On 14 September 2023, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced the release of the final Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 401 Water Quality Certification Improvement Rule (the Rule). The Rule restores regulatory...more
Responding to the US Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Sackett v. EPA, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the US Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) published a final rule (Sackett Rule), effective 8 September...more
The White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) issued a proposed rulemaking on 31 July 2023 to implement Congress’s updates to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) recently enacted in the Fiscal Responsibility...more
It is rare for the U.S. Supreme Court to construe a statutory phrase on multiple occasions. And yet now, for purposes of the federal Clean Water Act (CWA or the Act), it has rendered no less than four interpretations of the...more
The compromise reached in the Fiscal Responsibility Act increases the U.S. debt ceiling in exchange for discretionary spending limits and reform to several existing legislative schemes, including National Environmental Policy...more
On 11 May 2023, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced new standards for carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from new and existing power plants (the Proposed Rule). EPA projects that the rule, if finalized, would...more
On 30 December 2022, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the Corps) (together, the Agencies) released a final rule redefining the scope of waters protected under the Clean Water Act...more
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), on 29 September, released a significant rulemaking proposal that seeks to ease the permitting process to authorize incidental take of bald and golden eagles. If finalized, USFWS’s...more
On 30 June 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, limiting the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) power to regulate carbon emissions from power plants...more
On 9 June 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published in the federal register a proposed rule regarding the Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 401 water quality certification process (the Proposed Rule), undoing...more
On Wednesday, 20 April, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) finalized its first of two phases of rulemaking updates to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations (the 2022 Rule). The 2022 Rule unwinds a...more
The U.S. offshore wind market has surged in growth over the last few years, bolstered by the U.S government’s commitment in 2021 to increase offshore wind lease capacity as well as the Biden Administration’s declaration that...more
4/26/2022
/ Asset Management ,
Biden Administration ,
BOEM ,
Energy Policy ,
Energy Projects ,
Energy Sector ,
FERC ,
Offshore Wind ,
Project Finance ,
Regulatory Requirements ,
Renewable Energy ,
Wind Farm ,
Wind Power
On 23 March 2022, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (the Service) issued a proposed rule (Proposed Rule) to reclassify the northern long-eared bat from a threatened species to an endangered species under the Endangered...more
The regulations that implement the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) are crucially important for the development of major energy and infrastructure projects in the United States. For example, the NEPA regulations will...more
On 18 November 2021, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the "Corps") (together, the Agencies) released the pre-publication version of the proposed rule redefining the scope of...more
On 29 September 2021, the U.S. Department of Interior (Interior) announced a series of actions to unwind a Trump-era rule in an effort to “to ensure that the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) conserves birds today and into the...more
On 30 August 2021, Judge Rosemary Márquez, a federal district judge in the District of Arizona, ordered the remand and vacatur of the Trump administration’s Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR) defining “waters of the...more
On 14 January 2021, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a guidance memorandum on the application of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 23 April 2020 decision in County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund (Maui)....more
2/2/2021
/ 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 ,
SCOTUS ,
Waters of the United States
The Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) is hosting an informal meeting on January 28, 2021 to discuss implementing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) new total maximum daily load (TMDL) for...more
Building Relationships with Tribes and Operating on Reservation Lands: Lessons From FMC v. Shoshone - On 11 January 2021, the United States Supreme Court declined a petition to review the Ninth Circuit’s decision in FMC...more
INTRODUCTION - On 15 July 2020, the Trump administration—through the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ)—released its long-anticipated overhaul to the regulations that implement the National Environmental Policy Act’s...more
On July 9, 2020, the United States Supreme Court held in McGirt v. Oklahoma that, for purposes of the Major Crimes Act (MCA), land in eastern Oklahoma reserved for the Creek Nation pursuant to a treaty ratified by Congress...more
7/21/2020
/ Criminal Convictions ,
Disestablishment ,
Federal Jurisdiction ,
Federal v State Law Application ,
Fee Simple ,
Land Titles ,
Major Crimes Act ,
McGirt v Oklahoma ,
Native American Issues ,
Reversal ,
SCOTUS ,
Treaties ,
Tribal Lands
The Washington State Department of Ecology (Ecology) recently released “preliminary draft rules” that would grant variances to the Clean Water Act (CWA) Water Quality Standard (WQS) for PCBs at three public and two private...more
The Trump administration issued two executive orders (EOs) in the past month seeking to encourage economic development through regulatory reform and relief as the United States navigates the reopening of business and...more
On 1 June 2020, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its much anticipated “Clean Water Act Section 401 Certification Rule” the (401 Certification Rule or Final Rule) revising and clarifying the water...more