Litigation
The Path to Abundance, Part V
Abundance reforms will require consensus and trust, which are in short supply in American politics
This is the fifth post in a series of six posts. The first post is here. The second post is here. The third post is here. The fourth post is here. In my last post I noted some important political challenges to abundance reforms: It is unlikely that they will produce immediate political benefits, but …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Path to Abundance, Part III
Abundance reforms will pose difficult tradeoffs, including with environmental goals and public participation
This is the third post in a series of six posts. The first post is here. The second post is here. The reforms that abundance advocates have proposed are varied, in part because they target a wide range of policy areas. I will begin with housing as an example of the reforms being proposed – …
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CONTINUE READINGPolicies on the Bus Go Round and Round
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
A year ago, the transportation manager of Northshore School District, outside of Seattle, wrote to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin pleading with him to release frozen funding she was owed for new school buses. “We need your assistance to complete these projects and lift the financial burdens school districts are facing due to the delay in …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Tangled Web of the Boulder v. Suncor Cert Grant
Pass me some aspirin. Attorney General Rob Bonta might want some, too.
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take up the Boulder v. Suncor Energy case, one of the growing set of state-law nuisance and consumer protection cases filed by states and municipalities against fossil fuel companies for harms from climate change. The Court will review the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision to allow the case …
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CONTINUE READINGFake species?
Looking at the data on ESA listed species to see if enviro groups strategically identify species to block development.
This tweet, arguing that it’s “an open secret at this point that environmental activists try to invent fake ‘endangered’ species to block infrastructure projects they don’t like” got a lot of traction. But is it correct? It turns out that a paper I did (with Berry Brosi) about 15 years ago provides some insights into …
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CONTINUE READINGBig Decisions to Come in 2026
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
I spent much of 2024 warning about the nihilistic goals of Project 2025 and then spent 2025 watching a lot of it come true. Our collective project for 2026 is to settle on solid alternatives to MAGA and decide on candidates. Luckily, last year also brought a growing resistance movement, lots of litigation, and unpopularity …
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CONTINUE READINGA Procedural Snarl in the Oil Patch
Can oil companies use World War II contracts to vault from state to federal court in cases about present-day coastal damage?
As a matter of common sense, however, it’s hard to see why oil production activities that would not otherwise be considered “federal” should change their statute because the producers also happen to own refineries — especially since in some instances it appears that all the oil from one of their fields might be going to a different refinery anyway. But textualist judges aren’t necessarily attended to common sense.
CONTINUE READINGAnother Attempt to Measure NEPA’s Impact
This most recent report is better, but still has significant flaws
The Breakthrough Institute has produced another report on litigation under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), building on a report it prepared earlier, which I sharply criticized in this prior blog post. The updated report is a mixed bag: It doesn’t solve many of the methodological issues I identified in the earlier blogpost; it does …
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CONTINUE READINGClimate Lawsuits Now a Matter of Life and Death
The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.
What a week for watchers of climate litigation. Big new filings, claims of death and destruction, a landmark ruling, and a juicy hearing all in the span of 36 hours. First, there was what the New York Times described as “the first wrongful death lawsuit” to be brought against oil and gas companies over claims …
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CONTINUE READINGThe Top-Ten Lower Court Decisions on Environmental Law
Don’t let the headlines deceive you. It’s not just the Supreme Court that shapes environmental law.
The Supreme Court tends to get all the attention, but for every Supreme Court opinion on environmental law there are probably fifty opinions in the lower federal courts. Collectively, the lower courts have done fat least as much to shape the law than the Supreme Court’s occasional interventions.
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