Month: October 2009
Another Law Professor to Washington
We’ve just received word that Rob Verchick has been appointed the Deputy Associate Administrator for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Policy, Economics, and Innovation (OPEI). OEPI is the main policy arm of the EPA, responsible for supervising the rulemaking process and pushing innovative strategies, among other things. He will report to Associate …
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CONTINUE READING“It is not natural…
…for a man to write this well every day.” So commented the great literary critic Alfred Kazin on Henry David Thoreau’s Journal, which he kept quite regularly from his Harvard College graduation in 1837 to just a few months before his death. Kazin is right: the Journal is a real gem of American letters and …
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CONTINUE READINGSandra Day O’Connor: The Most Gullible Jurist in America
So now we hear from Sandra Day O’Connor that she is “disappointed” that the Roberts Court has “dismantled” several of her rulings: Asked how she felt about the fact that the current court had undone some of her rulings, the nation’s first woman justice responded, “What would you feel? I’d be a little bit disappointed. …
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CONTINUE READINGFederal Circuit rules for water contractors
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled in Stockton East Water Dist. v. U.S. that the federal government must pay damages to two California water districts for its failure to deliver water they were contractually promised. Plaintiff districts hold contracts for water delivery from the New Melones Reservoir, which is part of …
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CONTINUE READINGA student’s law school rankings for environmental law
In general, I’m a skeptic of rankings for schools. My view is that decisions about where to go should depend not just on the school but on the student and her or his individual goals and interests. There’s no way that a single ranking system can represent the best choices for everyone. So I’m all …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #6: Every Crisis is an Opportunity
This is the sixth in a series of short homilies about the lessons of climate change. It’s not clear who first observed that every crisis is an opportunity. Probably it’s in the Bible somewhere, if not the story of Gilgamesh. But a crisis, painful as it may be, does present opportunities for innovation. In the …
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CONTINUE READINGFeds re-engage on the Delta
Last week brought a lot of good California water news. Restoration of the San Joaquin River took a giant step forward, as the first flows were returned to the channel in accordance with a settlement agreement negotiated in 2006, ending years of litigation by NRDC. As Steve and I noted, removal of four dams on …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Change Lesson #5: Send Not to Ask For Whom the Bell Tolls
This is the fifth in a series of short homilies on the lessons of climate change. As far back as Sierra Club v. Morton, Justice Blackmun quoted John Dunne, but Dunne’s words seem equally apropos today, particularly for climate change: No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man is a peece of the …
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CONTINUE READINGNew EPA Greenhouse Gas Rulemaking Not Quite What it Seems
EPA is proposing to tailor the major source applicability thresholds for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) and title V programs of the Clean Air Act (CAA or Act) and to set a PSD significance level for GHG emissions. This proposal is necessary because EPA expects soon to promulgate regulations …
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