Tag Archives: standing

Establishing Standing in Citizen Suits Under the Clean Air Act: Breathing Polluted Air May Not Suffice

Earlier this month, Judge William Young dismissed for lack of standing claims brought by the Conservation Law Foundation alleging that bus companies violated anti-idling regulations.  The opinion is important, because it does not make life easy for citizen plaintiffs and it provides something of a roadmap for defendants to follow in challenging plaintiffs’ standing.

The Court addressed both the injury in fact and traceability requirements. … More

Did the 5th Circuit Just Make Standing Much More Difficult?

Last week, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals vacated a $20M penalty imposed on ExxonMobil for Clean Air Act violations at its Baytown facility, remanding the case for a more particularized review by the District Court regarding whether the plaintiffs have demonstrated that they have standing with respect to all of the violations committed by ExxonMobil.  The Court held that it is not enough to show that each of the claims in the complaint are traceable to ExxonMobil’s conduct. … More

Trees Don’t Have Standing and Lake Erie Does Not Have a Bill of Rights

Almost 50 years ago, Christopher Stone published “Should Trees Have Standing,” suggesting that the natural world should be given legal rights to ensure its protection for future generations.  It is not, I say with my usual gift for understatement, an idea that has taken widespread hold in legal systems in the United States.  It has had broad philosophical influence, however, and attempts are made periodically to implement Stone’s idea. … More

Broken Record Department; EPA Loses Another Delay Case

On Monday, District Judge Haywood Gilliam imposed a schedule on EPA for review of state plans under EPA’s 2016 rule for emissions from municipal solid waste landfills.  The ruling is notable for two reasons.

Because EPA did not dispute that it had missed certain deadlines, its first line of defense wasn’t that it complied with the statute; it was that the states challenging EPA’s delay did not have standing. … More

Shooting Fish In a Barrel: EPA Loses Another Regulatory Delay Case

On Wednesday, EPA lost yet another regulatory delay case.  After the Obama EPA promulgated rules updating requirements concerning certification and use of “restricted use pesticides” in January 2017, the Trump EPA purported to delay the rule’s implementation date five separate times.  According to the Court, EPA provided no notice and opportunity to comment on four of those occasions; once, they provided a four-day (yes, four) comment period.… More

How Imminent Are the Impacts of Climate Change in Everett?

Yesterday, Judge Mark Wolf dismissed part of the Conservation Law Foundation’s claims in its litigation against ExxonMobil concerning ExxonMobil’s Everett Terminal facility.  The opinion is both interesting and pleasurably concise – a rare combination!

Judge Wolf found that CLF had credibly alleged that the Terminal is violating its NPDES permit.  Importantly, he also found that CLF stated that there is:

substantial risk”… More

A Substantive Due Process Right to Climate Change Regulation? What’s a Lonely Apostle of Judicial Restraint To Do?

Late last week, Magistrate Judge Thomas Coffin concluded that the most recent public trust Mosaic_of_Justinianus_I_-_Basilica_San_Vitale_(Ravenna) (1)case, which seeks an injunction requiring the United States to take actions to reduce atmospheric CO2 concentrations to 350 parts per million by 2100, should not be dismissed.

The complaint here is similar to, but broader than, others of its ilk.  As we noted previously, at least one federal court has already held that there is no public trust in the atmosphere. … More

Easy Cases Make Better Law — Standing Edition

In an interesting, but not really difficult, decision on Tuesday, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals found that the National Association of Home Builders did not have standing to challenge a consent decree pursuant to which the Fish and Wildlife Service agreed to a schedule for moving 251 species from “warranted-but-precluded” status under the ESA to either warranted or unwarranted.  ontheesawaitinglistbannergunnison_sagegrouse_noppadolpao13225The FWS, short of resources to make final listing decisions under the ESA,… More

Proof and Causation Matter: District Court Declines to Penalize ExxonMobil in Texas Citizen Suit

On Wednesday, Judge David Hittner, of the District Court for the Southern District of Texas, in a decision long enough to require two separate pdfs, declined to impose an injunction or penalties (plaintiffs sought $642,697,500) against ExxonMobil in a Clean Air Act citizens’ suit brought by Environment Texas and the Sierra Club concerning the ExxonMobil facility in Baytown, Texas. baytown-night-lights_supporting_image (1) The plaintiffs lost even though Judge Hittner did find a number of violations of the CAA. … More

More Sauce For the Standing Goose: Industry Associations Cannot Challenge EPA’s E15 Rule

I have previously noted that standing is a double-edged sword.  Most commonly, the regulated community uses standing to keep citizen plaintiffs out of court.  However, as the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals demonstrated yesterday, the regulated community is sometimes hoist on its own collective petard.petard

The decision in Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers v. EPA in the challenge to EPA’s E15 rule wasn’t surprising. … More

An Update On Standing — Some Specifics Really Are Required

Last week, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed EPA’s approval of Nevada’s State Implementation Plan for regional haze against a challenge by WildEarth Guardians. The decision isn’t earthshaking.  However, because it found that WildEarth Guardians did not have standing to challenge EPA’s reasonable further progress determination for measuring visibility improvements, but did have standing to challenge EPA’s determination regarding the Best Available Retrofit Technology for the Reid Gardner Generating Station in northeast Nevada,… More

Citizens Are Not Harmed By the Concept of Pollution Trading: A Challenge to the Chesapeake Bay TMDL Is Dismissed

On December 13, the District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed plaintiffs’ challenge in Food and Water Watch v. EPA to the Chesapeake Bay TMDL’s discussion of pollution trading and offsets.  As I had previously noted, the TMDL itself already survived judicial challenge.

In this case, plaintiffs alleged that they would be harmed by trading of effluent discharge rights,… More

Standing Matters, TMDL Version

Last week, in Conservation Law Foundation v. EPA, Judge Mark Wolf ruled that CLF did not have standing to challenge EPA’s approval of total maximum daily loads promulgated for certain waters in and around Cape Cod.  Given the increasing number of citizen suits involving TMDL promulgation, the decision is important.

CLF asserted two claims.  First, it alleged that EPA wrongly classified certain sources,… More

MassDEP Issues Its Decision on the Palmer Bio-mass Facility: Right on the Merits, Wrong on Standing

I finally had an opportunity to review the recent Final Decision in In the Matter of Palmer Renewable Energy, concerning the proposed Palmer biomass facility. Last week, MassDEP Commissioner Ken Kimmell affirmed the Recommended Final Decision by Presiding Officer Timothy Jones, rejecting challenges by the Conservation Law Foundation to the air permit issued to the project by MassDEP. For practitioners, the case is important, but a decidedly mixed bag.… More