A California court upheld the California Air Resource Board's (CARB's) authority to sell greenhouse gas allowances at auction under the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, also known as Assembly Bill 32 (AB 32). As in its tentative decision issued last August, the court ruled that the a...

A California appellate court reversed a lower court decision dismissing a clean energy group's petition challenging a city's certification and approval of an environmental impact report (EIR) prepared for a proposed update to the city's general plan. The group argued that the approved final EIR fell...

The D.C. Circuit dismissed as moot truck engine manufacturers' lawsuit challenging four certificates of conformity EPA issued to another engine manufacturer pursuant to an interim final rule that allowed certificates to be issued to 2012 and 2013 model-year engines even if the engines fail to confor...

A district court denied industry groups' motion to intervene in a CAA citizen suit concerning EPA's alleged failure to review the ozone NAAQS in a timely manner. The underlying lawsuit concerns whether EPA has failed to perform a mandatory duty to review the ozone air quality standards, and whether ...

A California appellate court held that California's Commission on State Mandates erred in ruling that certain requirements set forth in a municipal stormwater sewer permit for Los Angeles County constituted unfunded state mandates subject to reimbursement under the state constitution. Although the p...

A Wisconsin court held that the state environmental agency should have considered impacts on downstream water quality when it issued a state pollutant discharge elimination system permit to an industrial dairy processing plant. An environmental group challenged the permit, arguing that it would allo...

The Supreme Court of Kansas reversed and remanded the Kansas Department of Health and Environment's decision to issue a prevention of significant deterioration (PSD) permit to a power company to construct an 895-megawatt coal-fired power plant. An environmental group filed suit against the state age...

The Eighth Circuit vacated and remanded EPA's best available retrofit technology (BART) determination for a large power plant in North Dakota, but otherwise upheld EPA's partial disapproval of two SIPs submitted by North Dakota to meet the CAA's visibility requirements as well as the Agency's federa...

The Eleventh Circuit reversed a lower court decision excluding the testimony of two expert witnesses in the government's case against a power company for making major modifications at three of its coal-fired power plants without obtaining a permit or installing modern pollution control devices. The ...

The Ninth Circuit held that the California Air Resource Board (CARB) low carbon fuel standard's regulation of ethanol does not facially discriminate against out-of-state commerce. CARB treats all ethanol within each regional category the same, and its decision to draw one of the regional categories ...