Melissa Horne

Melissa’s attention to detail, thoroughness, and ability to translate complex regulatory schemes into easy-to-understand language make her ideally suited to help companies understand and stay on top of environmental requirements. She counsels clients on an expansive range of issues arising under the Clean Air Act, as well as on environmental and social governance (ESG) matters, including voluntary and mandatory climate and sustainability disclosures and mitigating greenwashing risk. Her practice also encompasses environmental justice, federal and state regulation of PFAS, state extended producer responsibility laws, and reporting under Toxic Release Inventory and TSCA PFAS reporting regulations.

Melissa focuses her Clean Air Act practice on New Source Review and state preconstruction permitting; Title V permitting; NSPS, NESHAP, and MACT requirements; interstate transport, and climate change policy and regulation. She represents a wide variety of companies at the local, state, and federal levels, helping them interpret and comply with regulatory and permit requirements. Melissa assists clients to develop permitting and compliance strategies, respond to agency inquiries and enforcement actions, and participate in the rulemaking process, whether through formal public comments or informally by providing background information and talking points to educate regulators and legislators about the potential impacts of their proposals.

In her ESG practice, Melissa helps companies keep pace with the rapidly evolving landscape of voluntary and mandatory sustainability and climate-specific disclosures and reporting. She assists companies to navigate the complex and sometimes overlapping disclosure schemes, and to understand the implications of disclosures for their business. Melissa’s ESG advice includes a significant focus on the minimization of greenwashing risks.

Melissa has also helped clients to navigate the patchwork of state regulations governing PFAS and to comply with the federal TSCA PFAS reporting rule and with TRI reporting and supplier notification requirements. She also advises clients on complying with an ever-expanding suite of state Extended Producer Responsibility laws targeting packaging and numerous hard-to-recycle consumer goods.

Melissa’s pro bono work includes serving as a pro bono ambassador for the firm’s Atlanta office. She has assisted cancer patients and veterans in preparing estate planning documents and health care directives, and represents clients seeking gender-affirming legal name changes. Melissa also served on the Election Protection voter hotline through the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law during the 2020 presidential election.

• Provide 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 U.S.
• Represented a nationwide manufacturer in an EPA enforcement action focused on air permitting requirements and NSPS compliance and supervised air permitting audit of other facilities not involved in the enforcement action.
• Assisted a pulp and paper client and a refinery to anticipate and respond to public comments, including environmental justice concerns, raised during the Title V permitting process.
• Assist a major utility holding company and two of its operating companies with pursuing a comprehensive strategy for complying with Clean Air Act preconstruction review requirements.
• Advised a packaging company on the implementation of the SO2 NAAQS and the associated implications for a state-level enforcement action related to SO2.
• Counsel clients on the greenwashing risks associated with corporate ESG commitments, brand names, and marketing campaigns.
• Conduct greenwashing risk analysis of corporate external communications.
• Advise clients on climate and sustainability reporting and disclosure obligations.
• Assisted a national airline in tracking and understanding the impacts of a patchwork of state regulations governing PFAS on their business.
• 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.

• Best Lawyers in America®: Ones to Watch: Environmental Law (2021-2025)
• Best Lawyers in America®: Environmental Law (2026)