Although fish and others who rely on our rivers don’t see the separation, our legal system has long treated water quality and quantity as unrelated concerns. Water quality is regulated by the federal Clean Water Act, while state laws govern water quantity. Aquatic and riparian habitat protection and restoration has been even more removed – when habitat issues are addressed at all, it is through a hodge-podge of statutes, regulations and voluntary programs at the federal, state and local level.

Even within our landmark water quality law – the Clean Water Act – biological and physical components of our river systems have received far less attention than traditional chemical pollution issues. Although this is slowly changing, the power of the Act has not truly been brought to bear on issues of quantity or habitat.

The goal of the paper is to identify Clean Water Act and related tools that could be better used to drive in-stream flow and habitat restoration and protection efforts. Our research focuses heavily on flow protection and restoration, but touches on habitat issues where appropriate.

Our findings focus on several policy areas – including better utilizing bioassessement data, developing and implementing strong water quality standards, applying the states’ 401 water quality certification power more broadly to flow and habitat issues, and expanding creative use of the Total Maximum Daily Load program to better identify and remedy habitat and/or flowrelated impairments. Each finding is illustrated with real world examples from the states and includes recommendations for – and limitations to – importing the policy ideas into new states.

Download the full paper or click the button below.