Save the Scenic Santa Ritas v. Darwin
An Arizona court overturned the state's issuance of an air permit for a proposed open-pit copper mine. An environmental group argued that the state's approval of the permit was arbitrary and capricious because the mine has the potential to violate NAAQS. They also claimed that the mine's modeling re...
Natural Resources Defense Council v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
The Ninth Circuit denied an environmental group's petition challenging EPA's approval of a revision to California's SIP. The revision provided alternative "not less stringent" controls to what is required in CAA §185's antibacksliding measures, which require that major stationary sources of polluti...
Berkeley Hillside Preservation v. City of Berkeley
The California Supreme Court reversed a lower court decision that a developer's proposal to demolish an existing home and build a 10,000 square-foot single-family home on the lot may not be categorically exempt from environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). After th...
California Dump Truck Owners Ass'n v. Nichols
The Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal of a trucking association's federal preemption challenge to a California environmental regulation on diesel trucks. The regulation requires heavy-duty diesel trucks, whose emissions contribute significantly to particulate matter and ozone pollution, to be upgra...
Western Watersheds Project v. United States Bureau of Land Management
A district court held that BLM failed to adequately explain and support its decision to allow grazing on Sonoran Desert National Monument lands north of Interstate Highway 8 in violation of NEPA. Specifically, the court ruled that BLM's land health evaluation—an essential step in the process of de...