water pollution

The Des Moines Water Works federal lawsuit over nitrate runoff into the Raccoon River is taking a detour to the Iowa Supreme Court, says DTN. The lawsuit could set a precedent with its argument that 10 drainage districts in northwestern Iowa should be regulated as "point sources" of pollution and required to meet clean-water standards.

EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy is to visit a Rocheport, Mo, farm today and speak to the Kansas City Agribusiness Council on Thursday in defense of new clean water regulations. Farm groups loudly oppose the Waters of the United States proposal as a power grab. The EPA says the rule reflects a Supreme Court decision and does not expand its reach.

Farm leaders in Ohio say producers have worked for years to reduce their use of fertilizer and to reduce runoff through using no-till cultivation and planting filter strips near waterways, says AgWeb.

The House Appropriations Committee voted to block EPA's proposed "waters of the United States" rule as part of a fiscal 2015 interior and environment spending bill. Members approved the bill on a mostly party-line vote of 29-19. "Republicans have derided the measure as a brazen power grab that could result in the EPA expanding its jurisdiction to ponds, trenches or even dry riverbeds," said The Hill newspaper.

States in the Chesapeake Bay region made progress in controlling water pollution from agriculture and communities but many jurisdictions are short of goals, says the Associated Press in summarizing...

The executive summary of a European study, "Nitrogen on the Table," says if Europe reduced its meat consumption, it "would reduce nitrogen air and water pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions, while freeing up large areas of farmland for other purposes such as food export or bioenergy."

The largest U.S. farm group strongly criticized a proposed clean water rule as "an unlawful expansion of federal regulation to cover routine farming and ranching practices as well as other common private land uses, such as building homes."

As predicted, the low-oxygen “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico is larger than average this year, said the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Thursday. At 6,705 square miles — or roughly the size of New Jersey — this year’s dead zone is more than three times the size of the target set for 2035.