FINDLAW RECENT CASE SUMMARIES

STATE OF NEW MEXICO V. GEN. ELEC. CO.
10th Circuit

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act's (CERCLA) comprehensive natural resource damages (NRD) scheme preempts any state remedy designed to achieve something other than the restoration, replacement, or acquisition of the equivalent of a contaminated natural resource. In an action in which New Mexico sought unrestricted money damages exclusively under state law for groundwater contamination in Albuquerque, an appeal from summary judgment for defendants, General Electric Co. and another company, is affirmed in part and dismissed in part for want of jurisdiction.

http://laws.lp.findlaw.com/10th/042191.html


US V. JOHNSON
1st Circuit

Following the Supreme Court's decision in Rapanos v. US, 126 S.Ct. 2208 (2006), a suit against a group of cranberry farmers for violation of the Clean Water Act is remanded to the district court for factual determinations relating to the federal government's jurisdiction over "navigable waters," and thus the wetlands in question. On remand, the government can establish jurisdiction over the target sites if it meets either the plurality's literal interpretation of the term "navigable waters" or Justice Kennedy's "substantial nexus" standard.

http://laws.lp.findlaw.com/1st/051444.html