Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection Submits RGGI Regulations for Legislative Approval
The Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (“DEP”) has submitted for legislative approval regulations to control carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and establish a CO2 emissions credit program.[i] The controversial regulations are designed to fulfill Connecticut’s commitment to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (“RGGI”), which establishes a CO2 emissions cap and trade program for power plants in nine Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic states.[ii] RGGI is designed to be a model for a broader, national market-driven program to establish a market value for greenhouse gas (“GHG”) emissions to provide incentives for reducing GHG emissions over the long term.
Carbon dioxide is the most significant GHG by volume. Unlike many other pollutants emitted by the combustion of fossil fuels, there are no commercially available control technologies to limit CO2 emissions. Therefore, programs to reduce GHG emissions focus on improving energy efficiency, reducing the use of fossil fuels through conservation efforts, and using renewable and alternative fuels.
[i] Proposed Conn. Agencies Regs. § 22a-174-31 and 31a.
[ii] Information about RGGI can be found at http://rggi.org.
Delaware Environmental Law Update
On May 15, 2008, Delaware enacted legislation that will affect the transfer or closing of facilities in Delaware where chemical or hazardous substances have been or are located. The legislation establishes three principal requirements for affected facilities. First, prior to the transfer of a facility, the parties to the transaction must conduct "All Appropriate Inquiry" as defined in Delaware's Hazardous Substances Cleanup Act, and all documents prepared or identified pursuant to such inquiry must be submitted to the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC). Second, if an affected facility terminates its operations or files for bankruptcy, certain requirements must be completed no later than 90 days after termination of all business or activities at the facility, including certification of the removal of the chemicals or hazardous substances from the facility. Third, financial assurance will be required for transferred facilities or new facilities, in an amount to ensure that, upon termination, abandonment or liquidation of activities at the facility, all appropriate means will be taken to stabilize and secure the facility.
The legislation will become effective upon the promulgation by DNREC of facility transfer regulations. DNREC will begin the development of regulations to implement this legislation in late summer or early fall and is expected to promulgate regulations in early 2009.
If you have any questions about this Delaware Corporate Update , or other legal issues, please contact a Richards, Layton & Finger attorney.
WHOA THERE
Broad statement of underlying support cannot sustain EPA regulatory definition of navigable waters [1]
EPA’s broad regulatory reach on navigable waters is rejected by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.
Setting aside the EPA’s regulatory definition of navigable waters, the D.C. Circuit Court found the EPA’s definition was inadequately explained in light of recent United States Supreme Court cases. Oil producing facilities that add pollutants to navigable waters were required to develop spill prevention, control and counter measure plans under a Clean Water Act regulation that broadly defined navigable waters. Affected industry participants and associations successfully challenged the regulation.
The question became whether in promulgating a regulation in an area where there has been recent Supreme Court activity whether the EPA considered all the relevant factors. If it did not, plaintiffs argued the EPA’s decisions were arbitrary and capricious or a clear error of judgment. The EPA argued while concise, its explanation was adequate. Its explanation came in a response to a comment and provided in part: “The case law supports a broad definition of navigable waters, such as the one published today, and that definition does not necessarily depend on navigability in fact.”[2]
The court could not reconcile, however, recent cases, that do not define navigable waters as broadly as in the EPA’s expansive rule. Noting recent courts have reined in the reach of the definition of navigable waters to not reach the fullest extent of the commerce clause, the court found inadequate EPA’s brief comment statement. Thus, the court agreed the EPA rule was not the product of reasoned decision making and struck it.
[1] American Petroleum Ind. v. Johnson, No. 02-2247 (D.D.C. March 31, 2008) (LEXIS 24963).
[2] 2002 SPCC Rule, 67 Fed. Reg. at 47,075.
Is Massachusetts Showing the Way Towards a Comprehensive Environmental Law?
I. Introduction
In Massachusetts, the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) recently announced two significant new initiatives. In October 2007, Massachusetts became one of the first states in the nation to require assessment of greenhouse gas emissions as part of an environmental policy act review process, issuing its final MEPA Greenhouse Gas Emissions Policy and Protocol (“GHG Policy”). The policy requires proponents of projects subject to the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act, or MEPA, M.G.L. ch. 30, §§ 61-62I, to assess the greenhouse gas impacts of such developments. The requirement applies not only to direct impacts, such as stack emissions, but also to indirect impacts, such as electricity demand and traffic generation.
Second, In January 2008, EEA issued a draft guidance for public comment on “Integrated MEPA/Permitting Review.” The purpose of the Integrated Review Guidance is to make the MEPA process the true focus of a comprehensive review of project permitting, in order to avoid the more haphazard coordination between MEPA and permitting agencies that has been the rule in the past.
Both of these developments are important in their own right for anyone practicing environmental law or doing development in Massachusetts. However, they are significant for another reason as well -- in both of these efforts, one can detect a glimmer of an effort by EEA to craft one comprehensive environmental protection statute for Massachusetts.
Continue Reading...Evans v. Walter Industries, Inc. - The Heightened Pleading Standards Announced In Bell Atlantic v. Twombly Apply To Toxic Tort Cases
I. Introduction
On May 21, 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Bell Atlantic Corporation v. Twombly, 127 S.Ct. 1955; 167 L.Ed. 2d 929, announced a new standard for testing the sufficiency of pleadings in the face of a motion to dismiss. The Court set aside the rule in Conley v. Gibson, 355 US 41; 78 S.Ct. 99; 2 L.Ed. 80 (1957), which held that a complaint should not be dismissed unless it could be shown that it was not possible, pursuant to the pleadings, to demonstrate any set of facts which would support recovery; instead, the Court said that the appropriate test was whether the allegations of the complaint, if taken as true, would support the conclusion that recovery was “plausible.” In overruling Conley, the Court said, of the “possible” standard, “*** after puzzling the profession for 50 years, this famous observation has earned its retirement. The phrase is best forgotten as an incomplete, negative gloss on an accepted pleading standard ****.”
Bell Atlantic was an anti-trust case based on the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. Many commentators suggested that the Bell Atlantic standard would only apply to matters (such as anti-trust) where the requirements of a statute dictated specific pleading requirements, that the Court had not intended to completely change the standards for testing the sufficiency of complaints.
Shortly after the Bell Atlantic decision, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama was faced with the question in Evans v. Walter Industries, case no. 1:05-CV-01017-KOB. The Alabama court held the “plausible” standard applicable to a putative class action toxic tort case and it dismissed the case, with prejudice, against one of the Defendants.
As noted below, this decision could have significant implications in other Superfund cases if the federal courts, generally, reach the same conclusion.
Continue Reading...Kansas Agency Denies Air Quality Construction Permit for Coal-Fired Generating Units Based Solely on Projected CO2 Emissions
On October 18, 2007, the head of the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), Secretary Roderick Bremby, denied an air quality permit application for two proposed 700-megawatt coal-fired generating units to be constructed in Holcomb, Kansas. The application was submitted by Sunflower Electric Power Company as part of a planned $3.6 billion expansion of an existing facility. The Secretary’s decision to deny the permit was based solely on the projected carbon dioxide emissions from these units and the impact of such emissions on climate change. Carbon dioxide is not specifically regulated as an air pollutant in Kansas.
In announcing his decision, which rejected the recommendation of agency staff that the permit be granted, the Secretary stated “I believe it would be irresponsible to ignore emerging information about the contribution of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to climate change and the potential harm to our environment and health if we do nothing.” The expanded facility was projected to release an estimated 11 million tons of carbon dioxide annually. The Secretary did not indicate at what level projected carbon dioxide emissions would, in his opinion, threaten human health and the environment. Thus, the Secretary left open the question of how other CO2 emitting facilities would be regulated in Kansas in the future. Although a number of states have entered into regional initiatives or enacted legislation designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions over time, it is believed that KDHE’s outright denial of an air quality permit based solely on perceived “excessive” emissions of an unregulated greenhouse gas is a first in the nation.
The cited legal support for the decision is an opinion of the Kansas Attorney General that, notwithstanding specific statutes or rules regulating air emissions, K.S.A. 65-3012 gives KDHE the broad authority to take any permitting or other action deemed necessary should the Secretary make a factual determination that a particular emission constitutes an air pollutant and that such emissions threaten health or the environment. The “factual determination” supporting the Secretary’s conclusion that carbon dioxide is an air pollutant and that this particular facility’s projected carbon dioxide emissions would constitute a threat to health and the environment is not apparent from the permit denial decision.
On November 16, 2007, Sunflower Electric Power Corporation filed two lawsuits seeking to overturn KDHE’s permit denial decision challenging the legal authority for the agency’s decision.
Not surprisingly, the KDHE’s permit denial decision has generated substantial controversy. A media campaign was immediately launched by those opposing the KDHE’s decision. The theme of that campaign is that the Secretary’s claimed authority could logically be extended to other facilities and potentially other unregulated emissions to the general detriment of the state and its ability to attract and retain business.
In a subsequent action perceived as an attempt to diffuse this criticism, the Secretary announced the decision to approve an air quality permit for an ethanol plant, notwithstanding the facility’s carbon dioxide emissions. Although the projected CO2 emissions from the ethanol facility are substantially less than those of the proposed coal-fired generating plant, the KDHE’s approval of the ethanol plant permit did not elaborate on the specific factual and scientific bases for distinguishing the facilities. Thus, it remains unclear in Kansas what quantity of projected carbon dioxide emissions may exceed the unspecified level deemed by KDHE to constitute an unacceptable global warming threat.
State law-makers in both chambers of the legislature are presently considering several bills directed at the Secretary’s permit denial decision. Provisions of the various bills include legislation specifically “over-turning” the Secretary’s decision, the enactment of phased-in limitations on CO2 emissions with a “carbon tax” penalty for violators, and a variety of alternative energy incentives and requirements. Most of the bills being considered are being opposed by the governor and environmental groups as being hastily conceived and inadequate to meet the future health and regulatory challenges of greenhouse gas emissions in the state.
For more information please contact Charles Efflandt, practice group leader of the Environmental and Natural Resources team, Foulston Siefkin L.L.P., Wichita, Kansas http://www.foulston.com.
Climate and the Courts
The Supreme Court ruled last term that climate change can be regulated under federal law. But will the continuing lack of action by Congress, the Environmental Protection Agency, and most states be replaced by new litigation by activist states and public interest organizations against government agencies and private parties? Is this an area where litigation will, or alternatively should, fill a void left by meaningful government activity? When EPA separately receives a record-breaking 100,000 comment letters on the request by California to waive the Clean Air Act’s barrier to state regulation of greenhouse gases from motor vehicles, one realizes that the public’s demand for concrete action is urgent. A legitimate fear, however, is that these petitions and lawsuits could produce a patchwork response to global warming where a comprehensive national strategy is called for.
Continue Reading...NRDC v. Winter -- Green Trumps the Blue and Gold -- National Security Takes a Back Seat to Natural Resources
I. INTRO On January 3, 2008, a federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California imposed substantial restrictions on the U.S. Navy’s use of mid-frequency active (MFA) sonar in waters off the California coastline. Although details of the restrictions and their immediate impact on the Navy can readily be discerned by reviewing the judge's order, the reverberations of this order may have a much broader impact that could further enhance the role of environmental lawyers. Until recently, few might have predicted the success of an environmental challenge to military operations -- especially given our country's current military operations abroad. The California court's much-anticipated order is the latest word in an ongoing debate over MFA sonar operations in potentially close proximity to marine mammals, an activity decried by environmental groups and vigorously defended by the Navy. The U.S. military has generally been able to defend questionable practices by emphasizing the overall importance of those practices to national security. As the Supreme Court noted twenty years ago, "unless Congress specifically has provided otherwise, courts traditionally have been reluctant to intrude upon the authority of the Executive in military and national security affairs."[1]
California v. U.S. EPA--Fighting for the Last Word on Mobile Source Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Following the United States Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Massachusetts v. EPA, deciding that greenhouse gases are a pollutant under the Clean Air Act, a federal-state skirmish has emerged in the climate change arena over mobile source emissions. The United States Government estimates that the transportation sector accounts for approximately one-third of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. Over the past months, the question of how to reduce those emissions has evolved into a dramatic political and legal battle, pitting California’s Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger against U.S. President George Bush.
The stage for this tussle was set long ago when Congress adopted the federal Clean Air Act and included in the law a special provision for California. Specifically, Section 209(a) of the Clean Air Act prohibits individual states from adopting emission standards for new motor vehicles. However, in recognition of California’s unique smog problems, a subsection (b) was added to enable California to adopt standards more stringent than federal standards so long as it applies for and obtains a waiver from the U.S. EPA. As one court recently explained, under Section 209(b), “Congress has essentially designated California as a proving ground for innovation in emission control regulations.” Other states are then free to adopt California’s standards pursuant to Section 177 of the Clean Air Act, so long as the standards are adopted at least two years before the model year that they regulate.
In 2002, California invoked its unique Clean Air Act authority to address greenhouse gas emissions from mobile sources. In particular, the State passed AB 1493 requiring the California Air Resources Board to develop and adopt regulations for the greenhouse gas emissions of passenger automobiles and light duty trucks. In September of 2004, the Air Resources Board adopted standards that apply to such vehicles beginning with model year 2009. As required by the Clean Air Act, California then requested a waiver from the U.S. EPA so that the standards could enter into force. While the waiver request was pending, no less than sixteen other states lined up to adopt California’s standards—for all practical purposes, the California standards were poised to become the de facto national standard.
Automobile manufacturers challenged those regulations in federal courts in both Vermont and California, arguing that the state automobile emission standards for greenhouse gases constituted fuel efficiency standards, and that fuel efficiency standards are exclusively regulated by the federal government under the Environmental Policy and Conservation Act (“EPCA”).[1] Both courts rejected the manufacturers’ challenges, deciding that federal law did not preempt California’s ability to affect fuel economy through the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles, so long as the U.S. EPA granted a waiver under the Clean Air Act—the stage was set for a showdown between California and the U.S. EPA.
The U.S. EPA played its hand slowly. During the summer of 2007, the U.S. EPA held hearings on California’s waiver request. Perhaps foreshadowing its upcoming decision on the request, the U.S. EPA then announced in the fall that it would begin its own “Rulemaking To Address Greenhouse Gas Emissions From Motor Vehicles,” planning for the adoption of federal regulations by October 2008. Finally, the shot was fired on December 19, 2007, when Stephen Johnson, the U.S. EPA Administrator, held a press conference announcing his agency would not grant a waiver to California’s regulation. At the same time, President Bush signed a new energy bill, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, requiring a fleet average of thirty-five miles per gallon by 2020 and an annual production of thirty-six billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2022.[2] In making the announcement, Johnson specifically cited Bush’s recent signing of the bill and said, “The Bush administration is moving forward with a clear national solution, not a confusing patchwork of state rules. I believe this is a better approach than if individual states were to act alone.”
Retaliation came swiftly. Little more than two weeks after Johnson’s announcement, California, along with 15 other states and five environmental groups, petitioned the Ninth Circuit on January 2, 2008, for review of the waiver denial. In the lawsuit, California will need to make the case that its regulation under Section 209 was necessary to “meet compelling and extraordinary conditions.” As a coastal state with limited fresh water resources, the effect of climate change on California may indeed be severe, involving rising sea levels, a reduction in the Sierra snow pack, and higher temperatures that would exacerbate the state’s ozone nonattainment problem, which is already the worst in the nation. A recent Stanford University study added fodder to this argument when it found Californians’ health will be disproportionately affected by greenhouse gas emissions, because the state is home to six of the most polluted cities in the United States. California will also need to make the case under section 209, that its standards “will be, in the aggregate, at least as protective of public health and welfare as applicable Federal standards.” To that end, the California Air Resources Board released a January 2, 2008, assessment that concludes the federal law, even when fully implemented, will not be as effective as California’s standards at reducing greenhouse gas emissions from new vehicles. Even if California is successful, California’s regulation will have to be modified as it was to apply to 2009 model cars—models that will shortly be coming to market.
The EPA’s first legal maneuver in response to California’s petition may be to request a transfer from the Ninth Circuit to the more agency-friendly D.C. Circuit. Most challenges of EPA regulations must be filed in the D.C. Circuit—the relevant jurisdictional trigger being whether the action has “nationwide scope or effect.” While the issue of the waiver makes its way through the courts, the U.S. EPA’s rulemaking will also go forward. To meet its goal of final action by October 2008, the U.S. EPA will have to move quickly, with the public comment period coming by summer 2008 at the latest.
As these battles are fought, looming on the horizon is a general election in November, and a new federal administration beginning in January of 2009. If the U.S. EPA adopts regulations in October 2008 that do not go as far as the California standards, yet another legal challenge seems almost inevitable, if for no other reason than to stall any final rule until the administration changeover. When the dust does settle, presumably in 2009, the road to mobile source emission reductions will finally be paved.
Michèle Corash is a partner in the international law firm of Morrison & Foerster LLP and a member of the firm’s environmental law practice group. She served as General Counsel of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from 1979 to 1982 and previously as Deputy General Counsel for the U.S. Department of Energy and Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. Ms. Corash has consistently been listed in American Lawyer’s Corporate Counsel among the “Best Lawyers in America for Environmental Law” and in numerous other publications as being at the top of her field. She represents companies on a broad range of state, national and international environmental issues and claims regarding exposure to toxic substances. With the experience of being a former General Counsel of the EPA, Ms. Corash is well versed, and has been for many years, in the evolving area of clean technology, renewable resources and climate change. She advises clients on the many issues now facing corporations as they face the challenges of new technologies, infrastructures, markets and regulatory regimes.
Contact information: mcorash@mofo.com or (415) 268-7124
[1] Adopted in 1975, EPCA provides for the establishment of national corporate average fuel economy (“CAFÉ”) standards that apply to all passenger automobiles and light duty trucks.
[2] Coincidentally, at the same time, the European Commission adopted a proposal for legislation to dramatically reduce the average carbon dioxide (“CO2”) emissions of new passenger cars by 2012. If adopted by the European Parliament, the proposal requires, by 2012, a fleet average of 130 grams of CO2 emissions per kilometer, with another 10 grams per kilometer reduction from alternative sources such as biofuels and more efficient air-conditioning. Considering Europe’s cars currently emit on average 160 grams of CO2 per kilometer, this represents an almost twenty percent reduction of CO2 emissions in four years.
Conferences and Events
The ACOEL group will be meeting on January 31st during the Lex Mundi North American Regional Conference in Miami. The meeting will take place at the Miami office of the law firm Akerman Senterfitt, from 12:15 - 2:45.
