A district court dismissed claims that the workplace safety exposure levels—or threshold limit values—for silica, copper, n-propyl bromide, and diesel particulate matter are adopted by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) and enforced by the U.S. Department of La...
The California Supreme Court reversed a lower court decision finding that the programmatic environmental impact statement (EIS) and environmental impact report (EIR) for the CALFED Program—a long-term comprehensive plan designed by a consortium of 18 state and federal agencies (CALFED) to restore ...
A Texas appellate court upheld a state railroad commission order requiring a company to obtain a permit to receive and store oilfield waste consisting primarily of oil-based drill cuttings—bits of rock and soil that are byproducts of the drilling process—that it would then recycle into road base...
The court holds in a Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) §113 contribution action that plaintiff, the successor-owner/operator of a battery breaking facility, is liable for 75 percent of the cleanup costs and that defendant-battery suppliers are liable for...
The court holds that a county's action to quiet title to real property used by the United States as a wildlife management area on Matagorda Island in Texas is time barred. The federal government condemned a portion of Matagorda Island for use as a bombing and gunnery range, and in 1982 the U.S. Fish...
The court holds that a corporation's contingent claims for environmental cleanup costs associated with real property it purchased from a potentially responsible party (PRP) that filed for bankruptcy are claims for reimbursement and contribution and, therefore, may be disallowed if the bankruptcy cou...
The court holds that a band of Native Americans has the right to moor commercial fishing vessels at two municipally owned marinas on Lake Michigan. The court first holds that treaties signed in 1836 and 1855 provided for an easement of access to reach traditional fishing grounds, which includes the ...
Editors' Summary: This Article addresses the effect of the U.S. Constitution's Takings Clause on the government's authority to protect environmental resources. An earlier Article, published in the May 1994 of ELR, analyzed bases for government regulation provided by limitations inherent in the property right itself. In contrast, this Article focuses on an emerging doctrine of sustainable use, rooted in background principles of nuisance law and the government's complementary police power.
Editors' Summary: Environmental regulation has come under increasing attack from those who argue that governmental limitations on property use violate constitutional restrictions on regulatory takings of property. The author addresses this controversy by focusing on the background limitations on owners' rights that are inherent in property law itself, as opposed to the external controls that government may impose under the doctrines of police power and nuisance.
Is an intentional temporary deprivation of the use of land not a "temporary taking"? This proposition was asserted by a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Tahoe-Sierra Preservation Council, Inc. v. Tahoe Regional Planning Agency. The Ninth Circuit denied en banc review, despite a strong dissent by Judge Alex Kozinski. Perhaps because it had never explicated the meaning of "temporary taking," and perhaps in part because its interest was kindled by the Kozinski dissent, the U.S. Supreme Court recently granted certiorari. The question is limited to: