The court vacated a lower court order denying environmental groups' motion for attorneys fees in an underlying case challenging a surface mining operation permit. In that case, the groups sought, and eventually obtained, a writ of mandamus setting aside the permit. Pursuant to California Code of Civ...

The court affirmed the dismissal of a home builder association's claims that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) violated the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) in its promulgation of survey protocols to detect the endangered quino checkerspot butterfly in s...

The court upholds a district court decision that the U.S. Navy's environmental impact statement (EIS) for the construction of an aircraft landing field in North Carolina was deficient under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), but it vacates the court's injunction of the project as overly b...

The court holds that National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminstration (NOAA) Fisheries erred when it denied a fishing vessel's application for an Aleutian Islands brown king crab endorsement under the license limitation program for the Bearing Sea and Aleutian Islands groundfish and crab fisheries. Th...

The court dismisses as moot an animal advocacy group's claims against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) for denying their petition to list the trumpeter swan in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming as endangered or threatened and for authorizing the limited take of the swans during the 2001 and 2002 h...

A court dismisses an environmental group's Endangered Species Act (ESA) and National Environmental Policy Act claims against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries concerning logging activity on private lands in Humboldt County, California, a...

The court holds that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers complied with the National Environmental Policy Act in connection with its plan to preserve an aquifer in the Grand Prairie Region in East Central Arkansas, a major rice producing area. The plan includes the construction of a system that would pu...

The court upholds the U.S. Forest Service's decision allowing the salvage of dead and/or dying trees on up to 250 acres to proceed without the preparation of an environmental impact statement or environmental assessment. The methodology the Forest Service used in promulgating the categorical exclusi...

The court upholds the dismissal of Wyoming's constitutional, Adminstrative Procedure Act (APA), Endangered Species Act, and National Environmental Policy Act claims against the U.S. Department of the Interior for failing to initiate delisting of the gray wolf as an endangered species and for its all...

The court rejects a mining association's statutory and constitutional claims challenging a 1999 Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) rule defining "valid existing rights." The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act prohibits new surface coal mining operations on certain lan...