New Tactics, Same Result: Local Efforts to Regulate Hydraulic Fracturing Continue to Falter Despite New Approaches to Regulation

Posted on: October 13, 2017 By: Ryan Eletto, Kevin Voelkel
Despite numerous attempts in recent years by local governments to regulate oil and gas activities at the municipal level, recent developments in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Colorado signal a continued trend favoring states’ authority to regulate these issues as matters of statewide concern. Pennsylvania On September 29, 2017, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania invalidated a township charter that sought to prohibit corporations from depositing wastewater from oil and gas activities within the municipality’s borders. The municipality in question, Highland Township,...
Tags: 
Enforcement
Environmental
Oil & Gas
Regional Energy Law
Shale
Shale Development
Upstream Energy

U.S. Futures Exchanges Disciplinary Actions Report - September 2017

Posted on: October 11, 2017 By: David Perlman, Michael Brooks, Bob Pease, Jennifer Gordon, Ryan Eletto
The Bracewell U.S. Futures Exchanges Disciplinary Actions Report is a monthly report that provides summaries of certain disciplinary notices by U.S. exchanges during the prior month. The report has a particular focus on notices potentially relevant to energy commodities and is not intended to be a comprehensive review of each and every notice issued. Instead, the report is intended to provide market participants, and compliance personnel in particular, with illustrative examples of rule violations and to bring to light enforcement trends across the exchanges. COMEX COMEX 15-0261-BC-1 Misc...
Tags: 
Commodities
Organized Markets

FERC Improves Treatment of Passive Tax Equity for Transaction Approvals

Posted on: October 9, 2017 By: Seth Lucia, Catherine McCarthy, David Perlman
On October 4, 2017, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) issued an order clarifying that it will not treat certain tax equity interests in public utilities or public utility holding companies as voting securities for purposes of transaction approval requirements pursuant to Section 203 of the Federal Power Act (“FPA”) (“Passive Interest Order”). [1] The Passive Interest Order provides guidance regarding FERC’s consideration of certain “tax equity” passive interests for purposes of determining whether transactions involving such interests constitute a transfer of control over the...
Tags: 
FERC
Renewable Energy
Power
Electric

Federal District Court Vacates BLM’s Postponement of the Waste Prevention Rule

Posted on: October 6, 2017 By: Whit Swift, Brittany Pemberton
On October 4, 2017, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California issued a decision vacating the Bureau of Land Management’s (“BLM’s”) June 15, 2017 notice that indefinitely postponed compliance dates for sections of BLM’s Methane and Waste Prevention Rule . State of California v. BLM , Nos. 17-cv-03804-EDL and 17-cv-3885-EDL (N.D. Cal., Oct. 4, 2017). The Methane and Waste Prevention Rule, which was adopted as a final rule in November 2016, is intended to limit venting, flaring, and leaks of natural gas from oil and natural gas production activities on public and tribal...
Tags: 
Air Quality/Climate Change
Downstream
Enforcement
Environmental
EPA
Manufacturing
Midstream
National Energy Law
Natural Gas/LNG
Oil & Gas
Upstream Energy

Will Supreme Court Find Constitutional Problems With ALJs?

Posted on: October 4, 2017 By: David Perlman, Britt Cass Steckman
Recent federal circuit court of appeals decisions have cast doubt on the constitutionality of the use of administrative law judges (ALJs) in adjudicative proceedings. ALJs are widely used to adjudicate disputes and enforcement actions in regulated industries, including in administrative proceedings overseen by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). [1] At FERC, ALJs also preside over adversarial trial-type rate and technical proceedings. As of March 2017, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) reported that nearly 2,000 ALJs were...
Tags: 
FERC
SEC
Courts

Pages