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Watershed Permit Assistance Program Reports
WVRC’s Watershed Permit Assistance Program publishes reports on permitting issues that affect water quality. Please download PDF versions of these reports from this page or request free copies.

DOWNLOAD REPORTS
Coal Mining and the Clean Water Act: Why regulated coal mines still pollute West Virginia's streams, April 2003, by Evan Hansen and Margaret Janes.
This report documents how the essential requirements of NPDES permits-limits on the discharge of pollutants into streams as well as monitoring of these discharges at important flows-are not consistently applied to the coal mining industry. Because of these failures, West Virginia's waters are degraded by coal mining operations, and agencies and the public often have no idea what amounts or types of pollutants are actually discharged. The report includes recommendations for several agencies, as well as for citizens' groups that are interested in the effects of coal mining on local streams.

EPA's Nutrient Criteria Recommendations and Their Application in Nutrient Ecoregion XI, May 2001, by Evan Hansen and Martin Christ, Ph.D.
EPA is requiring all states to adopt new water quality criteria for nutrients by 2004. These new criteria are likely to impact NPDES permits across West Virginia. This report assesses EPA's proposed process for states to use in developing new nutrient criteria.

Presentation to the West Virginia Environmental Quality Board regarding nutrient criteria, February 2002, by Martin Christ, Ph.D. and Evan Hansen.
This presentation contains suggestions regarding the development of new nutrient criteria in West Virginia. For each designated use, it proposes which parameters to use to measure nutrient impairment, and which to use as endpoints for TMDLs. Justifications and processes for developing these new criteria are also proposed. Finally, the presentation identifies which types of water bodies should have the highest priority for nutrient criteria development.

TMDL Implementation in West Virginia: A status report, December 2001, by Evan Hansen.
The dozens of total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) completed in West Virginia since 1998 require pollutant reductions from permitted point sources and unpermitted nonpoint sources of pollution. This report assesses progress made toward implementing the pollutant reduction goals set forth in the state's TMDLs.

Achieving Balance: Improving public participation in West Virginia's NPDES permitting process, March 2001, by Evan Hansen.
This report documents the limited public role in past water pollution discharge permitting decisions in West Virginia, and recommends changes that will result in more active and informed public participation in the future.