August 10, 2023 — The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled in favor of North Carolina shrimp fishermen, who had been accused of violating the Clean Water Act by discarding bycatch at sea.
“This is a huge win for all fishermen, commercial and recreational,” North Carolina Fisheries Association Executive Director Glenn Skinner said. “If the courts had decided with Mr. Joseph Albea and the Coastal Fisheries Reform Group, the results would have been devastating for both sectors.”
August 8, 2023 — Commercial shrimpers in the state’s sounds received an overwhelming vote of confidence Monday, Aug. 7 with a unanimous decision by the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals affirming a lower court ruling dismissing complaints against shrimp trawling under the Clean Water Act.
The case stems from a 2020 complaint filed by recreational fishermen, Joseph William Albea, David Anthony Sammons, Capt. Seth Vernon, Capt. Richard Andrews, Dwayne Bevell and the North Carolina Fisheries Reform Group.
The Reform Group states on its website that its mission, in part, is “in association with our conservation partners, to change how the State of North Carolina manages our public trust marine resources. We will support the implementation of a new comprehensive management plan to restore our fisheries back to the world-class fishers that they once were.”
The plaintiffs contend that shrimp trawlers in Pamlico Sound are violating the Clean Water Act by engaging in two types of unpermitted activity, “throwing bycatch overboard and disturbing sediment with their trawl net.”
May 30, 2023 — The United States Supreme Court rolled back the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate wetlands under the Clean Water Act, ruling that the law only applies to wetlands that are indistinguishable from “waters of the United States.”
Environmental groups have condemned the court’s decision as a limitation on the ability of communities to protect waterways and the fish that live in them, but others argue that it’s a necessary curtailment of federal overreach and state bodies can better balance environmental protections and local needs.
July 4, 2022 — The Environmental Protection Agency announced last week that it is extending its comment period for proposed restrictions on mining of the Pebble deposit. The comment period was originally set to end in July. Now it will continue for two more months, to Sept. 6.
Representatives with the EPA visited Dillingham and Newhalen earlier this month to hear public testimony on the agency’s proposal to protect waters around the Pebble deposit. It was the first in-person public hearings since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2014, when the Obama administration released a proposed determination for protections, more than a million people — including tens of thousands of Alaskans — commented in support of the federal protections for Bristol Bay. In 2019, the Trump administration revoked the proposal.
In May, the EPA used its authority under the Clean Water Act to issue a revised proposal that included analysis from multi-year environmental reviews and Pebble’s mining proposal.
June 20, 2022 — One of the oldest Bristol Bay fishing associations came out strongly against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed new limits on the potential Pebble Mine, reflecting unease that the much-heralded move does not go far enough.
“The Bristol Bay Fishermen’s Association regrets that it cannot support the EPA’s weak and watered-down 2022 PD (proposed determination),” said David Harsila, a spokesman for the association in a statement this week.
“The watershed will not be protected, and a large-scale mining operation could still be permitted. We demand that EPA do more to protect the Bristol Bay drainages.”
Under the Obama administration, the EPA in 2014 proposed a declaration under section 404 (c) of the Clean Water Act to protect headwaters of Bristol Bay salmon streams from pollution generated by mining for gold, copper and other metal ores in the Pebble Deposit.
June 2, 2022 — Groups united in opposition to the proposed Pebble Mine say they will marshal a big turnout to press the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to go even farther with its proposed protections for the Bristol Bay headwaters.
Advocates outlined their plan at a June 1 press conference in Dillingham, Alaska, with public hearings on the EPA proposal coming up June 16-17 – along with a projected record-setting sockeye season for the $2.2 billion summer fishery.
The EPA’s newly proposed determination under Clean Water Act Section 404(c) “is a milestone, it is a starting point, but we have a long way to go,” said Daniel Cheyette, vice president lands and resources for the Bristol Bay Native Corporation.
Biologists anticipate 75 million sockeye could return this season, underscoring Bristol Bay’s status as the most productive salmon habitat, said Katherine Carscallen, director of Commercial Fishermen for Bristol Bay.
May 31, 2022 — EPA’s move to ban mining the Pebble deposit in the Bristol Bay watershed this week set off a swirl of questions about whether the proposed Clean Water Act veto could have broader implications for mining in one of the world’s premier salmon habitats.
But a close look at the agency documents explaining the decision makes it crystal clear: The Pebble veto won’t stop mining in Bristol Bay, much less the rest of the Last Frontier.
EPA’s proposed veto Wednesday only targets efforts to mine the Pebble deposit. It was based on a mine plan Pebble LP and its backer Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd. submitted to the Army Corps of Engineers as part of the Clean Water Act permitting process two years ago.
That mine plan specifically affected three watersheds, the South and North Forks of the Koktuli River and the Upper Talarik Creek, where it would permanently damage 99 miles of stream habitat and more than 2,000 acres of wetlands. EPA says it is vetoing the project because it would result in four “unacceptable adverse effects” on aquatic life and habitat, including the loss of salmon habitat and negative effects on the genetic diversity of salmon in the watersheds.
The veto is limited to certain headwaters of those watersheds, and includes approximately 309 square miles surrounding the 2020 mine plan. There are other mine claims within that restricted area, however the veto documents are clear that the restriction only applies to mining the Pebble deposit, specifically.
Read the full story at Greenwire
May 31, 2022 — In late May, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced it wants to veto development of the Pebble Mine — a vast deposit of copper and gold at the headwaters of Bristol Bay.
The proposal is a step toward permanently blocking development of the proposed open-pit mine in the Bristol Bay watershed. Mine opponents have pursued a veto for more than a decade.
The EPA said mining the Pebble deposit would result in unacceptable loss of salmon habitat, both at the site and further downstream. Using its authority under the Clean Water Act, the agency proposes to prohibit the discharge of mining materials in waters and wetlands at the Pebble site. That could make it impossible to extract minerals from the deposit.
The executive director of the United Tribes of Bristol Bay, Alannah Hurley, opposes the mine and said the EPA’s move is a step in the right direction.
“Today is a really big day for Bristol Bay — for us to get back on track in this process, and for the Biden administration to be committed to finishing the job to stop Pebble Mine once and for all is very exciting,” she said. “But we’re not there yet. We definitely need to get through the rest of this process.”
May 27, 2022 — The Biden administration’s move to veto the contentious Pebble gold and copper mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay watershed may soothe the state’s Republican senators who in the past have pushed back against federal intervention.
GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan said he and Sen. Lisa Murkowski, both staunch supporters of mining in Alaska, are still digesting the agency’s proposal to impose a Clean Water Act veto against mining in the watershed (Greenwire, May 25).
Sullivan suggested his opposition to federal intervention could be muted if EPA’s decision was based on Pebble LP’s most recent proposal. When the Obama administration tried to veto the project, the company had yet to enter the permitting process. The agency used a watershed assessment and publicly available information about the company’s intentions.
Indeed, Sullivan told E&E News his past opposition was based on EPA moving forward with a “preemptive veto.” In 2014, he said, there was “kind of a vague declaration that the EPA had the power to veto any project on state of Alaska land, that they deem vetoable.”
“Most people, myself included, and the whole Alaskan delegation, were vehemently opposed to that, because they didn’t have the legal authority to do it,” said Sullivan. “If this is based on the project, not the 2014 watershed assessment, it’s very different.”
January 31, 2022 — The Environmental Protection Agency released a letter On January 27th signaling a change in its original timeline to put Clean Water Act protections in place for Bristol Bay.
Their letter indicates that the EPA will issue a revised Clean Water Act Section 404(c) Proposed Determination for Alaska’s Bristol Bay watershed by May 31, 2022, meaning that a potential comment period could occur while Bristol Bay’s commercial fishermen and residents are out fishing and offline at remote fishing camps.
In response to the EPA’s letter, Commercial Fishermen for Bristol Bay’s Executive Director, Katherine Carscallen issued the following statement:
“Bristol Bay’s fishermen are deeply concerned by news from the EPA that they do not intend to protect Bristol Bay by the time we head out for another fishing season. We’ve been calling on EPA to finalize its proposed Clean Water Act protections for a decade. Now, in spite of President Biden’s commitment in August 2020 to stop the Pebble Mine and despite a decade of science supporting Clean Water Act protections, we are yet again asked to wait,” the release stated.