Waterkeepers are known for taking legal actions against polluters and regulators to enforce laws and to ensure cleanup of pollution. But not all pollution issues call for a legal remedy. Sometimes the issues are complicated and we need to employ several different strategies under a campaign. We often have to enlist the community to stop pollution or demand better laws. Sometimes we need a legislative solution or regulatory reform which means we lobby for better laws and comment to improve regulations and permits. We enlist the media’s help to shine a spotlight on an issue. We send out calls for action when we need your voice and need you to show up at public meetings and rallies. Check out our current campaigns and see how you can become involved.
Projects
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Citizen Science Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring Program
Citizen Science Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring to Make the Potomac Swimmable Again! Part of Potomac Riverkeeper Network’s mission is to improve recreation access throughout the entire river basin. For years it has been illegal to swim in the Potomac River in Washington, DC because of high levels of bacteria making
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Green and Prosperous Valley Vision: SRK’s Chesapeake Bay Trust Collaboration
Shenandoah Valley Clean Water Collaboration Creating a Smart, Green, and Economically Prosperous Watershed Potomac Riverkeeper Network has obtained a $100,000 grant from the Chesapeake Bay Trust to develop a Shenandoah Valley “Green Vision” through the use of expanded collaborative forums in the Valley that will be focused on increasing wildlife
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Upper Potomac Riverkeeper Leads Fight Against Mining Permit in Pennsylvania
Upper Potomac Riverkeeper Brent Walls joined Friends of Tom’s Creek (FOTC) to oppose the expansion of operations for Specialty Granules, Inc (SGI) on Tom’s Creek in Fairfield, PA. Brent’s goal is to convince Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection to deny a permit for SGI, which, if granted, will allow stormwater
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Atlantic Coast Pipeline Threatens Shenandoah River Campaign
The proposed construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline would impact the headwaters of the South Fork of the Shenandoah River. This is a transmission line to get fracked gas out of Pennsylvania and West Virginia and ship it down to North Carolina and Portsmouth, Virginia. If constructed, this pipeline will traverse
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Toxic Wastewater Discharges from Coal Power Plants
EPA’s 2015 “Effluent Limitation Guideline” Rule was developed to deal with the discharge of toxic metals and other pollutants removed from coal plants’ air emissions in response to more protective air pollution standards issued over a decade ago. The same metals that were being “scrubbed” from coal plant smokestacks were
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Big Springs Filtration Plant & Firefighting Chemical Contamination
EPA issued a lifetime health advisory (LHA) in 2016 that gave a limit of 70 parts per trillion for PFOS and PFOAs, two chemicals commonly used in firefighting foam and sometimes found in drinking water. While this advisory does not set legally enforceable standards, it is typically used by public
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Clean Water is Under Attack
The Administration has directed the EPA to take sweeping measures to undo clean water protections under the Clean Water Rule intended to safeguard the health of our rivers, streams and wetlands. The announcement to repeal the Clean Water Rule represents one of the most serious assaults on our water resources
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Safe Disposal of Coal Ash at Possum Point Campaign
PROJECT UPDATE: Virginia lawmakers have approved legislation to require the state’s largest electric utility to excavate and clean up unlined coal ash pits. The General Assembly approved legislation that requires Dominion Energy to recycle or safely landfill millions of cubic yards of coal ash currently located at sites around the state. Gov.
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No Potomac Pipeline Campaign
In 2016, behind the scenes, without public input, a West Virginia gas company called Mountaineer Gas quietly laid the groundwork for a fracked gas pipeline that would threaten the Potomac River and the National Park Service’s C&O Canal, one of the most visited national parks. Residents in Morgan County, WV
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Stopping Alexandria Sewage Overflow Campaign
Like Washington D.C., the historic downtown section of Alexandria uses a combined sewer system that dumps untreated sewage and stormwater into Hunting Creek and the Potomac River nearly every time it rains, resulting in millions of gallons of sewage containing E.coli and other pathogens flowing into our waterways every year.