The Justice Department has filed a proposed consent decree in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas to resolve alleged Clean Water Act violations arising from the 2022 Keystone Pipeline rupture in Kansas. The case targets the owner and operator of the pipeline system, now associated with South Bow, and centers on one of the most closely watched pipeline spill events in recent years.

According to the government, the settlement would address civil environmental claims tied to the rupture and the operator’s spill-response obligations.

The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Division has announced that the United States will pay approximately $17 million to resolve claims brought by nearly 630 plaintiffs arising from the Red Hill jet fuel spills, a significant development in the long-running legal fallout from the Hawaii fuel contamination crisis.

The settlement stands out not only because of the dollar amount, but because it reflects the government’s continuing exposure from one of the military’s most visible environmental disasters in recent years.

The U.S. Supreme Court has handed climate plaintiffs a meaningful procedural win, ruling that Enbridge could not remove a climate-related suit to federal court after the statutory deadline had passed. The Court rejected Enbridge’s argument that the removal clock under 28 U.S.C. § 1446(b)(1) could be equitably tolled, leaving the case where it began: state court.

That may sound like a narrow civil-procedure dispute, but for litigators following energy and environmental cases, it is a consequential one.

Cleveland-Cliffs has agreed to a proposed settlement with the United States that would require at least $12 million in corrective measures at its Middletown Works facility, resolving a long-running federal suit over alleged hazardous-waste discharges in Ohio federal court. While the dollar figure is notable on its own, the bigger takeaway for legal and compliance teams is the government’s continued emphasis on operational fixes and facility remediation—not just civil penalties—when pursuing environmental enforcement.

That distinction matters.

The U.S. Supreme Court handed oil and gas defendants a meaningful procedural victory in long-running Louisiana coastal-damage litigation, unanimously holding that the companies may pursue a federal forum under the federal-officer removal statute when the challenged conduct is tied to wartime fuel production for the federal government. The ruling, covered in AP’s report on the decision, does not resolve the merits of the environmental claims.

The U.S. Supreme Court on April 17, 2026 handed Chevron a significant procedural victory in long-running Louisiana coastal-damage litigation, unanimously ruling that the company may pursue removal to federal court in a major suit brought by Plaquemines Parish. The decision does not resolve the merits of the parish’s land-loss and environmental damage claims, but it strengthens a key defense strategy in a wave of cases targeting oil and gas operators for decades of coastal erosion and wetlands degradation.

The case, Chevron USA Incorporated, et al., Petitioners v. Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, et al., has been closely watched because Louisiana’s coastal suits have produced enormous exposure risk.

The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a closely watched dispute over whether state and local governments can continue pursuing climate-change tort claims against oil and gas companies in state court. The case arises out of Colorado litigation brought by local governments seeking to recover damages tied to alleged climate impacts, including costs associated with extreme weather, wildfire risk, and other harms.

At the center of the fight is a recurring threshold issue in climate-liability litigation: forum.