Law Commons^™

The Role Of Creative Language In Addressing Political Asymmetries: The Israeli-Arab Water Agreements, Itay Fischhendler, Aaron T. Wolf, Gabriel E. Eckstein

Gabriel Eckstein

International water agreements are often used as mechanisms for fostering and institutionalizing political cooperation. Yet, since water resources in many places are being driven to the edge of their natural limits, a number of international organizations have formulated legal principles and norms aimed at helping states resolve water disputes. While states have been urged to adopt these principles, it seems that they often embrace other less-traditional alternatives that may better address their own political needs. The aim of this study is to examine why states fail or decline to adopt several of the general principles of customary law formulated by …

Weed And Water Law: Regulating Legal Marijuana, Ryan Stoa

Ryan B. Stoa

Marijuana is nearing the end of its prohibition in the United States. Arguably the country’s largest cash crop, marijuana is already legal for recreational use in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, and Washington DC. Between now and election day 2016, an additional 14 states may place marijuana legalization initiatives on their ballots. In addition, 23 states and Washington DC have legalized medical marijuana, with up to seven states pending legislation. The era of marijuana prohibition is rapidly coming to a close. At the same time, traditional doctrines of water law are struggling to cope with the modern realities of water scarcity. …

Climate Change And Water Transfers, Jesse Reiblich, Christine A. Klein

Christine A. Klein

Climate change adaptation is all about water. Although some governments have begun to plan for severe water disruptions, many have not. The consequences of inaction, however, may be dire. As a report of the U.N. Environment Programme warns, “countries that adopt a ‘wait and see’ approach potentially risk the lives of their people, their ecosystems and their economies.” In the United States, according to one study, nearly 60% of the states are unprepared to deal with the impending crisis. Responding to this void, we offer what we believe is the first comprehensive, fifty-state survey of water allocation law and its …

Unnatural Resource Law: Situating Desalination In Coastal Resource And Water Law Doctrines, Michael Pappas

Michael Pappas

This Article offers the first legal analysis of desalination, the process of converting saltwater into freshwater. Desalination represents a key climate change adaptation measure because the United States has exploited nearly all of its freshwater resources, freshwater demands continue to grow, and climate change threatens to diminish significantly existing freshwater supplies. However, scholarship has yet to address the legal ambiguities that desalination raises in the context of property, water law, and coastal resource doctrines.

This Article addresses these ambiguities and suggests the legal adaptations necessary to accommodate desalination as a climate change adaptation. Under current legal doctrines, the chain of …

The Use Of The Public Trust Doctrine As A Management Tool Over Public And Private Lands, Patricia E. Salkin

Patricia E. Salkin

No abstract provided.

Integrated Eastern States Water Management: Borrowing From The Coastal Zone Management Act, Robert H. Abrams

Robert H Abrams

More robust planning and management is needed to confront new patterns of water use and increasingly extreme and less predictable variations in water availability. Items such as water allocation law, an incomplete array of water management objectives, and the comparatively rigid operating rules for water facilities, that in the past had barely mattered, are now much more important. Neither the water law of most Eastern states nor the existing water institutions are adequate to the needs of a less stable, and possibly shorter, water supply. The failure of adaptation has the potential to cause serious economic and environmental harm if …

Property Rights On The New Frontier: Climate Change, Natural Resources Development, And Renewable Energy, Alexandra B. Klass

Alexandra B. Klass

This Article explores the history of natural resources law and pollution control law to provide insights into current efforts by states to create wind easements, solar easements, and other property rights in the use of or access to renewable resources. Development of these resources is critical to current efforts to address climate change, which has a foot in both natural resources law and pollution control law. This creates challenges for developing theoretical and policy frameworks in this area, particularly surrounding the role of property rights. Property rights have played an important role in both natural resources law and pollution control …

Physical Takings, Regulatory Takings, And Water Rights, Josh Patashnik

Josh Patashnik

Alleged takings of property are divided into two broad categories: physical takings claims, which are categorically subject to compensation, and regulatory takings claims, which are analyzed under the multi-factor Penn Central test and rarely result in compensation being paid. This Article addresses the question of whether alleged takings of water rights should be treated as physical or regulatory takings. It is an increasingly salient question in the West, where growing conflict between federal environmental laws and appropriative water rights has resulted in a proliferation of takings claims over the past decade. Because whether a claim is analyzed as a physical …

The Last Stand Of The Wild West: Twenty-First Century Water Wars In Southern California, Shannon M. Baker-Branstetter

Shannon M Baker-Branstetter

In 2003, the Imperial Irrigation District of California agreed to transfer water from rural Imperial County to urban Southern California cities as part of a quantitative settlement agreement (QSA). The Colorado River water that the Imperial Irrigation District (IID) transferred to the wealthy coastal cities was held in trust for the residents of the Imperial Valley, the poorest county in the State. The following paper asserts that the IID Board of Directors breached its trust to the residents and farmers of Imperial County when it sold water rights to municipal districts in Southern California, thus acerbating the poor economic conditions …

Washington Water Rights, Denis Binder

Denis Binder

No abstract provided.