Defying environmentalists and public health advocates, the Trump administration on Thursday will announce the replacement of Obama-era water protections with a significantly weaker set of regulations that lifts limits on how much pollution can be dumped into small streams and wetlands.
The changes to the Clean Water Act’s protections are expected to hit California and other Western states especially hard.
Gov. Gavin Newsom has consistently expressed support for successful completion of voluntary agreements as a path forward in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay-Delta. The California Natural Resources Agency and California Environmental Protection Agency recently described collaborative, voluntary agreements as a “game changer” for the environment. We strongly agree, and stand ready in bringing proactive decision makers to the table for the management of water in the Delta and its tributaries.
Abundant and clean water supplies will be essential for California’s people, communities and economy to thrive in the future. Yet, the state faces significant challenges on the road to water security.
To address those difficulties, Governor Gavin Newsom’s administration has released a draft “Water Resilience Portfolio” designed to ensure that California’s water systems, both natural and constructed, will adequately support our growing state in the future.
The number of coal-fired power plants in operation across the country has plummeted in recent years, quickly changing the power mix — especially in states such as California.
But what has that change meant in terms of health? Or even in the number of crops produced?
President Trump yesterday touted his repeal of key Clean Water Act regulations as more than three dozen current and former government officials called for an investigation into the scientific basis of his forthcoming replacement rule.
Trump told a gathering of the country’s farmers that last fall he repealed “one of the most ridiculous regulations of all,” the Obama administration’s Waters of the U.S., or WOTUS, rule, which defined which marshes, creeks and streams quality for federal protections.
Farm organizations welcomed a new water planning document from state agencies while they analyzed the document’s proposed strategies.
Titled the California Water Resilience Portfolio and released last week, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration described the document as an effort to guide water management in a way that works for people, the environment and the economy.
A provision tucked within the EPA’s proposal to overhaul the way it regulates lead in drinking water—initially derided as toothless—could have far-reaching consequences for public health, municipal policies, and even real estate transactions, water industry insiders now say.
Congress has reached a deal on a spending bill that would require the military to stop using firefighting foam containing toxic chemicals linked to cancer, but would abandon efforts to place stronger regulations on the chemicals. The bill, called the National Defense Authorization Act, has been the focus of intense negotiations for months. House Democrats saw it as their best chance to force President Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency to increase its oversight of a class of chemicals, called perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances — commonly known as PFAS — that have contaminated drinking water sources across the country.
Before Democrats managed to secure provisions to address a class of toxic chemicals in an annual defense measure, negotiations fell apart at the hands of their own members.
For months, Democrats pushed to attach provisions in the National Defense Authorization Act that would designate a class of 5,000 toxic chemicals, known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), as hazardous.
Doing so would spark federal cleanup standards. Democrats also wanted EPA to set a strong drinking water standard.
Contamination of drinking water from per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) may be the nation’s most pressing drinking water quality issue. With many calling for the expedited banning and removal of PFAS in water sources, a new U.S. EPA procedure to better assess them may be a concrete step in that direction.
“The US EPA has published a systemic review protocol for the toxicity assessment of five per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) and is now seeking the public’s input on its approach during a 45-day comment period,” according to Chemical Watch.
