In Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. USFDA, U.S. District Judge Matthew J. Kasmaryck stayed the FDA approval of the abortion drug Mifepristone, disregarding the FDA's medical and scientific judgment to approve the drug 23...more
As distinguished from the previous administration's oft-announced but never followed through on "Infrastructure Weeks," it appears that President Biden and Congress are intent on getting something done, and multi-faceted,...more
Expect big expansion in the use of clean hydrogen energy—that has been a periodic mantra in the climate change press for years. While commercial scale development continues to face serious technical and cost barriers, there...more
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has just finalized its rule reissuing and modifying a dozen existing Nationwide Permits (NWPs), issuing four new NWPs, and revising the general conditions and definitions applying to these...more
Those of a certain age will remember this plaintive, kumbaya-seeking line from John Lennon's Vietnam War protest song. Naïve, perhaps, but an Uncommon Dialogue process initiated through Stanford's Woods Institute for the...more
On July 15, 2020, President Trump announced a "top to bottom overhaul" of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations, deriding what he characterized as the "mountains and mountains of bureaucratic red tape in...more
A federal judge in California declined to enjoin implementation of the rule, holding that in view of ambiguous Supreme Court guidance, the government is free to reinterpret WOTUS. The opposite conclusion was reached by a...more
On June 1, 2020, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its new rules implementing section 401 of the Clean Water Act (CWA). Section 401 provides that before a federal agency can approve a project that may result...more
On May 15, 2020, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) submitted a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in which it objected to EPA's draft water quality discharge permits (NPDES permits)...more
In a 6-3 opinion, the U. S. Supreme Court decided one of the more closely followed environmental disputes of recent years. In County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund, the Court considered whether injecting municipal sewage...more
4/24/2020
/ Appeals ,
Clean Water Act ,
Direct Discharge ,
Discharge of Pollutants ,
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ,
Functional Equivalent ,
Groundwater ,
Hawaii Wildlife Fund v County of Maui ,
Navigable Waters ,
Permits ,
Point Sources ,
Remand ,
SCOTUS ,
Vacated ,
Waters of the United States
Among the barrage of news reports related to state and federal responses to COVID-19, less discussed is the suspension of some environmental compliance obligations for regulated entities affected by the crisis....more
The EPA yesterday announced that the Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule, jointly proposed by EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers in June 2019, is now final. ...more
In an extraordinary opinion issued January 17, the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals concluded that the redress sought by the Juliana v. United States plaintiffs is beyond the power of federal courts. ...more
On December 9, the Supreme Court denied certiorari to review the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in Hoopa Valley Tribe v. FERC. As reported in this space, in January the D.C. Circuit roundly rejected the common practice...more
On August 12, 2019, the Trump Administration adopted three new rules in an attempt to rein in the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The rules would eliminate regulations in place since 1978 affording protections for "threatened"...more
What is the jurisdictional reach of the Clean Water Act? The Act applies to “navigable waters”, which are defined as the “waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.”...more
As part of the Administration’s policy in favor of domestic oil and gas development, on April 10 President Trump issued an Executive Order “Promoting Energy Infrastructure and Economic Growth.” ...more
In western states that have legalized cannabis over the last few years, water agencies have seen a sharp increase of permit applications to secure water rights. Cannabis is an agricultural crop and, of course, it needs water...more
On January 25, 2019, the U. S. Court of Appeals for the D. C. Circuit rendered a highly significant opinion with respect to state water quality certification under section 401 of the Clean Water Act (CWA). ...more
On October 19, President Trump issued a “Memorandum Promoting the Reliable Supply and Delivery of Water in the West.” The memorandum calls for streamlining federal water infrastructure development and operations, apparently...more
In Environmental Law Foundation v. State Water Resources Control Board, the California Court of Appeal for the Third District on August 29, 2018 affirmed a district court’s application of the Public Trust Doctrine to the...more
On August 16, a federal judge in South Carolina invalidated the Trump Administration’s suspension of the rule defining “waters of the United States” (WOTUS), under the Clean Water Act....more
In a tweet released August 6, President Trump offered his analysis of how to combat the ongoing human and ecological tragedy of one worst fire seasons of record.
The president then directed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross...more
Last Friday, the D.C. Circuit torpedoed a hydroelectric license issued in 2013 to Alabama Power Company because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) “declined to...more
On June 11, the Supreme Court issued a one-sentence order affirming the Ninth Circuit’s 2016 judgment in United States v. State of Washington. In that case, the federal government sued Washington on behalf of several Indian...more