Environmental Law

Environmental Law Program

Environmental Law Program

The Environmental Law Program uses strategic legal campaigns to fight climate change, to protect clean air, water and wilderness, and to promote justice for communities threatened by pollution.


In the past year alone, we launched more than 200 legal actions to challenge the fossil fuel industry's destructive effects on our air, water, and climate.

About Our Program

Our team of top-notch attorneys and legal staff leverages all of the Club's tools of democracy, integrating legal advocacy with grassroots organizing, sophisticated communications, a state-of-the-art digital strategies team, and administrative lobbying.

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Support the Environmental Law Program

We pair litigation with effective community organizing and strong local communications to build genuine, informed support from community members and government officials.

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Sierra Club ELP in Lake Tahoe

Our Staff

We are a team of professional attorneys and staff who combine sophisticated legal tactics with a commitment to social and environmental justice at the grassroots level. We pair litigation with effective community organizing and strong local communications to build genuine, informed support from community members and government officials, making courtroom victories sustainable over the long term.

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July 30, 2018

Despite acknowledging the severe climate threat posed by burning fossil fuels, an administrative law judge recommended today to allow FPL to expand its fracked gas-burning operations in Dania Beach

July 27, 2018

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit dealt another blow to the floundering Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), handing down a decision that rescinds permission for all pipeline-related activities in the Jefferson National Forest

July 26, 2018

Washington, DC -- Tonight, Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler reversed course and withdrew EPA’s No Action Assurance on the glider truck rule. Agreeing with environmental groups’ and states’ claims in the challenges filed last week in the D. C.

July 17, 2018

Environmental groups sued the Trump administration today for opening up more than 78 million acres of the Gulf of Mexico to offshore drilling without fully analyzing the risks to people, wildlife, and the environment.

July 16, 2018

Washington, DC -- Today, the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense Fund, and Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit challenging Andrew Wheeler’s Environmental Protection Agency for its…

10M+

acres of wilderness protected

200+

lawsuits filed to resist Trump

1K+

miles of dirty fuel pipelines blocked

382

coal plants retired