Most recent 40 articles: Legal Planet
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California Wins Major Clean Air Act/Climate Change Case in D.C. Circuit - Legal Planet (Apr 12) |
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Apr 12 · This week California and the Biden Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency won a critically-important environmental lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The case involves a constitutional challenge brought by a coalition of conservative (“red”) states to E.P.A.’s delegation of federal Clean Air Act (CAA) authority for California to adopt regulations limiting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from motor vehicles and mandating the state’s steady transition from sales of conventional cars and light trucks to electric vehicles.
The D.C. Circuit’s long-awaited decision is State of Ohio v. Environmental ... Read more ...
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Shanahan, Kennedy and Climate Change: Unanswered Questions - Legal Planet (Apr 11) |
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Apr 11 · In a flare-up between former allies last week, Rep. Ro Khanna, a progressive Democrat, asked Nicole Shanahan to think twice about continuing as RFK Jr.’s running mate. His argument was that the campaign could ultimately send Donald Trump back to the White House, risking the destruction of U.S. climate efforts.
The resulting public exchange is revealing about what motivates independent candidates like Shanahan. It also points to a conundrum for the Kennedy-Shanahan ticket: how to address concerns about the climate implications of another Trump Administration.
Khanna’s point was simple: Shanahan cares about climate change, but the RFK candidacy might help elect Trump, who ... Read more ...
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Power of the People: Environmental Advocacy in China - Legal Planet (Apr 10) |
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Apr 10 · China’s global rise has raised concerns about impacts on the environment in a bewilderingly wide range of issues. These include global climate change, deforestation, impacts on rare and endangered species, harm to fisheries, environmental impacts of overseas infrastructure, mining, and energy sector investments, to name just a few. Popular attention has often focused on Chinese government action (or lack thereof) and the behavior of Chinese companies “going out” into the world. What role are Chinese civil society organizations playing these days?
Chinese environmental groups had somewhat of a renaissance in the early 2000s, with groups such as Friends of Nature, Global Village ... Read more ...
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Not All Community Benefits Are Created Equal - Legal Planet (Apr 9) |
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Apr 9 · CLEE has just released a new report, Offshore Wind & Community Benefits Agreements in California: CBA Examples, detailing the CBA and other community provisions in California’s offshore wind leases, as well as examples of CBA precursors and models from other industries. Read it here.
As California offshore wind moves forward, there are opportunities for underserved, environmental justice, and tribal communities to secure benefits and community investment (if communities are interested in negotiating with developers). This is because California’s current offshore wind leases contain different types of community-beneficial measures, including Community Benefits Agreements, or ... Read more ...
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Climate Change and Nigeria - Legal Planet (Apr 8) |
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Apr 8 · By the time my youngest granddaughter is thirty, Nigeria will be the world’s third-largest country. It’s also one of the countries that’s least prepared to adapt to climate change, which will be much worse by then.
Nigeria’s population is expected to roughly double by 2050, to around 400 million. The population was previously expected to double again by 2100, but the current estimate is that it will reach “only” about 550 million. In the meantime, China’s population is expected to fall; as a result, Nigeria’s population will be about three-fourths that of China.
The Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative rankings show that Nigeria as the 17th most vulnerable ... Read more ...
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A Total Eclipse of the Heat - Legal Planet (Apr 7) |
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Apr 7 · Millions of Americans traveled this week to the path of totality to hunker down with loved ones and total strangers to gaze upwards at one of the most amazing astronomical events of our lives and share something like a transcendent, spiritual experience. I hope we can collectively reckon with another terrifyingly awesome atmospheric event: the hottest year.
Multiple relentless heat waves occurred in 2023, with much of the globe experiencing 20 more “heatwave days” than in the previous three decades. The annual-average temperature was 1.48 C above the pre-industrial average, just shy of the 1.5 target set by the Paris Agreement – and an astonishing 0.17 C hotter than the ... Read more ...
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No, EVs are Not Worse for the Planet - Legal Planet (Apr 5) |
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Apr 5 · If you have somehow managed to escape the frenzied political headlines about electric vehicles, first I envy you and second, I must regrettably inform you that the EV has become an acronym of partisan rancor on par with IVF, DEI, and CRT. There’s a lot of reasons for this electric car culture war: President Biden has made EVs central to his climate and economic policies. They intersect with labor politics and growing tensions with China. And cars remain a symbol of American freedom, so the idea of regulating them is an easy boogeyman for Republicans who want to exploit the rural-urban divide.
It’s tempting for climate policy people to just ignore the car culture war, ... Read more ...
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Ranking the Candidates’ Focus on Energy & Climate - Legal Planet (Apr 4) |
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Apr 4 · I thought it would be helpful to provide some kind of objective measure of how much various candidates focus on energy and climate. I based this on how extensively they discuss these issues on their websites. By this ranking, Biden came in first - surprisingly, ahead of progressives Jill Stein and Cornel West.
Also surprisingly, RFK Jr. and Jill Stein came in last in terms of focus on climate change. In fairness, Stein endorsed the general idea of a Green New Deal but provided little explanation. Kennedy’s environmental tab is fairly long, but says little about climate change. Still, neither one presented any sort of climate plan.
My measure is simple if maybe a little ... Read more ...
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The 'Year of Climate’ in International Courts - Legal Planet (Apr 2) |
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Apr 2 · “The Year of Climate in International Courts” by guest contributor Rebecca Hamilton was originally published on Just Security
This year promises to be the 'Year of Climate’ in international courts and tribunals with opinions slated to be coming down from the European Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, and the International Court of Justice. The European Court of Human Rights will decide on three contentious cases brought by individual applicants, and the other three courts will issue advisory opinions at the request of different States. But all cases overlap to some degree on the question of ... Read more ...
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Ripped from the Headlines - Legal Planet (Apr 1) |
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Apr 1 · Here’s a selection of recent headlines, which I only wish I had made up for April Fool’s Day.
“Earth just had its hottest year ever recorded - by far.” - NBC
“Hurricanes are getting so intense, scientists propose a Category 6” - Washington Post
“Parts of Amazon rainforest could tip toward collapse by 2050, study warns.” – Washington Post
“Critical Atlantic Ocean current system is showing early signs of collapse, prompting warning from scientists.” –- CNN
“Scientists discover an alarming change in Antarctica’s past that could spell devastating future sea level rise.” - CNN
Those headlines look like they’re taken from a dystopian science ... Read more ...
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A Word on Congestion Pricing - Legal Planet (Mar 28) |
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Mar 28 · Yesterday, New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority approved the city’s long-planned and hotly debated congestion pricing program, the first of its kind in the US. The program will involve a $15 toll for vehicles entering midtown or lower Manhattan, with discounts for some qualifying drivers and credits for bridge and tunnel tolls so drivers aren’t double-charged. It is expected to raise about $1 billion annually for transit and transportation investments.
The plan is already being challenged in court by the expected mix of outer-borough and neighboring state representatives who call the plan an unfair tax on commuters and right-wing groups that oppose regulation and ... Read more ...
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Election 2024: The Current Outlook - Legal Planet (Mar 28) |
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Mar 28 · Last November, it appeared that the Democrats had a small edge in terms of electoral votes. In congressional races, however, the Republicans had the edge in the Senate and perhaps the House. Since then, the electoral vote situation has become foggier, gerrymandering in North Carolina has given the Republicans a bit more of an advantage in the House, and the Senate has become an even tougher battle for the Democrats.
As I said in November, not being a political expert, I’m relying on two respected political website, Sabato and Cook . Here are the reasons for the shifts since then:
There are still a lot of unknowns in terms of the presidency and the House. The improving ... Read more ...
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Florida is a Climate-Denying Hellscape - Legal Planet (Mar 27) |
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Mar 27 · Take the latest, science-backed climate policies that are gaining traction in state houses around the country - and then do the exact opposite. That seems to be the Florida playbook for dealing with the climate crisis facing Floridians in the form of rising sea levels and deadly temperatures.
This legislative session, state lawmakers in the Sunshine State focused on erasing climate change from their laws, killing offshore wind, and banning local heat protection ordinances that are meant to keep people safe in the hottest state in the nation.
Last year, residents of Miami suffered through 46 straight days of the heat index topping 100 degrees while coastal waters rose to ... Read more ...
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New Bill Takes Up Local Oil Drilling Phase-Outs - Legal Planet (Mar 25) |
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Mar 25 · When the California Supreme Court ruled last August that Monterey County could not enforce its voter-approved ban on new oil and gas wells, lawyers for Chevron said the company was “pleased” to end the 7 years of litigation. Monterey County is home to the eighth-largest oil field in California, so there was plenty at stake on the face of the case. But this legal battle was about much more than the San Ardo Oil Field; it was the latest in a line of coordinated legal efforts to sow confusion and doubt about the scope of local power to limit oil and gas drilling in cities and counties throughout California.
Hopefully, Assembly Bill (AB) 3233––a new bill introduced last Friday by ... Read more ...
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Critical Insights on the Mineral Boom: Part III - Legal Planet (Mar 21) |
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Mar 21 · The topic of critical minerals and the energy transition is one of choices and priorities, at least according to author and journalist Ernest Scheyder, who spoke at the second panel in our recent “Powering the Future” symposium. This panel, Critical Minerals and Global Supply Chains, discussed some of the fundamental choices that governments, industry, and individuals have made and will make in the coming years to facilitate the energy transition. It also spoke to how we can––and must––navigate an uncertain future as we move from an extractive economy built on fossil fuels to a still-extractive economy built on lithium and other critical minerals.
It’s an issue that implicates ... Read more ...
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How Can Cities Deliver Equitable EV Charging to the Curbside and Public Right of Way? - Legal Planet (Mar 21) |
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Mar 21 · As California and other states transition to one hundred percent zero-emission new vehicle (ZEV) sales by 2035, local governments will play a crucial role in addressing inequities in the ZEV transition. Limited access to abundant and reliable charging equipment remains a key barrier to ZEV adoption for all, and city governments can lead efforts to broaden charger availability. Specifically, cities can help coordinate stakeholders, streamline permitting processes, and elevate innovative charging models that orient electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure toward equity-centered practices.
Curbside and public right-of-way (PROW) locations are a key venue for city governments to lead ... Read more ...
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The New EPA Car Rule Doesn’t Violate the Major Questions Doctrine - Legal Planet (Mar 21) |
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Mar 21 · In West Virginia v. EPA, the Supreme Court struck down the Obama-era Clean Power Plan. The heart of the ruling was that EPA had engaged in a power grab, basing an unprecedented expansion of its regulatory authority on an obscure provision of the statute. Conservative groups have claimed since then that virtually every government regulation raises a major question. But the doctrine cannot be read that broadly.
In particular, the doctrine does not apply to the emission standards for cars that EPA issued yesterday. As EPA explains in its prologue to the rule, the car standard is very different from the Clean Power Plan.
In striking down the Clean Power Plan, the Supreme ... Read more ...
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The Changing Politics of Coal - Legal Planet (Mar 19) |
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Mar 19 · The “War Against Coal” was a major conservative theme eight years ago. Now it seems almost forgotten even by Donald Trump, who was once coal’s caped crusader. But although protecting coal production is no longer much of a national issue, keeping coal-fired power plants open has percolated as an issue at the state level. It remains to be seen how long increasingly uneconomic coal generators remain online.
In 2016, Trump was all in for coal. Donning a miner’s helmet in a swing through West Virginia, he pretended to shovel coal while the crowd chanted, “Trump Digs Coal.” By 2020, however, a United Mine Workers union spokesman said he couldn’t remember the last time Trump had said ... Read more ...
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Critical Insights on the Mineral Boom - Legal Planet (Mar 18) |
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Mar 18 · A couple hundred miles north of the Las Vegas strip at Rhyolite Ridge you’ll find a dusty yellow wildflower called Tiehm’s buckwheat that grows nowhere else in the world. But this flower sits atop a massive, untapped lithium reserve that would help the U.S. transition to cleaner energy. Now, what if you had to choose between approving this much-needed mining operation and preserving this unique flower?
In a way, you do have to choose. We all do. We’re in a race for lithium, copper, cobalt, nickel, and other critical minerals needed to move away from fossil fuels. Elected officials, policymakers, and courts are at this moment struggling to strike the right balance between that ... Read more ...
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Replacing McConnell - Legal Planet (Mar 14) |
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Mar 14 · Who will lead the Senate in 2025? The odds are that it will be a Republican. Democrats have a slim margin and face some close races, while all the GOP seats seem secure. That makes the question of who will replace Mitch McConell as GOP leader all the more important for climate and energy policy.
Here are two top possibilities. Neither of them is by any stretch of the imagination an environmentalist. Yet you have to say one thing in their favor: neither is half as anti-environmentalist as their national party leader, Donald Trump.
John Cornyn (TX). LCV score of 7%, just below Mitch McConnell’s lifetime score of 9% s third of Susan Collins’s score. Cornyn’s Senate ... Read more ...
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How to Cooperate with China on Climate - Legal Planet (Mar 13) |
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Mar 13 · China is the world’s largest producer of both CO2 emissions and green technology to cut those emissions. It installed more solar panels last year than the U.S. has in its history, and yet keeps building coal-fired plants too. And Chinese officials just announced that the country will accelerate the construction of solar, wind and hydropower. So, China plays an outsized and even paradoxical role in deploying clean energy technologies to address the climate crisis.
To predict what the future might hold, it helps to consult history. Joanna Lewis’ recent book, “Cooperating for the Climate” does that by examining the motivations, science, and politics behind international clean ... Read more ...
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States May Be Warming to Green Amendments - Legal Planet (Mar 12) |
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Mar 12 · Last week, New Jersey lawmakers and a variety of stakeholders crammed into a statehouse committee room for a relatively rare legislative hearing. This 2-hour hearing centered on New Jersey’s proposed green amendment, which committee chair Senator Bob Smith described as “a very controversial topic” as he gaveled in the meeting. This green amendment would add a constitutional guarantee to a healthy, clean environment. Advocates have been pushing for such a hearing for years. Dozens of supporters spoke up for the legislation while a handful of corporate lobbyists and executives read statements against the bill.
In 2024, these kinds of hearings may take place more and more in ... Read more ...
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Fifteen Years of Legal Planet - Legal Planet (Mar 11) |
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Mar 11 · A decade and a half ago, the law school here announced the launch of a new environmental law blog by Berkeley and UCLA. The March 11, 2009 press release began:
“The University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Berkeley Law) and UCLA School of Law today announced the launch of a new blog, Legal Planet, which provides insight and analysis on climate change, energy, and environmental law and policy. This collaborative blog draws upon the individual research strengths and vast expertise of the law schools’ think tanks and legal scholars.”
I should probably note while March 2009 was the official launch announcement for Legal Planet, we did some trial blog posts ... Read more ...
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The global conversation about solar geoengineering just changed at the UN Environment Assembly. Here’s how. - Legal Planet (Mar 8) |
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Mar 8 · As we wrote in part 1, a Swiss-led proposal to the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA) to establish an expert group on solar radiation management (SRM) proved divisive and was eventually withdrawn. Here we explore why, and what that means for any global conversation about SRM.
SRM has long generated concerns that, as a powerful lever on the Earth system, it could have unwanted side-effects and generate political and ethical risks, as well as lowering temperatures. But rules and norms about such technologies are patchy, and recent unauthorized experiments have set alarm bells ringing.
With good will on all sides, a UNEA resolution might have been a step towards a genuinely ... Read more ...
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Countries failed to agree first steps on solar geoengineering at the UN. What went wrong? - Legal Planet (Mar 7) |
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Mar 7 · In the last weeks, diplomats from all over the world were negotiating more than twenty draft resolutions at the UN Environment Assembly (UNEA). The Assembly is a biennial intergovernmental meeting which sets the global environmental agenda. It also sets the strategy for the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), and outlines policy responses to address emerging environmental challenges. In amongst proposals regarding plastic pollution, air quality, pesticides and circular economies, to mention but a few, the most controversial was a Swiss-led proposal to establish an expert group on solar radiation modification (SRM).
Back in 2019, at the last face-to-face Assembly, the Swiss ... Read more ...
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The SEC’s Watered-Down Climate Rule - Legal Planet (Mar 6) |
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Mar 6 · After months of discussion, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) voted 3-2 to adopt climate reporting standards that will mandate publicly-traded companies disclose some of their greenhouse gas emissions. The SEC’s rule was proposed way back in 2022, and the initial draft would have required companies to disclose their “Scope 3” supply chain emissions, in addition to the “Scope 1” and “Scope 2” direct and indirect emissions the final rule includes. Those Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions need only be reported to the extent they are “material,” further limiting which corporate emissions are subject to disclosure requirements.
The rule’s adoption comes months after ... Read more ...
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Actually, EV Sales Are Right on Track - Legal Planet (Mar 4) |
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Mar 4 · There is a lot of talk about weak consumer demand for EVs - doleful from greens, triumphant from others. Maybe US carmakers have hit a few speed bumps –not surprising when trying to rapidly ramp up a product that’s new to most consumers. But the reality is actually quite reassuring in terms of the U.S. market. Globally, the picture is even rosier for EVs, with the big open question being whether U.S. carmakers are going to be shoved to the curb by the Chinese.
Let’s start by looking at projections when Congress passed the Inflation Reduction Act’s big push for electric vehicles. How do actual sales compare with the predictions? In 2020, the Energy Information ... Read more ...
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Misusing Carbon Removal as a Climate Response - Legal Planet (Feb 29) |
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Feb 29 · It seems clear that in some form, carbon removal is going to be an important component of climate policy, especially later in the century to deal with carbon levels that overshoot the targets in the Paris Climate Agreement. The problem is not with the concept but with its misuse. One of the risks that comes with such good ideas is that they provide cover for poorly conceived and badly executed policies. A trio of recent articles in the leading research journal Science highlights that risk.
The most recent article of the three focuses don a specific carbon removal strategy, forest restoration. Forest restoration seems like an unambiguously good idea. It promises to undo the ... Read more ...
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California Year In Fire Report - Legal Planet (Feb 28) |
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Feb 28 · On behalf of CLEE and the Climate and Wildfire Institute (CWI), and with additional support from the Moore Foundation, I am pleased to announce publication of the California Year in Fire Report. Wildfire and the risk of wildfire impact far more than acres burned. This Report is an effort to provide a more multi-dimensional view of those impacts, incorporating measures of resilience, public health, and environmental impact. The Report was conceived of, researched, and written by Leana Weissberg, who is now the California Director of American Forests. Leana undertook the project at the instigation of CWI when she was a research fellow at CLEE.
This is from Leana’s Introduction ... Read more ...
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RFK Jr. Joins the War on Climate Scientists - Legal Planet (Feb 27) |
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Feb 27 · Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made headlines when a Super PAC supporting his presidential bid ran a pricey Super Bowl ad, stealing the look of a famous 1960 spot for his uncle John F. Kennedy. But he got far less attention for another move that says a lot about his campaign: He has tapped Del Bigtree to run his communications team. Bigtree, like RFK Jr., is a well-known anti-vaccine activist. But he also voices full-throated conspiracy theories denying the reality of human-caused climate change.
Here’s what we know about the campaign’s chief communicator. Del Bigtree is an LA-based producer of conspiracy theory content. He leads the Informed Consent Action Network, or ICAN, a ... Read more ...
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America’s Leading Environmental Court - Legal Planet (Feb 26) |
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Feb 26 · The state court on the cutting edge of environmental law is a long way from the major population and media centers, which may be one reason it doesn’t get much attention. It deserves more. The Hawaiian Supreme Court has been forging new paths in environmental law that may lead the way for other courts in years to come.
Environmental rights. In 2023, the court issued two major decisions relating to climate change. The first case, In re Hawaii Electric Co. , involved a biomass power plant’s request to sell energy to a utility. The power plant planned to use offsets from planting trees to achieve carbon neutrality.
The state’s Public Utility Commission (PUC) found that ... Read more ...
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Recentering Environmental Law: A Thought Experiment - Legal Planet (Feb 22) |
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Feb 22 · In 1965, scientists sent LBJ a memo mentioning the risks of climate change. Imagine if history had been a little different. Suppose it had been this memo and a follow-up report, rather than Rachel Carson’s attack on pesticides, that sparked the environmental movement. How would environmental law look different and how might we be thinking about it differently?
First of all, we would have had a very different understanding of the air pollution problem. We thought that the key to reducing air pollution was to require better pollution control devices. Instead, we would have understood that the root problem was the burning of fossil fuels in the first place. Conventional pollution ... Read more ...
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California’s Climate Leadership: A Timeline - Legal Planet (Feb 21) |
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Feb 21 · The Golden State has adopted a slew of climate change laws over the past twenty years, and an even greater number of regulations . To help you keep track, here is a timeline of California’s most important actions.
2002
SB1078. California established first renewable portfolio standard (20% from renewables by 2010).
AB 1493 (Pavley Act). Required the California Air Resources Board (CARB) to set standards for greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) new vehicles.
2006
AB 32. Required state to reduce emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and gave broad authority to CARB to implement the standard.
AB 1803. Required CARB to create an inventory of GHG emissions. Read more ...
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New Bill Targets Carbon Dioxide Pipeline Leaks - Legal Planet (Feb 20) |
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Feb 20 · Guest contributor Jennifer Imm is a J.D. Candidate at UCLA Law (2L)
Last week, Assemblymember Dr. Joaquin Arambula introduced AB 2623, a bill designed to guard California communities against the dangers of transporting carbon dioxide in pipelines. These risks aren’t hypothetical: A leak from a carbon dioxide pipeline already caused serious health harms in Satartia, Mississippi, where 45 people were hospitalized following a pipeline rupture in early 2020. Firsthand accounts of that mass poisoning described a white cloud shooting into the sky, hundreds of people evacuated, and unprepared first responders. Fortunately, nobody died, but an investigation showed deaths would have ... Read more ...
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Ranking Presidents on Climate Change - Legal Planet (Feb 19) |
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Feb 19 · Although a 1977 memo alerted Jimmy Carter to the problem of climate change, the first tentative responses to climate change didn’t emerge until he left the White House. Since then, there have been seven very different men in the White House. You may find the rankings surprising. Here’s how I would rank them, from best to worst:
If you wonder about some these rankings — like where the Bushes and Regan rank — keep reading to find out my reasons.
Ronald Reagan & George H.W. Bush’s surprising roles.
Readers today are accustomed to think of Republicans as bitter opponents of climate action, but that was not true four decades ago. In 1983, Reagan’s EPA warned ... Read more ...
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I ? IRA - Legal Planet (Feb 14) |
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Feb 14 · Call me eccentric, but this is my Valentine to a federal statute, the Inflation Reduction Act, better known as the IRA.
No one really expected IRA to pass. A version of the Green New Deal had passed the House. But the Democrats had only a one-vote margin in the Senate, and that one vote was Joe Manchin. Manchin was (and is) the least liberal Democrat in the Senate. On top of that, he represented West Virginia. That’s a place where coal is still King and Trump beat Biden by forty points in 2020. Biden didn’t come close to carrying even a single county, that’s how Red the state is.
The Senate majority lead Chuck Schumer engaged in long, fraught negotiations with Manchin ... Read more ...
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We Crossed 1.5 C. Did We Breach the Paris Agreement? - Legal Planet (Feb 14) |
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Feb 14 · If you’re not a climate scientist - and maybe even if you are - reading news headlines this month has been confounding and a little scary. “In First, Earth’s Temperature Breached Key Threshold Over a 12 Month Period” is how the Wall Street Journal put it. “Earth Just Experienced 12 Months Of Global Temperatures Above Critical 1.5C Climate Threshold,” was the version at Forbes. And the Washington Post went with “Earth Breached a Feared Level of Warming Over the Past Year. Are We Doomed?” Oof, we get the picture. If that weren’t enough, new research on sea sponges made for a second wave of stories that declared the “The World Blew Past 1.5 Degrees of Warming 4 Years Ago.”
My ... Read more ...
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A New Strategic Plan for California Offshore Wind - Legal Planet (Feb 12) |
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Feb 12 · For those following offshore wind development in California, January 19, 2024, marked an important moment - the release of the long-awaited Draft Assembly Bill 525 Offshore Wind Strategic Plan from the California Energy Commission (CEC). Some important foundations for offshore wind, a new but growing industry in California, had already been laid. Assembly Bill 525 (AB 525, Chiu, Chapter 231, Statutes of 2021) lent momentum to the development of offshore wind in the state by identifying important next steps that the CEC should take in coordination with other agencies. After AB 525 was signed into law, the CEC set offshore wind state planning goals in 2022 (2 to 5 gigawatts (GW) by ... Read more ...
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Climate Election 2024: “Drill, Baby, Drill” but Then What? - Legal Planet (Feb 8) |
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Feb 8 · If you’ve missed the sound of a crowd shouting “Drill, Baby, Drill” you’re in luck. That chant is back in vogue, as the general election heats up. The 2008-era slogan is shorthand for the Trump campaign’s energy policy, but we know much more about current conservative thinking on the subject thanks to Project 2025, the 920-page transition plan for the next administration by policy strategists from the Heritage Foundation.
The right-wing approach to energy in this critical 2024 election is straightforward: The U.S. should prop up fossil fuels, constrain renewables wherever possible, and claw back the federal government’s historic investments in clean energy, while reinvesting ... Read more ...
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The Long Life and Sudden Demise of Federal Wetlands Protection - Legal Planet (Feb 7) |
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Feb 7 · It’s no wonder that one EPA staffer’s reaction to the Supreme Court ruling was a single word: “Heartbroken.” In 2023, the Supreme Court ended fifty years of broad federal protection to wetlands in Sackett v. United States. It is only when you look back at the history of federal wetland regulation that you realize just how radical and destructive this decision was. For instance, under the Court’s reasoning, a Reagan Administration regulation would be considered a blatant environmentalist overreach.
Here’s a timeline of the major events.
1972,
Congress passes the Clean Water Act, which requires a federal permit for filling or dredging in ... Read more ...
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