EPA Fall Regulatory Agenda

Twice a year, federal agencies publish a comprehensive report describing regulations currently under development or recently completed.  Each agency’s contribution is called a Semiannual Regulatory Agenda.  There were no new drinking water rules included in the Fall Regulatory Agenda for EPA which was released on November 27th.

For the Office of Water, the Regulatory Agenda did list some rule actions on the clean water side that may be of interest including a Section 610 Review of NPDES Permit Regulation and Effluent Limitations Guidelines Standards for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (review ending this year), NPDES Regulations to Address Water Quality Impacts from Forest Road Discharges (possible proposal in 2014), and the Definition of “Waters of the United States” Under the Clean Water Act (proposed in 2013).  See the full Regulatory Agenda for more details on individual actions.

This does not mean EPA has gotten out of the rule writing business (a fact which may disappoint some in Congress!).  EPA’s own Regulatory Development and Retrospective Review Tracker (Reg DaRRT) lists a number of drinking water regulations in the “pre-proposal” stage including perchlorate (December 2014 projected date), carcinogenic VOCs (December 2014 projected date), Lead and Copper Rule revisions (2015 projected date), and storage tank inspection requirements (no projected date).