Environmental Protection Clinic
The Environmental Protection Clinic is an interdisciplinary clinic that addresses environmental law and policy problems on behalf of client organizations such as environmental groups, government agencies, and international bodies.
It offers 3 credits to students who engage with actual environmental law or policy problems on behalf of client organizations (environmental groups, government agencies, international bodies, etc.). The class meets weekly and students work eight to ten hours per week in interdisciplinary groups (with students from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and other departments or schools at Yale) on projects with a specific legal or policy product to be produced by the end of the term. Visit the clinic's web site for more detailed information.
Contact: Professor Dale Bryk
Environmental Protection Clinic Activities in 2008
The Environmental Protection Clinic is designed to introduce students to several major environmental policy questions and a variety of methods of advocating for environmental improvement. Students work in small teams for a single client organization, such as a local, national or international environmental organization, a community group, or a local, state, or national governmental entity. Students work on a specific project for the term that involves environmental law and policy issues, and that may include litigation, drafting legislation, organizing community action, developing media campaigns, participating in stakeholder working groups, and developing policy proposals.
This year, 37 students were involved in the clinic. They worked with:
It offers 3 credits to students who engage with actual environmental law or policy problems on behalf of client organizations (environmental groups, government agencies, international bodies, etc.). The class meets weekly and students work eight to ten hours per week in interdisciplinary groups (with students from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and other departments or schools at Yale) on projects with a specific legal or policy product to be produced by the end of the term. Visit the clinic's web site for more detailed information.
Contact: Professor Dale Bryk
Environmental Protection Clinic Activities in 2008
The Environmental Protection Clinic is designed to introduce students to several major environmental policy questions and a variety of methods of advocating for environmental improvement. Students work in small teams for a single client organization, such as a local, national or international environmental organization, a community group, or a local, state, or national governmental entity. Students work on a specific project for the term that involves environmental law and policy issues, and that may include litigation, drafting legislation, organizing community action, developing media campaigns, participating in stakeholder working groups, and developing policy proposals.
This year, 37 students were involved in the clinic. They worked with:
- a community group in Nicaragua to address issues of chronic renal failure and drinking water pollution believed to be associated with the operations of a nearby sugar plantation
- a national environmental organization to develop legal strategies to challenge the environmental destructive practice of mountaintop removal in Appalachia
- a stakeholder group in North Carolina to identify economic opportunities associated with policies to promote investment in clean energy
- a conservation and recreation organization to mitigate the environmental impacts of a large-scale residential development in northern Maine through participation in a complex multi-party regulatory proceeding
- a national environmental organization to develop a “green investment scheme” and so-called “programmatic” carbon trading schemes in Russia with a goal of fostering investment in energy efficiency
- a school district to develop strategies to reduce energy consumption and shift to low carbon and renewable energy sources
- two national environmental groups on litigation challenging the permitting of coal-fired power plants
- a nonprofit group developing national pollution control law for a developing country
- a local community group strategizing about how to phase out a major source of local pollution in New Haven
- a national environmental group on policy and regulatory initiatives to rapidly scale up adoption of energy efficiency and clean distributed energy generation in the United States