In County of Butte v. Dep’t of Wat. Resources (2022) 13 Cal.5th 612, issued on August 1, 2022, the California Supreme Court carved out a role for the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) even where the project is...more
On July 14, 2021, the City and County of Denver, Colorado, acting through its Board of Water Commissioners (“Denver Water”), filed a Complaint in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, requesting...more
On December 11, 2019, the California Supreme Court granted review of the Third District’s decision in County of Butte v. Department of Water Resources, dismissing a CEQA challenge to DWR’s relicensing application to the...more
Welcome to CEQA News You Can Use, a quarterly production of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, LLP’s Natural Resources lawyers. This publication provides quick, useful bites of CEQA news, which we hope can be a resource to your...more
In 2018, the New Hampshire legislature enacted a law requiring electric distribution companies in the state to offer to purchase the net output of eligible biomass and waste facilities within their service territories at a...more
Update: On April 15, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court denied, without decision, two petitions for writs of certiorari that were filed by one of the nation’s leading trade associations representing independent power producers....more
In two related cases, Petitioners are asking the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down state generator subsidies that Petitioners argue distort competitive wholesale power markets that are under the exclusive jurisdiction of the...more
On September 27, 2018, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (Second Circuit) affirmed a district court’s finding that New York’s Zero Emissions Credit (ZEC) program is not preempted by federal law. The Second...more
On September 27, 2018, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals issued its decision in Coalition for Competitive Electricity v. Zibelman, 2nd Cir. No. 17-2654, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 27605 (Sep. 27, 2018). ...more
Following up on our recent blog post regarding the Seventh Circuit’s decision to uphold Illinois’ nuclear subsidy program, two weeks later on September 27, 2018, the Second Circuit upheld a district court’s decision finding...more
In a surprisingly terse opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (Seventh Circuit) recently affirmed a district court’s finding that Illinois’ Zero Emissions Credit (ZEC) program is not preempted by federal...more
On September 13, 2018, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals issued its long-awaited decision in the consolidated cases of Elec. Power Supply Assn. v. Anthony M. Star, 7th Cir. Nos. 17-2433, 17-2445, 2018 U.S. App. LEXIS 25980...more
On July 14, 2017, and July 25, 2017, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, respectively, dismissed challenges to the Illinois and New...more
For the third time in the past month, a federal court has upheld a state program to pursue support for clean energy, including renewable energy certificates (RECs), and zero emission credits (ZECs) in New York and Illinois....more
On Feb. 12, 2017, the Butte County, California, sheriff ordered the evacuation of more than 180,000 people in the communities surrounding California’s Oroville Dam after officials spotted severe erosion in the dam’s emergency...more
On August 23, 2016, two Maryland electric cooperatives filed a Petition for Declaratory Order asking the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to find that the Maryland Public Service Commission’s (MPSC) recently...more
This Advisory briefly reports on some of the significant U.S. Supreme Court actions from January through June 2016 related to environmental and administrative law. ...more
On June 24, 2016, two complaints were filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“Commission or FERC”) that highlight the continued tension between state policy initiatives and the mandatory centralized capacity...more
If you needed any further proof that energy law is very complicated, Wednesday’s decision in North Dakota v. Heydinger should convince you. The judgment is simple – the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a Minnesota...more
One of the most important issues currently facing the power industry is the potential conflict between federal and state roles in power supply planning. Two recent developments at the federal level bear directly on this...more
On April 19, 2016, for the second time in three months, the Supreme Court of the United States reaffirmed the exclusive jurisdiction of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) over the formation of wholesale rates in...more
In recent years, Maryland attempted to subsidize new power plants by guaranteeing prices for generating capacity at wholesale auctions administered by PJM Interconnection L.L.C. (PJM). Tuesday, the Supreme Court unanimously...more
The Supreme Court of the United States issued decisions in two cases on April 19, 2016: Hughes v. Talen Energy Marketing, LLC, No. 14-614: Congress, though the Federal Power Act (“FPA”), 16 U.S.C. §791a et seq., vested...more
With its decision on Tuesday, April 20 in Hughes v. Talen Energy Marketing, the Supreme Court issued its second significant holding of the year on the reach of federal authority over interstate wholesale sales markets. The...more
The U.S. Supreme Court, in a narrowly crafted opinion by Justice Ginsburg, has unanimously invalidated Maryland's program to promote construction of new natural gas capacity by guaranteeing new generating capacity. The...more