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Joel Reynolds, Western Director, Senior Attorney, Santa Monica, CA
I graduated in 1978 from Columbia Law School, where I was a Stone Scholar and winner of the Convers Prize. Since 1980, following a federal court clerkship, I have specialized in issues of coastal protection, land use, marine mammal protection, nuclear energy, environmental justice, and transportation and have argued cases at all levels of the federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. I have twice been designated California Lawyer of the Year in the environmental category -- 2003 and 2008. Currently, I also serve as Board Chair of the Tejon Ranch Conservancy.
Recent Posts
Posted April 22, 2013 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Green Enterprise, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably, Moving Beyond Oil, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places, Solving Global Warming, The Media and the Environment, U.S. Law and Policy
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbaynativecorporation, bristrolbay, copper, earthday, environmentalprotectionagency, epa, gold, northerndynastyminerals, nrdc, nunahmtaaulukestai, pebblemine, pebblepartnership, riotinto, wildsalmon, wwf
Today is Earth Day -- a day to celebrate and strengthen our year-round commitment to protecting the world's great endangered places. These are natural gems -- biogems -- that enrich us all. Special places on our small planet we simply...continued→
Posted April 15, 2013 by Joel Reynolds in Reviving the World's Oceans, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, london, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, petitions, riotinto, salmon
Today I join a delegation headed to London to deliver a message to the new CEOs of Anglo American and Rio Tinto and the companies’ shareholders. Our message is simple: avert environmental and economic disaster by abandoning plans for the...continued→
Posted February 14, 2013 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Green Enterprise, Health and the Environment, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, and, angloamerican, curbing, environment, environmentaljustice, environmentalprotectionagency, EPA, health, northerndynastyminerals, pebble, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, places, pollution, riotinto, saving, the, wild, wildlife
NRDC staff attorney Taryn Kiekow and I were in Washington, D.C. this week for meetings at the White House, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior, and congressional offices. After a month of activism by NRDC members and activists asking President Obama...continued→
Posted January 2, 2013 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, canaccord, EPA, pebble, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, watershedassessment
If you’re the Pebble Limited Partnership (“PLP”), you have to be relieved to see 2012 fade into history. According to PLP, 2012 was to be a year of gathering momentum for the Pebble Mine (or at least a year in...continued→
Posted October 28, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places, The Media and the Environment
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, billcarter, biogems, boombustboom, bristolbay, copper, environmentalprotectionagency, mining, northerndynastyminerals, pebblemine, riotinto, scribner, wildsalmon
Last month, Grover Norquist surprised a lot of people when he appeared to take up the cause of renewable energy, noting in a Politico column that copper is a necessary component of wind turbines. In his view, therefore, we need...continued→
Posted September 25, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places, U.S. Law and Policy
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, bristolbaywatershedassessment, EPA, northerndynastyminerals, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, thekeystonecenter, usenvironmentalprotectionagency
When a mining partnership, having already spent hundreds of millions of dollars to advance its proposed mine, hires a consultant to conduct an “independent scientific review,” there is reason to be skeptical. This is the situation in the Bristol Bay...continued→
Posted August 20, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, bristolbaywatershedassessment, copper, EPA, gold, mining, northerndynastyminerals, pebblemine, pebblepartnership, riotinto, USEnvironmentalProtectionAgency, wildsalmon
The August 16, 2012 “Pebble Update” from the Pebble Partnership summarizes testimony they consider most persuasive in discrediting the U.S. EPA’s Bristol Bay Watershed Assessment process. It’s a pretty predictable but surprisingly weak effort given the ties of these “experts”...continued→
Posted July 25, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, EPA, mine, northerndynastyminerals, nrdc, pebble, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, usenvironmentalprotectionagency, watershedassessment
If the proposed Pebble Mine has a best friend, it is silence. That’s why the Pebble Limited Partnership – the consortium of foreign mining giants behind the uniquely destructive mega-mine planned for the Bristol Bay region of southwest Alaska –...continued→
Posted July 16, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, EPA, mine, northerndynastyminerals, nrdc, pebble, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, usenvironmentalprotectionagency, watershedassessment
In May, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released a draft scientific assessment of the potential impacts of large-scale mining—like the proposed Pebble Mine—in the Bristol Bay region of southwest Alaska. And the results are sobering: the mine would generate 10...continued→
Posted June 4, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, EPA, mine, northerndynastyminerals, nrdc, pebble, pebblelimitedpartnership, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, usenvironmentalprotectionagency, watershedassessment
The dark mood among the few Anglo American and the Pebble Limited Partnership representatives at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) hearing last Thursday in Seattle was palpable. Perhaps it was a reaction to the hundreds of commercial fishermen, Native...continued→
Posted May 25, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbaynativecorporation, commercialfishing, copper, epa, gold, northerndynastyminerals, pebblemine, recreationalfishing, riotinto, salmon, saveoursalmon, usenvironmentalprotectionagency, wildsalmon
The proposal to build one of the world's largest gold and copper mines at the head of the Bristol Bay watershed -- the massive Pebble Mine -- has generated a lot of press for the risks it would pose to...continued→
Posted May 19, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, bristolbay, environmentalpotectionagency, epa, garystevens, northerndynastyminrals, pebblemine, rickhalford, riotinto, watershedassessment, wildsalmon
You may have heard that, after 15 months of study, the US Environmental Protection Agency last week released in draft for public comment its Bristol Bay Watershed Assessment, characterizing the natural resources in the region and documenting the potential impacts...continued→
Posted May 18, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places, U.S. Law and Policy
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogem, biogems, bristolbay, bristolbaynativecorporation, environmentalprotectionagency, northerndynastyminerals, nrdc, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, usepa, wildsalmon
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took a major step forward today in its review of petitions to intervene in the intensifying battle over the proposed Pebble Mine in the Bristol Bay region of southwest Alaska. After fifteen months of study,...continued→
Posted May 8, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Curbing Pollution, Green Enterprise, Health and the Environment, Living Sustainably
- Tags:
- alaska, angloamerican, biogems, environmentalist, environmentalprotection, gregorycanyonlandfill, keystonexl, naturalresourcesdefensecouncil, nrdc, pebblemine, riotinto, salmon, sanonofre, tollroad
Someone sent me a blog post this morning titled "Don't call me an environmentalist," arguing that "we need to look beyond the divisions and understand that most of us are on the same side, regardless of the labels we place on...continued→
Posted April 23, 2012 by Joel Reynolds in Saving Wildlife and Wild Places
- Tags:
- angloamerican, biogem, bristolbay, northerndynasty, pebblemine, riotinto
Last Thursday in London, in support of the communities of Bristol Bay opposed to the massive Pebble Mine, NRDC delivered another 400,000 opposition petitions to the management of Anglo American and Rio Tinto, the two mining giants backing the mine. ...continued→
