A district court held that a coal company discharged excessive amounts of selenium into the waters of West Virginia in violation of the CWA and SMCRA. The environmental group that filed suit against the company has standing, and it satisfied the statutes' 60-day notice requirements for citizen suits...
A Texas appellate court affirmed a lower court decision that commercial pecan growers suffered a regulatory taking when the Edwards Aquifer Authority—a water reclamation district—denied the growers' request for a water permit for one of their pecan orchards and granted a limited permit for a sec...
The Supreme Court of Washington upheld an administrative order the state environmental agency issued to a farmer, directing him to take several steps to curb pollution of a creek that runs through his property. A lower court invalidated the order, ruling that it was unsupported by substantial eviden...
The Seventh Circuit reversed a lower court decision finding a Wisconsin mine operator liable under the CWA for discharging copper into navigable waters without a permit. The CWA's permit shield provision provides that if a NPDES permit holder discharges pollutants in accordance with the terms of its...
A district court dismissed a landowner's lawsuit challenging the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' jurisdictional determination for property that contains peat. The Corps issued its jurisdictional determination after the landowner sought permission to mine peat from the property for use in the construct...
The Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision vacating the Nevada state engineer's approval of the state wildlife agency's application to transfer water rights from agricultural land in the Newlands Reclamation Project to the Carson Lake and Pasture, a wetlands-containing wildlife refuge, in ord...
A California court held that the California Department of Public Health must adopt a final primary drinking water standard for hexavalent chromium. The state legislature commanded the department to adopt a standard by January 1, 2004; the department is therefore in ongoing violation of its ministeri...
A district court dismissed a homebuilder association's lawsuit against EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers challenging their determination that portions of the Santa Cruz River are traditional navigable waters (TNW) under the CWA. The association lacks standing because it failed to allege a spe...
A district court held that a mining company is liable under the CWA for the unpermitted discharge of selenium at one its surface mines. The company did not dispute that it has been discharging selenium from the mine, nor did it contest the fact that its permit contains no explicit authorization to d...
A district court upheld DOI's approval of oil spill response plans an oil company submitted for drilling operations in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. Despite environmental groups' arguments to the contrary, an environmental review was not required under NEPA since the approvals do not constitute a m...