1972 FWPCA Amendments
Congress enacted major amendments to the FWPCA in 1972. (See Clean Water Act.) Included in the legislation was a new discharge permit program, called the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES), which replaced the Refuse Act permit program. The amendments assigned lead responsibility for implementation of NPDES to the newly formed Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Congress did not repeal the Refuse Act. The law is still used by the Corps of Engineers to prevent obstructions to navigation. In some pollution enforcement cases, the federal government has used it as a supplemental authority along with the FWPCA.
Read more about this topic: Refuse Act
Famous quotes containing the word amendments:
“Both of us felt more anxiety about the South—about the colored people especially—than about anything else sinister in the result. My hope of a sound currency will somehow be realized; civil service reform will be delayed; but the great injury is in the South. There the Amendments will be nullified, disorder will continue, prosperity to both whites and colored people will be pushed off for years.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)