The Barrasso/Heller Amendment to the Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act (H.R. 2354) is bad news.  It would  permanently bar the Army Corps of Engineers from restoring longstanding Clean Water Act protections to water bodies throughout the country.  This undermines the common-sense protections that Americans expect to ensure clean water for drinking, swimming and fishing. We have to stop it - and we will. 

Wetlands and streams are a vital part of our water system. They feed into and clean rivers and lakes throughout the country.  The Mississippi and Colorado rivers, San Francisco and Chesapeake Bays and every other body of water relies on small streams and wetlands across the United States. Wetlands also provide vital flood protection for cities, towns, and farmland - an acre of wetland can hold nearly 1 million gallons of floodwaters.

we can’t live without clean water

It’s that simple. But sometimes, the people we elect seem to forget that. And they’ve been forgetting it a lot lately in Washington, DC and in too many of our state capitals.

Oil and gas operations in the U.S. produce significant air pollution – everything from drilling to the production and processing of natural gas affects our air. In fact, the oil and gas industry releases millions of pounds of pollutants like methane, benzene, and sulfur dioxide into our air each year.

Gas Drilling Operations

These toxins pose a threat to our air quality and contribute to serious health problems like asthma, cancer, and neurological issues. Currently more than half of Pennsylvanians live in an area that doesn’t meet federal air quality standards for smog and nearly 800,000 suffer from asthma. 

Federal air pollution standards for drilling are woefully outdated. In July the EPA proposed new safeguards to reduce air pollution from the oil and natural gas industry to get us back on track.

What's in your air?

the house of representatives voted to make our air dirtier & less breathable!
The U.S. House debated and passed the "TRAIN" Act in September. Find out how your Representative voted here.  The passage of TRAIN is the most dangerous assault on clean air in forty years.  It's estimated that passage of the TRAIN Act could result in 66,000 additional hospital and emergency room visits and over 1 million more days of work lost to illness due to smog and other air pollution.  This TRAIN wreck is bad for our air and terrible for our economy.

first reactions from the frontlines

Here are some of the first reactions from folks on the frontlines here at Clean Water Action when they heard the President’s announcement that pending rules to crack down on health-harming ozone pollution would be shelved indefinitely:

Water defines our life in the summer in Maryland. We visit and vacation on the water. Sadly, this summer, many of us avoided spending time on Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. Throughout the summer we saw reports of people and pets contracting serious infections from swimming in those waters that flow into the Chesapeake Bay.

Take action today to protect our waters!