18 articles
21st Century ROAD to Housing Act
The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act (P.L. 119-101), also called the ROAD to Housing Act, is a 2026 US federal housing law combining S. 2651 and H.R. 6644; enacted July 11, 2026 without Trump's signature, it streamlines permitting, removes the manufactured-home chassis rule, raises FHA loan limits, and limits institutional investors to 350 single-family homes.
Antiquities Act
The Antiquities Act is a federal statute signed in 1906 that safeguards historic and natural resources on public lands. It authorizes the President to declare national monuments.
Clean Air Act (United States)
The Clean Air Act, also known as the Muskie Act, is the United States federal law regulating air emissions from power plants, factories, and vehicles, first enacted in 1955.
Clean Water Act
The Clean Water Act (CWA), also called the Federal Water Pollution Control Act as amended in 1972, is the principal US water pollution law, built on NPDES point-source permits, Section 404 dredge-and-fill permits, and the contested 'waters of the United States' jurisdiction narrowed by Sackett v. EPA (2023).
Dawes Act
Dawes Act (General Allotment Act, 1887), US law by Sen. Henry Dawes allotting reservation lands in severalty to individual Native Americans, selling "surplus" to settlers; 25-year trust; ~90 million acres lost by 1934.
Emission standard
Emission standard: legal limit on the quantity, rate, or concentration of air pollutant emissions, defined by the US Clean Air Act and implemented via NAAQS, NSPS, NESHAPs, vehicle tailpipe standards, Euro 6, and continuous emission monitoring.
Environment Protection Act, 1986
Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 (Act No. 29 of 1986): India's umbrella environmental framework law, in force 19 November 1986, defining 'environment' in Section 2, empowering the central government under Sections 3 and 5, with penalties decriminalised by the Jan Vishwas Act 2023.
Environmental law
Environmental law, also known as environmental regulation or green law, is the body of statutes, treaties, and judicial decisions protecting air, water, land, and biodiversity, with modern global practice traced to the 1972 Stockholm Conference.
EPA Tier 3 emissions standards
The EPA Tier 3 emissions standards, promulgated in 2014, tighten tailpipe and evaporative emission limits for new vehicles and cut gasoline sulfur to 10 ppm from 2017.
Good Neighbor Rule (EPA)
The Good Neighbor Rule is a 2023 EPA rule limiting ozone-season nitrogen oxide emissions from power plants and industrial facilities in 23 upwind states, stayed since 2024.
Industrial area
Industrial area: land allocated for industry in a town-planning scheme, distinct from UN-defined industrial zone, estate, and park; zoned, buffered from residences, and tracked in land use statistics.
Land development
Land development, also called land use change or land conversion, is the process of acquiring, subdividing, and building on land to raise its value. Covers regulation, environmental impacts, farmland conversion, and planning.
Love Canal
Love Canal is a Niagara Falls, New York neighborhood built over a chemical waste landfill whose contamination led to hundreds of evacuations and the 1980 Superfund law.
National Environmental Policy Act
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), US federal law signed January 1, 1970, requiring environmental review of major federal actions through categorical exclusions, environmental assessments, and environmental impact statements, overseen by the Council on Environmental Quality.
Precautionary principle
The precautionary principle is a risk-management rule allowing protective action against possible serious harm despite scientific uncertainty. Key forms: EU Article 191 TFEU, Rio Declaration 1992, Wingspread 1998 burden-shifting.
Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals
REACH (Regulation EC 1907/2006) is the EU's main chemicals law, requiring registration of substances above 1 tonne per year with ECHA and providing evaluation, authorisation, and restriction processes; its planned revision was abandoned in 2026.
River basin management
River basin management, in its integrated form known as IRBM, governs water, land, and related resources across a whole river basin; the EU's 2000 Water Framework Directive made such plans obligatory for member states.
Zoning
Zoning divides a municipality into districts with legal rules on land use, density, and building form. Key facts: NYC 1916 first comprehensive ordinance, Euclid v. Ambler 1926 upheld it, zoning raises housing prices, reform wave since 2020.