In a long-anticipated decision, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled this week that stormwater – largely rainwater – that runs off of logging roads into streams and rivers must be permitted under the Clean Water Act (CWA). This decision (Northwest Environmental Defense Center v. Brown) will have far-ranging impacts that...

The events relating to the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico continue metaphorically to parallel the relationship between the courts and environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) with regard to deep water oil drilling off the north coast of Alaska. Shortly after BP installed a temporary...

Property owners rely on the protection afforded by the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution to shield them against the government improperly interfering with their property rights. The Takings Clause requires “just compensation” to be given to the property owner if the government takes...

The Ninth Circuit recently joined the Eighth and Tenth Circuits in finding that non-settling parties can intervene in litigation to oppose settlements between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and other settling responsible parties under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act or CERCLA. This decision is significant because...

As a BP oil well in the Gulf of Mexico continues to prove, at the rate of thousands of barrels of oil per day, that modern technology is no fail-safe against disastrous environmental mishaps, it provides a metaphor for a risk of malfunction in the legal system on which...

Twice in recent months, federal appeals courts have opened the door to climate change damage claims by private parties against companies that contribute to global warming. On October 16, 2009, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in  Comer, et al. v. Murphy Oil USA, et al.  held that residents...