Which is Better: LADWP or SCE? - Legal Planet
New UCLA report, "The Cost & Carbon of Competing Utility Models," contrasts municipally owned electric utilities and investor-owned utilities.| Legal Planet
Never has the adage that A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words been more appropriate. Donald Trump has destroyed much of the federal government and much of the Constitution, so now he is destroying the White House – in this case, to build a horrific 90,000 square foot ballroom paid for by “private contributors,” who … Continue reading "How “Passive Virtues” Destroy the Constitution"| Legal Planet
The Philippines made international news last month when several tens of thousands of protestors took over the streets of Manila to express their outrage over the government’s embezzlement of over a trillion Philippine pesos (approximately $17.6 billion USD) designated for flood control projects. Losing this amount of climate-designated funds to corruption would be problematic anywhere … Continue reading "Manila Protests Over Environment Follow a Rich Tradition"| Legal Planet
The upshot is that it will be very challenging for the Feds to overturn state emissions regulations of power plants and other facilities. The statutory and doctrinal landscape are favorable for states playing defense, and the Supreme Court seems if anything more favorable to the states than the national government. Of course, these general observations leave plenty of room for litigation over the fine points, and the Feds could win some cases. But the states start the contest with an advant...| Legal Planet
“I’m still here working.” That’s what a park ranger at Yosemite National Park told me last Friday, as he made his rounds. Anyone who thinks they can flagrantly break the park rules during the government shutdown is in for “a rude awakening,” he said. Literally. He and other rangers have been using noise to wake … Continue reading "Our National Parks are Open — and Openly Threatened"| Legal Planet
“National Energy Dominance Month.” So typical of Trump: a bungled exercise in foolish bravado. The “bungled” part is that they forgot to designate October as a special month until it was halfway over. The “bravado” saturates almost every sentence, combined with the fact that the blustering has no practical effect. And the “foolish” part is about bad energy policy and bad economics. To expand supply, he needs higher prices, but that would hurt him politically. And there's...| Legal Planet
This Substack post from Matthew Yglesias on climate policy gets, I think two things right and one thing wrong. And getting those three components of climate policy correct is, I believe, important to long term, politically sustainable success in addressing climate change. First, as Yglesias correctly notes, climate change is not a priority for most … Continue reading "Quiet Climate Policy"| Legal Planet
Why do we even bother with this anymore? The New York Times breathlessly reports that the University of Virginia’s Caleb Nelson, a well-respected originalist scholar, has concluded that the “unitary executive theory,” long promoted by conservatives, is, well, bunk. “A bombshell!,” enthuses Will Baude of the University of Chicago, himself a well-respected originalist scholar – … Continue reading "Legal “Scholarship” and the Overproduction of Elites"| Legal Planet
Environmental law have become vibrant parts of the law and policy ecosystem. At a time when despondency seems all too common, the work of these law school centers offers beacons of hope for the future of environmental protection. Some of that work is playing defense — pushing back against deregulatory efforts — while other work plays offense by identifying innovative directions for environmental policy. A comprehensive survey isn’t practical, but I’ll provide examples from several...| Legal Planet
I wrote this past spring about a proposal by the Trump Administration to eliminate the definition of harm in the regulations implementing the federal Endangered Species Act (ESA), which might eliminate protections from habitat modification for federally listed species. I also noted three different steps California could do to backfill the federal ESA if such … Continue reading "Backfilling the federal ESA"| Legal Planet
New UCLA report, "The Cost & Carbon of Competing Utility Models," contrasts municipally owned electric utilities and investor-owned utilities.| Legal Planet
An obscure drafting wrinkle in current state law is impeding local governments from springing into action after disasters.| Legal Planet
Here’s a good legal Rule Of Thumb: whenever anyone makes a federalism argument concerning any dispute, do not take them seriously. It’s a mug’s game. The Venn Diagram of “people who argue for federalism” and “people who lack control over the federal government” is pretty much a perfect circle. And the positions will completely flip … Continue reading "Federalism Is For Suckers, Part The Millionth"| Legal Planet
New Analysis: The Trump Administration’s proposed rollback of Biden’s standards for fossil fuel generators will cost American dearly.| Legal Planet
Dear 1L: It’s no secret that this is a dark time for people who care about the environment. All the more reason you'll be needed!| Legal Planet
Lessons learned from Big Oil can be applied to animal agriculture, writes Guest Contributor Alexander Wood, a UCLA Law student.| Legal Planet
Guest Contributor Sharmila L. Murthy explains how the AGs of a dozen states are acting as important counterweights to the federal government.| Legal Planet
A UCLA Law student reflects on the current administration’s attack on civil servants and the cancellation of summer internships.| Legal Planet
Representational sovereignty, Indigenous rights, and ecocide are key to the climate obligations of states, our guest contributors write.| Legal Planet
Trump 2.0 is pushing alternative science: The Drain is a weekly roundup of environmental and climate news from Legal Planet.| Legal Planet
The CPUC heard an earful about neighborhood decarbonization. Here's the input from Californians who support climate action.| Legal Planet
With the Trump Administration attacks on climate science, renewable energy, research, power plan emissions standards, EVs, national monuments, and pretty much anything that smacks of environmental protection, it is not surprising that most responses from the environmental community and the Democratic party have been to defend the status quo. The defensive posture has resulted in … Continue reading "Time for a Positive Vision of America’s Environment"| Legal Planet
The state’s largest gas utilities are trying to delay priority zones for decarbonization and to block public access to important data.| Legal Planet
Multistate compacts might be a critical way to help replace lost federal capacity - but we need more details.| Legal Planet
Insight & Analysis: Environmental Law and Policy| Legal Planet
We are likely to learn next week if the Trump Administration will eviscerate the most important climate regulations the Biden Administration issued over the last four years. Under Trump’s “Unleashing American Energy” Executive Order, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin is supposed to recommend by February 19 whether to reverse the central basis for much of the … Continue reading "What Happens If EPA Revokes the Endangerment Finding?"| Legal Planet
The U.S. has faced true energy emergencies.. This is not one of them. Trump's executive order is totally unjustified,.| Legal Planet
The debates over community solar program design are fascinating sites of struggle over which values should drive decision-making.| Legal Planet
Trump and Republicans are trying to ‘flood the zone’ when it comes to wrongly blaming California environmental regulations for the LA fires.| Legal Planet
This is the second of three posts on proposed legislation to address the fire crisis on federal lands (the first post is here). Last post, I talked about why this legislation is essential, and the strengths of the bill that the House passed last Congress. In this post, I’ll talk about the parts of the … Continue reading "Fire and Permitting Reform"| Legal Planet
The Manchin-Barrasso energy permitting bill that I’ve posted about is not the only permitting reform bill that died with the last Congress. The House had passed the “Fix Our Forests Act,” legislation sponsored by Rep. Bruce Westerman, a Republican from Arkansas, with a focus on trying to reduce fire risks on federal (and other) lands. … Continue reading "The Urgent Need to Address Fire Risk"| Legal Planet
My UCLA colleagues Ted Parson, JP Escudero and I just returned from Baku. Most of our work there related to side talks on advancing methane regulation (and our UCLA project on that topic), but we also got a sense of how the central negotiations were unfolding. As the New York Times and others are reporting, … Continue reading "What’s Making this COP Especially Difficult?"| Legal Planet
As California continues, and even accelerates, on its path to 100% renewable energy, it must grapple with the costs and burdens on electricity ratepayers. Among the largest rate impacts is the cost of new transmission carrying renewable power to customers. We need new approaches to transmission financing that avoid rate shocks and ratepayer backlash. With … Continue reading "How Do We Reduce Cost and Time to Build Transmission Lines?"| Legal Planet
The GOP has gained working class and Latino voters, while college grads and affluent voters have shifted to the Democrats. This will change the politics surrounding climate change.| Legal Planet
New principles for ethical and responsible geoengineering research offer hope of reducing controversy in this polarized field| Legal Planet
"Unacceptable risks." Developing countries at UNEA-6 lost patience with a Northern led, narrowly scientific, approach to solar geoengineering| Legal Planet
The US and Africa fought over how, and even whether, to assess the risks of solar geoengineering at the UN Environment Assembly| Legal Planet
A new report recommends urgent action to prevent triggering climate tipping points, but warns against relying on speculative geoengineering| Legal Planet
Late last month, Governor Newsom signed Assembly Bill 2427, which represents a modest step in the effort to ensure all Californians have access to convenient electric vehicle (EV) charging, not just those who own their homes and have garages, by supporting efforts to invest in curbside EV charging. As CLEE described in a report issued … Continue reading "A Small Win for Curbside EV Charging in California"| Legal Planet
New data insights from a community choice aggregator elevate the role of Level 1 charging in an equitable (and rapid) EV transition| Legal Planet
Achieving climate goals requires significant investments in clean energy, transportation, and other climate technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and remove carbon from the atmosphere. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act have resulted in historic levels of public investment to transform existing energy and transportation systems and lay the foundation for emerging climate … Continue reading "A Framework for Equitable Climate Infrastructure Investments"| Legal Planet
This is the third in a series of posts detailing CLEE’s new set of resources on Equitable Climate Infrastructure Investment. Communities and local and state governments are increasingly turning to community benefits tools to support an equitable climate transition, catalyze substantive long-term investments in community priorities, and achieve effective, durable projects. CLEE’s new report, Community Benefits Tools and California … Continue reading "Community Benefits Tools and Poli...| Legal Planet
Allan Marks is a partner at Milbank LLP and a lecturer at UC Berkeley School of Law and UCLA School of Law. This article was originally published in Forbes, for which he is a contributor, on November 7, 2024. When Donald Trump returns to the Oval Office in January 2025, his second presidency will have … Continue reading "U.S. Energy Industry Trends To Watch In A 2025 Trump Presidency"| Legal Planet
Under NEPA, effects that are overly speculative, beyond the technical capabilities of the agency to analyze, too complex to assess, or are otherwise intractable for an agency to assess need not be documented in an environmental impact statement.| Legal Planet
The same groups that succeeded in gutting federal wetlands jurisdiction a few years ago are hoping to do the same thing to environmental impact statements.| Legal Planet
In the ABC debate, both candidates were asked directly, “What would you do to fight climate change?” Fracking got a lot of the focus.| Legal Planet
James Salzman is the Donald Bren Distinguished Professor of Environmental Law with joint appointments at the UCLA School of Law and at the Bren School of the Environment at UC Santa Barbara. He formerly held joint appointments at Duke University as the Samuel F. Mordecai Professor of Law and Nicholas Institute Professor of Environmental Policy. In more than eight books and eighty articles and book chapters, his broad-ranging scholarship has addressed topics spanning drinking water, trade an...| Legal Planet
The Supreme Court decision in Loper Bright will not likely impact how California courts review state agency determinations. But we’ll still feel it.| Legal Planet
Headlines about today’s decision in Loper v Raimondo overturning the 40 year-old decision in Chevron v NRDC that granted agencies deference in their interpretation of ambiguous statutes focus on the “massive power grab,” the decision’s “sweeping” nature and call it a “blow” to the administrative state. My view may be idiosyncratic but I don’t view … Continue reading "Is Loper v. Raimondo Really the Power Grab Commentators Assume?"| Legal Planet
The Palsgraf case is a classic that every law student studies in torts class. Surprisingly, its legacy also looms large in environmental law.| Legal Planet
Previous cases decided under Chevron are still good law. Overruling Chevron will matter only for regs that haven't gone through the courts yet.| Legal Planet
Here's a recap of the UCLA Emmett Institute panel on the climate implications of the 2024 election from the state, national, and international perspective.| Legal Planet
There's a direct line of descent from the Contract with America, signed 30 years ago, and today's Republican party.| Legal Planet
Too many people have been taken in by the myth that environmental regulation causes big job losses. It just isn't so.| Legal Planet
California regulators had an opportunity this year to be a global leader on requiring airplanes to use low-carbon jet fuel. But the Air Resources Board announced earlier this month that it will back off from its earlier proposal to require jet fuel providers to decarbonize, through the agency’s landmark low carbon fuel standard program. Why … Continue reading "California Pulls Back On Sustainable Aviation Fuels"| Legal Planet
Children will be roaming the streets tonight dressed as Superheroes, Princesses, and Evil Villains. But really, these invented figures can’t hold a candle to the real ones in our world. Here are some new custumes, suitable for a world facing a climate crisis.| Legal Planet
This elections seemunusually weighty in its policy implications. In terms of energy and climate policy, the two parties parties are far apart — Republicans favor energy dominance through massive fossil fuel production, Demorats favor clean energy. To the immense frustration of people on both sides, things haven’t moved much since September, when I last wrote … Continue reading "With a Week to Go, Where Do the Elections Stand?"| Legal Planet
A Trump victory would increase the odds that we'll ultimately need to start blocking sunlight as a last resort to limit climate change.| Legal Planet
The report’s significance is precisely that it goes beyond a few headline proposals to set a comprehensive agenda for a second Trump Administration. There are dozens of significant proposals relating to energy and the environment.| Legal Planet
You can’t blame people for thinking the bureaucracy is faceless when they never see a face to put with the name.There would be some real benefits to appointing a governor or a well-known member of Congress to head EPA.| Legal Planet
Elon Musk wants to slash government and regulations for a Trump administration—even though California regulations helped build his companies.| Legal Planet
The global transformation to an economy fueled by clean energy can't be stopped. Trump could slow down U.S. progress though.| Legal Planet
California will need a significant build-out of new high-voltage transmission lines to meet state goals for renewable energy deployment and a decarbonized grid by 2045, which requires quadrupling its current in-state solar and wind capacity. But if this new infrastructure is paid for solely through electricity rates, it could increase them significantly, when they have … Continue reading "Reducing Financing Costs for New Transmission in California"| Legal Planet
Back in August 2015, I blogged on a then newly-filed federal lawsuit in which a coalition of children and their legal guardians sued the federal government to challenge the government’s proposed approval of a controversial liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal proposed to be located on the Oregon coast. That lawsuit contends that approval of the project would … Continue reading "Trump Administration Seeks Ninth Circuit Review in Pioneering “Atmospheric Trust” Case"| Legal Planet
Late last week, attorneys representing children from around the nation filed a provocative new lawsuit in federal court, arguing that the Obama Administration is violating the children’s constitutional rights by not taking far more dramatic steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions and address climate change concerns. The newly-filed complaint in the lawsuit, Juliana ex rel. … Continue reading "And a Child Shall Sue Them: Ambitious New Climate Lawsuit Filed Against Obama Administration"| Legal Planet
Trump has shifted from Project 2025 to the America First Agenda, the blueprint for his transition team. Turns out to be pretty much the same thing.| Legal Planet
Coal advocates offer troubling new grounds for the Supreme Court to stay EPA’s carbon pollution standards.| Legal Planet
We should set aside a day for people to think about climate change, how it will affect them, and what to do. Aug. 23 is the day the greenhouse effect was discovered.| Legal Planet
California has groundbreaking goals to require automakers to sell, and large fleets to purchase, zero-emission trucks and buses in increasing percentages, starting this year. But these goals will only be achievable if the state has sufficient charging infrastructure to fuel the vehicles, along with available financing to help truck owners purchase or lease them. To … Continue reading "New Report: Charging and Financing Electric Trucks"| Legal Planet
A decade ago, California stood out–and not in a good way–as the only Western state without comprehensive state laws monitoring and regulating groundwater pumping and use. But in 2014, following years of severe and protracted California drought, and both agricultural and urban water users compensating for depleted surface water flows by pumping groundwater in unprecedented … Continue reading "Assessing the First Decade of California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act"| Legal Planet
Climate and energy are one of the big dividing lines in U.S. politics. The party platforms leave little doubt: one side cares about climate change, the other loves oil.| Legal Planet
