On October 23, 2015, the Environmental Protection Agency published its final rule known as the Clean Power Plan, a state-centered plan to reduce carbon emissions from fossil-fueled power plants, the single largest source of carbon pollution. The Clean Power Plan, … Continue reading
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Making Challenges to an Impaired Waters Listing Stick
This article is reprinted with the permission of Law360, where it originally appeared on July 30, 2014, under the title “Arguing Injury Can Prevent Harm From EPA Water Listing.” The listing of a water body as impaired under the Clean … Continue reading
D.C. Circuit rebuffs another coal mining industry challenge
Last year, we reported on Mingo Logan Coal Co. v. EPA, 714 F.3d 608 (D.C. Cir. 2013). In that case, a coal mining company argued that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had exceeded its statutory authority when it invoked … Continue reading
Hoisted by its own petard: D.C. Circuit finds that EPA’s own regulations prevent the agency’s inconsistent application of a judicial decision
EPA’s controversial practice of declining to apply unfavorable judicial decisions outside of the jurisdictions in which they were issued finally caught up with the agency last week. In Nat’l Envtl. Dev. Ass’n’s Clean Air Project v. EPA, No. 13-1035 (D.C. Cir. May 30, … Continue reading
Do water transfers require NPDES permits? The debate continues.
Whether or not a discharge qualifies as a “discharge of a pollutant” determines whether or not it is regulated under the Clean Water Act, which has significant consequences for the person discharging. Section 301 of the Act broadly prohibits “the discharge … Continue reading
Challenging EPA’s administration of the Clean Water Act for failure to consider climate impacts
Environmental interests have seemingly embarked on a new campaign to challenge the EPA’s administration of the Clean Water Act (CWA) for failure to consider the impacts of climate change. In some instances, they have opposed consent decrees that EPA has proposed to resolve violations associated with combined … Continue reading
Consent decrees take center stage in two high profile environmental cases
Consent decrees are settlement agreements among litigating parties that are sanctioned by and entered as orders of the court. By any measure, last week was an important week for consent decrees in environmental litigation. On Monday, over the objections of several intervening … Continue reading
Pennsylvania Environmental Quality Board Accepts Climate Change Petition for Rulemaking
In a previous blog post, we discussed a decision by the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court dismissing a petition for review filed by 18-year-old Ashley Funk seeking to require the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to submit her petition for rulemaking to regulate fossil fuel carbon … Continue reading
Pennsylvania Environmental Hearing Board issues trinity of opinions on fee shifting under the Clean Streams Law
On December 12, 2013, the Pennsylvania Environmental Hearing Board (EHB) delivered three opinions deciding several applications for attorney’s fees and costs under the Pennsylvania Clean Streams Law (CSL). Befitting the season, the EHB stuffed some of these stockings with gifts while … Continue reading
Still standing, still intact: Chesapeake Bay TMDL survives second legal challenge
This past September, in a case currently up on appeal before the Third Circuit, the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania rejected a challenge to the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load (“Bay TMDL”) brought by several … Continue reading