The Eighth Circuit held that costs a developer incurred to reduce pollution on a property it owns in Brainerd, Minnesota, that had formerly been owned by a railway company were not removal costs and thus not recoverable under the Minnesota Environmental Response and Liability Act (MERLA). Although n...

The Fifth Circuit upheld an EPA rule partially approving and partially disapproving revisions to Texas' SIP concerning civil penalties for excess emissions resulting from startup, shutdown, and malfunction (SSM) activities. Environmental petitioners sought review of EPA's decision to approve a revis...

The Ninth Circuit held that the U.S. Forest Service's EIS for a forest thinning research project in the Pringle Falls Experimental Forest within the Deschutes National Forest complies with NEPA. The project allows logging and controlled burning on roughly 2,500 acres of the Forest to reduce the risk...

The First Circuit denied a petition challenging an EPA NPDES permit setting forth discharge limits for nitrogen, phosphorous, and aluminum for a large sewage treatment plant along the Blackstone River in Massachusetts. A water district that operates the treatment plant argued that EPA should have wa...