Mandatory Supply Chain Human Rights Due Diligence in the UK

By Begonia Filgueira, Hannah Laming and Cristina Vela Gonzalez on November 10, 2026 Posted in Supply Chain

The UK Government has taken a significant step towards mandatory supply chain human rights due diligence.

On 4 November 2026, the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, the Rt Hon Jonathan Reynolds MP, announced that the UK will introduce mandatory human rights due diligence requirements for certain businesses. This marks one of the most substantial developments in responsible business regulation since the introduction of the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

However, this is not the only legislative proposal currently under consideration. A number of overlapping initiatives are progressing through Parliament, creating an increasingly complex compliance landscape for businesses operating in the UK.

While key details remain to be clarified, the direction of travel is unmistakable. Companies should now be reviewing and, where necessary, strengthening their human rights due diligence processes, supply chain risk assessments, governance frameworks, policies and public disclosures.

CERCLA Five-Year Reviews and Reopeners After the PFOA/PFOS Designation: How It Is Happening and What the Reviews Have Found

By Alex Arensberg, Phil Sandick, Michael Cox and Vivien Beadle on November 10, 2026 Posted in CERCLA/RCRA, Chemicals & Products, Property Acquisition, Site Remediation & Brownfields Redevelopment, Rulemaking & Policy Development

On August 18, 2026, a unanimous D.C. Circuit panel denied every petition challenging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) rule designating perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) as hazardous substances under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) § 102(a). In doing so, the court held that uncertainty about future cleanup costs did not make the rule arbitrary and capricious, because, as explained in EPA’s Designation itself, “CERCLA response actions are discretionary, contingent, and site-specific determinations.”

This post analyzes how those site-specific determinations have been made and are likely to be made when closed sites are reviewed for potential contamination by PFOA/PFOS. The mechanism is the Five-Year Review (FYR), which is required wherever a site remedy leaves contamination in place above levels that allow unrestricted use. In the FYR process, PFOA/PFOS contamination may be assessed, at which point EPA may determine that further response action is needed to ensure the remedy selected for the site remains protective of public health and the environment—including with respect to any known or suspected PFOA/PFOS contamination. At settled sites, that determination can lead EPA to invoke a consent decree “reopener.”

EPA Finalizes Colorado’s Class VI Primacy: What Changes on November 12 and What CCS Developers Should Watch

By Ghislaine Bruner, Phil Sandick and Michael Cox on November 9, 2026 Posted in Climate Change & Sustainability, Rulemaking & Policy Development

In our August 6 post, we explained how EPA’s proposed grant of Class VI underground injection control (UIC) primacy to Colorado, together with the Colorado–Wyoming Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), could bring faster and more coordinated permitting to carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects in the Rocky Mountain West. That proposal is now final.

On October 13, 2026, EPA published a final rule (91 Fed. Reg. 64780) approving Colorado’s Class VI program. The rule takes effect on November 12, 2026. On that date, the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission (ECMC) will become the permitting and enforcement authority for Class VI wells in Colorado, except on Indian lands. Colorado becomes the seventh Class VI primacy state, and the Colorado–Wyoming MOU now links two neighboring states that both administer their own Class VI programs.

Draft Regulations Set to Amend GB Persistent Organic Pollutants Regulation

By Francesca Puttock on October 16, 2026 Posted in Brexit, Chemicals & Products, Environmental, Environmental Due Diligence, Environmental Protection

The draft Persistent Organic Pollutants (Amendment) Regulations 2026 (“Draft Regulations“) have this week been laid before Parliament and are set to come into force on 16 December 2026. They will amend the post-Brexit, assimilated version of the Persistent Organic Pollutants Regulation (EU 2019/1021) as it applies in Great Britain (“GB POPs Regulation“). In Northern Ireland, the EU POPs Regulation continues to apply.

The Draft Regulations will amend Annex I of the GB POPs Regulation to prohibit the manufacturing, placing on the market, and use of five POPs:

UV-328 (commonly used as an ultraviolet absorber for plastics)
Dechlorane Plus (DP) (a flame retardant)
Chlorpyrifos (an insecticide used on fodder crops and grassland)
Medium-chain chlorinated paraffins (MCCPs)
Long-chain perfluorocarboxylic acids (LC-PFCAs)

On account of their properties, these substances are used in a range of applications and across many industries, so consideration of (i) the exemptions to the bans and (ii) the ‘unintentional trade contaminants’ (“UTC“) limits will be particularly important for businesses evaluating the impact of the bans.

The Draft Regulations also amend the UTC limits for PFOS, which was already designated as a POP, and that of the PBDEs (tetra-, penta-, hexa-, hepta- and deca-BDE) when present in mixtures and articles.

We have (somewhat) been here before. In 2025, regulations amending the GB POPs Regulation to prohibit manufacturing, placing on the market, and use of DP and UV-328 were introduced (by a first and second set of regulations) and subsequently omitted within weeks following concerns voiced primarily by medical industry stakeholders.

‘POP’ is the designation given to substances that are persistent, toxic, bio-accumulative, and subject to long-range environmental transport. These changes at local level are being made on account of the UK’s commitments as a member of the Stockholm Convention.

Our Environmental, Safety, and Health team advises clients on both the GB and EU POPs Regulations and has recently reported on the outcome of the Government consultation on POPs in our latest edition of frESH Law Horizons, available here.

Modernising corporate reporting: The shift from ESG reporting to sustainability-related financial disclosure

By Begonia Filgueira and Benjamin Morgan on October 2, 2026 Posted in Climate Change & Sustainability

On 7 September 2026, the government launched its consultation on modernising corporate reporting. The consultation runs until 30 November 2026, and proposes wide-ranging changes to the UK’s corporate reporting framework, including the provisions that currently underpin non-financial reporting, or what has become known as environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting.

This briefing focuses on the sustainability-related reporting proposals within the consultation and taken as a whole, the consultation points towards a reporting framework that places greater emphasis on investor decision-useful information and financially material sustainability risks and opportunities. This is consistent with the publication of the UK’s Sustainability Reporting Standards (SRS), UK SRS S1: General Requirements for Disclosure of Sustainability related Financial Information and UK SRS S2: Climate-related Disclosures, which were endorsed and published by the government on 25 February 2026, and are currently available for voluntary use. While the consultation does not propose mandatory reporting against UK SRS, it may signal a future pathway towards broader adoption of UK SRS-based reporting within the UK’s corporate reporting framework.

Extended Producer Responsibility Beyond Waste: AG Kokott’s Opinion proposing partial annulment of the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive a Watershed?

By Manon Ombredane and Peter Sellar on September 11, 2026 Posted in Environmental, Water Quality

Few concepts have shaped EU environmental law as profoundly as the polluter pays principle.

Despite its apparent simplicity, its implementation continues to raise a number of questions, such as who qualifies as the “polluter” and which mechanisms, from taxes to extended producer responsibility (EPR) schemes, should be used to transfer the costs of environmental protection to those deemed responsible for the resulting impacts.

These questions are becoming increasingly relevant as the European Union relies on and is expected to further expand the use of extended producer responsibility schemes beyond their traditional role in waste management.

AI Data Centres in the UK: Environmental Permitting and Consenting Risks

By Caroline Almond and Will Swarbrick on August 12, 2026 Posted in Environmental

Our firm has published an article on the environmental consenting landscape for artificial intelligence data centres in the UK, a sector that is developing quickly and being actively encouraged by the UK Government. The article looks at how the consenting position is shaped by the infrastructure needed to operate these facilities, particularly power, cooling, water and grid connections. It also considers why early design decisions can have a significant effect on permitting requirements, planning strategy and future challenge risk.

Read the full update here.

Waste carriers, brokers and dealers reform: What to expect

By Begonia Filgueira and Cristina Vela Gonzalez on August 6, 2026 Posted in Environmental, Solid & Hazardous Waste

If you are a waste carrier, broker or dealer in England, your registration will no longer be valid from 22 July 2027. You will instead need to take out an environmental permit and be subject to identity checks and criminal record checks, prove your technical competence to transport and make decisions about waste, as well as be required to display a permit number on your vehicles and advertising. The Chartered Institute of Wastes Management (CIWM) is currently working with the Environment Agency to support the delivery of the new Controllers and Transporters Competence Scheme, which will require learning, assessments and digital certification to prove technical competence before a permit is granted.

Waste activities are under greater scrutiny, and it is worth noting that a new penalty is also being introduced for waste transporting and controlling offences of up to five years’ imprisonment. The current Burnham government has also appointed a minister that will deal with waste crime and the circular economy, which only emphasises the focus on waste enforcement.

Colorado’s Class VI Primacy and the Colorado–Wyoming MOU: Streamlined and Coordinated Permitting May Benefit Carbon Capture and Storage Projects

By Phil Sandick, Michael Cox and Ghislaine Bruner on August 6, 2026 Posted in Air Quality, Water Quality

The Rocky Mountain West is quietly becoming the most organized regulatory environment in the country for carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects. Two developments this spring deserve close attention:

1) The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed rulemaking granting Class VI underground injection control (UIC) well primacy to the State of Colorado, and

2) An interstate Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Colorado and Wyoming to coordinate cross-border CCS projects.

As explained below, EPA’s final grant of primacy, coupled with the MOU, should provide Colorado and Wyoming CCS project developers and sponsors with increased speed and consistency of permitting and project review. They should also reduce risk for interstate projects that could otherwise face uncertainty regarding ownership and liability if injected CO₂ migrates across the CO-WY state boundary.

Operators planning Class VI wells and CCS projects near the Colorado-Wyoming border should begin aligning permitting strategy, title diligence, and stakeholder engagement with the emerging state framework ahead of EPA’s final decision on the proposed rule.

Consultation opens on Draft European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) for Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) reporting for certain non-EU companies

By Begonia Filgueira and Cristina Vela Gonzalez on August 3, 2026 Posted in Climate Change & Sustainability

The European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG) has opened a 100-day consultation between 23 July and 31 October 2026 on the draft ESRS that apply to certain non-EU companies reporting under CSRD. This is relevant if you are, for example a UK, US or Japanese company with a large presence in the EU, whatever sector you operate in.

This exposure draft sets out what type of sustainability information certain non-EU undertakings need to disclose in accordance with Article 40a of the Accounting Directive – to be known as ESRS-40a. The CSRD for these companies will be known as the ‘ESRS-40a Sustainability Report’.