EPA recently released on its website, without much fanfare, its final Clean Water Act strategy document, Coming Together for Clean Water. The document was developed as an output from a spring 2010 meeting convened by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to discuss how to reinvigorate the Clean Water Act program. After accepting public comment on the draft document last summer, EPA’s final strategy includes many additions related to the importance of drinking water in the clean water discussion, noting that the agency will look strategically at ways to “integrate drinking water concerns into clean water strategies.”
The strategy also acknowledges that an integrated systems approach is needed to address current environmental problems, and points to the future National Academy of Sciences sustainability study – the Green Book – as the first step toward exploring an approach to incorporating sustainability concepts into EPA programs and “establishing a scientific framework to understand the linkages between energy, water, air, materials, and land.”
The document also includes new information highlighting the importance of addressing concerns raised by hydraulic fracturing and “other resource extraction operations,” noting that EPA will work with federal partners and others to clarify CWA requirements for hydraulic fracturing.
And the document notes that EPA plans to develop and implement a systematic strategy to make green infrastructure an available tool for meeting CWA requirements as well as municipal storm sewer system permits and combined sewer overflow plans and enforcement actions.
The document concludes by stating that EPA has already implemented many of the actions in the strategy and will work to maintain an open dialogue with stakeholders as it plans and implements the other key actions for the protection of water resources.