Getting to the point -- and nonpoint

In the wake of Judge Sylvia Rambo's September 13 decision upholding the Chesapeake Bay TMDL (read: Bay pollution "diet"), and its subsequent appeal less than a month later, you've probably heard the words "point source" and "nonpoint source" more than a few times. But what do these terms mean? Well, a point source (of pollution), as defined by the Clean Water Act, is "any discernible, confined, and discrete conveyance." For example, a pipe, ditch, channel, tunnel, well, or container can be a point source, just to name a few. Given that definition, you'd think the definition for a nonpoint source (of pollution) would be equally technical and concise. However, you would be wrong. A nonpoint source is any source of water pollution that does not meet the legal definition of a point source. Is that clear? About as clear as mud. It is pollution from everywhere else.

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Nonpoint source pollution is caused by rainfall and snowmelt moving over and through the ground. Picture a farmer's field, your own lawn or driveway, or a parking lot. As the runoff moves, it picks up and carries excess fertilizers, pesticides, oil, grease, salt, sediment, and whatever else may be on the ground, to our rivers, lakes and ground waters.

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Nonpoint source pollution remains Pennsylvania's, and the nation's, largest contributor to water quality problems. It's why 20 percent of Pennsylvania's streams and 50 percent of its lakes are polluted. And that's why the Chesapeake Bay TMDL is so important. The Bay's pollution diet sets limits for the amount of pollutants that can enter the Bay and the only way to achieve those limits is to significantly reduce the amount of nonpoint source pollution in the Bay's tributaries. 

   The Clean Water Act (CWA) has done a pretty good job of regulating point source pollutants. The Cuyahoga River is no longer flammable and Lake Erie is no longer dead, thanks to the CWA. But it hasn't done a whole lot to regulate nonpoint sources because nonpoint source regulation has been left largely to the states with little federal oversight. However, developing the Bay pollution diet required the states and federal government to work together to set pollution limits, develop watershed implementation plans, and milestones to track progress.

This cooperative federalism, and resulting TMDL, represents the best chance for clean water in Pennsylvania and the Chesapeake Bay.