News & Updates

The Western Environmental Law Center, a nonprofit public-interest environmental law firm, is proud to announce the addition of Dr. Brian Henning to its board of directors. Dr. Brian G. Henning is professor of philosophy and of environmental studies at Gonzaga...

Late yesterday, the District Court of Montana approved a legal agreement wildlife conservation groups secured with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service compelling the agency to revise its Canada lynx critical habitat rule to evaluate territory in the wild cat’s southern...

The world is facing a set of intersecting crises, from Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine, to consumer hardship at the gas pump caused by dependency on fossil fuels, to ever-intensifying climate impacts. To address these crises, the Western Environmental Law Center...

Late yesterday, the Arizona District Court in Phoenix approved a legal agreement requiring the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to re-examine its decision to allow target shooting in 90% of Sonoran Desert National Monument, a quiet oasis of saguaro cacti, native desert...

Today on Earth Day, President Biden announced his administration would consider a path to ending logging of late-successional and old-growth forests on public lands. The Western Environmental Law Center, an organization that has worked since its founding in 1993...

Today, in a necessary first step, the Biden administration’s Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) finalized Phase One rulemaking for the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), restoring some protections removed by the previous administration. However, many...

The Bureau of Land Management announced today it will resume oil and gas leasing on public lands, violating Biden’s campaign promise to end new oil and gas leasing and locking in new extraction that thwarts his pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Despite its...

Conservation, public health, and community leaders from across New Mexico today applauded the Environmental Improvement Board’s (EIB) preliminary approval of final ozone precursor regulations for oil and gas production and processing. This includes nation-leading...

Today, the Supreme Court of the U.S. used its emergency docket to revive a Trump Administration Clean Water Act rule that sidelined states, Tribes, and the public in permitting decisions for large projects affecting water. SCOTUS provided no reasoning for its decision...

In response to legal action from a coalition of organizations, the Biden administration today agreed to review the Trump administration’s illegal approval of fracking on nearly 45,000 acres—70 square miles—of the Greater Chaco region of northwest New Mexico and to...