Suit Filed in Florida To Stop Pollution Loop Hole

On behalf of Plaintiffs St. Johns Riverkeeper, Inc. and Linda Young, the Center filed suit in summer 2006 against EPA under the Administrative Procedures Act for EPA’s failure to require that the Florida Department of Environmental Protection meet minimum standards for water quality when amending Rule 62-302.800 of the Florida Administrative Code. Rule 62-302.800 allows the State to establish site specific alternative criteria for individual waterbodies if they meet certain requirements. A site specific alternative criterion allows a waterbody to meet a lesser standard for a pollutant than that required for meeting its specified designated use. Specifically, the new rule is contrary to the requirements in the CWA, federal regulations and relevant guidance documents published by the EPA regarding variances and site specific criteria.

Plaintiffs filed a Motion for Preliminary Injunction to stop the approval of any variances under the revised rule. The Motion stirred an industry backlash prompting the filing of several Motions to Intervene. The Motion for Preliminary Injunction and the multiple Motions for Intervention are currently pending. The new rule would ease requirements for avoiding water quality standards for individual waterbodies by allowing the agency to meet less stringent levels of pollutants than is currently required for their designated use, the use the water is designated to achieve, i.e. public water supply, recreational, or propagation of fish. The State and EPA have already approved a site specific alternative criterion for the St. Johns River for dissolved oxygen. Site specific alternative criteria for the dissolved oxygen had been previously prohibited. A more stringent level of Dissolved Oxygen is of particular importance in the St. Johns River because the St. Johns River has a problem with toxic algae blooms from nutrients and low dissolved oxygen starting in spring every year.  (St. Johns Riverkeeper, Inc. v. EPA, Civil Action No. 06-332 (N.D. Fla. 2006))

Challenging Weak EPA-State Plan for Florida’s Lower Saint Johns River

In August 2004, MAELC filed a complaint in federal court against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on behalf of the St. Johns Riverkeeper and Linda Young. The complaint alleges that EPA acted “arbitrarily and capriciously” in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act in its approval of Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection’s submission of a Nutrient TMDL for the Lower Saint Johns River. The Nutrient TMDL contains a dissolved oxygen criteria that violates Florida’s Water Quality Standards.