The U.S. Supreme Court has waded in again on the issue of how wide the reach of the Clean Water Act is. The high court on Nov. 6 heard oral arguments in a case that deals with whether pollutants from a Maui wastewater treatment plant that are discharged into groundwater and eventually end up in the Pacific Ocean are covered by federal permits that govern specific facilities, or “point sources.”
The County of Maui, Hawaii—and the federal government—contend that discharges into groundwater should be excluded from such National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permits. On the other side, the Hawaii Wildlife Fund and other environmental groups strongly disagree.