The Waterkeeper Alliance, Waterkeepers Chesapeake and California Coastkeeper Alliance are the plaintiffs in a new lawsuit against EPA. The three environmental groups allege that EPA has put the public at risk by missing multiple deadlines under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). In particular, the lawsuit points out that EPA has been “perpetually behind schedule” with the SDWA timeline requirements for the Candidate Contaminant List (CCL), Regulatory Determination (Reg-Det), and the Six-Year Review. These require the agency to identify contaminants in drinking water, determine which contaminants to regulate, and once every six years, to review the existing drinking water regulations for potential revision.
The SDWA requires that the CCL be published every five years. According to the lawsuit, EPA has missed each of the deadlines for CCL1 through CCL4. The agency solicited nominations for CCL5 in December 2018 and is scheduled to publish the list by 2021. The final CCL4 was published in 2016.
Under SDWA, the agency must then make regulatory determinations on at least five contaminants from the most current CCL within five years of the last regulatory determination. Perchlorate is the only contaminant that EPA has determined needs regulation, but the agency has missed the deadline for proposing a standard and is currently in the midst of a separate lawsuit regarding this delay. EPA is currently completing its fourth regulatory determination (Reg-Det 4) and plans to complete it by 2021.
Finally, EPA is required to review all national primary drinking water regulations once every six years and revise them, if appropriate, using any new available data or technologies. Revisions must maintain or improve public health protection. According to EPA, the agency anticipates completing the fourth sixth-year review by 2023. The lawsuit specifically mentions hexavalent chromium, also known as chromium-6, and highlights EPA’s failure to make a determination on whether or not to revise the standard after being chosen for possible revision in 2010.