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Direct implications are limited, but we’ll be reading the tea leaves for future implications. Scholars, lawyers, and judges will be spending a lot of time dissecting today’s ruling.   Overall, it’s a bit like yesterday’s World Cup game — EPA didn’t win outright but it didn’t lose either. Here are three key questions with some […]

Power plants are not only one of the nation’s largest sources of greenhouse gases, they are also a significant source of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulates, and mercury, all of which have direct public health and welfare consequences. EPA’s recently proposed Clean Power Plan, which applies Clean Air Act § 111(d) to reduce greenhouse gases […]

With little notice in the West, India has just launched the most far-reaching corporate social responsibility (CSR) program in the world.  The CSR law, which took effect April 1, requires large and mid-sized firms to contribute at least 2% of their pre-tax profits (averaged over the previous three years) to social, health, educational, or environmental […]

On Monday, June 9, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court decided CTS Corp. v. Waldburger, — U.S. —, — S. Ct. —, 2014 WL 2560466 (June 9, 2014), a case that posed the seemingly simple legal question of whether the federal Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (“CERCLA,” also known as Superfund), 42 U.S.C. §§ […]

OIRA should conduct a cost-benefit analysis of its own activities and explore alternatives to its current oversight methods. A White House office called OIRA polices regulations by other agencies in the executive branch.  OIRA basically performs the role of a traditional regulator – it issues regulations that bind other agencies, and agencies need OIRA approval before […]

The EPA’s June 2, 2014 announcement of a Clean Power Plan is momentous. On the surface, its scope, complexity, potential for myriad legal challenges and, not to mention, the difficulty of gathering reliable cost and benefit data, make it so. Mothers should advise their children to grow up to be energy lawyers, not cowboys.  However, what […]

On June 2, 2014, the United States Environmental Protection Agency issued its much awaited and debated proposed Clean Air Act Section 111(d) regulations to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from existing electric utility generating units, colloquially referred to as power plants.  And because the largest GHG emitters in this category are coal burning plants, such […]

Megan Herzog has done a great job of explaining the background of the rules and summarizing the proposal in her blog posts.  I just wanted to add a quick note about how EPA has structured its rules in light of possible legal challenges.  The fundamental issue facing EPA is how to define the “best system” for […]

Today, Center for Progressive Reform Member Scholar Robert Verchick published an op-ed in New Orleans’ Times-Picayune entitled, “Gov. Jindal, don’t sign away our legal claims against BP.” The piece notes: Governor Jindal will probably sign SB469, a bill designed to neutralize the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority – East’s lawsuit against oil and gas companies. But does […]