Overview
Businesses cannot ignore climate change. From privately held companies to public corporations, businesses of all sizes must adapt to shifting legal and regulatory regimes, growing pressure to reduce carbon footprints, and novel risks and opportunities in the clean energy transition. Taking a proactive approach to climate change can help you secure new funding opportunities and strengthen your competitive position. At the same time, that approach must address the competing climate priorities of all stakeholders and regulators.
Bringing together regulatory insight, legal experience and technical knowledge, Manatt can help your organization navigate this complex landscape while delivering strategic advice to help you move forward with confidence in an uncertain future. Our work includes:
- Biodiversity and habitat protection
- Climate change mitigation and adaptation
- Circular economy practices
- Corporate sustainability program review
- Climate technology
- Energy efficiency
- Environmental due diligence in business transactions
- Environmental reporting and disclosure analysis
- Environmental risk management
- Green product design and innovation
- Greenwashing claims mitigation and litigation
- Land use and development
- Legislative monitoring and advocacy
- Project finance
- Remediation/brownfields
- Retrofits and conversion of existing facilities.
- Sustainable sourcing
- Waste management
- Water quality and conservation
Climate mandates are real and carry the force of law—nationally, state by state and city by city. Companies face overlapping regulatory mandates and are exposed to significant penalties. However, they may also avail themselves of billions of dollars in public subsidies. The problem is that federal, state and local authorities provide little to no tangible guidance on how to develop long-term compliance strategies and leverage public resources. Ensuring simultaneous compliance with climate mandates that can seem unaligned, or even contradictory, presents an added challenge.
From monitoring legislation, engaging in government advocacy and crafting compliance strategies to examining your supply chain and identifying areas of improvement for emissions reduction, energy efficiency, water conservation and waste management, Manatt has the strategic experience to evaluate your business exposure and identify incentive opportunities.
Whether you have comprehensive corporate sustainability policies in place or are just beginning to assess your carbon footprint, our professionals can guide you through the maze of federal, state and local regulations while accounting for market trends and financial opportunities aimed at mitigating climate risk and enhancing sustainable business practices.
The transition from hydrocarbons to renewables shudders with fits and starts, as regulations, markets and consumer preferences shift drastically and unpredictably. There is a rapidly expanding range of technologies deployed to reduce emissions and manage carbon.
We help clients navigate nuanced, volatile regulations related to clean energy alternatives, environmental compliance, due diligence and licensing so they can maximize their advantage when siting new projects.
Before a project can be sited, it must be financed. We help identify capital market investment sources and leverage government and other incentives that can make projects viable. In energy development transactions, we help you evaluate the risks and rewards, decide which concerns are most important and complete the transaction to meet your goals.
Experience
Clean Energy
We have represented and advised:
- A foreign energy company in the initial stages of financing a wind generation project in Montana
- A large-scale provider of solar product installation and grid sellback services in connection with construction licensing agreements in 15 states; M&A and entity formation in Delaware and California; and energy research, including tariff analysis, in Hawaii and California
- A limited partnership seeking tax advice on wind and solar energy projects
- A crude-oil producer in the development and financing of alternative energy facilities in California, including oil fields, cogeneration projects and geothermal power plants
- A limited partnership in the development of a project to create natural gas through clean coal gasification technology using a retrofitted coal-fired electric generation unit
- A private equity fund in connection with a workout and auction liquidation of a foreign lender's interest in a California hydroelectric portfolio
- A commercial developer of solar thermal electric projects in the construction of nine power plants in California
- A real estate developer in connection with the development of a green building project that included the installation of solar panels on units, water containment and small hydroelectric usage, and a large-scale solar farm
- A rooftop solar panel manufacturer/installer in the siting and building of its headquarters and manufacturing facilities
- A hydrogenation and decarbonization joint venture in connection with a large project to convert coal and petroleum coke to hydrogen-powered electricity with carbon capture and storage
Climate Change
- Represented real estate developments featuring green building design (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, or LEED), storm water containment, small hydroelectric usage and a large-scale solar farm
- Represented a large-scale commercial provider of solar product installation and grid sellback services in construction licensing agreements in 15 different states; corporate mergers and acquisitions and entity formation in Delaware and California; and energy research, including tariff analysis, in California and Hawaii
- Represented a business in a project to create natural gas in a clean coal gasification technology to be used by a retrofitted coal-fired electric generation unit
- Advised a business in its efforts to remove hydrogen and other gases from coal and petroleum coke for use in electric generation and for carbon dioxide sequestration to enhance oil recovery
- Advised businesses on how to properly advertise and maximize the value of green claims
- Advised on changes to corporate governance to detect and deal with impending risk from climate change regulation
- Prepared affirmative public relations messages and required disclosures concerning efforts to protect the climate
- Represented an entertainment industry association in conjunction with its solid waste packaging initiative to reduce the waste associated with compact disc packaging and to adopt environmentally sustainable packaging material
- Successfully defended a well-known discount store in a high-profile litigation brought by a well-funded environmental group challenging the siting of a store in Riverside County, California. The environmental group advanced claims under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), claiming that the project did not adequately describe and mitigate impacts of the project on climate change. These claims were universally rejected by the Superior Court of Riverside County.
- Advised multiple energy company clients on federal lawsuits alleging nuisance claims for climate change-related damages, including substantial analysis and pretrial motion work on political question, nonjusticiability and causation issues.
- Defended challenges alleging upstream and downstream climate change impacts of issuing a permit for a petroleum coke facility.
