The Seventh Circuit reversed a lower court decision finding a Wisconsin mine operator liable under the CWA for discharging copper into navigable waters without a permit. The CWA's permit shield provision provides that if a NPDES permit holder discharges pollutants in accordance with the terms of its...

The Third Circuit held that a PRP that entered into a consent decree resolving its state-law liability with the commonwealth of Pennsylvania in connection with contamination at an industrial facility may seek contribution under CERCLA from a second PRP. The court held that CERCLA §113(f)(3)(B) does...

The Second Circuit upheld a lower court's permanent injunction barring the state of Vermont from bringing an enforcement action, or taking other action, to compel the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant to shut down after its license expires on March 21, 2012, if it fails to obtain legislative approv...

The Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal of an environmental group's challenge to a CAA permit that allows an oil company to conduct "pollutant emitting activities" associated with a drilling vessel in the Beaufort Sea off Alaska's North Slope. CAA §504(e) is ambiguous as to whether "increment" requi...

The Third Circuit affirmed a lower court decision dismissing the U.S. government's lawsuit against the current and former owners of a coal-fired power plant in Indiana County, Pennsylvania, for alleged CAA violations that took place 15-20 years earlier. The government alleged that the former owners ...

The Third Circuit held that the CAA does not preempt state law tort claims brought by private property owners against a source of pollution located within the state. The case arose after a group of 1,500 residents who live within one mile of a coal-fired power plant filed suit against the facility u...

The D.C. Circuit denied petitions to downlist the straighthorned markhor, a subspecies of wild goat found in Pakistan, from endangered to threatened. The petitioners—safari clubs, hunters, and international conservationists—argued that FWS violated the ESA and APA by failing to issue a 12-month ...

A district court held that a nonprofit law firm may conduct limited discovery in connection with its FOIA request for records regarding any EPA rule or regulation for which public notice has not been made, but which was contemplated or under consideration for public notice, between January 1, 2012, ...

A district court dismissed groups' lawsuit challenging BLM's approval of a 370-megawatt utility-scale solar power plant currently under construction in the Mojave Desert. BLM's decision to consider cumulative impacts within a single EIS was not arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or other...

The D.C. Circuit remanded EPA's "maximum achievable control technology" (MACT) standards for sewage sludge incinerators under CAA §129. The court upheld EPA's authority to regulate sewage sludge incinerators under §129, deferring to the Agency's interpretation of "solid waste incineration unit" as...