The Ninth Circuit affirmed vacatur of FWS' designation of an area in the northern Santa Rita Mountains as occupied critical habitat for jaguar. An environmental group initially sued FWS, challenging the Service's conclusion that a proposed copper mine project in the area would not destroy or adverse...
A district court adopted the recommendations of a magistrate judge and vacated portions of NMFS' 2019 biological opinion concerning the incidental take statement that authorized take of southern resident killer whales and chinook salmon resulting from commercial harvest of chinook salmon during trol...
A district court granted environmental groups' motion to preliminarily enjoin a logging project in the Kootenai National Forest. The groups argued the project violated the ESA by failing to adequately consider the impacts of unauthorized motorized access on grizzly bears in the project area. The cou...
A robust and growing commercial space sector is moving ahead at warp speed. While the industry today primarily offers satellite and launch services, tomorrow will bring manufacturing, research and development, resource extraction, and space tourism. What do these developments mean for the earth’s biosphere, as well as for the environments of other celestial bodies finally within humanity’s reach? This is the role of planetary protection, the principle of safeguarding both terrestrial and extraterrestrial environments from humanity’s propensity for introducing pollution into any habitat.
A district court granted in part and denied in part summary judgment for environmental groups in a lawsuit concerning FWS' management of grizzly bear recovery in the Bitterroot Ecosystem. The groups argued FWS violated NEPA and the APA by choosing not to implement grizzly bear recovery plans adopted...
A district court granted in part an environmental group's motion for summary judgment in a challenge to NMFS' 2021 permit authorizing the incidental taking of ESA-listed humpback whales in a sablefish fishery off the Pacific coast. The group argued NMFS violated the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMP...
A district court granted in part and denied in part FWS' motion to dismiss a challenge to the Service's failure to comply with deadlines for listing species as threatened or endangered and for designating critical habitats for them. An environmental group sought to compel FWS to make 12-month findin...
A district court denied the Army Corps of Engineers' motion to dismiss an ESA citizen suit alleging the Corps' operation of a dam in California was unlawfully taking protected salmon species. An individual argued the Corps violated the ESA by jeopardizing salmon populations with the dam's flood cont...
The Fifth Circuit reversed summary judgment for NOAA and NMFS in a challenge to the agencies' rule requiring charter boat owners to install NMFS-approved vessel monitoring systems (VMSs) to track the vessels' GPS locations. Charter boat captains argued the rule's tracking requirement exceeded the au...
The Oak Ridge Reservation is one of the largest U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) facilities in the country, with areas that are highly contaminated by chemicals, metals, and radionuclides. DOE is in the middle of a multi-decade, multi-billion-dollar cleanup there, and a recent Superfund decision for one portion of the site raises a number of significant legal issues. This Article addresses some related questions: Should radionuclides get less stringent cleanup than other equally harmful pollutants like mercury and polychlorinated biphenyls?