Litigation

Another Posthumous Loss for the Bush EPA

Greenwire Reports: The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that U.S. EPA’s 2006 standards for fine particulate matter were, “in several respects, contrary to law and unsupported by adequately reasoned decisionmaking.” At issue was the rule that kept the primary standard for annual fine particulate matter at 15 micrograms per …

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Supreme Court Denies Cert. in Mercury Case

The Supreme Court has declined to review a lower court opinion striking down the Bush Administration’s regulation of mercury.  This isn’t a huge surprise since the Obama Admimistration indicated that the lower court opinion was consistent with its own regulatory policy, leaving only the industry to seek revieew.  The lower court opinion is one of …

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Wolf woes

Wolf conservation has long been among both the most controversial and the most  creative aspects of implementation of the U.S. Endangered Species Act. There’s been a flurry of wolf news over the past three months. It emphasizes conflict, some of that over attempts at creative ESA implementation. In the southwest the Mexican wolf is suffering …

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Legal Challenge to RGGI

The operator of a cogeneration plant in upstate New York, Indeck Corinth, has filed suit to challenge the Northeastern states’ carbon trading scheme, RGGI.  Apart from some state law claims, the most significant claims seem to be preemption under PURPA and Compact Clause violation.   For reasons, discussed in this article, I think the Compact Clause …

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Can NEPA save the world?

New Scientist‘s blog, Short Sharp Science, reports that repairs on the proton-smashing Large Hadron Collider at Europe’s CERN may be complete by September. What’s the environmental law connection? You might recall that before the LHC was briefly fired up in September 2008 (it only worked for 9 days before crashing), a lawsuit was filed in …

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