The Alaska Supreme Court held that neither the Alaska Constitution nor the Alaska Land Act require the state's natural resources agency to issue a written best interest finding at each step of an oil and gas development project. The Act's best interest finding requirement is purely a creature of the...

A district court dismissed CWA claims brought by an environmental group seeking to compel an electric company to obtain NPDES permits for its facilities. The group alleged that activities conducted at the facilities and the materials stored there contaminate stormwater discharged from the sites. Whi...

The First Circuit held that a lower court erred in dismissing a landowner's CWA citizen suit for lack of proper pre-suit notice. The landowner filed suit against the neighboring property owner—an automobile salvage and recycling business—for discharging pollutants into U.S. waters without a vali...

The U.S. Supreme Court held that stormwater runoff from logging roads that is collected by and then discharged from a system of ditches, culverts, and channels is not a point source discharge for which an NPDES permit is required. An environmental group filed suit claiming that the Oregon forestry d...

A district court held that commercial fishing groups may go forward with their NEPA lawsuit against the Bureau of Reclamation in a case involving the Bureau's approval of eight water delivery contracts in California's Central Valley. The groups argued that the Bureau's EA failed to adequately consid...

The Tenth Circuit dismissed an appeal brought by energy companies arguing that §266(b)(1)(A) of the Mineral Leasing Act requires BLM to issue oil and gas leases within 60 days of payment. The energy companies were the highest bidders on 118 pending leases, and because more than 60 days had passed s...