Andrew N. Davis

Andrew advises clients across industries on environmental, health and safety issues that arise in virtually every area of business operations, including management and remediation of contaminated properties; environmental due diligence for business transactions; regulatory compliance and permitting; regulatory agency inspections; industrial and specialty chemical compliance and health hazard evaluations/product liability claims; environmental management systems (including ISO 14001); crisis management; enforcement and dispute resolution; and business strategy development. His practice philosophies are straightforward and results oriented: preventative action is better (and less costly) than reaction; “there is risk and there is risk that matters”; “begin with the end in mind”; “fail to plan, plan to fail”; and environmental lawyers and consultants can and should add value to a deal, not kill it.

As a result of his work on numerous high-profile matters — including collaborations with law firms and clients around the world through the Interlaw legal network — Andrew has gained a positive reputation for providing effective environmental support in domestic and cross-border energy, corporate and real estate transactions. In such matters, he regularly represents buyers, sellers, developers, banks and institutional lenders, energy companies and environmental engineering/consulting firms. Among other services, Andrew develops and negotiates deal documents and designs and implements environmental insurance and other risk/liability-transfer mechanisms (such as guaranteed fixed price and aligned-interest remediation contracting) to creatively manage environmental concerns and close deals involving contaminated properties, including in the bankruptcy context.

In the area of compliance counseling, Andrew assists manufacturers,  lenders/investors, public and private schools, colleges and universities, developers and property owners with site assessments, environmental auditing, reporting/disclosures to regulatory agencies, record keeping and other compliance obligations under various programs governing asbestos, PCBs, lead, radon, mold, emerging contaminants (such as PFAS) and other environmental, health and safety issues.

When accidents and other environmental crises arise, Andrew is regularly tapped to provide rapid, focused and result-driven counsel. He is known internationally for his work in the area of oil spills and natural resource damages and has represented some of the world's largest shipping companies and their insurers in numerous marine casualty events throughout the United States, including in the Gulf of Mexico, the Mississippi River, the northern Atlantic (Buzzards Bay) and Pacific (Puget Sound) oceans, and in international waters. He provides strategic guidance regarding natural resource damage assessment and restoration requirements under US laws to the International Group of P&I Clubs, which provides marine liability cover (protection and indemnity) for approximately 90% of the world's ocean-going tonnage.

In addition to his work on traditional environmental matters, Andrew has significant experience in fast-developing and consequential issues such as climate change. He provides strategic advice to insurance and energy clients regarding potential risks and opportunities associated with global warming, including with respect to potential liability and new-product development, and counsels clients on SEC environmental disclosure obligations and forward-looking statements in financial filings and reporting.

Andrew serves as a director and in other advisory capacities for several environmental organizations, including the Blue Latitudes Foundation, where he has helped guide its initiatives, including the R2R (“Rigs to Reefs”) program that promotes the repurposing of decommissioned offshore infrastructures for the development and sustainability of healthy marine environments.

In addition to his numerous publications, he speaks regularly on a variety of environmental topics. Andrew is an adjunct professor of environmental science, law and policy at Connecticut College and a Fellow at the Goodwin-Niering Center for the Environment.