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Full-Text Articles in Law

Public Trust Doctrine Implications Of Electricity Production, Lance Noel, Jeremy Firestone Dec 2015

Public Trust Doctrine Implications Of Electricity Production, Lance Noel, Jeremy Firestone

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

The public trust doctrine is a powerful legal tool in property law that requires the sovereign, as a trustee, to protect and manage natural resources. Historically, the public trust doctrine has been used in relationship to navigable waterways and wildlife management. Despite electricity production’s impact on those two areas and the comparatively smaller impacts of renewable energy, electricity production has garnered very little public trust doctrine attention. This Article examines how electricity production implicates the public trust doctrine, primarily through the lens of four states—California, Wisconsin, Hawaii, and New Jersey—and how it would potentially apply to each state’s electricity planning …


Minimization Criteria For Off-Road Vehicle Use, Louisa S. Eberle Dec 2015

Minimization Criteria For Off-Road Vehicle Use, Louisa S. Eberle

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

President Nixon recognized the controversy surrounding off-road vehicle (ORV) use on public lands when he signed Executive Order 11,644 in 1972. The Executive Order set out minimization criteria that bound federal land management agencies’ ORV area and trail designations. Forty years later, agencies are still struggling to implement the minimization criteria. Recent court opinions have struck down implementation attempts by the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, and Forest Service. This note argues that agencies require additional guidance for ORV management, particularly in light of case law that sets a floor for achieving minimization. After examining how the mandate …