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The EPA on September 16 rescinded its guidance document entitled “Applying the Supreme Court’s County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund Decision in the Clean Water Act Section 402 National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permit Program.” This guidance document was issued on January 14, 2021, by the Trump administration. “Using the tools provided by the […]
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on August 5 dismissed a challenge to EPA guidance documents in Southern California Alliance of Publicly Owned Treatment Works, et al. v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Guidance documents are often issued by agencies such as the EPA to provide government entities with a means to move quickly without having […]
New Mexico is known as the “Land of Enchantment,” but it is also a state without a lot of bodies of water. When the Trump administration changed the “navigable waters” definition to include only waters that flowed year-round, both New Mexico and Arizona were particularly hard hit, as the majority of their waterways don’t have […]
On May 27, 2021, the EPA announced in a press release that it will revise the 2020 Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 401 Certification Rule after determining the rule hinders state and tribal authorities from protecting their water resources.
On January 13, 2021, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) announced publication in the Federal Register of its final rule for revisions and renewals to Nationwide Permits (NWPs). The USACE “reissued 12 and issued four new (NWPs) for work in wetlands and other waters that are regulated by Section 404 of the Clean Water […]
In response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s (SCOTUS) decision in County of Maui v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund, the EPA issued draft guidance dated December 4, 2020, to clarify how the Agency intends to apply the decision on a case-by-case basis.
In November, the EPA asked the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Colorado to restore its definition of waters that are protected by the Clean Water Act (CWA) after it was struck down by a federal judge at the request of the state of Colorado.
On November 2, 2020, a final rule addressing the Clean Water Act National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Electronic Reporting Rule (eRule) was published by the EPA in the Federal Register.
In response to complaints by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Senator Kamala D. Harris (D-Calif.), on August 25, 2020, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) announced it would open a review of the penalties the EPA has assessed against San Francisco due to sewer overflows.
The Environmental Justice for All Act was introduced in the U.S. Senate on June 30, 2020.