Clean Water Act

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The Clean Water Act (also CWA , actually: Federal Water Pollution Control Act , German: Act to keep water clean) is a federal law of the USA that serves to protect surface waters . It was passed in 1972 following the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which is also the responsible supervisory authority. The scope of the law includes the restoration of the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the water ("... to restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters ...") as well as the maintenance of this state. It contains a ban on introducing pollutants into bodies of water. The EPA issues individual regulations on the basis of this law.

The current Clean Water Act goes back to the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948. It was passed under the presidency of Richard Nixon and the then democratic- majority chambers of the United States Congress. Among other things, the politicians John Blatnik and Joseph W. Westphal were involved in the preparation of the law. The law passed in 1972 proved too ambitious; it was revised in 1977 ( Clean Water Act of 1977 ). Significant other changes were introduced in 1987 ( Water Quality Act of 1987 ).

The Clean Water Act was the basis for major lawsuits in the United States (which were often decided by the Supreme Court ) - for example the Deepwater Horizon environmental disaster , Mingo Logan v EPA , Rapanos v United States , Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v Army Corps of Engineers or at Hanousek against United States .

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Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Bernd Klauer: Sustainability and nature assessment: What contribution can the economic concept of prices make to the operationalization of sustainability? , Environment and Economics, Volume 25, Springer-Verlag, 2013, ISBN 978-3-64247-0264 , p. 20
  2. ↑ Yŏng-hŭi Yi: Sustainable soil protection: international, European and national , FAGUS-Schriften, Volume 14, Interdisciplinary Research Working Group for Society, Environment and Settlements (ed.), Universitäts-Verlag der TU Berlin, 2006, ISBN 978-3-79831 -9950 , pp. 214f.
  3. ↑ "Integrity" (translated as a whole) means a kind of completeness; Water should not only be clean, but also in a natural form, according to Wetlands Explained: Wetland Science, Policy, and Politics in America: Wetland Science, Policy, and Politics in America , Center for Limnology, Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences University of Colorado, Oxford University Press, USA, 2001, ISBN 978-0 -19803-0218 , pp. 50f. (English)
  4. ^ The Clean Water Act: Protecting and Restoring our Nation's Waters , Water: Clean Water Act 40th Anniversary, Environmental Protection Agency (English)
  5. ↑ Summary of the Clean Water Act: 33 USC §1251 et seq. (1972) , Laws & Regulations, Environmental Protection Agency (English)
  6. ↑ "Deepwater Horizon" disaster: BP gets away with a minor sentence , January 16, 2015, Der Spiegel
  7. ^ Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v United States Army Corps of Engineers et al. , Legal Information Institute, Cornell University Law School (English)
  8. ↑ Supreme Court of the United States: Edward Hanousek, Jr v. United States , Legal Information Institute, Cornell University Law School (English)