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Retailers Pay Millions for Hazardous Waste Violations
Retailers across the nation are buttressing their trash disposal practices after Dollar General Stores and Big Lots Stores paid Millions of dollars to settle civil suits for environmental violations...
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Attorney General’s End of Third Party Settlements is Good for the Environment
Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued a memo on June 5, 2017 to all Department of Justice components and 94 U.S. Attorney’s Offices prohibiting them from entering into any agreement in settlement of...
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You Need a Green Building Consultant (Who Speaks for the Trees)
We are often asked “what is the best way to assure success in a green building project?” Whether that query is from a Fortune 1000 businesses or an architect, the answer is the same, have the owner...
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PACE in Maryland is Not Keeping Pace
In 2008 I said Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) loans “could be bigger than anything in U.S. real estate since the invention of the glass window.” But today, despite Maryland having enacted a PACE...
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Superfund can Save Our Current Way of Life
Superfund is broken. “[W]e all know it doesn’t work — the Superfund has been a disaster,” said President Clinton. President Bush described the need for a program overhaul. President Obama acknowledged...
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Mold can be Arrested in the Marketplace
Concern about exposure to indoor mold has been increasing as the public becomes sensitive to issues of building occupant health and wellbeing. Mold problems in buildings have in large measure been...
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South Miami Poised to Mandate Solar Panels
The City of South Miami, Florida City Commission is scheduled to take a final vote on July 18 on an ordinance that will require rooftop photovoltaic panels on new construction and major renovations....
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FTC Settles Charges Over Deceptive Zero VOC Claims
Four paint companies have agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that they deceptively promoted products as containing zero volatile organic compounds (VOCs) or as emission free, including...
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Eat, Pray, Greenbuild?
I am often asked, “how can I expand my green building business?” My answer is simple and the same response I have offered for years, attend the Greenbuild International Conference and Expo. This year...
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You Should Not Contract With Your Environmental Consultant
In an effort to mitigate risk you should not contract directly with an environmental consultant, but rather your attorney should contract with that consultant. While laws vary from state to state, in...
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Solar Panel Tariff Fight Makes Strange Bedfellows
The U.S. International Trade Commission held a nearly 10 hour initial public hearing this past Tuesday on a petition seeking tariffs and price minimums on low cost imported solar panels. The petition...
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Green Globes to be Approved in Maryland
Last week the Maryland Green Building Council voted unanimously to recommend that Green Globes, at the two Green Globes level, be approved by the Maryland Secretaries of Budget and Management and...
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Denver Voters Petition Green Roof Mandate to the Ballot
The Denver Elections Commission has announced that the Denver Green Roof Initiative, a mandatory green roof ballot initiative will appear on the November 7 ballot. A ballot initiative is a means by...
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LEED Commercial Interiors can Save the Planet
By Katie Stanford and Stuart Kaplow LEED Commercial Interiors projects present the best single opportunity for greening buildings. The proof is in the numbers. There are more than 5.6 million existing...
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The Second Best Way to Mitigate Your Risk in Green Building
The best way to mitigate risk in your green building project are properly drafted contract documents prepared by this law firm or by another attorney with green building experience. That may sound self...
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50 Shades of Green in Montgomery County
Green building will remain mandatory for new construction in Montgomery County, Maryland and effective December 1, 2017, the International Green Construction Code 2012 will be a permitted alternative....
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Rhode Island goes for LEED for Neighborhood Development and SITES
The State of Rhode Island is expanding its longstanding Green Buildings Act adding built landscapes to the list of public projects that must be built to recognized green building standards. Rhode...
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EPA Ends Perverse Practice of “Sue and Settle”
“The days of regulation through litigation are over,” according to EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. In fulfilling his promise to end the practice of regulation through litigation that has harmed the...
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The Systole and Diastole in Recycling
Recycling is not new. 11,000 years before Christ the people in the Nile valley recognized the intrinsic value of reusing waste. But maybe not since that dawn of civilization has recycling undergone the...
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Arbitration is Why There is So Little Litigation in Green Building
It is surprising to many in the environmental industrial complex that there has been relatively little litigation arising out of green building. There have been only a very modest number of cases...
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