The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is a nonprofit international environmental advocacy group based in the United States. Its headquarters is in New York City, and it has offices in Washington, D.C., San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Bozeman, India, and Beijing. The group was founded in 1970 to oppose the construction of a hydroelectric power plant in New York.

As of 2019, the NRDC had over three million members. It conducted online activities across the United States and employed a team of about 700 lawyers, scientists, and other policy experts.

History

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) was founded in 1970. Its creation was partly because of a legal case called the Storm King case. This case involved a plan by Con Ed to build the world's largest hydroelectric facility at Storm King Mountain in New York's Hudson Valley. The plan would have moved large amounts of water from the Hudson River to a reservoir and then released it through turbines to create electricity during times of high demand.

A group of 12 people formed the Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference to oppose the project, arguing it would harm the environment. The group, represented by Whitney North Seymour Jr., his law partner Stephen Duggan, and David Sive, sued the Federal Power Commission. They won a ruling that groups like Scenic Hudson and other environmental organizations had the right to challenge the FPC's decisions. Recognizing that future environmental lawsuits would need professional lawyers and scientists, Duggan, Seymour, and Sive got funding from the Ford Foundation. They worked with Gus Speth and three other recent Yale Law School graduates from the class of 1969: Richard Ayres, Edward Strohbehn Jr., and John Bryson.

John H. Adams was the group's first staff member, and Duggan was its founding chairman. Seymour, Laurance Rockefeller, and others were on the board.

In September 1979, the Ford Foundation stopped funding the NRDC and the Environmental Defense Fund after Henry Ford II said groups receiving money from the foundation were "antibusiness" and "biting the hand that feeds them." At the time, the NRDC had recently challenged the FDA's approval of Coca-Cola's first plastic bottle made of acrylonitrile/styrene. The FDA found that test animals exposed to acrylonitrile had lower body weight and other harmful effects, including problems in the nervous system and growths in the ear ducts. The FDA then stopped its approval.

In the 1970s, the NRDC tried to stop the expansion of the Indian Point nuclear power plant in New York. It supported closing the plant until it stopped operating in 2021. The NRDC also worked to close the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in California. In 2018, the NRDC did not take a position on New Jersey laws that would give money to three nuclear reactors. The NRDC has argued that nuclear power is not a good solution for climate change because it creates public health risks from nuclear waste and the possibility of nuclear weapons. In 2014, NRDC president Frances Beinecke said the group could not support nuclear power because it might lose donations.

According to the NRDC, rooftop solar power is important for reducing the climate crisis. However, the NRDC's actions on rooftop solar have caused disagreements. In 2022, the NRDC asked for less support for rooftop solar in California, leading to criticism from other environmental groups.

In 2012, the NRDC sued the federal government to stop the 663.5-megawatt Calico solar station in the Mojave Desert in California. The NRDC claimed the solar plant would harm protected wildlife.

The NRDC believes hydropower is not a renewable energy source. When Indian Point was scheduled to close, the NRDC did not support a plan to build a power line to Quebec to use extra hydropower. The NRDC stated, "we certainly would not be on board where [hydropower] gobbles up the space we think should be covered by true renewables."

Programs

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) says its goal is to "protect the Earth—its people, plants, animals, and natural systems that all life depends on," and to "ensure that everyone has the right to clean air, water, and nature, and to stop groups that prioritize their own interests over what is best for the public." The NRDC focuses on issues such as climate change, communities, energy, food, health, oceans, water, and wildlife.

As a legal advocacy group, the NRDC works to achieve environmental goals by using the legal system to reduce pollution and protect natural resources through lawsuits. It also collaborates with experts in science, law, and policy at the national and international levels. The NRDC's Center for Campaigns & Organizing (CC&O) manages the NRDC Action Fund, which is a separate nonprofit organization that works on political and election-related activities.

The NRDC published onEarth, a magazine about environmental issues, until 2016. The magazine was first created in 1979 as The Amicus Journal. While it was called Amicus, it won the George Polk Award in 1983 for reporting on special interest topics.

Staff

The council's first president was John H. Adams, who served until 2006. He was replaced by Frances Beinecke, who served as president from 2006 to 2015. The third president was Rhea Suh, who served from 2015 to 2019.

In 2020, Gina McCarthy served as the CEO and president. She previously led the Environmental Protection Agency in the Obama administration and worked as the White House National Climate Advisor in the Biden administration in 2021. In 2021, NRDC selected Manish Bapna, who worked at the World Resources Institute before, as their new president and CEO. At their website, NRDC states they have about 700 employees, including scientists, lawyers, and policy advocates.

Legislation

In 1973, the case NRDC v. U.S. EPA, with David Schoenbrod, led the United States Environmental Protection Agency to start reducing tetraethyl lead in gasoline earlier than planned.

The NRDC was against the Water Rights Protection Act, a law that would stop federal agencies from requiring groups to give up their water rights to the United States in order to use public lands.

The NRDC supported the EPS Service Parts Act of 2014 (H.R. 5057; 113th Congress), a law that would not require certain power supplies to follow rules set by the United States Department of Energy in February 2014.

Effect on administrative law

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has participated in several important Supreme Court cases that explain how United States administrative law works.

• Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 435 U.S. 519 (1978), determined that courts cannot require administrative agencies to follow extra procedural rules unless those rules are already required by the law that created the agency or by the Administrative Procedure Act.
• Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837 (1984), established that administrative agencies have the authority to interpret laws and make policy changes if Congress did not clearly express its intentions in the law.
• Baltimore Gas & Elec. Co. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 462 U.S. 78 (1983), was a Supreme Court decision that approved a rule by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) stating that the permanent storage of nuclear waste would be considered to have no environmental impact during the licensing process for nuclear power plants.