Indirect Discharges and Clean Water Act Permits—the Supreme Court’s New Functional Equivalent Standard
presented at the 2020 Virtual Bar Convention and Annual Meeting of the Hawaii State Bar Association
Manko, Gold, Katcher & Fox partner Brenda H. Gotanda will serve as a panelist at the 2020 Hawaii State Bar Association Annual Bar Convention as part of the Environment, Energy & Resources Section Seminar. The programming will take place virtually on October 16, 2020 from 9 am to 4:30 pm HST.
Gotanda will present on “Indirect Discharges and Clean Water Act Permits—the Supreme Court’s New Functional Equivalent Standard” in the afternoon session. The panel discussion will focus on the federal Clean Water Act’s NPDES permitting framework and provide an analysis of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in County of Maui, Hawaii v. Hawaii Wildlife Fund, which created a new standard for evaluating whether a permit is required when pollutants are discharged from a point source to groundwater and conveyed indirectly to navigable waters. The panel will address key aspects of the statutory text and the Supreme Court’s decision, including its new “functional equivalent” standard, and explore the potential implications of the decision on current and future permitting, enforcement, and litigation.
