Water Quality

The EPA is expected to issue more stringent regulations to protect fish and waterways from cooling water intake structures following an April 1 U.S. Supreme Court decision.The Supreme Court decision basically left it to EPA to decide whether and how to compare costs to benefits as it drafts appropriate rules for cooling water structures for existing power plants.

On Feb. 10th the Senate passed their version of the economic recovery package by a 61-31 vote. Compared to the Senate Bill, the House-passed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (H.R.1), contains more funding for the EPA's clean water and drinking water revolving funds along with superfund cleanups.The largest allocation of funds is within the Department of Energy environmental cleanup funds. While the Senate would allocate $6.4 billion, the House would allocate $500 million.