Drafting EPA consent decrees manually requires synthesizing complex regulatory requirements, coordinating compliance schedules, calculating penalties, and ensuring every provision meets federal standards. Environmental attorneys spend 6-8 hours per decree navigating intricate Clean Water Act provisions, formatting compliance tables, and cross-referencing similar settlements—all while managing tight negotiation deadlines.
Environmental attorneys spend days drafting complex EPA consent decrees, navigating intricate compliance schedules, stipulated penalties, and jurisdictional requirements. Manual drafting of these regulatory settlement documents is time-intensive, requires deep technical expertise, and leaves room for inconsistencies that can jeopardize judicial approval or future enforcement.
CaseMark automates EPA consent decree preparation by analyzing your case documents and generating comprehensive settlement agreements with all required provisions. Our AI extracts violation details, calculates compliance schedules, and drafts enforceable remedial obligations, stipulated penalties, and dispute resolution procedures that meet DOJ and EPA standards.
This workflow is applicable across multiple practice areas and use cases
Energy law attorneys representing power plants, refineries, and oil and gas facilities frequently negotiate EPA consent decrees for Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act violations.
The energy sector is heavily regulated by EPA and commonly enters into consent decrees for environmental violations, requiring the same compliance schedules, penalty frameworks, and remedial action provisions.
Commercial litigation attorneys representing corporate defendants in environmental enforcement actions need to draft settlement agreements and consent decrees to resolve EPA disputes.
Environmental enforcement cases are often litigated matters that settle through consent decrees, requiring the same document structure and provisions for dispute resolution, penalties, and compliance schedules.
In-house corporate counsel at manufacturing and industrial companies need to negotiate and draft consent decrees when their facilities face EPA enforcement actions.
Corporate legal departments regularly handle regulatory compliance matters and settlements with government agencies, making consent decree preparation a core corporate legal function for regulated industries.
Government contracts attorneys need to draft settlement agreements with federal agencies that mirror consent decree structures when resolving regulatory compliance disputes.
Government contractors facing environmental or regulatory enforcement actions use similar settlement frameworks with federal agencies, including compliance schedules, penalty provisions, and dispute resolution mechanisms.
CaseMark supports consent decrees under all major federal environmental statutes including the Clean Water Act, Clean Air Act, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), and Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). The tool automatically incorporates the appropriate jurisdictional provisions, penalty frameworks, and statutory requirements based on the violations identified in your case documents.
CaseMark analyzes your uploaded documents to identify relevant penalty factors including violation severity, economic benefit from noncompliance, prior enforcement history, and ability to pay. The tool references applicable EPA penalty policies and statutory frameworks to generate penalty provisions with proper justification language. You maintain full control to adjust amounts based on settlement negotiations while ensuring the decree includes required documentation of penalty considerations.
Yes, CaseMark creates detailed compliance schedules with specific milestones, deadlines, and deliverables based on your remedial action plans and technical documents. The tool structures obligations in logical sequence, identifies dependencies between tasks, and incorporates EPA review and approval requirements at critical decision points. All schedules include provisions for progress reporting, performance standards, and extensions for force majeure events.
CaseMark automatically generates comprehensive stipulated penalty provisions with escalating daily rates based on violation duration and severity. The tool differentiates between major violations (missed cleanup milestones, permit exceedances) and minor violations (late reports), establishes proper notice and demand procedures, and includes provisions addressing penalty accrual during force majeure periods and dispute resolution.
Yes, CaseMark incorporates all DOJ settlement policy requirements including public notice and comment provisions, responsiveness summary obligations, and withdrawal rights. The tool includes proper covenant not to sue language with appropriate carve-outs, comprehensive reservation of rights, and all procedural requirements for lodging and judicial approval. The output is designed to meet the standards required for federal court entry and EPA acceptance.