Climate Change

Experience Highlights

• Automobile manufacturer in both negotiating groundbreaking alternative greenhouse gas agreement with the California Air Resources Board and providing representation in related litigation.

• BP in over a dozen novel climate change lawsuits filed by state and local governments including in California, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Washington, and by a fishermen's trade association. The plaintiffs allege that greenhouse gas-driven sea level rise is currently damaging their coastal communities and civil infrastructures.

• Corn ethanol manufacturing company regarding aspects of carbon credit calculations under the California Low Carbon Fuels (LCFS) program.

• POET in a range of regulatory compliance, rulemaking, and litigation matters, including representing client in litigation in the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and the D.C. Circuit regarding EPA’s position on granting renewable fuels credit for cellulosic ethanol generated from corn kernel fiber.

• A biofuels trade association in providing regulatory and litigation assistance in connection with efforts to relieve regulatory restrictions on marketing of blends of gasoline and 15 percent ethanol (E15), and in connection with EPA rulemaking proceedings concerning the Renewable Fuels Standard.

• Major multinational manufacturer with regard to regulatory proceedings and litigation challenging EPA’s rule under the Clean Air Act’s Significant New Alternatives Program to prohibit high global warming potential hydrofluorocarbon chemicals in favor of new alternatives called hydrofluoroolefins that do not pose global warming risks.

• Major multinational energy company in helping to establish the foundation for its Carbon Capture Use & Storage (CCUS) business through a comprehensive assessment and comparison of regulatory and liability regimes across various states, as well as to evaluate federal regulation of potential onshore and off-shore CCUS projects. 

• Outdoor recreation companies in filing a D.C. Circuit brief supporting challenge to the rescission of the Clean Power Plan and enactment of the Affordable Clean Energy Rule.

• A major multinational energy company regarding state and local government regulation of carbon emissions, including with respect to evaluation of GHG impacts in environmental reviews, development of GHG life cycle analysis standards, GHG mitigation and offsets, and carbon leakage.

• A leading Canadian producer and marketer of renewable biogas, in D.C. Circuit litigation challenging EPA’s final rule setting cellulosic biofuel volumes for purposes of the annual Renewable Fuel Standards Rule under the Clean Air Act.

• Heating Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International in challenge to EPA ban on non-refillable refrigerant canisters.