The United States Supreme Court denied a petition for certiorari earlier this month after the Iowa Supreme Court held in June that the plaintiffs' nuisance claims were not pre-empted by the Clean Air Act (CAA) in Freeman v. Grain Processing Corp., 848 N.W.2d 58, 63 (Iowa 2014). Petitioners Grain Processing Corporation (GPC), defendants in the original action, submitted the petition for certiorari earlier this year. An amicus brief was submitted to the high Court in support of the petition. The National Association of Manufacturers and the National Mining Association signed on to the brief, among others.
The Supreme Court's decision is significant because of its implications for pre-emption of common law tort claims by federal environmental statutes. The Iowa Supreme Court found that the plaintiffs' nuisance claim was not pre-empted because common law tort claims serve a different purpose than the Clean Air Act. The court reasoned that common law tort claims "protect the use and enjoyment of specific property," while the CAA has a general regulatory purpose. This was the case even though the alleged harm was caused by by-products and chemicals created at GPC's facility and released into the atmosphere, a description that bears a striking resemblance to the types of atmospheric substances traditionally regulated by the CAA.
This petition is part of a growing trend of litigation brought by plaintiffs who are using the flexibility of common law claims such as nuisance to address what are...
