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Environmental Law Posts, from members of Post & Schell’s Environmental Group, are intended to provide current updates and analysis of judicial opinions, emerging regulatory issues, and potential risks and liabilities in environmental law.

What Utilities Should Do, Now That Wetland Permit NWP12 Has Been Vacated

Among utility companies nationwide, there is justifiable alarm over the Montana United States District Court’s April 15, 2020, ruling vacating Nationwide Permit 12 (NWP12). NWP12 provides an expedited process for obtaining federal approval to conduct certain linear utility projects that impact wetlands. These projects include oil and gas pipelines, electrical lines, and phone, internet, and TV cable lines. 

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Conducting Environmental Compliance Activities During the COVID-19 Crisis

As the COVID-19 crisis continues, the ways in which businesses engage in everyday activities is evolving at a pace more rapid than most of us have ever seen in our lives, and hopefully will ever see again. Among these changes is the way businesses address environmental compliance obligations. Two of the more important questions regarding environmental compliance are: (1) Can a business continue environmental investigation and remediation field work?; (2) Can a business cease or reduce its performance of operational compliance obligations?

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COVID-19: Considerations and Support for Property Owners

In these trying times, offering our clients the support they need is of the utmost importance to the Environmental Group at Post & Schell. The past few weeks have left us all navigating uncharted waters, taking each day as it comes, and facing and addressing new and previously unheard of challenges.

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Deadline Approaching for CA Property Owners to Submit HazMat Business Plans and Comply with Aboveground Storage Tank Requirements

Pursuant to Chapter 6.95 of California's Health and Safety Code and the associated regulations in Title 19, every commercial property in California that stores a hazardous material or mixture of hazardous materials in quantities equal or greater to 55 gallons, 500 pounds, or 200 cubic feet of gas must file electronically through either the state CERS portal or local Uniform Procedures Act (UPA) portal the property's Hazardous Materials Business Plan.

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Use Caution When Giving Legal Advice in the Presence of Consultants - Part 2

Last year, we reported on a Pennsylvania Superior Court decision that addressed the possible waiver of the attorney/client and attorney/work product privileges when the work product is shared with an outside consultant. In Bousamra v. Excela Health, the Superior Court held that when an email from outside counsel was forwarded to a third-party public relations consultant, both the attorney/client privilege and the attorney/work product privilege were waived. That decision was appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and, in a recently announced decision, the Court has addressed both of those issues.

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Recent Legionella Outbreaks Illustrate Risks for Health Care, Hospitality, and Commercial Industries (Even at New Facilities)

Despite increasingly onerous regulatory obligations placed on health care, hospitality, and commercial facilities, reported incidents of Legionnaires' disease remain on the rise. These include recent reported outbreaks in Ohio, New Jersey, New York, California, Texas, and Nevada - the majority of which have been attributed to cooling towers, potable water systems, or swimming pools/hot tubs in hospitals, hotels, or other large facilities.

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Recent Case Offers Five Lessons for Corporate Managers on Avoiding Personal Liability for Environmental Violations

Few topics cause as much discomfort for corporate managers as the question of whether they can be held personally liable for environmental violations committed by the companies they manage. When a manager commits an affirmative, unlawful act, the case is fairly clear. But what about when the violation results from a manager's failure to act? Recently, in Schlafke v. DEP, the Pennsylvania Environmental Hearing Board addressed just that question, providing five lessons for managers.

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An Independent Environmental Quality Board for Pennsylvania

My colleague Michael Canavan and I recently examined this problem in an article for The Legal Intelligencer's Energy & Environmental Law Supplement ("Environmental Quality Board: Is It Time to Make it Truly Independent?"). There are a variety of issues that keep the EQB from delivering on its assigned power and duties, including the fact that the board has had little or no staff throughout its 50-year history placing many of its presumed duties back on the DEP.

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Ensuring That Your Voluntary Cleanup Gets You What You Need - Overcoming Bars to Contemplated Uses

As the desirability of mixed use development continues to increase, so too will the need to ensure that remediation will allow all intended uses. On that point, one of our manufacturing clients recently found itself in a surprising dilemma when it decided to modify the planned use of the property. The client decided to not only acquire a bigger facility to accommodate increased operations, but also to engage in side-activities that it hoped would be lucrative, fun, and beneficial to the community.

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Post & Schell Advises National Real Estate Client on Cleanup, Redevelopment, and Sale of Historic Former Industrial Complex in Northern New Jersey

Environmental Practice Group Principal Paul M. Schmidt recently assisted a client with the cleanup, redevelopment, and sale of a historic, 10-acre former industrial complex in northern New Jersey that began operations in the 19th Century.  Mr. Schmidt counseled the client on the remediation of two dozen areas of contamination, and on the demolition, reuse, and disposal of several large contaminated buildings.

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Use Caution When Giving Legal Advice in the Presence of Consultants

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court is about to address the question of whether sharing legal advice with outside consultants engaged by the client results in a waiver of the attorney-client privilege or attorney work product privilege. The Superior Court has already partially addressed this question. Last summer in Bousamra v. Excela Health, 167 A.3rd 728 (Pa. Super. 2017), the Superior Court ruled that both the attorney-client privilege and the attorney work-product privilege were waived when an email from outside counsel was shared with an outside consultant. The Supreme Court has granted allocator (Bousamra v. Excela Health, 5 WAP 2018) and the initial briefs in the Supreme Court are due this week.

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