David Mandelbaum, Greenberg Traurig. David Mandelbaum, Greenberg Traurig.

Unsurprisingly, the Pennsylvania appellate courts decided fewer environmental cases than usual in 2020. Please forgive any omissions of cases or detail in this catalogue.

COVID-19

The governmental response to the viral pandemic is either a response to an environmental problem or, perhaps, a dress rehearsal for economywide measures to mitigate and perhaps to adapt to climate change. Two cases this year addressed the constitutional limitations on executive action. Friends of Danny Devito v. Wolf, 227 A.3d 872 (Pa. 2020), upheld Gov. Tom Wolf's first executive shutdown order. When the General Assembly attempted to rescind his second order by resolution, that effort failed because the resolution had not been presented to the governor for signature or veto.  See Wolf v. Scarnati, 233 A.3d 679 (Pa. 2020).