Law360: The Biggest Enviro Decisions Of 2024: Midyear Report
August 14, 2024
The US Supreme Court ruled that Texas, New Mexico, and Colorado improperly excluded the federal government from an agreement that resolved a Rio Grande water sharing dispute. “There’s a new variable in this calculus of resolving interstate water disputes,” said Zach Smith, an associate at O’Melveny & Myers LLP. “States will analyze what the current role of the federal government is in their watershed. And they may decide, based on this ruling, that the federal government has a role, and so they need to include them up front in their discussions. … On the other hand, they may determine that the federal government really doesn't have a role in the watershed. And so they’re not going to open the door to them, and they’re going to exclude them from negotiations and resolutions.”
Read the full article here.