EPA Announces Plans to Revise Waters of the U.S. Definition

Earlier this week, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, in conjunction with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, announced its intent to revise the definition of “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) that was put in place by the Navigable Waters Protection Rule during the Trump Administration in 2020. The 2020 definition was itself a revision of policy instituted during the Obama Administration in 2015, which many stakeholders including RCRC opposed as a harmful federal jurisdictional overreach on ditches, vernal pools and other bodies of water with no clear nexus to federal waters. 

EPA and the Corps stated that they would remand the provisions of the rule to pre-2015 protections while undergoing a full rulemaking process to gather public input. RCRC plans to fully engage in the rulemaking, which will be noticed in the Federal Register in the coming days. For more on the WOTUS revision, visit EPA’s website.