Will a major reorganization within the state agency charged with environmental protection downgrade the protection of clean water? This week in CIB:

• Executive Watch: Hanging Water Quality Out to Dry

• Legislative Watch: Landfills Up, “Terminal Groins” Down
• Washington Watch: Moves Coming on Climate Change
• Education & Resources: Model Solar Ordinance

Executive Watch: Hanging Water Quality Out to Dry

Why would the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) eliminate its key Division of Water Quality, and hand out its several responsibilities to other divisions? While there’s no official announcement of the plan, word is circulating in Raleigh that the McCrory Administration plans to announce this reorganization soon.

The stormwater management program would move under the Land Quality Section of the Division of Energy, Mining and Land Resources. Everything else would head to the Division of Water Resources, which is now responsible primarily for overseeing water withdrawal issues–water as an economic resource.

It’s hard to see this as anything short of a downgrade of the importance of protecting water QUALITY. The concept of protecting clean water as the key to a living ecosystem, including its wildlife, its beauty, fishing and swimming survives as an afterthought at best.

An insider look at the history of how the Division of Water Quality (DWQ) has operated within the broader DENR may provide more insight. Some divisions within DENR have long been seen as truly independent—e.g., DWQ—while others have been seen as more responsive to the interests of the industries they regulate. In the parlance of the current administration, these industry-responsive divisions have been “customer friendly”.

In the view of advocates for treating applicants for environmental permits chiefly as ‘customers’ to be served, the independent DWQ is too concerned with carefully vetting proposed discharges for their broad impacts on the environment. They move too slowly, and they should concentrate instead on efficiently processing permits. If that means squeezing out cross-checks with other agencies, and degrading the checks and balances within DENR, that’s just fine.

On the enforcement side of the equation, DWQ (with its focus on clean water for multiple uses) would no longer serve as bigger gun to call in when its independent review and higher penalty limits could serve to address the worst pollution cases. One source familiar with the way the DENR divisions have worked together in handling the worst problems observed, “This reorganization would take away some of the tools they have had for when things got really egregious.”

Eliminating DWQ as a separate division raises other important process and legal questions as well. To which commission will the water quality protection programs report for the handling of contested cases and rulemaking functions: Environmental Management? Sedimentation Control? Mining and Energy? Will the commission(s) charged with oversight be ones with the necessary expertise and independence to do the job of water quality protection? Will they be willing to do so, or will their more industry-heavy membership create another case of “industry capture” of key regulatory oversight functions?

What penalty structures will apply to stormwater violations? The very low state penalties or the much higher federal Clean Water Act authority? Will this move present yet another risk to North Carolina’s retention of authority under the Clean Water Act to manage its own pollution control programs instead of handing them back to the EPA?

Will Water Resources be empowered—and willing—to continue DWQ’s practice of levying water quality fines for the most severe cases of offsite sediment pollution?

Answers to questions like these will help determine whether and to what degree the philosophy of “customer friendly” rapid permitting and gentle enforcement trumps the responsibility of protecting clean water in the broader public interest.

Legislative Watch: Landfills Up, “Terminal Groins” Down

Meanwhile at the General Assembly, legislators continue to debate which environmental protection programs will be rolled back, and how far. Two major programs saw significant movement on relevant legislation last week: solid waste, and coastal management.

First, the Senate gave tentative approval to SB 328, the “Solid Waste Management Reform Act of 2013”. SB 328 takes aim at rolling back landmark legislation from 2007 which was designed to protect water quality, wildlife, and parks. The new bill would slash the required buffer distance between landfills and wildlife refuges or parks; drastically limit the reasons for which DENR could deny a landfill permit; and act to facilitate the use of North Carolina as a dumping ground for solid waste from other states. Observed Rep. Pricey Harrison (D-Guilford), “The bill also removes many environmental justice provisions that protect low income and minority communities from these mega dumps.” Never mind the fact that N.C. has enough landfill capacity now to serve in-state needs for the next 30 years. Nope, it’s time to repeal protections of our own people in order to attract the import of trash from other states. The Senate is slated to take its final vote on SB 328 tonight (Monday, June 24).

On a piece of better news, the House Committee on Environment and Natural Resources approved a revised version of SB 151, the “Coastal Policy Reform Act of 2013”, which would limit that bill’s damage to the laws protecting our barrier island beaches from “terminal groins”. (As discussed in previous bulletins, these are long rock jetties built perpendicular to the beach, which temporarily trap sand on one side while accelerating erosion on the other.) The House committee removed from the original SB 151 provisions which would allow construction of an unlimited number of these groins on N.C. beaches, and permit their construction by local governments without approval in a public referendum.

By the way, does it seem that the standard title for legislation gutting a law or program this year is the “[xxxx] Reform Act of 2013”?

Washington Watch: Moves Coming on Climate Change

Sources associated with the Obama Administration project that the president will roll out this week (as soon as tomorrow) details of his plan to act on climate change without the necessity of approval from a deadlocked Congress.

According to sources cited in the June 20 edition of The Climate Post, the plan will include final rules on emissions from new fossil fuel-fired power plants, triggering requirements for the regulation of greenhouse gases from existing plants as well. The plan is also said to include an expansion of efforts to promote the development of clean energy resources (e.g., wind and solar) on public lands, as well as expanded energy efficiency efforts.

More discussion of these developments can be found here.

Education & Resources: Model Solar Ordinance

Finally this week, we note that the N.C. Sustainable Energy Association (NCSEA) is hosting a forum on the development of model local ordinances on solar energy projects in our state. The forum is to be held this Thursday, June 27, from 4 to 7:45 p.m. at the Proximity Hotel in Greensboro. Registration is free but seating is limited. For the complete agenda and details on how to participate, see here.

That’s our report for this week.