Kazue Asano / Flickr By Moosa Zaidi, S23 Environmental Clinic Student The recent $11 billion settlement in a suit against Monsanto over the herbicide Roundup might lead some to think we are winning the battle on regulating harmful chemicals in the environment, but in reality we are still losing the war.… read more
What's New in Environmental Law
The Energy Transition: Balancing Climate and Cultural Harms
By Nina Reed, S23 Environmental Clinic Student The climate crisis has spurred a number of changes across industries. One avenue used to tackle the issue of climate change has been the through the clean energy transition. As the burning of fossil fuels remains the dominant cause of global warming, there have… read more
The Need for Inclusive Siting in Energy Infrastructure Development
By Tiphaine Kugener, S23 Environmental Clinic Student In the coming decades, the United States needs more power generation and energy transmission capacity to meet environmental goals and increasing energy demand. This means using more land. As of April 2021, the US energy sector takes up over 81 million acres of land,… read more
Wetlands: More than Just a Swamp, and Worthy of Legal Protection
Michael R Appleton, United Nations Development Programme in Europe and CIS / Flickr By Klara Henry, S23 Environmental Clinic Student Yes, sometimes they teem with mosquitoes. But wetlands are enormously important in supporting a range of animal and plant species–up to 40% of earth’s species live or breed in wetlands–and they… read more
Does the Participatory Model Work in Texas? We’ll See
U.S. Fish And Wildlife Service By Emma Edmund, S23 Environmental Clinic Student The EPA has some work to do, at least according to almost 300 people from across the country, all of whom commented on the agency’s proposal to reduce methane in natural gas and oil development. Many of those… read more
Microplastics: A Look at Global Efforts to Slow Accumulation
Oregon State University / Flickr By Erin Hartmann, S23 Environmental Clinic Student Microplastics are tiny plastic particles (usually less than 5 millimeters in diameter) that do not readily break down into bio-friendly molecules. In fact, plastics can take hundreds to thousands of years to break down. While some microplastics are… read more
Chevron Deference: Dead, Alive, or Doomed?
Tony Webster / Flickr By Graham Rex, F22 Environmental Clinic Student Chevron has done wonderful things to protect the environment. No, not the company Chevron—I’m talking about Chevron, the legal doctrine. Under the Chevron doctrine, courts defer to agencies’ interpretations of ambiguous statutes, so long as such interpretations are reasonable.… read more
Mining after the Gold Rush
By Pleasant Garner, F22 Environmental Clinic Student Once I add a key-term to my Google Alerts, it is there forever. As a result, I stay passively apprised of my research topics of yore, even when the research is no longer relevant to my life. A search term I inputted years… read more
The Changing Face of the Legal Remedy in Environmental Justice Actions
Tim Hill / Pixabay By Beebs Hartzell, F22 Environmental Clinic Student Over the past decade, as climate activism has risen to the forefront of the national stage, there has been a correlative rise in attention to environmental justice. The goal of environmental justice, according to the EPA, is to provide… read more
America’s Foreign & Domestic Climate Migrants
John Englart / Flickr By Yuyan Pu, F22 Environmental Clinic Student The playbill for September’s political theater featured the surprising appearance of immigration amid record-breaking inflation and accelerating setbacks to reproductive rights. Taking the spotlight are Republican governors of Florida, Texas, and Arizona who have all created their respective state-funded… read more