IRS Urged To Clarify Foreign-Owner Rules For Energy Credits

By Kat Lucero

Public power and nuclear associations, along with battery groups, are among stakeholders urging the Internal Revenue Service to clarify foreign ownership rules that could disqualify projects from certain clean energy tax credits, emphasizing that timely guidance is critical to securing project financing.

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EPA Plan To Revise Coal Ash Rules Draws Quick Objections

By Tom Lotshaw

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday proposed a rule to update coal ash disposal regulations, sparking immediate outcry from environmental groups that accused it of seeking to roll back health protections and cleanup requirements in a Big Coal handout.

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9th Circ. Axes Kids' 'Sprawling And Speculative' Climate Suit

By Dorothy Atkins

A Ninth Circuit panel affirmed Thursday tossing youths' lawsuit alleging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's greenhouse gas "discount" program discriminates against children by favoring present-day consumption over future consumption, finding the kids' "sprawling and speculative causal theory" of alleged environmental harms aren't traceable to the government's policies.

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UK Drafts Carbon Border Tax Rules To Match EU System

By Josh White

The U.K. tax authority released draft regulations on the country's carbon border tax regime Thursday that would broadly align it with the European Union's system for taxing carbon-intensive imports.

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Texas Panel Nixes $7.9M Pipe Award Over 'Meager' Evidence

By José Luis Martínez

A Texas state appeals court on Thursday erased a $7.9 million judgment tied to defective pipe work on natural gas liquefaction projects, finding there wasn't enough evidence that the company the jurors ruled liable was the one that actually made the deal.

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Rivera's Ex-Partner Kept Cut Of $50M Venezuela Contract

By Carolina Bolado

Real estate developer and convicted drug trafficker Hugo Perera told jurors Thursday he regretted "1,000%" getting involved with former U.S. Rep. David Rivera in a $50 million contract with a unit of Venezuela's state-owned oil company but admitted he kept his $5 million cut of the deal.

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Brief

Canada Probe Of Keyera-Plains Deal Seeks Rival's Records

By Keith Goldberg

Canada's competition regulator said it has obtained a court order to get information from a rival of Keyera Corp. to aid its probe of the energy infrastructure giant's proposed $3.72 billion (around CA$5.16 billion) acquisition of Plains All American Pipeline LP's Canadian natural gas liquids business.

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Fuel Executive Gets 5 Years For $4.5M Navy Fraud Scheme

By Elaine Briseño

A Florida federal judge sentenced a former fuel executive to five years in prison after a jury found him guilty of defrauding the U.S. Department of Defense of more than $4.5 million.

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Senators Warn EPA Rule Will Erode State, Tribal Water Review

By Crystal Owens

Nearly a dozen Democratic U.S. senators are opposing a proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule that will limit states' and tribes' rights to block and regulate the effects of hydropower dams on water quality on their lands.

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New US Lithium Biz Formed Through $571M SPAC Merger

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

A new American lithium development company announced plans to go public Thursday through a $571 million merger between Australian Jindalee Lithium Ltd. and special purpose acquisition company Constellation Acquisition Corp. I in a deal built by three law firms.

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Brief

Neb. Utility Allowed To Join Power Line Project Approval Fight

By Keith Goldberg

A Colorado federal judge has allowed Nebraska's largest electric utility to back the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in litigation seeking to undo the agency's fast-track approval of the utility's 226-mile high-voltage transmission project.

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Stellantis Faces Investor Suit Over EV-Linked Biz Slump

By Sydney Price

Auto distributor Stellantis NV is facing a proposed shareholder class action alleging it concealed the €22.2 billion ($26 billion) financial burden of shifting focus away from battery-powered electric vehicles after experiencing weaker-than-expected demand.

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Investor Says Chinese Firms Took $476M EV Venture Stake

By Jared Foretek

A British Virgin Islands company accused a Chinese state-owned enterprise of exploiting COVID-19 travel bans to seize its 11% stake in an electric vehicle manufacturer, wiping out the investor's equity without compensation and stealing proprietary technology.

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3 Federal Policy Trends Shaping Data Center Power

With the White House, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and Congress each pushing energy policies that will influence how data centers are sited, powered and interconnected for years to come, industry stakeholders should understand compliance obligations, consider possible downstream effects, and evaluate off-grid and self-supply energy options, say attorneys at ArentFox Schiff.

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'Made In America' Rules Raise Stakes For Gov't Contractors

The convergence of widely varying "buy American" requirements, increased enforcement efforts and continuing regulatory attempts to limit foreign sourcing suggests that government contractors should carefully review their supply chain and country-of-origin compliance to remain competitive, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

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Series

Alpine Skiing Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Skiing has shaped habits I rely on daily as an attorney — focus, resilience and the ability to remain steady when circumstances shift rapidly — and influences the way I approach legal strategy, client counseling and teamwork, says Isaku Begert at Marshall Gerstein.

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DLA Piper Partner Rejects Pregnant Atty's Account Of Firing

By Pete Brush

The DLA Piper partner who fired a pregnant associate said she did so lawfully, telling a Manhattan federal jury her former employee was "in over her head" and disputing that the associate raised pregnancy bias concerns on a termination call.

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6th Circ. Won't Revisit EFAA Ruling Against Adams & Reese

By Patrick Hoff

The Sixth Circuit said it won't reconsider its ruling that a law barring mandatory arbitration of sexual harassment cases kept a former Adams & Reese LLP paralegal's sex harassment and disability bias suit in court, concluding that the firm's objections were already considered.

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Roundup

UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

By Laura Stewart Liberty

The past week in London has seen the owner of an oil tanker stuck in the Strait of Hormuz sued by an energy company and an insurer, law firm Boodle Hatfield LLP and two Serle Court barristers sued by a group of Winston Churchill's great-grandchildren, and Welsh Water hit with a fresh class action suit over polluted rivers.

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Calif. Atty Avoids Sanctions For Filing Bogus Citations With AI

By Matt Perez

A California attorney has avoided sanctions over his use of artificial intelligence for a filing in a civil rights case, which resulted in false citations.

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Another Gov't Atty From Vt. Joins Stris & Maher's Team

By Jack Rodgers

A former civil chief of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Vermont has joined Stris & Maher LLP's practice as a partner, the firm announced Friday.

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GC Cheat Sheet: The Hottest Corporate News Of The Week

By Sue Reisinger

Other states might follow the lead of California and break with President Donald Trump's policies in implementing guardrails for state agencies to contract with AI companies. And after three individual indictments last month for selling banned tech to China, Supermicro has hired Munger Tolles & Olson LLP to conduct an independent investigation, assigned its general counsel to lead an internal compliance review, and shaken up its compliance leadership.

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NJ Justices Won't Review Beasley Allen's DQ From Talc Cases

By George Woolston

The New Jersey Supreme Court has declined to review a lower court's order booting the Beasley Allen Law Firm from multicounty litigation in the Garden State over Johnson & Johnson's talcum powder, according to an order made public Friday.

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Conn. Justices Block Agency's Bias Probe Into Atty Licensing

By Brian Steele

Because citizens blocked the legislature from reviewing court decisions when ratifying the state's 1818 constitution, a Connecticut human rights agency has no power to investigate alleged bias in attorney licensing decisions, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled Friday in a unanimous opinion.

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BREAKING: Trump Taps Personal Atty For 2nd Circ.

By Courtney Bublé

President Donald Trump announced on Friday evening he's tapping Matthew Schwartz, his attorney in the New York hush money case, for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. 

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