California wants to implement a 2002 state law that would require automakers to begin making vehicles that emit fewer greenhouse gas emissions by model year 2009. It would cut emissions by about a quarter by the year 2030. But the law can take effect only if the EPA grants the state a waiver under the Clean Air Act.

"Unfortunately, the Bush administration has really had their head in the sand," Attorney General Jerry Brown said. "In this case, there has been an unreasonable delay."

The EPA held hearings this summer on California's waiver request, and administrator Steven Johnson told Congress he would make a decision by the end of the year. The schedule has not changed, EPA spokeswoman Jennifer Wood said Monday.

The agency is also crafting national standards that it will propose by the end of the year, Wood said.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in April warned the EPA he would sue if the agency failed to act on the waiver within six months. That deadline is Tuesday.

"We feel like it's a reasonable request," Schwarzenegger spokesman Aaron McLear said. "They've delayed for a long time, and it's time to take action."

Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Washington also plan to join California's lawsuit against the EPA, officials in those states said.

While the federal government sets national air pollution rules, California has unique status under the Clean Air Act to enact its own regulations — with permission from the EPA. Other states can then follow either the federal rules or California standards, if they are tougher.

Eleven other states — Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington — are ready to implement California's emissions standards if it gets the waiver. The governors of Arizona, Florida and New Mexico have said their states will adopt the standard.

The Association of International Automobile Manufacturers, which represents Honda, Nissan, Toyota and 11 other foreign car companies, has sued to block the standards from taking effect.

It argues that the tougher standards would raise the cost of cars and could force manufacturers to pull some sports utility vehicles and pickup trucks from showrooms. Their case is pending in federal court in Fresno.

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers has asked the EPA to deny the waiver, arguing there should be one federal standard for tailpipe emissions.

A pipeline that the company owned ruptured about six miles west of Kingman in October 2004. More than a million pounds of liquid ammonia was released.

U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren says the ruptured pipe created a vapor cloud that was a half-mile wide and 1.5 miles long. The ammonia flowed into a 10-mile stretch of a tributary of Smoots Creek, killing the fish, including several endangered ones.

The sonar is used to detect underwater objects like submarines and is critical to readiness training, Navy officials said.

"The U.S. Navy's use of sonar, and the ability to test and train with it, is critical to the national security of the United States," the government argued before the start of the hearing in the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.

Three tests have taken place off the California coast and 11 more were scheduled through 2009.

But the NRDC claims the sonar, which shoots bursts of sound, is so loud it kills whales.

"Scientists all agree that mid-frequency sonar causes whales to strand and die," said Joel Reynolds, senior attorney at NRDC and director of its marine mammal protection program.

The NRDC filed a similar lawsuit in Hawaii, where a court ordered the Navy to implement measures to protect whales before proceeding with its exercises.

"This is among the most biologically rich areas in the country," Reynolds said about the area off the California coast. "It's an extraordinary place and it's the wrong place to be testing with sonar technology that's known to kill whales."

The NRDC said it expects the judge to issue a final decision later on Monday or Tuesday.

Navy officials said they will appeal.

In its 4-3 decision, the Supreme Court upheld Court of Appeals decisions that said the residents had the legal standing to sue the company over how its water withdrawals might affect the Dead Stream and Thompson Lake.

But it disagreed with the lower court's ruling that the residents also had the legal standing to sue over a nearby lake -- Osprey Lake Impoundment -- and three wetlands, saying residents didn't prove they used those areas.

Justice Marilyn Kelly criticized the majority's decision, writing in her dissent that "it extinguishes a valid cause of action for no reason other than its belief that the cause of action granted by the Legislature is too broad."

A Nestle spokeswoman said the court simply was being consistent with an earlier ruling that limited the law's scope.

But David Holtz, director of Clean Water Action Michigan, said the court's ruling makes it even more important to pass legislation protecting Michigan's waters. A package of bills was introduced this week in the state House to strengthen a permit system for water withdrawals.

U.S. federal appeals court has ordered Royal Dutch Shell Plc to suspend drilling operations on offshore oil blocks in the Beaufort Sea off the north coast of Alaska pending a legal challenge being brought by environmental activists and Alaska Native groups.

The Alaska North Slope Borough has been leading a legal fight against Shell's drilling plans, arguing that environmental impact assessments prepared by the company are inadequate.

The Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers wrote the new guidelines after the Supreme Court split a year ago in a case about which waters fall under the Clean Water Act.

Because of the split decision, lower courts must decide on a case-by-case basis if the law applies to smaller water areas.

Four justices said the law was restricted to protecting navigable waters such as lakes and rivers, and bodies connected to them, while four argued the law had a broader reach.

The new guidelines were intended to help workers in the field determine if a waterway fell under the act, using the argument of Justice Anthony Kennedy, who did not join either side in the decision.

Benjamin Grumbles, EPA's assistant administrator for water, told reporters during a conference the new guidelines would provide greater consistency and predictability for the public.

Now his agency will regulate waters large enough to be used by boats that transport commerce, along with wetlands adjacent to them. It will decide on a case-by-case basis to regulate other tributaries that may affect main waterways.

'In effect, the EPA and the Corps are taking their field staff and the public out to the woods, blindfolding them, spinning them in circles, telling them to 'go west,' and calling that guidance,' complained Jon Devine, a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The EPA's new policy does not offer clear instructions to scientists in the field on how to protect surface waters, Devine said, and would eliminate protections for many streams. He also said the case-by-case decisions would inspire an onslaught of lawsuits and public confusion.

John Woodley, Assistant Secretary of the Army, said there would be no way to measure changes from the guidance.

But, he said, the waterways in the Supreme Court case would have been considered wetlands according to EPA's new guidance.

Angered by the Supreme Court's split, Democratic lawmakers last month introduced the 'Clean Water Restoration Act' that would drop the word 'navigable' from the original law.

Rep. James Oberstar, a Minnesota Democrat sponsoring the legislation, said the single edit would make clear that the EPA must also protect watersheds, which are often creeks or estuaries where water has collected.

A high-stakes legal battle over a century of smelter contamination dumped into the Columbia River by a Canadian mining and smelting giant may be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court issued an order today inviting the U.S. Solicitor General – the lead lawyer for the Bush administration – to file an amicus brief on behalf of one or more of the parties in the complex case, filed in 2004 against Teck Cominco Ltd. by two leaders of the Colville Confederated Tribes.

The high court’s order doesn’t necessarily mean the justices have agreed to accept the case, said Mary Sue Wilson, a senior assistant attorney general for Washington state in Olympia.

“We don’t think it’s a signal either way. It’s not unusual for the court to ask, what does the U.S. government have to say?,” Wilson said.

The litigation was brought by Joe Pakootas and D.R. Michel under the “citizen’s suit” provisions of Superfund in an effort to force Teck Cominco to pay for an environmental cleanup of Lake Roosevelt.

Teck Cominco, based in Vancouver, B.C., claims it would only be subject to Superfund, the U.S. law governing toxic waste cleanups, if it had “arranged” for the waste to end up in the United States.

Last July, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rebuffed that argument and ruled that Teck Cominco is subject to U.S. toxic waste cleanup laws. That ruling was hailed by Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire, who called it “good news for all Washingtonians.”

On Oct. 30, the court reiterated its position after lawyers for Teck Cominco unsuccessfully petitioned for a rehearing. Teck Cominco filed an immediate appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

For months, the court has been silent on whether it would accept or reject the case, which legal experts have called a unique use of Superfund’s “citizen’s suit” provision in an effort to compel a foreign company to clean up under strict U.S. cleanup laws.

Additional briefing in the case could take two to six months, Wilson said.