Melissa Legge

Senior Attorney

Clean Energy Program

Melissa looks directly at the viewer with a friendly, open smile. She's wearing a sea-green collared, button-down blouse, and is standing in front of a white backdrop.

Bar Admissions

NY

Pronouns

she / her

Melissa Legge

Senior Attorney Clean Energy Program

Kathryn McGrath
Public Affairs and Communications Strategist
kmcgrath@earthjustice.org

Melissa Legge is a senior attorney with Earthjustice’s Clean Energy Program, based in New York. She advocates in the courts and state public utility commissions to advance the transition to clean energy and clean up the coal ash that the energy industry has left behind.

Melissa came to Earthjustice as an Equal Justice Works Fellow, where her project focused on environmental justice for the incarcerated.

Melissa earned her law degree from Yale Law School and a Master of Environmental Management from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. She went to Washington University in St. Louis for college and majored in Environmental Studies and American Culture Studies. Between college and law school, Melissa was an organizer at the political consulting firm Grassroots Solutions in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Kathryn McGrath
Public Affairs and Communications Strategist
kmcgrath@earthjustice.org

Bar Admissions

NY

Pronouns

she / her

Quoted in the News

June 20, 2024

WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Danskammer withdraws permit application for Newburgh generation facility

“The decision shows how the courts and the Department of Environmental Conservation are upholding that law and enforcing that law. New York does not need any more gas plants like Danskammer. What New York needs is renewables like solar and wind to come online and battery storage in order to reduce pollution and decarbonize the electric grid in the state.”

Latest Press Statements

Aerial view of Newburgh, a small city in the Hudson River Valley in Orange County, New York, on a cloudy autumn afternoon.
June 17, 2024

Danskammer Energy Abandons Plans to Construct a New Methane Gas Plant in Newburgh, NY

Construction of a new gas plant is incompatible with New York’s landmark clean energy law
January 25, 2023

EPA Moves to Reject Six Coal Plants’ Applications to Keep Toxic Coal Ash Dumps Open

EPA found that the six plants failed to prove that their coal ash ponds were not leaking and not contaminating groundwater
April 2, 2021

First 500 Unaccompanied Minors Sent to Toxic Military Base Fort Bliss

Biden administration reportedly considering multiple contaminated military sites to serve as detention centers for children in immigration custody
A woman who identified herself as Jennifer sits with her son Jaydan at the Catholic Charities Humanitarian Respite Center after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in McAllen, Texas.
November 21, 2019

Hundreds of Documents Released Detailing Plans to Build Migrant Detention Facilities at Contaminated Fort Bliss Site

Up to 7,500 unaccompanied minors would have been held at toxic site according to plans unearthed by environmental and community advocates