The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, in a case styled Friends of the Everglades v. So. Fla. Water Mgmt., is the first court to rule on the USEPA’s water transfer rule (40 CFR 122.3(i)), which provides that the discharge of one meaninfully distinct water into another meaningfully distinct water does not require a NPDES permit. The issue in this case was whether the pumping of dirty canal water into a lake required a NPDES permit. The 11th Circuit, in finding the Clean Water Act language on this issue ambiguious, said the USEPA’s rule was a reasonable interpretation of the Act and, therefore, no permit was required.
