Law Columbia

MARCH 27, 2025

City of New York , plumbing and building trade groups challenged New York Citys Local Law 154 of 2021 , a piece of legislation that prohibits fossil fuel combustion in most new buildings. This blog post discusses Local Law 154, unpacks Judge Abrams decision, and ends with a refresher on California Restaurant Association v.

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Legal Planet

JUNE 16, 2022

According to the Energy Information Agency , South Korea’s power sector is heavily reliant on fossil fuels. Two thirds of generation capacity is based on fossil fuels, split evenly between coal and natural gas, with 17% nuclear, and 14% hydro and other renewables. 50% coal, 26% gas, and 25% nuclear.

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Legal Planet

MARCH 31, 2022

It turns out that most of them are 50-60% reliant on fossil fuels, with a lot of the remainder coming from nuclear and hydro. However, there are important differences in the mix of gas and coal in generation, which matters a lot since coal-fired generators emit much more carbon per kilowatt. Fossil Fuel Use.

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Enviromental Defense

AUGUST 23, 2021

Nine of the largest oil and gas companies reported receiving a combined $870 million. million for other categories of support to fossil fuels. Cleaning up is the law. We shouldn’t be paying oil and gas companies to reduce their emissions . Canada committed to phasing out subsidies by 2025 back in 2009.

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Legal Planet

JANUARY 4, 2023

This means that, with few exceptions, new buildings will need to exclusively use electric appliances, and will not be allowed to contain any fossil-fuel infrastructure, like natural-gas lines. All-electric as the new normal. Just as important is the process that led to the new-buildings ordinance.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

MARCH 16, 2022

According to the forecast, while economy-wide CO 2 emissions decrease from 2022 to 2037 due primarily to the growth in renewable energy replacing retiring coal plants, emissions do increase after 2037 from increased usage of natural gas. EIA is projecting that natural gas prices will remain low.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

APRIL 11, 2022

The November 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), also referred to as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, or BIL, includes an $8 billion “regional clean hydrogen hubs” program that charges the Department of Energy (DOE) with the development of at least four hydrogen hubs to advance the nation’s clean hydrogen sector.

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Law Columbia

SEPTEMBER 9, 2021

Flickr: Natural Gas Plant. As Senior Fellow Amy Turner documented last year , a number of local governments around the country have moved to prohibit natural gas hookups in buildings. These prohibitions are part of cities’ broader effort to participate in the transition away from fossil fuels.

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Legal Planet

AUGUST 9, 2021

Unfortunately, federal courts ruled that the existing law doesn’t apply when state utility commissions simply sit on the applications without acting rather than rejecting them outright. There’s a similar provision governing natural gas pipelines. That made the existing statute a dead letter. Download as PDF.

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Law Columbia

JULY 7, 2021

The decision essentially – and subject to possible appeals – answered in the negative the question of whether Berkeley’s first-in-the-nation prohibition on natural gas hookups to newly-constructed buildings (often termed a “natural gas ban”; herein referred to as the “Berkeley Ordinance”) was preempted by the U.S.

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PA Environment Daily

AUGUST 26, 2024

Speakers from several public health, community advocacy and environmental groups will participate in a September 19 webinar -- A Year Later: Have Leaders Addressed Health Concerns From Natural Gas Development Raised In University Of Pittsburgh Public Health Studies? Shapiro's deal with natural gas developer CNX Resources.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

DECEMBER 20, 2022

These higher costs are being driven by a major overreliance on natural gas, which has sharply spiked in price and is currently the dominant fuel source in the US for both home heating and electricity generation. Likewise, pipeline giant Williams Companies now refers to its gas projects as “clean energy” projects.

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PA Environment Daily

OCTOBER 17, 2023

On October 17, the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee held an informational briefing on Project Canary , a company that measures, analyzes and reports on methane emissions from natural gas production and distribution infrastructure.

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Natural Gas Regulations Fossil Fuels Technology 125

Union of Concerned Scientists

FEBRUARY 9, 2024

Just how bad is fossil “natural” gas? And, as it turns out, the infrastructure used to produce, store, distribute, transmit, and burn gas leaks like a sieve , making gas as bad as coal for the climate. Its primary component is methane. EN: US infrastructure planning has a long history of discrimination.

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Legal Planet

JUNE 4, 2021

, its district, appellate , and supreme courts decided in favor of Urgenda, an upstart environmental organization, ordering the government to more aggressively reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Under Dutch tort law, the standard of care is that “acting in conflict with what is generally accepted according to unwritten law is unlawful.”

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PA Environment Daily

JULY 10, 2023

The third annual Penn State Solar Law Symposium will be held virtually on August 23, from noon to 4:30 p.m., for attorneys and energy professionals.

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Law Natural Gas Renewable Energy Electricity 109

Legal Planet

MAY 5, 2022

AMLO has come under criticism for his commitment to fossil fuel production and refining in Mexico. Recent changes in electricity regulation seem likely to increase the role of fuel oil in electricity production, which produces about 50% more carbon than natural gas.

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PA Environment Daily

OCTOBER 18, 2023

The Safety Division investigation continues to explore the circumstances surrounding this incident, compliance with state and federal pipeline safety regulations, as well as compliance with Pennsylvania’s “One Call Law,” which is intended to help prevent damage to underground utility lines. Click Here for the complete announcement.

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Law and Environment

AUGUST 11, 2022

5060 ), titled An Act Driving Clean Energy and Offshore Wind, into law on Thursday August 11, 2022. The law keeps the required procurement total at 5.6 Reduction of Fossil Fuels. Governor Baker signed the climate bill ( H.5060 The act combines and modifies provisions from the House’s proposed offshore wind bill (H.4524)

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Clean Energy Fossil Fuels Renewable Energy 2027 147

Union of Concerned Scientists

DECEMBER 21, 2023

Upcoming research from my colleague Dave Cooke shows that electric delivery trucks can reduce climate-warming emissions from driving by up to 92 percent and reduce lifecycle public health impacts by up to 85 percent compared to today’s average fossil-fueled delivery trucks.

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PA Environment Daily

NOVEMBER 22, 2022

“Extending a permit that judges just found to be illegal is a slap in the face to residents of Clinton County and to the rule of law,” said Joseph Otis Minott, Executive Director and Chief Counsel of Clean Air Council, on behalf of all three environmental groups filing this appeal. Renewable energy is cleaner, cheaper, and more abundant.”

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Natural Gas Fossil Fuels Air Pollution Renewable Energy 104

Union of Concerned Scientists

APRIL 3, 2023

It is overwhelmingly produced by a process known as steam methane reforming (SMR), which is heavily carbon-polluting, and the resulting hydrogen is primarily consumed as a feedstock for industrial purposes, such as oil refining and fertilizer production, not as a way to displace fossil fuels. And this isn’t just hypothetical.

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Legal Planet

JUNE 13, 2022

Natural gas, oil, and nuclear are minor players. Prior to Glasgow, the NRDC had concluded that India was on track to meet its previous commitment to have 40% non-fossil fuel power generation by 2030. Twelve percent of capacity comes from hydro, and an impressive 23% from renewables (10% wind, 9% solar).

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PA Environment Daily

AUGUST 14, 2024

On August 14, CNX Resources issued a press release announcing the preliminary results of air emissions monitoring at 14 sites it said "indicate that CNX natural gas development poses no public health risk." Eleven of the sites were monitored for as little as just four weeks up to 24 weeks or less.

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Natural Gas Air Pollution Fossil Fuels Regulations 108

Law Columbia

DECEMBER 2, 2022

Exxon , the cities and towns allege that the fossil fuel companies were liable because they knowingly produced and marketed products that have caused climate change harms, while concealing and misrepresenting the associated dangers. have filed more than twenty cases seeking damages from fossil fuel companies for climate harms.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

NOVEMBER 2, 2023

In response to this disastrous event, a federal law passed two years later calling for an entity to develop and enforce reliability standards for the power grid. As extreme weather events cut off fossil fuels, narratives that fossil fuels are a guaranteed resource for grid reliability are proving outdated and harmful.

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Legal Planet

APRIL 21, 2023

City of Berkeley , addressing whether the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) invalidates a Berkeley municipal ordinance specifying when natural-gas infrastructure can be extended into new buildings. Unfortunately, the panel did not provide that clarity. But see below for an interesting caveat here.)

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Natural Gas Fossil Fuels Regulations Government 130

Law Columbia

APRIL 18, 2023

The court overturned a District Court ruling to invalidate a Berkeley, California, prohibition on natural gas infrastructure in newly-constructed buildings. Berkeley’s so-called “natural gas ban” was the first local ordinance in the country to effectively require all-electric construction of new buildings.

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Legal Planet

FEBRUARY 22, 2022

This post was originally published on the Law and Political Economy blog as part of a symposium on inflation. In the early days of the current price shocks, fossil fuel boosters blamed clean energy and climate policy. Photo credit: Matthew Smith, Flickr. The Capacity Story. In the U.S.,

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Natural Gas Electricity Fossil Fuels Clean Energy 130

Law and Environment

DECEMBER 5, 2022

The report seeks to establish a framework for a long-term reduction in emissions from heating fuels, to align with the Commonwealth’s emissions reduction target of net zero by 2050 and the 2050 Decarbonization Roadmap. Governor-elect Healey has her work cut out for her!

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Fossil Fuels Clean Energy Electricity Natural Gas 130

Energy & the Law

MAY 17, 2023

This was the City of Baltimore case but it is expected to affect all climate litigation in which the plaintiffs assert only state law claims. Climate Change Litigation sponsored by Columbia Law School and Arnold and Porter. It’s probably pre-empted by federal law anyway.

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Fossil Fuels Climate Change Natural Gas Law 130

Legal Planet

JANUARY 26, 2023

LA City Council recently approved LADWP’s request for $800 million in funding to save the Scattergood natural gas plant from decommissioning by retrofitting the plant to combust a blend of natural gas and hydrogen. For comparison, the combustion of natural gas produces about 0.42

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Carbon Dioxide Fossil Fuels Natural Gas Technology 130

PA Environment Daily

OCTOBER 15, 2023

One of the most significant changes is "enhance resource accreditation" that would more accurately assess the reliability value of natural gas-fired power plants which accounted for 70% of the power plant outages in PJM during Winter Storm Elliot.

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Natural Gas Electricity Nuclear Power Fossil Fuels 83

Legal Planet

OCTOBER 26, 2021

It is a highly professional and analytically competent organization, rather conservative, and quite sympathetic to the perspectives and business needs of the energy sector, including fossil-fuel producers. It’s worth reading through their roadmap in detail, but it’s a few of the most immediate requirements that jump out at you.

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Enviromental Defense

MAY 1, 2024

Ebel, the CEO of Enbridge, to our list of infamous Climate Villains – powerful people with fossil fuel interests holding Canada back from effective climate action. The executives behind the fossil fuel industry often avoid public scrutiny, which is why we’re shining the spotlight on their activities.

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Union of Concerned Scientists

APRIL 20, 2023

Through the Clean Air Act , and as affirmed—and reaffirmed—through multiple legal sagas, EPA is statutorily obligated to address carbon pollution from fossil fuel-fired power plants. One critical tool for forcing that reckoning comes from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). EPA decision, but it did not ground EPA.

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PA Environment Daily

JANUARY 28, 2023

27 -- Committee Schedule TODAY’s Calendar Of Events -- DEP Releases Bid Solicitation To Plug 19 Abandoned Conventional Gas Wells In Forest County All At Taxpayer Expense [PaEN] -- DEP Blog: Plugging PA’s Abandoned Conventional Oil And Gas Wells -- Bradford Era: Rep. Senate returns to voting session Feb.

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