Environmental Law Prof Blog

Biggest Ideas

John Bonine of Oregon -- who always has great questions -- offered a list of biggest ideas in Environmental Law over the summer on ENVLAWPROFESSORS and solicited additions.  So far, here's the first draft of our collective wisdom:

1. attorneys fees - (environmental plaintiff friendly rules)
2. biodiversity preservation
3. citizen suits
4. cost/benefit analysis
5. cost/benefit balancing as pollution standard setting approach (as well as  health/environmental quality and technology based models)
6. ecologically sustainable development
7. economic incentives approaches
8. ecosystem services
9. ecosystem management (indicator species or other)
10. environmental impact assessment
11. free market environmentalism (not the same as 4 or 6)
12. information strategies (e.g. TRI)
13. injunctions - relaxed standard
14. mitigation/compensation
15. polluter pays principle
16. precautionary principle
17. preservation of wild and lonely places
18. public participation/citizen democracy
19. public trust doctrine
20. risk assessment (similar to 4, but different)
21. standing - relaxed standard for judicial review of administrative action
22. strict or absolute liability
23. technology forcing approaches to regulation

Feel free to add others!

Evolutionary Economics: Perverse Incentives - Incentives Can Reduce Good Behavior

Just when economists had us convinced....

Excerpted Abstract:    Rewards or punishments (whether material or image-related) create doubt about the true motive for which good deeds are performed and this "overjustification effect" can induce a partial or even net crowding out of prosocial behavior by extrinsic incentives. In some settings, disclosing one’s generosity may backfire. Finally, we analyze the choice by public and private sponsors of incentive levels, their degree of confidentiality and the publicity given to agents’ behavior. Sponsor competition is shown to potentially reduce social welfare.

Link: Incentives and Prosocial Behavior.

Frivilous SLAPP suit costs firm $ 267,000

On Monday, August 15, a judge sanctioned lawyers who filed a RICO suit against a community activist and three Forest Service employees opposing a luxury condominium project.  The lawyers were fined $267,000 for filing the frivilous SLAPP suit on behalf of the developer.Link: Los Angeles Times: Law Firm Sanctioned for Forest Service Suit.

GAO: EPA Has Failed to Protect Environment from Failed Businesses

<>

GAO has issued a report faulting EPA, among other things, for failing to require businesses to provide financial assurances that they are able to clean up environmental contamination caused by their use of hazardous substances.  GAO claims that EPA had a duty to issue financial assurance regulations under CERCLA § 108(b).
GAO Report Highlights
Full GAO Report

Reducing the Stink?

Animal feeding operations have argued that the Clean Air Act did not apply, that there are no sound methodologies for measuring their emissions, and that there are no cost effective technologies for reducing emission.  However, over 2000 dairy, feedlot, and similar livestock operations have now signed EPAs air quality compliance agreement for animal feeding operations.  The operations pay a relatively small penalty and emission monitoring study fee while making their operations available for monitoring so that standardized emissions monitoring methodologies can be developed and agreeing to install LAER/BACT if they are major sources.  Link: Animal Feeding Operations Air Quality Compliance Agreement . 

Environmental Article Hit Parade

Link: SSRN Top Downloads.

1     249 hits      Chevron Step Zero
                        Cass R. Sunstein, U. Chicago
2     53 hits       Sustainable Development and
                        Private Global Governance
                        Douglas A. Kysar, Cornell
3     50 hits        The Scope of Regulatory Bargaining
                        Jim Rossi, Florida State
4     47 hits          The Accidental Environmentalist: Judge Posner on                         Catastrophic Thinking
                         Lisa Heinzerling, Georgetown
5     45 hits          Political Institutions, Judicial Review, and Private                              Property: A Comparative Institutional Analysis
                        Daniel H. Cole, Indiana
6     40 hits        Governance of International Institutions: A Review                             of the North American Commission for Environmental                         Cooperation's Citizen Submissions
                        David L. Markell, Florida State
7     36 hits          Operational versus Rhetorical Sustainability:                                     Conflicting Goals, Values and Functions
                        David Barnhizer, Cleveland-Marshall
8     35 hits          Mustering the Missing Voices: A Collaborative Model                         for Fostering Equality, Community Involvement and                             Adaptive Planning in Land Use Decisions II                                        Alejandro E. Camacho, Notre Dame
9     33 hits          Mustering the Missing Voices I
                         Alejandro E. Camacho, Notre Dame
10     25 hits        Lucas's Unlikely Legacy: The Rise of Background                             Principles As Categorical Takings Defenses
                        Michael C. Blumm, Lucus Ritchie, Lewis and Clark