Clean Water Act

LA River oral argument: the Justices debate how to tell the Ninth Circuit that it screwed up

I attended the oral argument on Tuesday in L.A. Flood Control District v. NRDC. (See Sean’s post for an in-depth background on the case, and Richard’s initial reactions to the oral argument). The Justices were actively engaged and appeared to have a strong grasp of the underlying facts about the District’s MS4. Much of the …

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Today’s Supreme Court Arguments in Los Angeles County Flood Control District

  The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals got no love from either the U.S. Supreme Court or the advocates appearing before it today in Los Angeles County Flood Control District v. Natural Resources Defense Counsel.  Nor did a previously-unheard-from government actor similarly absent from the Supreme Court chambers today. Yesterday Sean Hecht posted on the …

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Deconstructing Today’s Supreme Court Arguments in Decker v. Northwest Environmental Defense Center

Legal Planet colleague Holly Doremus did an excellent job last week of previewing today’s U.S. Supreme Court arguments in Decker v. Northwest Environmental Defense Center, a potentially important case involving the scope of  USEPA’s point source permit jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act.  But given the results of those arguments and a major, late-breaking regulatory …

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The strange saga of how Los Angeles County’s stormwater pollution ended up in the Supreme Court

Tomorrow, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in Los Angeles County Flood Control District v. Natural Resources Defense Council. This case involves a lawsuit by clean-water advocates to require our County Flood Control District to take responsibility for ensuring that polluted stormwater doesn’t impair our local water quality in two local rivers. The Ninth …

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What to expect in the logging roads case

Cross-posted at CPRBlog. This coming Monday, Dec. 3, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argument in the logging roads case. The case involves two consolidated petitions, Decker v. Northwest Environmental Defense Center and Georgia Pacific v. Northwest Environmental Defense Center , both challenging the same decision of the Ninth Circuit, Northwest Environmental Defense Center …

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Ninth Circuit Rules Against Indian Tribe’s Climate Change Suit

Not much of a surprise here; a Ninth Circuit panel “has ruled against the northwest Alaska village of Kivalina, which sued energy companies over claims that greenhouse emissions contributed to global warming that is threatening the community’s existence.”  The village brought a common-law public nuisance claim against the oil companies, but the panel held that …

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Supreme Court Grants Review in Two Clean Water Act Cases From Ninth Circuit

This morning the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in two high-profile Clean Water Act cases from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  The justices simultaneously denied review in a major federalism decision, also from the Ninth Circuit, involving an industry challenge to a California Air Resources Board’s regulation requiring ships to use low-polluting fuels near …

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In the Supreme Court’s Crosshairs: the Ninth Circuit’s Environmental Jurisprudence

All eyes will be on the U.S. Supreme Court this week, as the justices conclude their current Term and, among other things, issue their long-awaited decision(s) on the constitutionality of the newly-enacted federal healthcare law. But the Supreme Court also has some other, key decisions to make as to whether to take up four controversial environmental cases from …

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Supreme Court Sides With Property Owners in Wetlands Dispute With USEPA

The U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in the most closely watched environmental case on the Court’s docket this Term: Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. As expected following an especially lively set of oral arguments in the Sackett case earlier this year, the justices ruled–unanimously–in favor of the private property owners who had brought …

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Can you stand to hear more about Sackett?

Cross posted at CPRBlog. As usual, I’m behind Rick on commenting on the latest Supreme Court development. (In my defense, it is the first day of classes, although I know that’s not much of an excuse.) Unlike Rick, I didn’t attend the oral argument (see lame excuse above), but having read the transcript I agree …

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