Clean Water Law
Overview
Clean Water law encompasses layers of state, federal, and local water resource and water quality statutes and regulatory programs. BCLP lawyers have broad and deep experience advising clients on all aspects of Clean Water Act compliance and use that experience to help clients develop a comprehensive plan for meeting all applicable permitting requirements early in the life of any project so clients may ensure that the regulatory approval process goes smoothly. BCLP's water rights and wetlands experience is discussed separately.
Meet The Team
Related Practice Areas
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Energy & Natural Resources
Experience
- Interpreting Clean Water Act jurisdiction and compliance requirements with respect to hard rock mining, large-scale construction, and various manufacturing and processing facilities.
- Helping clients prosecute, appeal, and defend unfavorable permit decisions.
- Advising clients regarding effluent guidelines and variances.
- Drafting and negotiating state and federal National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (“NPDES”) permit applications and notices, including stormwater permits, construction permits and state operating permits, based both on effluent guidelines and water quality standards and helping clients comply with associated permit requirements.
- Defending clients against administrative, civil, and criminal charges of violations of the Clean Water Act, including, but not limited to, NPDES and Wetlands violations. For example, our experience includes handling administrative appeals to Missouri Clean Water Commission orders to abate a stormwater permit violation.
- Working with technical personnel to prepare and comply with Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan (“SWPPP”) requirements.
- Preparing comments on proposed state and federal Clean Water Act permits.
- Representation of clients in Clean Water Act debarment actions.
- Advising and defending clients regarding stream buffer issues.
- Representing municipal authorities in developing pretreatment programs.
- Representing clients in both challenging and establishing stream designations, water quality standards, in the form of narrative criteria and numeric values on a constituent-specific basis, and total maximum daily limitations for water body segments.
- Negotiating with the state environmental agency and attorney general’s office to enter into a consent decree for a multimillion dollar groundwater remediation which will take place over the next decade. This project involves soil and groundwater contamination at a former manufacturing facility from historic metal degreasing operations utilizing trichloroethylene.