Turner Clinic

In 1983, a first-of-its-kind government study revealed race was the primary factor that determined where hazardous waste winds up in the South—which was predominantly in Black communities.

KMCL-gift to Emory Law will increase diversity among environmental lawyers

An appeal filed in the D.C. Court of Appeals argues the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's licensing of a proposed New Mexico facility would violate federal law, Energywire reports. It flouts the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and the Administrative Procedure Act due to the facility's potential reliance on the Department of Energy as its main customer. "This NRC decision flagrantly violates the federal Administrative Procedure Act, which prohibits an agency from acting contrary to the law as issued by Congress and signed by the president," said Turner Environmental Law Clinic Director Mindy Goldstein, who also represents Beyond Nuclear.

Mindy Goldstein represents Beyond Nuclear, a group that has challenged the interim storage of nuclear waste at a site in New Mexico. The group filed an appeal in federal court that asks for review of an NRC decision that Goldstein says violates the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. "Agencies have to work with what Congress gave (them)," Goldstein tells the Albuquerque Journal. "We feel NRC is stepping around that requirement. Congress has said that DOE can't own this waste." Goldstein is director of Emory Law's Turner Environmental Law Clinic. (subscription required)

This month, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said an application to store "a massive quantity of highly radioactive irradiated nuclear fuel" in southeastern New Mexico violates federal regulations, KRWG reports. But the commission ruled that the unlawful provisions of the license application could be ignored and would not bar approval. Turner Environmental Clinic Director Mindy Goldstein represented Beyond Nuclear, a nonprofit which opposed the application. "The NRC's decision flagrantly violates the federal Administrative Procedure Act," she said, adding the commission lacked a "legal or logical basis for its rationale."

The farm-to-table movement, which provides restaurants with locally grown, high-quality produce generated $12 billion last year for small-scale producers including cheesemakers and vintners. But as restaurants have shuttered during the COVID-19 pandemic, small farms are in trouble. "I was getting calls as soon we went into lockdown," Mindy Goldstein, director of the Turner Environmental Law Center, told the New York Times. "The question is how do we get these folks any form of market."