Part of our job as environmental lawyers is to immerse ourselves in the details of environmental policies affecting our clients. One of the most significant policy developments to emerge in recent years is the concept of environmental justice or "EJ." Indeed, we have been knee-deep in EJ policies, legislation, and regulations at the federal, state, and local levels. We regularly throw around the term "EJ," assuming it's colloquial now—but that's not totally accurate. In this article, we take a look at the concept of EJ through a wider-angle lens, beginning with its history and then discussing some of its current real-world implications for environmental practitioners and regulated facilities.

To start, the notion of environmental justice is not new. It began to take shape between the late 1970s and the early 1990s, after several incidents sparked interest in the environmental and health burdens facing certain minority and low-income communities. Notably, residents of Shocco Township, Warren County, North Carolina, protested the state's selection of the township for a landfill to dispose of 30,000 gallons of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) contaminated soil that had been dumped along North Carolina roadways. At the time, Shocco Township was 75% Black, and Warren County was ranked 97th in per capita income out of 100 counties in the state. About a decade later, a group of neighbors in the Black community of Norco, Louisiana, demanded that residents of an area with over 100 petrochemical facilities be offered the opportunity to relocate, and eventually Shell Corp. agreed. There are other examples like these.