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Full-Text Articles in Law

From Ship To Shore: Reforming The National Contingency Plan To Improve Protections For Oil Spill Cleanup Workers, Rebecca Bratspies, Alyson Flournoy, Thomas Mcgarity, Sidney A. Shapiro, Rena I. Steinzor, Matthew Shudtz Aug 2010

From Ship To Shore: Reforming The National Contingency Plan To Improve Protections For Oil Spill Cleanup Workers, Rebecca Bratspies, Alyson Flournoy, Thomas Mcgarity, Sidney A. Shapiro, Rena I. Steinzor, Matthew Shudtz

Faculty Scholarship

Eleven workers died on April 20, 2010, when the Deepwater Horizon oil drilling platform exploded beneath them. Since then, tens of thousands of workers have toiled under difficult conditions to stop the leak and clean up the mess. For these workers, the spill is more than an environmental and economic disaster; it poses straightforward and serious risks to their health and safety. Oil is toxic, as are the dispersants used liberally by BP to contain it. BP’s foul up is not the first significant oil spill in the nation’s history, nor even the first in the Gulf. The oil companies …


Ecosystem Services And The Clean Water Act: Strategies For Fitting New Science Into Old Law, J.B. Ruhl Jan 2010

Ecosystem Services And The Clean Water Act: Strategies For Fitting New Science Into Old Law, J.B. Ruhl

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

This Article explores the administrative reform potential that exists for integrating new knowledge about ecosystem services into Clean Water Act (CWA) regulatory programs as an example for all environmental laws. Part II of the Article reviews the relevant general rules of federal administrative law governing agency interpretation of the policy space available under statutory authority for integrating new science into decision making. Part III then explores the strategies an agency such as EPA can use under those rules to integrate the concept of ecosystem services into regulatory programs by searching for statutory provisions to support what I call "direct protection" …


Crimes On The Gulf, David M. Uhlmann Jan 2010

Crimes On The Gulf, David M. Uhlmann

Articles

The explosion that rocked the Deepwater Horizon oil rig on April 20, 2010, killed 11 workers and triggered the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. After six weeks of failed efforts to stop the gushing oil and protect the fragile ecosystem of the Gulf of Mexico and the communities along its shores, President Obama pledged on June 1 that “if our laws were broken . . . we will bring those responsible to justice.”