Environmental Law

From its inception in 1970, modern environmental law has been a joint venture between the federal government and the states. When Congress enacted the Clean Air Act (CAA) of 1970 1 it crafted the model for much of the pollution control legislation enacted in the ensuing decade. Commonly referred to as cooperative federalism, the model entailed delegating authority to a federal agency, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), to enact standards and take other action to achieve clean air protection and enhancement goals 2 and inviting states to participate in implementation, permitting, and enforcement. 3 With some variations, Congress built subsequent statutory efforts to protect water quality and prevent land pollution along similar lines, 'shar[ing] governmental responsibilities for regulating private activity' with the potential to create environmental harm between the federal government and the states. 4 In the environmental context, cooperative federalism involves federal 1

The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the legal profession and the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation. It works closely with the scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and with a wide range of governmental, nongovernmental and academic organizations.

The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the legal profession and the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation. It works closely with the scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and with a wide range of governmental, nongovernmental and academic organizations.

The judge who called for a climate tutorial in a federal court in San Francisco accepted the science that says that human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide play the central role in rising average global temperatures, increased sea levels, and coastal floodingbut threw out a lawsuit calling for financial reparations from the oil companies for causing these problems. Why? And what might the decision mean for other cases in other states, along similar lines, that are still in the works? Two environmental lawyers, one of whom was in the courtroom for the tutorial, explain.

Despite the high certainty of our looming climate catastrophe fossil fuel production and consumption, and the greenhouse gas emissions that result, are increasing. In the United States, fossil fuel production reached record levels in 2018, and oil and gas pipelines are being constructed at an unprecedented pace. The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) provides the legal framework for the federal government to evaluate the climate impacts of these supply projects, such as leasing public lands and approving pipelines and export terminals. Yet, while federal agencies have begun to analyze how such projects impact climate change there are major inconsistencies in agency practice as well as questions about the accuracy and integrity of these assessments. Some agencies are seeking to avoid any meaningful analysis of GHG emissions, others are downplaying the significance of GHG impacts, others are claiming that the impacts are too uncertain to inform the agency’s decision. There is no...

There have been several proposals to include a “climate change displacement coordination facility” in the upcoming UNFCCC agreement, but there has been very little public discussion about what this facility would entail and how it would operate. This briefing note highlights some of the functions that the displacement coordination facility could fulfill, as well as some key questions for negotiators in the lead-up to COP 21 and subsequent talks. The note is not intended to be a proposal for how the facility should operate, nor do the functions highlighted below necessarily reflect what is politically or economically feasible. Rather, the note is intended to outline a broad array of considerations for decision-makers as they contemplate whether and how to proceed with the displacement coordination facility.

Federal climate regulations are currently under attack, in part due to the perception that these regulations will impose excessive costs on regulated industries and society as a whole. But according to federal projections, the benefits of these regulations would significantly outweigh the costs. We added up the projected economic impacts of major federal rules aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and found that the net benefits could reach nearly $300 billion per year by 2030. The rules will also generate a variety of non-monetized benefits, such as improved public health outcomes and the creation of jobs, as well as climate mitigation benefits that will extend well beyond 2030.

In recent years, there has been a marked increase in the number of lawsuits seeking to hold governments and private actors accountable for failure to take action on climate change. Climate change attribution science—which examines the causal links between human activities, global climate change, and the impacts of climate change—plays a central role in many of these lawsuits. Attribution science is rapidly evolving, both in regards to attributing impacts and extreme events to climate change and in attributing greenhouse gas emissions to particular actors—and so too is its role in the courtroom and in policymaking. Armed with a growing body of evidence linking increases in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations to specific harmful impacts, plaintiffs are pursuing more ambitious claims against governments and emitters for their contribution to, or failure to take action on, climate change. The Law and Science of Climate Change Attribution examines how attribution science is used in...

The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the legal profession and the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation. It works closely with the scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and with a wide range of governmental, nongovernmental and academic organizations.

This report describes the results from a survey of 238 federal Environmental Impact Statements (EISs) published from July 2012 through December 2014. The report includes a general overview of trends across all EISs, as well as an analysis of how climate change is addressed in the context of specific types of projects, such as fossil fuel development and natural resource management. We find that Federal agencies generally do account for climate change when conducting environmental reviews of projects that will generate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions or be affected by climate-related phenomena such as sea level rise. However, the percentage of EISs that address specific considerations related to climate change varies considerably depending on the type of project that is being reviewed and the lead agency. The scope and depth of the analysis also vary considerably, both within and across different project categories.

This report describes how climate change will affect natural resources in the United States, and explains why consideration of how climate change will affect those resources is necessary in order to fulfill legal requirements under NEPA and other statutes governing the management of these resources. It also presents examples of how climate change has been meaningfully accounted for in environmental review and planning documents. The accompanying protocol contains guidelines for considering the impacts of climate change in environmental reviews as well as other planning documents (e.g., resource management plans and resource assessments).

The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the legal profession and the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation. It works closely with the scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and with a wide range of governmental, nongovernmental and academic organizations.

This article, published in the Environmental Law Reporter, examines how the federal agencies that manage natural resources and public lands can account for the current and future impacts of climate change in their management activities. It finds that the federal agencies responsible for managing these resources have generally recognized that considerations pertaining to climate change adaptation should be incorporated into existing planning processes, yet this topic is still treated as an afterthought in many planning documents. Only a few federal agencies have published guidance on how managers should consider climate change impacts and their management implications. This Article explains why these agencies are legally required to consider climate-related risks in planning processes, and presents recommendations and a model protocol for conducting this analysis.

The Sabin Center for Climate Change Law develops legal techniques to fight climate change, trains law students and lawyers in their use, and provides the legal profession and the public with up-to-date resources on key topics in climate law and regulation. It works closely with the scientists at Columbia University's Earth Institute and with a wide range of governmental, nongovernmental and academic organizations.

Climate change poses an enormous risk to plant and animal species across the planet. Mean global temperatures have already increased by approximately 1ºC, causing environmental changes that affect species abundance, distribution, behavior, physiology, genetics, and survival prospects. These changes, combined with other human stressors, have already resulted in the extinction of some species and imperiled many others. Some scientists describe this as the “Holocene” or “Anthropocene” mass extinction event. The fate of many vulnerable species will depend on emissions trajectories and mitigation efforts. But there is also a compelling need for adaptive species management in the context of a changing climate. In the U.S., the Endangered Species Act (ESA) is the primary legal vehicle for the protection and management of species at risk of extinction. The statute and accompanying regulations outline a science-based framework for identifying endangered and threatened species, establishing c...