Federal judge rules EPA can limit runoff from farms in Chesapeake Bay watershed

Watershed of the Chesapeake Bay

A federal judge will allow the Environmental Protection Agency "to go ahead with its plan to limit pollution in the Chesapeake Bay, delivering a setback to the American Farm Bureau Federation and allied agricultural groups that claimed EPA overstepped its authority," reports Agri-Pulse, a Washington newsletter. "EPA’s plan would prescribe total maximum daily loads of runoff of nitrogen, phosphorous and sediment into the bay."

In late August, the Maryland Department of Agriculture withdrew "its request to make immediate changes to rules governing where farmers may use chicken manure to fertilize their crops, after chicken growers warned it could cripple the state's lucrative poultry industry if imposed now," Timothy Wheeler reported for The Baltimore Sun. "According to researchers, more than 80 percent of the fields sampled on the Lower Eastern Shore and nearly 50 percent statewide are saturated with phosphorus, one of the plant nutrients in manure and a contributor to the algae blooms and dead zones plaguing the bay and its tributaries."

U.S. District Judge Sylvia H. Rambo ruled that EPA has authority under the Clean Water Act “to partner with the six states (New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia) in the bay watershed to cut the pollution that pours in from sewers and construction developments, and particularly chemical and biological waste from farms,” Agri-Pulse reports. "The challengers, she said, failed to meet the burden of proving EPA had overreached." She "concluded that EPA has authority to set TMDL allocations for upstream states in order to achieve downstream water quality standards, endorsing the agency’s 'holistic, watershed approach.' It is consistent with the law 'and practical in terms of attaining a full and fair contribution by all major source sectors and coordinated participation of all states in the watershed.'"

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