The Ninth Circuit denied EPA's request for an additional six months to take final action on its proposal to ban the pesticide chlorpyrifos in response to an administrative petition filed nearly nine years ago. EPA claimed that "extraordinary circumstances" warranted the extension because it needed a...
A district court held that an insurer has no duty to defend or indemnify a company in two underlying actions seeking contribution for past and future costs incurred at a PCB-contaminated site. The company had sent transformers to the site for repair, during which PCBs were released. The company was ...
A district court granted an oil company's motion to dismiss claims filed against it for economic losses stemming from the government's moratorium on offshore drilling in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The oil company is a responsible party under OPA, and the plaintiffs—oilfield s...
The Ninth Circuit, in an unpublished opinion, held that environmental groups have standing to bring a RCRA citizen suit against the U.S. Forest Service for failing to regulate the disposal of spent lead ammunition in the Kaibab National Forest. The groups allege that the Forest Service's failure to ...
A district court held that an individual may go forward with her toxic tort claims against the successor to a manufacturing company that released trichloroethylene (TCE) into the environment near her childhood home. The plaintiff alleges she was exposed to the TCE, which caused her to develop severa...
A district court granted in part motions to dismiss an oil company's OPA, Pipeline Safety Act, and Maryland state-law claims against the alleged owners and operators of an underground pipeline in southeast Baltimore. The company filed suit to recover damages it incurred due to a pipeline leak. All o...
The Supreme Court of New Hampshire upheld a $236 million jury award against an oil company for groundwater contamination. In 2003, New Hampshire sued several gasoline suppliers, refiners, and chemical manufacturers seeking damages for groundwater contamination allegedly caused by methyl tertiary but...
A district court denied in part motions to dismiss as time barred Puerto Rico's lawsuit against various oil companies for methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) groundwater contamination. Under Puerto Rico law, once the defendant has established that the injury occurred more than one year prior to the f...
The Ninth Circuit vacated and remanded EPA's unconditional registration of insecticides containing sulfoxaflor, ordering the Agency to obtain further studies and data regarding the effect of sulfoxaflor on bees, as required by EPA regulations. FIFRA prohibits the use or sale of pesticides that lack ...
The Fifth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision that investors who bought BP stock soon after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill may file a class action against the oil company for alleged misrepresentations regarding the oil flow rate after the spill, but that investors who purchased stock befo...