On March 6, 2024, the SEC narrowly voted to release its long-awaited final climate-related risk disclosure rule requiring public companies to report on material climate-related risks that affect the business and, for some large companies, greenhouse gas emissions. Sara Dewey, senior staff attorney with the Harvard Law School Environmental & Energy Law Program, reviews key components of the rule, including its legal authority, changes from the proposal, and the legal challenges already underway.
In late 2023, California passed two laws that will require public and private companies that do business in California to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and their climate-related financial risks. In January 2024, business groups filed a complaint challenging the laws. Sara Dewey and Abby Husselbee, attorneys at the Harvard Law School Environmental & Energy Law Program, explain the First Amendment, federal preemption, and dormant Commerce Clause challenges to these laws.
On March 4, 2024 MethaneSAT – an innovative space-based system for detecting methane emissions and identifying their sources – launched on a SpaceX rocket from Vandenburg Air Force Base in California.
When methane leaks, it is often accompanied by other toxins more hazardous to human health. New remote sensing technologies help stop both at the source.
The Harvard Initiative on Reducing Global Methane Emissions has released a research brief titled “EPA’s Municipal Solid Waste Landfill Methane Emission Rules.” The brief provides an account of the recent evolution of regulation in the United States to address methane emissions from landfills. An earlier version of the brief was prepared in support of a convening on methane emissions from landfills conducted by the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program (EELP) in January 2024. The workshop –and the brief – were supported by the Salata Institute through the Harvard Initiative on Reducing Global Methane Emissions. The brief was written by Carrie Jenks and Hannah Dobie, Executive Director and Staff Attorney, respectively, at EELP.
Jody Freeman, Archibald Cox Professor and Director of the Environment & Energy Law Program (EELP) at Harvard Law School, hosted a podcast on December 28, 2023 that provided an insightful and wide-ranging overview of global and U.S. developments in reducing methane emissions.
Carrie Jenks, a legal scholar participating in the Salata Institute Initiative on Reducing Global Methane Emissions, has posted a brief titled “The Inflation Reduction Act’s Waste Emission Charge for Methane Emissions—What Did Congress Require and How is EPA Proposing to Implement the Program?” Jenks is Executive Director of Harvard Law School’s Environment and Energy Law Program, which released the brief.
Featured today in E&E News: New Harvard-led research demonstrates a new method of methane emissions monitoring, revealing massive methane releases over short periods of time, including an extreme 3-hour methane release from a natural gas pipeline in Durango, Mexico.