Environmental Law in the United States

Legal Materials

The environmental field is particularly rich with Internet sources. These include home pages by the EPA, the Cornell Legal Information Institute, the Environmental Professionals Homepage and The Environmental Organization Web Directory.

Administrative Decisions: Westlaw has the environmental ALJ decisions for various states in databases using the form xxENV-ADMIN, where the “xx” stands for the states’ two-letter postal code abbreviation. To search all states at once, use the MENV-ADMIN database. For U.S. EPA decisions, see “United States Environmental Protection Agency.”

Document Delivery: Environment-related pleadings, opinions, regulations and other materials may be published or reported in the Daily Environment Report or The Environmental Law Reporter (see News, below). If they’re only reported, you can order the full text from Bloomberg BNA Research & Custom Services (formerly BNA Plus) at 703-341-3287 or research@bna.com, or ELR at 800-433-5120, respectively.

Foreign & International: The European Environment Agency posts information on the environmental situation in Europe, with links to national Agencies. The ASIL Electronic Resource Guide includes a chapter on International Environmental Law. Databases posted on The Multilaterals Project function as an online catalog for environmental law-related laws, treaties, cases, Instruments of the E.U., reports, etc. For more, see A Basic Guide to International Environmental Legal Research by Heidi Frostestad Kuehl and, if applicable, Researching International Marine Environmental Law by Arundhati Ashok Satkalmi.

The Environment and Climate Regulation volumes in the Getting the Deal Throughseries (print and online) explain key aspects of the environmental laws for individual foreign countries.

See also “Treaties,” below.

News: Probably the best sources of environmental law news are the BNA’s Daily Environment Report and The Environmental Law Reporter. Both are published as newsletters and kept in looseleaf binders. They are also available – and searchable — on Lexis (BNA;BNAED, ENVIRN;ALLELR) and Westlaw (BNA-DEN, ELR-xx, depending on the part of the ELR you want to search).

Treaties: Many major environment-related treaties are posted by the Environmental Treaties and Resource Indicators Service (ENTRI) and The Multilaterals Project. See also “Treaties-U.S.” and “Treaties-Foreign.”

The ECOLEX treaty database is effectively an online catalog of environment-related treaties. This is particularly useful for finding treaties on a particular subject or environmental problem.

Also look at the “Foreign & International” section, above.

Violations Database: The EDR database lets you search on an address or a company name to find any related U.S. state and Federal permit violations, Superfund sites, etc.

Environmental Law and Corporate Law

This section provides basic coverage of Environmental Law in relation to U.S. state and federal corporate law. For comprehensive coverage, please visit the main entry.

The United States Environmental Regulations

the United States laws regulating businesses include environmental regulations, such as waste and pollution controls.

Resources

See Also

• Corporate Law

Resources

See Also

• Energy
• Tobacco
• Water Rights
• Army Corps of Engineers
• Superfund
• Treaties
• United States Environmental Protection Agency
• Water

Further Reading (Articles)

Environmental Laws in Abu Dhabi., Mondaq Business Briefing; July 15, 2010

Raising a Roar Over A Ruling; Trade Pact Imperils Environmental Laws, The Washington Post; October 1, 1991; Stuart Auerbach

Environmental Laws Are Unfair To Minorities, Oakland Post; October 18, 2000

Military Training: Compliance with Environmental Laws Affects Some Training Activities, but DOD Has Not Made a Sound Business Case for Additional Environmental Exemptions., General Accounting Office Reports & Testimony; May 1, 2008

THE ENVIRONMENT WRONG APPROACH TOP VIRGINIA NATURAL RESOURCES OFFICIAL COMPLAINS OF FEDERAL EMPHASIS ON ENFORCING ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS.(LOCAL)(Editorial), The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk, VA); June 14, 1997

US Environmental Laws Increasingly Lead to Litigation Concerning the Siting and Construction of New Infrastructure Projects., Mondaq Business Briefing; February 24, 2010

Making Nigeria’s environmental laws easier to see.(Originated from KRT FORUM), Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service; May 3, 1997;

Environmental laws keep our citizens safe, Dayton Daily News (Dayton, OH); April 23, 2012; Carter Stewart

Senators Want Tougher Environmental Laws, Says Bush Soft On.(Brief Article), The Oil Daily; July 31, 2002

Fight on environmental laws is about state sovereignty, The Gazette (Colorado Springs, CO); May 2, 2004; KEN SALAZR

Swedish environmental laws to be “sharpened”?, Haznews; May 1, 1994

International gathering of judges discuss role of the courts in upholding environmental laws, AP Worldstream; August 21, 2002; DINA KRAFT, Associated Press Writer;

Auditing for Violations of Environmental Laws, The National Public Accountant; July 1, 1991; Cornell, David W. Apostolou, Barbara

HOYTE, GROUP FIGHT AMENDMENT EXEMPTING STEAMSHIP AGENCY FROM ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS, The Boston Globe (Boston, MA); March 13, 1988; Dianne Dumanoski, Globe Staff

What’s new in Canadian environmental laws? Nine new air standards are raising the stakes for Canada’s most populous province.(CASEBOOK CANADA), Pollution Engineering; October 1, 2009; Saxe, Dianne

Republican buzzwords signal effort to water down environmental laws. (Originated from Knight-Ridder Newspapers), Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service; November 10, 1994; Dewar, Heather

Some Congressmen Fear Environmental Laws are Dangerous, NPR Morning Edition; July 28, 1994

Environmentalists worry about new Justice Department policy on applying environmental laws past the territorial limit, AP Worldstream; August 9, 2002; H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Writer