| Protecting Seneca Lake from Gas Industry Infrastructure Projects | Two gas industry infrastructure projects are proposed for underground salt caverns on the shores of Seneca Lake, in the Finger Lakes region of Western New York. They would involve large-scale storage facilities with new capacity for 88 million gallons of liquid petroleum gasand additional capacity for natural gas, expanding storage to 2 billion cubic feet. Environmental advocates are concerned that these projects will lock the region into continued extraction and use of dirty fossil fuels and discourage the growth of renewable energy. |
| Public's Right to Know: Styrene | Earthjustice and a coalition of groups are working to make sure the government can alert the American public to the potential dangers of styrene, a chemical used extensively in the manufacture of plastics, as well as boats, cars, bathtubs and products made with rubber, such as tires and conveyer belts. |
| Stopping Industrialization of the Thompson Divide |
Earthjustice, representing Wilderness Workshop, has filed an administrative appeal seeking reversal of the April 9, 2013, Colorado Bureau of Land Management (BLM) decision that extended the lives of 25 oil and gas leases set to expire in 2013. These leases, which BLM admits were illegally sold and which have sat unused for ten years, are located in the heart of the Thompson Divide, a prized refuge of public lands in the White River National Forest. |
| Protecting Chesapeake Bay from LNG Export Terminal | Earthjustice and a coalition of local, regional, and national groups are objecting to the environmental impacts posed by the proposed Dominion Cove Point liquefied natural gasexport terminal on the Chesapeake Bay, saying the project would hurt the Bay’s economy and ecology, increase air pollution, and hasten fracking and drilling in neighboring states. |
| Protecting America's First National River | A coalition of conservation and citizen groups, represented by Earthjustice, have sent a notice of intent to sue to the U.S. Department of Agriculture regarding its Farm Service Agency’s loan guarantee for an industrial 6,500-pig swine facility on the banks of a tributary that flows straight into the Buffalo National River—an action that was not properly examined and may violate the Endangered Species Act. The facility, C&H Hog Farms, is under contract with Cargill, an international producer and marketer of agricultural products. |
| Suing City of Rochelle, GA, Over Decades of Sewage Dumping | In Rochelle, Georgia, a group of African-American citizens is suing their city government for discharging the city’s raw sewage onto their properties. On behalf of those residents, Earthjustice has notified the city on May 2, 2013 that if problems are not fixed in 60 days, it will file suit under the Clean Water Act to stop the unpermitted discharges of raw sewage from manholes, broken pipes and a ditch. The suit would also prevent the city from bypassing its sewer system and endangering public health by forcing citizens to release sewage into their yards in order to keep it out of their homes. These discharges and bypasses are violations of the Clean Water Act. |
| Coal Mines Clouding America's Air | A coalition of groups—including WildEarth Guardians, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity, and Environmental Integrity Project represented by Earthjustice—have filed suit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over its failure to protect public health and the environment from air pollution from coal mines in the United States. |
| Banning Dangerous Rat Poisons | The American Bird Conservancy, Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club, represented by Earthjustice, are taking legal action to support the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s efforts to ban sales of several harmful rodenticides. |
| Seeking Full Review of GE Salmon Environmental Risks |
Genetically engineered salmon is the first ever GE fish intended for human consumption in the United States. Documents disclosed through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request raise serious questions about the adequacy of the Food and Drug Administration’s review of the AquAdvantage Salmon application. |
| Protecting Waterways from the TVA Gallatin Coal Plant |
Earthjustice, representing the Tennessee Clean Water Network, the Sierra Club and the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, has appealed a pollution permit issued to Tennessee Valley Authority for its Gallatin coal-fired power plant to prevent toxic discharges of heavy metals and other harmful waste byproducts of burning coal. The plant’s polluted wastewaters are dumped into unlined ponds that allow pollution to continue to harm the environment. |
| Challenging TVA's Expensive Decision on Gallatin Plant |
Earthjustice and Southern Environmental Law Center, representing Tennessee Scenic Rivers Association, Tennessee Environmental Council, Sierra Club, and Center for Biological Diversity, has filed a legal challenge to the Tennessee Valley Authority on the grounds that TVA violated the National Environmental Policy Act when the federal power company finalized its plan to spend more than one billion dollars to retrofit the Gallatin Fossil Plant, a coal-fired power plant near Nashville. |
| Protecting Human Rights by Reducing Black Carbon Emissions to Slow Arctic Warming | The Arctic Athabaskan Council has filed a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, asking the Commission to declare that Canada is undermining the human rights of Athabaskan peoples by poorly regulating emissions of black carbon, or soot, a short-lived climate pollutant which contributes significantly to Arctic warming and melting. Readily available emissions reduction measures could substantially slow Arctic warming and melting and protect Athabaskan rights. |
| Protecting Grays Harbor from Becoming an Industrial Crude Oil Zone |
The Quinault Indian Nation, represented by Earthjustice, is opposing the first of at least three proposed oil shipping facilities that could transform Grays Harbor, WA into an industrial crude oil zone. |
| Seeking Solutions to Critical Salmon Barrier on Rogue Basin’s Evans Creek |
In the wake of failed efforts to broker the voluntary removal of the Rogue Basin’s defunct Fielder Dam, Earthjustice, representing WaterWatch of Oregon, has filed suit in U.S. District Court, contending that the dam harms threatened coho salmon in violation of the Endangered Species Act. |
| Defending the Gulf of California from "Mega Resorts" |
Earthjustice and the Interamerican Association for Environmental Defense (AIDA), representing local and international environmental organizations, have filed a petition to the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation, charging the Mexican government with failing to enforce its own environmental laws in authorizing the construction of four “mega resorts” in the Gulf of California. |