Environment

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It wouldn’t be a change in Presidential administration without a change to the all-important definition of “Waters of the United States” (“WOTUS”) under the Clean Water Act. Last year, we updated you on Clean Water Act developments, including the then-new Trump administration WOTUS rule. The WOTUS rule defines which waters are subject to Clean Water…

Last month, Maine signed the nation’s first packaging-based extended producer responsibility program into law, signaling a possible sea change in the way we handle recycling in the United States.

Maine’s extended producer responsibility for packaging law, LD 1541, will shift the costs of dealing with product packaging, whether it is recyclable or not, from…

Last week, Coca-Cola was sued by Earth Island Institute for deceptive marketing regarding its sustainability efforts “despite being one of the largest contributors to plastic pollution in the world.”

In the Complaint, Earth Island Institute, a not-for-profit environmental organization, alleges that Coca-Cola is deceiving the public by marketing itself as sustainable and environmentally friendly while…

Thank you to Jonathan Schaefer for this post. Jon focuses his practice on environmental compliance counseling, occupational health and safety, permitting, site remediation, and litigation related to federal and state regulatory programs.

Growing evidence suggests that corporate focus on ESG—Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance—may offer short- and long-term advantages to both companies and investors. These…

This week, we continue with our 2021 outlook series with a focus on environmental, health, and safety. This year brings a new Presidential administration, and with it will come a host of new programs, as well as some new takes on established programs. The following are a few initiatives that could impact manufacturers in 2021.…

This week we are pleased to have a guest post from Robert S. Melvin, a member of Robinson+Cole’s Environmental, Energy + Telecommunications Group. Attorney Melvin has over 20 years of experience counseling clients on environmental, health, and safety compliance, sustainability, emergency response efforts, site remediation, and development projects. A wide range of clients benefit from his services, including aerospace and other manufacturers, stone and aggregate producers, metal finishers, municipalities, educational institutions, and water and wastewater utilities.

In these days of working from home and managing countless other demands on our time, we offer this post to help you decide whether to add the latest Clean Water Act (CWA) cases and rules to your must-see legal watch list. Since its 1972 inception, the Clean Water Act has prohibited any unpermitted “discharge,” defined as “any addition of any pollutant to navigable waters from any point source.” For more than four decades, agencies and courts have struggled with this CWA liability trigger in various circumstances, as well as the CWA’s vague definition of “navigable waters” as “waters of the United States” (WOTUS).
Continue Reading Binge-Watching the Clean Water Act Cases and Rules

Welcome to 2020! As always, we at the Manufacturing Law Blog are starting the year with our annual forecasts of hot topics. We start the series with our Environmental, Health & Safety outlook.

PFAS

We highlighted per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, as a hot topic in last year’s 2019 outlook post, saying, “If you…

Earlier this year, we wrote about EPA’s PFAS Action Plan, the agency’s blueprint for addressing contamination and protecting public health from per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). The PFAS Action Plan, released in February 2019, details a number of actions EPA plans to take with regard to PFAS, including time frames for implementation. EPA has…

Earlier this year, we wrote about EPA’s PFAS Action Plan, the agency’s blueprint for addressing contamination and protecting public health from per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). The PFAS Action Plan, released in February 2019, details a number of actions EPA plans to take with regard to PFAS, including time frames for implementation. EPA has…

Over the summer, EPA published a policy document to enhance cooperation between it and the many state agencies that enforce federal environmental programs. The document formalizes a long-standing priority of this administration to, as we previously reported, “rebalance the power between Washington and the states to create tangible environmental results for the American people.”…