On March 24, 2025, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) published plans to seek stakeholder input on implementing a new definition of “waters of the United States” (WOTUS) under the Clean Water Act (CWA). The EPA’s goal...more
Welcome to the August edition of Nutter’s Environment & Energy Insights, a monthly update of current trends in environment and energy law. This month we cover: EPA’s new Facility Response Plan requirements for potential...more
Garry Lewis owns 2000 acres in Livingston Parish, Louisiana and he has been fighting with the Army Corps of Engineers over whether any of those 2000 acres are wetlands subject to Federal Clean Water Act jurisdiction for over...more
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Aug. 29, 2023, issued a final rulemaking revising the definition of "Waters of the United States" (WOTUS) within Corps1 and EPA2...more
Ahead of schedule, yesterday EPA and the US Army Corps of Engineers published their tenth attempt to specify the reach of the Federal Clean Water Act. The only question now is will its opponents file amended complaints in...more
On January 18, 2023, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) published a final rule (2023 Rule) revising the definition of “waters of the United States” (WOTUS) as used in the...more
Following decades of regulatory actions and lawsuits concerning the definition of “waters of the United States under the Clean Water Act, on December 30, 2022, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army...more
The U.S. Supreme Court's October 2022 term began with a bang: a new Justice on the bench, the public back in the courtroom for the first time since the pandemic - and two hours of argument about the scope of federal...more
On July 21, 2022, new Ohio law governing regulation of ephemeral streams went into effect. The new law is the result of House Bill 175, which was passed by the Ohio General Assembly on April 6, 2022. ...more
Announcement Follows Federal District Court Decision Vacating Trump Administration Waters of the United States Rule - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced on September 3 that...more
On January 23, 2020, the Department of the Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finalized a rule redefining the scope of federal regulatory jurisdiction over “waters of the United States.” ...more
The Clean Water Act applies by its terms to “navigable waters,” which the act defines merely as “waters of the United States.” A clear and consistent definition of this critically important phrase, which demarcates the...more
On January 23, EPA Administrator Wheeler announced the final rulemaking for the revised definition of “Waters of the United States,” a key phrase in the Clean Water Act that delineates the extent of federal jurisdiction over...more
On Jan. 23, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released revised rules defining what constitute waters of the United States under federal Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction. The rule, entitled the Navigable Water...more
On January 23rd the United States Environmental Protection Agency and United States Corps of Engineers (collectively “EPA”) announced the finalization of a new rule addressing the Clean Water Act definition of Waters of the...more
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) published a rule on October 23, 2019, repealing the Clean Water Rule promulgated by the Obama administration in 2015. The rule, which...more
We are on the eve of a new regulatory definition of "waters of the United States" for the Clean Water Act. The United States Environmental Protection Agency ("EPA") and Army Corps of Engineers ("Corps") completed step one...more
A new final regulation issued on September 12, 2019 by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers repeals the Obama administration’s 2015 “Clean Water Rule,” but does little to clear up the...more
After decades of insisting otherwise and before the U.S. Supreme Court has had a chance to rule on the issue, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) took steps to limit its interpretation of the Clean Water Act’s...more
I under took a presentation at the April 18th Arkansas Environmental Federation Water Conference (“Conference”) titled: Does a Discharge to Groundwater Require an NPDES Permit? (“Presentation”) The Presentation focused...more
February 2019 In Short The Situation: The definition of "waters of the United States" in the Clean Water Act ("CWA") circumscribes the jurisdictional authority of the federal government under the Act. This impacts not just...more
The American Fisheries Society (“AFS”) referenced on February 5th the publication of a paper titled: Headwater Streams and Wetlands are Critical for Sustaining Fish, Fisheries, and Ecosystem Services (“Paper”)...more
On December 11, 2018, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (the “Corps”) proposed new regulations that would sharply curtail the Corps’ permitting authority under the Clean Water...more
The US Supreme Court may be poised to review two 2018 decisions in the Fourth and Ninth Circuits, both of which applied the so-called ‘hydrological connection” theory to extend jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act (“CWA”) to...more
Fulfilling one of President Trump’s campaign promises, on December 11, 2018, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of the Army (the Corps) signed a proposed rule to limit the scope of the...more