Methane, Exposed
Two new reports from the UCLA Emmett Institute reveal some of the largest methane sources in 2025.
One of the transformations in the climate policy world over the last few years has been the (rightful and helpful) rise in focus on methane pollution. For a long while, carbon dioxide was the attention-grabbing greenhouse gas, the one at which most policy initiatives were aimed. And CO2 remains critically important, of course. But folks have now realized that methane acts as the far more powerful driver of warming in the short- and mid-term, given its greater potency...
CONTINUE READINGBACA makes the ballot
Initiative to drastically change CEQA appears to have enough signatures to make ballot
It looks like the California Chamber of Commerce has enough signatures to put on the November ballot their initiative that would drastically change the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Given that, I’m re-upping the analyses I did earlier this year on the measure: Part 1 (overview), Part 2 (sweeping scope of the initiative in terms of laws affected), Part 3 (broad vested rights created by the initiative), Part 4 (approval changes that apply to all Californ...
CONTINUE READINGThe 2026 Election: Six Months to Go
Here’s what things look like now, but a lot could change.
Because of polarization, environmental policy is closely tied to political party. It's sad, since these should be non-partisan issues, but it's a reality. With that in mind, I’ve been providing election information for about the past ten years. I don’t claim any special expertise in political forecasting. My assessments are based on two respected politics websites, Cook and Sabato. Given all that’s happening, the situation will surely shift in the six months, bu...
CONTINUE READINGReturn to Plessy v. Ferguson?
Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash
DeFacto Discrimination at the Supreme Court
Time to say the quiet part out loud: Louisiana v. Callais is one of the most racist Supreme Court decisions since Plessy v. Ferguson. To borrow a concept from employment discrimination case law, Plessy is de jure discrimination, and Callais is de facto. In Plessy, the Supreme Court decided that separate schools and facilities were fine and dandy for blacks and whites because, despite overwhelming evidence (even in 1896) that facilities were not equal, the idea t...
CONTINUE READINGDoes Taking Oil Money Disqualify You from Being Governor?
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
The race to be California’s next governor has managed to be both wild and underwhelming, with a wide field of candidates who are competent but not exactly captivating. Exciting or not, voters are starting to tune in. If the environment and climate change rank among your top concerns, who should you vote for? My Legal Planet colleagues from UC Berkeley have an ongoing series examining the climate issues in the race and while we don’t do endorsements, I have s...
CONTINUE READINGNew Issue Brief: Community Engagement in Equity-Oriented EV Planning
Examining lessons from the Monterey Bay EV CAR Framework.
As federal support for the EV transition recedes, state and local planning processes are playing an increasingly central role in shaping equitable access to clean mobility infrastructure. Community engagement is a critical component of these efforts, yet relatively few case studies document how equity-oriented engagement processes work in practice. CLEE has released a new issue brief examining the engagement process behind a regional EV planning initiative led by the ...
CONTINUE READINGRoundup at the Supreme Court
Bayer and its allies in the Trump Administration got their day in court.
Today, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Monsanto v. Durnell. As discussed in a previous blog post, the broader context of the case is significant even though the question before the Court was a narrow one: “Whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act preempts a label-based failure-to-warn claim where EPA has not required the warning?” John Durnell used Roundup for more than twenty years (he was “the spray guy” for the local neighb...
CONTINUE READINGHow to Flip the Script for a Real Fossil Fuel Phaseout
The First International Conference on the Just Transition Away from Fossil Fuels should look to the Montreal Protocol for a model.
More than 50 governments are gathered in Colombia this week to design a roadmap to phase out oil, gas and coal. This aim, repeatedly proposed in UN climate conferences, has never seriously been pursued. Current fuel market shocks give it new urgency beyond climate change. The Santa Marta conference provides a promising platform to start work. And there is a model for how to pursue it, which offers sharp strategic lessons that have not been heeded: the phaseout of ozo...
CONTINUE READINGAn Encouraging Signal About Federal Preemption
A new Supreme Court ruling should help states defend their climate laws.
The Trump Administration and its allies are attacking state climate laws with challenges based on preemption, arguing that federal law trumps state powers. A new Supreme Court ruling signals that the Court respects state prerogatives and isn’t willing to find preemption without a clear basis in a federal statute. Although the facts of the case are remote from environmental law, the Court’s attitude toward preemption has broader relevance. The preemption claim in t...
CONTINUE READINGThe Story of California’s Advanced Clean Trucks Regulation
New CLEE report & webinar tells the story of this first-of-its-kind supply-side regulation for zero-emission trucks
California has been a global pioneer on electric vehicles, and that leadership extends to zero-emission trucks. To address the pollution and disproportionate impacts on disadvantaged communities, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) adopted the first-of-its-kind Advanced Clean Trucks (ACT) regulation in 2020. This landmark standard required truckmakers to begin selling zero-emission versions (such as battery electric or hydrogen fuel cell models) starting in 2024, w...
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