Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal LLP offers a comprehensive energy practice, with expertise in all areas of relevance to the electricity and oil and gas industries, energy consumers and the investment community. We are leaders in representation of the burgeoning renewable energy development sector, provide comprehensive state and federal utility regulatory counsel, and offer profession-leading expertise in energy litigation, transactions, finance and tax. Sonnenschein’s business regulatory attorneys have also successfully represented water and sewer utilities and telecommunications providers in a variety of regulatory and litigation matters, including rate cases, rulemakings and investigations. Our Public Law & Policy Strategies practice offers energy clients a premier government affairs and strategic communications resource in Washington and every state capitol.
Typical examples of our energy industry leadership include representing the City Council of New Orleans in the massive rebuilding of the electric and gas industries after Hurricane Katrina. Our team is credited with saving New Orleans consumers hundreds of millions of dollars through effective regulatory and litigation measures. We recently handled the financing for the largest photovoltaic energy project built in North America and secured the first federal license for an ocean wave energy project. Our state utility regulatory expertise puts us in the center of rate cases and has led to victories for our clients worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
We have litigated energy matters successfully at all levels of the state and federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other high-profile cases, we are heavily involved in the “water wars” among Georgia, Florida, Alabama and the United States as litigation counsel to the municipal and cooperative electric systems in eight Southeastern states that purchase electricity from the region’s federal hydropower projects.
Our exceptional command of the federal energy regulatory process gives our clients access to innovative policy-making solutions. Our understanding of the energy industry's complex regulatory, transactional, legislative, and litigation environments enables us to help clients develop or restructure competitive strategies through negotiation of power supply agreements, mergers and acquisitions, franchise competition, stranded cost litigation, infrastructure development, and alternative means for municipalities and large consumers to lower their energy costs by purchasing power from independent producers.
We have a specialized expertise in advising non-US companies on opportunities to invest in or develop energy projects in the United States. For example, Sonnenschein represents several of the largest and most prestigious Japanese companies with interests in energy developments in the US. We serve as counsel to leading European renewable energy companies, helping them, among other things, navigate the complex and unfamiliar worlds of federal, state and Indian tribal regulatory authority and politics.
We regularly represent developers of energy generation and transmission infrastructure, including renewable and conventional energy plants, power lines and pipelines in siting and related environmental regulatory proceedings. No federal or state environmental review prepared under our supervision has ever been overturned in litigation.
Our attorneys and other professionals are at the forefront of climate change policy and regulation at the federal and state levels. Our energy practice includes some of the most prominent and successful developers of emission trading and monetization strategies.
We have counseled clients throughout the country on oil and gas leasing and have broad experience handling the environmental and other regulatory requirements associated with exploration, development, transportation, and release of petroleum and natural gas.
