Your Guide to Emerging Issues in Environmental Regulation and Litigation.
On February 3, 2022 a Los Angeles County, California judge concluded an early evidentiary hearing centered on the opinions from four of the plaintiff’s experts in one of the nation’s first lawsuits over baby food allegedly contaminated with toxic metals. In what is known in California as a Sargon hearing, the defendants asked the court …
In December 2021, the EPA announced new lead and copper rule improvements for drinking water. These rule improvements come on the heels of a prior extension of the final rule from June 2021. The final lead and copper rule was extended by the Biden Administration to provide more time for review and for input from …
A decade ago, as part of a concerted effort to reign in industrial pollution, the Obama-era Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) promulgated the mercury and air toxics standards (MATS) pursuant to its authority under the Clean Air Act (CAA). The purpose, as implied by the title, was to limit the amount of mercury and other toxins …
As our blog recently reported, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced an ambitious national strategy to address per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) over the next three years. Dubbed a “roadmap,” the EPA says that it is centered on three guiding strategies focused on research, restrictions, and remediation: “Increase investments in research, leverage authorities to take …
* This article is a follow-up to our October 2021 post “No Asylum from Microplastics: How Recent Studies May Spark a Flood of Environmental Litigation.” It was inevitable. As soon as the media mentioned that microplastics were found in babies’ fecal matter—our most innocent demographic—the proverbial gloves came off, and now plastics manufacturers are in …
A year to the day from when President Joseph Biden announced a moratorium on federal leasing for oil and gas drilling just a week after his term began, a federal district court judge for the District of Columbia invalidated the largest oil and gas lease sale—for 2,700 square miles—in U.S. History. The lease, which fetched …
On Monday, January 24, 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States announced that it will clarify the governing standard for determining whether wetlands are “Waters of the United States” under the Clean Water Act in Sackett v. EPA. The court granted certiorari, limited to the following question: “Whether the Ninth Circuit set forth the …
On December 29, 2021, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington held that, under the Clean Water Act, the EPA does not serve as a “mere bystander” in cases where states refuse to or cannot take action to implement water quality standards that protect aquatic life. See Northwest Envtl. Advocates v. United …
The U.S. Supreme Court dealt a significant setback to the ethanol industry on Monday, January 10, 2022, when it refused to review a ban stopping the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from allowing the year-round sale of a higher ethanol blend of gasoline. The sale of gasoline with 15% ethanol (E15) is generally banned in …
On December 23, 2021, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a new amendment to the public health law that will create New York’s first emerging contaminants list, and expand the number of chemicals to be included—many of which are per- and polyfluorinated substances (PFAS). Some say this new law establishes New York as perhaps the …