Melissa Horne helps industrial and utility clients understand and navigate complex environmental requirements with a focus on real-world implications for their business. She also advises hydropower clients on FERC licensing and regulatory compliance matters.
Melissa counsels clients on a wide range of issues arising under the Clean Air Act. Her practice also includes guiding clients through the FERC licensing process, providing compliance advice to hydropower licensees and occasionally assisting clients with Clean Water Act matters.
Melissa’s attention to detail, thoroughness and ability to translate complicated regulatory schemes into easy-to-understand language make her ideally suited to help companies make sense of and stay on top of complex environmental requirements.
Melissa’s Clean Air Act practice focuses on Title V permitting, NSPS, NESHAP and MACT requirements; NAAQS development and implementation; new source review; regional haze; and CO2 and climate change regulation.
She represents companies at the local, state and federal levels, helping them interpret and comply with complicated regulatory and permit requirements, develop permitting strategies, and respond to agency inquiries and enforcement actions.
Melissa works closely with clients in helping them not only to understand and develop compliance strategies for current environmental requirements, but to become involved with shaping future requirements.
She assists companies by working alongside environmental regulators in the development of permits and shepherds clients through participation in the rulemaking process, whether through developing comments on proposed regulatory and legislative requirements or by preparing background information and talking points to educate regulators and legislators about the potential impacts of their proposals.
Melissa also regularly advises hydropower clients and assists them through all aspects of the FERC licensing process, including obtaining preliminary permits for new developments, applying for a license, amending and transferring licenses, relicensing, and surrendering licenses.
She prepares clients to successfully engage and negotiate with all stakeholders in the licensing process, including FERC; federal, state and local regulatory agencies; state and local governments; Indian tribes; adjacent landowners; and other interested parties.
Melissa’s pro bono work includes preparing estate planning documents such as wills, financial powers of attorney and healthcare directives for cancer patients and veterans.
Representative Matters :
- Provided air permitting assistance, regulatory compliance counseling and enforcement advice under state and federal air quality laws to clients in a range of industry sectors with operations across the country.
- Assisting a major utility holding company and one of its operating companies with refining and pursuing a comprehensive strategy for complying with Clean Air Act preconstruction review requirements.
- Advised a packaging company on implementation of the SO2 NAAQS and the associated implications for a state-level enforcement action related to SO2
- Assisted a hydropower client with obtaining a preliminary permit from FERC to develop a project on property with an ongoing hazardous waste cleanup, despite previous rejections of applications from other developers.
- Represented a Southeastern poultry processor in negotiating with a local government to obtain new conditions for its permit to discharge to a local water treatment plant.
Professional and Community Involvement :
- Member, Environmental Law Section, State Bar of Georgia
- Elder, First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta
- Chair, Community Ministries Council, First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta
- Sustainer, Junior League of Atlanta
- Member, Board of Directors, Pace Academy Arts Alliance
Professional Experience : Environmental Management Analyst, AER*X, 1990-1992
EDUCATION :
- Vanderbilt University Law School, J.D., Order of the Coif, 1995, Associate Editor, Vanderbilt Law Review
- Duke University, B.A., magna cum laude; Phi Beta Kappa, 1990
COURT ADMISSIONS :
- Supreme Court of Georgia
- Georgia Court of Appeals
- U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia
BAR ADMISSIONS : Georgia
Cost
Rate : $$$