A Maryland appellate court held that under certain circumstances, Maryland law permits recovery for emotional distress related to reasonable fear of cancer. The case involved a jury verdict awarding compensatory damages totaling over $147 million to hundreds of plaintiffs who claimed that an oil...

The Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision dismissing a conservation group's claims that the State Department violated its NEPA and ESA obligations in conducting annual certifications of countries exempted from the general ban on shrimp imports. Section 609(b) of Public Law No. 101-162 prohib...

A New York court upheld a town's zoning amendment that bans hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracking) within its jurisdiction. The zoning amendment was enacted in response to a petition from town residents concerned about hydrofracking's impact on ground and surface water supplies. An energy company ...

The U.S. Supreme Court reversed a state court decision that Montana may charge rent from an electric company that owns dams on the Missouri, Madison, and Clark Fork rivers. The Montana Supreme Court held that title to the riverbeds passed to Montana when it became a state in 1889 and awarded alm...

A district court upheld the FWS' "warranted-but-precluded" finding for the sage-grouse under the ESA. An environmental group challenged the “precluded” portion of the “warranted-but-precluded” decision, focusing on a key finding by the Director of the FWS that the threats to the sage-grouse ...

A district court granted an environmental group's motion for reconsideration and overturned its previous decision upholding the DOI's "Counterpart ESA §7 Consultation Regulations" for National Fire Plan (NFP) projects. The government's rationale for proposing the rule in the first instance was ...