On November 12, 2025, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved Texas’s request for primacy over Class VI underground injection control (UIC) wells under the Safe Drinking Water Act, authorizing the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC) to issue and oversee permits for carbon capture and storage (CCS) injection projects. The…
Gravel2Gavel Construction & Real Estate Law Blog
Real Estate & Construction News Roundup (11/12/25) – Banks Weather CRE Storm, Industrial Outdoor Storage Markets Soar, and Office Vacancy Decline
In our latest roundup, turnover rate for US homes drops to a 30-year low, global data center real estate funding struggles to keep pace, industrial real estate space surges, and more! U.S. regional banks’ commercial real estate loan books are proving broadly resilient despite worries sparked by a handful of…
Real Estate & Construction News Roundup (11/5/25) – Apartment Conversion Projects Surge, Targeted AI in Real Estate Increases and Hotel Lobby Urge End of Government Shutdown
In our latest roundup, government shutdown affects contractors, hotel construction stays flat, and more! The total U.S. hotel construction pipeline stayed relatively flat year over year in the third quarter of 2025, while brand conversions saw record-high project totals. (Lara Ewen, Construction Dive) Construction attorneys say some federal jobs during…
Real Estate & Construction News Roundup (10/29/25) – Office Market Bounces Back, Senate Passes ROAD to Housing Act, and CRE Embraces Blockchain
In our latest roundup, lab space real estate faces challenges, demand for data creates power brokers, the cost burden of sports stadiums, and more! The U.S. office market is bouncing back, entering a growth cycle after years of fighting vacancies. (Joe Burns, Construction Dive) Cities eager to tout privately financed sports…
New California Law Imposes a Five Percent Cap on Retention for Private Works of Improvement
Most private construction contracts executed on or after January 1, 2026, must limit progress payment retention to five percent or less under a new law that goes into effect on the first of the year in California. This requirement applies to retention withheld by an owner from the direct contractor,…
CARB Publishes Preliminary List of Entities Subject to Climate Disclosure Rules
The California Air Resources Board (CARB) released a preliminary list of companies it believes may be subject to the state’s new climate disclosure regime, which imposes significant disclosure duties on large United States entities “doing business in California”—even if the business they do in California is not itself large. CARB’s…
DOE Issues First Solicitation for AI Data Center and Energy Co-Location on Designated Federal Land
On September 8, 2025, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) issued a Request for Applications (RFA) seeking proposals from U.S. companies to develop AI data centers co-located with advanced energy projects at the Idaho National Laboratory. This RFA follows the Administration’s July Executive Order on accelerating AI data center infrastructure…
Climate Superfund Litigation: Courts Split on Venue and Intervention in New York and Vermont Cases
Coalitions of Republican-led states, industry associations led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and, most recently, the U.S. Department of Justice are testing “climate superfund” laws that aim to recover billions from carbon majors for climate adaptation costs. Recent rulings in lawsuits challenging the New York and Vermont statutes have…
Satellite Data Centers
Data centers … in space. How did the “final frontier” become a genuine consideration for siting and constructing next-generation data centers? Perhaps it is the inevitable result of demand greatly outstripping supply in two of the great pillars of the data center ecosystem: real estate and power supply. As Pillsbury…
The Supreme Court’s Administrative and Regulatory Law Rulings in the 2024 Term and Preview of Cases to Be Decided in Fall 2025
This post reviews the U.S. Supreme Court’s significant regulatory and administrative law decisions from the Court’s 2024 Term and previews cases on the docket for Fall 2025. While the term produced no true “blockbusters,” the Court displayed particular concern with how lower federal courts have been applying the National Environmental…