California
California Takes a Stab at Climate and Energy Costs
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
It’s remarkable that with everything else that’s raging, climate and energy bills still managed to dominate the legislative session that just wrapped in Sacramento. After all, the reason lawmakers were still at work this past Saturday — the day after the legislative session was supposed to end — was that negotiations on climate bills pushed …
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CONTINUE READINGCalifornia Must Invest in Climate and Communities to Drive Climate Progress
The state has pioneered an approach—what’s worked, and what’s next?
As solar and other climate infrastructure construction accelerates, and with Californians concerned both about the cost of living and about seeing local opportunities result from climate projects, the conversation about community benefits (commitments to hiring and other local investments made by developers in connection with new projects) has grown increasingly animated in California and even …
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CONTINUE READINGYoung Climate Plaintiffs Won Big in Montana. Can They Again?
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
One of the biggest climate victories to date belongs to 19-year-old Eva Lighthiser and the other Montana youth climate plaintiffs who won their landmark case against state officials and saw it upheld in the state Supreme Court. Now, some of those same young people — Lighthiser included — are headed back to court next week …
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CONTINUE READINGTrump’s War on Wind is Dumb. It also Makes Sense.
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
The Trump administration’s attack on wind energy feels dumber and dumber every day. Let’s see if we can make it make some sense. After that, the major headlines of the week. Last Friday, his Transportation Department withdrew $679 million for offshore wind projects at 12 ports. Last month, the administration sent a stop-work order to …
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CONTINUE READINGStates Should Not Wait to “Make Polluters Pay”
Guest contributors Laura Fox and Doug Kysar write that now is the right time for more states to adopt climate accountability laws, despite ongoing legal challenges.
As states weigh whether to adopt climate accountability legislation like Vermont’s Climate Superfund Act, some are hesitating out of concern that the Second Circuit’s decision in City of New York v. Chevron Corp., 993 F.3d 81 (2d Cir. 2021), dooms such efforts. That concern is misplaced. In fact, now is precisely the time for states …
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CONTINUE READINGFrom Sacramento to Geneva: Two Arenas Tackle Plastic Pollution
California considers adding microplastics to its Candidate Chemical List as delegates negotiate a Global Binding Treaty on Plastics in Switzerland
Last Monday, the California Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC) closed its public comment period on a proposal to add microplastics to its Candidate Chemicals List. Adding microplastics to this list would allow the State’s Safer Consumer Product Program to evaluate potential Priority Products that may contain or release microplastics. The Program works to make …
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CONTINUE READINGChina is Kicking Our Ass at Our Own Game
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
The first time I saw a Chinese-made EV on the road I was walking on a crowded sidewalk in São Paulo. It was a Saturday night this May, when the whole city seemed to be out enjoying the warm weather. A street rave took over an entire block so to keep moving, we pedestrians had …
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CONTINUE READINGStates Become “Norm Sustainers” on Environmental Justice
Guest Contributor Sharmila L. Murthy explains how state Attorneys General are acting as important counterweights to the federal government on environmental justice.
Guest contributor Sharmila L. Murthy is a Professor of Law and Public Policy at Northeastern University In the wake of misleading and inaccurate characterizations by the Trump Administration that wrongly label environmental justice activities as illegal discrimination, the Attorneys General of California, Massachusetts, and New York, joined by the Attorneys General of Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, …
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CONTINUE READINGThoughts on AB 131
Overall a good bill, but the definition of natural and protected lands is inadequate
Governor Newsom is pushing for CEQA reform as part of approval of the state budget, and the result is two budget trailer bills, AB 130 and AB 131, that together provide some of the most significant changes to CEQA in many years. Overall, these are good bills. The changes are focused on facilitating development where …
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CONTINUE READINGImmigration Raids are an Attack on Climate
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
It’s hard to watch the Trump administration test drive authoritarianism in California. Since the inauguration, I’ve found solace in slowly rewatching The West Wing, a good bedtime story for anyone who feels nostalgia for partisan politics of yesteryear. Anyone else doing this? It’s uncanny how my rewatching has lined up with real world events. In …
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