Water
Environmental Hypocrisy
Recently, CBS’s 60 Minutes ran a story on the current environmental damages litigation 30,000 Ecuadorians are bringing in that country’s courts against Chevron. The case arises out the toxic oil wastes a Chevron subsidiary left behind in the Ecuadorian rain forest following decades of oil production deep in the headwaters of the Amazon. The plaintiffs, …
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CONTINUE READINGA Supreme Court Speed-Bump for Coeur Alaska
With the U.S. Supreme Court’s issuance of its major CERCLA opinion yesterday in Burlington Northern, the Court has now decided four of the five major environmental cases on its docket this Term. But a little-noticed order from the Court–also issued yesterday–suggests that the Court is struggling mightily with the fifth and final case, Coeur Alaska, …
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CONTINUE READINGAnother Batch of Free On-Line Classes
In case, the headline is misleading: no, we don’t give credit to on-line viewers. Maybe someday soon Berkeley Law will get into the distance education business, but not yet. So you won’t get credit, but you’ll still learn a lot. Law 271.71 – International Environmental Law – Cymie Payne (Spring 2009): http://webcast.berkeley.edu/course_details_new.php?seriesid=2009-B-49982|2009-B-49985&semesterid=2009-B Law 272.1 – …
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CONTINUE READINGJustice Souter and the Environment
The news that Justice Souter is leaving the Supreme Court probably means little for environmental cases. Souter has been a reliable environmental vote, joining the majority in Massachusetts v. EPA, the Court’s only case on climate change. He dissented with the liberal wing in Rapanos v. United States , the convoluted decision about the extent to …
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CONTINUE READINGInterior to pull mountaintop mining rule
UPDATE 4/29: AP reports that the Justice Department’s filing requests that the rule be vacated and remanded on the grounds that it was not preceded by ESA consultation. (Hat tip: PLF on ESA). Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced today that his department would ask the court hearing a challenge to a key Bush-era rule on …
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CONTINUE READINGUpdating the Delta litigation line-up
The era of collaboration and cooperation that CalFed briefly brought to management of California’s water system is well and truly over. Lawsuits are multiplying like rabbits, promising to provide full employment for water and natural resource lawyers in California for the foreseeable future. For those of you scoring at home, here are some of the …
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CONTINUE READINGGetting to the root of recurring water conflicts
This post is co-authored by A. Dan Tarlock, Distinguished Professor of Law at Chicago-Kent College of Law, and cross-posted by permission from the Island Press Eco-Compass blog. The western United States is characterized by highly variable and seasonal rainfall patterns. To deal with the constant threat of drought, the West relies on intensively managed water …
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CONTINUE READINGIs an ocean acidification TMDL on the (distant) horizon?
In January, Dan posted on the problem of ocean acidification and Sean noted that a lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity had convinced EPA to look into the possible application of the Clean Water Act. Now EPA has issued a call for interested parties to submit information as it considers whether to tighten its …
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CONTINUE READINGChina and Climate Change
In a recent lecture at Berkeley, Orville Schell discussed the attitudes of Chinese leaders toward climate change. One significant factor is the increased understanding of how vulnerable China’s water supply is to climatic changes on the Tibetan Plateau, which is a key source of water for 2 billion Asians. The speech includes some remarkable photos …
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CONTINUE READINGWhat’s new on the Delta?
Quite a bit, and most of the news is bad. American Rivers has declared the Sacramento-San Joaquin the most endangered river in the United States. The longfin smelt has been listed as threatened by the state, but it is not going to be federally listed, at least not yet. Commercial salmon fishing off the California …
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