The case revolves around a Maui County wastewater treatment plan in Lahaina that pumps millions of gallons of treated sewage into the groundwater each day using underground injection wells.
That groundwater, mixed with treated sewage, then travels underground and seeps into the ocean where studies have shown that it promotes algae growth that suffocates and kills the coral reefs and other marine life.
Several environmental groups, including the Hawaii Wildlife Fund, Sierra Club-Maui Group, Surfrider Foundation and West Maui Preservation Association, filed a lawsuit in 2012, saying that the county needed a permit under the Clean Water Act if it was going to discharge pollutants into a federal waterway. The lower courts agreed, citing long-standing interpretations of the law.
As people cook at home and disinfect their households more frequently due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, fatbergs are becoming a worsening problem. A combination of the words fat and iceberg, fatbergs are large masses of common household trash items that do not belong in the water works including cleaning wipes, grease, and various personal hygiene products. Improper disposal means clogged pipes, sewage backups, damaged equipment at wastewater treatment plants.
Many popular products that are marketed as “flushable,” including disinfecting wipes, do not disintegrate in water. Wastewater is treated in three main steps: physical, chemical, and biological. However, the physical treatment step is being severely slowed by massive amounts of products that are obstructing the filters.
Cold temperatures, high winds and waves from Lake Erie created an ice spectacle at Hoover Beach in Hamburg.
A few homes in Hoover Beach are completely encased in ice.
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Lake Erie rose 5 inches in January. By the end of the month, lake levels were 7 inches above last January’s. And by Monday, the lake broke the February high water record, set in 1987.
The latest water forecast from the U.S. Corps of Army Engineers predicts Lake Erie will break monthly records for the next four months before leveling off in June and July. Levels should be 2-11 inches higher than they were last year.
The Trump administration announced it’s finalizing a rollback of a major Obama Era rule that clarified which waterways can be regulated by the Clean Water Act.
The new rules were cheered by farming, oil and gas, and construction industries, but panned by environmentalists and even the EPA’s own science advisory board.
At a press conference in Pittsburgh Thursday, administration officials said the new rule will bring clarity to a longstanding question: which streams and wetlands the federal government can regulate under the Clean Water Act.