The Biden administration is swinging the pendulum of repeated changes to water regulation back to expanding after those regulatory powers contracted under President Donald Trump.
But the swing isn’t likely to be permanent, legal scholars say.
If U.S. Rep. Debra Haaland is confirmed as interior secretary, the Native American from New Mexico could make a huge difference to Arizona and the West when her background and outlook are translated into policy. Experts in Native American affairs and Democratic Party congressional leaders including Rep. Raúl Grijalva of Tucson and Sen. Tom Udall of New Mexico offer predictions for how Haaland’s tenure could affect federal lands and waters: Water rights.
For the first time in three decades, the federal government on Tuesday overhauled a rule aimed at reducing lead in drinking water across the country — a long-standing scourge made worse by the nation’s weathered and crumbling infrastructure.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s lead and copper rule, widely criticized as complicated, poorly enforced and too weak to protect the health of many Americans, has not been revised since 1991, when George H.W. Bush was president.
The Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday released a draft guidance that interprets a Supreme Court decision in a way that may exempt some facilities from needing permits to pollute groundwater. In April, the court decided that a permit is required for both direct discharges of pollutants into federally-regulated rivers and oceans as well as their “functional equivalent” in groundwater that flows into regulated waters.
The EPA under a future Biden administration is expected to quickly move to set regulations on “forever chemicals” in water and other areas, but not to restrict the entire group of thousands of the substances, attorneys said in recent interviews.
The Environmental Protection Agency is already expected to set national drinking water limits for two of these chemicals, perfluorooctane sulfonate, or PFOS, and perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, said Cynthia AM Stroman, a partner in King & Spalding LLP’s Washington, D.C. office.
Here in California, rivers are a cornerstone of our landscapes. On a recent rafting trip down Northern California’s Yuba River, I was lucky to see eagles flying overhead and salmon spawning beneath our boat. Experiences like this remind me to appreciate the protections that keep our water clean and safe, and help habitats thrive.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has announced a $108 million Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (WIFIA) loan to the Stockton Public Financing Authority to help modernize the city’s wastewater treatment facility and reduce nitrogen discharges to the San Joaquin River. With this loan, EPA is supporting a regionally significant project that will improve water quality and support public health and the economies of the California Delta.
A federal judge on Monday ruled that a sprawling collage of salt ponds in Redwood City is subject to protections under the Clean Water Act — going against a previous decision by the Environmental Protection Agency that would have eased development along the bay.
San Diego, Calif. – In an important cost-savings agreement, the City of San Diego has refinanced a loan with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that will save an estimated $293 million for taxpayers as the City’s Public Utilities Department embarks on the first phase of Pure Water San Diego – the largest infrastructure project in City history.
Federal investments in Tijuana River Valley infrastructure to address ongoing problems with sewage runoff could mean an end to beach closures that have plagued the South Bay in recent years, officials announced today in San Diego.
