The 2026 Lawdragon 500 Leading Environmental Lawyers – The Green 500

We are honored to introduce the 2026 Lawdragon 500 Leading Environmental Lawyers – The Green 500.

This guide is a celebration of the advocates and warriors who fight every day for sustainable practices, remediation from harm and environmental justice for the planet and all of us who live on it. Communities seeking cleanups of toxic sites, companies transforming brownfields into viable spaces, nonprofits holding the torch of climate justice. These are the lawyers that step up for each of these groups and individuals to seek solutions so we can all thrive on this little blue dot we call home.

Banu Rangarajan, with prior service at the U.S. Department of Justice and as an Assistant U.S. Attorney, is part of the team at the Southern Environmental Law Center bringing a case against the Trump administration's Environmental Protection Agency over the termination of the Solar for All program. The program included $7B in federal grants to make solar power more accessible to low-income communities and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels; the lawsuit is calling the termination unconstitutional and illegal.  

A founder of Philadelphia’s first Environmental Justice Advisory Commission and former counsel for Earthjustice, Ebony Griffin-Guerrier is continuing her environmental advocacy work at Singleton Schreiber in San Diego. Her career is marked by a consistent push for environmental justice, particularly for the health of individuals in low-income areas, most recently as she organizes landowners to protect their rights as a pipeline is built through Mississippi.

Eric Garner is a leading voice in water use law in California. The former managing partner of Best Best & Krieger has represented cities and districts throughout the state to determine rights to the use of groundwater, as well as salvaged and imported water. He has also been instrumental in the development of state water legislation, including California's landmark Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, and internationally, drafting water laws for South Africa, Trinidad and Pakistan. 

We created this guide through our time-honed process combining nominations with journalistic research into the lawyers and firms leading the way in environmental protection, remediation and compliance. Honorees who are also in our esteemed Hall of Fame are noted with an asterisk.