Trump to propose reducing EPA authority over water pollution - Entrepreneur Generations

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt says President Trump's administration will scale back the agency's authority to regulate the pollution of wetlands and tributaries that feed into large rivers, reports The Washington Post.

When he was attorney general of Oklahoma, Pruitt sued the EPA over the Waters of the United States regulation on the grounds that it was too costly for landowners to adhere to, unlawfully broadened the definition of "waters" in the U.S. and trumped state authority. Pruitt says he plans to recuse himself from working on active litigation in the matter, but testified before Congress that the EPA would withdraw the rule and revert back to standards as they stood in 2008.

"The existing regulation covers wetlands adjacent to either traditional navigable waters or interstate waters, as well as streams serving as tributaries to navigable waters," explains the Post. "The rule says that wetlands and tributaries must be 'relatively permanent,' a phrase used in previous court opinions, which means they can be intermittent. Defining it this way extends federal jurisdiction to 60 percent of the water bodies in the United States."

Trump called rule "destructive" and "horrible," signing an executive order in February asking the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers to look into repealing it. Trump argued in his executive order that the agencies should rely on the opinion of the late Justice Antonin Scalia to define what kind of waters fall under federal jurisdiction. In the Supreme Court's 2006 Rapanos v. United States decision. Scalia's dissenting opinion was that the federal government's authority, and therefore protection under the Clean Water Act, only applies to "navigable waters."

Rhea Suh, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council, says stripping the EPA's authority "would strip out needed protections for the streams that feed drinking water sources for 1 in every 3 Americans."

After repealing the current rule, the EPA will have to craft its own rule for defining which waters fall under federal authority.

from The Rural Blog http://ift.tt/2snb64m Trump to propose reducing EPA authority over water pollution - Entrepreneur Generations

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