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Full-Text Articles in Law

Environmental Injustice And The Problem Of The Law, Uma Outka Nov 2017

Environmental Injustice And The Problem Of The Law, Uma Outka

Maine Law Review

Over the past fifteen years, legal academia has produced a sizeable body of scholarship on the widely acknowledged problem of environmental injustice. Although there have been positive responses in the policy arena, no similar level of concern is evident in the courts. Most legal claims directly addressing environmental injustice fail, recent developments in civil rights case law are discouraging, and current constructions of environmental laws are proving theoretically inadequate to protect communities already subjected to disproportionate toxic exposure or threatened by new pollution. This Comment explores the state of the law of environmental justice and offers an analysis of why …


Pope Francis, Laudato Si', And U.S. Environmentalism, Jonathan Z. Cannon, Stephen Cushman Nov 2017

Pope Francis, Laudato Si', And U.S. Environmentalism, Jonathan Z. Cannon, Stephen Cushman

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

No abstract provided.


Measuring Brief (Cordelia Lear), Haley Chee, Mahesh Cleveland, Kevin Yolken Nov 2017

Measuring Brief (Cordelia Lear), Haley Chee, Mahesh Cleveland, Kevin Yolken

Pace Environmental Law Review Online Companion

No abstract provided.


Measuring Brief (Brittain County, New Union), Spencer Newman, Davis Vaughn Nov 2017

Measuring Brief (Brittain County, New Union), Spencer Newman, Davis Vaughn

Pace Environmental Law Review Online Companion

No abstract provided.


Measuring Brief (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service), David Sheaffer, Caitlin Brown, Jacob Simon Nov 2017

Measuring Brief (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service), David Sheaffer, Caitlin Brown, Jacob Simon

Pace Environmental Law Review Online Companion

No abstract provided.


Water Security, Rhett B. Larson Nov 2017

Water Security, Rhett B. Larson

Northwestern University Law Review

Climate change, as the dominant paradigm in natural resource policy, is obsolete and should be replaced by the water security paradigm. The climate change paradigm is obsolete because it fails to adequately resonate with the concerns of the general public and fails to integrate fundamental sustainability challenges related to economic development and population growth. The water security paradigm directly addresses the main reasons climate change ultimately matters to most people—droughts, floods, plagues, and wars. Additionally, this new proposed paradigm better integrates climate change concerns with other pressing global sustainability challenges—including that economic development and population growth will require 50% more …


The Detroit Frontier: Urban Agriculture In A Legal Vacuum, Jacqueline Hand, Amanda Gregory Oct 2017

The Detroit Frontier: Urban Agriculture In A Legal Vacuum, Jacqueline Hand, Amanda Gregory

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.


The Natural Capital Crisis In Southern U.S. Cities, Blake Hudson Oct 2017

The Natural Capital Crisis In Southern U.S. Cities, Blake Hudson

Chicago-Kent Law Review

No abstract provided.


The Key To Engaging With The Sdgs: Utilizing Rio Principle 10 To Succeessfully Implement The U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, Taís Ludwig Oct 2017

The Key To Engaging With The Sdgs: Utilizing Rio Principle 10 To Succeessfully Implement The U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, Taís Ludwig

Sustainable Development Law & Policy

No abstract provided.


A "Delicate Balance": How Agency Nonacquiescence And The Epa's Water Transfer Rule Dilute The Clean Water Act After Catskill Mountains Chapter Of Trout Unlimited, Inc. V. City Of New York, Kevin J. Haskins Oct 2017

A "Delicate Balance": How Agency Nonacquiescence And The Epa's Water Transfer Rule Dilute The Clean Water Act After Catskill Mountains Chapter Of Trout Unlimited, Inc. V. City Of New York, Kevin J. Haskins

Maine Law Review

Congress enacted the Clean Water Act (CWA) in 1972 with the express objective of restoring and maintaining the health of the nation’s waters. To achieve this objective, Congress declared that discharges of pollutants into the nation’s waters are prohibited unless they comply with permit requirements. The CWA’s primary vehicle for regulating discharge permits is the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES. The CWA defines the phrase “discharge of a pollutant” as the “addition of any pollutant to navigable waters from any point source.” Although the CWA further defines the terms “pollutant,” “navigable waters,” and “point source,” it fails to …


Report And Recommendations Concerning Environmental Aspects Of The New York State Constitution, New York State Bar Association Environmental And Energy Law Section Oct 2017

Report And Recommendations Concerning Environmental Aspects Of The New York State Constitution, New York State Bar Association Environmental And Energy Law Section

Pace Law Review

The purpose of the Report is to inform and enrich understanding of environmental issues which may be considered at a Constitutional Convention (should one occur) or with respect to proposals to amend the Constitution through the legislative process.


Updating New York’S Constitutional Environmental Rights, Nicholas A. Robinson Oct 2017

Updating New York’S Constitutional Environmental Rights, Nicholas A. Robinson

Pace Law Review

The stakes are high as New York State considers whether to amend the constitution. The electorate contemplates the gathering crises of sea level rise, disruption of weather patterns, intensified summer heat waves, and other climate change impacts. New York also faces escalating environmental problems, which the newly perceived climate impacts in turn exacerbate. It is timely to debate whether or not New York should recognize the right to the environment to its constitution. In 2016, the House of Delegates of the New York State Bar Association adopted the report of its committee on the constitution, regarding the environmental conservation article …


Subnational Environmental Constitutionalism And Reform In New York State, James R. May Oct 2017

Subnational Environmental Constitutionalism And Reform In New York State, James R. May

Pace Law Review

The State of New York’s constitution was perhaps the first in the world to embody environmental constitutionalism, most directly in what is known as its “Forever Wild” mandate from 1894. In contrast to many subnational environmental provisions, courts in New York have regularly enforced Forever Wild. New York’s Constitution also contains a remarkable mandate that every twenty years voters decide whether to hold elections for delegates to convene a convention to amend the state’s constitution, with the next such opportunity on November 7, 2017. This article explores how subnational constitutionalism from around the world informs discussions about whether and how …


Environmental Restorative Justice, Aiden Stark Oct 2017

Environmental Restorative Justice, Aiden Stark

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Section I briefly introduces this article. Section II discusses the gravity of environmental crimes. Section III highlights the history of environmental criminal prosecution. Section IV explains how environmental crimes are currently prosecuted. Section V demonstrates how restorative justice procedures work. Section VI critiques the only previous analysis applying restorative justice to environmental crimes in the United States. Section Vll walks through Australian Justice Preston's analysis, which provides a proper foundation for applying restorative justice to environmental crimes. Section VIII applies Justice Preston's framework to criminal procedures in the United States. Section IX discusses criticisms that will be raised by bringing …


Does One Size Fit All? The Importance Of State Natural Resource Damage Assessment Laws, Elizabeth Conti Jun 2017

Does One Size Fit All? The Importance Of State Natural Resource Damage Assessment Laws, Elizabeth Conti

Catholic University Law Review

Natural Resource Damage Assessments (NRDAs) are necessary for the purpose of ensuring restoration and revitalization to natural resources harmed or destroyed by environmental contaminations, whether natural or manmade. Many federal laws such as the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), the Oil Pollution Act (OPA), and the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (CWA) are available to assess damages to natural resources. However, their effectiveness is limited due to factors such as lack of resources and funding, political intervention, and a multitude of damages to assess spread throughout the country. Many states have taken the lead in enacting NRDA …


Lights Out: Decommissioning The American Nuclear Plant, Joseph D. Mcmanus Apr 2017

Lights Out: Decommissioning The American Nuclear Plant, Joseph D. Mcmanus

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

This article seeks to examine the United States commercial nuclear power plant decommissioning process, a look into a subject that begins at the end of a nuclear plant's life. The subject is often overlooked in favor of the more dominant and controversial issue of when and where a federal spent nuclear fuel repository will be established. But to overlook the American nuclear plant decommissioning process would be a missed opportunity to understand what happens after a nuclear plant permanently ceases power operations-a process that has the potential to last decades and affect the plant's local community through economic and environmental …


Do Mess With Texas ... ? Why Rolling Easements May Provide A Solution To The Loss Of Public Beaches Due To Climate Change-Induced Landward Coastal Migration, Carolyn Ginno Jan 2017

Do Mess With Texas ... ? Why Rolling Easements May Provide A Solution To The Loss Of Public Beaches Due To Climate Change-Induced Landward Coastal Migration, Carolyn Ginno

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

This paper explores the viability of rolling easements in California as well as how they might be implemented. California has the opportunity to use rolling easement doctrine to fill the public policy vacuum created by the Severance decision. By messing with Texas; precedent, California could utilize rolling easements to preserve public access to its beaches in the wake of coastal inundation resulting from climate change.
Determining whether and how rolling easements might be used in California requires an understanding of climate change as a man-made phenomenon and the impacts it has on coastal property. The next sections will outline this …


Moving The Legal Needle Of Western Climate And Energy Options, Steven Ferrey Jan 2017

Moving The Legal Needle Of Western Climate And Energy Options, Steven Ferrey

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

All fifty U.S. states are not legally equal on energy options. The Western states are different from others in three notable regards, when assessing the possibilities and tools available to dictate their future energy landscapes. That future will not be based as much on traditional fossil fuel use. There will be a transition to more use of renewable energy, such that the majority of future electric power additions will be comprised of renewable energy.[1] For context, fossil fuels are transportable within the U.S.;either by pipeline or surface transport. Renewable energy is fixed in place and in its raw form is …


Enter Sandman: The Viability Of Environmental Personhood To Us Soil Conservation Efforts, Thomas E. Johnson Jan 2017

Enter Sandman: The Viability Of Environmental Personhood To Us Soil Conservation Efforts, Thomas E. Johnson

Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment & Technology Law

The US agricultural system relies on healthy soil for economic and environmental stability. The federal government established soil conservation efforts following the Dust Bowl, and state and local entities later developed legal tools to supplement soil conservation. These efforts, however, are insufficient to protect the nation's soil in the face of a changing climate. Conservation techniques are available that could substantially mitigate the effects of climate change, but the federal government lacks the tools to encourage their uniform adoption. The rigidity of prior state efforts, moreover, has disabled some landowners from adapting conservation lands to modern challenges. This Note recommends …