Source: FARMDOC DAILY, 3/21/19


A previous series of articles discussed water quality and environmental issues relevant, or potentially of concern, to agriculture (see e.g., farmdoc daily, April 6, 2017; February 9, 2017; March 24, 2016).  In a return to the topic, recent developments on matters of water quality will be discussed in two articles.  On February 14, 2019, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers published a proposed rule for defining the waters of the United States for purposes of the Clean Water Act; the proposed rule is open for public comment until April 15, 2019 (Office of the Federal Register, February 14, 2019).  Additionally, a recent decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on a case out of Hawai’i will soon be heard by the Supreme Court regarding permitting under the Clean Water Act (Hawai’i Wildlife Fund v. City of Maui; Gilmer, February 19, 2019). This article reviews the lawsuit under the Clean Water Act that will soon be heard by the Supreme Court.

Background
What is commonly referred to as the Clean Water Act (CWA) was a comprehensive overhaul of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act by Congress in 1972 (P.L. 92-500; S. Rept. 92-1236).  With the CWA, Congress’s objective was to “restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the Nation’s waters” (33 U.S.C. §1251; P.L. 92-500, Sec. 101).  The basic method for achieving this objective was to prohibit the discharge of a pollutant from a point source to the navigable waters of the United States, unless the person received a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit (Hawai’i Wildlife Fund).

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