This morning, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released the final “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) rule. NCA will be analyzing the final rule and providing additional information to members in the coming days. You can see the EPA announcement here.
The EPA based the final rule on the pre-2015 definition of WOTUS with updates based upon Supreme Court rulings. Among the bodies of water excluded from the defined WOTUS are:
- Ditches, excavated wholly in and draining only dry land, and the do not carry a relatively permanent flow of water.
- Artificially irrigated areas, that would revert to dry land if the irrigation ceased.
- Artificial lakes or ponds created by excavating or diking dry land that are used exclusively for such purposes as stock watering, irrigation, settling basins or rice growing.
- Artificial reflecting pools or swimming pools and other small ornamental bodies of water created by excavating or diking dry land.
- Waterfilled depressions created in dry land incidental to construction activity and pits excavated in dry land for the purposes of obtaining fill, sand, or gravel unless and until the construction operation is abandoned and the resulting body of water meets the definition of WOTUS.
- Swales and erosional features that are characterized by low volume, infrequent, or short duration flow.
Additional information can be found at epa.gov/wotus.
Contact NCA President & CEO Joe Trauger at [email protected] if you have any questions or comments.