Clean Water Act

 

NWPR & WOTUS

 

Op-Ed: Clean Water Act Rollbacks Hurt Rivers And Drinking Water. According to The Baltimore Sun, “I have always loved spending time on rivers. I tend to visit the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers because they’re closest to where I live, but I’ve had great adventures throughout the Chesapeake Bay. One of my favorite memories is a white water rafting trip on the Potomac River with my water advocacy colleagues before the pandemic. We enjoyed the cool water on a hot summer day, and we were reminded of the importance of advocacy and protections for waterways that we love. My colleagues at Potomac Riverkeeper Network like to say that if you live in the Washington, D.C., area, the Potomac River makes up 80% of your body. This is because the vast majority of our local drinking water comes from the Potomac River. But, regardless of where you live, clean water is essential to all of us. We can thank the Clean Water Act for protecting our rivers and our drinking water nationwide. The Clean Water Act (CWA) was enacted in the 1970s to prevent pollution in rivers. Although the CWA is federal law, an important piece of it gives states and some tribes authority to ensure that infrastructure projects, such as dams or pipelines, won’t pollute our water or otherwise negatively affect water quality.” [The Baltimore Sun, 10/27/20 (+)]

 

Water Pollution

 

Drinking Water

 

EPA Faces Complex Issues In Potential Update To Drinking Water Rules. According to InsideEPA, “EPA is beginning a lengthy consideration of whether to update an interconnected set of drinking water treatment rules aimed at reducing microbial pathogens and harmful disinfection byproducts, but the issues involved are so complex that environmentalists are urging the agency to consider a negotiated rulemaking or seek advice from a panel of experts. ‘I don’t see how it can be handled without convening some body’ for a negotiated rule making, a federal advisory committee panel or a technical work group, Lynn Thorp, campaigns director for Clean Water Action, said during a recent EPA virtual public meeting on potential revisions to the agency’s microbial and disinfection byproducts (M/DBP) rules. Erik Olson, senior strategic director for Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), also said EPA should consider a negotiated rulemaking. Proponents of the rarely used administrative tool say it saves time and reduces litigation, but critics say it does neither. EPA concluded in 2017 that several of its M/DBP rules were candidates for revision due to new information on health effects, treatment technologies, analytical methods, occurrence and exposure.” [InsideEPA, 10/26/20 (=)]

 

Reducing Cancer Risk Drives EPA Reconsideration Of Disinfection Rules. According to InsideEPA, “EPA is looking for ways to reduce the formation of disinfection byproducts (DBPs) during the drinking water treatment process as it weighs updates to a set of interconnected set of drinking water treatment rules, noting an increasing body of evidence that DBPs are carcinogenic and the fact that DBP rules are among the most violated. Exposure to DBPs is virtually universal across the U.S. population, so even small risks can have large public health impacts, Jane Ellen Simmons, chief of the Integrated Health Assessment Branch within the EPA Office of Research and Development’s Center for Public Health and Environmental Assessment, said during an Oct. 14-15 virtual public meeting on possible revisions to the agency’s microbial and DBP rules. EPA concluded in 2017 that several of its M/DBP rules were candidates for revision due to new information on health effects, treatment technologies, analytical methods, occurrence and exposure. And under a consent decree reached earlier this year with the Waterkeeper Alliance, EPA is required by July 31, 2024, to propose its revisions or propose why it intends to keep the rules as they are, and then take final action by Sept. 30, 2027.” [InsideEPA, 10/26/20 (=)]

 

Coal Ash

 

Op-Ed: We Must Protect Our Environmental Protections . According to Harvard Political Review, “The Trump administration is dismantling the coal ash rule sentence by sentence. Through a series of ostensibly unremarkable changes — an added exception here, an extended deadline there — the Trump EPA has poked enough holes in that environmental regulation to put this country’s water resources at risk. And the crumbling of the coal ash rule reflects a larger pattern: Among the scores of environmental regulations that the Trump administration has attempted — often successfully — to roll back, many seem esoteric or mundane. Changes to the rules are so embedded in regulatory jargon or misleading language that their implications risk going unnoticed. Moreover, the Trump EPA has pursued these rollbacks in the shadow of other extraordinary attacks on the environment and climate: withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accord and replacing the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, to name a couple. Those decisions are egregious, and they demand our attention. But if we want a stable future for Earth and its inhabitants — in fact, if we do not want to reverse environmental progress by decades — we cannot afford to ignore the Trump EPA’s subtler moves. After all, steady erosion can cause a landslide.” [Harvard Political Review, 10/27/20 (+)]

 

Toxic Algae

 

Judge Orders Agencies To Examine Lake Okeechobee Discharges. According to Politico, “A federal judge in South Florida on Monday ordered the Army Corps of Engineers to hold a formal consultation with wildlife agencies on Lake Okeechobee discharges. The details: Judge Donald Middlebrooks of U.S. District Court in West Palm Beach signed the order as the Corps continues discharges that in the past have caused downstream algae blooms and fish kills that closed beaches and harmed tourism. The discharges and resulting environmental and economic damage have ignited fierce political debate and finger-pointing. Middlebrooks ordered the Corps to conduct a biological assessment of the discharges and send it to the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service within 90 days. The Corps and other federal agencies filed the proposed order jointly with the environmental groups that sued over the discharges. The order requires the Corps, in its biological assessment, to consider the effects of discharges on the growth of blue-green algae and red tide and their effects on manatees, sea turtles, sea grasses, and threatened shorebirds.” [Politico, 10/26/20 (=)]

 

Wastewater

 

Fracking Has A Radioactive Problem. According to Popular Mechanics, “Harvard scientists have found that fracking is associated with greatly increased radioactive particulate in the air, especially in West Virginia’s dependent petrochemical economy. People who live within about 12 miles of fracking sites are at the highest risk, with ambient radiation as high as 40 percent over the background level. The data comes from 17 years of measurements at over 150 radiation monitoring sites. Scientists examined these measurements, combined with the location data on more than 120,000 fracking wells. While experts have known fracking can release chemicals into the groundwater in particular, this is the first study to analyze radiation levels. … The scientists crunched the data for each radiation measurement in combination with the many fracking sites—1.5 million total—that dot the U.S. They found that radiation sites within 12 miles of heavy fracking activity, as the wind blows, had higher radiation levels than are otherwise explained. … ‘These associations suggested the existence of some pathways by which UOGD activities could release [radioactive material] into the atmospheric environment,’ the researchers say. They conclude: ‘Likely mechanisms include the fugitive release of natural gas, which contains a higher-than-background level of radon at wellheads, compressor stations, pipelines, and other associated facilities; the management, storage, discharge and disposal of flow-back and produced water which is rich in [radioactive materials]; the accidental spill or beneficial use of produced water in nearby communities; the handling, transport, management, and disposal of radioactive drill cuttings.’” [Popular Mechanics, 10/26/20 (+)]

 

Hurt By Fracking But Voting For Trump. According to E&E News, “In rural Susquehanna County, one Republican described a cascading series of hardships caused by nearby fracking. The resident, who asked to have their name withheld because they reached a settlement with Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. that included a nondisclosure agreement, said they have to shower and wash laundry in contaminated well water because they can only afford to buy enough fresh water for drinking and cooking. ‘I’ll buy a head of lettuce, and I’ll go through a gallon of water just to rinse it,’ the resident said. ‘I’d never really thought about it before.’ Cabot, which is facing 15 criminal charges, has denied wrongdoing in the region and has said the area’s water has naturally occurring contaminants. The industry needs more oversight, the resident said. But voting for Biden was out of the question, in part because of the more liberal presence of the vice presidential nominee, California Sen. Kamala Harris, on the Democratic ticket, and in part because of Biden’s perceived corruption — an issue the Trump campaign has hammered in the election’s closing days. ‘Even Bill Clinton was kind of a normal politician. Now, it’s so freakin’ whacked out,’ the person said.” [E&E News, 10/27/20 (=)]

 

Cities Involved In Wastewater Testing For Coronavirus. According to Associated Press, “A handful of North Dakota cities are involved in the emerging science of testing wastewater for the coronavirus. North Dakota’s Department of Environmental Quality is heading the testing that’s underway in Bismarck, Fargo, West Fargo, Mandan and Williston with plans to expand it to other communities. Testing wastewater is potentially an earlier indicator of active cases in contrast to testing people. It’s funded by $65,000 in federal CARES Act coronavirus aid that includes a $50,000 grant for North Dakota State University which is doing the lab analysis, the Bismarck Tribune reported. ‘This is an emerging science so it’s hard to definitively say what we’re looking for, but we are learning,’ said Environmental Engineer Jim Uhlman, with the department’s Division of Municipal Facilities. ‘And what we’re learning is when we correlate our lab information with the number of actives or the number of positive cases that day, we have the possibility of finding trends, and the trends, whether they’re increasing, decreasing or staying the same.’” [Associated Press, 10/26/20 (=)]

 

Western Water

 

Groups Gird For Court Fight Over Salmon Protections. According to E&E News, “Conservationists announced Friday that they will head back to court over federal management of hydropower dams in the Pacific Northwest. A dozen groups said they would challenge a federal endangered species analysis of the Columbia and Snake River dams that did not endorse breaching dams. That analysis and an environmental impact statement released in July were mandated by a court ruling that criticized federal agencies for not doing enough to protect the region’s threatened salmon and steelhead. The Trump administration ‘rubber-stamped a plan that yet again fails to take the legally required actions necessary to protect salmon and steelhead,’ said attorney Todd True of Earthjustice, who is representing the groups. ‘So we have no choice but to begin the process of going back to court again.’ The conservation groups that signed the notice of intent are American Rivers, Idaho Rivers United, the Institute for Fisheries Resources, the NW Energy Coalition, the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations, the Sierra Club, the National Wildlife Federation, Columbia Riverkeeper and the Idaho Conservation League.” [E&E News, 10/26/20 (=)]

 

Misc. Waterways

 

Community Groups Vow To Fight Plan For ‘Mountain Of Dredge’ On Chicago’s Southeast Side. According to WTTW-TV, “Community organizers on Chicago’s Southeast Side are marshaling their forces and looking for solutions to address what they see as yet another environmental threat to their already beleaguered neighborhood. Organizers and representatives of environmental groups convened in a digital session Saturday to discuss the Army Corps of Engineers’ plan to expand a toxic sludge dump, called a Confined Disposal Facility (CDF), in Calumet Harbor, at the confluence of Lake Michigan and the Calumet River. The session ‘CDF What? A Pollution Dump on the Lakefront’ was held as part of an annual conference hosted by the nonprofit group Friends of the Parks. The CDF, which stores polluted sediment dredged from the Calumet River and the Cal-Sag Channel, was constructed in 1984. The Illinois General Assembly granted use to the Corps with the idea that, once full, the CDF would be topped off and handed over to the Chicago Park District for redevelopment. The 45-acre site is expected to reach capacity by 2022. But instead of ceasing operation and turning over the property, the Corps’ has decided to extend the CDF’s life via a 22-foot vertical expansion. The Corps estimates that approximately 1.3 million cubic yards of additional sediment — a mix of contaminated soil and water — would be dumped onto the CDF over the next 20 years.” [WTTW-TV, 10/27/20 (+)]

 

A Plan For The Future Of The Ohio River. According to WFPL-Radio, “From its sometimes turbid currents, the Ohio River and the basin encompassing it provide drinking water, electricity, commerce, habitat and recreation for tens of millions of people encompassing parts of 15 states. Though mighty, the Ohio River has its share of challenges. Urban runoff, abandoned mine drainage, coal-ash contamination and emerging industrial contaminants like PFAS pollute the its water, threatening wildlife habitat and drinking water for millions. Invasive species like the Asian carp and zebra mussels threaten not just ecosystems, but economies. All of this, made worse by a changing climate that is expected to warm the Ohio River Basin by a half-degree Fahrenheit per decade until 2040, when it begins to warm one whole degree per decade through 2099, if nothing is done, according to an Ohio River Basin Climate Change study report. The Ohio River Basin Alliance has released a strategy to restore and safeguard the Ohio River Basin to make it clean, healthy and productive. The goal is to unify communities along with state and federal partners to implement a regional strategy similar to what has been done to protect other great American environmental assets including Chesapeake Bay, Florida Everglades, Great Lakes and Puget Sound.” [WFPL-Radio, 10/26/20 (+)]

 

 

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