94% of wetlands could lose federal protections under proposed EPA rule

The Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed a new rule on Sept. 4 that would potentially strip federal protections from 94% of U.S. wetlands, according to a preliminary analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council. The proposed rule would significantly narrow what bodies of water are protected from harmful pollution under the Clean Water Act of 1972. 

A Supreme Court decision in 2023 determined that the Clean Water Act only allowed the EPA to regulate “relatively permanent” bodies of water and the wetlands connected to them, but didn’t define “relatively permanent.” Friday’s proposal would define such waterways as those that flowed every day except for temporary interruptions like droughts lasting less than 30 days. Other than coastal wetlands, there are minimal wetlands with water flowing through them daily. 

The proposed rule would also strip protections from at least 33% of streams in the U.S., said Jim Murphy, the associate vice president of legal advocacy at the National Wildlife Federation. After decades of drought, there are few streams left in the Southwest that flow every day.