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Environmental Law

Environmental Law Prof Blog

Coverage includes agriculture, timber, energy, mining, fisheries, land use, forests, marine resources, water resources, water quality, air quality, climate change, endangered species, biodiversity, environmental impact assessment, NEPA, environmental science, physical and social science, policy, legislation, law, case law, governance, management, and international law. News and analysis of environmental law; upcoming colloquia, conferences, and meetings; abstracts of working papers and recently-published scholarship in law, natural sciences, social science, economics; book reviews; career moves; other items of interest to faculty in the area.
By Susan Smith

Post Frequency: 2.8/day

Last Entry: March 31, 2011 at 14:15:36

Owen on Critical Habitat

Posted on March 31, 2011
Recently, Dave Owen posted his latest article, Critical Habitat and the Challenge of Regulating Small Harms, on SSRN (available here). He also recently accepted an offer to publish the piece in the Florida Law Review. Of course, critical habitat has....

Nuclear's(?) Future(s)

Posted on March 31, 2011
As the saga continues to unfold at Fukushima Daiichi, commentators continue to question what the disaster will mean for the future of nuclear energy. Numerous media outlets have extensive coverage, including at the Washington Post, the New York Times, the...

Position Opening -- Assistant Dean of Environmental Programs at Pace Law

Posted on March 30, 2011
The Pace University School of Law has posted an opening for its Assistant Dean of Environmental Programs. The Assistant Dean is responsible for directing the school's Center for Environmental Legal Studies (CELS). Applicants should submit a resume and references to:...

A Historical Perspective on the AB32 Lawsuit

Posted on March 29, 2011
The folks at Legal Planet have done a great job discussing the California Superior Court decision, Association of Irritated Residents, et al. v. California Air Resources Board (available here), which enjoins further AB32 rulemaking and implementation until the Air Resources...

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Hari Osofsky on Diagonal Federalism and Climate Change

Posted on March 28, 2011
Hari Osofsky, Minnesota Law School, has posted a thoughtful and engaging article titled "Diagonal Federalism and Climate Change: Implications for the Obama Administration" on SSRN. The article is forthcoming in the Alabama Law Review and can be downloaded here...

Rethinking Transportation

Posted on March 25, 2011
As oil prices reach a two and a half year high, America's oil dependence--recently highlighted by the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico--is once again apparent. About seventy-two percent of oil used in the United States is for...

Renewable Energy and the Common Law

Posted on March 25, 2011
Regulation of renewable energy is almost as old as the field itself. Who, for instance, doesn't want a t-shirt emblazoned with the logo "I PURPA"? Clearly, the emergence of renewable portfolio standards, feed-in tariffs, net metering requirements, a "smart...

Red Risk, Blue Risk

Posted on March 24, 2011
A few months ago, Dan Kahan, Donald Braman, and Hank Jenkins-Smith published an important article titled, Cultural Cognition of Scientific Consensus (available here). The article looked at several risks, two of which are quite relevant to today?s news and environmental...

Energy Efficiency on the Rebound?

Posted on March 22, 2011
Energy efficiency policy is one of the few areas where we might still expect some progress at the federal level toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the next few years. Predictably, energy efficiency has become the target of criticism. Republican...

Hunting, Fishing, Survival, Guns, Gear....and Environmental Protection?

Posted on March 21, 2011
You might expect an article titled "How the Budget Bill Will Decimate Conservation" to be found on the Environmental Defense, Greenpeace or a variety of other environmentalist websites. In fact, the article was posted at fieldandstream.com. When you search for...

Energy Options

Posted on March 18, 2011
Similar to Professor McAllister's approach to nuclear energy in the classroom, I typically tell students in my energy and environmental law classes that there is no silver bullet in energy and that a range of fuel sources is necessary to...

Fukushima, Chernobyl, and U.S.

Posted on March 17, 2011
While the people of Japan continue to deal with the devastation of the massive earthquake and tsunami last week, the tragedy there has reignited the debate over nuclear power worldwide. As the Washington Post reports, in the wake of the...

Junk Politics

Posted on March 16, 2011
Currently the United States House of Representatives? Energy and Commerce Committee is considering legislation that would strip the EPA of its power to use the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases. Earlier this week, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) offered...

Learning from Another Worst-Case Scenario

Posted on March 15, 2011
In my climate change class, I have become accustomed to saying that ?nuclear energy has to be on the table? as an alternative source of energy. It has been an easy thing to say as it appeals to the political...

A Scalpel or a Sledgehammer? Preserving Environmental Protection in a Down Economy

Posted on March 14, 2011
A recent slate of reports have highlighted Congressional efforts to curb spending on environmental matters in order to prevent further deterioration of the economy. A House subcommittee recently voted to block EPA authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, asserting that...

Pennsylvania, New York, and the EPA: A Case Study in Varied Environmental Regulatory Response

Posted on March 11, 2011
Speaking of looking both forward and back in environmental law, a case study in regulatory response to energy development is rapidly unfolding. Last week, the New York Times ran several stories on state and federal responses to a rapid expansion...

Plater on Deepwater Horizon and TVA v. Hill

Posted on March 10, 2011
Environmental law, by definition, looks forward. But it also pays to look back. Today, one of the most experienced leaders in the field, Prof. Zyg Plater, will help us do both. He will give two lectures at the University of...

DeChristopher?s Actions

Posted on March 09, 2011
Earlier this week, Tim DeChristopher was found guilty by a Utah jury for unlawfully interfering with a public auction for oil and gas leases on federal lands near national parks in southern Utah. In many ways, the result was not...

Hoping for the Least-Bad in AEP v. Connecticut

Posted on March 08, 2011
The Supreme Court will hear oral argument in its second major climate change case soon. Argument in American Electric Power Co. v. Connecticut is scheduled for Tuesday, April 19. The questions presented are (1) whether Connecticut and other plaintiffs have...

Lions, Tigers, and Bears...All Gone?

Posted on March 07, 2011
A recent CNN article described the plummeting population of big cats in Africa, noting that populations have dropped from 450,000 fifty years ago to as few as 20,000 today. Worldwide tiger populations have experienced similar drastic declines, with an estimated...

About Environmental Law Prof Blog

Posted on March 01, 2011
Welcome to the Relaunch of the Environmental Law Prof Blog! We are here to stimulate discussion and thought about the ever-growing and all-important field of environmental law. It is ever-growing because environmental law no longer just encompasses traditional pollution and...

About Environmental Law Prof Blog

Posted on October 04, 2009
If you are interested in serving as an editor of Environmental Law Prof Blog for the Law Professor Blogs Network, please contact Paul Caron and Joe Hodnicki by email.

Conn. v. Amer. Electric Power Co. public nuisance case

Posted on September 23, 2009
John Bonine sent out an immediate e-mail to the ENVLAWPROF listserve, giving a succinct summary of the 2nd Circuit's opinion in the Connecticutt v. American Electric Power Co. public nuisance. He's given me permission to share it with you: An...

Here's something to aspire to:

Posted on September 23, 2009
Green Buildings: Is Your City in the Top Ten? The U.S. Green Building Council ranked cities across the country with the most LEED certified green buildings. A total of 88 green buildings makes Chicago number one. Portland and Seattle follow...

John Bonine sent out an immediate

1 million trees

Posted on September 16, 2009
I prefer reforestation in developing countries like Haiti where reforestation has great social justice impacts, but the bottom line is great: actually removing CO2 from the atmosphere: BALTIMORE STUDENTS AND LAWYERS TEAM UP TO LAUNCH THE ABA?S ONE MILLION TREES...

New CAFE-GHG Proposal

Posted on September 16, 2009
The Obama administration on Tuesday formally proposed joint CAFE-CAA fuel efficiency standards for cars and trucks that link fuel economy to reduced emissions from vehicles. Manufacturers would need to increase fuel economy 5 percent per year from 2012 to 2016,...

For those of you interested in

Posted on September 16, 2009
For those of you interested in mercury issues: MERCURY FREE PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPS DRAFT OF GROUNDBREAKING LEGISLATION TO KEEP AIR AND WATER CLEAN Communities and Individuals Form Coalition Focused on Mercury Reduction within Broad Environmental Policy September 9, 2009?The Mercury Free...

The Changing Shape of the World Economy

Posted on September 15, 2009
Take a look at this chart available at Visualizing Economics You can also click the image to see it in a pop-up window. It shows China, India, Russia and Brazil with rapidly growing GDPs between now and 2050.

Environmental Law Preference Rankings: a Prospective Student's Statistical Perspective

Posted on September 15, 2009
Here's an interesting new law ranking system authored by Josh Gellers, a 3rd year PhD student in Political Science at UC Irvine, who is applying to law school and interested in practicing environmental law. He devised a statistical ranking of...

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