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Full-Text Articles in Law
Investigating 40 C.F.R. Sec. 124.55(B): State-Court Review Of Npdes Permit Certifications, Tad Macfarlan
Investigating 40 C.F.R. Sec. 124.55(B): State-Court Review Of Npdes Permit Certifications, Tad Macfarlan
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
This Note investigates the wisdom and validity of 40 CER. § 124.55(b), a Clean Water Act regulation promulgated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as part of the National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permitting program. The Clean Water Act provides affected states with an opportunity to certify federally administered NDES permits before issuance by EPA. State certification is a meaningful moment in water quality regulation, and judicial review of these critical decisions takes place in state courts. Unfortunately, 40 C.ER. § 124.55(b), designed to bring certainty and finality to permit-holders, effectively removes state courts from the process of …
Environmental Deliberative Democracy And The Search For Administrative Legitimacy: A Legal, Positivism Approach, Michael Ray Harris
Environmental Deliberative Democracy And The Search For Administrative Legitimacy: A Legal, Positivism Approach, Michael Ray Harris
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
The failure of regulatory systems over the past two decades to lessen the environment degradation associated with modern human economic output has begun to undermine the legitimacy of environmental lawmaking in the United States and around the world. Recent scholarship suggests that reversal of this trend will require a breach of the environmental administrative apparatus by democratization of a particular kind, namely the inclusion of greater public discourse within the context of regulatory decision-making. This Article examines this claim through the lens of modern legal positivism. Legal positivism provides the tools necessary to test for and identify the specfic structural …
Nepa In The Hot Seat: A Proposal For An Office Of Environmental Analysis, Aliza M. Cohen
Nepa In The Hot Seat: A Proposal For An Office Of Environmental Analysis, Aliza M. Cohen
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
Judicial deference under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) can be problematic. It is a well-established rule of administrative law that courts will grant a high degree of deference to agency decisions. They do this out of respect for agency expertise and policy judgment. This deference is applied to NEPA lawsuits without acknowledging the special pressures that agencies face while assessing the environmental impacts of their own projects. Though there is a strong argument that these pressures undermine the reasons for deferential review, neither the statute nor the courts have provided plaintiffs with adequate means to remedy this problem. Agency …
The Dilution Of The Clean Water Act, Mark C. Van Putten, Bradley D. Jackson
The Dilution Of The Clean Water Act, Mark C. Van Putten, Bradley D. Jackson
University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform
This Article argues that the zero discharge goal of the Clean Water Act is more than naive rhetoric. To the contrary, it is the Act's raison d'être, and it is woven into the fabric of the Act's operative provisions. So understood, the zero discharge goal can and should provide continuing guidance for EPA's implementation of the Act.