clean Water Act (CWA) requires states to develop and implement water quality standards sufficient to produce fishable waters. Nearly a half-century after its 1972 enactment, the modern federal statute’s goal of fishable waters has yet to be achieved in the case of salmon streams.