Ecosystems
The Overlooked Fast Track for Cutting Planetary Warming
Guest contributors V. Ram Ramanathan, Durwood Zaelke, and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco write that we can cut the rate of warming by 30% to 50% within 15 years. “And we must.”
This guest post is authored by V. Ram Ramanathan, Durwood Zaelke, and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco and is informed by a presentation that Ramanathan is set to give at the Vatican on September 26. Among the three of us, we have 15 decades of high-level experience in climate science, policies and actions, and we have never been …
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CONTINUE READINGEnough With The Doomscrolling
Environmental Progress Does Exist – And So Does Good News
So much is awful nowadays, that we need to share good news at Legal Planet, and there actually is some. For the first time ever, German solar and wind electricity production outpaced that of fossil fuels. In 1987, forest cover in Costa Rica, one of the famously most biodiverse nations on the face of …
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CONTINUE READINGA Compendium of Good News
Hey, it’s not all gloom and doom out there.
We don’t lack for bad news these days. Still, there are also good things happening. I’ve been putting together a list of things that are good news for the environment. EVs, battery storage, and solar are growing around the world. So put on your happy face!
CONTINUE READINGJudicial Review of the Hegseth Gambit
Hegseth and the “God Squad” may have just stepped into a morass.
As expected, the Endangered Species Committee issued a blanket exemption, preventing any challenges to oil and gas drilling in the Gulf that threaten endangered species. Hegseth’s request for the exemption is premised on the existing (but possibly insufficient) protections that the government is currently giving endangered species. Thus, it’s not quite a license for Exxon to send out harpoon boats to kill off whales. It does, however, raise the suspicion that the current protections are grossly inadequate and that the government expected to lose in court, before in effect breaking the glass and pulling the red emergency lever.
CONTINUE READINGDear UNFCCC, Subnational Governments are Key to Protecting Forests
GCF Task Force and Regions4 Submit Comments to COP30 Roadmap on Halting and Reversing Deforestation and Forest Degradation by 2030
Two of the world’s largest subnational governmental networks – the Governors’ Climate and Forests Task Force (GCF Task Force, a project of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at UCLA School of Law), and Regions4 – submitted a comment letter today providing input to the Roadmap on Halting and Reversing Deforestation and …
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CONTINUE READINGThe “God Squad” is Subject to a Lot of Limits. But I’m still worried.
Getting an exemption from the Endangered Species Act is normally difficult. But there’s a scary exception.
The Endangered Species Act Committee has been nicknamed the God Squad, on the theory that it holds the power of life and death over endangered species. It does the have the power to exempt from projects from the Endangered Species Act (ESA), although that’s not quite as ominous as it sounds. It’s understandable that many people freaked out when a Federal Register notice appeared announcing a meeting of the Committee relating to offshore drilling in the Gulf. We don’t have any specifics , What we do know is that the process is complex and cumbersome, and that there are important limits on the Committee’s discretion. There’s still reason to worry, however, because Pete Hegseth actually is the one with godlike powers over endangered species.
CONTINUE READINGLaunching OPERATION EPIC FURRY
It’s time to rename the Endangered Species Act.
Environmentalists need to do better. at marketing Consider the Endangered Species Act. That’s an accurate but uninspiring name. Where’s the pizzaz? Where’s the spark? And the acronym ESA is just lame.The aspects of the law that appeal most to the public are its protections of iconic creatures like polar bears and cute creatures like black-footed ferrets. Why not take a leaf from Trump’s book and rebrand? Make it big, bold, and appealing: EPIC FURRY. Sounds thrilling! It could stand for Endangered Prized Innocent Creatures Flourishing Under Real Regulatory Yodas. The title doesn’t mean anything, but has a nice Star Wars connection, which never hurt anyone’s marketing. And what regulator wouldn’t like to be compared with Yoda the Jedi Master?
CONTINUE READINGThe Trump Administration is Squandering Our Natural Heritage
Proposed Endangered Species Act regulations are designed to stifle protections and provide developers even more power.
The world’s ecosystems have been subject to an increasingly dangerous cocktail of stressors from land and ocean over-development, invasive species, and pollution. But rather than stem the tide of these harms, the Trump administration has resurrected several regulatory changes to the Endangered Species Act designed to stifle species’ protections and provide land developers even more power to …
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CONTINUE READINGScience and Democracy
The scientific process is crucial for a well-functioning democracy.
Beyond its utility, science also models some important features of democracy. It aspires to a marketplace of ideas in which everyone with the needed background knowledge can participate, and in which conclusions are based on debate and data rather than power. As a recent D.C. Circuit case illustrates, the law calls on government agencies to make decisions in the same, considering all the scientific evidence and arguments, then providing a reasoned explanation for its decision.
CONTINUE READINGThe Top Ten Things to be Thankful for this Year
It’s been a horrible year for federal environmental law, but there are hopeful developments elsewhere.
This is, if not the winter of our discontent, at least the late autumn. In terms of federal environmental policy, 2025 has been a disaster. Trump’s previous term in office pales by comparison. But all is not gloomy. Outside of D.C., there have been encouraging developments within the U.S. and globally.
Here are ten of those positive developments.
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