Insights

Washington – June 1, 2022: Chambers and Partners has ranked 70 Crowell & Moring lawyers in 84 rankings across 40 categories in the Chambers USA 2022 guide. In addition, 37 practice areas were also ranked in the guide. The regional and national rankings are driven by independent interviews of clients and lawyers.

Washington – May 20, 2021: Chambers and Partners has ranked 63 Crowell & Moring lawyers in 75 rankings across 41 categories in the Chambers USA 2021 guide, an increase of 10 lawyers, 13 rankings and 8 categories over last year’s results. In addition, 30 practice areas were also ranked in the guide, up from 21 practices last year. The regional and national rankings are driven by independent interviews of clients and lawyers.

Washington – April 23, 2020: Chambers and Partners has ranked 53 Crowell & Moring lawyers in 62 rankings across 33 categories in the Chambers USA 2020 guide. In addition, 21 practice areas were also ranked in the guide. The regional and national rankings are driven by independent interviews of clients and lawyers.

On February 27, 2021, the Interagency Working Group on Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases (Working Group) published interim values for the Social Cost of Carbon (S-CO2), Social Cost of Nitrous Oxide (S-N2O) and Social Cost of Methane (S-CH4) (collectively referred to as the Social Costs of Greenhouse Gases (S-GHG)). As we predicted in our prior client alert, the Working Group reinstated the values that had been established for these parameters immediately before the Trump Administration disbanded the Working Group in 2017. To that end, for 2021 the Working Group set S-CO2 at $51 a ton, S-N2O at $18000 a ton and S-CH4 at $1500 based on a 3% discount rate. These rates will replace the Trump Administration’s calculation of the Social Cost of Carbon, which included values as low as $1 based on a 7% discount rate. The new figure will be used on an interim basis while a Working Group readies the final values, which are expected in early 2022.

Potentially the most consequential, yet least noticed, part of President Biden’s Day 1 Executive Order on Protecting Public Health and the Environment and Restoring Science to Tackle Climate Change (Jan. 20, 2021) (“EO 13990”) is the directive to re-establish the Interagency Working Group on the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases (“Working Group”), which President Trump disbanded during his administration.  See E.O. 13990, Sec. 5.  One of the Working Group’s primary mandates is to calculate what is referred to as the “Social Cost of Carbon,” which measures the cost to society of emitting one additional ton of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.  These include the costs associated with sea level rise and extreme weather events, and adverse effects on water and agricultural resources and human health.  Section 5 directs the Working Group to publish an interim Social Cost of Carbon within 30 days of the date of the Executive Order, and to publish a final value by January 2022.  (The Executive Order also directs the Working Group to publish Social Costs for two other global warming chemicals, i.e., nitrous oxide and methane.)  The Working Group has not yet published the interim value, but it doesn’t take a clairvoyant to predict at least interim reinstatement of the values used by the Obama Administration.  One signal is the Council on Environmental Quality’s decision to rescind the Trump Administration’s “Draft National Environmental Policy Act Guidance on Consideration of Greenhouse Gas Emissions” and directive that until a replacement is adopted “agencies should consider all available tools and resources in assessing GHG emissions and climate change effects of their proposed actions, including, as appropriate and relevant, the 2016 GHG Guidance.”  (86 Fed. Reg. 10252.)

In a case that may be remembered more for its dicta than its holding, Communities for a Better Environment v. South Coast Air Quality Management District, ____ Cal. App. 5th ___ (April 7, 2020) (Second District), provides a helpful and practical guide on how lead agencies should affix the “baseline” in California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) cases. 

The National Energy Industry Environmental Law Conference is designed primarily for energy attorneys. This conference will provide energy professionals with opportunities to network with their peers from in-house and law firm environments to build relationships that will benefit them professionally.

Crowell & Moring will host the 2017 Diesel Technology Forum and Truck & Engine Manufacturers Association Fall Meeting. This meeting will gather government regulators, stakeholders and leaders in clean diesel technology and regulation.

The Air & Waste Management Association (A&WMA) MEGA Symposium will examine the various perspectives on electric power issues as the industry transitions to a cleaner footprint with advanced, cost-effective and reliable energy solutions. Challenges and opportunities will be discussed for new technologies such as renewables and batteries, traditional fossil-based power generation, and the intersection of new and existing energy sources.

The fourth webinar in our Election 2020 series will focus on the presidential candidates’ platforms on environmental law and policy and how American businesses, workers and consumers will have to prepare for two very different worlds depending upon the election outcome. In this roundtable webinar, our lawyers will discuss what’s at stake, the opportunities that exist to influence policy making, and how to leverage administration and congressional priorities under various election scenarios for the coming years, including:

As regulated industries continue to confront mounting disruptions and, in some cases, temporary shutdown as a consequence of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, they face the added challenge of managing a range of unrelenting environmental compliance obligations at both the federal and state levels.