Justia Environmental Law Opinion Summaries

The Tennessee Valley Authority, a federal agency, operates power plants that provide electricity to nine million Americans in the Southeastern United States, 16 U.S.C. 831n-4(h). Like private power companies, TVA must comply with the Clean Air Act. In 2012, the Environmental Protection Agency told TVA that it needed to reduce emissions from some of the coal-fired units at its plants, including the Drakesboro, Kentucky, Paradise Fossil Plant. TVA considered several options, including maintaining coal-fired generation by retrofitting the Paradise units with new pollution controls and switching the fuel source from coal to natural gas. After more than a year of environmental study, TVA decided to switch from coal to natural-gas generation and concluded that the conversion would be better for the environment. TVA issued a “finding of no significant impact” on the environment stemming from the newly configured project. The district court denied opponents a preliminary injunction, and granted TVA judgment on the administrative record. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, rejecting arguments that TVA acted arbitrarily in failing to follow the particulars of the Tennessee Valley Authority Act for making such decisions, and in failing to consider the project’s environmental effects in an impact statement under the National Environmental Policy Act. View "Ky. Coal Ass'n, Inc. v. Tenn. Valley Auth." on Justia Law

Metro approved the Westside Subway Extension Project in May 2012, which will extend the Metro Purple Line heavy rail transit (HRT) subway system to the Westside of Los Angeles. To reach the Constellation station, the subway will travel through a tunnel to be constructed under Beverly Hills High School. The School District and the City filed petitions for writ of mandate, challenging Metro's approval of the Project. The trial court denied the petitions. The court concluded that substantial evidence supports Metro’s decision not to recirculate the environmental impact statement/environmental impact report (EIS/EIR), and that the EIS/EIR adequately discussed air pollution and public health impacts. The court also concluded that Metro did not violate the statutory requirements in conducting the transit hearing, that the City received a full and fair hearing, and that substantial evidence supports Metro’s decision and findings of fact in light of the issues tendered for hearing. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Beverly Hills USD v. LA Metro." on Justia Law

James Pyne, who died during these proceedings, was the founder and sole stockholder of Remet Corporation. Pyne sold Remet’s stock and facilities, along with real property he had been leasing to Remet, to Burmah Castro Holding, Inc. The sales agreement contained an indemnification provision obligating Pyne to indemnify, defendant, and holder the buyer harmless for certain environmental losses. Remet later received a letter from the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) notifying Remet that it was a potentially responsible party for environmental contamination at the Erie Canal Site adjacent to Remet’s real property. Remet filed notices of claim against Pyne’s estate seeking indemnification for environmental liabilities under the sales agreement. Remet then brought this action against the Estate asserting claims for contractual and common-law indemnification. Supreme Court granted Remet summary judgment on liability. The Appellate Division reversed, concluding that DEC’s letter did not require Remet to take action. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding (1) the letter was sufficiently coercive and adversarial as to require action in connection with any environmental law pursuant to the sales agreement; and (2) Remet was entitled to contractual indemnification for past and future environmental losses arising out of DEC’s investigation and remediation of the Erie Canal Site. View "Remet Corp. v. Estate of Pyne" on Justia Law

In 2001, Furnival and its insurer agreed to a Pollution and Remediation Legal Liability Policy, detailing $10 million in liability protection; a 10-year coverage period; and insurance coverage for 12 Furnival locations, including the Elizabethtown Landfill Site, which Furnival was obligated to clean up under a consent decree with the federal government. Insurer knew about the consent decree when the Policy issued. The Policy Endorsements list five reasons for which insurer may “refuse to offer a renewal extension of coverage,” and states that insurer “shall not cancel nor non-renew this Policy except for the reasons stated above.” None of the listed reasons for non-renewal occurred. In 2006, the parties increased the Policy’s limit to $14 million. After the term expired, insurer sent Furnival’s insurance broker its version of a renewal offer, providing $5 million of coverage over a one-year term, omitting coverage for Elizabethtown, the only previously insured site for which Furnival had made a claim, refusing to renew the same terms. The Third Circuit vacated a ruling in favor of insurer, holding that, for a contract to be considered a renewal, it must contain the same, or nearly the same, terms as the original contract. View "Indian Harbor Ins. Co v. F&M Equip., Ltd" on Justia Law

Trona is a sodium carbonate compound that is processed into soda ash or baking soda. Because oil and gas development posed a risk to the extraction of trona and trona worker safety, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which manages the leasing of federal public land for mineral development, indefinitely suspended all oil and gas leases in the mechanically mineable trona area (MMTA) of Wyoming. The area includes 26 pre-existing oil and gas leases owned by Barlow. Barlow filed suit, alleging that the BLM’s suspension of oil and gas leases constituted a taking of Barlow’s interests without just compensation and constituted a breach of both the express provisions of the leases and their implied covenants of good faith and fair dealing. The Federal Circuit affirmed the Claims Court’s dismissal of the contract claims on the merits and of the takings claim as unripe. BLM has not repudiated the contracts and Barlow did not establish that seeking a permit to drill would be futile. View "Barlow & Haun, Inc. v. United States" on Justia Law

Herr bought waterfront property on Crooked Lake in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and planned to use their gas-powered motorboat on it. The U.S. Forest Service threatened to enforce a regulation (36 C.F.R. 293.6) that bans non-electric motorboats from the 95 percent of the lake that falls within the Sylvania National Wilderness Area. Herr sought and injunction on the ground that the Forest Service’s authority over Crooked Lake is “[s]ubject to valid existing rights,” Michigan Wilderness Act, 101 Stat. 1274, 1275. The district court held that a six-year time bar on the action was jurisdictional and that Herr had waited too long to file this lawsuit. The Sixth Circuit reversed, citing a 2015 Supreme Court decision, United States v. Kwai Fun Wong, and stating that the statute contains no language suggesting that the limitations period starts when a plaintiff’s predecessor in interest could first file a lawsuit. When a party first becomes aggrieved by a regulation that exceeds an agency’s statutory authority more than six years after the regulation was promulgated, that party may challenge the regulation without waiting for enforcement proceedings. View "Herr v. U.S. Forest Serv." on Justia Law

The Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation consolidated challenges, by 18 states, to the 2015 Clean Water Rule adopted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency, which clarifies the definition of “waters of the United States,” as used in the Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. 1251., “through increased use of bright-line boundaries.” The Sixth Circuit granted a stay of enforcement. The court noted a pending jurisdictional issue, concluded that the states acted without undue delay, and held that the status quo is the pre-Rule regime of federal-state collaboration that has been in place since the Supreme Court’s 2006 decision, Rapanos v. United States. The states have demonstrated a substantial possibility of success on the merits; the rulemaking process by which the Rule’s distance limitations were adopted is “facially suspect.” While there is no compelling showing that any state would suffer immediate irreparable harm of interference with state sovereignty, or unrecoverable expenditure of resources, in endeavoring to comply with the new regime, absent a stay, there is also no indication that the integrity of the nation’s waters will suffer imminent injury if the new scheme is not immediately implemented. The “sheer breadth of the ripple effects caused by the Rule’s definitional changes counsels strongly in favor of maintaining the status quo for the time being.” View "State of Ohio v. U.S. Army Corps of Eng'rs" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented for the Supreme Court's review centered on a challenge to a water right permit issued to the City of Yelm. The permit allowed the Department of Ecology to authorize withdrawals of water that impaired minimum flows where it was determined overriding considerations of public interest (OCPI) were established by the permit applicant. The trial court affirmed the Pollution Control Hearings Hoard's decision approving the permit. Sara Foster was the challenger to Yelm's permit, arguing Ecology exceeded its statutory authority in approving the permit under the OCPI exception. While this case was pending in the trial court, the Washington Supreme Court decided "Swinomish Indian Tribal Community v. Department of Ecology," (311 P.3d 6 (2013)), in which the Court comprehensively analyzed the statutory provision at issue here, and held that the provision operated as an exception to the overall prioritization of water rights, and that withdrawals of water authorized under that statute could not permanently impair senior water rights with earlier priority. After review of Foster's arguments, the Supreme Court concluded that "Swinomish" controlled in this matter, and reversed for many of the same reasons. View "Foster v. Dep't of Ecology" on Justia Law

Brian Bailey filed a Me. R. Civ. P. 80C appeal from a decision of the Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR) setting Bailey’s 2014 elver fishing quota at four pounds. The basis for the quota was confirmed on March 31, 2014 by issuance of a 2014 elver transaction card. No appeal was filed within thirty days after Bailey’s receipt of the 2014 elver transaction card. After the close of the 2014 elver season on May 31, 2014, Bailey filed this appeal on July 10, 2014. The superior court dismissed the appeal. The Supreme Judicial Court affirmed, holding (1) the issues in this case present an exception to the jurisprudence that would ordinarily require the Court to dismiss this appeal for mootness; and (2) DMR’s issuance of Bailey’s 2014 elver transaction card constituted a final agency action, and therefore, Bailey’s appeal was not timely filed. View "Bailey v. Dep’t of Marine Res." on Justia Law

The Commissioner of Environmental Protection brought this action against Defendants, auto parts companies, alleging that Defendants had violated Conn. Gen. Stat. 22a-430(a), 22a-430b and 22a-427, which are part of the Water Pollution Control Act. As a remedy, the trial court ordered Defendants to pay certain fines and to retain an environmental professional to assist Defendants in complying with the law, to conduct testing on the site at issue to determine whether a significant environmental hazard exists, and, if so, to abate the condition. The trial court rendered judgment against Defendants. The Supreme Court reversed, holding (1) having found that Defendants had violated the Water Pollution Control Act, the trial court was required to order Defendants to remediate the pollution in accordance with the remediation standards promulgated by the Commissioner, and the court did not have discretion to fashion a remedy that did not purport to do so; and (2) the trial court’s order also constituted an abuse of discretion because it was effectively unenforceable. Remanded for a new trial. View "Comm’r of Envtl. Prot. v. Underpass Auto Parts Co." on Justia Law