After more than a year of community meetings and deliberations, the U.S. EPA announced in February 2019 that it would begin the process of regulating two drinking water contaminants, seeking to stem a growing national public health crisis. If EPA follows through, this would be the first time in nearly 20 years that it has set an enforceable standard for a new chemical contaminant under the Safe Drinking Water Act.
Keeping an eye on what happens with domestic oil and gas regulation is a bit like herding cats. We’ve seen encouraging progress on air quality issues related to oil and gas, but an equally critical front that’s seen major action is protection of our land and water resources.
Even as the drinking water crisis draws more attention, the true impact of PFAS exposure may be largely underestimated, necessitating louder calls for action.
When it comes to answering questions about whether the oil and gas industry’s wastewater can be safely reused for other purposes, like food crops, livestock, or even drinking water, there are a number of other serious factors to be considered.
After the Supreme Court, in its 2006 Rapanos v. United States decision, admonished the U.S. EPA and Army Corps of Engineers to once and for all come up with an acceptable definition of “waters of the United States,” which is the linchpin for all regulation under the Clean Water Act, the agencies, nine years later, finalized regulations redefining that term in their 2015 Rule.
Fresh water is the most important resource for human life on earth. People can survive far longer without food than without water, and virtually all of our food sources require fresh water to grow or create.
The cities of Duluth, Minnesota and Superior, Wisconsin, and the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa reservation are all situated at the western end of Lake Superior, along the St. Louis River where it flows into the lake.
When the California hexavalent chromium maximum contaminant level (MCL) comes back in 2019, treatment technology improvements will have already significantly lowered the cost of compliance.
If lead is found in drinking water, it is important to identify where it is coming from within the water system — that means taking samples at every stage, from the distribution system all the way to the plumbing system inside the home, also known as premise plumbing.
Just when we thought the jurisdictional and regulatory issues concerning the federal Clean Water Act and the resulting implications could not get more complicated, recent developments have put that possibility to rest.
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