Energy and Utilities Law Commons^™

Beyond Tax Credits: Smarter Tax Policy For A Cleaner, More Democratic Energy Future, Felix Mormann

Articles

Solar, wind, and other renewable energy technologies have the potential to mitigate climate change, secure America's energy independence, and create millions of green jobs. In the absence of a price on carbon emissions, however, these long-term benefits will not be realized without near-term policy support for renewable energy. This Article assesses the efficiency of federal tax incentives for renewables and proposes policy reform to promote renewable energy more cost-effectively through capital markets and crowdfunding.

Federal support for renewable energy today comes primarily in the form of accelerated depreciation and, critically, tax credits. Empirical evidence reveals that only a fraction of …

Green Go! - The Military's Sustainability Mission, Felix Mormann

Articles

No abstract provided.

Energy Versus Property, Michael Pappas

Faculty Scholarship

This article is the first to detail the balance legislatures and courts have struck between private property rights and the compelling public interest in energy production. By examining how property rights have consistently yielded to energy development from colonial times to the most recent decisions involving hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”), it identifies a coherent energy/property balance that has shaped property expectations to accommodate energy needs. The article then applies this insight to current disputes pitting aggressive renewable energy policies— such as nuisance immunity or mandatory installations on private property— against fundamental property expectations— the right to exclude and the right to …

Fundamental Principles Of Law For The Anthropocene?, Nicholas A. Robinson

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

A wide array of questions arises from global change to confront environmental law. The IPCC has examined social decisions affecting the climate in the design of human settlements, transport systems, industrialisation, agriculture and silviculture, waste management, provisions for energy, and virtually all other socio-economic dimensions of human life. The AR-5, too, cannot avoid raising issues of human ethics and values at local and regional scales. Such issues reach environmental policy and law directly. The IPCC’s AR-5 report furthers widespread public debate about the human dimensions of climate change, and how social theory relates to environmental change. Already, climate change has …

Securitize Me: Stimulating Renewable Energy Financing By Embracing The Capital Markets, Andrew C. Fink

The University of New Hampshire Law Review

The current system of financing renewable energy projects is broken and inadequate, especially when compared to the framework for participating in oil and gas ventures. The solution lies in borrowing accepted energy business practices and adapting them to solar and wind energy projects. This Article focuses on the current issues facing renewable energy project financing in the United States, analyzes failed attempts to stimulate growth, and presents the securitization of renewable energy assets as a solution. Drawing on current legal structure and debates from the corporate sphere, this Article also discusses specific securitization techniques that can help to democratize and …

Environment, Energy, And Resources Law, Amanda Leiter

Contributions to Books

This chapter from The Year in Review, published by the ABA Section on Environment, Energy and Resources, covers developments during 2013 in the areas of standing, Commerce Clause, political question doctrine, preemption, takings, due process, First Amendment, Tenth Amendment, and state constitutional law.

Unilateral Climate Regulation, James W. Coleman

Faculty Journal Articles and Book Chapters

It is now plain that decades of negotiation toward a binding global climate treaty have failed. Yet, at the same time, many nations are adopting a range of unilateral policies to address climate change. The existing literature on climate policy neglects these unilateral climate regulations because it focuses on the necessity and possible design of a multilateral climate treaty. But these domestic regulations present a unique puzzle: given that climate outcomes are determined by global emissions, and that unilateral regulations inevitably influence incentives to regulate elsewhere, how can domestic action achieve the greatest marginal reduction in global emissions? In other …

Solving The Multimillion Dollar Constitutional Puzzle Surrounding State "Sustainable" Energy Policy, Steven Ferrey

Suffolk University Law School Faculty Works

The U.S. confronted a Constitutional impasse: The ability of state government to enact sustainable energy statutes and regulations is significantly restricted by successful recent Constitutional legal challenges to states actions This article identifies a solution to implement legally ‘bulletproof’ sustainable regulation at the state level, circumventing the major Constitutional impasse now frustrating U.S renewable energy policy

U.S. sustainable energy policy is principally implemented through state law and regulation, through five types of state programs. As implemented, these five policies are now being challenged as unconstitutional and improper exercises of state government authority. There is a legally “bright” jurisdictional line nowhere …

Utility Air Regulatory Group V. Epa: A Shot Across The Bow Of The Administrative State, Amanda Leiter

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

No abstract provided.

Electric Power Resource "Shuffling" And Subnational Carbon Regulation: Looking Upstream For A Solution, Jim Rossi, Andrew J.D. Smith

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

"Resource shuffling" occurs when different subnational approaches to carbon regulation create variations in the costs of production across jurisdictions. California is the most aggressive jurisdiction in the United States to address climate change and has adopted a cap & trade program for its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This Article addresses the resource shuffling issue presented by California's cap-and-trade program and evaluates the merits of various legal and regulatory solutions to the problem.

For The Birds: Wind Energy, Dead Eagles, And Unwelcome Surprises, Sam Panarella

Faculty Law Review Articles

Wind turbines kill birds. A lot of birds. You would be hard pressed to find someone who is happy with that fact, including anyone in the wind energy development community. But until and unless there are technological advances in wind turbine design that eliminate their deadly impact on birds, it is something we must accept. Of course, acceptance does not and should not mean issuing a blank check to wind energy developers to wantonly injure birds. To do so would violate both the spirit and letter of a host of environmental laws that have at their core a stubborn insistence …

Energy Versus Property, Michael Pappas

Publications

This Article is the first to detail the balance legislatures and courts have struck between private property rights and the compelling public interest in energy production. By examining how property rights have consistently yielded to energy development from colonial times to the most recent decisions involving hydraulic fracturing ("fracking'), it identifies a coherent energy/property balance that has shaped property expectations to accommodate energy needs. The Article then applies this insight to current disputes pitting aggressive renewable energy policies-such as nuisance immunity or mandatory installations on private property-- against fundamental property expectations: the right to exclude and the right to use …

Public Utility And The Low-Carbon Future, William Boyd

Publications

Substantial reductions in global power sector emissions will be needed by midcentury to avoid significant disruption of the climate system. Achieving these reductions will require greatly increased levels of financing, technological innovation, and policy reform. In the United States, the scale and complexity of the overall challenge have raised important questions regarding prevailing regulatory and business models, with much scrutiny directed at the traditional practice of public utility regulation. Recognizing the many valid criticisms leveled against public utility regulation and the important questions raised about the viability of traditional utility business models, particularly in the face of substantial growth in …

Broken At Both Ends: The Need To Reconnect Energy And Environment, Steven Ferrey

Suffolk University Law School Faculty Works

In the post-industrial economy, key national environmental laws and energy regulations can impose contradictory demands, pursuant to which it is impossible to comply with both. Do regulated companies follow orders to generate essential energy supply or adhere to environmental emissions limits or orders not to generate? The United States Congress and federal agencies have each ignored creating a critical joinder of national policy, and there is no judicial precedent to resolve this conflict. The conflict between energy and environmental regulation creates a new constitutional challenge of essential first impression.

Pentagon Preemption: The 5-Sided Loss Of Energy And Power, Steven Ferrey

Suffolk University Law School Faculty Works

States have attempted recently to regulate the unique form of electric energy as to its:

· Place – forcing power generation to locate in the state or leave the state

· Price – Providing a higher price for certain power generated in the state or requiring utilities and their ratepayers to pay above market prices for certain power

· Regulatory credit value -- Providing greater credits for in-state power or fuel

Some federal courts have struck state regulation of energy and climate change-related renewable technologies as constituting a violation preempted under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution in five dimensions. …

A Turquoise Mess: Green Subsidies, Blue Industrial Policy And Renewable Energy: The Case For Redrafting The Subsidies Agreement Of The Wto, Aaron Cosbey, Petros C. Mavroidis

Faculty Scholarship

Canada-Renewable Energy presented the WTO Panel and Appellate Body (AB) with a novel issue: at the heart of the dispute was a measure adopted by the province of Ontario whereby producers of renewable energy would be paid a premium relative to conventional power producers. Some WTO Members complained that the measure was a prohibited subsidy because payments were conditional upon using Canadian equipment for the production of renewable energy. The AB gave them right only in part: it found that a local content requirement had indeed been imposed, but also found that it lacked evidence to determine whether a subsidy …

The Value Of Solar Tariff: Net Metering 2.0, Karl R. Rábago

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Increasing numbers of customers are installing solar photovoltaic systems on their homes and businesses. As module and system costs decline, customer demand grows, and more businesses organize around the solar opportunity, it is time to revisit the tariff structure under which these systems integrate with and operate on the electric grid. This article details a novel approach to a distributed solar tariff, called the “Value of Solar” tariff (“VOST”), that addresses important utility and customer issues, and offers some significant improvements over traditional net metering approaches. There is a saying in the venture capital world to the effect that, “It …

Filling In The Holes In Whistleblower Protection Systems: Lessons From The Hanford Council Experience, Jonathan Brock

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Tribal Advocacy And The Art Of Dam Removal: The Lower Elwha Klallam And The Elwha Dams, Julia Guarino

American Indian Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Asserting Treaty Rights To Harness The Wind On The Great Lakes, Gerald Carr

American Indian Law Journal

No abstract provided.

The Climate Change-Sustainable Development Nexus: A Proposal For Convergence, Alvin K. Leong

Dissertations & Theses

This thesis is founded on the proposition that climate change and sustainable development are inextricably linked with each other and form a “nexus” that should be understood in a pragmatic and holistic way. Accordingly, the climate change “problem” cannot be adequately addressed in “silos” or by traditional output control techniques but instead should be viewed as a multidimensional challenge that calls for transformative change in the world energy sector in light of the wider contexts of sustainability and social equity. This thesis observes that with the emergence of a post-2015 development agenda and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the United …

Converting Natural Resources Into Electricity, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

This paper provides the groundwork for understanding the conversion of natural resources, such as wind, solar, biomass, and geothermal, into electric energy. It includes a summary of the current technologies and latest statistics on their distribution among states and on land and water. It also provides an introduction to some of the legal issues related to their deployment and interconnection with the electric grid.

Good-Bye Christopher Columbus Langdell?, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

The call of this Article was to take "A Prospective Look" at Environmental and Natural Resources Law for the next 40 years with a special focus on law school teaching. Daunted by the hubris involved in prognosticating so far into the future, this piece more modestly explores three areas in which law school teaching is currently changing: I. Methods of Presentation; II. Use of Skills Exercises; and III. Influence of Digital Technologies and the Internet. To add an empirical component, the author canvassed AALS members about pedagogies they used both in class and outside of classroom time, as well as …

Washington Environmental Law Year In Review, Abigail Pearl, Hunter Elenbaas

Washington Journal of Environmental Law & Policy

We are proud to present the first installment of the Washington Environmental Law Year in Review. This feature, which will be published annually in the Fall issue, will track significant developments in the environmental laws and regulations of Washington, and present a summary of these changes organized by topic.

The Columbia River Treaty's Canadian Entitlement: The Role Of Liberalized And Integrated North American Electricity Markets In A New Calculation, Kevin Kirkpatrick

Washington Journal of Environmental Law & Policy

The Columbia River Treaty between the United States and Canada may be terminated unilaterally by either nation beginning next year; this has brough attention within the Pacific Northwest and beyond to the 1964 agreement on river flows. Much of the discussion about updating the accord highlights important goals such as bettering the protection of fish and increasing public participation in ecosystem governance, but often neglects analysis of how electricity markets have changed over the past fifty years. This Comment, through an examination of key developments in utilities law and application of economic theory, attempts to parse principles that may prove …

The Undersigned Attorney Hereby Certifies -- The Washington Supreme Court Rule On Standards And Its Implications, Justice Sheryl Gordon Mccloud, Justice Susan Owens, Marc Boman, Joanne Moore

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

G Forces: Gideon V. Wainwright And Matthew Adler's Move Beyond Cost-Benefit Analysis, Janet Moore

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Dark Medicine: How The National Research Act Has Failed To Address Racist Practices In Biomedical Experiments Targeting The African-American Community, Anietie Maureen-Ann Akpan

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Do We Have It Right This Time? An Analysis Of The Accomplishments And Shortcomings Of Washington's Indian Child Welfare Act, Karen Gray Young

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Securing Food Justice, Sovereignty & Sustainability In The Face Of The Food Safety Modernization Act (Fsma), Eve Kerber

Seattle Journal for Social Justice

No abstract provided.