The 2025 legislative session has been a banner year for energy affordability legislation in California. The legislature passed—and the governor signed—a suite of six major bills that the governor and legislative leaders have championed in an effort to bring down energy costs for Californians. However, the job is not yet done. Governor Newsom has not … Continue reading "Signing AB 1167 Would be a Win for Energy Affordability "| Legal Planet
A key First Amendment principle prohibits the government from discriminating on the basis of viewpoint. This Compact contains a string of viewpoint-based rules. That's a threat to any view the government doesn't like, which definitely includes a belief in climate change or the benefits of renewable energy. Because violation of the agreement triggers draconian sanctions, and the Administration is the judge of what constitutes a violation, the chilling effect will be tremendous.| Legal Planet
When the state’s second-largest refinery emitted a fireball into the heavens last week, it was bad. But it wasn’t all bad. The “incident” at the Chevron refinery in El Segundo was a good reminder that air pollution is present during the entire life cycle of oil and gas products, from when it comes out of … Continue reading "Some Good News About the El Segundo Chevron Explosion"| Legal Planet
Never say never. Maybe someday the Court will surprise us with a big win for the environment. But it would be foolish to count on that. We can also hope that the Court will do other good things, such as reining in Trump’s executive overreach. But it would be foolish to count on the Court to take a stand in favor of environmental protection.| Legal Planet
Given all the garbage that we have to deal with nowadays, you might have missed the prospect of actual, non-metaphorical garbage this week: to virtually no one’s surprise, UN negotiations over an international plastics treaty collapsed this week. It’s easy to make jokes referencing The Graduate – and in fact I will – but this … Continue reading "Garbage In, Garbage Out, Garbage Everywhere"| Legal Planet
A successful strategy will involve not only winning individual cases, but building a body of precedent that make the legal ground increasingly shaky for Trump rollbacks. It the Administrative can be forced into the normal rulemaking process and has to rely on scientific and economic justifications for what it is doing, it will have lost more than half the battle.| Legal Planet
A few years ago, I was writing about how President Joe Biden was flying around the country to promote his landmark climate law without uttering the word “climate.” Seems so quaint. Now, we find ourselves in a place where “climate change” is on a list of banned words maintained by the U.S. Energy Department, along … Continue reading "At a Loss for Words? Resist Climate Silence"| Legal Planet
Based on the facts as set forth by the D.C. Circuit, its decision in the Tennessee Pipeline case may have been right. But the opinion went astray with its unrestrained enthusiasm for deference in NEPA cases, and its assumption that the same rules carry over in reviewing decisions under other statutes like the Natural Gas Act.| Legal Planet
As Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin rushes to rescind the endangerment finding — which some have called “the Holy Grail of U.S. climate policy” — the UCLA Emmett Institute hosted an expert panel discussion on the reasoning and ramifications of such a move. The effort underlines “an extraordinarily dark time in U.S. environmental politics,” … Continue reading "Webinar: Climate Policy without the Endangerment Finding"| Legal Planet
An obscure drafting wrinkle in current state law is impeding local governments from springing into action after disasters.| Legal Planet
I recently wrote an assessment of the ROAD Act, a bill in the US Senate that would do some (mild) changes to NEPA and develop some guidelines and incentives for state and local governments to amend their zoning to facilitate more housing production. While the ROAD Act may be fine policy, one question is whether … Continue reading "The perils of federal abundance legislation"| Legal Planet
Well, there’s the reason why the last election I ever won was for chalkboard monitor in the second grade. Last Friday, the California Senate passed the Assembly’s version of SB 79 (Wiener), which mandates higher densities and height restrictions within a half-mile of high-quality transit stops (with diminishing densities and heights the farther one goes … Continue reading "Let’s All Play The Zoning Game!"| Legal Planet
It’s not news that the Trump administration has little interest in getting the facts right. But facts often matter for crafting policy that serves our societal goals. And it’s not rare for the law to require that specific factual findings underpin government decisions. In both cases, we need to assemble, understand, and apply the best … Continue reading "National Academies School the Trump Administration on Gold-standard Science"| Legal Planet
To hear Trump & Co., you might think that the Constitution was one sentence long, with that sentence vesting the executive power in the President. That’s the theory behind his efforts to remake the government – including environmental regulation – single-handedly. But there’s a lot more in there. Much of that forgotten language is directly relevant to the presidential actions that are now shaking the government, including environmental governance.| Legal Planet
EPA’s proposal to rescind the Clean Air Act endangerment finding is not final but it is already causing problems for the Trump Administration in court. The Department of Justice today filed a brief for summary judgment challenging Vermont’s climate superfund law. Its principal argument? That the Clean Air Act — in regulating greenhouse gases — … Continue reading "DOJ Challenge to Vermont’s Climate Law Has a Problem"| Legal Planet
It’s remarkable that with everything else that’s raging, climate and energy bills still managed to dominate the legislative session that just wrapped in Sacramento. After all, the reason lawmakers were still at work this past Saturday — the day after the legislative session was supposed to end — was that negotiations on climate bills pushed … Continue reading "California Takes a Stab at Climate and Energy Costs"| Legal Planet
There’s been a lot of legislative action advancing housing production through reforms to land-use and environmental regulations at the state level, including California. Now, the federal government is every so gingerly stepping into the area. The ROAD Act passed unanimously through the relevant Senate committee last month. In this blog post I’ll provide a brief … Continue reading "The ROAD to housing?"| Legal Planet
The majority in a recent case -- an Obama appointeet and a Trump appointee -- ruled in favor of renewable energy. Even without Chevron deference, they were able to conclude that the statute favored solar producers. And unlike a win under Chevron, this one can't be reversed by a more conservative agency -- it's etched in stone.| Legal Planet
As the California legislative session came to an end last week, Assembly and Senate leaders released a last-minute deal on formally extending California’s Cap-and-Trade Program for the next two decades through Assembly Bill (AB) 1207. The bill received the required supermajority vote on Saturday, September 13, and now moves to Governor Newsom’s desk for signature. … Continue reading "Certainty for the California Compliance Carbon Market"| Legal Planet
If you want to get a good sense of the travails of the modern press, look no further than Politico’s recent writeup of SB 79, Senator Scott Wiener’s new bill to mandate upzoning around transit stops. Importantly, this isn’t because it’s a bad article but precisely because it’s a good article (and not just because … Continue reading "Bread and Circuses and Journalism"| 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
