Winstead's Environmental Team has a breadth and depth of experience in all areas of environmental law, including transactional, regulatory and litigation.

Of note is our legal leadership in developing water law on issues ranging from water rights to municipal utility districts. We have advised clients on the CAA, CERCLA, RCRA, FIFRA, TSCA, EPCRA, CWA, NEPA, and many other federal and state laws and regulations.

Winstead attorneys represent clients before a number of federal and state governmental environmental regulatory agencies including the U.S. EPA, U.S. Army Corp of Engineers, U.S. Department of Transportation, Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Railroad Commission of Texas and others.

We regularly counsel clients in highly complex transactions ranging from environmental indemnities to indoor air quality issues. Among our achievements, our attorneys have devised new forms of environmental insurance and advised major trade and industry groups on diverse issues, most recently on asbestos, mold and dampness in indoor spaces.

Environmental Group Capabilities

We also collaborate with scientific, engineering and financial professionals who provide unique perspectives and invaluable experience to assist us in dealing with the challenges faced by our clients.

Environmental Regulatory

Environmental Due Diligence and Transactions

Environmental laws impact almost every commercial transaction in the business world, and in turn, companies' day-to-day business operations. Winstead's Environmental Team regularly provides solutions to environmental issues that arise in the course of highly complex transactions. Areas of experience include:

• Assessment and Remediation Contracts 
• Brownfields Redevelopment and Contaminated Property Closures 
• Due Diligence and Allocation of Environmental Liability Risks 
• Environmental Disclosures 
• Environmental Insurance 
• International 
• Management of Environmental Risks 
• Water Rights 
• Wetland permitting and Mitigation

Environmental Transactional Counsel

Environmental Litigation

Our attorneys work with clients to help resolve controversies, whether they are in a courtroom or before a governmental agency. We help our clients in matters ranging from enforcement proceedings to Superfund and toxic tort lawsuits and criminal violations. Our experience includes work at the: 

• U.S. EPA 
• U.S. Department of Transportation 
• Texas Commission on Environmental Quality 
• Texas Railroad Commission 
• Environmental Protection Division of the Texas Attorney General's Office

Winstead represents companies from various industries and market segments including: 

• Land Development and Brownfield redevelopment 
• Chemical and petrochemical companies 
• Cement and Lime companies 
• Electric power companies 
• Construction and remediation companies 
• Industrial and commercial facilities 
• Oil & Gas companies 
• Railroads and Shipping 
• Mining companies 
• Solid waste management

Our attorneys have extensive state and federal experience in environmental litigation matters including: 

• Administrative hearings, including permitting and enforcement orders 
• Clean Air Act 
• Clean Water Act 
• CERCLA/Superfund 
• EPCRA / TRI 
• FIFRA 
• Mold 
• RCRA Corrective Action / Property contamination and remediation 
• Toxic tort including asbestos and silicosis matters 
• TSCA

Environmental Litigation Counsel

Environmental Transactional Counsel

Assessment and Remediation Contracts
We routinely assist clients in contracting for the services of other environmental professionals. Those professionals include: 

• Environmental consultants performing assessments required as part of the environmental due diligence process. 
• Consultants and contractors developing specifications and contracts required for real property remediation, lead-based paint abatement activities, asbestos operations, maintenance programs and abatement contracts.

Brownfields Redevelopment and Contaminated Property Closures
Attorneys on Winstead's Environmental Team have experience in the redevelopment of contaminated properties under various Brownfields redevelopment programs. We regularly work with environmental and other regulatory agencies in connection with contaminated property remediation projects.

We have handled projects under the Texas Voluntary Cleanup Program and Innocent Operator Program, and Municipal Setting Designation programs to allow redevelopment projects to proceed with potential environmental liabilities being adequately addressed.

Our attorneys also assist clients in obtaining a regulatory closure for contaminated property discovered during site assessments and in connection with current spills and releases.

Due Diligence and Allocation of Environmental Liability Risks
Assessing environmental liability risks in connection with any business transaction or operation requires knowledge of federal and state environmental regulatory programs and the ability to work closely with other environmental professionals.

Winstead's background includes all aspects of environmental due diligence in a wide range of complex business transactions. Our clients include real estate owners and developers, lenders and companies involved in regulated industries.

During our transactional counsel, we identify potential environmental liability risks and the allocation of such risks through indemnities and other contractual agreements on a regular basis.

Environmental Disclosures
In connection with many transactions, disclosure of potential liabilities is required, both as a matter of good business practice and, depending on the circumstances, as a matter of securities law.

Members of the Environmental Team have experience in developing proper disclosure language to assist our clients in meeting their obligations under the mandates of law. We also ensure that a commercial transaction is not subject to post-closing disputes because of failure to make such disclosures.

Environmental Insurance
In insurance related matters, Winstead attorneys have developed innovative effective approaches to the creation and negotiation of insurance programs for the transfer of environmental risks.

We have devised programs using standard insurance policies, and when they weren't enough, have revised and even rewritten existing policies or created new policy provisions that would provide better coverage.

Our extensive experience includes general liability, construction, secured creditor, environmental impairment, mold and microbial coverages, alone or together with indemnification provisions, holdbacks and other devices that can be used to transfer risk.

International
Winstead attorneys have extensive international experience involving environmental law. This includes both transactional and regulatory assignments applicable to American companies operating on foreign soils and international companies operating within the United States.

We are also experienced with the international sovereignty issues involving environmental law between Native American Tribal Nations and states and involving delegation of authority to American Indians. Our attorneys are fluent in many languages including Spanish, French, German and others, and we access interpreters trained in other languages.

Management of Environmental Risks
Property owners and businesses encounter all sorts of environmental regulatory programs where compliance is required. Winstead works with other environmental professionals, including environmental engineers and industrial hygienists, to ensure that compliance with such programs is achieved.

We have significant experience in addressing lead-based paint, asbestos and indoor air quality issues, as well as occupational health issues for which we utilize the skills of the members of Winstead's Labor, Employment & Immigration Practice Group.

In our counsel to major trade and industry groups, we advise on diverse issues, most recently on asbestos, mold and dampness in indoor spaces.

Water Rights
Few areas of law in Texas are evolving as rapidly as private property rights in both surface and groundwater resources. Our water law practitioners have significant experience in navigating through the dense thicket of state and federal common law, statutory enactments and administrative rulings.

In fact, Winstead has been a leading presence in developing water law on issues ranging from water rights to municipal utility districts. Winstead's attorneys also handle contracts involving the purchase and sale of water and water rights.

Whether we are involved in obtaining and amending surface or groundwater rights, or advocating our clients' interests before the legislature, the TCEQ or the TWDB, we create a positive impact on your overall business strategy.

Our services for individual, governmental, corporate, industrial, commercial and agricultural interests involved in, or affected by, the water resource include: 

• Obtaining and amending water rights for the appropriation and use of surface water. 
• Where groundwater conservation districts exist, obtaining permits and amendments to permits for use of groundwater 
• Negotiating contracts for the purchase and sale of water and water rights, both surface and groundwater 
• Legislative and agency advocacy and monitoring

Wetlands Development
Our attorneys are experienced with the federal wetlands regulatory program under the Clean Water Act. We have worked with the Corps of Engineers and the EPA in providing advice and permitting assistance to clients who seek to develop property where wetlands are present.

Environmental Regulatory Counsel

Our attorneys regularly counsel clients about the numerous environmental regulatory programs affecting their businesses.

Our experience ranges from counseling on environmental compliance issues, obtaining permits under various regulatory programs, representing clients in enforcement actions before agencies, and representing clients in agency rulemaking in connection with numerous regulatory programs.

Winstead attorneys have experience in all major environmental laws, including: CERCLA, RCRA, FIFRA, TSCA, ECPRA, CWA, CAA, and many other federal and state law regulations. Our practice background includes: 

• Administrative Hearings 
• Legislative Lobbying and Rulemaking 
• Clean Air Act 
• Clean Water Act 
• Community Reporting, Spill Reporting and Response 
• Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) 
• Endangered Species Act (ESA) 
• Occupation Safety and Health Act (OSHA) 
• Oil and Gas 
• Permitting & Approvals
• Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA)
• Storm Water 
• Underground Storage Tanks

Administrative Hearings
Winstead's Environmental Team includes some of the most experienced administrative law practitioners in the State of Texas.

Many of our attorneys have played leading roles in a number of significant administrative proceedings that have shaped today's environmental law. Our practice includes a number of former state and federal regulators.

We have represented individuals and entities from both the private and public sectors in administrative proceedings at the local, state, federal and international levels, including: 

• Enforcement proceedings
• Hazardous waste, solid waste, and municipal landfill permitting matters 
• Air permitting and exemption issues 
• Waste discharge permits 
• Water rights adjudications and permitting matters 
• Storm water permitting 
• Rate disputes 
• Section 404 and wetlands permitting
• SOAH, TCEQ, RRC, and PUC contested case hearings
• Compliance meetings 
• Certificates of Convenience and Necessity (CCN) utility service area disputes

Legislative Lobbying and Rulemaking
Environmental laws and regulations are ever-changing. Our clients are best served by having input into these changes. As a result, Winstead's environmental team represents clients before the federal government and state legislatures on pending environmental bills and before administrative agencies on regulatory developments.

Our attorneys have extensive experience in state and federal administrative rulemaking proceedings including assisting in the drafting of technical comments and filing of judicial challenges to such regulations.

Additionally, our attorneys frequently work closely with professional lobbyists with the Winstead Consulting Group to help achieve client goals.

Clean Air Act
Air pollution, whether indoor or outdoor, is a topic known to Winstead's environmental team.

Winstead attorneys have significant and broad experience with the Clean Air Act. We assist clients with air quality improvement strategies and state implementation plan requirements and rulemakings in non-attainment areas dealing with issues such as ozone, airborne fine particulate matter, and the chemicals that lead to their formation or emissions trading.

We also assist clients with new source review consultation, NOVs, negotiations with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, TCEQ and other regulation agencies, and various air planning requirements.

Clean Water Act
The Clean Water Act, which is one of the most comprehensive and far-reaching federal environmental statutes yet enacted. Winstead regulatory attorneys have varied and broad experience assisting clients with matters involving compliance to the Act. We have represented parties in: 

• NPDES permitting actions under Section 402 
• Point and non-point source remediation matters
• POTW discharge suits under Section 307(b) 
• Section 404 wetland dredge and fill permitting cases

Community Reporting, Spill Reporting and Response
Winstead environmental attorneys are familiar with reporting obligations under federal and state statutes.

We have extensive experience in Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-know Act (EPCRA) state laws, and the steps that should or should not be taken in responding to a spill or other discharge of hazardous material.

We assist clients to create reporting and response plans in advance of trouble, and work with regulators in the event issues develop over adequacy of reporting or response.

Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) Winstead's environmental attorneys have represented numerous Potentially Responsible Parties, de minimis parties, contractors and other interested parties.

We counsel at all stages of administrative proceedings before EPA and state environmental agencies relating to Superfund sites, including listing, investigation, RI/FS preparation, public comment, remedy design and implementation, and post closure management. Winstead attorneys are familiar with all phases of this complex and difficult statute.

Endangered Species Act (ESA)
The ESA has become one of the most potent and feared environmental regulatory statutes ever enacted. Our Environmental Practice has broad experience assisting our clients to both maintain compliance with and plan development around the ESA. Our environmental attorneys have worked with all phases of the ESA, from the biological underpinnings of the Act to the legal ramifications of its provisions.

Occupation Safety and Health Act (OSHA)
Workplace environmental exposures fall under the purview of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The agency has standards for environmental matters ranging from respiratory protection for workers, to permissible exposure levels for a wide array of substances.

Oil and Gas
Winstead's Environmental Team understands pollution issues in oil and gas operations. Our experience includes permitting for operations, pits, tanks, pipelines, and downhole waste disposal. We also regularly address discharges of produced gases such as sulfur dioxide and hydrogen sulfide, produced water, salt water, oil, drilling mud, drill cuttings, workover and completion waste, dehydration materials, frac sands, bottom wastes and naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM).

Our attorneys represent oil and gas producers and related entities in rulemaking, permitting and enforcement proceedings before federal and state regulatory bodies, including the Texas Railroad Commission and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality.

Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA)
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and analogous state statutes govern the generation, transportation, treatment and disposal of solid and hazardous wastes. Winstead's environmental team advises clients on all aspects of RCRA including: 

• Classification and identification of waste issues 
• Permitting of generators 
• Transporters and waste facilities 
• Modification or sale of permits 
• TSD permitting 
• Release reporting and response 
• RCRA inspections 
• Administrative enforcement proceedings.

Storm Water
The Federal Clean Water Act establishes standards under which persons in businesses and construction may discharge storm water into the environment. The enforcement of the Federal Clean Water Act has been delegated to the states and, in some cases, municipalities.

Winstead's environmental attorneys are familiar with all phases of the storm water pollution process, including permitting, creation of compliant Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plans and maintenance of proper documentation. We are also experienced in the process by which the entities charged with enforcing these regulations operate.

Underground Storage Tanks
Our attorneys have substantial experience in dealing with the agencies regulating underground storage tank systems, and the issues associated with such systems.

Environmental Litigation Counsel

Winstead represents clients in matters ranging from enforcement proceedings and class action lawsuits, to Superfund and toxic tort lawsuits, to criminal violations.

Agency Administrative and Civil Enforcement Proceedings
Winstead advises clients in CERCLA, RCRA, FIFRA, TSCA, ECPRA, CWA, CAA, and many other federal and state laws and regulations, and represents clients before a number of governmental environmental regulatory agencies, including: EPA, TCEQ, TRRC, DOT, and many of their counterparts.

CERCLA - Cost Recovery, Contribution and Liability Allocation Litigation
Winstead handles litigation on behalf of petrochemical, chemical and other companies. We represent clients on matters brought by the EPA and TCEQ to recover costs at Superfund sites as well as in mediation to resolve allocation issues. Our attorneys also negotiate Superfund site remediation agreements from the RI/FS stage through the final remedial plan.

Common Counsel Representation
We represent major manufacturing, chemical and petrochemical companies in property contamination cases stemming from Superfund sites brought by owners of property. We also act as Common Counsel for major PRPs at Superfund sites in common issues.

Mold
Winstead has favorably litigated several mold claims on behalf of major insurance clients in litigation relating to alleged mold damage to homes.

Property Contamination
Winstead represents both plaintiffs and defendants for contaminated property discovered after acquisition or resulting from ongoing industrial operations. We also represent PRP groups accused of contaminating property stemming from Superfund sites.

Toxic Torts
Winstead has represented numerous major pipeline companies and petrochemical companies in toxic tort cases ranging from underground hydrocarbon plumes and arsenic contamination to asbestos and silicosis cases. Our range of experience also includes MTBE, chlorinated solvents, chlordane and other insecticides, and occupational solvent and dust exposures.