Anyone who resides, works or plays in North Carolina’s 20 coastal counties interested in marine debris management is encouraged to take part in planned workshops to offer tools for eliminating or addressing abandoned and derelict vessels and encouraging better construction standards for docks and piers, often a source of storm-related pollution.

The Local Government ADV and Resilient Docks workshops are scheduled for Aug. 28 in Wilmington or Sept. 15 in Washington. Both sessions will run 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Register online to secure a spot.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation and the N.C. Coastal Reserve and National Estuarine Research Reserve are leading the two workshops that will provide resources for implementing an inspection program for residential dock and piers, and for developing and implementing a program or ordinance for abandoned and derelict vessels.

Panel discussions will feature local and regional stakeholders sharing real-world experiences, implementation challenges, lessons learned, and opportunities for continued collaboration.

Among the resources are the Resilient Residential Docks and Piers webpage and the N.C. Marine Debris Action Plan: 2026-30. Resilient Docks and Piers is a toolkit that offers best practices for design and construction, permitting guidance, sustainable materials and legislative updates. The Marine Debris Action Plan is a multiagency, five-year effort to reduce marine debris in state waters.

Lunch will be provided, along with coffee and light refreshments in the morning. Full or partial mileage reimbursements may be available.

These workshops are made possible through the support of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program and the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation.

The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Update Aug. 17: The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission has modified its draft agenda for the Aug. 19-20 meeting regarding the Coastal Habitat Protection Plan. The commission will hear a presentation on the 2026 draft amendment, as previously planned, but will not vote on sending it out to public comment, as indicated in an earlier draft of the agenda.

The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission, when it meets this month in Raleigh, is expected to vote on sending out for public and advisory committee review this year’s draft changes to the Coastal Habitat Protection Plan.

The commission is set to meet Wednesday and Thursday, Aug. 19-20, at the Doubletree by Hilton Raleigh Midtown, 2805 Highwoods Blvd. The meeting is open to the public and will be livestreamed on YouTube.

The meeting sessions begin at 1 p.m. on Aug. 19, and at 9 a.m., Aug. 20.

The Coastal Habitat Protection Plan was first adopted in 2004 as a long-term roadmap for improving coastal fisheries by protecting, restoring and enhancing critical fish habitats. It’s a requirement of the Fisheries Reform Act of 1997, and it must be updated every five years. While it was amended in 2021, the plan hasn’t been substantially reworked since 2016.

Work on the rewrite began earlier this year.

The commission is also expected to consider approving the final determination of 335 commission rules as part of the mandatory 10-year review of existing state agency rules.

Members are also expected to set the number of licenses in the Standard Commercial Fishing License Eligibility Pool for the 2026-27 license year.

Electing a vice chair is also on the meeting agenda, in addition to presentations on the following:

• The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Marine Fisheries’ Annual Fishery Management Plan review and accompanying draft Fishery Management Plan review schedule.
• Summary of North Carolina Kingfishes Stock Complex data analysis to aid in the review of the Kingfishes Fishery Management Plan.

The period for public comments begins at 6 p.m. Wednesday and at 9 a.m. Thursday. Those wishing to speak may do so at either time, but not during both comment periods.

If attending in-person, sign up at the hotel prior to the public comment sessions. To facilitate the meeting, and to accommodate as many speakers as possible, the chair will limit each speaker to three minutes, according to meeting materials. Those who wish to provide handouts to the commission during the public comment period should bring at least 12 copies to the meeting.

The public may also submit written comments via an online form; by mail to: MFC Meeting Comments, P.O. Box 769, Morehead City, NC 28557; or by dropping of a hard copy at the Division of Marine Fisheries’ Morehead City Headquarters at 3441 Arendell St. The deadline to submit written comments for this meeting is 4 p.m. Monday, Aug. 17.

The full agenda and meeting materials, as well as a link to the YouTube livestream, are available on the Marine Fisheries Commission Meetings webpage.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation’s office in the Wilmington area is holding later this month its quarterly “Ask an Advocate,” a casual coffee chat with Kerri Allen, the nonprofit’s coastal management program director and coastal advocate.

The discussion is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. Thursday, Aug. 20, at the Fred & Alice Stanback Coastal Education Center in Wrightsville Beach. Those wishing to attend are asked to reserve a spot using the online form.

The Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, is a member-supported nonprofit that focuses on protecting and restoring the North Carolina coast with offices in Carteret County and the Outer Banks as well.

“People care deeply about our coast, but sometimes they aren’t sure where to start or how they can make a difference,” Allen explained about the opportunity to discuss coastal management strategies and local and state issues.

“Ask an Advocate is about opening that door and helping people better understand the issues, answer questions, and find meaningful ways to get involved. We want folks to know that their voice matters, and that when communities are informed and engaged, they can have a real impact on the decisions that shape our coast,” she added.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is pushing forward its proposal to deepen the Wilmington Harbor by an additional 5 feet and widen segments of the shipping lane up the Cape Fear River.

The Corps-prepared final Wilmington Harbor 403 environmental impact statement, or EIS, sticks with a plan to extend the entrance of the federal navigation channel by about 9 miles, deepen the channel from 42 feet to 47 feet and widen portions of it from the river mouth about 28 miles to the Wilmington port. The construction, which is projected to begin in 2030 and take about six years to complete, is estimated to cost more than $1.3 billion.

The North Carolina State Ports Authority says the project is needed to accommodate larger, deep-draft container vessels at the Wilmington port in U.S. East Coast-Asia trade. Deepening the shipping channel would attract more import and export business and boost job growth in the state, ports officials say.

The Port of Wilmington is the 67^th largest port in the nation when measured by total cargo tonnage. In 2022, about 7.6 million tons of cargo, including 6.6 million tons of largely containerized foreign cargo, and 1 million tons of domestic cargo was shipped through the Wilmington Harbor, according to the Corp’s Waterborne Commerce Statistics Center.  

The final environmental impact statement and accompanying letter report, as required under Section 403 of the 2020 Water Resources Development Act, will be formally submitted this month to the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works for review and then a record of decision, or the final stage of the approval process, will be published in the Federal Register.

Once that office receives those documents, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management may submit objections it raised earlier this year about the proposed project, one the division’s director wrote would have “significant adverse impacts to coastal resources.”

Looking back: Port plan would have ‘significant adverse impacts’

“The FEIS acknowledges the State’s federal consistency objection but does not resolve it,” a Division of Coastal Management spokesperson said in an email responding to a request for comment. “DCM and DEQ will continue to come to the table with the Army Corps and the State Ports to discuss a potential path forward.”

Wilmington District Public Affairs Specialist Jed Cayton explained in an email to Coastal Review last month that federal rules outline how a state agency must reply when that agency objects to a federal agency’s consistency choice.

“The regulation provides several potential paths forward, including not proceeding with the action, attempting to resolve differences with the state, or determining that the federal action is consistent to the maximum extent practicable with the state’s coastal zone management program,” Cayton wrote. “The Wilmington District is consulting with its higher headquarters to determine the specific course of action regarding the State’s non-concurrence with the USACE’s coastal consistency determination.”

The Corps anticipates that the record of decision will be issued in October.

Division officials argue that the Corps’ draft EIS failed to adequately assess cumulative flooding impacts or thoroughly detail areas where dredged material would be placed, did not sufficiently account for potential effects on fisheries habitat, freshwater wetlands, shorelines, or state, historic and other sites along the Cape Fear River, and did not evaluate PFAS in the lower Cape Fear River sediment.

Residents, environmental organizations and local governments have widely expressed similar concerns, saying that the project will threaten historic and cultural resources along the river, accelerate erosion and exacerbate flooding, destroy habitat, is not economically justified, and will disperse contaminants in the riverbed’s sediment into marshes and onto public beaches.

“The Final Letter Report and FEIS continue to show that this project is unnecessary and extraordinarily damaging to the environment,” Southern Environmental Law Center attorneys wrote in a July 31 letter in response to those documents. “The costs of this harbor expansion continue to climb as the alleged need and purported benefits simultaneously dwindle. On top of the questionable economic considerations, the project would come with a host of permanent harms to the natural environment of the Lower Cape Fear, cherished by locals and tourists alike.”

The letter, written on behalf of more than a half-dozen environmental and nonprofit organizations, including the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, concludes, “Before the Corps finalizes the record of decision, we implore the Corps to reevaluate the economic justifications for this project, complete all required consultations, and address the significant questions regarding the project’s environmental impacts.”

Looming questions, PFAS concerns

The Corps has identified several areas in which it would place material dredged from the channel, including on nearby beaches in Brunswick and New Hanover counties and bird islands in the river. Dredged material would also be used for intertidal marsh restoration, fish habitat enhancement structures, riverbank protection, and back-bay marsh restoration.

About half of the construction dredge material would be placed for beneficial use instead of within federal offshore sites, according to the final EIS.

But worries persist over whether that material is contaminated by per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, that have been discharged into the Cape Fear River for decades by upstream industries.

“Known contamination exists upstream, but it is not known if the sediment proposed to be dredged is contaminated,” the final EIS states. “At the time this EIS was prepared, this concern and the associated controversy remain, and the lack of resolution is hindering resolution of other issues that require state agency approvals and certifications.”

There are no federal or state human health limits for PFAS in sediment.

“The proposed project is not expected to contribute to PFAS contamination or impact drinking water contaminant concentrations. The sediment will be tested in accordance with all applicable requirements, including any new standards that are developed, prior to construction, and the results will be used to guide decisions related to use and disposal options based on the testing results and applicable criteria.”

A peer-reviewed study published by the Royal Science of Chemistry in 2022 confirms the presence of PFAS in the sediment in areas of the Cape Fear River.

The study targeted six PFAS, including legacy chemical compounds PFOA and PFOS, which have been phased out of production and replaced by what are referred to as emerging compounds. For this study, scientists focused on emerging compounds HFPO-DA, commonly referred to as GenX, PFMOAA, PFMOBA and PFMOPrA.

After collecting sediment samples between September 2017 and October 2019, scientists found that the highest concentration of PFAS was found in the sediment at Lock and Dam No. 1, some 39 miles upstream of Wilmington.

The overall trend of the data researchers collected found that PFAS in the Cape Fear River’s sediment “is decreasing as you go down the river,” said University of North Carolina Wilmington Professor Dr. Ralph Mead, program director of the NC PFAS Research Network and one of the study’s corresponding authors.

“There’s PFAS in the sediment, and while the concentration changes, of course, the distribution of PFAS compounds change as you move along the river itself,” Mead said in a recent telephone interview.

“One of the interesting things about the Cape Fear River is, as you move down the river, of course the salinity is going to increase. That salinity increase, depending on the freshwater flow, you can have salty water downtown by the hotels down on the riverfront,” he continued.

This leaves a question that does not yet have a clear answer. If a particle of sediment with PFAS in it floats down the river, will the salt make the particle hold on to PFAS or let it go?

“We all like to think that sediment is the ultimate sink for a lot of organic compounds, but sometimes, if the conditions and water chemistry is right, there can be a desorption that can take place,” Mead said.

He pointed out that researchers also detected a series of unknown fluorinated compounds in their sediment samples that were found by using high-resolution mass spectrometry, which can clearly distinguish tiny mass differences between molecules.

“The significance of this is we do not have standards for any of these compounds,” Mead said. “So, there’s potentially more PFAS present than we know of. I think this all ties back to the idea that there’s a lot of research that’s left to be done. There’s just a lot of questions out there and it’s not just the Cape Fear, there are other waterbodies as well that are impaired.”

Adverse impacts, outstanding issues

The final EIS identifies two “general types of meaningful adverse impacts,” including the destruction of fish habitat during construction and loss of freshwater, forested wetlands in the lower Cape Fear River.

The Corps would compensate for fish habitat loss by improving fish passages at lock and dams No. 1 and 2 more than 35 miles upstream of Wilmington “to enable anadromous fish to access quality habitat upstream of those facilities.”

The proposed plan to offset impacts to freshwater wetlands include preserving high-quality freshwater forested wetlands and upgrading lower-quality sites along the lower Cape Fear.

“Along with the adverse impacts, some beneficial effects would be expected,” according to the final EIS. “The deepened and widened channels would allow the cargo to be transported on a smaller number of larger and more modern and efficient vessels. In addition to the economic benefits, these transportation efficiencies would result in fewer vessel transits through the harbor yielding beneficial effects such as reduced fuel consumption, air emissions, vessel strikes to animals in the channels and shoreline erosion,” when compared to leaving the channel at its current depth.

The final EIS also notes that several controversial issues have been raised about the proposed project.

“Most were addressed and resolved,” the final EIS states.

But other controversial and outstanding issues remain, those “that require more time or additional action to resolve,” including federal review of the project’s impacts to endangered species and their habitat.

The Corps anticipates executing a programmatic agreement with agencies including the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources’ State Historic Preservation Office “this summer,” Cayton wrote. A programmatic agreement aims to address a project’s impacts on cultural and historic resources.

There are nearly 30 historic sites and properties within the proposed project’s area of potential effects, according to the State Historic Preservation Office.

Those sites include Dark Branch, a community in unincorporated Brunswick County where land remains largely owned by the descendants of previously enslaved residents, and Orton, a sprawling, former rice plantation.

Orton’s owner, billionaire hedge fund manager and conservation philanthropist Louis Moore Bacon, remains firmly opposed to the proposed harbor project, one he argues would threaten the expansive, historic rice field system and earthen dike in which he’s invested tens of millions of dollars to restore.

“The Cape Fear’s West Bank exists today because generations of conservationists, landowners, public agencies and local communities made the deliberate decision to protect one of North Carolina’s most important ecological and cultural landscapes,” Bacon said in an emailed statement to Coastal Review. “It would be a profound mistake to unravel that achievement with proposed Wilmington Harbor Dredging Project, which would threaten permanent harm to protected wetlands, wildlife habitat, historic rice fields built by the hands of enslaved African Americans and the historic Gullah Geechee cultural landscape. Before moving forward with what would be irreversible losses, we should be certain the project’s economic rationale still holds, and that every environmental and cultural consequence has been transparently and scientifically evaluated. Once these resources are compromised, nothing can fully bring them back.”

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Wilmington District has issued a public notice of a proposal to establish a wetlands mitigation bank and site in the Cape Fear River Basin.

The Northeast Cape Fear Umbrella Mitigation Bank – Quinn Farm Site in Duplin County would be used to offset unavoidable environmental damage to natural wetlands associated with Department of the Army permit authorizations.

The Quinn Farm site consists of historically farmed land with an extensive ditch network that has effectively removed characteristic wetland hydrology across much of the site, according to the notice. The network of ditches directly discharge into the Northeast Cape Fear River.

According to the applicant, Cal Miller of Shaw Highway Properties, LLC, the proposed project would restore 59.7 acres of riverine wetland habitat and 3,380 linear feet of zero-order stream valley.

“Restoration activities will involve the backfilling and/or plugging of the existing drainage network, re-contouring of a zero-order stream valley, and planting of characteristic wetland trees and shrubs in select areas of the tract,” according to the notice.

The project will reestablish natural wetland hydroperiods associated with headwater forest, bottomland hardwood and riverine swamp forest communities, the notice states.

The nonprofit Broad Water Innovations will serve as a long-term steward for the mitigation property, which will be placed under conservation easement in perpetuity.

The proposed project initially went out to public notice in March 2025, but was withdrawn due to processing delays. It was resubmitted March 31 of this year.

Elevated levels of a federally deemed likely cancer-causing substance were detected in a sample collected earlier this month from a municipal wastewater treatment plant that discharges into the Cape Fear River Basin.

The N.C. Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources announced Wednesday it had been notified that elevated 1,4-dioxane levels were discharged from Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant into Hasketts Creek, which empties into the Deep River.

A sample collected by the plant July 10 detected a concentration of 2,010 parts per billion, or ppb, of 1-4 dioxane, an industrial chemical used for a variety of purposes.

For downstream water supplies to remain safe, DEQ has determined the Asheboro plant should keep its monthly average 1,4-dioxane discharge at or below 22 ppb. DEQ uses U.S. Environmental Protection Agency toxicity calculations for lifetime exposure to determine safe levels of 1,4-dioxane discharges.

State water resources officials have taken additional sampling since July 10 and are awaiting to confirm the results of those samples, according to a release.

The Division of Water Resources has notified several downstream drinking water utilities about the elevated levels. Those utilities include Bladen Bluffs Water System, Brunswick County, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, the city of Dunn, Fayetteville Public Works Commission, Harnett Regional Water, International Paper Co., Pender County, Pilgrim’s Pride Water System and the city of Sandford.

“DEQ continues to monitor the levels of 1,4-dioxane discharged by wastewater treatment plants in the Cape Fear River Basin,” according to a release. “Significant reductions have occurred at one wastewater treatment plant through a collaborative effort with municipal operators. DEQ continues to work with the remaining municipal operators.”

Asheboro and division officials are in an ongoing court battle over the division’s inclusion of 1,4-dioxane discharge limits in city’s August 2023 National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit.

In early February, a Wake County Superior Court judge ruled that the limits set by the state were properly included in the plant’s discharge permit. Asheboro appealed and the limits are stayed until the case is heard by the Court of Appeals.

Water has carried Tatiana the Trash roughly 70 miles downstream from where it and dozens of other reusable bottles were released into a Northeast Raleigh creek more than a year ago.

Dan the Debris doesn’t appear to have made it far from where it was placed into Marsh Creek in the spring of 2025.

Today, there are 60 cheekily named bottles that can be tracked as they journey, or not, from the freshwaters of the creek and the Neuse River and into the brackish waters of the Pamlico Sound.

They’re part of an ongoing study examining how stormwater flushes litter into local creeks, how far that litter travels downstream, and the direct link between urban trash and plastic pollution in our waterways.

“Even though we’re up here in Wake County, the Neuse River carries a lot of our pollutants down to the coast, where our coastal neighbors, unfortunately, have a cumulative impact of our river in the watersheds upstream,” said Christy Perrin, sustainable waters and communities coordinator with Waters Resources Research Institute and North Carolina Sea Grant, and co-principal investigator of the study.

To get an understanding of how litter gets into our waterways and travels downstream, researchers are digging deep to pinpoint litter hotspots and identify correlations between storms and how much trash enters individual streams during those storms.

Researchers will use their findings to guide location-specific interventions to help prevent litter from reaching waterways.

The study was funded in 2024 through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Sea Grant Office.

As part of the study, researchers installed three litter traps in Marsh Creek, a small watershed that flows into Crabtree Creek near Interstate 440 and into the Neuse River. After each rainfall, the team removes trash captured in the traps, counts each piece of litter, and documents the different types of litter collected.

“Every time it rains, stormwater will wash trash and pollutants from sidewalks and roads and streets into our local streams,” said Madison Haley, a doctoral student in North Carolina State University’s Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department. “Here, we’re able to understand from specific storms how much trash is entering and then moving through watersheds. What we’re finding is that the higher the peak of that flow, the more trash we see.”

Researchers have found a clear link between the amount of trash captured by litter traps and the size of the nearby human population.

“The less populated a watershed is, the less trash we see typically. And the more urbanized a watershed is, the more trash we see typically,” Haley said.

Researchers teamed up with volunteers of The Great Raleigh Cleanup, a nonprofit founded in 2020 that has removed more than 45,000 pounds of litter from the city’s landscapes, to take stock of the amounts of litter along roads within the Marsh Creek watershed and identify litter hotspots.

“We do notice that roads that see higher traffic have more litter,” Haley said. “Roads that see lower traffic have less litter. Roads that are more industrialized tend to have more litter. Roads that are residential tend to have less litter.”

There is no perfect formula for pinpointing exactly what creates a litter hotspot, she said, but researchers have uncovered a definite pattern.

And they’re trying to find patterns in how litter is carried by waters downstream – how long it takes litter to get from headwaters into the river and all the way down into the Pamlico Sound.

That’s where the bottles, with a little help from citizen scientists, particularly those recreating in waters closer to the coast, come in.

Each 1-liter Nalgene bottle holds a GPS tracker and a bright-colored note with a QR code that links to the project website.

Eventually GPS tracker batteries run out of juice.

“If you ever see a bottle, there’s a chance it could be one of ours” with a tracker that has lost power, Haley said.

She asks anyone who spots a bottle while recreating on the Neuse River or Pamlico Sound to check to see if it is one of theirs. If you find one of their research bottles, simply scan the QR code, log its location, and then place it back in the water.

“It’s a good time for folks to be out there paying more attention and recreating and seeing if they can find our bottles, but also picking up trash in the process,” Haley said, noting that this month is Plastic Free July. “The point is that folks can connect more than what we do here in Raleigh, and what we do in these urban areas can impact our neighbors downstream, and everything that we do here doesn’t necessarily stay in our own community. The plastic persists for a very long time, and it moves through our waterways and our environments.”

Researchers initially released 40 bottles into Marsh Creek in April and May 2025.

Haley explained that the bottles traveled slower than researchers anticipated and they wanted to understand how bottles moved in different areas of the Neuse River. So, last February, they placed 10 more bottles into the Neuse River just upstream of Goldsboro. In April, they released another 10 bottles into the river in Kinston.

“We’re finding that the Neuse River is not just a conduit of water from Raleigh to the ocean but also is turned into this place where we’re storing lots of our trash,” Haley said. “Trash is just sitting there in the Neuse River for potentially long amounts of time, and so this study, we can see those bottles if they are sitting and staying in certain places for a long amount of time. We can see where trash is being stored within the river itself.”

She said she understands how it might be easy to get disheartened about the issue of litter.

“We all see it everywhere,” she said. “But to know how many people are interested in our work and how many people are interested in helping us is incredibly – it’s exciting and hopeful. There’s a lot of work to be done.”

The Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership has found that the amount of seagrass the state has lost over a 14-year period totals about 25 square miles.

The federal-state program that manages the Albemarle-Pamlico Estuarine System located in northeastern North Carolina and southeastern Virginia recently published these findings, an update to its 2021 report on the extent of high-salinity underwater grass in the Albemarle-Pamlico estuary.

APNEP Quantitative Ecologist Dr. Tim Ellis, an author of the study, explained that, although the study confirms that North Carolina has the largest amount of seagrass habitat along the U.S. Atlantic Coast, the critical coastal resource is declining, with an estimated loss of approximately 16,000 acres, or 16%, from 2006 until 2020.

Using data from three aerial surveys of soundside, high-salinity estuarine waters, or where seagrasses would most likely be expected to grow, between Manteo and Bogue Inlet, researchers found that the real extent of seagrass in 2006-07 was 109,607 acres, in 2013 was 95,157 acres, and in 2020 was 88,531 acres. That is a decline of about 1% a year, “despite suitable habitat available for expansion.”

These flowering plants that are fully submerged and are completely dependent on sunlight to flourish are often called subaquatic vegetation, SAV, seagrasses or underwater grasses. In addition to keeping “waters healthy by providing habitat, food, and shelter for aquatic life, sequestering carbon, protecting shorelines, absorbing and recycling nutrients, filtering sediment, and acting as a barometer of water quality,” seagrasses “enrich shallow aquatic environments around the world, providing sanctuaries for mollusks, crustaceans, and finfish as well as sustenance for waterfowl and other herbivores,” according to the report.

The declining trend is seen worldwide, “primarily due to water quality degradation, coastal development, dredging, fishing, boating, and other related aquatic activities, sea level rise, warming water temperatures, and tropical cyclones.”

North Carolina is experiencing annual rates of seagrass loss at or below the global average, but that’s cold comfort. “Because seagrass is sensitive to water quality, including nutrient and sediment pollution, a continued decline in the acreage of these underwater meadows indicates that the overall health of North Carolina’s estuaries may be declining,” APNEP states.

Ellis said that seagrass is a sensitive indicator of estuarine health because of its direct and complex associations with its surrounding environment. Seagrasses are also ecosystem engineers, meaning these plants modify the areas they inhabit by trapping sediments and absorbing nutrients to improve water clarity and by creating habitat to support biodiversity and biological productivity.

The study notes that the decline in North Carolina is not evenly distributed. “In the central portion of the study area, from Hatteras Inlet to Barden Inlet near Cape Lookout, seagrass acreage decreased 2.0% per year compared with a decline of 0.8% and 1.4% per year in the northern and southern portions of the study area, respectively.”

Over the 14 years there were three notable changes in the estuarine system’s seagrass meadows that were identified in the study, including that the total area of seagrass meadows is declining, the rates of change in extent vary, and coverage is shifting away from continuous toward more patchy and fragmented meadows.

Related: Work begins for periodic update of state coastal habitat plan

These “seagrass meadows are becoming more fragmented, meaning large, continuous beds are transitioning to more isolated and disconnected patches,” Ellis said. “This affects how well seagrass can provide critical habitat for fisheries and wildlife, stabilize sediments and protect shorelines, contribute to good water quality, and endure and respond to environmental changes, including major storm events.”

Over the period that the three surveys were conducted there were 10 tropical cyclones that directly impacted the Albemarle-Pamlico estuary, physically disturbing meadows, water quality and the stability of the barrier island inlets and flood deltas, APNEP notes.

Impact on marine life

Study co-author Jud Kenworthy, who researched seagrass for his more than 30-year career before retiring from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, said in an interview that “what we’re seeing in the patchiness is that we’re losing the cover of grass. Not only are we losing the total amount (of seagrass) in the entire coastal system, the increase in patchiness is also a decrease in cover where the seagrasses are actually occurring in those patches.”

The implications of seagrass patchiness and reducing cover cascade through everything, especially all the fisheries that depend on this habitat at some point in their life stage. “They’re exposed to less vegetation and a tendency for less cover due to the increase of patchiness,” he said.

Although some species will be affected by that process more than others, it could result in changes in food availability for different commercial and recreational fisheries cherished in North Carolina as part of the social and economic fabric, Kenworthy said.

When asked what species will see the biggest hit, Kenworthy said there’s probably a list of at least a dozen, including the keystone commercial and recreational fisheries like red drum, spotted sea trout and flounder, any species of shrimp, plus any marine life that use the estuary as a nursery and depend on the resources in seagrass beds.

Kenworthy added that many species totally dependent on the seagrass beds are not harvested but are food for larger predators.

“The one that comes to mind is the pinfish,” which consume seagrass. “Nobody that I know of eats pinfish, but a lot of people use pinfish for bait, and of course, pinfish are a major source of food for a lot of the larger species,” Kenworthy said. If there’s no seagrass for pinfish or other prey for larger species, the foundation of the food chain is going to be affected.

Kenworthy explained that if estuaries lose SAV, all the important ecosystem services like capturing, trapping and recycling nutrients, stabilizing sediments, storing carbon in the soil and providing habitat places for plants and animals, especially their food, are going to be affected.

“How dramatically these services are affected is going to depend on whether we find some sort of balance where the seagrasses reach an equilibrium or whether they tend to continue to decline,” he added.

Continued monitoring

Ellis said continued monitoring of seagrass allows APNEP and partners to closely track changes in the estuary to evaluate the effectiveness of existing conservation and management strategies and to adapt those strategies quickly as needed to meet desired protection and restoration goals.

“Based on the experience gained during these three surveys and our better understanding of the ecology of the seagrass ecosystem in North Carolina, APNEP and partners have intensified and expanded seagrass monitoring efforts, completing new subregional surveys of the Albemarle-Pamlico estuary in 2021-2025,” Ellis said.

In addition to aerial surveys, he continued, which are now conducted during both spring and fall each year to better capture the different peak abundances of the state’s temperate and subtropical seagrass species, monitoring also includes in-water sampling to collect information on species composition and abundance, depth, and water quality.

“Analysis of these additional survey data are underway and will enable APNEP to provide a more complete picture of seagrass status and trends in the Albemarle-Pamlico estuary,” Ellis said.

Ellis said It takes a lot of funding and coordinated effort to monitor seagrass in North Carolina, especially given its widespread distribution across the coast. APNEP relies on regional partnerships with state and federal agencies, universities, and others to build and maintain the collaborative network and leveraging of resources needed to address the many financial and logistical challenges of conducting a long-term seagrass monitoring and assessment program.

What’s causing the decline?

Why it’s happening though, that “is the $64,000 question,” Kenworthy said. “I don’t think you can pin any one thing on seagrass decline.”

Ellis agreed that understanding the causes of the changes they’re seeing is complicated “because seagrass in North Carolina faces many challenges, including rising and warmer waters, more frequent and intense storms, varying and marginal water clarity that limits the amount of sunlight that reaches the plants, and physical damage from human activities.”

Regardless, “the situation warrants the attention of managers to both better protect the resource where it remains and to evaluate restoration opportunities in areas where it no longer exists but could potentially thrive again.”

Kenworthy points to water quality, especially water clarity, as the biggest issue right now that can be managed immediately and reasonably. The plants in this warmer environment​ have high light requirements​,​ and when there’s turbidity and phytoplankton in the water from nutrients or sediments ​released from the land, the actual clarity of the water declines,​ and the plants get less light​.

​”Our biggest manageable challenge is to at least sustain or improve the clarity of the water.”

ROCKY POINT – New Hanover County residents and environmentalists continue their pushback against Martin Marietta’s plan to scale up Castle Hayne quarry mining operations, arguing that the company should further explore other expansion alternatives that would lessen the threat to vital wetlands and water quality.

During a public hearing Tuesday night, more than a dozen speakers pressed the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources to reject the construction supply company’s request for a Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certificate to enlarge its Castle Hayne quarry by 358 acres.

“Let me first say that I understand the need for construction materials for a growing area but also know that we have significant natural areas that should and must be protected,” said Roger Shew, a coastal geologist at the University of North Carolina Wilmington and the first to step up to the mic in the hearing hosted at Heide Trask Senior High School in Rocky Point.

The Island Creek and Northeast Cape Fear River floodplain includes significant natural areas, where riverine swamp forests provide high levels of biodiversity, great habitat quality, nutrient absorption, carbon storage, sediment retention, and recreation, he said.

The company would mitigate wetland loss at a 2:1 ratio, either by purchasing riparian wetland credits or paying into the fund that buys wetland areas. Stormwater management measures would also be employed to minimize wetlands impacts and preserve water quality downstream. This would include a 50-foot minimum wooded buffer around wetlands.

Martin Marietta’s preferred plan to expand limestone mining operations would impact 143.46 acres of wetlands of medium and high quality, and 9.7 acres of open water that connect to those classified as primary nursery areas, strategic habitat areas, and essential fish habitat.

Shew said Tuesday that it is likely even more wetlands would be lost because mining requires pit dewatering, which “creates a cone of depression on lower water tables.”

“If mining is done in the lowermost floodplain area, flooding will be even more frequent, and of course sediment can be washed in the surrounding wetlands,” he said.

He and other opponents argue that the company could pursue alternatives that would better protect the environment and maintain profitable mining operations.

Shew suggested that mining operations occur largely outside of the floodplain and instead in upland areas of Castle Hayne and Rocky Point, which would conserve significant wetlands.

He also pointed to the company’s Rocky Point quarry, which sits about 3½ miles away from the Castle Hayne site. The Rocky Point quarry includes upland areas that are not directly connected with the significant riverine swamp forests along the Northeast Cape Fear River, Shew said.

He cautioned that if these areas are mined, land immediately adjacent to Interstate 40 must be designated as a buffer zone to avoid the risk of causing sinkholes.

“I hope you see there are options that may allow us to minimize costs of our significant natural areas, protect our waters, and provide the needed acreage for mines,” he said.

In order to obtain a 401 water quality certification, the Division of Water Resources requires that a project have no practical alternatives, that it minimizes adverse impacts to surface water and wetlands and avoids degrading ground or surface waters and causing indirect degradation that violates downstream water quality standards.

“Decades of industrialization and development of the Cape Fear River Basin limits the river’s ability to absorb the impacts of a quarry expansion in its direct floodplain,” said Page Turner, conservation biologist, chair the Cape Fear Audubon Society conservation committee and North Carolina Wildlife Federation conservation manager. “Loss of these wetlands and contamination of the waterway has a direct impact on the water quality of the Cape Fear River and should not be permitted.”

The Alliance for Cape Fear Trees Executive Director Isabelle Shepherd described the river as one that is “already carrying an enormous burden.”

“It receives runoff and pollution from the most densely populated parts of our state, from textile manufacturing, industrial discharge, wastewater treatment plants, concentrated animal feeding operations, and countless other upstream sources,” she said. “By the time that water reaches us, our wetlands and the trees within are among the last natural filters standing between those pollutants and our communities. When we remove wetlands, we remove one of nature’s most effective and irreplaceable water treatment systems. Once these wetlands are evacuated, they cannot simply be rebuilt elsewhere.”

Megan Teachey issued an ultimatum at the hearing, saying that she will pursue a court order known as a writ of mandamus against the Division of Water Resources to enforce its legal obligations if the division does not perform an independent aquifer impact study and verify state ownership of the affected submerged lands.

“The state does not own these waters,” she said. “It holds them in a strict fiduciary trust. Blasting, dredging and injection of industrial chemicals into our aquifer is happening without legal authority. This is a direct offense against the common people and the public trust that we are owed.”

New Hanover County resident Kelly McConnell expressed concerns that the proposed expansion of the Castle Hayne quarry would exacerbate flooding in the area.

“This area is already at high risk and this risk is increasing,” she said. “There are alternatives available that do not impact the wetlands as much and do not impact water quality. I appreciate the need for additional mining. Do it if truly needed, but with much less environmental impact.”

Fellow resident Margie Gewirtzman, her young daughter standing next to her side, said she is particularly concerned for the health of her daughter and other children who live in the area of the quarry.

“Everything that has been said here today sounds really dangerous for my daughter,” Gewirtzman said, adding that once wetlands are destroyed, they will not be the same.

“And it’s so perfect right now. How could we destroy it?” she asked.

The division is accepting written comments on Martin Marietta’s request for a 401 water quality certification through Aug. 13.

Comments may be submitted online. Refer to project No. 20260387, version 1, project name “Castle Hayne.”

Comments may also be submitted by mail to Stephanie Goss, 401 Permitting, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC  27699-1617.

State Auditor Dave Boliek’s office released its performance audit of the Department of Environmental Quality’s Pre-Regulatory Landfill Program on Monday, revealing what the report called a shortfall in the statewide monitoring of former landfill sites.

The report found that 78%, or 534, of the 688 identified landfill sites where municipal solid waste disposal occurred without regulatory oversight have never been investigated under the DEQ program. Eleven of the list of top 100 of 629 program sites prioritized for investigation because of risk are in coastal counties.

The audit noted that, for most of the pre-regulation sites, it’s unknown what contamination may be present, whether it has spread to nearby properties or water supplies, or whether current conditions pose a risk to nearby residents. More than 80% of the landfill sites are within 1,000 feet of what are described as “vulnerable areas,” which includes homes, schools, daycares, churches, or drinking water wells.

“The Pre-Regulatory Landfill Program is a complex issue that creates challenges from a regulatory, legal, funding, and administrative standpoint,” said Boliek in the news release accompanying the audit. “But the bottom line is there are hundreds of potentially hazardous landfill sites across North Carolina, and despite tax dollars supporting a program meant to investigate these sites, 78% haven’t been examined. This audit lays out the facts, giving taxpayers a reliable update on a longstanding government issue.”

The program was established as part of the Division of Waste Management in 2007 to identify, assess, and remediate sites that accepted a wide range of waste prior to 1983. That’s before when modern environmental regulations were adopted. The list includes public and private sites near homes, schools and drinking water sources that could contain hazardous materials that pose health and environmental risks.

The risk ranking reflects scoring as of April 2025. In addition to the risk ranking, the audit includes an appendix listing all landfills alphabetically by county, then by risk priority rank within each county, if applicable. Another appendix identifies sites where issues related to property access have prevented or delayed investigation or cleanup and shows how long those delays have persisted in years.

The average estimated cost to investigate, assess and remediate a site is about $1.9 million. That would put the total cost, if applied to the remaining sites, at close to $1 billion. According to the report, of the 97 sites investigated since the program started, DEQ has secured 370 acres of waste, sampled 1,642 water supply wells and provided an alternate water supply to 30 homes.

According to the announcement, the DEQ Division of Waste Management agreed with the findings and the auditor’s recommendations. The audit lists all landfill sites, including sites pending access permission and sites that have been addressed, prioritized according to risk.

Among the ranked priority list’s top 100 sites in coastal counties are the following:

• No. 5, Jacksonville Wastewater Treatement Plant Landfill at Sturgeon City in Jacksonville, Onslow County.
• No. 9, Burnt Mill Creek Landfill in Wilmington.
• No. 11, Buxton Dump in Dare County.
• No. 30, Belltown Road Dump in Craven County.
• No. 44, Winnabow Landfill in Brunswick County.
• No. 53, Bolivia Refuse Disposal in Brunswick County.
• No. 67, Otway Community Refuse Dump in Carteret County.
• No. 73, Pantego Refuse Disposal in Beaufort County.
• No. 84, Rural Garbage Service in New Hanover County.
• No. 92, Ray’s Rural Dump in Onslow County.
• No. 98, Carolina Beach Refuse Disposal in New Hanover County.

Lawmakers on Thursday sent their approved and long-awaited budget to Gov. Josh Stein, who on Tuesday signed the $34.4 billion spending plan, one that includes notable coastal environmental spending and policy provisions, as well as a blow for commuters who rely on the state ferries that have long been free to ride.

Republican leaders in the North Carolina General Assembly unveiled the measure, Senate Bill 257, on Tuesday, June 30. Despite short notice and the exclusion of Democrats in negotiations, the bill passed both chambers last week with bipartisan support. It’s the state’s first full budget in more than two years.

On Thursday, Stein told reporters he would carefully weigh its provisions, some of which further diminish the governor’s appointment powers.

“North Carolinians expect their elected officials to come together across our differences to deliver for people,” said Stein in a statement released upon signing the budget, in which he also added that the budget addresses serious concerns such as clean, safe water and disaster recovery.

Stein said the budget “makes meaningful investments” in community colleges and increases salaries for teachers and public safety officers. But the measure “has real flaws” and “unconstitutional and wrong-headed provisions,” the governor said.

“The legislature slashed more than 1,000 state government positions, making it harder for us to keep people safe and healthy,” Stein said in the statement.

The budget includes a provision mandating that the North Carolina Department of Transportation begin charging tolls on the state’s four free vehicle ferry routes. The measure does not set fare amounts. This prompted Sen. Bobby Hanig, R-Currituck, and Sen. Norman Sanderson, R-Pamlico, to cast preliminary “no” votes earlier last week, but both senators voted affirmatively in the final tally. Sanderson had been successful in striking down proposed ferry tolls during his tenure in the legislature.

Coastal environmental advocates were largely pleased with the bill’s coastal provisions, including those pertaining to water, wastewater, and stormwater projects. Among these are Flood Blueprint and other resiliency projects, creation of a state-nonprofit partnership with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, publisher of Coastal Review, to remove abandoned and derelict vessels from waterways, measures to protect wildlife and natural lands, and efforts to study and address per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, pollution.

“This is a very strong budget for North Carolina’s coast,” said Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis. “From investments in removing derelict vessels and improving stormwater management to addressing PFAS, the legislature and governor have reinforced their bipartisan commitment to making our coastal waters cleaner and safer. These investments will also strengthen the coastal economy by protecting the natural resources that support our communities, businesses, and way of life.”

The nonprofit Coastal Federation was also more fully empowered to establish and administer a stormwater retrofit pilot cost-share program and award grants, including to support a temporary position in the Division of Energy, Mineral, and Land Resources. This position would be to provide compliance assistance for existing stormwater permitholders.

The Coastal Federation was also awarded a $1 million grant for its Center for Coastal Protection and Restoration in Carteret County. That project will be completed this summer.

The budget incorporates language from Senate Bill 1053, the 2026 Water Safety Act, introduced by Sen. Michael Lee, R-New Hanover, and with Sen. Danny Earl Britt Jr., a Republican representing Hoke, Robeson and Scotland counties, and Sen. Val Applewhite, a Democrat representing Cumberland County, as cosponsors.

This section defines “emerging contaminants” as PFAS and 1,4-dioxane and establishes an Emerging Contaminant Mitigation Fund under the Division of Water Infrastructure seeded with $45 million nonrecurring under the Department of Environmental Quality to support efforts to offset the compounds’ negative effects on municipal and county public water and wastewater systems. The fund will also go to support detection, reduction, and prevention of exposure to PFAS and 1,4-dioxane, and related research and development. Another $10 million is to cover costs of emergency drinking water supplies resulting from emerging contaminants.

“For nearly a decade, families in the Cape Fear region have carried the burden of PFAS contamination they did nothing to create,” Lee said in a statement in response to Coastal Review. “This budget delivers the most significant state investment yet in confronting that problem: a new $45 million Emerging Contaminant Mitigation Fund to help local utilities test for and treat PFAS, more than $10 million in additional help for families on private wells, and a statewide sampling initiative to trace these compounds back to their sources. The fund is also built for the long haul, because when polluters settle in court, those dollars will flow directly into cleaning up our water. Add the moratorium on new water transfers out of the Cape Fear basin, and this budget treats clean water as exactly what it is: a public health imperative and the foundation of our region’s future.”

The budget authorizes the State Water Infrastructure Authority to award grants from the fund on a priority basis to public water or wastewater system operators to cover costs associated with sampling, treatment, emergency response, remediation and technical assistance to eliminate PFAS and 1,4-dioxane discharges.

About $7.68 million in federal infrastructure money is budgeted for grants for projects addressing emerging contaminants. And $16.5 million in federal Clean Water Act Emergency Response funding will go toward grants to help wastewater systems address emergencies.

The budget appropriates $1 million in recurring funds to DEQ for positions and operating costs associated with the increased need for emerging contaminant research and response. The department may create up to five positions for this purpose. An additional $7 million in nonrecurring funds are provided for the collection of samples for PFAS and 1,4-dioxane research to be conducted by the North Carolina Collaboratory at the University of North Carolina, as directed in the Water Safety Act language.

The Collaboratory is appropriated $15 million for research, development, and remedial activities associated with PFAS and its effects on firefighters. This includes funding of a partnership with the Office of the State Fire Marshal and North Carolina State University to develop and implement a pilot program for deep-cleaning firefighter protective gear to mitigate PFAS exposure and remediation activities related to PFAS at or near fire stations.

The Collaboratory, in cooperation with DEQ, is to conduct a two-phased study to identify and quantify measurable industrial PFAS discharges in the state, first, by collecting samples from publicly owned treatments works and National Pollution Discharge Elimination System permitholders and then sampling other significant dischargers. The final Phase 1 report is due to DEQ, the Environmental Management Commission and the Environmental Review Commission no later than March 31, 2028, and Phase 2 no later than March 31, 2029.

The Collaboratory must also conduct a study of PFAS contamination in biosolids.

The Collaboratory is further directed to conduct a Cape Fear River Basin study with $1.5 million appropriated for that purpose through the end of the decade, when a report is due, and conduct a study of long-term water supply needs in river basins experiencing high rates of growth.

Of the total $4.5 million in Collaboratory operating funds, $170,000 nonrecurring is to support the FerryMon water quality monitoring program that employs sensors mounted to state ferries, and $160,000 nonrecurring for the ModMon river monitoring, a Neuse River Estuary modeling and monitoring project.

DEQ’s total appropriation, net of $295.5 million in receipts, is $111.9 million.

Abandoned vessels

The budget directs the Wildlife Resources Commission to contract with the Coastal Federation to remove and dispose of commission-identified abandoned and derelict vessels with priority given to those in public waters. This refers to vessels left for more than 30 days in a wrecked, junked, or substantially damaged or dismantled condition, docked, grounded, or beached upon the property of another without owner consent.

The measure also provides for expedited vessel abatement during declared emergencies and liability protection for removal work absent gross negligence.

Lee told Coastal Review that owner protections are “built in” to the legislation. After a 30-day notice period, such vessels are deemed forfeited. Funding for removal is to come from boating registration fees, 10% of the total, which is estimated to generate about $1.01 million.

“Our coast has lived with abandoned and derelict vessels for too long,” Lee said. “This budget finally builds a standing program to get them out of our waters, with a dedicated funding stream and the Coastal Federation as the state’s partner on removal.”

The Coastal Federation launched its first coordinated, large-scale, marine debris cleanup in 2019 and has worked with the Wildlife Resources Commission on abandoned boat removals since 2021. The organization’s larger clean water effort dates back much earlier.

“Several of the investments included in this year’s budget strengthen programs that have been central to the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s mission of protecting and restoring the coast for decades,” Federation Chief Program Officer Ana Živanović-Nenadović told Coastal Review Tuesday. Noting the bipartisan support of coastal conservation, she explained how reducing amounts of polluted stormwater runoff keeps estuarine waters clean, supports shellfish harvesting and sustains healthy fisheries.

“Funding for abandoned and derelict vessel removal improves public access and navigation while restoring habitat. Together, these investments will deliver lasting benefits for North Carolina’s coastal ecosystems, communities, and economy,” she said.

Resilience spending

The budget appropriates $4.5 million for projects defined in the Flood Resiliency Blueprint, a planning tool geared to increase community resilience to flooding, and $850,000 for time-limited, associated DEQ positions. Another $250,000 is appropriated to the Resilient Coastal Communities Program to convert two temporary staff positions to permanent. This program administered by the Division of Coastal Management provides financial and technical assistance to help local governments in the 20 coastal counties become more resilient to flooding.

Other provisions

Lee said the budget also modernizes the state’s beach and inlet management planning with a required four-year cycle of planned maintenance and resiliency projects and with DEQ’s updated plan due July 1, 2027. The measure provides roughly $11.5 million combined for coastal storm risk management at Wrightsville Beach, Carolina Beach, and Kure Beach.

The budget eliminates two Department of Environmental Quality positions assigned to the Environmental Justice initiative. It also eliminates the state Office of Environmental Education.

Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, released a statement in which he said he was “glad” Stein had signed the bill into law and that he “recognizes how vital this budget is for the people of North Carolina.”

The North Carolina Democratic Party also released a statement, noting that after more than 1,000 days, the state finally has a budget that addresses some of the most urgent needs. “While this budget isn’t perfect, it takes real steps in the right direction,” party officials said.

A construction materials company’s proposal to expand its limestone quarry in northern New Hanover County threatens more than 140 acres of mostly high-quality wetlands and vital fish habitat, environmental groups say.

Martin Marietta’s preferred plan to enlarge its Castle Hayne quarry would permanently destroy 143.46 acres of pristine wetlands and 9.7 acres of open water that connect to those classified as primary nursery area, strategic habitat area, and essential fish habitat, the groups argue.

The proposed expansion of the 1,700-acre quarry that sits between the Northeast Cape Fear River and Holly Shelter Road could also decrease natural flood defenses, environmentalists say.

Advocates are pushing regulators to deny the company’s first-choice plan, arguing that other options Martin Marietta has identified to source limestone to meet the demand of future construction needs carry fewer ecological consequences.

They’ll get their chance to voice their concerns on water quality impacts from the proposed 358-acre expansion in northern New Hanover County during a public hearing hosted by the North Carolina Division of Water Resources on July 14. That hearing is scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. at Heide Trask Senior High School auditorium, 14328 N.C. 210 in Rocky Point. Speaker registration will open at 5:30 p.m.

More than half a dozen environmental groups have asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to deny Martin Marietta’s Clean Water Action Act Section 404 permit application. A federal 404 permit regulates discharges of dredged or fill material into waters of the United States, including wetlands.

In a May 22 letter to the Corps, those groups, including the Southern Environmental Law Center, Cape Fear River Watch, Carolina Wetlands Association, Coastal Plain Conservation Group, North Carolina Sierra Club, North Carolina Wildlife Federation, and Save Sledge Forest, said Martin Marietta’s permit application does not include a thorough analysis of the project’s impacts to environmental resources, including wetlands.

Those groups also argue that the company’s other project alternatives, including expanding mining operations at the company’s Rocky Point quarry, would be “less damaging” to wetlands and waterways.

“Where Martin Marietta is proposing to expand its Castle Hayne quarry, it’s just closer to so many sensitive and high-quality waters,” said Julie Youngman, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center. “The Rocky Point quarry is not very far away. It could provide the same value to the local community and provide the same source of building supplies, but still cause far less environmental damage. I think that’s what all of us are focused on ‘why aren’t you thinking about that location.’”

Martin Marietta’s application details six potential project alternatives, alongside a no-action alternative.

The possible expansion of the company’s Rocky Point quarry, which sits about 3½ miles away from its Castle Hayne site, would destroy a little more than 152 acres of wetlands and 13.28 acres of freshwater ponds, according to environmental groups.

“At first glance, this alternative would result in the net loss of more wetlands than Martin Marietta’s preferred alternative,” the May 22 letter states. “However, the quality and function of the wetlands at the Rocky Point or any other major waterway. Unlike at the Castle Hayne Quarry, an expansion of the Rocky Point site would not pose the same concerns about runoff and water quality. Likewise, this off-site alternative is not located near important fish habitat or a nationally significant floodplain.”

The letter urges that any expansion of the Rocky Point quarry be conditioned on Martin Marietta maintaining a 100-foot minimum internal buffer zone to protect adjacent wetlands from the direct effects of mining activity.

“The Cape Fear River in New Hanover County is already suffering from enough sources of degradation that if an additional one could be avoided, the state and federal agencies should think hard about doing so,” Youngman said. “The Castle Hayne community is also shouldering more of an environmental burden than maybe is fair between a proposed development and various industrial operations around them. They don’t need more mining to cause more water quality and noise and traffic hardship for them.”

Later this month, lawyers for several Castle Hayne residents are expected to go before the New Hanover County Board of Adjustment to appeal Hilton Bluffs, a proposed 1,800-home development covering 600 acres of a 4,000-acre tract that includes Sledge Forest. The forest includes ancient trees, vast wetlands, and riverine habitat.

If Martin Mariett’s preferred alternative to expand its Castle Hayne quarry is approved, the groups are urging regulators to require the company to produce an environmental impact study.

DWR is accepting written comments on the proposed expansion through 5 p.m. Aug. 13 using an online form for project No 20260387, version 1 with the project name listed as “Castle Hayne.” Mailed written comments may be submitted to Stephanie Goss, 401 Permitting, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC  27699-1617.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission will hear about the progress to update the state’s plan that outlines strategies to protect and restore critical ecosystems coastal fishery habitats.

The 15-member commission is to hear an update on the 2026 amendment to the N.C. Coastal Habitat Protection Plan, or CHPP, from N.C. Department of Environmental Quality staff. The commission is responsible for adopting rules that protect, preserve and enhance the state’s air and water resources implemented by several divisions within DEQ.

The plan, adopted in December 2004 by Environmental Management, North Carolina Marine Fisheries and Coastal Resources commissions, provides information on coastal habitat distribution and abundance, ecological functions and importance to fish production, status and trends, threats to the habitat, and recommendations to address those threats. The CHPP is updated every five years.

The full commission is scheduled to meet at 9 a.m. July 9 in the ground floor hearing room of the Archdale Building in Raleigh. The meeting will be livestreamed. The meeting number is 2439 266 6247 and password ncdeq. The meeting may also be accessed by telephone at 1-415-655-0003, password 62338.

Commission committee meetings are planned to begin the day prior at 9 a.m. July 8 in the Archdale Building and available to stream using Webex and by phone using the same telephone number, meeting number and passwords.

Agendas for the committees and the full commission are available on the EMC’s website.

The Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center is rolling out this week a new speaker series that delves into the relationship between people and place.

A similar format to its annual Parlor Talks offered every Thursday afternoon in the summer, the “Water/Ways” speaker series set to launch at 2 p.m. Wednesday at the museum on Harkers Island is an extension of the Smithsonian’s traveling “Water/Ways” exhibit on display until Aug. 9.

The exhibit “explores the centrality of water in our lives including its effect on the environment and climate, it’s practical role in agriculture and economic planning, and its impact on culture and spirituality,” organizers said.

Geoffrey Adair, an area historian from Beaufort, is to give the first talk this week on waterfowling traditions. Other topics for the series include water and the arts with Connie Mason July 8, water and a changing coast with Dr. Reide Corbett July 15, water as recreation with Frank Tursi July 22, and water as a way of life with Wayne Davis and Staci Davis Basden July 29.

The museum began its fifth year of Parlor Talks, which focus on the history, heritage and the research taking place in Carteret County, earlier this month.

Next on the schedule is Dr. Nathan Hall who will focus on “Our Amazing Seagrass.”

Hall is a research assistant professor and director of the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Institute for the Environment’s Morehead City Field Site at UNC Institute of Marine Sciences. His primary research focuses on understanding the factors that control microalgal biomass and community composition in lakes, rivers, and estuaries.

His talk Thursday afternoon will highlight why seagrass matters and why it need lots of light, what factors determine how much light reaches the seagrasses, and why scientists are worried about the current state of seagrass. Hall plans to wrap the talk up with what data exists on water quality where there are seagrass beds, and new efforts led by the Albemarle-Pamlico National Estuary Partnership to improve understanding of water quality.

Parlor Talks summer schedule:

• July 9: “The Wit & Wisdom of Ordinary People of Harkers Island” with Joel Hancock.
• July 16: “Opening Season for the Krakens” with Carteret Community College.
• July 23: “Everyone Has a Story” with Wayne and Staci Davis.
• July 30: The Atlantic Hotels of Morehead City with Geoffrey Adair.
• Aug. 6: Cape Lookout Foundation’s restoration of the U.S. Coast Guard Station with Bud Doughton, Mason Williams and Garry Brown.
• Aug. 13: “Coastal Heroes: An Old Newsman Looks Back at Those Who Fought to Make a Difference” with Frank Tursi.
• Aug. 20: “Growing Up in the Promise Land and the Inevitable Changes” with Promise Land friends.
• Aug. 27: “100 Years of Shark Research off Cape Lookout” with Dr. Joel Fodrie, who is moving from his role as UNC-IMS director to director of Duke University Marine Lab.
• Sept. 3: “Songs & Stories We Love the Best” with Connie Mason

WILMINGTON – Officials and environmental groups in North Carolina are blasting Chemours’ proposed $450 million federal settlement over PFAS pollution, saying the deal will do little for the state.

The U.S. Justice Department on Wednesday announced the multistate agreement, touting it as the federal government’s first comprehensive settlement over per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances pollution.

Under the terms of the settlement, Chemours is expected to pay the Environmental Protection Agency and West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection a $22.5 million civil penalty over three years, and pump in $90 million over 15 years “to further reduce PFAS emissions and enhance certain existing off-site drinking water programs,” according to a company release.

The company will spend an estimated $60 million installing pollution controls for surface water discharges and air emissions at its West Virginia plant, cover an estimated $280 million in costs to provide clean drinking water for more than a decade to residents of communities around its facilities in West Virginia and New Jersey, and “evaluate options and implement corresponding controls to reduce releases of PFAS and other toxic chemicals from its facility in North Carolina,” according to the U.S. Justice Department.

Gov. Josh Stein expressed doubts about whether North Carolina, one of three states named in the agreement, will actually receive any portion of those funds.

“It’s entirely possible that North Carolina doesn’t get a dime from this federal settlement,” Stein said Wednesday afternoon during home visit with a Wilmington-area family that uses a state-funded water filtration system to remove PFAS from their drinking water.

“The settlement that they just announced today will not have any meaningful impact for the state of North Carolina or the people of North Carolina,” he said. “It may help West Virginia, it may help New Jersey, but it really doesn’t do much for North Carolina.”

Clean Cape Fear Co-founder Emily Donovan agreed.

“If Chemours is unable to control its own pollution for follow the law without a constant stream of lawsuits, then maybe it has no business making toxic forever chemicals,” she stated in a release. “We’re not sure who this favors. It isn’t those of us in North Carolina who have been dealing with nearly half a century of PFAS pollution from the Fayetteville Works facility.”

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Jean Zhuang said the settlement is devoid of meaningful enforcement and “appears designed to shield Chemours from real accountability.”

“The Department of Justice has wrapped a sweeping set of allegations involving drinking water contamination affecting millions of Americans into a resolution that largely asks the company to monitor itself and develop plans, while surrendering its claims tied to contamination from multiple facilities across multiple states,” Zhuang stated in a release. “At the same time DOJ is resolving its litigation on such lenient terms, Chemours is actively challenging federal PFAS drinking water standards in court, seeking a massive expansion of its North Carolina facility, and continuing to release extremely high concentrations of ultra-short-chain PFAS – chemicals it knows are likely ending up in drinking water for roughly half a million North Carolinians.”

Public hearing set on standards

Wednesday’s announcement comes as the Environmental Protection Agency rolls ahead with a proposal to strike down the nation’s first-ever health standards for PFAS, chemical contaminants found in the drinking water sources of millions of North Carolinians.

The agency is scheduled to host a virtual public hearing on July 7 regarding its plans to rescind and reconsider current federal standards for HFPO-DA, commonly referred to as GenX, PFNA, PFHxS and PFBS. The agency also wants to push the deadline in which water utilities must comply with enforceable standards for PFOA and PFOS, chemicals that are no longer manufactured, by two years from 2029 to 2031.

Meanwhile, the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission is considering monitoring and minimization rules for discharges of PFOS, PFOA, GenX, and 1,4-dioxane, which the EPA classifies as a likely human-carcinogen, into the state’s surface waters. The proposed rules have been widely criticized for lacking specific discharge limits and penalties for PFAS dischargers found to be in violation of the rules.

Stein said he is “not happy” with the EPA’s and commission’s proposals.

“These are both unfortunate steps that do not give the people the assurance that they deserve that their drinking water is clean,” he said.

Chemours’ Fayetteville Works plant in Bladen County for decades directly discharged GenX and other chemical compounds into the Cape Fear River, the drinking water sources for tens of thousands of residents in the Cape Fear Region.

Stein pointed out that Chemours, under a 2019 consent order with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality and Cape Fear River Watch, has already been required to mitigate discharges and emissions of PFAS from its Fayetteville Works facility.

“What we need help from Chemours today, and the settlement doesn’t address this point, is we need Chemours and DuPont to pay to help us clean up the pollution that exists in our communities,” he said.

As part of ongoing environmental remediation efforts in the state, Chemours has been required to test tens of thousands of private drinking water wells for PFAS contamination throughout the Cape Fear Region. The company must provide temporary drinking water supplies to households with wells that contain levels of PFAS above concentrations established by environmental and health officials until a new, permanent supply, whether through a home filtration system or hook up to a public water system, is provided at the company’s expense.

Although the well water at the home of Brenda and Vance Moore tested positive for PFAS, levels of types of those contaminants in their drinking source did not rate the thresholds that make Chemours responsible for providing alternative water supplies to them.

Thousands of North Carolinians are in the same situation, state officials, including Stein and N.C. Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Reid Wilson, explained Wednesday during their visit to the Moores’ home in Porters Neck, an unincorporated community in northern New Hanover County.

“My question is we’re 10 miles from the river,” Brenda Moore said about the Cape Fear. “How did these chemicals get here?”

Moore, a breast cancer survivor, said she can’t definitely prove that her illness, or her daughter Lauren’s skin and thyroid problems, stem from drinking PFAS-contaminated water for years. Still, “you wonder,” she said.

PFAS are a group of chemicals used to make water-, stain- and grease-resistant consumer goods. The EPA now categorizes nearly 15,000 PFAS, most of which have yet to be studied for their potential effects on human health. But some of the known human health effects of PFAS included weakened immunity, low birth weight in newborns, thyroid disease, and certain types of cancers.

The Moores qualified for funding through the Bernard Allen Emergency Drinking Water Fund, which reimburses residents for water treatment systems or, where feasible, public waterline connections when their wells are contaminated.

The North Carolina General Assembly in 2006 created the fund to improve the state’s response to drinking well water contamination and help low-income households receive safe drinking water.

In 2022, DEQ opened the program statewide, allowing residents with PFAS-contaminated private drinking water wells to receive assistance in cases where an individual or company is not held responsible for the pollution.

The program funded the approximately $3,500 reverse osmosis filtration system installed under the Moore family’s kitchen sink in October 2023.

Stein said North Carolina will continue its legal actions to get compensation from Chemours and its affiliated companies for responding to PFAS pollution.

“There is a lot of pollution that already exists throughout southeastern North Carolina and the polluters should be the one to pay and clean it up, not us, the people, and that’s why I took them to court and that action is continuing,” he said.

The North Carolina Marine Fisheries Commission’s Habitat and Water Quality Advisory Committee is scheduled to meet this week to discuss proposed changes to a plan that guides habitat decisions related to fisheries.

The committee will review the draft 2026 amendment to the North Carolina Coastal Habitat Protection Plan on Thursday, June 25, at the state Division of Marine Fisheries Central District Office, 5285 Highway 70 West in Morehead City.

Discussion will include formulating comprehensive options to protect identified submerged aquatic vegetation, or SAV and more broadly as known as seagrass, habitat. SAVs are rooted plants that grow beneath the surface of fresh, estuarine and marine waters. These plants are vital to coastal and riverine habitats that support aquatic life and water quality.

The meeting is scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. and is open to the public. The meeting will also be livestreamed via Webex. The agenda is available online.

SNEADS FERRY — Nearly a dozen abandoned marine vessels left to rot in North Carolina’s coastal waters are expected to be removed by July.

Crews this week pulled a dilapidated commercial fishing trawler and a sunken cabin cruiser from Wheeler Creek, a working waterway nestled off the New River in Sneads Ferry.

Mainstream Commercial Divers Inc., an underwater construction, maintenance, inspection and commercial diving company headquartered in Murray, Kentucky, also removed two rusted, battered barges from waters in the Onslow County fishing village.

On Monday, crews removed two vessels from the waters around Carolina Beach. Removal of the stranded commercial shrimper Claire Skye is scheduled for later this year. The vessel, currently stranded in Stump Sound near Morris Landing Clean Water Preserve in Holly Ridge, cannot be moved until its resident osprey chicks leave their nest built atop one of the trawler’s outriggers.

This marks the latest wave of abandoned and derelict vessel, or ADV, removals spearheaded by the North Carolina Coastal Federation through a $450,000 grant from the BoatUS Foundation, a nonprofit that focuses on safe, accessible recreational boating for all Americans and promotes environmental stewardship.

The Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, was awarded the grant earlier this year to oversee the removal and disposal of 12 ADVs littering waters in Carteret, Chowan, New Hanover and Onslow counties.

Ted Wilgis, the Coastal Federation’s marine debris program manager, said Wednesday that the organization is actively working to remove another 30 ADVs.

“There’s probably another 10 to 20 more that we know of that we can’t get funding for,” he said, noting that money the organization has received through a four-year, $4.5 million federal grant, state appropriations, and BoatUS Foundation for ADV and marine debris removal is expected to run dry by late summer.

Along with seeking state funding for ADV removal, the organization is working with state lawmakers on legislation to establish a formal North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission abandoned and derelict vessel program, grant liability immunity to the commission, it’s agents and contractors, and other state agencies during removal operations, and permit emergency removals during declared emergencies.

“There are hundreds of vessels out there that haven’t been investigated yet,” Wilgis said. “There are areas where there are a lot of vessels that are kind of in a limbo state. There’s a big demand for removals and, especially in this economy, there’s going to be more and more.”

Unwanted and derelict vessels are often left by owners who can no longer afford to maintain them. During severe storms, some vessels break from their moorings and are either left adrift only to sink in tidal areas or strand in marshes, on shorelines or in reefs.

ADVs obstruct waterways and pose serious pollution risks because of their potential to leak fuel and other hazardous materials such as hydraulic fluid and oil. Most recreational boats are made of fiberglass, which can break down over time in the water.

ADV removal is usually a painstaking process that in some cases can take up to a couple of years to complete, depending on the location and condition of the vessel. Removal can cost anywhere from a few thousand dollars for smaller recreational vessels to more than $100,000.

“It varies on where it is and how long it’s been out there,” Wilgis said.

BoatUS Foundation launched a national initiative supported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program to remove hundreds of ADVs from coastal waterways. The project also includes the development of a national database to track ADVs.

More than $7 million in grants have been awarded to cover the costs of direct ADV removals in Alaska, Guam, Oregon, Washington, Louisiana, Maine, the U.S. Virgin Islands and North Carolina, according to BoatUS Foundation Project Coordinator Michael Moore.

The organization is hosting in early December its Turning the Tide Summit, a four-day event where government agencies, environmentalists, marine professionals and recycling and waste management experts from across the country will gather to discuss ways to responsibly and sustainably remove and dispose of ADVs and boating-related debris, and share new technologies and innovative recycling programs.

More than 450 ADVs have been removed from North Carolina’s coastal waters either through the Coastal Federation’s marine debris removal program, local governments, the North Carolina Division of Coastal Management or the Wildlife Resources Commission, Wilgis said.

In 2020, the North Carolina General Assembly authorized and funded the commission to inspect, investigate and remove ADVs associated with Hurricane Florence and other coastal storms. The agency also publishes a database that identifies ADVs and prioritizes their removal.

Beach towns and coastal counties have also in recent years taken steps authorizing their law enforcement agencies to remove abandoned vessels within their jurisdictions.

Coastal Carolina Riverwatch recently announced that registration and sponsor opportunities are open for the 2026 Water Quality for Fisheries Symposium, a collaborative forum for sharing recent research, best management practices, policy development, restoration and resilience projects, and advocacy that protects water quality and quality of life on the coast.

The annual event, set for Oct. 19-20 at the Sturgeon City Environmental Education Center in Jacksonville, is designed for fishermen, students, researchers, agency partners, local governments, decision makers, educators, advocates, and coastal community members who care about clean water, healthy fisheries, and the future of working waterfronts.

The 2025 Water Quality for Fisheries Symposium included 121 registrations, with 120 in-person participants, 21 speakers, 34 scholarship registrations, and 45 organizations represented. Organizers said the event created space for “real conversations across sectors, helping connect research, policy, and lived experience in ways that support fisheries resilience and coastal public health.”

Hosting the event this year at Sturgeon City in Jacksonville “reflects the strong local leadership and engagement shown during the 2025 event, including participation from Onslow County Commissioners who attended sessions, listened to fishermen and researchers, and joined discussions about water quality and fisheries impacts.”

This year’s conversations will focus on the issues coastal communities are already facing, including stormwater runoff, wastewater and septic concerns, industrial pollutants, plastic pollution, harmful algal blooms, fish kills, contaminants in seafood, restoration opportunities, and the need for practical solutions that support both healthy waters and strong coastal economies.

“These priorities are directly connected to the Water Quality for Fisheries program’s work to enhance the sustainability of North Carolina’s coastal fishing communities by addressing water quality issues that affect fisheries,” organizers said.

A reduced registration fee is offered to students and fishermen, “because these voices are essential to the conversation,” according to the announcement. General registration is also open. Register online.

Historian Glenn Blackburn, professor emeritus of history at University of Virginia’s College at Wise, has written his second book about Coastal Review’s publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation and the nonprofit’s history, people and accomplishments.

Released earlier this year, “A Spectacular Coast and Its Guardians” tells the Coastal Federation’s story and examines, according to the book’s subtitle, “its conservation, restoration, education, and advocacy work to protect and restore the North Carolina coast.”

The book chronicles the changes that have occurred on the coast since the organization was founded in 1982 to protect coastal water quality, with a shift toward helping coastal residents and the natural areas here adapt to the increasingly extreme weather that climate change has fueled.

“Through hundreds of interviews with staff, volunteers, fishermen, scientists, and community leaders, Blackburn’s books tell the story of the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s grassroots beginnings and its coastwide work to protect and restore the places we love,” according to the Coastal Federation. The book is a follow-up to Blackburn’s 2018 volume, “Saving Great Places,” which focuses on five projects the Coastal Federation and coastal residents took on to protect the  coast, including the organization’s first big win, stopping a proposed peat mining operation that put at risk wetlands and fisheries in the Albemarle-Pamlico peninsula.

Blackburn will be on hand 5:30-7 p.m. July 14 at the Coastal Federation’s Wrightsville Beach office, at 309 West Salisbury St. for an evening of coastal stories, history, and conversation. Learn more and register online.

Guests will have the opportunity to meet the author, get a copy of his book personally signed, and learn more about the people and places that shaped the Coastal Federation’s history. Light hors d’oeuvres will be served. You may purchase the book online.

An Advocacy Organization That Saved Land and Water

The Coastal Federation was a small but very effective advocacy organization in the 1980s and 1990s. Led by Todd Miller it was a polite but persistent advocate that worked in alliance with large numbers of ordinary people on the coast.

A very popular advocacy campaign was the Federation’s strong support for the right of all people to have access to North Carolina’s beaches. Another was a long-term, still ongoing campaign to keep our coastal waters clean and safe. Three others focused on specific places on the coast where commercial or housing development threatened the well-being of a beautiful place and the people who lived there.

First, was the 1982-1984 alliance with local fishermen that blocked a peat mining operation in the Albemarle-Pamlico peninsula that would have destroyed 120,000 acres of wetlands and undermined fishing waters.

Second was the 1983-1987 Stump Sound fight in which the Federation and local fishermen worked together to stop a condominium development that would likely have ruined the fishing waters in a lovely sound.

Third was a 1992-2002 struggle by the Federation, local residents, and other environmental groups to prevent a housing development from taking over valuable wild land on Bird Island near Sunset Beach. Full accounts of these three public fights are in Saving Great Places found online at nccoast.org.

And there was a very small beginning of advocacy about the threat of sea level rise.

Advocacy in Defense of Public Access to Sandy Beaches

The most popular policy the Federation has ever had is its ongoing advocacy that everyone should be able to enjoy our sandy beaches and all our public trust lands and waters, particularly the salt marshes. A huge number of North Carolinians are beach lovers, people who want to go to the beach to play. They want to play in the water, on the sand, in their boats, and on their surfboards. They want to see the beauty of the world on a spectacular coast. They want to feel the wonder and majesty of the ocean. They want to smell saltwater and hear birds sing. And a large number are fishermen who want to enjoy the riches of salt marsh habitats, particularly oystering.

From the 1980s on, the Federation has continually worked to educate North Carolinians about their legal right to use the state’s beaches. This work aligns exactly with long-established state policy stipulating that North Carolina’s beaches are held in public trust for everyone. The public owns and has the right to use any part of a beach up to the mean high tide mark. The dry sand area between the mean high tide mark and the base of the first line of sand dunes may be owned by individual property owners, but the public has the right to use this dry sand area so as to have access to the wet beach. These two rights are public trust rights protected by the state.

The right of public access to beaches is generally supported in North Carolina, although there is one gated island — Figure Eight — that keeps the public out and a few private housing developments that provide little if any, public access to beaches in front of them. And there are some chronic problems — not enough walkways for visitors to get to the beach, not enough parking spaces and toilet facilities for people wanting to spend a day at the beach. The Federation constantly pushes state agencies and beach town governments to provide more walkways, more parking, and more toilets.

The Federation also strongly opposes the building of oceanfront seawalls, because seawalls lead to the destruction of the beaches that belong to everyone. When sea level rise and hurricanes cause ocean waves to crash across beaches into the foundations of oceanfront houses, the instinct of property owners is to build something — a seawall or a row of sandbags — to block the ocean. But when waves hit a wall, the wave energy explodes and the explosion begins to eat out the sand in front of the wall. With explosion after explosion over days and months, the eaten-out sand is pulled back into the ocean bit by bit, and the sandy beach slowly disappears. A property owner may gain some protection, but the public loses its beach.

In the 1970s state policymakers began to realize that oceanfront seawalls do more harm than good, and in the 1980s the Federation, along with Duke University coastal scientist Orrin Pilkey and many others, began to push for a ban on all hardened structures on oceanfronts. In 1985, the Coastal Resources Commission (CRC) imposed a ban on seawalls and groins on the oceanfront (a groin is a wall perpendicular to a beach that is designed to capture sand from ocean currents thereby helping to restore an eroding beach). The ban eventually became state law early in 2003 after the Federation pointed out to Senator Marc Basnight that too many variances were being issued to the state’s seawall ban regulations by the CRC.

Within a few years of the original ban, a number of wealthy people who owned beach property allied with some developer organizations and began to try to find a way to circumvent the ban. Pressure on the CRC to modify the ban became so intense that in the early 1990s, the Federation had to organize a major letter-writing campaign leading to thousands of messages being sent to the CRC to demonstrate public support for the ban. The campaign succeeded in blocking the political pressure.

A few years later in the late 1990s, the Shell Island Resort on the northern end of Wrightsville Beach made another attempt to get around the ban. The Resort was built so close to Mason’s Inlet that inlet waters were threatening to erode the foundations of buildings, so the Resort’s owners (many of them out-of­state investors) sued the state seeking to get the right to build a permanent seawall. In 1998, the Federation joined the state in a legal defense of the ban on oceanfront seawalls on the grounds that a seawall would destroy the public beach. A court upheld the state ban, and the Resort was able to resolve its problem only by paying for a dredging operation to move the inlet away from its buildings.

The ban on oceanfront seawalls remained in place into the 21st century, but environmental attorneys believe that sea level rise will lead to more challenges to the ban. John Runkle, an attorney on the Federation’s Board, says bluntly: “If sea level rise speeds up, wealthy people who own oceanfront property will push hard for the right to build seawalls to protect their property” (John Runkle, July 18, 2009). Geoff Gisler of the Southern Environmental Law Center says the same thing in different words: “The conflict between nature and development will not go away. The desire to build terminal groins will be a continuing issue, as people will want to protect development in dynamic coastal areas through the use of hardened structures. These issues will be amplified by sea level rise” (Geoff Gisler, August 3, 2014).

Orrin Pilkey, the Duke scientist who has written numerous well-regarded books on barrier island beaches, is a long-time ally of the Federation. He insists that the most important thing we need to do on the coast is “preserve the beaches for future generations.” The Federation is very sympathetic to PiIkey’s argument (Dr. Orrin H. Pilkey, September 22, 2008).

Whether tempted to dip your toe or cannonball into a pond, lake or other waterbody this summer, check the color of the water first.

Elevated temperatures, increased sunlight, low or no water flow, and increased nutrient loads create a recipe for harmful algal blooms, which can be toxic to humans, pets and aquatic organisms.

The N.C. Division of Water Resources is reminding people to avoid contact with discolored water, which could indicate the presence of an algal bloom. 

While algae naturally occur in all waterbodies, certain environmental conditions can cause rapid algal cell growth, which leads to blooms, according to the division.

“You cannot tell for sure by looking at a bloom whether it is harmful or not,” according to a division release.

Algal blooms may be reported to the nearest state Department of Environmental Quality regional office or via an online report. Reported algal bloom events may be viewed at the division’s Fish Kill & Algal Bloom Dashboard.  

DEQ may collect water samples for further testing to an algae lab for analysis based on preliminary reports received through the reporting tool if an investigation is needed and resources are available.

To help staff, please provide detailed reports with a high-quality photo, contact information and a description of the bloom. 

The public should steer clear from coming in contact with large accumulations of algae and children and pets should be prevented from swimming or ingesting water water in an algal bloom.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health suggests safeguarding against algal blooms through the following steps:

• Keep children and pets away from water that appears bright green, blue, discolored or scummy.
• Do not handle or touch large mats of algae. 
• Avoid handling, cooking, or eating dead fish that may be present. 
• If you come into contact with an algal bloom, wash thoroughly.
• Use clean water to rinse off pets that may have come into contact with an algal bloom. 
• If your child appears ill after being in waters containing an algal bloom, seek medical care immediately. 
• If your pet appears to stumble, stagger, or collapse after being in a pond, lake or river, seek veterinary care immediately.

For tips on water safety, heat protection and food safety visit the health and human service’s website.

An Outer Banks nonprofit has a two-day program planned for next weekend that digs into historic and modern-day agricultural practices as part of its mission to honor the indigenous Earth ethic.

The Secotan Alliance … and Beyond’s “In the Spirit of Wingina 3: Seeds of Wisdom and Sustenance,” begins at 9 a.m. Friday, May 29, and continues starting at 9 a.m. Saturday, May 30, in the Virginia S. Tillett Community Center in Manteo.

There is no charge to attend, but organizers ask those interested in attending to register online through the website. There are also volunteer opportunities listed as well.

Gray Parsons of Frisco is a descendent of the Machapunga-Mattamuskeet, and is president of the Secotan Alliance … and Beyond.

Parsons founded the Outer Banks-based nonprofit in 2023 to honor Chief Wingina and indigenous environmental history. Wingina was chief of the Roanoke-Secotan tribe that inhabited Roanoke Island and the nearby mainland. Wingina established the Secotan Alliance with other village leaders to resist English colonization. The alliance territory included current-day Dare, Hyde, Beaufort, Washington and Tyrrell counties and its inhabitants were of Algonquin culture and spoke what has been called a “Carolina Algonquin” dialect. The chief’s attempt to expand the alliance farther inland resulted in his beheading by the English military in 1586, the website explains.

The mission of the nonprofit “is to educate the public on the traditional indigenous principles of the Secotan Alliance under the leadership of Chief Wingina specifically in terms of their application and value in today’s world…and to educate the public regarding the need and the methods to protect Mother Earth through individual, community, corporate and government actions based on the traditional indigenous earth ethic.”

Parsons explained to Coastal Review that this year’s program is following a similar outline as the first two events, though the focus has changed a bit.

The dual mission doesn’t change, “that will always be paramount, but the focus of how we accomplish that will change from year to year,” Parsons said. The inaugural program in 2024 focused on indigenous environmental history and last year’s program emphasized the unique leadership roles of women.

“This year it’s on Seeds of Wisdom and Sustenance,” Parsons said, and will focus on agricultural patterns with an emphasis on ancient, indigenous agricultural methods on May 29, and modern-day gardening with some connectivity to the ancient on May 30.

The keynote speaker for the two-day event is retired professor Dr. Tom Shields, who will speak Friday morning about the “Images of Sustenance: Writings and the Archaeology of Foodways from the 1580s.”

Shields taught early American and frontier literature, at East Carolina University. His publications focus on the Spanish and English literature of colonial North America, particularly the “Lost Colony” and 17^th century English explorer and writer John Lawson. Shields helped establish the Roanoke Colonies Research Office at ECU in 1993, according to the university.

Shields told to Coastal Review that the first idea that many of us had of what Native American life was like along the Outer Banks in the 1580s came from the John White watercolors and the Theodore de Bry engravings based on those drawings. He referenced the website, Virtual Jamestown, where the watercolors and engravings are indexed and compared.

John White, who was eventually made governor of the “Lost Colony,” was an English artist and cartographer who accompanied Sir Walter Raleigh on his voyage to the Americas in 1585. He was brought along to create a “visual representation of the people, plants, animals and way of life in the New World,” according to the National Park Service. Based in Germany, de Bry engraved a set of plates to illustrate scientist Thomas Harriot’s account of the 1585 journey to the Roanoke colony, “A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia,” published in 1595.

“These were done about the same time that Ralph Lane, governor of the 1585-86 English colony on Roanoke Island, wrote the line promoters of North Carolina still like to use, that this is ‘goodliest soil under the cope of heaven,’” he said, adding it’s just as often given as “the goodliest land under the cope of heaven.”

“Whether ‘soil’ or ‘land,’ the emphasis tends to be agricultural — how well maize (corn) grows, sometimes along with beans and squash, the classic Native American Three Sisters companion planting,” he continued.

“The idea of a North American agricultural paradise created in these works influenced how Europe viewed Native America back then, and it continues to influence how people think of that past even today. The pictures and writings from the 1580s English expeditions are still important primary sources about the Algonquian tribes that lived in the region.”

However, Shields explained, archaeological work along the Outer Banks and “throughout the inland Sound Country of northeastern North Carolina paints a more complex picture. The various Algonquian settlements of the inner and Outer Banks shared a language and culture. At the same time, the foods that dominated people’s diets — an important part of any culture — differed according to where the various settlements were located in the region,”

New to the lineup is North Carolina Extension Master Gardener Cheryl Anby of Manteo. She will speak the second day on “A-Maizing Corn.” Anby is the alliance’s secretary and is of French-Canadian indigenous ancestry.

Parsons said that there are a handful of return speakers this year, including Dr. Gabrielle Tayac, associate professor at George Mason University and Piscataway tribal citizen, will speak about “Gourds and Thunders: A Piscataway Return to the Water.”

Dr. Arwin Smallwood, of Tuscarora descent, is Dean of the College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities at North Carolina Central University, and will present, “War, Enslavement and Migration: The Tuscarora Diaspora and its impact on the Tuscarora Nation 1711 to 1722.”

David Rahahę́·tih Webb, a member of the Tuscarora Indians of Kahtenuaka Territories, will present on “Relational Living: Lifeways Rooted in Responsibility.” The Kahtenuaka Territories include the Roanoke, Neuse, Trent, Tar, Cape Fear and Pee Dee river basins, Lake Mattamuskeet territory, archeological sites and traditionally occupied lands throughout the coastal plains of present-day North Carolina and South Carolina, according to the territories website.

Sara Hallas, education and outreach director for the North Carolina Coastal Federation will give a talk on “Environmental Stewardship: Future Engineers and Innovators.” The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Her focus has been to bring in public school students who have achieved either recognition or some type of honor within the scope of environmentalism, Parsons explained.

Parsons added that presenter, Sound Rivers Pamlico-Tar Riverkeeper Katey Zimmerman, will speak about the effects of agricultural runoff into the water in her presentation, “The Impacts of Modern Agriculture on our Rivers and Communities.”

“Because of our geography, because we’re surrounded by water, water will always be part of the theme or the content, but each year, there will be a theme that sort of expands that,” he said.

Last year, organizers brought in the jazz band, the Benjie Porecki Trio, based in the Washington, D.C., area, and invited the band to return this year. The performance is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Friday at Jennette’s Pier in Nags Head.

Alliance Board Member Erica Lewis said about this year’s programming that she feels everybody can get something out of the concept of seeds and how it connects with their own family history that of the region.

“People should be able to walk away with newfound information about the parallels of a seed like a native plant in the Outer Banks, and then the seeds of their family,” Lewis said.

City officials in Jacksonville announced on Monday that an early morning sewage spill reached a tributary that leads to the nearby New River.

According to the announcement, which is required by state law, 35,751 gallons of untreated sewage spilled into Mill Creek near the area of Dewitt Street in Jacksonville. Officials attributed the spill to a bypass pump that malfunctioned.

City crews stopped the discharge at 8 a.m. Monday by swapping in a new relay on the primary pump.

Crews have deployed chlorine tablets and pelletized lime at the site, according to the mandated announcement. Sampling in multiple locations along the creek will continue until bacterial counts clear up.

“At no time was city drinking water compromised and there is no danger to the public,” officials stated.

State requires that owners or operators of wastewater collection or treatment works issue a press release when an untreated wastewater discharge of 1,000 gallons or more reaches surface waters. The city’s announcement was in accordance with that regulation and issued to the media covering Onslow County.

The state Division of Water Resources was notified of the spill and is reviewing the matter, according to the press release. If you’d like more information, call city hall at 910-938-5249.

The draft 2026 Cape Fear River Basin plan, one that highlights areas that need additional protection, restoration or preservation within the state’s largest and most populous river basin, is out for public comment.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources is accepting comments through Aug. 4 on the draft plan, which focuses on water quality data collected between 2000 and 2020.

The plan includes an overview of water use and availability in the basin, a brief discussion of changes in water quality over a 20-year period, existing management strategies and approaches for addressing point and nonpoint sources of pollution, and addresses ongoing studies and actions to manage and reduce pollution from emerging compounds, including per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, and 1,4-dioxane.

Waters in the basin, including the Haw and Cape Fear rivers, have been found to be contaminated with these compounds.

PFAS, which are used in the manufacturing in a host of consumer goods including waterproof clothing and disposable food containers, do not break down in the environment and can build up in humans and animals. There are more than 15,000 of these substances today, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. While their effects on human health continue to be studied, PFAS exposure has been linked to adverse health effects including thyroid disease, high cholesterol, and increased risks of certain cancers, including kidney and testicular.

The EPA classifies 1,4-dioxane, a synthetic industrial chemical, as a likely human carcinogen.

The basin covers more than 9,300 square miles and includes portions of the urban population centers in the Triad as well as the Triangle, and the cities of Fayetteville and Wilmington. Major rivers in the basin include the Haw, Deep, Cape Fear, Black, South and Northeast Cape Fear.

The basin has experienced increased growth, poultry production and stormwater and wastewater discharges, all of which have boosted nitrogen and phosphorus levels that simulate plant and algal growth.

Written comments may be submitted by email to DEQ.DWR.BasinPlanning@deq.nc.gov or by mail to NCDEQ Division of Water Resources ATTN: Nora Deamer, Basin Planner 1611 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-1611.

Based on the 2022 U.S. Department of Agriculture Census of Agriculture, agriculture in the basin has seen an overall decrease in cattle and swine numbers but a substantial increase in poultry production. 

Information on the division’s basin plans are available at Basin Planning Branch | NC DEQ. 

NEAR BEAUFORT — Officials wielded ceremonial gold-painted shovels Monday to break ground on an economic development project specifically tailored to the needs of coastal communities, a plan that one advocate likened to successful technology-incubation hubs but instead intended to support shellfish aquaculture jobs.

When construction begins at the recently cleared site this summer, the Shellfish Mariculture Hub will feature a 2,500-square-foot structure on county-owned land next to the boat ramp at Straits Landing, just across from Harkers Island. The building will be outfitted with cold storage, equipment, an outdoor workspace and crucial water access — shared resources for shellfish growers, officials said.

Tom Looney of Wrightsville Beach, a former vice president and general manager of Lenovo North America and a longtime board member with Coastal Review’s publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation, said he had been involved a decade ago in developing the Economic Development Partnership of North Carolina, which works to recruit new business, assist existing businesses, help companies with international trade, promote the state as a tourist destination and counsel small companies and startups.   

“Today, it’s the number one workforce engine in the country for the last three out of four years,” Looney said. “We know how to attract businesses. We know how to create new businesses. What I learned in that role was, some of the most economically challenged regions in our state were our coastal communities. We had to find new ways to create jobs for people to feed their families, grow a business, have opportunity.”

Looney, who was an IBM man for more than 30 years, said that, since 2013, North Carolina’s oyster industry has grown more than 500%. Today, the state boasts one of the fastest-growing oyster industries in the country, generating more than $300 million annually.

“And let me tell you, folks, this hub will set it on fire, as far as North Carolina as a state,” Looney said.

That success will be the result of combined forces, including the shellfish aquaculture program at Carteret Community College, and provide a good return on the investments made by the legislature, the county, the Coastal Federation and others, he said. Looney praised Coastal Federation staff, including Chief Program Officer Ana Zivanovic-Nenadovic for shepherding the project.

“We’re doing it the right way. We’re creating jobs while protecting the culture and our coastal waters,” Looney said.

He said the mariculture hub would apply the same principle as American Underground, a Google tech hub for startups in Durham, but with oysters.

Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis said the hub project was “about putting down roots for an industry that has been proving its worth in eastern North Carolina and across the country for a long time now.”

Shellfish mariculture, Davis said, combines economic opportunity, environmental benefits and a unique cultural heritage in a way that few other industries can.

“It creates jobs, it supports working waterfronts, and it keeps seafood production local, which is fantastic,” Davis said. “And at the same time, our oysters are out there every day, quietly doing their work, cleaning the water, filtering the water, improving clarity and water quality across the coast. So, that all together is a combined return on investment that you rarely find and few industries can match. It’s driving economic growth while actively improving water quality and protecting the coast.”

Also on hand for the event was Sen. Norm Sanderson, R-Pamlico, and who also represents Carteret, Chowan, Halifax, Hyde, Martin, Warren and Washington counties. Sanderson explained how his district has a “very important role to play in our seafood industry,” as producers and consumers. He noted the move to transfer the Division of Marine Fisheries from the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality to the Department of Agriculture as part of the Republican-led legislature’s regulatory reform efforts. “Because too many times, it hinders the growth that we could use here on the coast to create jobs and to make our economies more stronger and more prosperous.”

Sanderson described his district’s rankings in the state Department of Commerce economically distressed counties tier system. Under this system, the department ranks the 100 counties’ economic well-being and assigns a corresponding tier number, 1-3. Commerce designates the 40 most distressed counties as Tier 1, the next 40 as Tier 2 and the 20 least distressed as Tier 3.

“I have four counties, five counties that are Tier 1s, which is the most economically distressed counties in the state of North Carolina. And so anything that we can do to help those counties is going to be a blessing,” Sanderson said.

He said the Mariculture Hub was one of the few projects to get legislative support from all corners.

“This one is an easy one to sell, because I think people, first of all, they love seafood,” Sanderson said, adding that he hoped that the project becomes a prototype for others.

“We have over 300 farmers now farming oysters for at least a secondary income. We’re hoping that it will eventually become primary income for them,” he said.

Rep. Celeste Cairns, R-Carteret and Craven, also spoke at the event Monday. She said the project was “a real collaboration among state folks, local folks, and great organizations like the Coastal Federation, and I know I speak for Senator Sanderson as well when I say, when everybody is moving and pulling in the same direction, it is a rare and beautiful thing.”

Cairns said she had been told the total number of leases and franchises was about 500.

“Each of those, whatever the number — it’s a lot and growing — and each of those folks represents a small business or family or an individual trying to make a livelihood on the water.”

The Rocky Mount-based Golden LEAF Foundation, created by the North Carolina General Assembly to award proceeds from the 1998 National Cigarette Manufacturer Settlement Agreement, uses that money to create economic opportunities in rural, tobacco-dependent and poorer counties.

Golden LEAF’s early support and $200,000 in backing in August 2022 helped build momentum for the project. Jason Rochelle evaluates funding proposals for the organization, works to implement Golden LEAF priorities, and oversees project monitoring and compliance.

“At the time, the project represented a strong vision, one rooted in supporting local aquaculture, strengthening coastal economies and creating new opportunities for shellfish growers in the region,” Rochelle said. “Today, it’s incredibly rewarding to see that vision move forward. The shellfish hub is a strategic investment in the future of Carteret County and addresses real needs identified by the shellfish farming community by providing shared infrastructure such as dock access, refrigeration, storage, grading and loading equipment and a central point for distribution. This facility will make a meaningful difference in the day-to-day operations of local growers.”

Rochelle said the hub would serve up to 15 operations and generate around $2 million annually.

“By locating the facilities near the fishing waters, growers will be able to spend more time harvesting, less time on logistics,” Rochelle said. “This increased efficiency will translate to higher production, increased income and the creation of high-quality jobs in this community.”

Assistant Carteret County Manager Matt Reynal said the project reflects “who we are as a county, from Harkers Island to Cedar Island and all across Down East, our connection to the water has always been central to how we live and work. Shellfish mariculture builds on that tradition.”

Reynal said that economic development “isn’t just about bringing in something new or shiny” to Carteret County.

“It’s about supporting the industries that are already here and ensuring that we have the infrastructure to grow,” he said. “That’s why the county was proud to provide this land. We see the long-term value and what this project supports working waterfronts local businesses and innovative opportunity that stays rooted in our communities, and that’s especially important for Down East.”

Chris Matteo, president of the North Carolina Shellfish Growers Association, said that when he was first told of the plan, he “immediately agreed to participate.” He said Coastal Federation founder Todd Miller and Looney had seen a similar model in Australia, and that infrastructure helped fuel a thriving shellfish aquaculture industry there.

“And today we are finally breaking ground on our shared vision. I’m very excited for our local shellfish farmers and for our industry. This is a special day, not just because we are breaking ground on a new building, but because we’re laying the foundation for the next stage of growth in our young industry,” said Matteo. “This project took years of persistence, collaboration and a shared belief that working waterfronts and shellfish mariculture are critically important to North Carolina’s coast.”

The fun part lies ahead, Matteo said.

“This shellfish hub will create job local jobs, support family businesses and keep waterfront communities working on the water. It will do so while helping grow one of the world’s most sustainable and healthy animal proteins, and as if that wasn’t enough, it will also improve our estuaries. Every oyster grown in our waters does more than feed someone. It is filtering water, creating habitat, rebuilding public trust stocks of marine species, and proving that economic growth and environmental stewardship can go hand in hand.”

Matteo said he was especially proud that shellfish farms in North Carolina filter more than 600 million gallons of estuarine water every day.

“This hub will help us grow that number further,” he said. “As a shellfish grower here in North Carolina, I can tell you firsthand, this hub isn’t just a nice to have. It solves real-world problems that growers across the state deal with daily. While shellfish farming has enormous potential, the reality is, starting and scaling a farm is not easy. For many growers, one of the biggest barriers has always been access to waterfront infrastructure.”

For small operations, the costs can be terminal.

“Shellfish farmers haven’t been limited by demand or ability,” Matteo said. “They’ve been limited by not having a place to work on the water, the equipment to process and refrigerate their product and an efficient way to get it to market.”

Stewards of North Carolina’s rivers and streams have created a manual designed to assist local governments in establishing land use rules that protect water quality and boost community flood resilience.

The new guide, “Gold Standard Development Practices for Watershed Protection,” was developed in response to river keepers’ documentation of irresponsible land use practices that have resulted in severe and devastating impacts across the state, said Neuse Riverkeeper and Sound Rivers Inc. Director of Advocacy Samantha Krop.

“We realized that how our cities approach land use practices is one of the most important indicators of water quality and flooding mitigation we have,” she said. “So, we’ve taken a very thoughtful pivot to focusing on land use policy because we see it as inextricably linked to our community health and safety in the future.”

The guide, created by Waterkeepers Carolina with support from the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, provides an array of options local governments may consider implementing in land use rules, developers can offer as proffers or in conditional rezoning applications, and concerned residents may use as an advocacy tool.

Counties, cities and towns throughout North Carolina establish key land use regulations through a single, consolidated document called a unified development ordinance, or UDO.

A UDO governs land use, zoning, and development standards aimed at guiding growth and protecting natural resources.

Local governments use these ordinances to govern land use in ways tailored to their communities.

Down-zoning ban limits local governments

In 2024, the North Carolina General Assembly banned local governments from being able to initiate a process called down-zoning, which is when property is rezoned to less dense or less intense use.

The ban effectively restricts those governments’ ability to enforce land use rules because the law requires that they must get written permission from all affected property owners before amending zoning text or maps.

The down-zoning ban in Senate Bill 382, a 2024 disaster relief bill, one vetoed by then-Gov. Roy Cooper, has prompted cities like New Bern and Durham to pump the brakes on updating their UDOs because the law lacks clarity, Krop said.

“I think that is presenting a lot of challenges, both in what the letter of the law says and also in what municipalities are sort of perceiving it to say, or sort of worried it’s created this boogeyman that I think is creating a lot of fear in municipal governments around can we do anything at all,” she said. “There are a lot of things that we can still do, both in passing changes to local UDOs and also in asking for more in some of these rezoning cases as proffers to protect waterways and communities from some of the harms that we’ve been documenting associated with development practices.”

Waterkeepers Carolina and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice last week in Durham hosted an event, “Designing Communities that Protect our Waters,” to discuss development and zoning practices aimed at protecting water and building community flood resilience.

Counsel for Environmental Justice James Huey at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice explained that one tool local governments have is something called conditional zoning.

Conditional zoning is a process in which a property owner and local government negotiate conditions in a rezoning request.

Local governments, “can impose conditions that address lots of various potential issues that might come up with any sort of development,” he said. “A lot of times with development, there isn’t really a one-size-fits-all and I think that’s why this document is important to show that there is a path forward, especially for those local governments that are concerned about their authority and also a little bit confused about if they should always be implementing a certain system or what systems to implement.”

Tree retention protects water quality

The guide also highlights how local governments can implement overlay districts that identify and bolster protections specific to sensitive and important areas such as drinking watersheds.

“With water quality, it really boils down to silver bullets, and that starts with leaving more trees in the ground,” Krop said. “The single, best thing that we can do when developing a landscape, a forested landscape, is leaving as many trees in the ground as possible. That looks like tree retention instead of removal and replacement with young saplings.”

Targeting tree retention around waterways, expanding riparian buffers, making sure wetlands are protected and buffered and increasing overall tree connectivity on the landscape are crucial in protecting water quality.

In areas where multiple acres of trees are being removed at one time, it is crucial that exposed soil is stabilized as soon as possible to prevent erosion, sedimentation and pollution in waterways. Local governments can regulate timeframes for which developers must establish ground cover to avert erosion.

Waterkeepers Carolina continues to push for a change in state law that would require developers to monitor all discharges coming from their sediment basins to prove they’re not pumping dirty water into creeks and streams.

“We would argue that this is something that needs to happen, at least in all sensitive watersheds where there’s evidence of construction practices polluting waterways,” Krop said.

She encourages communities to look at those that are implementing forward-thinking rules and protections for waterways.

“I think we can learn from each other and try to create more universal, more consistent protections across the whole state,” she said.

A Craven County-based sand and limestone mining company seeks to modify its state permit to more than double its acreage, and the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Energy, Mineral and Land Resources has set a public hearing on the proposal for May 27.

The applicant, R.J.’s Bushhogging Inc. with a registered address of 1185 Winn Circle, in Vanceboro, and registered agent, Robin McDaniel, is looking to add 58.8 acres to its permitted area, with 50.08 acres to be mined. The area is in a flood hazard area, already a point of frustration for its neighbors, who have filed with the county planning department a petition opposing the expansion.

“The quarry currently operates close to our homes and has already caused a range of problems for residents, roads, children, animals, and Wildlife,” according to the neighborhood petition, which cites dust that affects public health and property and “lasting effects such as noise, traffic, fragmented wildlife habitat, water pollution and water that fills excavated areas. Further expansion would bring excavation activity even closer, increasing the disruption to our daily lives.”

The operation known as Willis Neck Mine is near Swift Creek, a tributary of the Neuse River. The applicant says the change to its permit will not involve mine dewatering nor will it require changes to its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System outfall permit. NPDES is a program under the Clean Water Act and regulates point-source discharges of pollutants to waters of the United States with enforcement at the state level.

R.J’s Bushhogging’s 2026 modification application for mining permit 25-75 also includes “smaller areas,” tracts of 8.78 acres, 2.79 acres and 1.89 acres, on the west side of Winn Circle, intended for shallow sand mining.

“Therefore, these areas will not be dewatered,” according to McDaniel’s application cover letter.  

The hearing will be held at 6 p.m. in the Craven County Community College Auditorium at 800 College Court in New Bern. Those who wish to speak during the hearing can sign up to do so starting at 5:30 p.m. 

Public comments are to be limited to the following seven denial criteria listed under the Mining Act of 1971:

1. That any rule or regulation would be violated by the proposed operation.
2. That the operation will have unduly adverse effects on potable groundwater supplies, wildlife, or fresh water, estuarine, or marine fisheries.
3. That the operation will violate regulated standards of air quality, surface water quality, or groundwater quality.
4. That the operation will constitute a direct and substantial physical hazard to public health and safety or to a neighboring dwelling house, school, church, hospital, commercial or industrial building, public road or other public property, excluding matters relating to use of a public road.
5. That the operation will have a significantly adverse effect on the purposes of a publicly owned park, forest or recreation area.
6. That previous experience with similar operations indicates a substantial possibility that the operation will result in substantial deposits of sediment in stream beds or lakes, landslides, or acid water pollution.
7. That the applicant hasn’t violated any rule or regulation that resulted in a permit revocation of a permit, forfeiture of part or all of a bond or other security, conviction of a misdemeanor under the Mining Act, or any other court order, final assessment of a civil penalty or failure to pay the required application processing fee.

The public can submit comments in writing to Assistant State Mining Engineer Kelly Jonas, Division of Energy, Mineral, and Land Resources, Department of Environmental Quality, 1612 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1612.

Comments may also be sent via email to ncminingprogram@deq.nc.gov with the subject line “Willis Neck Mine.”   

For more information on the permit, visit the DEQ website.. 

Though parts of North Carolina saw rainfall over the weekend, it didn’t touch the extreme drought conditions the state has been experiencing for at least six months.

State Climate Office of North Carolina Assistant State Climatologist Corey Davis told Coastal Review Monday that, while eastern North Carolina fared better than the rest of the state this weekend with the rainfall totals outperforming the forecasts — with A few spots like Lumberton and Goldsboro had around an inch, and parts of the Crystal Coast had 2 to 3 inches — “I don’t expect that will bring any improvements on the drought map this week.”

He is referring to the U.S. Drought Monitor’s weekly assessment of drought conditions. The North Carolina Drought Management Advisory Council, or DMAC, looks at data from Tuesday to Tuesday and submits its recommendations to the National Drought Mitigation Center. The center then publishes on that Thursday a map showing where conditions range from abnormally dry, or D1, to exceptional drought, or D4.

Often, Davis continued, the first rain event or two after a prolonged dry spell has little to no impact on things like soil moisture because the ground can hardened and then it becomes tough for water to infiltrate.

“Streamflow levels are also very low still, so it will take more rain to recharge those streams and their tributaries,” he said, calling the recent rain more of a “stop-the-bleeding kind of week.”

The state began moving toward these extreme drought conditions late last summer, the result of little rainfall overall, a quiet tropical storm season that did not contribute to the average precipitation numbers, and followed by a fairly dry fall and winter.

Since mid-March of this year, there has been a summer-like weather pattern with high pressure overhead, meaning unseasonably warm temperatures and little rainfall. That has helped drought intensify, and more than 40% of the state is now in extreme drought, which is considered the second most severe category in the U.S. Drought Monitor’s classification system, according to the climate office. Most of coastal North Carolina is in the severe drought category, the third category.

“The main hope is that this event is the start of a pattern change, and the forecast is promising for at least a couple more rain events through the end of the week,” Davis said Monday. “If we can pick up a few more inches of rain over the next week or two, then that could at least soften the edges of those Severe and Extreme Drought areas on the map and start bringing some gradual improvements.”

Davis made a similar point Thursday during a webinar “About Extreme Drought: What to know this spring and beyond.” He was joined by other members of DMAC, including its chair Klaus Albertin with the Division of Water Resources, N.C. Forest Service Forestry and Fire Environment Staff Forester Jamie Dunbar, and Senior Service Hydrologist Barrett Smith with the National Weather Service’s Raleigh office.

Davis said during the online presentation that the state had been experiencing a substantial drought for a while and will not be getting rid of the drought and its impacts with one event, or even in one month.

“Ideally, we would like to start seeing consistently at least 1 to 2 inches of rain per week,” Davis explained. “This time of the year, we tend to average between three-quarters of an inch to an inch of rain every week. We want at least to get that normal amount — an extra inch on top of that would be even better — and that would let us start chipping away at this drought and some of the ongoing impacts.”

In parts of northeastern North Carolina, “they are only, in quotes, in the moderate drought level, but that still means they are starting to see some crop stress and some low surface water levels,” Davis said.

The severe drought still prevalent across the coastal plain and central Piedmont means that it has been dry long enough that farmers are not going to see the yields that they expect if these conditions continue. And “at this point, that drought has been around long enough that it can start to take a toll on our water supplies.”

The final category, exceptional drought, “is reserved for the very rarest and the very driest events,” or “the most dire situation,” Davis said, which is “when water supplies are critically low, and you’ll see even more water restrictions implemented at even higher levels than what we’re seeing right now in extreme drought.”

Adding to the drought this winter was a La Niña pattern, which is where there tends to be cooler water out across the Pacific that weakens the jet stream, and ultimately shifting storms north, making it so places like the Great Lakes see more rain, while North Carolina usually experiences warmer and drier winter months.

The snowfall in late January and early February did not have much effect on the rain total deficits. “Even though we saw a foot of snow in some spots, that only amounted to about an inch of liquid, which is average per week at that time of the year,” he added.

Since the middle of March, there has been high pressure either just offshore or right over the Carolinas and has put the area in what Davis called a “heat dome” that is expected around June or July, not in April. “That’s why we’ve seen record high temperatures over the last few weeks and it has really blocked any sort of rai- making weather systems from moving through.” 

Impacts that most people are starting to notice as the drought lingers is that the soil moisture is extremely low right now.

“What that tells us is that the soil moisture is not in any shape for planting right now. There is just no moisture there, especially in the upper layers of the soil. And even if we were to get some decent rainfall over the next week, that does not necessarily mean it is time to start planting,” he said, because anything that’s planted will establish a very shallow root system.

“And if this drought continues, or if we get into some hot weather this summer, those shallow roots will dry out very easily, and that can kill the plant,” he said.

Davis mentioned Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow Network, or CoCoRaHs, a community science program that encourages people to make daily rainfall measurements and to submit condition monitoring reports that talk about the sort of dryness or impacts that they’re seeing around their home or in their neighborhood or in their community.

There was “a really interesting report from the northeastern part of the state,” Davis said about a submission from a farmer in Chowan County, which is in a moderate drought.

While farmers were able to get the corn in the fields, “the problem there is that a lot of those farmers will pull water directly from the Albemarle Sound, where it meets the Roanoke River, and use that to irrigate their farms,” Davis said. “Typically, in the upper levels of the sound there, you’re getting enough fresh water that’s being flushed down the river, then it’s not too much of a worry about saltiness.”

Because of the drought, water isn’t moving down the river, and salty water is pushing farther inland, which is too salty to use for irrigation. “That’s a very unique impact that we’ll see in that corner of the state during times of extreme drought like this one.”

Albertin with the Division of Water Resources explained that groundwater gives a good indication of the more extreme droughts.

“Surface water can fluctuate rapidly,” Albertin said. When there’s rainfall, groundwater is much more stable, but when there are low groundwater levels, widespread impacts to water resources across the state should be expected.

Another place drought presents itself is that the reservoirs are under more demand, and as the temperatures rise, evaporation is higher.

“When you have inflows that are below or well below the median,” he said, “it’s not surprising that we’ll start to see levels in the reservoirs drop fairly quickly.”

This has resulted in many areas implementing water restrictions, which may increase if conditions do not improve.

Common conservation guidelines are to limit outdoor watering to a couple of days a week and water by hand instead of using a sprinkler.

“It’s better to water heavier once a week versus lighter twice a week and try and water before 10 a.m. this results in less evaporation and reduces grass diseases,” Albertin said. Adding to avoid washing driveways and sidewalks, but repair leaking faucets and run full loads of dishwashers and washing machines.

Dunbar with the state Forest Service, said that as early as December, there have been abnormal load of wildfires.

The 10-year average for January was around 339 fires, but this year, there were more than 1,000 incidents that month across the state.

The coastal plain has a very pronounced spring fire season and if the drought gets worse, eastern North Carolina could very easily have a late spring and summer fire season, he added, and has an above-normal risk for significant wildfires next month.

When the burn ban was instituted on March 28 by the Commissioner of Agriculture, almost 18,000 online burn permits were canceled, noting that in the southeast, about 45% of wildfires are caused by debris burn escapes.

“Although the ban doesn’t prevent wildfire, it definitely reduces the number of new ignitions,” Smith said, allowing more local resources to be used to control complex fires, and allows firefighters to be able to move around more effectively around the state.

Smith with the National Weather Service said the next 30 days are critical for the state in terms of how much rainfall we get and how it impacts the drought.

The outlook for the coming weeks points to above-normal precipitation, and more rain through the summer months.

“As we head toward June, July and August, we come much more dependent on afternoon showers and thunderstorms,” which may help an individual community, farm, city, reservoir, but not always the entire state.

Forecasters are also keeping an eye on patterns in the pacific that could impact the 2026 tropical storm season.

Smith also plugged CoCoRaHS, which he said they are desperate for rainfall reports, “not just when it is raining, not just when it is flooding, but when we’re in these dry situations. We don’t have enough rainfall reports.” Adding that it does not take up much time. “We really need these reports, especially in these very dry situations.”

WILMINGTON – For more than two hours, residents in an area considered ground zero for PFAS contamination in North Carolina passionately, often angrily, chastised the Environmental Management Commission’s proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules.

Dozens of people who signed up to speak – 60 in all – at the public hearing Thursday in downtown Wilmington took turns at a podium unleashing what turned into a collective no-holds-barred rebuke of the proposed rules and, at times, the commissioners who pushed them forward for public comment.

Several of those who spoke in front of a crowd of about 230 people who filled a room in Wilmington’s Skyline Center shared stories about their own health issues, illnesses their loved ones have suffered, and family and friends they’ve lost to various forms of cancer.

Throughout the hearing, people snapped their fingers, signaling their agreement with those speaking at the podium. At the close of every short speech, the audience erupted in rousing applause and cheers.

The sheer number of people who signed up to speak prompted Environmental Management Commissioner Yvonne Bailey, the hearing officer that evening, to ask that residents limit their comments to two minutes.

“Those of us living here have advocated relentlessly at the local, state and federal level, and even at the U.N. for protection of our air and water,” said New Hanover County resident Priss Endo. The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality “has proposed new surface water standards, but in response, the Environmental Management Commission is proposing regulations that will still allow 500 industries across the state to release PFAS chemicals.”

The hearing last week was the third and final the commission scheduled this year on its proposed monitoring and minimization rules for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA; perfluorooctanesulfonic acid, or PFOS; and a branded compound called GenX developed by DuPont spinoff Chemours. The commission has also been hosting public hearings on similar proposed rules for the monitoring and minimization of 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent and likely human carcinogen that has also been found in downstream drinking water sources.

PFAS are a mixture of chemicals used in a host of consumer products from nonstick cookware and food packaging to stain-resistant carpets, water-repellant attire, and makeup.

These chemicals have been found in numerous drinking water sources in North Carolina and traced back to discharges from industrial manufacturers, landfills, firefighting facilities and publicly owned treatment works that accept industry effluent.

Ongoing research into human health effects of PFAS, of which there are more than 15,000 related compounds, have found that some of the substances, including PFOA and PFOS, have been linked to health issues such as weakened immune response, liver damage, low infant birth weights, and higher risk of certain cancers.

Nearly a decade has passed since residents in the Lower Cape Fear region first learned through a local newspaper article that Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility in Bladen County had for decades knowingly discharged PFAS directly into the Cape Fear River.

Since then, public drinking water utilities that pull raw water from the river have spent millions of dollars upgrading their facilities with filtration systems and methods to keep PFAS out of their final product.

Chemours, under a 2019 consent order, has had to test thousands of privately owned drinking water wells for contamination.

“The 2019 consent order was a start,” resident Jim Nesbit said. “It’s not enough. Your mission is to protect the health of the people of this state. Use the full authority you have to take on the pollution of corporations.”

The PFAS monitoring and minimization rules the commission agreed to put out for public comment have remained under a hail of verbal fire from residents, the public utilities that provide their drinking water, and environmental organizations throughout the Cape Fear region.

As written, the rules do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for PFAS dischargers found to be in violation of those rules.

“As a 33-year water professional and former EMC member, I am testifying that the voluntary minimization plans, as proposed, are ineffective,” Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Ken Waldroup said Thursday. “They’re essentially empty facades that do not solve the problem. These minimization plans do not remove PFAS from the Cape Fear River because all reductions are voluntary. Voluntary plans are simply ineffective. Upstream dischargers have had decades to disclose and minimize their PFAS discharges. Unfortunately, history has shown that dischargers only do so in response to effective regulation with specific mandatory limits or mitigation.”

Dr. LeShonda Wallace, who serves on the advisory board for the GenX Exposure Study, one that is measuring GenX and other PFAS exposure in area residents, said the proposed rules ignore science.

Instead, the proposed rules prioritize corporate convenience over public health, she said.

“The impacts are also economic as well as generational,” Wallace said. “PFAS contamination reduces property values, and it shifts the cost away from the polluters and on to the rate payers. Environmental protection and justice requires that those who cause the pollution pay to prevent it and that they pay to clean it up, and I urge the commission to reject these ineffective minimization rules and adopt enforceable, evidence-based standards that reduce pollution at the source.”

Lifelong New Hanover County resident Chip Jackson carried a doll baby with him to the podium.

“I came here tonight to tell this panel how ignorant I have been. I’ve been ignorant because nine years ago I trusted you people. I trusted you to do something,” he said. “I’ll give y’all a pro tip. When you see a baby float by in a stream, you look upstream to see who threw it in the stream.”

Resident Rosemary Schmitt said she simply wants to trust that the water coming out of her tap is not harmful.

“Drinking water should be safe, not something that comes with a list of side effects,” she said.

Just two weeks away from graduating with an undergraduate degree from the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Tyler Raines said he was in a conundrum.

“I don’t have much else to say that hasn’t already been said about the economic, environmental, and social impacts of PFAS on the health of all human beings,” he said. “As I think about where I’m planning to root myself post-graduation, I find myself at a loss. Do I stay here in Wilmington and get poisoned by PFAS or do I go back to my home in Fuquay-Varina and get poisoned by 1,4-dioxane?”

The Environmental Management Commission could decide as early as September to approve or reject the proposed rules. If adopted, those rules would go to the Rules Review Commission for final approval by early next year.

Written comments on the proposed PFAS monitoring and minimization rules are being accepted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject title “PFAS minimization” or by mail to Karen Preston, DEQ-DWR NPDES Permitting Section, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC  27699-1617.

The North Carolina Department of Transportation announced Wednesday that its officials are considering new design options for the Carolina Bays Parkway Extension project in Brunswick County after feedback from the public.

NCDOT, in collaboration with the South Carolina Department of Transportation, is planning to extend S.C. Highway 31, aka the Carolina Bays Parkway, from S.C. Highway 9 in Horry County across the state line to U.S. Highway 17 in Brunswick County.

Proposed is a multilane highway that would use portions of the existing road in addition to building roadway in new areas. The total anticipated cost for the project is ​​$797 million. North Carolina’s share of the cost is estimated at $610.9 million. South Carolina anticipates construction commencing in 2029. North Carolina’s start date was listed as “TBD” on the project website.

In October 2025, the state highway departments jointly held two public hearings about the project. Seven different design alternatives were presented, including the departments’ preferred alternative known as Alternative 4.

NCDOT said Wednesday that, after reviewing public feedback and considering funding challenges, it’s not going to proceed with the North Carolina portion of Alternative 4, which builds on new location, tying in near the intersection of U.S. 17 and N.C. Highway 904.

Alternative 4 would also upgrade part of U.S. 17 to a fully controlled freeway from N.C. 904 to N.C. Highway 130 in Shallotte. 

The two state agencies and the Federal Highway Administration continue to collaborate and explore other alternatives and modified routes to minimize impacts and meet the purpose and need of the project, according to NCDOT’s announcement.

“NCDOT deeply values the input from this community and our stakeholders. We want to provide the region with the best possible roadway designs. We’ve listened to the feedback, and we’re working hard to prepare a new alternative,” said Division 3 Engineer Trevor Carroll in a statement.

Alternative 4 was preferred because of factors such as requiring the lowest number of residential displacements, estimated at 39, and the lowest number of identified noise effects. The impacts to wetlands and streams were also deemed moderate relative to other alternatives, despite a large amount of designated High-Quality Waters impacted.

A new alternative must include connectivity through the transportation network, increased mobility for the region and reduced travel time through the project corridor, officials noted in the announcement.

Additional information regarding the new design is to be presented to the public at a later date. 

NCDOT said it is “committed to transparency, innovative solutions and exploring community feedback regarding this project.” Its response to all comments received is available on the project webpage along with the most updated information regarding the project.

You can also follow NCDOT on social media for additional updates. 

FAYETTEVILLE — Proposed monitoring and minimization rules for industrial dischargers of 1,4-dioxane and the public sewage plants that accept those facilities’ waste fail to protect North Carolinians’ drinking water, speakers at a public hearing said Tuesday.

All but one of the 13 people who spoke at the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission’s hearing at Fayetteville Technical Community College criticized the proposed rules, arguing those rules fall short in reducing the amounts of 1,4-dioxane discharged into people’s drinking water sources and lack enforcement.

Those comments mirror ones articulated at the commission’s April 9 hearing on the proposed rules in Hickory. A third hearing is scheduled for May 12 in Jamestown.

“The so-called monitoring and minimization rule establishes certain monitoring requirements, but the term minimization is misleading,” Fayetteville resident Madison Williams said. “The way the rule is promulgated is in a way that does not require polluters to reduce PFAS or 1,4-dioxane emissions into North Carolina drinking water supplies, and it imposes no consequences, even if those discharges increase. This in effect is a polluter written rule.”

Related: Public hearings set on proposed wastewater discharge rules

The commission is hosting separate public hearings, the first of which was held in Asheville last week, on a similar rule for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS; perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA; perfluorooctanesulfonic acid, or PFOS; and GenX, a chemical specific to a manufacturing plant that sits near Cape Fear River in Bladen County.

Under the proposed rules, publicly owned treatment works that receive industrial wastewater, and their manufacturer customers, would be required to monitor for discharges of 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent, into rivers, creeks and streams.

Facilities would be required to conduct baseline monitoring every three months for one year. Based on those sampling results, dischargers may be required to conduct additional monitoring.

“If determined to need ongoing sampling the industrial direct discharger will be required to develop a minimization plan,” explained Bridget Shelton with the Division of Water Resources’ planning section. “A minimization plan is a strategy to reduce or eliminate pollutants at the source before they are discharged into the environment.”

Facilities that “meet certain criteria” may request exceptions from ongoing monitoring and minimization plan requirements, she said.

The proposed rules do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for violations.

That fact has drawn sharp criticism from residents, environmental groups and public drinking water providers who have been calling on the state to establish drinking water standards for PFAS and 1,4-dioxane and regulate direct dischargers of those chemicals.

“Over 1 million North Carolina residents consume water from the Cape Fear River, water that is contaminated with 1,4-dixoane, PFAS and other forever chemicals that will continue to proliferate without sufficient regulations at the federal and state levels,” said Jonelle Kimbrough, executive director of Fayetteville-based environmental nonprofit Sustainable Sandhills. “The proposed 1,4-dioxane minimization rules seem to be an attempt at regulation but, as written, they essentially do nothing to protect the natural resources or public health of our state and we need protection.”

Rob Clark, Cape Fear River Watch’s water quality programs manager, said the organization and its more than 1,000 members collectively opposed the proposed rules.

“These rules are completely inadequate when it comes to dealing with PFAS and 1,4-dioxane pollution in the Cape Fear River Basin,” he said. “The proposed minimization rules do not set enforceable limits on how much these toxic compounds can be discharged into our waterways. Instead, they rely on polluters to monitor their pollution and submit plans describing how they might reduce that over time. Do we really think that polluters are going to cut into their profits in order to do the right thing and stop discharging these chemicals into our waterways?”

Representatives of downstream public water suppliers said the proposed rules lack a clear objective to significantly decrease 1,4-dioxane levels in state surface waters.

Fayetteville Public Works Commission’s Environmental Programs Manager Rhonda Locklear pointed out that statewide monitoring has identified 1,4-dioxane primarily in the Cape Fear River Basin.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, “has sampled surface waters in 15 of North Carolina’s 17 river basins, confirming that most industrial 1,4-dioxane sources are in the Cape Fear River Basin, where 35% of these samples since 2017 were above non-detect thresholds, almost 10 times the rate in the Neuse River Basin, and nearly 200 times that of the Yadkin-Pee Dee River Basin,” she said. “The problem areas are well-defined, documented, and PWC expects DEQ to set meaningful regulations and reductions in the Cape Fear River Basin.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Deputy Executive Director Kevin Morris said that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which classifies 1,4-dioxane as a likely human carcinogen, warns that at even at concentrations of 0.35 parts per billion, long-term exposure to the chemical increases cancer risks to humans and may cause significant kidney and liver impacts.

“Downstream water systems continue to experience periodic spikes in 1,4-dioxane despite having no role in producing or discharging this chemical, which demonstrates the limitations of our current regulatory framework,” Morris said.

He highlighted how effluent from Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant has periodically tested for elevated levels of 1,4-dioxane, concentrations of which far exceeded levels associated with long-term health risks.

“These discharges flow into waterways like the Haw and Cape Fear rivers,” Morris said. “They’re relied upon by downstream drinking water systems, and they require additional monitoring, treatment, adjustments and customer communication. The downstream public ultimately bears the risk from and the cost of managing contamination that they had no part in creating. Voluntary reduction measures are insufficient to ensure consistent outcomes or to protect downstream communities. Utilities can manage only what arrives at their intake.”

As of Wednesday, DEQ had received more than 2,000 public comments and counting on the commission’s proposed rules for 1,4-dixoane and PFAS, according to Josh Kastrinksy, DEQ’s deputy communications director.

“The comments we’ve received in writing have by and large reflected the comments we’ve received in person,” he said.

Andrew Mlot, chair of the North Carolina Pretreatment Consortium Inc., a nonprofit that represents more than 180 pretreatment professionals in 64 state-approved pretreatment programs across North Carolina, was the only person Tuesday to speak in support of the proposed rules.

But that organization has “several specific concerns” with the rules as they are currently written, he said.

“The costs to treat 1,4-dioxane at the POTW (publicly owned treatment works) level is staggering. Capital costs alone range from $10 million to $1.3 billion, making source control the only practical path forward,” he said.

The proposed rules would require public treatment works in Greensboro, Burlington, Asheboro, High Point and Reidsville, which have been conducting monitoring and minimization activities going back to 2015, to start over, Mlot said.

“We ask for an explicit offramp for POTWs that have already completed successful programs. Replace any detection with a workable screening threshold. As currently written, any detection of 1,4-dioxane triggers ongoing monitoring requirements and a full minimization plan. NCPC members do not believe this is workable. We support an alternative screening threshold based on meaningful concentrations or loading levels,” he said.

DEQ is accepting written comments through June 15. Comments may be submitted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject heading “1,4-dioxane minimization, or by mail to Bridget Shelton, DEQ-DWR Planning Section, 1611 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1611.

Dare county residents and property owners are invited to participate in an interactive workshop on Tuesday to review and discuss key preliminary findings from an assessment of the vulnerability of unincorporated areas to flooding.

The North Carolina Resilient Coastal Communities Program is hosting the action development program from 5-7 p.m. in room 238 of the Dare County Administration Building, 954 Marshall Collins Drive, Manteo.

The workshop will be a drop-in, open house-style event with interactive stations where participants can learn about the program, review findings of from the assessment, and provide input on topics ranging from natural resources, stormwater management, infrastructure and residential adaptation in unincorporated Dare County.

The workshop will begin with a brief presentation. Refreshments and light snacks will be provided.

The assessment was conducted by a consulting firm through the North Carolina Resilient Coastal Communities Program, which is administered by the Division of Coastal Management to support coastal resilience goals, assess community capacity, and identify and prioritize projects that strengthen resilience to coastal hazards. The division is under North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.

Microplastics and pharmaceuticals have made the Environmental Protection Agency’s newly published draft list of substances in public drinking water that warrant scientific scrutiny.

This marks a first for the EPA, which, along with U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., announced last week that microplastics and pharmaceuticals are two of four contaminant groups and dozens of chemicals included on the draft Sixth Contaminant Candidate List.

The April 2 announcement kick-started a 60-day public comment period.

The Trump administration hailed the additions to the list, also referred to as CCL 6, as “a landmark set of actions to safeguard the nation’s drinking water.”

“For too long, Americans have vocalized concerns about plastics and pharmaceuticals in their drinking water. That ends today,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin stated in a release. “By placing microplastics and pharmaceuticals on the Contaminant Candidate List for the first time ever, EPA is sending a clear message: we will follow the science, we will pursue answers, and we will hold ourselves to the highest standards to protect the health of every American family.”

The announcement comes as the Trump administration is actively pursuing rolling back drinking water standards for several per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, established under the previous administration.

PFAS, along with disinfection byproducts, once again made it onto a CCL, which singles out contaminants that are known or anticipated to be in public drinking water systems, but are not regulated under the Safe Water Drinking Act and may be considered for future regulatory action.

Also making it back on the list is 1,4-dioxane, an industrial solvent that, along with PFAS, is known to be in the drinking water sources for tens of thousands of North Carolinians, perhaps most notably in the Cape Fear Region.

Last year, the EPA announced that it would retain current National Primary Drinking Water Regulations for PFOA and PFOS but rescind regulations and reconsider regulatory determinations for other PFAS, including GenX.

GenX is specific to Chemours’ Fayetteville Works facility that is situated near the banks of the Cape Fear River and more than 70 miles upstream of Wilmington. The Cape Fear River is the raw drinking water source for hundreds of thousands of North Carolinians.

The federal agency also said it was extending deadlines for public water treatment plants to come into compliance with the federally established limits for those PFAS.

Since the late 1990s, the EPA has been required by law to publish every five years a list of contaminants that are either unregulated or not proposed for regulation.

CCLs are considered the initial step in a process to better understand, through scientific research, potential human health risks of contaminants in drinking water.

And, while clean drinking water advocates say this is a good first step, they urge the public to call for regulations to limit the levels of or altogether halt the discharge of contaminants into public drinking water sources.

“I think it’s important to recognize what chemicals are in our drinking water and to study the risks associated with that,” Hannah Nelson, a staff attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center’s Chapel Hill office said. “But simply adding chemicals to this list isn’t going to protect our communities. They’re on the list because we know they’re in drinking water, so now we need to take the next step to control the source of that pollution at the source and get it out of our drinking water. I North Carolina, because we know these pollutants are already there, I think we really should be focusing on how do we keep them out in the first place, because that’s how we truly protect our communities.”

Residents in the Cape Fear region, the local governments that represent them, the public water utilities that serve them, and environmental organizations are embroiled in an ongoing fight pushing for state regulations to put the onus on dischargers of PFAS and 1,4-dioxane to reduce the amounts of chemicals they release into drinking water sources.

On Tuesday, the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission will host its first in a series of public hearings on proposed PFAS and 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules.

Three hearings will focus on proposed rules for discharges of PFOS, PFOA and GenX into North Carolina’s surface waters and three on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane in wastewater discharges from certain facilities into surface waters.

The proposed rules packages do not set specific discharge limits or penalties for discharge violations, which has become a sticking point for those who argue that the rules would do little in actually minimizing the amount of those contaminants in drinking water sources.

“We know our environmental rulemaking body is currently trying to pass rules on PFAS and 1,4-dioxane that don’t control chemicals at the source,” Nelson said. “Having drinking water standards would be a helpful too, but our real focus should be, how can we keep these out in the first place and how can we encourage our state and our federal leaders to protect the people from the pollution before it even reaches the point of coming out of our sink and pouring into our cups.”

Beyond Plastics, a Bennington College, Vermont-based organization dedicated to ending single-use plastic pollution, called for similar regulation for microplastics.

“The U.S. Environmental Agency has taken an important first step to regulate microplastics in drinking water,” Beyond Plastics President and former EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck stated in a release. “I applaud this decision by the EPA and urge the agency to move rapidly to not only regulate microplastics in drinking water but to also prevent microplastics from entering our water supplies.”

Cape Fear River Watch’s Water Quality Programs Manager Rob Clark agreed, saying that microplastics are ubiquitous – they’re in our environment and in our bodies.

“It’s a situation where it seems like we already have a lot of information on this,” he said. “What we need is ubiquitous monitoring across the country and we need regulation. The quicker that we get to setting a maximum contaminant level for microplastics, the quicker it’s not in our drinking water.”

In its April 2 release, the EPA noted that while human health benchmarks for pharmaceuticals are not regulations and not enforceable, “they are a vital resource, empowering local decision-makers to evaluate risks and protect their communities when pharmaceutical contamination is detected at concerning levels.”

The public comment period on draft CCL 6 will close June 5.

The EPA is expected to sign a final list by Nov. 17.

“I think public comment periods on action like this are really important because it’s a good time for folks to express concerns about the chemicals that are known to be present in their drinking water,” Nelson said. “Adding chemicals to the list is truly just an acknowledgement that they’re in the water. I don’t think we should read this list as a commitment to going above and beyond and advocating for folks. What we need to see is strong action to keep those chemicals out, whether it be from the federal administration or our state agencies.”

North Carolina Department of Transportation officials are kicking off this year’s spring litter sweep this weekend.

The biannual statewide roadside litter removal initiative, ​​usually held last two weeks of April and September, encourages residents to join efforts in their community to help clean up North Carolina’s roadways. 

The 2026 spring litter sweep begins Saturday and ends April 25.

While NCDOT does not assign specific dates, groups or individuals can contact for recommendations their NCDOT County Maintenance Yard office​ or local coordinator for NCDOT’s Litter Management Program, who are responsible for managing anti-litter programs, such as Adopt-A-Highway and Litter Sweep, in their assigned counties.

NCDOT does provide cleanup supplies, such as reversible orange-blue trash bags, gloves and orange safety vests, that can be obtained from the volunteer’s county maintenance yard or through the local coordinator.

Organizers are asking volunteers that find anything unusual or interesting during the litter sweep cleanup, use the hashtag, #StrangeLitter on social media​.​​

More details and a frequently asked questions are on NCDOT’s website.

The North Carolina Division of Water Resources is accepting proposals for stream restoration, water-based restoration and water management projects now through June 30.

Project proposals are being accepted through the current spring 2026 application cycle of the Water Resources Development Grant Program, which provides two different types of grants.

There’s the state and local program, which offers cost-sharing grants of up to 50% of nonfederal project costs for stream restoration, water-based restoration and water management projects.

Grants are also offered for stream restoration projects on agricultural lands that are cost-shared with the Natural Resources Conservation Service Environmental Quality Incentives Program, or EQIP. Applications for that program will be accepted through July 30.

The division typically receives $3 million for state and local projects, and $2 million for EQIP projects each year, according to a release.

Links to previously funded projects and additional resources are available online.

Contact Amin Davis, grant manager, at amin.davis@deq.nc.gov for more information. 

Construction and other projects expected to affect waters or wetlands will now be vetted through a newly implemented state process.

Depending on a its impacts to streams and wetlands, some projects will get to bypass a 30-day notice as part of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources Clean Water Act 401 general certifications updates that took effect March 15.

The new certificate of coverage process is anticipated to apply to “many project” currently requiring individual Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certifications, according to a DEQ release.

Applicants must still apply to the division through the new process, but those that meet thresholds and conditions under the general certification will receive a letter of concurrence, which will allow the project to proceed without a 30-day notice.

Project located in sensitive areas, those with a significant quantity of impacts to waters or wetlands, or those that cannot meet the general certification conditions must still go through the process of a 30-day public notice and project-specific decision letter to obtain individual 401 water quality certification.

The state’s update reflects corresponding U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 404 Nationwide Permits, which have been modified following a 2023 Supreme Court ruling that changed the definition of “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS.

That same year, the North Carolina General Assembly passed session law directing the state Environmental Management Commission to adopt a rule that aligns the state’s definition of wetlands to those of the federal definition.

The latest definition excludes noncontiguous wetlands, or those that are not connected to navigable waters.

The Corps has extended a one-year grace period to projects it has approved for permitting to complete impacts to waters outlined under their existing federal permit. New certifications will not be required for those projects.

DEQ advises permittees to check with their Corps representative to confirm whether the grace period is applicable to their projects.

The division has included a list of frequently asked questions online for general information.

It’s been nearly a month since a video first aired of Wilmington’s mayor invoking residents to voice their opposition to one town’s plans to pull millions of gallons of water daily from the Cape Fear River.

“Today this vital resource is under threat from growing water-hungry communities upstream,” Mayor Bill Saffo says in the clip as he stands along the city’s downtown Riverwalk.

Fuquay-Varina, a town about 30 miles south of Raleigh, wants to move more than 6 million gallons of water each day from the Cape Fear River to the Neuse River, he explains in the video made in collaboration with the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority.

“That’s 6 million gallons gone, each day, forever. It is important that you make your voice heard now for your family and for future generations. Add your voice to those of your neighbors and friends who already are telling the state to say no to Fuquay-Varina’s permanent taking of our water,” Saffo concludes.

Only a couple of more weeks are left until the public comment period on Fuquay-Varina’s request for an interbasin transfer, or IBT, certificate closes.

Maya Holcomb, a Division of Water Resources representative, told members of the state Environmental Management Commission’s Water Allocation Committee last week that she anticipated receiving comments all the way through to the April 1 deadline.

In her presentation to the committee Thursday, Holcomb provided an update on the numbers of correspondence she’d received in the days since she initially crafted her report, when the email count was at 283.

Related: Opponents say river water transfer puts Cape Fear in peril

“But I just keep getting so many emails, which — we’re hearing from the public, that’s great — but I have received an additional 42 emails since this PowerPoint was created last week,” Holcomb said.

Holcomb said she had also received 41 resolutions from cities, towns, counties, homebuilders, substations and public utilities.

She did not say how many of those resolutions oppose the IBT, but instead highlighted what she described as the “newest” issues of concern: loss of water for agricultural purposes, nutrient concentration in the Neuse River Basin, such as those that cause algal blooms, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, hypoxia, drought vulnerability and chemical export of industrial pollutants from the Cape Fear River.

Those concerns mirror some of arguments made by dozens of people who spoke out against the transfer during a series of state-hosted public hearings in December.

Fuquay-Varina projects that the water supply, from which it currently buys from Raleigh and Harnett and Johnston counties, will fall short of demand by 2030.

Under the proposed preferred alternative identified in a draft environmental impact statement for the transfer, Fuquay-Varina would source its entire water supply from a water treatment plant in Sanford, which is in the Cape Fear River Basin.

Once water pulled from the Cape Fear River is used by residents and businesses in that town, the treated wastewater would then be discharged into the Neuse River Basin.

This would permanently subtract 6.17 million gallons each day from the river flow that currently serves about 900,000 residents of counties, cities, towns and communities from Fayetteville to Wilmington.

“Put in perspective, 6.17 (million gallons per day) of raw water from the river is enough to provide treated drinking water to more than 27,000 homes,” according to Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s website.

In the weeks and months leading up to CFPUA’s campaign against Fuquay-Varina’s plan, several local governments and utilities adopted resolutions and sent letters of opposition to the state.

New Hanover County, Wilmington and Brunswick County and more than a dozen Brunswick County municipalities have officially gone on record opposing Fuquay-Varina’s request.

Holcomb explained last week that, after April 1, state environmental officials will respond to comments on the draft environmental impact statement and then formulate a hearing officers’ report, which will be finalized sometime between July and September.

After that, the Environmental Management Commission will determine whether the EIS is technically adequate. Following that determination, the Department of Environmental Quality will issue its record of decision.

Another round of public hearings will be held before the EMC makes its final determination.

If approved, the transfer would occur after 2031, according to the draft impact statement.

Comments may be submitted to Maya Holcomb, Division of Water Resources, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh, NC, 27604, or by email to maya.holcomb@deq.nc.gov.

Whether its a nature hike, a stormwater tour at North Carolina’s premiere coastal university, or helping a town’s staff permanently mark storm drains, there’s something for nearly everyone during Cape Fear Creek Week.

Creek Week kicks off on Sunday and goes through March 21, offering opportunities to connect with, celebrate, and care for local waterways of the Cape Fear Region.

Throughout the week, participants are invited to play Cape Fear Creek Week virtual bingo by completing activities for a chance to win a swag bag.

The events lineup starts Sunday with a birding walk from 10-11 a.m. in Leland, where participants will be given tips on how to identify local and migrating birds. Registration for this event is through the town of Leland.

On Monday, gather beneath cypress trees in Wallace Park at 2110 Market St. in Wilmington for a scavenger hunt from 10 a.m. until 11 a.m. The Alliance for Cape Fear Trees will have resources on hand to share tips on how to properly plant and care for trees.

The University of North Carolina Wilmington is hosting that afternoon a behind-the-scenes tour of its stormwater-control measures, including rain gardens, permeable pavement systems and other sustainable features that reduce runoff and support healthier waterways. This event will be held 2-3 p.m. Monday at 4935 Riegel Road. Registration is required.

On Monday evening, discover ways to diagnose and restore wetland habitats through Habitat Fixer Uppers with Fort Fisher Aquarium, a program scheduled for 6-7:30 p.m. at 1212 Magnolia Village Way in Leland. You may register here.

Tuesday, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority will host a tour of its Southside Water Reclamation Facility, 3436 River Road in Wilmington. Registered participants must be age 5 or older.

Events for Wednesday include a bird hike at Burnt Mill Creek 8-9:30 a.m., an opportunity to work alongside employees of Leland’s engineering department 4-5:30 p.m. to permanently mark the town’s storm drains, a children’s scavenger hunt 5-6 p.m. at Cypress Cover Park in Leland, and resilient coastal communities program public meeting drop in between 5p.m. and 7 p.m. at the Skyline Center in downtown Wilmington.

Events later in the week include a golden hour guided tour by paddleboat in Greenfield Lake Park, a walking tour at Pages Creek, a sustainability brewery tour at Mad Mole Brewing (for those 21 and older), a Brunswick Nature Park tour in Winnabow, and a cleanup at Greenfield Lake Park.

Details, including all dates, times and locations, are available on the N.C. Cooperative Extension website.

Cape Fear Creek Week is a collaboration between the N.C. Cooperative Extension, Wilmington’s Heal our Waterways, Leland, Cape Fear River Watch, New Hanover County Soil and Water Conservation District, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, Coastal Land Trust, Cape Fear Birding Observatory, Plastic Ocean Project, Mad Mole Brewery, UNCW Sustainability, and Alliance for Cape Fear Trees.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission has scheduled a series of public hearings in select cities beginning next month on proposed PFAS and 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules.

In all, six hearings have been set, three of which will focus on proposed rules for discharges of three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances through wastewater into North Carolina’s surface waters and three on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane in wastewater discharges from certain facilities into surface waters.

A public comment period for each set of proposed rules will kick off on March 16 and continue until June 15.

Under the proposed PFAS rules, all major and minor industrial direct dischargers, and significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works, would be required to monitor and implement “minimization activities required to eliminate or significantly reduce” discharges of PFOS, PFOA, and GenX within a period of anywhere between three and five years.

Discharge limits for those specific PFAS have yet to be determined.

PFAS exposure has been linked to a number of adverse health impacts to people, including thyroid disease, increased cholesterol, liver damage, and different types of cancers.

More than 3 million North Carolinians are estimated to drink tap water containing PFAS levels above the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency health-based standard scheduled to go into effect in the coming years, according to the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.

Public hearings on the proposed rules for the three PFAS are scheduled as follows:

• April 7 at 6 p.m. in Ferguson Auditorium, AB-Tech Community College, 19 Tech Drive, Asheville.
• April 20 at 6 p.m. in the Archdale Building, ground floor hearing room, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh. Public parking will be available after 5 p.m. at parking deck 64 across North Salisbury Street from the Archdale Building.
• April 23 at 6 p.m. in Wilmington City Hall at Skyline Center, first floor conference center, 929 North Front St., Wilmington. Parking is available in the south lot using the Brunswick Street entrance. Attendees requiring American with Disabilities Act access should park in the visitor lot.

Written comments are being accepted by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject title “PFAS minimization” or by mail to Karen Preston, DEQ-DWR NPDES Permitting Section, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1617.

Comments will be accepted on the proposed rule adoptions and associated regulatory impact analysis. The commission is also accepting comments on specific questions including:

• Whether it would be scientifically defensible and advisable to establish a screening threshold above the lowest reporting concentration for PFOS, PFOA and GenX that could serve as a trigger for ongoing monitoring and minimization requirements.
• Whether the applicability of the PFAS monitoring and minimization rule should be limited to industrial dischargers associated with a standard industry classification (SIC) or North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes known to be linked to PFAS use or discharge.

Hearings on proposed rules for monitoring and minimizing 1,4-dioxane, a federally deemed likely human carcinogen, in wastewater discharges into surface waters from certain facilities have been scheduled for the following dates:

• April 9 at 6 p.m. in the Catawba County St. Stephens Branch Library, 3225 Springs Road, Hickory.
• April 14 at 6 p.m. at Fayetteville Technology Community College, Tony Rand Student Center multipurpose room, 2220 Hull Road, Fayetteville.
• May 12 at 6 p.m. in the Percy H. Sears Applied Technologies Building Auditorium, Guilford Technical Community College, 1201 Bonner Drive, Jamestown.

Written comments on the proposed rules for 1,4-dixoane may be submitted via email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject heading “1,4-dioxane minimization,” or by mail to Bridget Shelton, DEQ-DWR Planning Section, 1611 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, N.C., 27699-1611.

The EMC will also be accepting specific comments on the proposed 1,4-dixoane minimization rules to include:

• Whether a screening threshold above the lowest reported concentration (currently 1 microgram per liter) for 1,4-dioxane would be appropriate as a trigger for ongoing monitoring and minimization planning.
• whether the applicability of the 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules should be expanded beyond the currently proposed scope of dischargers with certain standard industry classification or North American Industry Classification System codes to include all industrial dischargers.

Sign-in and speaker registration will begin at 5 p.m. at each of the hearings.

Based on attendance, speaking time may be limited to allow everyone an opportunity to be heard. The commission will accept written comments and copies of prepared remarks at each hearing.

Gov. Josh Stein and North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Reid Wilson made a visit Thursday to Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s Sweeney Water Treatment Plant in Wilmington to formally announce a $17.8 million grant from the state to support the replacement and capacity upgrade of the utility’s Southside Water Reclamation Facility.

The funds will be used to extend waterlines to connect more than 300 homes with contaminated wells to the utility’s supply of drinking water.

The governor’s office first announced Feb. 19 the nearly $18 million grant, which is coming out of more than $472 million for drinking water and wastewater infrastructure projects.

“The $472 million statewide investment through NCDEQ will help cities, towns and counties strengthen infrastructure to better withstand future storms, improve existing drinking water and wastewater infrastructure, reduce contamination by forever chemicals, and identify and replace lead pipes,” according to the press release.

A list of all the projects selected for funding is on the NCDEQ website.

“When families turn on the tap, they deserve to know that their water is clean and safe,” Stein said in an announcement. “This $17 million investment in Wilmington will protect more than 300 families from forever chemicals by connecting their homes to the public water supply. We’ve made historic commitments to upgrade water infrastructure across North Carolina because keeping North Carolinians healthy starts with reliable, resilient water systems.”

The Cape Fear Public Utility Authority will receive the funds through the Department of Environmental Quality’s Emerging Contaminants in Small or Disadvantaged Communities program, funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The $17.8 million funding to the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority brings DEQ’s total support for the Southside Replacement Project to $192.8 million.

“People who live in the Cape Fear River Basin are rightly concerned about high levels of forever chemicals like GenX and PFAS in their drinking water,” Wilson said. “The Department of Environmental Quality remains committed to doing everything we can to reduce exposure to these harmful chemicals so that families can trust that the water coming out of their tap is healthy and safe.”

In the parts of New Hanover County served by these waterline extension projects, more than 75% of sampled wells exceeded health-based drinking water standards for certain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS. PFAS is a group of thousands of human-made, persistent chemicals that have been used for decades to make heat, water, and stain-resistant products.

“Since CFPUA brought new filters online at our Sweeney Plant in 2022, we have been able to effectively remove GenX and other PFAS from our public drinking water,” utility Board Chairman Wesley P. Corder said. “We are very grateful for this support from Governor Stein’s Office and the Department of Environmental Quality, which will enable us to connect more families in our community to CFPUA’s clean, clearly better water.”

Since taking office, Stein has advanced more than $1.4 billion in water infrastructure projects to strengthen drinking water and wastewater systems and address PFAS and other contaminants.

Last week, the Governor traveled to Winston-Salem to join the 40th annual Emerging Issues Forum, where he discussed the importance of sustained investment in North Carolina’s water infrastructure.

Related: Population growth to impact water infrastructure: Forum

As North Carolina’s population grows, local and state governments, elected officials, educators and nonprofit groups are bracing for the demands more residents will put on the state’s already taxed and aging water infrastructure.

The 2026 Emerging Issues Forum: Future Forward Water held Feb. 25 brought together these decision-makers and advocates to forums in Morehead City, Winston-Salem and Asheville, where they could share their challenges, ideas and solutions regarding the often-unnoticed necessity.

The forum featured several speakers, including Gov. Josh Stein, and group discussions that focused on four main challenges: aging infrastructure, resiliency, the water workforce crisis, and maintaining safe and reliable water systems.  

In a video message, Stein said that North Carolina’s water infrastructure faces serious challenges. The American Society of Civil Engineers recently graded the state, giving it a C-plus on drinking water, C-minus on stormwater, and a D-minus on dams and on wastewater.

“Storms like Hurricane Helene, Hurricane Matthew, Hurricane Florence and tropical Storm Chantal damaged wells and water systems across the state, leaving many communities without clean water,” he continued. “At the same time, continued population growth in some of our areas require expanded service and new infrastructure. Life sciences, companies, data centers coming to North Carolina also require large amounts of water to operate, further straining our infrastructure. Many rural communities struggle in aging systems and limited financial capacity. Contaminants such as PFAS further poison our water supply. We must take all of these challenges on as a clarion call.” 

Usually held in Raleigh, this year’s forum was hosted in the three locations to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Emerging Issues Forum, the idea of the late Gov. Jim Hunt, who died in December. Institute for Emerging Issues, established in 2002 at North Carolina State University, hosts the forum. The institute “is a nonpartisan connector, bringing North Carolinians together across sectors, regions and perspectives to address the state’s most significant challenges while advancing its economic competitiveness.”

Sandra Merkel DeJames, who is a member of the Institute for Emerging Issues National Advisory Board, explained to the more than 100 attending the Morehead City forum that the challenge being addressed that day is how to keep up with the unprecedented population growth facing the state. Population growth is the topic of the three-year Emerging Issues Forum series that kicked off in 2025, and focused on energy infrastructure. Next year the event will address housing.

“Last year, the state added an average of 400 new residents every day. That’s over 145,000 people by 2050. Some 14 million residents will call our state home, compared to the 11.2 million today,” said DeJames, who is president and CEO of Harmonize Strategy Group.

“People are moving to North Carolina for work, education, our climate and a host of other reasons,” she continued. All of these “new residents will need access to housing, energy and water that’s safe and affordable. They’ll need transportation and broadband and all of the other critical infrastructure needed to support a thriving economy, like childcare, healthcare, public safety and education.”

Companies are moving to the state as well, she continued.

“We’ve been named the best state for business in three of the past four years by CNBC. Once here, they too need infrastructure to support their operations,” DeJames said. “As to those businesses already here, this population and business growth will not be even across the state, or even within this region, but all areas have infrastructure needs, and we must now meet them.”

DeJames continued that forum organizers spent the last year learning more about the state’s water issues, “and we’ve learned the following: Water is a truly hidden infrastructure.” But, it is also the “most local form of infrastructure.”

The state is one of 10 with more than 5,000 public water systems – it is closer to 6,000 — and that number does not include the more than 2 million people who use privately owned wells and septic systems.

While water issues vary by region, there are common themes.

“First, our water infrastructure is aging,” DeJames said, despite some of the largest increases in water infrastructure spending in recent years.

“One conservative estimate is that we need $20 billion in new investments for drinking water and $21 billion in new investments for wastewater treatment and sanitary sewers in the coming decades, left unaddressed, our state’s economic vitality and public health are at risk.”

Next is the need to treat water for new contaminants.

“The emergence of new contaminants that can impact our health, such as PFAS, and the additional billions of dollars in cost to treat them will further compound financial pressures on our water systems and our customers,” DeJames said. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, are long-lasting chemicals found in water, air and soil that are linked to harmful health effects.

Third, the state’s water infrastructure is too vulnerable.

“The damage done to wells and water systems from Hurricane Helene, Tropical Storm Chantal and other storms add to longer-term challenges to water and wastewater systems across the state. We need to increase our infrastructure’s resiliency,” she said.

“And finally, we need more workers in the water sector. There is significant shortage of qualified workers as the current workforce ages out, and not enough new workers to enter these fields.”

N.C. State’s Peter A. Pappas Real Estate Development Program Director Chuck Flink expressed similar points in a message delivered to all three forum locations via video.

The state’s population is expected to grow by between 3 and 3.5 million people in the next 25 years, and the growth is not going to hit North Carolina in a uniform manner. “A lot of it’s going to congregate in our two metro areas, which we expect to grow by more than a million people each in this 25-year period,” Flink said.

Wake County currently is the third fastest growing county in the country, averaging around 65 to 75 people moving there each day. It is the most populated county in the state. Charlotte is currently the sixth fastest growing city in America, averaging around 65 residents a day, and it’s the 15th most populated city in the country today, Flink continued.

By the year 2050, 75% of all residents will live in cities, and that’s a new phenomenon for the state, and at the same time, while we have this population growing, the state is experiencing population loss, with 41% of North Carolina’s municipalities in decline.

“We have vast swaths of our eastern part of our state and some portions of our western counties that are losing population,” Flink said. “In fact, we have a band of counties that stretches from the Virginia border to the South Carolina border, where we need more population, we need more economic opportunity. So it’s not a real simple picture there.”

He paused to say that he loves that the state is a collection of small communities, “and yet some of these small communities, especially in the eastern part of the state, are literally being abandoned due to population loss.”

“In North Carolina, 50% of us derive our drinking water from underground reservoirs, aquifers, and when we look at other elements of our water infrastructure, our water and wastewater systems are antiquated and they’re failing,” he said.

In some cases, there has been an overall decline in water quality across the state because of drought, overconsumption, and pollution, including forever chemicals.

The people that manage water infrastructure are aging as well. More education and training is needed for a new workforce to manage the infrastructure going forward.

However, Flink said he’s optimistic about where the state can go.

“It really begins with planning. Planning for growth. How do we want to grow? I think that’s the ace of spades that we control,” Flink said, adding that growth can be controlled and that’s how these challenges will be met.

There were four panel discussions throughout the day. The panels each had participants represented different sectors who shared the hurdles they’re facing, their frustrations and ways they’re navigating these challenges.

Martin Doyle, professor of River Systems Science and Policy at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Energy, explained that water systems are not supported by general tax revenue, but are covered by the funds generated by billing its customers.

The UNC School of Government surveyed water systems around the state, and found that less than a quarter of those water systems actually collected sufficient revenue to be considered economically viable.

“They’re not collecting sufficient revenue to cover their costs as well as to cover the cost of preventative maintenance,” Doyle said. “The challenge for this is that we have a large number of water systems that are operating right at the financial threshold. They’re just getting by” and unable to keep up with preventative maintenance.

East Carolina University Water Resources Center Associate Director Samantha Mosier said that there are a number of ways to solve some of the state’s problems. She encouraged raising awareness about infrastructure needs, but the “real solution” is to help municipalities establish or join a regional authority.

“Most small local governments in North Carolina have their own water and wastewater system because that was part of becoming a town, years and years ago when we had lots of population,” Mosier said. “But in the eastern part of the state, we’re seeing that loss of the population.”

With the population dwindling, utilities are losing their customer base, making it no longer feasible for every small town to maintain a water system. Encouraging regionalization brings folks together to have those conversations. 

“To me is that next critical strategy we’ve got to embrace as a local, regional and state level,” she said.

Belhaven Town Manager Lynn Davis said that Beaufort County town’s obstacles are many, including a limited budget. “How do we not just look at the day to day, not just look at the infrastructure that we have, but how do we plan for if something breaks and that’s a challenge that faces us.”

She said staffing is another challenge. Half of the town’s staff could retire right now, and it won’t be easy to replace those workers. “You just don’t find people that have the knowledge and the skills.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Security and Emergency Manager Craig Malone said when it comes to tackling these issues, “it’s not the plan itself that we need to focus on, it’s the process of planning. It helps us look at these contingencies, look at these risks, and our options to address these emergencies.”

He incorporates resiliency planning into his capital improvement plan. “Now you don’t have to stop and plan for emergency. Now you don’t have to stop and plan for that resiliency action or that upgrade to your facility.”

Nags Head Mayor Ben Cahoon said the town has 3,000 year-round residents, and around 45,000 in the summer time, and 80% of the properties have on-site septic systems. On a summer day, millions of gallons of water goes through the houses and into the septic systems.

“At the same time we have sea level rise, which is bringing the water table up under those wastewater systems, causing them to perhaps function less effectively. And then we get a storm, and you get a lot of water in those ditches and in the ground, and you can imagine the dynamics of what’s happening in the ground.”

Cahoon said the town has to plan for these issues.

“We do integrate drinking water, wastewater, stormwater, capacity into our zoning, development/redevelopment decisions. We do that by tying our infrastructure capacity directly to our long-range planning and adopted master plans and our resilience strategies, rather than treating any of these separately. So in Nags Head, our land use and development decisions are guided by the town’s comp plan.”

To address the retiring workforce that most local governments seem to be facing, some town leaders are changing how they recruit. For example, Maysville Town Manager Shcumata Brown said they’re looking for employees who have the aptitude to learn and not focus on certain certifications.

Perry Harker, vice president of Workforce Continuing Education at Carteret Community College, said that students aren’t hearing about this type of career, and the college is trying to introduce students to water and wastewater industry opportunities.

Compounding these issues is water quality.

Ben Farmer, planning and development services director for Upper Coastal Plain Council of Government, said raw water is pumped to a treatment plant, and that water has to fall within certain threshold or maximum containment levels. The systems, regardless of the town or city’s size, have to make sure that drinking water is up to that very extreme standard to keep the water safe.

Cape Fear Riverkeeper Kemp Burdette told the attendees that many residents get their drinking water from rivers — the Cape Fear River basin provides about one in five residents with the drinking water – and “protecting rivers is the single most effective way of protecting drinking water supply and reducing infrastructure costs for communities, period.”

Jacksonville Stormwater Manager Pat Donovan-Brandenburg said that we all need to be part of the solution.

“Each one of us impact stormwater. Meaning we have a home, we have a car, we have a road to get to and from work. I challenge all of us to look at our individual yards, our individual businesses,” she said.

“What can we do to disconnect our stormwater runoff from ever making it out to the storm drain in the road and out to a stream? Can we get it to infiltrate instead of making it to our surface waters? Making it to our surface waters does not recharge our aquifers, and we need to recharge aquifers in order to have the drinking water,” she said. “There’s the connection. So can you disconnect your storm drains or your gutters and put it into your landscape beds? Can you put in an infiltration trench? Can you put in a rain garden or rain barrel? Everybody’s yard, everybody’s business counts toward stormwater runoff, so we can all be part of the solution,” she reiterated.

There’s so much technology out there, so ask your engineer to think outside of the box. “Yes, it may cost a little bit more, but if you’re building there for the rest of your life, invest in your community. Because that’s what it is. We’ve got to invest in our neighborhoods, invest in our communities. So my message is very simple, reduce the storm water that you’re creating individually off your own property, and collectively, we will make a difference.”

Coastal Resources Commission members last week held off on addressing oceanfront septic tank system rules in order to give environmental and health officials the opportunity to collaborate on the process.

During the commission’s Feb. 26 meeting in Atlantic Beach, staff with the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management, which implements the commission’s rules and policies, asked for extra time to work with the state’s Department of Health and Human Services. DHHS regulates permitting, design, installation, operation and maintenance for on-site septic systems.

The failed septic system issue had been forefront for the commission in the early 2020s, until the topic was sidelined in April 2023 when the Rules Review Commission rejected dozens of rules the Coastal Resources Commission submitted as part of the 10-year rule review process, including protections for Jockey’s Ridge, redirecting the CRC’s attention.

After the rules protecting the sand dune system on the Outer Banks were put back in place in 2025, the Coastal Resource Commission resumed the discussions on remedies for oceanfront septic system failures.

Division Coastal Policy Analyst Cameron Luck explained last Thursday that the commission directed the staff at its November 2025 meeting to find out how many septic system failures along the waterfront were caused by tidal inundation, how many coastal communities rely on septic systems, and the overlap of the commission’s rules with the DHHS’s permitting process.

Luck said that Initially the plan for the February meeting was for the proposed amendments to move forward. But, after the division, DHHS and the North Carolina Coastal Federation, met Feb. 18 to review the issue, the consensus was to pause the rulemaking process.

The plan as of last Thursday was to schedule a meeting in mid-March with the health department and other agencies and organizations. “We want everybody at the table,” to better understand how stakeholders feel about the issue and willingness to address septic tank failures through a collaborative effort, Luck said.

Under the current rules, septic tanks are grouped with houses, which precludes oceanfront septic systems from requiring a permit for repair. And, an oceanfront septic system must be relocated or dismantled within eight years of when a home becomes threatened.

Division staff proposed clarifying that new structures must meet the oceanfront setback, and if a home or septic system is relocated, all remaining debris, including the original septic system, must be removed as well.

Staff also proposed specifying that septic system repair and/or replacement is not evaluated under general statute. Instead, it requires a Coastal Area Management Act permit to replace any septic tank, pump tank, or ground absorption system component.

North Carolina Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis, who was previously director of the Division of Coastal Management, has been involved in the process for some time. The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Davis explained to the commission that it already regulates new oceanfront septic tanks by requiring that those systems meet the oceanfront setback. However, the division currently doesn’t have rules regarding repairing oceanfront septic systems.

DHHS, Dare and septic systems

Two officials with the state health department explained to the commission the prevalence of on-site wastewater systems in the state and the role the division plays in managing them.

Deputy Environmental Health Section Chief Jon Fowlkes said that about 50% of the state relies on septic systems and that has remained consistent over the last 20 to 30 years.

“Every county in our state uses septic systems, some counties more, some counties less,” he said, with some ranging from 14% to 93%, “so it really varies on where you’re at, and we’ve had approximately 1 million septic systems installed since 1990.”

The state’s wastewater rules apply to residential and some commercial on-site septic systems.

On-Site Water Protection Branch Head Wilson Mize with DHHS told the commission that neither he nor Fowlkes worked on the coast before, and “it’s been a learning curve” for them while working with Dare, Currituck and Carteret counties.

He used Dare as an example for how the county is handling its oceanfront septic problems, particularly the scenario of when a tank that was once covered in sand is exposed during a weather event.

After every storm, environmental health staff coordinate with local building inspectors and walk the impacted beach areas, looking for damaged dwellings and determine which systems have been compromised, Mize said.

In many cases the health department’s hands are tied when it comes to not issuing permits. “Our rules don’t give the county much authority to deny that permit if it meets our rules,” Fowlkes said.

Dare County Manager Bobby Outten said the county has a similar situation, stating that they’re also required to issue a permit for septic tanks, even if they’re in the surf zone.

“If the owner can get access to his building, we have to give them the permits. And so now they’ve got a house sitting in the water, their septic tank’s on the wet sand beach, and their drain field is back in the dry sand beach and we have to permit it,” he continued.

“They do it. Two weeks later, we have a nor’easter. It knocks the top off, it dumps the septic in the ocean again, and we start the process again. The water subsides. They put a new top on it. It meets all the requirements. We permit it,” he explained. “And the cycle continues until they lose enough lot that they can’t have a drain field, or they’ve lost enough lot, or lose the tank, and they don’t have anywhere to put the tank, and we don’t have a remedy for that, and we don’t have a remedy for it once it’s all said and done.”

Outten said there are options to break the cycle, including the establishment of setbacks by the commission, or rules that the health department can enforce.

“So we’re stuck in this situation because none of the rules work together to solve what I think we all see as a problem,” he said. “If our goal is to get those tanks off of the beaches, then the rules don’t currently work to do that.”

Commission Chair Renee Cahoon recognized that there’s no easy solution, “but we know that we can’t continue to have all the septic tanks on the beach. It’s not environmentally healthy. It’s not even good business sense for the people in North Carolina, because it does impact our tourism industry and all the property owners that are invested here.”

Though it snakes 50 miles through Onslow County from start to finish, the New River is, in a practical sense, two distinct parts.

The upper river begins northwest of Richlands, a small but increasingly developing town that’s roughly 10 miles from the Duplin County line. From there, the river cuts a narrow path through largely rural agricultural land southeast to Jacksonville, where it widens, its fresh water transitioning to salt water.

The lower river then forms into a tidal estuarine 2 miles wide before ultimately opening into Onslow Bay in the Atlantic Ocean.

Plans have been in the works some two years now to ensure the river’s distinguishing parts get the attention they need. This year, Coastal Carolina Riverwatch, with the support of the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, is finalizing the Lower New River Watershed Restoration Plan,  one that focuses on areas where saltwater creeks drain into shellfish-harvesting waters and tributaries including bays and creeks.

One river, two plans.

Plans are being designed through a wide-reaching collaborative effort to work in unison to restore and protect the river’s water quality.

“We felt that, even though this a river that begins and ends in Onslow County, that it would be a great opportunity for us to separate it into two different plans so that we are spending as much time as we can in those two sections and really delve into the issues and the concerns and things that are affecting water quality and things that could potentially improve water quality through the watershed restoration plan,” Coastal Carolina Riverwatch Executive Director Lisa Rider told Coastal Review in an interview earlier this month.

Next year, the upper New River plan is expected to be complete. That plan addresses inland freshwater systems that flow through neighborhoods, farms, and paddle trails, she added.

At their cores, the plans espouse the connections shared by water, land and people. Essential to both missions is bridging people, whether it be those who live along it, recreate on it, or fish in it for sustenance, with organizations and agencies “needed to respond at the scale the river demands” to improve and protect it, Rider explained.

“It’s definitely a collaborative effort and I think that’s what makes this process a little bit unique for the watershed water management planning,” she said. “We’ve been really spending a lot of time connecting with community members, leadership in the community, folks that really have a unique grasp of what’s going on in the area.”

Riverwatch has worked through the New River Roundtable, a collaborative group of scientists, regulators, academics, government representatives and stakeholders, Rider explained. The organization has also worked closely with the county and with state partners.

The organization took a boots-on-the-ground approach, setting up at local festivals and other public events and speaking at various homeowners’ associations and community meetings.

The watershed restoration plans are a first for Coastal Carolina Riverwatch, an organization that has for years been monitoring the New River to try and determine sources of bacteria detected in the river.

The plans are rooted in the idea that, by creating one set of watershed restoration plans for the river, “we may get some really great projects out of that” to fill in gaps in areas of the river where water quality improvements and protections are needed, Rider said.

“That sort of initiated us into starting to work with the North Carolina Land and Water Fund to start funding the lower part of the New River plan, and we talked to them quite a bit about the reasoning for separating those plans out, knowing that eventually we would be working in unison,” she said.

The North Carolina Division of Water Resources has been key in helping the organization make the lower river plan sustainable through continued use and updates.

The plans in the agency’s watershed improvement projects, or WIPS, tool, which maps water quality improvement projects reported by residents, organizations and local governments.

“Even after the plan is complete it’s not really complete because we’re going to be continually using the watershed improvement tool to gauge what the public sees, what’s being requested in terms of projects by stakeholders and community members, and then looking to help connect funders with the projects that are being prioritized,” Rider said.

Severe pollution closed the New River to the public in the 1980s.

Things were so dire in the river that when 25 million gallons of waste flowed from a breached hog lagoon into its waters, no fish kills were recorded.

Three years after that spill, Jacksonville closed its downtown wastewater treatment plant to cut off the predominant source of pollution that had been sickening the lower river, where the riverbed between Wilson Bay and Stones Bay was covered by soft organics like ammonia and phosphates that, when in excessive amounts, choke out aquatic life.

City officials urged those at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune to stop its wastewater facility from discharging into the river.

The river was reopened in 2001.

Since then, both the city and Onslow County have been taking further steps to improve and protect the New River.

Jacksonville took on a multiyear project installing artificial reefs on either side of the river between Wilson Bay and Stones Bay to grow millions of oysters. The final phase of the $1.6 million Oyster Highway Project, which has helped usher marine life back into the river, wrapped a couple of years ago.

In 2024, the city’s elected leaders signed off on a grant awarded to Jacksonville’s stormwater department to develop a New River Nutrient Management Plan.

That plan focuses on nutrient loading from nonpoint sources — stormwater that flows from streets, subdivisions, commercial and industrial areas — into the city’s drainage system.

Last December, the Onslow County Board of Commissioners adopted a resolution that supports using low-impact development strategies in all new or significantly renovated county-funded facilities “when they are fiscally responsible and practical,” according to a county notice.

The resolution also encourages the county school system and Coastal Carolina Community College in Jacksonville to adopt similar strategies, such as bioretention areas, swales, pocket wetlands, impervious surface removal, cisterns, green roofs, and permeable pavement, for new and renovated projects.

“As Onslow County continues to grow it will be increasingly important to meet the needs of future development through sustainable means,” according to a county release.

Onslow County residents who would like to help Coastal Carolina Riverwatch identify flood-prone areas, streams in need of restoration or stabilization, areas where stormwater runoff causes erosion or water quality problems, and flood mitigation projects may contact the organization by email at waterkeeper@coastalcarolina.org.

Community-based organizations, including homeowner associations, civic and church groups, environmental and conservation clubs, paddling and fishing organizations, business associations and school groups may request a presentation by Coastal Carolina Riverwatch – or offer a project idea, or talk about an area where there are problems with flooding, at one of the group’s regular meetings.

“The collaboration, I think, really reflects how the river itself works,” Rider said. “Water doesn’t recognize those jurisdictional lines so the solutions themselves are more effective when the planning reflects that reality. This approach, we fell like, helps ensure that the investments are targeted, the support is local, and that it’s designed to deliver real benefits for both water quality and the quality of life across the watershed.”                                                                                                               

This story has been updated to include a corrected description of land ownership. Information initially provided to Coastal Review had incorrectly identified the owner.

More people moved to North Carolina last year from different parts of the country than any other state in the nation.

North Carolina’s population grew by almost 150,000 people, trailing behind only Texas and Florida, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released last month.

As political leaders grapple with the demands that growth is placing on essential services like water and sewer, public safety and education, pressure is mounting on conservation groups to acquire, conserve and preserve land.

This month, more than 2,000 acres in coastal counties have been secured for permanent protection from development.

These newly protected areas are filled with natural landscape features that reduce flood risk, improve water quality, and provide habitat for plants and animals that are increasingly getting squeezed out by encroaching development.

In Brunswick County, one of the fastest growing in the state, North Carolina-based conservation nonprofit Unique Places to Save acquired land that serves as a corridor between two protected natural areas, bridging what amounts to nearly 10,000 acres of conserved landscape.

“We really want to be able to maintain large, connected natural areas for habitat for species and to maintain biodiversity of our natural areas,” Unique Places to Save Executive Director Christine Pickens told Coastal Review in a recent telephone interview. “And, particularly, in the southeast of North Carolina, we have some really cool endemic species and really wonderful habitats that you don’t find anywhere else.”

Within the 1,040-acre tract nestled between the towns of St. James and Boiling Spring Lakes are forested wetlands, Carolina bays, sandy pine and wet sandy pine savanna.

The tract, referred to as Boiling Springs Wilderness, specifically connects thousands of acres of privately conserved land including Orton with the North Carolina Boiling Spring Lakes Plant Conservation Preserve.

“When you connect these large areas, you’re connecting a mosaic across the landscape and there’s tiny variations of habitat availability,” Pickens explained. “What that does is allow species that use that area for habitat or refuge or migration to use those slight variations of habitat. When we experience extremes in weather, precipitation or drought or big storms, having just a little bit of wiggle room in terms of available habitat goes a long way to allowing species to be resilient to some of these extremes and some of these changes.”

Habitat that is free from being sliced up by ditches or roads is valuable to species that rely on that habitat, she said.

Take the red cockaded woodpecker, for example. These birds, which were reclassified in late 2024 from endangered to threatened, live in groups, or clusters, helping each other raise their young.

They depend on large, connected natural areas – typically anywhere from 125 to 200 acres – where living pine trees, preferably mature, longleaf pine forests, grow.

Boiling Springs Wilderness includes varying types of soils that support different sets of plants, trees, shrubs and forbs, more commonly referred to as herbs.

A good deal of pond pine and a “little bit” of young longleaf pine grace its landscape, Pickens said.

The headwaters of Orton Creek are within the project area, as are wetlands that blanket the Castle Hayne aquifer, a drinking water source for thousands of Brunswick County residents and tens of thousands in other coastal North Carolina areas.

“That’s a long-term way to protect water quality,” Pickens said. “The areas around streams act as buffers to absorb nutrients, runoff, excess components in surface water that soak in, and they get absorbed by the plants and the roots and the soils around streams. That prevents excess nutrients getting into waterways.”

Then there are the wetlands, which function like nature’s sponges, absorbing stormwater that might otherwise flood developed properties.

“Every chance we get to conserve wetlands is really important right now,” Pickens said.

That’s because state lawmakers decided to align North Carolina’s definition of wetlands with that of the federal government, which is in the process of changing the interpretation of waters of the United States that may omit protections for millions of acres of wetlands in the state.

“It may result in more wetlands being nonjurisdictional, therefore a lot more likely to be converted to uplands through ditching and draining. These conservation easements are perpetual. Once we protect it, that’s it,” Pickens said.

The Boiling Springs Wilderness project was funded through a $3.68 million North Carolina Land and Water Fund grant.

Unique Places to Save will own and manage the tract, while the state will hold the conservation easement. The Coastal Land Trust will steward that easement.

Last year, Unique Places to Save applied for another state Land and Water Fund grant to protect about 500 acres of predominately wetlands between the town of St. James and N.C. Highway 211.

“We’ve got a provisional award from the Land and Water Fund so if they have enough funding we may get funded this year for that effort,” Pickens said.

She touted efforts among other groups that work to conserve land throughout the state, including the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, The Nature Conservancy, North Carolina Plant Conservation Program, North Carolina Coastal Land Trust, and Cape Fear Arch to name a few.

Tyrrell County parcel transferred

Last week, national nonprofit The Conservation Fund finalized the transfer of ownership of about 1,550 acres of coastal wetlands and forestland in Tyrrell County to the Coastal Federation.

“This partnership reflects years of careful conservation planning and cooperation,” Coastal Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis stated in a release. “This acquisition protects important coastal wetlands that help filter water, support fish and wildlife habitat, and provide natural flood buffering in on the of the state’s most ecologically significant regions.”

Portions of the Tyrrell County property, which is valued at an estimated $1.7 million, are in the Land and Water Fund’s Stewardship Program, one designed to establish, monitor and enforce perpetual conservation agreements.

The property will be included as part of the Coastal Federation’s Land for a Healthy Coast program, which focuses on protecting estuaries, reducing polluted runoff, buffering floods, and boosting long-term coastal resilience.

“Some lands are simply too important to risk losing,” Coastal Federation founder and senior adviser Todd Miller said in the release. “When a property protects water quality, supports fisheries, and strengthens the natural defenses of the coast, we believe it’s our responsibility to step forward and ensure it is permanently conserved and well managed.”

A North Carolina court has ruled that the state’s lead environmental agency has the authority to set 1,4-dioxane discharge limits for public wastewater utilities.

The ruling reverses a 2024 administrative law judge’s determination that the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality did not follow the proper process when it established discharge limits for a handful of municipal wastewater treatment plants in the piedmont.

DEQ followed state Environmental Management Commission and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “protocols in creating the 1,4-dioxane limits and created the criteria for the purpose of protecting the health and wellbeing of North Carolinians,” Wake County Superior Court Judge A. Graham Shirley wrote in his Feb. 5 decision. “Compliance with regulations and a desire to maintain or improve public health cannot be said to be a ‘patently in bad faith’ decision.”

Shirley wrote that the agency “did not err” in considering 1,4-dioxane, a substance used primarily as a solvent in chemical manufacturing, as a carcinogen.

“Because 1,4-dioxane is a pollutant likely to cause cancer in humans, permit limits are necessary to protect North Carolinians’ drinking water and their health,” DEQ Secretary Reid Wilson stated in a release the agency published Thursday. “The court vindicates DEQ’s decision to impose limits to protect downstream communities from this harmful carcinogen.”

Discharges of the chemical substance into North Carolinians’ drinking water sources has gained attention in recent years, with downstream public water suppliers and communities calling for tighter regulations and that pollution be controlled at the source.

DEQ’s Division of Water Resources attempted to do that when, in August 2023, it issued Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit that capped its releases of 1,4-dixoane.

Asheboro sued, challenging the state’s authority to include a water quality standard for 1,4-dioxane in the permit and arguing the new limits created an excessive financial burden.

The cities of Greensboro and Reidsville joined the lawsuit. Both had been ordered to include limits in their draft NPDES permits after they received notices of violation for 1,4-dioxane discharges in November 2019.

Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant discharges into Cape Fear River basin, where some 900,000 North Carolinians receive their drinking water downstream of the plant.

Brunswick County, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority and Fayetteville Public Works Commission intervened in the case, asserting that upstream 1,4-dioxane dischargers placed an undue financial burden on them to sample drinking water sources for the chemical and try and reduce the level of consumption of it to their customers.

In a September 2024 ruling, then-Chief Administrative Law Judge Dr. Donald van der Vaart sided with the upstream municipalities and revoked the permit limits set by DEQ.

“The Superior Court was right to uphold DEQ’s ability to limit chemicals in our water, and my office will continue working with DEQ to make sure people have clean drinking water,” North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson stated in a release.

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Kenneth Waldroup said in a statement to Coastal Review Thursday afternoon that the utility is pleased with Shirley’s decision.

“CFPUA’s raw water intake is the last on the Cape Fear River. We rely on State regulators to set and enforce reasonable discharge standards upstream of our intake to protect our region’s raw water supply,” he explained. “While CFPUA’s Sweeney Water Treatment Plant is able to treat drinking water for 1,4-dioxane, that treatment process carries an expense and our ability to treat this pollution has its limits. Reducing the amounts of 1,4-dioxane and other emerging contaminants being released upstream also reduces the financial burden on downstream customers and communities.”

Last October, Waldroup joined representatives of other public water utilities and residents in asking the EPA to uphold its earlier objection to the proposed NPDES permit excluding Asheboro’s discharge limit for 1,4-dioxane.

As of this report, the EPA had not made its final determination.

Emily Donovan, co-founder of Clean Cape Fear, said in an email that the Superior Court ruling, “is a win for public health and every downstream community threatened by Asheboro’s irresponsible leadership.”

“It’s a shame cities like Asheboro prefer squandering tax dollars defending industrial polluters rather than protecting the public’s drinking water supplies,” she said. “It’s also a devastating reminder that until North Carolina creates strong source control measures for toxic chemicals, we will always be one discharge away from the next preventable crisis.”

Earlier this year, the state Environmental Management Commission voted to push proposed monitoring and minimization rules for 1,4-dioxane and three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, to the public this month.

Critics of the proposed rules argue they lack any real enforceability because they do not include water quality standards, specify what best management practices dischargers must follow, or how facilities must minimize their discharges.

The public comment period had yet to be announced as of this report.

In June of last year, the Southern Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch and Haw River Assembly against Asheboro and the city’s industrial customer StarPet Inc., to stop their discharges of 1,4-dioxane into the Cape Fear River basin.

“Asheboro, Greensboro, and Reidsville have spent years arguing for downstream communities to shoulder the health and monetary costs of the cities’ pollution,” Jean Zhuang, a senior attorney with the center’s Chapel Hill office, stated in a release. “The Wake County Superior Court saw through the cities’ arguments and restored a key tool that can be used to protect families, communities, and drinking water utilities downstream.”

According to that release, the cities have filed a motion to suspend the court’s decision and an appeal is pending.

While North Carolina residents are dealing with the inches of snowfall in the aftermath of this weekend’s winter storm, National Park Service officials on the Outer Banks are also dealing with the debris left behind by four more houses collapsing on Cape Hatteras National Seashore’s beaches.

National Park Service Public Affairs Specialist Mike Barber told Coastal Review Monday that Cape Hatteras National Seashore officials were notified that a house in Buxton collapsed earlier in the day, around 9 a.m. It was the fourth unoccupied house to collapse since Sunday morning.

The first house at 46201 Tower Circle Road collapsed early Sunday morning. Overnight, two more unoccupied houses at 46215 and 46219 Tower Circle Road fell, then the fourth house, which was at 46285 Old Lighthouse Road, Buxton. These four bring to 31 the total number of houses to collapse on the seashore’s beaches since 2020.

“Cape Hatteras National Seashore advises everyone to stay away from the collapse sites and the surrounding beach area, due to potentially hazardous debris. The beach is closed in front of the entire village of Buxton,” Barber said.

The Outer Banks, like much of the coast, continued to experience compromised roadways Monday and people were advised to stay off the roads unless necessary.

State transportation officials closed N.C. Highway 12 Saturday evening between the Basnight Bridge and Rodanthe, as well as on the north end of Ocracoke. They said Monday that the road would remain closed, “as we continue to see ocean overwash from this weekend’s nor’easter. Overwash also occurring at Buxton corner and on Rodanthe secondaries. Crews will be out working to clear today.”

N.C. 12 experienced ocean overwash and dune breaches on Pea Island Sunday morning, as well in Buxton and in Hatteras.

Additionally, all ferry routes were suspended Friday and remain suspended until conditions are deemed safe for operation, according to the North Carolina Department of Transportation.

NCDOT crews said they were making progress Monday clearing interstates and highways, but dangerous icy spots may remain because temperatures remained low. Gov. Josh Stein’s office and transportation officials urged people to stay off snow- and ice-covered roads and warned people to beware of black ice, which forms when ice and snow melt and then refreeze overnight into hard-to-see slippery patches.

As of late Monday, there were 2,500 NCDOT employees and contractors working to plow snow and spread salt on the highways and secondary routes. Since the storm began affecting the coast Saturday, crews have spread more than 23,000 tons of salt and plowed thousands of miles of roads.

Stein said that the state was “working around the clock to clear roads and get people back to their daily lives as quickly and safely as possible, but because temperatures will remain low overnight, this process takes time. We ask for your patience, and if you need to be on the roads this week, I urge you to slow down, give extra distance, and use caution while traveling.”

His office reported that the sunshine Monday, with temperatures reaching the upper 30s to lower 40s, allowed for snow that fell over the weekend to melt. However, that water will likely refreeze after sunset Monday evening because temperatures are forecast to fall into the teens and 20s.

Temperatures will warm into the low to mid 40s Tuesday before a cold front approaches the region.

The National Weather Service said Monday that for parts of eastern North Carolina, a light wintry mix of snow and freezing rain was possible Wednesday night.

“Please continue to remain vigilant as we are still experiencing extremely cold temperatures across the state,” NC Emergency Management Director Will Ray said in a statement. “As a reminder, several hazards remain, such as the risk of freezing pipes in homes. There are many people in our communities that are especially vulnerable to prolonged cold temperatures, so please check on your friends, family, and neighbors.”

Currituck County Emergency Management, in a social media post around lunchtime Monday, said that NCDOT crews were actively out working on the primary roadways throughout the county.

“While some roads are improving, many side roads remain covered with snow and ice, and freezing temperatures are keeping conditions slick. As temperatures drop and the sun goes down tonight, please be alert for black ice: a thin, nearly invisible layer of ice that forms when moisture refreezes on road surfaces. Black ice is especially common on bridges, shaded areas, overpasses, and low-lying roads, and can cause vehicles to lose traction with little warning,” they warned. “If you must travel, slow down, increase your following distance, and use extra caution. If you can stay home, that remains the safest option.”

Carteret County sent out a similar message Monday.

“Some roadways still have several inches of snow coverage, and partially melted snow and ice are expected to refreeze overnight, creating dangerous travel conditions. Residents are urged to stay off the roads if possible. If travel is necessary, exercise extreme caution, as icy conditions may make driving at posted speeds extremely dangerous and cause vehicles to lose traction with little warning,” according to Carteret County government officials. “Secondary and less-traveled roads are more likely to remain untreated and pose additional risks. Remaining off the roads also allows first responders and emergency management staff to continue their work safely.

Largely because of travel concerns, most county government offices were closed Monday because of the weather, and several had announced plans to close Tuesday as well, including Beaufort, Carteret, Gates, Pamlico, Dare and Hyde counties.

Record snowfall in coastal counties

Assistant State Climatologist Corey Davis, in a blog on this weekend’s snow storm, called the accumulated snow that fell all across North Carolina, “our most widespread wintry event in more than a dozen years, and the biggest snow for some areas in several decades.”

For parts of eastern North Carolina, this was the snowstorm of a lifetime, he continued.

“More than a foot fell over the central Coastal Plain, surpassing every other wintry event so far this century. The 12.5 inches in New Bern and 15 inches in Newport made this the first foot of snow for both areas since December 1989. The highest totals in the state came along the Crystal Coast, including 19.5 inches in Peletier and 17 inches in Swansboro,” he wrote.

In Cape Carteret, near whiteout conditions were observed on Saturday, Davis continues, bordering on blizzard criteria. Beaufort reported three consecutive hours with visibility of a quarter-mile or less, wind gusts of 35 mph or greater, and heavy snow falling or blowing.

Northeast North Carolina from Friday to Sunday experienced between 6 and 10.5 inches of snow, according to the National Weather Service Wakefield, Virginia, office, which provides the forecast for the region that includes Ahoskie, Elizabeth City and Currituck County.

Mainland Hyde County experienced a widespread swath of 8 to 12 inches, with localized snowfall totals in some townships exceeding 12 to 16 inches. For Ocracoke Island, “reliable totals” range from 4 to 6 inches, and that accumulation was coupled with “significant coastal flooding and inundation,” county officials announced Monday.

Heading south, centrally located counties including Beaufort, Carteret, Craven, Dare, Pamlico, Onslow and Tyrrell saw between 2 and 19 inches. Dare experienced the least amount with 2 to 11 inches and Carteret, Craven and Pamlico had areas getting hit with more than 18 inches, according to the Weather Service office in Newport.

“Most remarkably, along the Pamlico River in Beaufort County, this was the first foot of snow in more than 67 years, since December 1958. In that region, reported totals included 17 inches in Bath, 15 inches in Bayview, and 13 inches in Belhaven,” Davis explains in the blog.

“Along with having a strong, moisture-laden low pressure system just offshore, a key factor in ramping up the snowfall amounts was the cold air that created unusually high snow-to-liquid ratios for this part of the country. While Wilmington only measured 0.32 inches of liquid precipitation, that yielded 5.8 inches of fluffy snow – the heaviest snow there since 1989 – at an impressive 18-to-1 ratio,” Davis wrote.

In a Monday morning announcement, Holden Beach officials in Brunswick County warned residents that, although the bridge to the island had reopened, roads on the island were “treacherous.”

Holden Beach’s neighboring island to the west, Ocean Isle Beach, was covered in a whopping 15 inches of snow, according to estimated totals based on National Weather Service reports and local observations.

Farther north in Brunswick County, Leland, Bolivia and Southport all received a reported 9 inches of snow.

Brunswick County announced its offices and facilities will reopen at 10 a.m. Tuesday. The Brunswick County Commissioners meeting postponed Monday had not been rescheduled as of this report.

In New Hanover County, a reported 9 inches of snow accumulated in Carolina Beach. Wilmington saw less with a little under 6 inches of snow.

And, in Pender County, Hampstead received 10 inches of snow, while farther north, areas of Onslow County got upwards from 13 inches accumulation.

From a science perspective

Davis explained to Coastal Review that the coast was hit so hard because, “to put it simply, this was a strong nor’easter setup that happened to be cold enough for snow.”

He said that anytime the state gets these low-pressure systems right off the coast, whether they’re tropical storms or winter storms, “we know they’re capable of some major impacts. And we saw a lot of those typical impacts in this event, including the gusty winds and high surf that has already claimed a couple more houses along the Outer Banks.”

Davis compared this system and the nor’easter that moved up the coast October 2025.

The main low-pressure center started to deepen at pretty much the same location just south of Cape Fear, and the minimum pressure observed at Hatteras was nearly identical: 998.8 millibars in October, and 998.4 millibars during this storm. A millibar is a metric measurement of atmospheric pressure.

“If this had happened at any other time of year, we would have been talking about similar impacts, but with rain instead of snow. Having such cold temperatures in place so far south meant that it fell as all snow, and the snow-to-liquid ratios were off the charts compared to what we’re accustomed to. That let a lot of snow add up very quickly, and with the wind added in, that snow covered everything, and deep,” Davis continued.

When it comes to climate change and storms like these, Davis noted that a “common, or at least vocal, misconception about climate change is that it can and will make cold and snow impossible.”

He explained that while warming temperatures do make some wintry events — like the one from this previous weekend — more marginal for anything frozen, cold and snow are still a part of the winter climate, and big events like this can and do still occur.

“Of course, we’ve also seen the flip side of that, with a nearly three-year stretch with no measurable snowfall across much of the state, the average annual snowfall nearly cut in half in places like Charlotte and Raleigh, and steady warming in our wintertime low temperatures at the rate of about a degree per decade. All of those things — warming with snow events becoming rarer, along with seeing an occasional big snowfall — can still be true,” Davis explained.

“As a scientist, I think it’s important to acknowledge our certainty about climate changes and future projections. We’re very confident that the overall warming trend, especially in our nighttime low temperatures, will continue into the future, and that will continue to reduce our overall snow totals and snow event frequency. We’re less certain about how coastal winter storms like this one may change in the future,” he continued. “We often think about these climate trends as clearly pointing in one direction, but that’s really not true for projections of coastal storms like this, and there are competing forces that may affect how they evolve.”

He said that on one hand, these systems originate in tropical areas and strengthen over the warm ocean, which we know is warming at an even faster rate than the atmosphere, letting these coastal lows strengthen faster and pull in more moisture. But, on the other hand, it’s getting tougher to get temperatures cold enough over land to see all-snow events. These lows tend to bring in warm air in the mid-levels that causes precipitation to transition from snow to sleet, freezing rain, or regular rain, like we saw a couple of weekends ago.

“You might say that this storm offered up the best — or worst, depending on your perspective — of our past and future climates. We had that deep layer of cold air like we saw during our big storms back in the 1970s and 80s, but also a rapidly intensifying coastal low in a very warm and moist ocean environment that was able to drop extreme snowfall amounts,” he said. “That doesn’t mean this sort of event will get any more common in the future. It is now, and always will be, a rare collision of circumstances to bring such a major winter storm over such a large part of the state.”

Though there’s piles of snow out there, Davis said to keep in mind that, in terms of the liquid precipitation totals, most areas saw less than an inch of total liquid during this event, which he said is “a surprisingly low amount, given how much snow we received.”

That matters because it may mean the state sees less drought recovery than expected.

“Most of eastern North Carolina is still in moderate to severe drought, and even after the storm, places like Wilmington, Greenville, and Fayetteville are more than 10 inches below their normal precipitation over the past six months,” Davis said. “We may see some small improvements this week based on that precipitation, and the gradual snow melt may bring a slow recharge in streamflow and soil moisture levels over the next few weeks. But this winter is still tracking as a dry one overall, and we could use some more precipitation in any form before the end of the season to keep from entering the spring and the growing season with a bad drought still going on.”

More than 34,000 gallons of untreated wastewater is believed to have been discharged from a damaged sewer line tap in Calabash on Wednesday.

The overflow was discovered shortly after 1 p.m. near 101 South Middleton Drive NW, according to a Brunswick County release.

Brunswick County Public Utilities staff determined that a 2-inch sewer tap gate valve had failed. The valve was repaired about an hour after the discharge was discovered.

Officials believe about 34,650 gallons of untreated sewer was discharged and reached the Little Cawcaw Swamp.

Samples were taken downstream of the discharge and remediation of the affected site was completed, according to the release.

County Soil and Water Conservation Districts are accepting applications from high school students for a scholarship to attend the 2026 Resource Conservation Workshop, June 14-19 at North Carolina State University in Raleigh.

The Resource Conservation Workshop is a weeklong intensive study for students to learn about natural resources and their management in today’s environment. Students participate in field study, tours, hands-on sessions, and activities that focus on college-decision making and career decisions, according to the workshop’s website.

Workshop students stay on N.C. State’s campus in dormitories and attend workshop sessions in Williams Hall, Lake Wheeler Soils Field Lab as well as field studies at Falls Lake State Recreation Area and Clemmons State Educational Forest in Clayton.

Rising 10th through 12th graders interested in the workshop should contact their county’s Soil and Water Conservation District representative for an application, which should be submitted no later than March 31.

The Resource Conservation Workshop is sponsored by the Division of Soil and Water Conservation of the NC Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, the Crop and Soil Sciences Department of N.C. State University, and the N.C. Association of Soil and Water Conservation Districts in conjunction with the Hugh Hammond Bennett Chapter – Soil and Water Conservation Society of America, N.C. Soil and Water Conservation Commission.

Two coastal communities have been awarded grants from the state for stream restoration, water-based recreation and water management projects.

North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources awarded the grants totaling more than $1.5 million to nine local governments, including Morehead City in Carteret County and Windsor in Bertie County, the agency announced Wednesday.

“These grants will boost public waterfront access in unique places around the state, including rare forests along the coast and the Mayo River north of the Triad,” DEQ Secretary Reid Wilson stated in a release.

Morehead City has been awarded $200,000 for the Spooner Creek Conservation Nature Park. The project includes acquiring almost 23 acres of undeveloped land to create a publicly owned nature park that provides public waterfront access and conserve shoreline including rare, maritime forestland.

Windsor was awarded $200,000 to retrofit Hoggard’s Millpond. The project includes reconstruction of a breached mill dam, removal of damaged mill infrastructure and replacement of a naturalized fish passage structure to reconnect more than 50 miles of potential stream habitat and also to store stormwater.

A full list of the awards is online. More details are available on the Water Resources Development Grant program website.

Note: This story has been updated to correct the misspelling of Louis Bacon’s first name.

Restoring land as close to how it was more than two centuries ago is by no means a cheap venture.

Just ask Louis Moore Bacon.

Since 2012, Bacon has invested more than $100 million in the property on which his ancestor, Roger Moore, founded Orton Plantation in 1725 off the lower Cape Fear River’s western bank in Brunswick County.

Nearly a third of that cost has gone toward restoring an expansive, historic rice field system and an earthen dike enslaved Africans built some 250 years ago to protect the fields they planted, grew, and harvested Carolina Gold rice from the river.

If the state green lights a proposed project to deepen and widen portions of the shipping channel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Port of Wilmington, all of it – the dike, 350 acres of historic rice fields and hundreds of acres of freshwater wetlands – will face threat of “irreversible damage,” according to Bacon.

In a 22-page letter he submitted to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Coastal Management late last year, Bacon detailed how the proposed Wilmington Harbor 403 navigation project “threatens the failure” of the earthen dike.

“The structural integrity of the dike is Orton’s number one concern,” Bacon wrote. “The Project poses a real and unacceptable risk of catastrophic failure of the dike system. Failure of the dike will result in a cascading series of events including saltwater intrusion into the historic rice fields, rendering them incapable of growing rice and destroying the freshwater ecological water system at the Orton Property. Failure of the dike would flood the rice fields and freshwater ponds with saltwater, erasing what stands today as a preserved monument to enslaved African Americans dating back centuries.”

He closed the Nov. 24, 2025, letter with an ardent request of the division: Object to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ determination that the proposed project aligns with the state’s coastal policies and rules.

The Corps, Bacon wrote, failed to analyze how the proposed project to deepen and widen the harbor channel might affect historic and cultural resources along the river.

His objections echo those of other individuals and groups voicing concerns about how the project the N.C. State Ports Authority says is needed to keep the Wilmington Port competitive might impact those sites along the river.

Deepening the river channel from 42 feet to 47 feet and widening it along areas throughout the river will allow larger vessels to travel to and from the port, attracting more business, according to the authority.

But opponents of the proposed project say that, in addition to threatening historic and cultural resources along the river, it will accelerate erosion and exacerbate flooding, destroy habitat, disperse contaminants in the riverbed’s sediment into marshes and onto public beaches, and is not economically justified.

Like Bacon, their hope is that the Division of Coastal Management rejects the Corps’ determination.

The determination

Two days before the New Year, NCDEQ announced that the Corps was giving the Division of Coastal Management more time to complete its review of the federal determination, pushing the division’s deadline from Jan. 5 to Jan. 19.

Division officials have until then to determine whether the proposed project is consistent with the state’s coastal rules, including those under the Coastal Area Management Act, or CAMA.

The division must decide whether to concur with Corps’ determination, concur with conditions, or object.

Related: Wilmington residents see no good in proposed harbor project

If the division decides the latter, that could shutter the proposed project altogether.

“An objection generally prevents the federal permit or approval from being issued unless DCM and the project proponent negotiate a resolution that would allow the project to go forward,” according to the division’s Dec. 30 release notifying the public about the extension.

The Corps “may be entitled to certain mediation/appeal privileges” with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Office for Coastal Management, which heads programs including the National Coastal Zone Management Program and Estuarine Research Reserves and works with coastal states, territories and partners to manage resources and address impacts from climate change.

The division has to render its decision months before the Corps wraps what it says will be a detailed examination to identify all historic and cultural properties within the project study area.

“To ensure historical and cultural sites are identified and evaluated properly, the Corps is executing a study specific Programmatic Agreement (PA) with the North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office, the General Services Administration, the North Carolina State Ports Authority, and possibly the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation,” Jed Cayton, public affairs specialist with the Corps’ Wilmington District, said in an email responding to questions.

The programmatic agreement, he wrote, is a “commonly applied strategy to protect cultural and historical resources.”

“It facilitates more informed decision-making by allowing time for additional data collection and formal coordination efforts to extend beyond the feasibility study phase,” Cayton said.

The agreement, which is currently being reviewed, must be signed before the agency finalizes project plans, which would occur some time after the Corps releases its final environmental impact statement on the proposed project.

Under a tentative timeline the Corps has shared with the public, the federal agency is expected to release the final EIS sometime this summer.

Construction on the project would not begin until 2030 and take about six years to complete, a schedule Corps officials have said is optimistic.

‘Necessary analysis’

Today, the Orton property spans about 14,000 acres. More than 830 acres of that land, including 6,800 feet of restored and repaired earthen dike and coinciding system of canals, roads, dams, and ditches, around the rice fields is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

In his letter to the division last year, Bacon argued that CAMA protects the historic resources on his land “from irreversible damage and it protects the Property’s significant ecological resources from adverse impacts.”

The draft environmental impact statement, or EIS, the Corps released last September, “does not disclose these obvious impacts,” Bacon wrote.

“There is no analysis in the Draft EIS about the effects of the Project on the Orton Property or the CAMA-protected resources at Orton. None. This analysis cannot be deferred. The Corps’ consistency determination must be supported by ‘comprehensive data and information.’”

“The Corps’ failure to undertake the necessary analysis is the simplest reason that Division should object to the consistency determination,” he continued.

His land is among nearly 30 historic sites and properties the N.C. Department of Natural and Cultural Resources’ State Historic Preservation Office lists as being within the proposed projects area of potential effects.

Last October, that office penned a letter to the Corps requesting the programmatic agreement, “so as to address effects on known and potentially National Register-eligible historic properties to be adversely affected by the proposed undertaking and the regularly scheduled maintenance dredging, spoil placement, and environmental mitigation measures following the proposed undertaking.”

While Corps studies of historic properties that may be affected by the proposed project “appear to have focused solely on the physical impacts of dredging the river-bottom, placement of dredged materials, and locations of mitigation measures, we believe from nearly two decades of observation and monitoring erosion at historic properties along the channel that we can expect other effects will result from the proposed project,” the letter states.

Dark Branch

Among the list of 28 sites and properties identified in that letter is Dark Branch, a community in unincorporated Brunswick County where land remains largely owned by the descendants of emancipated slaves.

Dark Branch, also known as Kendall Chapel, was founded in the early 1870s by a handful of formerly enslaved people, including Robert “Hooper” Clark, who’d been forced to work the rice fields of Orton, Lilliput, and Kendal plantations.

The land they purchased between those plantations became “a thriving hub of Black farming, entrepreneurship, and civil rights activism,” according to the Historic Wilmington Foundation.

Dr. Charles Chavis Jr., Clark’s fourth-great-grandson and executive director of the Dark Branch Descendants Association, explained in a telephone interview that there is a direct connection between the cultural resources that have been restored at Orton and those members of the Dark Branch community have taken upon themselves to preserve.

“Everything that Mr. Moore Bacon has sought to preserve is the work of our ancestors and those who were enslaved on the various plantations,” Chavis said. “For us, this is not only about protecting our cultural resources, but also about protecting our community.”

Chavis, an assistant professor at George Mason University and founding director of the university’s John Mitchell Jr. Program for History, Justice, and Race, started the association about three years ago to preserve the community’s history.

There are about 20 historical structures in Dark Branch, including homes, a store, and sharecropping and slave cabins.

Some of those structures, as well as the community cemetery, one Chavis calls one of Dark Branch’s most sacred sites, are under threat of riverine flooding.

“We just can’t afford for it to get worse and we’re working with local organizations to try and get resources around historic resource preservation,” he said. “We’re concerned that any potential harm or more work done to the river is going to make our job as an organization harder to protect the cultural resources that we have. Based on the assessments and our conversations with those we’ve consulted with, it’s not going to get better. It’s going to get worse.”

Dark Branch is a member of the National Park Service’s Reconstruction Era National Historic Network.

According to the Division of State Historic Sites, the Dark Branch Community Historic District was added to the National Historic Preservation Study List in 2024.

Sites that make that list are good potential candidates for the National Register.

The association continues to pursue a nomination for the National Register of Historic Places.

The Dark Branch community lies within the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor, which encompasses 12,000 square miles of coastal area that runs up the southern Atlantic Coast from St. John’s County, Florida, to Pender County.

The corridor links places of historic significance to the Gullah Geechee, West Africans torn from their native land and enslaved on plantations along the southern Atlantic Coast, and tells stories of their lives on the plantations and in the coastal plains after abolition.

Efforts are underway to build the North Carolina Gullah Geechee Greenway Blueway Heritage Trail that will run from Navassa to Southport.

Last summer, the North Carolina General Assembly authorized the trail’s construction.

Veronica Carter, chairwoman of the heritage trail and member of the Leland Town Council, also raised concerns about how the proposed project might affect land within the trail. Carter is also board member with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review.

“Deepening the Cape Fear River will negatively impact our culturally significant, state-established North Carolina Gullah Geechee Blueway portion of our trail by increasing saltwater intrusion, worsening erosion, and degrading water quality, thereby threatening sensitive habitats,” she wrote Col. Brad Morgan, the Corps’ Wilmington District commander.

The Corps acknowledges that “more surveys are needed to determine the presence of additional historic and cultural properties within the study area,” Cayton said by email. “We have already included conservative cost estimates for this work, based on known resources identified within Wilmington Harbor and experiences at other similar projects, to ensure these resources are properly managed and respected.”

A preliminary study conducted by the North Carolina Division of Water Resources found PFAS in soil, wastewater and biosolid samples collected at sites across the state.

The study assessing concentrations of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances in biosolids concludes that a majority of those substances entering wastewater treatment plants are discharged into waterways, “as compared with the amount entering the environment through land application biosolids,” according to a Department of Environmental Quality release.

Biosolids are the nutrient-rich organic material that remains after wastewater has been treated. The material is typically used as a fertilizer.

The study is the first that the division has conducted assessing PFAS concentrations in biosolids across the state.

Division staff began gathering samples in 2023 to evaluate PFAS concentrations in wastewater and biosolids from 37 municipal, industrial and domestic wastewater treatment facilities. Soil samples were also collected from 19 fields regulated under non-discharge permits.

Wastewater treatment facilities can receive PFAS, which are a group of man-made chemicals used to make a host of commercial, industrial and consumer products, from residential, commercial and industrial sources.

“The study represents a first step for DEQ to begin to understand PFAS concentrations in wastewater and biosolids in our state,” Julie Grzyb, the division’s deputy director, stated in a release. “The study was based on a small sample size and was limited in scope, but it underscores the importance of characterizing and controlling PFAS contamination at the source.”

The study did not assess how these chemicals in biosolids move in the environment.

DEQ estimates that 3.5 million North Carolinians drink tap water that contains PFAS levels above the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency health-based standard scheduled that was to initially go into effect in 2029.

The Trump administration’s EPA announced last year that it would extend the deadline for public water treatment plants to come into compliance with the federally established limits for two legacy PFAS – PFOA and PFOS to 2031. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin also announced plans to rescind regulations and reconsider regulatory determination for other PFAS, including GenX.

North Carolina does not have state regulatory requirements for PFAS in biosolids.

“The study will inform future study design and identify opportunities for further data collection and analysis,” the release states.

More than 4,000 gallons of untreated wastewater was discharged Friday because of a valve leakage in Ocean Isle Beach, Brunswick County Public Utilities reported Monday.

The sanitary sewer overflow was discovered around noon Friday near 6576 Summerfield Place. Staff determined a force main isolation valve failure was the source of the discharge. The repairs that began at 12:15 p.m. Friday took a little less than an hour to complete, officials explained.

The county said around 4,444 gallons were discharged, enough to fill up a large, above-ground pool, and reached a tributary to Saw Pit Swamp. Downstream sampling and remediation of the affected site has been completed.

The legally required notice released Monday states that no action is required by the public at this time. Additional information will be provided if action is necessary.

Coastal oceanographer Dr. Reide Corbett will speak later this week on how the Outer Banks are changing during the first OBX Green Drinks of the year.

He is to give his talk, “Science, Shorelines, and Tradeoffs: Understanding What’s Happening Along the Outer Banks Coast,” at 6 p.m. Thursday at Waverider’s in Nags Head. The program is offered at no charge, food and drinks are available for purchase.

Corbett is the executive director of the Coastal Studies Institute and dean of Integrated Coastal Programs, both at East Carolina University Outer Banks campus in Wanchese, and professor in the Department of Coastal Studies at East Carolina University.

Corbett will explain what the science is showing about shoreline change, coastal dynamics, and the tradeoffs that come with decisions about managing and protecting the coast.

OBX Green Drinks is a monthly speaker series held October through March at Waverider’s in Nags Head. Organized by the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, the program brings together the Outer Banks community for an evening of networking, presentations on local environmental topics, and enjoying good food and drink.

Proposed rules that would require industrial polluters to monitor and minimize their discharges of some chemical compounds into drinking water sources may soon go out for public comment.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission is scheduled to vote this week on whether to approve proceeding to public notice and hearing proposed monitoring and minimization rules for direct dischargers of three types of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances into the state’s surface waters.

Under the proposed rule, all major and minor industrial direct dischargers, and significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works, would be required to monitor and implement “minimization activities required to eliminate or significantly reduce” discharges of PFOS, PFOA, and GenX anywhere between three and five years, according to the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.

Discharge limits for those specific PFAS have yet to be determined.

PFAS exposure has been linked to a number of adverse health impacts to people, including thyroid disease, increased cholesterol, liver damage, and different types of cancers.

The commission will also consider whether to proceed to public notice and hearing proposed 1,4-dioxane monitoring and minimization rules, which would target industries likely to discharge the organic synthetic chemical the Environmental Protection Agency classifies as a likely human carcinogen.

Critics of the proposed rules argue the rules lack any real enforcement because they do not include discharge limits or penalties for industries that increase their discharges.

Various committees of the commission are scheduled to meet beginning at 9 a.m. Wednesday in the ground floor hearing room of the Archdale Building, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh. Those meetings will also be livestreamed on WebEx.

The full commission is scheduled to meet at the same location 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. Thursday. The meeting will also be livestreamed.

The two agencies that enforce the Clean Water Act have proposed changes to the waterbodies considered jurisdictional, or under federal protection, and the deadline for the public to comment is here.

The Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers published on Nov. 20 in the Federal Register the “Updated Definition of ‘Waters of the United States,’” opening the public comment period that ends 11:59 p.m. Monday, Jan. 5. Information on how to submit comments is on the EPA website.

The agencies said the proposed rule revises “the regulations defining the scope of waters federally covered under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, as amended, also known as the Clean Water Act, in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency.”

The agencies argue that their proposed amendments to the “waters of the United States” definition when finalized, will provide clarity and align with the Supreme Court’s opinion in the Sackett case that the “Clean Water Act extends to relatively permanent bodies of water connected to traditional navigable waters and wetlands with a continuous surface connection to those waters ‘so that there is no clear demarcation between “waters” and wetlands.’”

Environmental organizations argue that the proposed changes will gut basic water quality protections, which were already compromised by the 2023 Supreme Court decision on Sackett v. EPA that essentially left nontidal wetlands without protection. Nontidal wetlands are usually in floodplains along rivers and streams, in isolated depressions surrounded by dry land, along the margins of lakes and ponds, and in other low-lying areas where the groundwater intercepts the soil surface or where precipitation sufficiently saturates the soil, according to the EPA.

“When it comes to the definition of ‘waters of the United States,’ EPA has an important responsibility to protect water resources while setting clear and practical rules of the road that accelerate economic growth and opportunity,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a Nov. 17 press release. “EPA is delivering on President Trump’s promise to finalize a revised definition for WOTUS that protects the nation’s navigable waters from pollution, advances cooperative federalism by empowering states, and will result in economic growth across the country.”

Environmental Defense Fund Coasts and Watersheds Science Senior Manager Dr. Adam Gold told Coastal Review that the “proposed rule could increase the pace of wetlands loss and lead to more flooding impacts for communities. Wetlands loss increases downstream flooding impacts, and at the same time, any new infrastructure built in former wetlands is also at increased flood risk.”

Under the agencies’ proposed rule, the term “waters of the United States” would include “(1) traditional navigable waters and the territorial seas; (2) most impoundments of “waters of the United States;” (3) relatively permanent tributaries of traditional navigable waters, the territorial seas, and impoundments; (4) wetlands adjacent (i.e., having a continuous surface connection) to traditional navigable waters, impoundments, and tributaries; and (5) lakes and ponds that are relatively permanent and have a continuous surface connection to a traditional navigable water, the territorial seas, or a tributary.”

The difference between the existing rule and proposed is that the existing rule includes an interstate waters category and the word “interstate” is in front of the lakes and ponds category. The agencies propose deleting both.

The agencies also recommend revising the existing exclusions from the Clean Water Act permitting process for waste treatment systems, prior converted cropland and ditches, and adding an exclusion for groundwater, as well as definitions for “continuous surface connection,” “ditch,” “prior converted cropland,” “relatively permanent,” “tributary,” “and waste treatment system.”

Carolina Wetlands Association Executive Director Rick Savage also has concerns about the flooding that could be unleashed on communities if these proposed changes go through, and the damage to water quality.

He said communities are going to see developers take wetlands without a permit.

“These wetlands are often buffers against flood waters. if they are developed then guess what happens? The flood waters just go inland to the community,” Savage said, adding that water quality could suffer as well, because of the potential for more pollution to pass into streams.”

North Carolina Sierra Club Deputy Director Erin Carey told Coastal Review that ultimately, “the American public should be very concerned that the federal agency tasked with ensuring clean water, clean air, and the protection of our natural environment seems determined to undermine that responsibility. With this proposed change, the EPA claims to seek clarity in regulation, but this rule would serve only to allow industry to profit from environmental destruction, and the ruination of our natural resources.”

Gold said that according to the fund’s analysis published September 2024 in Science that modeled different interpretations of the Sackett decision, the modeled scenario that best aligns with the proposed rule open for public comment now would result in 82 million acres, or 91%, of nontidal wetlands in the contiguous United States estimated to be without Clean Water Act protections. 

About WOTUS, Sackett decision

The Clean Water Act is the revised and restructured Federal Water Pollution Control Act, enacted in 1948 to protect waterways that are used for or could be used for commerce.

“The 1972 amendments to the Clean Water Act established federal jurisdiction over ‘navigable waters,’ defined in the Act as the ‘waters of the United States,’” according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

But that’s as far as the definition goes, leaving the two agencies that jointly enforce the regulations to define the term under statute, and have had to determine what geographical features such as wetlands, streams and rivers fall under “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS, and, therefore, under federal protection under the Clean Water Act.    

In the decades since, that definition has undergone several amendments, most recently in 2023 to conform to the Supreme Court’s Sackett decision.

The Sacketts are an Idaho couple who were fined by the EPA for backfilling wetlands on their property near Priest Lake. The Sacketts filed a lawsuit asserting that the wetlands were not directly connected to the lake, a navigable body of water protected by the Clean Water Act. Justices ruled in favor of the couple and put parameters on “waters of the United States.”

Justices state in the May 2023 majority opinion that the Clean Water Act’s use of “waters” only refers to geographical features described in everyday language streams, oceans, rivers, and lakes “and to adjacent wetlands that are ‘indistinguishable’ from those bodies of water due to a continuous surface connection.”

The ruling narrowed the definition of “waters of the United States, stripping away protection under the Clean Water Act for isolated wetlands, or those without an obvious connection to navigable waters.

The two federal agencies, under the Biden administration at the time, had published a revised definition in January 2023 that was then amended that September to conform to Sackett.

Shortly after the second Trump administration took office, the agencies began a campaign to change the amended 2023 WOTUS that it called “overly broad” in a news release Monday and “failing to fully implement the Supreme Court’s decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency.”

Savage explained that the Clean Water Act, passed in 1972, was based on relationships with navigable waters. Then in 1977, the Corps of Engineers came up with the wetlands definition manual, which set the process for how wetlands were defined, based on hydrology, hydrophilic vegetation and hydric soils.

“During that time, almost any wetland was protected because you could find some relationship to​ a navigable water, even if it’s over land, but now you know that’s all changing,” he said, and the reason it started changing was because the Supreme Court got involved.

“That was in 2006 and ever since then, it is going around and around and up and down and through. You know, nobody knows what the rules are half the time. I mean, there’s been a couple of times where half the states were under one set of rules and the other half are under another set of rules because of litigation,” Savage said.

On the state level

Savage said regarding the proposed rule change that there’s two ways to look at it: the federal level and the state level.

“Right now, as far as North Carolina is concerned, it’s not looking good, period,” he said, because of the Farm Bill that made state and federal regulations to protect wetlands the same.

During summer 2023, the General Assembly approved language in Senate Bill 582, often called the Farm Bill, to align the state’s definition of wetlands with the federal. The definition reads: “Wetlands are classified as waters of the State are restricted to waters of the United States as defined by” the Army Corps and EPA.

Savage said he’d heard that a few legislators were starting to reconsider the move, and he said part of it is because the state government is funneling millions of dollars to use nature-based solutions, like wetlands, to mitigate flooding issues. “However, what the heck is this about, not wanting to protect the very resources we need to use to protect our communities? And I think that might be having a little bit of an effect.”

Savage said they’re working with the Southern Environmental Law Center and other groups to make changes, but there’s not a lot that can be done at the state level in North Carolina because of Dillon’s rule, which means that local governments only have as much power as the state specifically allows.

“Anything a locality may want to do to protect wetlands, the state legislature can immediately overturn it” via legislation, Savage said. “So, it’s not a lot that can be done there.”

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Mark Sabath told Coastal Review in an earlier interview that, while this proposed rule reduces federal protections, states and tribes still have authority to protect waters, and can fill the void in protecting these resources that the federal government is leaving behind.

Sabath said in some situations, it’s not a possibility because of not having the resources, “and there are examples occasionally of states that do their best to try to fill that gap. But much more often, we see the opposite, like in North Carolina.”

Savage clarified his point in noting that, just because the wetland is not considered protected by the Clean Water Act, it is still a wetland.

“Some people think if it’s not jurisdiction​al, then it’s not a wetland. No, it’s just not a jurisdictional wetland. It’s still a wetland. It meets the Army Corps of Engineers’ definition of a wetland, which is heavily based on science,” Savage said. “I think it’s important to make that distinction. We have jurisdictional wetlands that are protected, and the definition of jurisdictional wetlands is getting tighter and tighter and tighter, so that most of our wetlands are no longer jurisdictional, right? Therefore, they’re not protected, but they’re still wetlands, right? And that’s why we still have to be concerned about them.”

The EPA and Corps committed in a Dec. 22 press release to consider the public input received in developing a final rule.

Cape Fear River Watch is kicking off its First Saturday Seminar series for the New Year with a discussion about the potential impacts of a Piedmont town’s request to permanently pull millions of gallons of water a day from the Cape Fear River.

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Kenneth Waldroup will discuss how Fuquay-Varina’s request to transfer 6.17 million gallons per day from the Cape Fear River Basin to the Neuse River Basin could impact the region, and how local leaders are responding.

An update on major CFPUA projects, including the Southside Water Reclamation Facility, will also be provided.

The event will begin at 8 a.m. Jan. 3 with a pancake breakfast, following by the presentation at 9 a.m. at 617 Surry St., Wilmington.

Those interested in attending the seminar are encouraged to arrive early as seating is limited.

Cape Fear River Watch will have postcards available at the seminar for anyone who is interested in writing comments about Fuquay-Varina’s proposal.

The organization will send those postcards to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, which is accepting public comments on the proposal through April 1.

Comments may be submitted to Maya Holcomb, Division of Water Resources, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh, NC, 27604, or by email to maya.holcomb@deq.nc.gov.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality has suffered the highest percentage of staff cuts of any state, with nearly one-third of its workforce eliminated between 2010 and 2024, according to an environmental watchdog group.

A whopping 32%, or 386 DEQ staff positions, were wiped out during that 14-year period, according to an Environmental Integrity Project report released earlier this month.

Those staff cuts, the report concludes, leave the state agency responsible for administering regulations to protect water, air quality and the public’s health “ill-positioned to confront” pollution from the state’s growing factory farming industry, climate-driven storms and flooding in coastal communities.

The report notes how the agency was downsized when former Gov. Pat McCrory signed the 2015-16 state budget into law, triggering a shift of several divisions from what was then the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

The Republican governor, who also renamed the agency the Department of Environmental Quality, said the move aligned with his vision for government efficiency.

Josh Kastrinsky, DEQ’s deputy communications director, said in an email last week that it is “difficult” to directly compare present staffing levels to those in 2010 because of the changes that were made to the department in 2015.

“However, for several regulatory divisions that existed in 2010 and 2025, staffing levels declined by at least 25%,” he wrote, adding that, “The EIP report focuses on regulatory work and does not include DEQ’s non-regulatory work, which affects the total numbers of staff shown.”

As of the week that began Dec. 8, the departments vacancy rate was 8%, Kastrinsky said.

“This includes an engineer vacancy rate of 14% and an environmental specialist vacancy rate of 9%,” he said. “Several DEQ programs have larger workloads and several programs have less staff than they did in 2010.”

North Carolina’s population has increased by more than 11.5% since 2010, according to USAFacts, a nonprofit organization that gathers data from federal, state and local governments.

The state’s population growth corresponds to an increase in environmental permit applications filed with the department.

Since 2010, the department’s Division of Mitigation Services has seen a 200% increase in projects.

During that same time period, the number of erosion and sediment control project applicants filed with the Division of Energy, Mineral, and Land Resources has jumped by nearly 60%, and the Division of Waste Management has received a 62% increase in underground storage tank applications.

“The 2010-2025 period also includes several destructive hurricanes, and DEQ staff have been heavily involved in recovery and long-term resilience in impacted communities,” Kastrinsky said. “DEQ’s ability to hire and retain sufficient staff levels has a direct effect on its ability to provide permit oversight, technical assistance to businesses and customer service to North Carolinians.”

The department’s “roughly 1,700 staff members remain dedicated to providing science-based efforts to ensure clean air, water and lands by managing applications, conducting inspections and permit oversight, investigating complaints and taking enforcement measures as appropriate under law,” he continued. “DEQ also continues to focus on a variety of funding and assistance programs to maintain critical infrastructure and make communities’ aging systems more resilient to increasingly severe natural disasters.”

The Environmental Integrity Program analyzed the budgets, annual expenditures and staffing levels from 2010 through to 2024 of the environmental agencies of all 50 states.

North Carolina topped the list of 31 states found to have cut jobs at their environmental agencies from 2010 to 2024. Connecticut experienced a 26% cut during that same time, followed closely by Arizona, which saw a 25% reduction in its environmental agency’s staff.

Seven states, including Texas, Mississippi, South Dakota, and Connecticut, reduced their pollution control funding by at least a third, the report concludes.

The impacts of such cuts will likely only be exacerbated by the Trump Administration’s plans to downsize the Environmental Protection Agency, the program warns.

“The Trump Administration is attempting to dismantle EPA and rollback commonsense federal pollution rules, claiming that the states can pick up the slack and protect our communities – but that’s not the case,” Jen Duggan, Environmental Integrity Project executive director, stated in a release. “The implementation of our environmental laws depend on both a strong EPA and state agencies that have the resources they need to do their jobs. But our research found that many states have already cut their pollution control agencies and so more cuts at the federal level will only put more Americans at risk.”

The report highlights North Carolina’s factory farming industry, which includes the production of nearly 1 billion chickens annually for sale as meat. And, as of March, there were 8.1 million hogs in concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, in the state.

Poultry waste at these CAFOs is sometimes dumped in open-air heaps and, when it rains, washes into nearby streams, discharging harmful nutrients into waters downstream, including those in the Cape Fear River Basin, which has the highest density of CAFOs in the world, according to Cape Fear River Watch.

“The unchecked expansion of hog and poultry farms has left the state environmental agency unable to even evaluate the cumulative impacts,” Drew Ball, director of Natural Resources Defense Council’s Southeast Campaigns team, states in the report. “At this point, policy experts and advocates can’t even get the information they need to protect the public. You can’t respond if you don’t know what’s coming online. We need to think a lot harder about keeping track of potential pollution and what it could mean for downstream communities.”

Coastal Review will not publish Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in observance of the Christmas holiday.

More than 100,000 gallons of untreated wastewater is estimated to have been released over this past weekend into a major tributary in Jacksonville.

City crews worked throughout Saturday evening after being notified of and finding a broken stormwater pipe and sewer line near Lejeune Boulevard, which is also Highway 24, near Scales Creek, according to a release.

An estimated 129,000 gallons of untreated wastewater is believed to have been discharged into the creek, which flows directly into the New River.

Crews “will continue work over next several days to fix the issue,” the release states.

Motorists on Lejeune Boulevard are being asked to slow down and use caution in the area where crews are working.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources was notified Saturday about the discharge “and is reviewing the matter,” according to the release.

An aggregates and heavy building materials supply company has received a revised permit to release millions of gallons per day of mine dewatering and stormwater discharge into unnamed tributaries of Blounts Creek.

The North Carolina Division of Water Resources issued Martin Marietta Inc.’s Vanceboro Quarry a revised wastewater discharge permit on Wednesday, according to a release.

“The revised permit requires an assessment of biological integrity, or the condition of the organisms such as fish and insects in a waterway, once every two years through sampling for benthos, or small aquatic organisms that live in water, with the first sampling event to occur between Feb. 1 through March 15, after the discharge begins,” the release states.

The permit also requires the company to monitor monthly for pH levels, total suspended solids and turbidity in the discharge, or effluent, from the mine.

The permit allows for the discharge of 12 million gallons per day from two outfalls into unnamed tributaries of the creek, which is classified as a Class C, swamp, nutrient sensitive waterbody in the Tar-Pamlico River Basin.

Waterways classified as Class C are protected for uses that include aquatic life survival and fish and wildlife maintenance, and agricultural and recreation such as wading or boating.

The division initially approved a permit to the company last February, then rescinded the permit following the March ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court, which sided with San Francisco’s challenge to water quality regulations issued by the Environmental Protection Agency.

The two federal branches that enforce the Clean Water Act last month pitched changes to the “waters of the United States” definition, which establishes the types of waterbodies that are federally protected against pollution, and if these amendments pass as written, conservation groups fear millions of acres of nontidal wetlands will be left vulnerable.

The Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers have for decades had the authority to regulate “navigable waters,” which means “the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas,” as written in the 1948 Federal Water Pollution Control Act. Expanded in the 1970s, the measure is typically referred to as the Clean Water Act.

The EPA explains on its website that the Clean Water Act “establishes the basic structure for regulating discharges of pollutants into the waters of the United States and regulating quality standards for surface waters.”

One thing the Clean Water Act doesn’t do is clearly define “waters of the United States.” The EPA calls it a “threshold term in the Clean Water Act and establishes the geographic scope of federal jurisdiction under the Act.”

EPA and Army leadership announced Nov. 17 plans to update the definition, which has been the subject of lawsuits and years’ worth of arguments.

The “Updated Definition of ‘’Waters of the United States’’’ was published Nov. 20 in the Federal Register, launching a 45-day comment period on the proposed changes that closes Jan. 5.  A virtual public meeting is scheduled for 12:30 to 4 p.m. Tuesday, with a 2-2:30 p.m. break. Attendees must register online to speak by 5 p.m. Monday. To listen only, register by the start of the meeting.

This latest attempt, which would exclude isolated wetlands, is directly linked to the Supreme Court’s May 2023 Sackett v. EPA decision. The Sacketts are an Idaho couple fined in the late 2000s for backfilling a section of their property that the EPA considered wetlands.

Judges ruled in the final opinion on the case that the “(Clean Water Act)’s use of ‘waters’” only refers to geographical features described in everyday language “as ‘streams, oceans, rivers and lakes’ and to adjacent wetlands that are ‘indistinguishable’ from those bodies of water due to a continuous surface connection.”

Earlier that year, the EPA had finalized a “Revised Definition of ‘Waters of the United States'” rule that took effect March 20, 2023, and which the Sackett case invalidated. In August 2023, the EPA and Army Corps issued an amendment to align the rule with the Sackett decision.

That final conforming rule is what the EPA and Army Corps leadership are proposing to amend.

The agencies argue that the change “would fully implement” the Supreme Court’s ruling “by ensuring federal jurisdiction is focused on relatively permanent, standing or continuously flowing bodies of water—such as streams, oceans, rivers, and lakes—and wetlands that are connected and indistinguishable from such waterbodies.”

With this proposed rule, the agencies explain in the docket, they “intend to provide greater regulatory certainty and increase Clean Water Act program predictability and consistency by clarifying the definition of ‘waters of the United States.’ This proposed rule is also intended to implement the overall objective of the Clean Water Act to restore and maintain the quality of the Nation’s waters while respecting State and Tribal authority over their own land and water resources.”

Environmental groups argued then, when the Sackett case was ruled, and still maintain that by removing protections from the millions of acres of nontidal wetlands, there will be consequences: Water quality will be jeopardized and flooding will increase, to name just two.

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Mark Sabath said in an interview that for 50 years, the Clean Water Act has been the strongest and best federal protection for many of the waters and wetlands around the country.

The law does that “by saying you can’t pollute, you can’t fill, you can’t destroy certain features, certain waters, without a permit,” Sabath said, and the permitting process means that there are certain protections and controls you have to apply to minimize the amount of destruction.

Sabath added that a number of features of the Clean Water Act are dependent on the type of water, and, in addressing its critics, not every puddle in the country covered by the act.

“It’s only things that meet the definition of waters of the United States, and that isn’t defined in the statute itself,” Sabath continued. “Congress didn’t define it, so EPA and the Army Corps, in a series of rules over the years, have tried to define exactly what wetlands are and aren’t covered by the Clean Water Act.”

This proposed rule is the latest revision and it is “by far the most narrow, the most extreme definition,” Sabath continued. “It includes the fewest number of streams and wetlands and other waters of any interpretation of ‘waters the United States’ that we’ve seen.”

North Carolina Wildlife Federation Conservation Policy Vice President Manley Fuller told Coastal Review that with this proposed rule, the bottom line is a massive loss of protection of waters of the United States, which are vital habitats for fish and wildlife.

“This will also negatively affect hunting and fishing, which are a significant part of our natural resource-based economy,” he continued. “Wetlands are also buffers for the built environment and help reduce downstream flooding. Protecting clean waters and wetlands is extremely popular with the public for many reasons and we need to strengthen rather than weaken these programs.”

North Carolina Sierra Club Deputy Director Erin Carey told Coastal Review the rule will effectively remove federal protections from at least 80% of wetlands and over 5 million miles of streams across the country.

“This rule will open millions of acres of wetlands to the threat of development, leaving communities already vulnerable to flooding without the frontline protection afforded by these invaluable habitats. Wetlands act as filters for floodwaters and other runoff, making them critical not only to flood mitigation, but to the preservation of clean water resources,” Carey said.

Environmental Defense Fund Coasts and Watersheds Science Senior Manager Dr. Adam Gold pointed out as well that if the proposed rule is implemented as written, nearly all nontidal wetlands and intermittent streams could be without Clean Water Act protections in North Carolina and across the United States.

While there are many changes in the proposed rule, the most notable are to the definitions of “relative permanence” of waters and a “continuous surface connection” for wetlands, Gold said, adding that the proposed language introduces the concept of a “wet season.”

“Under the proposed rule, wetlands and waters would only receive Clean Water Act protections if they have surface water throughout the ‘wet season,’ described in the rule as ‘an extended period where there is continuous surface hydrology resulting from predictable seasonal precipitation patterns year after year,’” Gold said. “This proposed rule would make it easier to drain or develop wetlands that do not meet the ‘wet season’ surface water requirement, putting our wetlands and the benefits they provide at serious risk.”

In North Carolina, the impact of the proposed rule is 3.2 million acres, or about 88%, of nontidal wetlands estimated to be without Clean Water Act protections. “Importantly, this analysis relies on wetland ‘wetness’ during the growing season, but the proposed rule uses the ‘wet season,’” Gold said.

About the wet season, Gold continued, there are “fundamental issues with the proposed rule’s ‘wet season’ dataset.”

He said the classification of the “wet season” comes from the Army Corps of Engineers Antecedent Precipitation Tool, but the underlying data this tool relies on is modeled using the average monthly temperature and precipitation between 1950 and 1999. The modeled dataset was published in 2001 and does not use the best-available methods.

“The agencies proposed ‘wet season’ dataset classifies most of the year, and in some cases the entire year, as ‘wet’ for much of coastal North Carolina. So, under this proposed rule, wetlands or streams in Jacksonville would need to have surface water year-round (the whole year is classified as ‘wet’) to have Clean Water Act protections. For New Bern, the ‘wet season’ is 11 months, and for Wilmington or Brunswick County, the ‘wet season’ is 10 months.”

Gold said the proposed rule “which could essentially remove nontidal wetland and intermittent waters from the Clean Water Act, does not align with the goal of the Clean Water Act to ‘restore and maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation’s waters.’ Science shows us that all wetlands, regardless of how ‘wet’ they are, clean our water, provide critical wildlife habitat, and reduce downstream flooding impacts.”

The EPA and Corps also asserted the week the proposed changes were announced that the new rules would provide “the regulatory certainty needed to support our nation’s farmers who feed and fuel the world and advance EPA’s Powering the Great American Comeback initiative.”

Sabath noted that the idea that this will have huge benefits for farming and for farmers is a common refrain when they’re restricting the protections of the Clean Water Act, “but the Clean Water Act actually exempts most farming activities from coverage already, so you don’t need to get a permit for doing regular farming activities, even when they would affect a wetland or stream that would otherwise be covered.”

The idea that this is a huge benefit for farmers is a nicer story, “because they don’t want to say, well, this is a huge benefit for large industrial facilities, industrial polluters, developers,” Sabath said.

Carey sees the proposed rule as demonstrating “that the EPA has abdicated its mandated responsibility to protect the environment and the people who depend on it. Even worse, the agency appears eager to sacrifice our natural resources on the altar of corporate greed.”

The public should be “very concerned that the federal agency tasked with ensuring clean water, clean air, and the protection of our natural environment seems determined to undermine that responsibility. With this proposed change, the EPA claims to seek clarity in regulation, but this rule would serve only to allow industry to profit from environmental destruction, and the ruination of our natural resources,” she added.

White Oak Waterkeeper Riley Lewis said in a statement that the EPA’s new definition of Waters of the United States ignores decades of scientific understanding and generations of Indigenous knowledge.

“By redefining wetlands using ambiguous criteria seemingly designed to maximize developable land and reduce regulatory barriers, the agency is turning a blind eye to the very real, very predictable impacts on our communities,” Lewis said. “Water will continue to move beneath our feet through groundwater and across the landscape during storms, regardless of a federal definition or a construction permit. This rule sets Americans up for flooding, damaged infrastructure, and increased pollution in the waters we rely on for our drinking supply, our food, and our way of life.”

So, why does this actually matter to the public? Sabath said it does in a few ways.

In North Carolina, people who hunt, fish and paddle use wetlands directly and those might be impacted by being destroyed or polluted without a permit.

“Anyone who is in a community that floods during extreme weather, and we all know that that’s happening more and more now, or that’s at risk of flooding,” Sabath said. By losing those wetlands, you lose their ability to protect communities from flooding, and that comes more often now from extreme weather.

“It’s a double whammy. You’re losing the benefits that they provide, and you’re probably creating more problems,” and more potential pollution or channels of pollution at the same time by replacing wetlands, natural areas with pavement or developed areas, he said.

With wetlands being a “good natural sponge” that can absorb huge amounts of water, “if anything, we should be trying to expand wetland coverage rather than take it away, Sabath said.

“In short,” Carey with the Sierra Club continued, “communities will watch rivers and streams in their communities fall victim to unchecked pollution. Without federal protections, industry will discharge and develop at will, destroying habitats, water quality, and flood protection measures as they go. The wetlands and streams of this country belong to all people, not just those who seek to exploit them.”

A Piedmont town’s request to permanently pull millions of gallons of water a day from the Cape Fear River would raise the risk of water shortages during periods of drought, undercut utilities’ ability to keep up with growing demand, and result in higher levels of contamination in the raw drinking water source for downstream communities, opponents of the plan say.

Of the dozen people who spoke Tuesday night during a public hearing in Raleigh, none supported Fuquay-Varina’s call for transferring 6.17 million gallons per day from the Cape Fear River Basin to the Neuse River Basin to meet that town’s projected water demands.

Similar opposition was expressed during a hearing held in Fayetteville last week by the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission and the state Division of Water Resources. A third hearing was scheduled to be held Thursday in Pittsboro.

Both elected officials and heads of public utilities in the lower Cape Fear region on Tuesday continued pressing the commission and division to host a public hearing in that area.

“None of the hearings for the Fuquay-Varina request are being held in the lower Cape Fear region, even though our communities will feel the downstream impacts,” said New Hanover County Commissioner Rob Zapple. “Residents in the city of Wilmington and the counties of New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender would have to spend four to five hours on the road just to attend the public hearing. Most residents simply cannot do that. Holding a hearing in the lower Cape Fear region in Wilmington would reduce frustration, encourage public trust, and allow our communities to be hearing in a constructive manner.”

As of Wednesday, more than 20 counties, municipalities, environmental organizations, businesses and drinking water providers have adopted resolutions opposing Fuquay-Varina’s request for an interbasin transfer certificate, or IBT.

Officials in Fuquay-Varina, which is about 30 miles south of Raleigh, project that the amount of water the town currently buys from the capital city, and Harnett and Johnston counties will fall short of demand by 2030.

Under the proposed preferred alternative identified in a draft environmental impact statement for the IBT, the town would source its entire water supply from a water treatment plant in Sanford, which is in the Cape Fear River Basin.

Once water pulled from the Cape Fear River is used by residents and businesses within the town, the treated wastewater would be discharged into the Neuse River Basin. This would permanently subtract more than 6 million gallons each day from the river flow that currently sources more than 500,000 residents with drinking water.

“We have absolutely no problem with Fuquay-Varina wanting to continue with their development,” Zapple said. “But if you take the water, just return it. That’s all. That’s the way the system works. And, if it costs more, well maybe that’s the price of doing business. We need our development down in the lower Cape Fear region as well and we can’t afford to lose 6.17 million gallons a day.”

The Cape Fear River is Brunswick County’s “primary and only reliable water source,” said Christopher Giesting, Brunswick County Public Utilities deputy director of water operations.

The utility supplies drinking water to 19 municipalities and serves more than 350,000 residents and seasonal visitors.

Giesting said that Brunswick County has invested more than $183 million to expand its Northwest Water Treatment Plant and upgrade to a reverse osmosis system designed to remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, discharged into the river by upstream polluters.

“These investments were made with the expectation that the full safe yield of the Cape Fear River at the intake would remain available,” he said. “Any IBT that removes water without returning it means that safe yield volume is reduced, ultimately making these major infrastructure investments unable to function as planned and designed. Our county alone has more than 50,000 planned housing units already built, under construction, or in the works. Without reliable access to the full safe yield of the Cape Fear, we cannot meet future water demands for these communities.”

The IBT proposal also threatens water quality, Giesting continued, because the requested daily transfer would lessen the amount of water available to dilute contaminants, including PFAS and 1,4-dioxane, discharged by upstream polluters.

The Lower Cape Fear Water and Sewer Authority, which provides wholesale regional raw water to treatment facilities that serve more than 550,000 customers in a five-county area, has sourced from the Cape Fear River more than half a century.

Authority Executive Director Tim Holloman said the river is already being substantially used as a water resource in the region.

“For a river that’s already maxed, we just ask that that be considered. If the IBT is granted, that (water) be returned to the Cape Fear River Basin because the need is not going to go away. It’s only going to increase over time,” he said.

Fayetteville Public Works Commission Chief Executive Officer and General Manager Timothy Bryant said that the commission would be forced to spend millions more each year to ensure safe drinking water to its more than 250,000 customers.

“I would argue very strenuously that no one with any legitimacy can claim that removing over 6 million gallons of water per day isn’t a foreseeable detrimental effect on the river basin and the 900,000 downstream residents of North Carolina who depend on this water every day,” he said. “To be clear, growth in Fuquay-Varina should not come at the expense of other communities. There are multiple reasonable alternative options presented that are not only consistent with the intent and letter of North Carolina law, but also squarely place the cost burden on Fuquay-Varina and not the customers downstream of it.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Ken Waldroup asked that the Environmental Management Commission look into what he said are “critical technical shortcomings” associated with models presented by the town.

The commission will make the final determination on whether to grant Fuquay-Varina’s request.

If approved, the IBT would occur after 2031, according to the draft impact statement.

No announcement had been made at the time of this publication as to whether a public hearing will be held in the lower Cape Fear region.

More than 19,000 gallons of untreated wastewater is believed to have been discharged Monday from a break in a sewer main in Sunset Beach.

The sanitary sewer overflow was discovered near 7588 Wallace Place SW at around 11 a.m. on Monday, according to a Brunswick County release.

An investigation by Brunswick County Public Utilities staff determined the discharge came from a 1.5-inch vale and nipple failure on a low-pressure sewer line, according to the release. The line was repaired by 2:30 p.m.

About 19,641 gallons of untreated wastewater are believed to have been discharged as a result of the break. Of that, 11,641 gallons are believed to have reached an unnamed tributary to Calabash Creek, near the intersection of Montclair and Wallace Place SW in the Sea Trail subdivision, according to the release.

Samples and remediation downstream of the main break were completed and officials said additional information will be provided if further action is necessary.

Questions regarding the notice of the discharge may be directed to Art Barnhardt, Brunswick County Public Utilities’ environmental compliance officer, at 910-253-1757.

A district court judge has ruled that Chemours and its predecessor company cannot conceal thousands of pages of documents from the public.

The manufacturing giant failed to provide sufficient evidence the documents include commercially sensitive information that, if released, could competitively undermine the companies, Judge James Dever III concluded in his Dec. 3 ruling.

Information the companies requested to keep under seal are among 25,000 pages of documents lawyers representing public utilities and local governments downstream of Chemours’ Bladen County plant submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina as part of lawsuit those entities brought against the companies in October 2017.

Related: EPA seeks reporting rollback as new study finds hidden PFAS

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, or CFPUA, Brunswick County, Lower Cape Fear Water & Sewer Authority, and Wrightsville Beach aim to recover costs and damages associated with the Fayetteville Works’ plant’s discharges of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, for decades into the Cape Fear River. The river is a drinking water source for tens of thousands of residents.

PFAS are a group of more than 14,000 chemicals used in everyday consumer products including food containers, stain-resistant carpet and water-repellant gear. These human-made chemical compounds are persistent in the environment and have been found to accumulate in humans and animals. Exposure to these substances has been linked to weakened immune function, reproductive and development issues and increased risk of some cancers.

Last February, attorneys for Chemours and its predecessor company DuPont filed a motion requesting that the court keep thousands of pages of those documents under seal, arguing information in those documents contain internal communications about chemical production that, if made public, could give a leg up to their competitors.

Dever denied that request. He also rejected a second motion by the companies’ attorneys seeking to keep from the public an April 2018 report of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency detailing its inspection the Fayetteville Works facility.

“Defendants’ second motion to seal fails for the same reason as defendant’s first motion to seal. Defendants provide insufficient evidence to demonstrate that sealing the [Toxic Substance Act Compliance Monitoring Inspection] report serves a compelling interest which outweighs the public’s right of access,” Dever wrote in his 13-page ruling.

A document’s “status as confidential or commercially sensitive alone does not justify its sealing,” he continued.

“We thank the Court for its wise ruling in denying the motion to seal,” Cammie Bellamy, CFPUA public information officer, said in an email responding to a request for comment. “CFPUA will oppose every attempt by Chemours to delay, obfuscate, and deny the public its right to access the facts of this case. The documents that Chemours and its codefendants wanted to hide from the public include records of its decades of wrongdoing. The people of Southeastern North Carolina deserve better. CFPUA continues to work to hold Chemours accountable for its decades of polluting of the Cape Fear River – the source water for 500,000 North Carolinians.”

Dever also denied requests submitted to the court last April by environmental and community organizations, and the NAACP New Hanover County Branch, to intervene in the case and object to the companies’ motion to keep the documents sealed, ruling those motions are moot.

The Southern Environmental Law Center filed a motion to intervene in the case on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch, the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, and the Environmental Justice Community Action Network.

“We think that this is absolutely the right outcome,” Jean Zhuang, a senior attorney with the center’s Chapel Hill office, said in a telephone interview Friday morning. “In this case, the companies have concealed decades of pollution in southeastern North Carolina and harmed drinking water from the Cape Fear River for 500,000 people.”

The release of the documents comes at a crucial time, she said, because Chemours wants to expand its production of vinyl ethers, which are a class of compounds used to create a variety of products used in a range of technologies from semiconductor chips to aviation components.

The company’s permit application for that expansion is under review by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.

“Chemours is expecting the public to just trust them while they are planning a massive expansion of their facility,” Zhuang said. “After all these decades of harm they have caused on North Carolina communities, secrecy is not an option anymore.”

Tests commissioned by the SELC and Cape Fear River Watch showed that Chemours is releasing “extremely high levels” of ultra-short chain PFAS, which are highly mobile and difficult to remove from raw drinking water, into the Cape Fear River.

The results of those tests, released last October, confirmed earlier test results published by CFPUA, which has spent tens of millions of dollars upgrading its Sweeney Water Treatment Plant in downtown Wilmington to filtrate PFAS from reaching its customers’ taps.

CFPUA officials, along with those from other downstream facilities, are calling on the state to enforce polluters to treat chemicals at the source and set enforceable limits in discharge permits.

Anne Harvey David, chief counsel for environmental justice for the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, which asked to intervene in the case on behalf of the NAACP New Hanover County Branch, said in a release, “An effort to conceal information that details with the health and safety of thousands of North Carolinians cannot go unchallenged. We are happy to see this decision in favor of protecting public access to these documents. Information and transparency around the extent of the pollution is fundamental for the health and safety of the impacted communities.”

NACCP New Hanover County Branch President LeRon Montgomery said last week’s ruling “is one win in a long battle for our community to live free from harmful contamination of our air and water,” according to the release.

“The importance of this decision goes far beyond who it will impact today,” he stated. “The pollution of the Cape Fear River will impact generations to come, but so will having access to this information.”

As of this publication, it was unclear when the documents would be made public or whether the companies’ attorneys would appeal the ruling.

Updated at 8 a.m. Thursday to include the link to the Federal Register, which published the proposed rules Thursday after the story posted, and public comment information.

The two federal agencies with jurisdiction over navigable waterways have published amendments to the existing “waters of the United States” rule that they say will “establish a clear, durable, common-sense definition” of the term, and a public comment period has opened.

The Environmental Protection Agency and Department of the Army’s changes have heightened worry among conservation groups that federal protections for isolated wetlands might be weakened further than they were soon after the 2023 Supreme Court decision that found wetlands must be connected by surface water to a navigable body of water to fall under the 1972 Clean Water Act.

The EPA and Army Corps of Engineers said in a release Monday that the newly proposed changes were to “fully implement the court’s direction by focusing on relatively permanent, standing or continuously flowing bodies of water—such as streams, oceans, rivers, and lakes—and wetlands that are connected and indistinguishable from such waterbodies.”

As part of the announcement, leadership posted the prepublication notice they planned to submit to the Federal Register, which was published Thursday, starting a 45-day public comment period.

Comments must be submitted by Jan. 5, 2026, and identified by Docket ID No. EPA–HQ– OW–2025–0322, through www.regulations.gov, by email to OW-Docket@epa.gov, or mail to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA Docket Center, Water Docket, Mail Code 28221T, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20460.

Language in the Clean Water Act states that the “term ‘navigable waters’ means the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.” However, the act doesn’t define what “waters of the United States,” or WOTUS, actually are, leaving the EPA and Corps to determine the geographic scope of the rule.

Over the last five decades, pushback and litigation have forced the two agencies to revise the definition several times.

The current regulatory definition, according to the EPA, was put in place in September 2023 to align with the May 2023 Supreme Court ruling on the Sackett v EPA lawsuit.

The Sacketts filed the lawsuit after the agency ordered the Idaho couple to restore where they had begun backfilling with dirt the section of their property that the EPA considered to be wetlands of a nearby navigable waterbody. The judges sided with the Sacketts that federally protected wetlands must have an obvious connection to waterbodies like streams, oceans, rivers and lakes.

To conform to the Sackett decision, the EPA and Army amended in September 2023 the latest final rule, which had been put in place that January.

EPA Secretary Lee Zeldin and Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works Adam Telle shared with Washington, D.C., lawmakers Monday afternoon an overview of the proposed rules.

“I know that across the country, news of today’s proposal is going to be met with a lot of relief and happiness from farmers, ranchers, other landowners, governments that have been looking for a simple, prescriptive definition that the whole country can operate off of, and would allow individuals to know whether or not there’s a ‘water of the United States’ without having to go hire an attorney or a consultant, having to pay someone to Tell them,” Zeldin said Monday during the announcement livestreamed on the EPA’s YouTube.

The EPA secretary explained that the proposal “includes practical, common-sense revisions that will make a real difference,” and adds definitions for what he called “key terms” such as “’relatively permanent,’ ‘continuous surface connection’ and ‘tributary’ to appropriately limit the scope of what is consistent with” the Sackett case.

“We’re establishing that jurisdictional tributaries must connect to traditional navigable waters, either directly or through other features that provide predictable and consistent flow. We’re adding a new exclusion for groundwater and revising exclusions for certain ditches prior converted cropland and waste treatment systems,” Zeldin continued. “We’re incorporating locally familiar terminology such as wet season to help determine whether a water body qualifies as WOTUS. And we’re strengthening state and tribal decision-making authority by providing clear regulatory guidelines while recognizing their expertise in local land and water resources.”

He explained that the proposed rules were developed based on input from multiple sources, including preproposal recommendations, docket information from nine public listening sessions and consultation comments from states, tribes and local governments.

Telle addressed the audience after Zeldin.

“Since 1972 Americans have struggled to understand what Congress meant when it included the term ‘waters of the United States’ in the Clean Water Act. Did it apply to them? Did it not? The definition of that term has been often abused, sometimes stretched beyond recognition over time, and it’s left Americans uncertain about whether they were complying with the Clean Water Act or not,” he said Monday, adding that “under President Trump’s leadership, the EPA and army Civil Works, which oversees the Corps of Engineers, are kicking off the formal process that will give American certainty about their property once and for all.”

Several Republican officials thanked Zeldin from the podium for initiating the proposed amendments including West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey who said that “for too long there’s been great deal of uncertainty” about the WOTUS rule.

“Unfortunately, it left many people holding the bag. Farmers, contractors, small business owners guessing whether their ephemeral stream or a backyard ditch was going to be classified as a waters of the United States rule and potentially subject them to significant penalties,” he continued.

Alabama Congressman Gary Palmer said he was confident that the rule will prioritize clean water while protecting farmers, ranchers, landowners and businesses alike.

Conservation groups have been vocal about these revisions opening up isolated wetlands to development and degradation since the announcement was made.

“Wetlands are the lifeblood of our coast, and should be held to the highest standards of protection,” North Carolina Coastal Federation Coastal Advocate Kerri Allen explained. “The wetlands most impacted by these proposed rollbacks are the very wetlands that hold water during storms and help protect downstream waters. With the proposed changes, our coast will face irrevocable damage that impacts not only our wildlife and fisheries, but also our coastal economy and communities.” The Coastal Federation publishes Coastal Review.

Southern Environmental Law Center Senior Attorney Mark Sabath said Monday in a statement that this proposed rule, if adopted, “could have catastrophic ramifications for communities already plagued by flooding, water quality concerns, and drinking water shortages. After critical, longstanding protections for clean water and wetlands were drastically narrowed by the Sackett decision, we need stronger protections, not weaker, to safeguard our communities and environment.”

League of Conservation Voters Healthy Communities Program Director Madeleine Foote had a similar reaction.

“The Trump administration’s Polluted Water Rule is another blatant giveaway to big corporate polluters that will jeopardize the waters that our families and communities rely on for drinking, recreation, and fueling our local economies,” Foote said.

“In 2023, the Supreme Court’s devastating Sackett decision stripped federal protections from millions of miles of streams and tens of millions of acres of wetlands, and now corporate polluters are pushing their friends in the administration to go even further in decimating our clean water safeguards. They won’t be happy until the Clean Water Act is nothing more than words on a page and they can pollute our waters with abandon,” Foote continued.

Environmental Defense Fund Associate Vice President Will McDow stated Monday that the new proposed WOTUS rule from the Trump administration that will redefine which wetlands and waters have Clean Water Act Protections. 

“We already spend billions annually responding to disasters that were created by building in risky areas. With today’s proposed WOTUS rule, commercial developers will be allowed to pave over wetlands to build unsafe housing that either floods or increases flooding to neighbors,” he continued. “This rule brings tremendous uncertainty and risk to our nation’s drinking water, flood protections and critical habitats. Based on our peer-reviewed analysis, new requirements for wetland protections could leave nearly all wetlands without Clean Water Act protections. Requirements in the new rule are not based in science, difficult to implement in practice and will create a dangerous lack of clarity.” 

The North Carolina Sedimentation Control Commission, during its meeting Thursday, is to consider continuing to give N.C. Department of Transpiration authority to review and approve erosion and sedimentation control plans for land-disturbing activities.

The meeting is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. Thursday in the Archdale Building in Raleigh. An agenda and supporting documents can be found on the commission webpage.

The public may attend in person or join online using the WebEx meeting link. The meeting number is 2429 642 9815 and the password is STOPMUD. Organizers ask those logging on to mute their audio and turn off the video when joining. To listen by phone, call 415-655-0003 and enter the meeting number 2429 642 9815.

The commission was created to administer the state’s Sedimentation Control Program in accordance with the  N.C. Sedimentation Pollution Control Act of 1973. The program is “to allow development within our state while preventing pollution by sedimentation,” the webpage explains.

In 1974, the commission and NCDOT came to an agreement that the transportation agency would be allowed to design, review, monitor and train for all aspects of the Erosion and Sedimentation Control Program. The agreement was reviewed and updated in 1991.

NCDOT submitted its annual summary that reviewed projects from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2025. The state sedimentation engineer based his report on that summary, and the recommendation that NCDOT continues to manage its erosion and sedimentation control program.

Commission members are scheduled to take action on updates and clarifications counsel provided to the memorandum of agreement between local governments and the commission.

Information items include an update on materials from the Environmental Protection Agency regarding the municipal separate storm sewer system, or MS4, permit changes and the potential impacts to the sediment program.

Staff are to also give an update on the sediment education program, on the land quality section’s current statewide plan approval, inspection and enforcement activities, and current number of vacancies in the land quality section.

Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant has once again discharged elevated levels of 1,4-dioxane into a creek that drains into a river within the Cape Fear River Basin, according to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.

The plant detected a concentration of 651 parts per billion, or ppb, of the chemical compound, one the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has categorized as a likely human carcinogen, in a sample it collected Nov. 7 from Hasketts Creek, according to a DEQ release.

Hasketts Creek drains into the Deep River, which converges with the Haw River to form the Cape Fear River.

Using the EPA’s toxicity calculations for lifetime exposure, DEQ “has determined that the average monthly concentration of 1,4-dixoane in the Asheboro discharge safe for downstream water supplies is 22 ppb or less,” the release states.

The department’s Division of Water Resources took additional sampling and is waiting to confirm results. Division officials have notified downstream drinking water utilities, which provide drinking water to some 900,000 North Carolinians.

Earlier this year, downstream water utilities were notified that sampling results by the state and Asheboro revealed 1,4-dixoane levels were more than 10 times higher than the average established as safe for downstream water supplies.

DEQ’s announcement Friday comes a little more than three weeks after the EPA hosted a public hearing in Asheboro regarding the agency’s objection to the city’s proposed permit that excludes an effluent discharge limit for 1,4-dioxane.

All but one person who spoke at that hearing urged the EPA to uphold its objection to the proposed National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit issued by the division.

DEQ issued an NPDES permit to the plant in August 2023 that included effluent discharge limits for 1,4-dioxane.

The city sued and, in September 2024, the North Carolina Office of Administrative Hearings struck the limits from the permit.

DEQ’s appeal of that ruling is pending in Wake County Superior Court.

“Monitoring is ongoing at wastewater treatment plants in the Cape Fear River Basin to track 1,4-dixoane,” according to the release. “Significant reductions have occurred at some wastewater treatment plants through a collaborative effort with the Environmental Management commission (EMC), DEQ and municipal operators. DEQ will continue to work with the EMC to seek additional ways to achieve reductions in 1,4-dioxane discharges.”

On Thursday, the EMC voted to push to a later date hearing proposed monitoring and minimization rules for 1,4-dixoane and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, from industrial users and dischargers.

The commission is not scheduled to meet again this year.

Sampling data is posted on the division’s website.

The commission responsible for adopting rules to protect the state’s air and water resources voted Thursday to wait on hearing proposed monitoring and minimization rules for PFAS and 1,4-dioxane from industrial users and dischargers.

The Environmental Management Commission committees met Wednesday and the full commission met Thursday in the Archdale Building in Raleigh.

Not enough members voted Thursday to waive the 30-day rule that would allow the full commission to take action on proposed rules for for 1,4-dioxane and per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.

For a waiver to be granted, at least two-thirds of the members must vote in favor of waiving the bylaw that requires 30 days between when a committee votes on a rule and when it goes before the commission.

Though PFAS and 1,4-dioxane are human-made and long-lasting chemicals, they’re not the same because the compounds have different structures and different uses.

PFAS are long-lasting chemicals used in industrial and commercial processes as well as consumer products, while 1,4-dioxane, a likely carcinogen, is an organic synthetic chemical used in specialized industrial processes that may enter the environment through discharges where it is used or produced.

With PFAS, because of their widespread use and their persistence in the environment, many “are found in the blood of people and animals all over the world, including NC, and are present at low levels in a variety of food products and in the environment,” documents state.

The commission’s water quality committee tasked staff within the Division of Water Resources, under the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, on Nov. 12, 2024, to develop a PFAS minimization initiative for all industrial direct dischargers to surface water and all significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works.

“The minimization initiative will require monitoring for PFAS, and implementation of minimization activities required to eliminate or significantly reduce discharges of PFOS, PFOA, and GenX, (levels TBD) over a 3-to-5-year period,” according to agenda documents.

In March of this year, the EMC water quality committee directed staff to develop a rule to support their “effort towards understanding the sources and levels of 1,4-dioxane.”

The proposed rules for both chemicals were drafted to monitor publicly owned treatment works with local pretreatment programs, and monitor and minimize significant industrial users, and industrial direct dischargers.

Guest Commentary

To stimulate discussion and debate, Coastal Review welcomes differing viewpoints on topical coastal issues.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is currently working on an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the Port of Wilmington’s plan to deepen the Cape Fear River, with the stated goal of accommodating larger cargo ships. As a retired Corps of Engineers senior project engineer, I feel it’s crucial to raise some serious concerns about this initiative.

The North Carolina State Ports Authority has significantly overlooked other viable alternatives, besides incremental deepening, and failed to assess the extensive infrastructure damage that increased freight traffic could inflict on our roads and bridges. This is particularly evident in major new projects like the replacement of the Cape Fear Memorial Bridge and Wilmington’s Rail Realignment Project. Both are billion-dollar investments intended to accommodate the large volume of new truck and rail freight movement. One only need to look at the definition of the secondary effects as defined by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). These secondary effects clearly relate to the need to expand the port’s freight-handling capacity.

Deepening the river will only worsen flooding, affecting areas around the downtown Wilmington waterfront and the historically significant North Carolina Battleship site. It will also lead to a substantial loss of vital wetlands and floodplains due to increasing saltwater intrusion, a value the Ports Authority conveniently understates in its Section 203 report required under the Clean Water Act.

From 1980 to 2017, DuPont, and now Chemours, released vast quantities of hazardous PFAS compounds, polluting nearly 100 miles of the Cape Fear River, including the proposed dredging prisms defined in the port’s set of alternatives. This legacy of contamination must be a central part of the EIS evaluation, as it directly challenges the claimed benefits of the project. Additionally, the reverse osmosis water treatment plant in Brunswick County, which aims to remove PFAS from drinking water, will release highly concentrated PFAS-contaminated wastewater 3 miles upstream of the port. This will further complicate the environmental challenges posed by the proposed dredging project, as well as future dredging operations and maintenance requirements, which once again go unaddressed in the port’s Section 203 report.

Why is this a critical oversight? PFAS clings to or settles into fine sediments like silt and clay found in the soil in and around the dredge-soil prism proposed to be dredged. It’s only logical that when these contaminated sediments are dredged, a safe disposal management plan would be an essential requirement for both federal and state regulators. When PFAS is detected in the dredged sediment, our regulators need to determine whether the material is suitable for placement or disposal, especially regarding upland sites or beach renourishment projects.

The Corps’ “Beneficial Use” strategy aims to repurpose the dredged material as a resource. However, this faces significant hurdles within the scope of this proposed project, as regulators decide how to prevent PFAS from being released back into the environment. The Eagles Island disposal area, which predates NEPA and was built on a previously healthy wetland and floodplain, is not an appropriate site for disposing of contaminated dredged soil because it lacks a liner. Furthermore, researchers in North Carolina and across the globe continue to investigate the damage that PFAS is causing to aquatic ecosystems as it transfers from sediment back into the water column during dredging and placement operations.

Without the Corps thoroughly addressing PFAS contamination, there is zero chance of ensuring the health and well-being of those who rely on the river’s resources in the future. This is particularly important when considering deepening options for the beneficial uses of these contaminated sediments. PFAS contamination adds another layer of complexity that will require extensive testing and could significantly impact project costs and feasibility.

There is no question that this proposed dredging project will certainly disturb sediments, releasing PFAS and other contaminants back into the water, which poses risks to aquatic life and human health.

Key issues include the following:

• Contamination — Dedging stirs PFAS, disrupts water quality.
• Aquatic risks — PFAS can bioaccumulate in marine organisms.
• Health concerns — Contaminated fish and drinking water pose human health risks.
• Regulatory challenges — Lack of consistent state or federal guidelines will create confusion for any of the deepening alternatives proposed under the port’s Section 203 study.

To enable the federal and state governments to properly manage PFAS risks related to deepening or maintenance dredging within the navigation channel, increased testing, ongoing research, development of standards, and best management practices are essential.

PFAS contamination is impacting rivers and harbors across our country. Michigan’s Department of Environment now mandates PFAS testing for sediments in harbor dredging, which is causing project delays, such as in Grand Haven, due to unclear safety standards. The Corps warns that this could reduce dredging operations from 24 to only three to five harbors annually due to rising costs — up to 200% higher with resampling — and the lack of precise guidance.

Given these critical issues, taxpayers should be alarmed by a proposed port project that fails to account for its environmental and infrastructural costs. Suppose we don’t consider the long-term implications of the port’s proposed alterations to our river. In that case, we might find ourselves stuck with unsustainable financial and environmental costs, while the economic benefits remain questionable at best.

It is our river, yet it has been treated as a stepchild compared to other, less critical economic priorities. Standard economic models often overlook the real financial value of natural resources and ecological systems like those on the lower Cape Fear River. Since nature’s “goods and services,” such as clean air, fresh water, and fully functioning floodplains and wetlands, are often considered free, they are becoming overused and undervalued. As I’ve tried to explain here, the degradation of our environment directly affects our citizens, taxpayers, and the species that depend on healthy ecosystems.

As the Corps prepares its EIS, it is essential to find more sustainable alternatives than digging us into a deeper hole that we can’t escape.  If not for us, then how about our kids, grandchildren, and their grandchildren?

If you have an opinion or concerns about this project, please submit your comments to:

By Email: WilmingtonHarbor403@usace.army.mil, or by mail to  ATTN: Wilmington Harbor 403, 69 Darlington Ave., Wilmington, NC 28403, or by comment cards at the public meetings.

Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of Coastal Review or our publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation.

The North Carolina Coastal Counties Fisheries Coalition is scheduled to have its third meeting at 1 p.m. Wednesday to discuss current issues, hear from its subcommittees and consider next steps.

The meeting will take place in the Crystal Coast Civic Center on the campus of Carteret Community College in Morehead City.

Dare County Chairman Bob Woodard founded the coalition this past summer after a proposed rule to ban shrimp trawling in certain North Carolina waters made its way through the Senate. The House decided not to take action on the bill.

The first meeting took place Aug. 5 to establish objectives for the coalition made up of elected officials and staff representing Beaufort, Brunswick, Carteret, Camden, Chowan, Craven, Currituck, Dare, Hertford, Hyde, Onslow, Pasquotank, Perquimans, Tyrrell and Washington counties.

During the second meeting Sept. 16, the coalition prioritized:

• Consumer marketing and education.
• Catch limits and water quality.
• Transparency from the Marine Fisheries Commission and sharing of data and moving of the director of Marine Fisheries to the Department of Agriculture.
• Testing for restaurants to back up local seafood claims.
• Predation management.

The agenda and more details about the coalition are on the Dare County website.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission’s Water Quality Committee may take action next week on proposed monitoring and minimization rules for three PFAS and 1,4-dioxane.

The proposed rules targeting the three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, called PFOA, PFOS and GenX are on the committee’s Nov. 12 meeting agenda. The committee is also expected to take action on proposed rules for 1,4-dioxane.

The proposed rules are not on the agenda of the full commission, which is scheduled to meet on the following day. Commissioners will select a chair and vice-chair during the meeting.

The proposed rules would require industries that directly discharge compounds into surface water and all significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works to monitor their releases of PFOA, PFOS, GenX, and 1,4-dioxane.

Meetings will be held in the ground floor hearing room of the Archdale Building, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh.

The public may attend in-person, by computer, or by telephone.

The Nov. 12 committee meetings will begin at 9 a.m. and may be joined online at https://ncgov.webex.com/ncgov/j.php?MTID=m226fb96f0777719d55b063d1c572423b using meeting number/access code 2439 988 8950.

To join the full commission meeting at 9 a.m. Nov. 13 visit https://ncgov.webex.com/ncgov/j.php?MTID=m3a68c6333a6a2633b6526360bfae676b. Use meeting number/access code 2435 258 8225.

The password for both days is NCDEQ (62337 when dialing from a phone or video system.

To join by phone, dial +1-415-655-0003 US Toll.

Agendas and supporting documents are available on the commission’s website.

The North Carolina Environmental Management Commission has extended the public comment period on a proposed rule change that would allow domestic wastewater discharges into zero-flow streams in the state.

A public hearing will be hosted by the EMC and N.C. Department of Environmental Quality on the proposed rule at 3:30 p.m. Nov. 5 in the ground-flood hearing room of the Archdale Building, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh. Speaker registration will begin at 3 p.m.

Comments on the draft rule will be accepted through Dec. 15 by mail to Karen Higgins, DEQ-DWR Planning Section, 1611 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 27699-1611, or by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov.     

The EMC, which is the rulemaking body that oversees and adopts rules for several divisions within DEQ, is required to adopt rules allowing domestic wastewater discharges to low-flow streams under Session Law 2024-44 (s. 5.1).

Lawmakers in 2024 adopted a provision to the law that mandates DEQ develop draft rules that permit households and light-industrial businesses to release up to 2 million gallons per day of treated wastewater into zero-flow surface waters, such as perennial streams, unnamed tributaries and wetlands.

Guest Commentary

To stimulate discussion and debate, Coastal Review welcomes differing viewpoints on topical coastal issues. Note: This piece was updated Nov. 3 to correct an erroneous statistic regarding Chemours’ proposed expansion.

One of the state’s most egregious corporate polluters has evaded public accountability for years. Now, the company is seeking to expand its output of toxic chemicals in eastern North Carolina. 

Since the mid 1970s the Chemours chemical manufacturing facility in Fayetteville has been spewing toxic PFAS into the air and water, contaminating the air and drinking water, food and bodies of water of a half-million people in the southeast region. The public was unaware of this until 2017, when researchers at NC State University detected high levels of the chemical GenX in the river’s drinking water. The revelation was so egregious community group Clean Cape Fear engaged the U.N. Human Rights Council to find Chemours and its parent company DuPont had committed business-related human rights abuses and called for accountability. Exposure to PFAS is known to cause certain types of cancers, immune system suppression, and developmental issues. But even after the news broke about this public health crisis in 2017, Chemours continued to produce PFAS and poisoning the Cape Fear River region. 

Beyond polluting the Cape Fear River, which supplies drinking water to more than 500,000 people downstream of Chemours’ discharge pipes, Chemours’ airborne PFAS emissions have poisoned at least 7,000 private drinking water wells across ten counties. This is not just a historical issue – it’s an ongoing crisis. Eight years after learning about GenX in North Carolina’s tap water and state regulators still do not know the full scope of groundwater contamination to the region. 

Despite this legacy of harm across southeastern North Carolina, the company has recently applied to NC DEQ (Department of Environmental Quality) for an air permit to dramatically expand its Fayetteville chemical production operations and increase its PFAS production and waste. Chemours has demonstrated a pattern of corporate misconduct, concealing information about the dangers of its water and air pollution from regulators and the public for decades. The company has violated court orders to curb PFAS pollution. And, earlier this year, the state expanded its PFAS testing zone, ordering Chemours to test for PFAS in an additional 150,000 private wells in six counties – a sign of how far these toxic chemicals have spread across the state.  

This is not a company that can be trusted to expand its operations responsibly, and it is one local example of the  PFAS pollution crisis, which is now a nationwide problem. Thoughtful and common-sense federal solutions were recently put in place, but  are now being rescinded.  

In 2024, the Biden Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) restricted six PFAS chemicals (GenX/HFPO-DA, PFBS, PFHxS PFNA, PFOA, and PFOS), under the Safe Drinking Water Act, which the agency estimated could benefit up to 105 million people nationwide. But the Trump administration is now in the process of trying to rescind some of those restrictions that would have helped reduce PFAS pollution in public tap water. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and its partners are opposing the EPA’s proposed rollbacks and have turned to the courts for protection.  

Until federal regulators issue clear guidance and protections for PFAS, it is up to state agencies to protect our health and natural resources. In North Carolina, that means DEQ must reject Chemours’ air permit application and do its job to protect North Carolinians from being further poisoned by this company’s toxic chemical pollution.

Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of Coastal Review or our publisher, the North Carolina Coastal Federation.

North Carolinians from cities, towns and communities throughout the Cape Fear River Basin urged the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to uphold its objection to a municipal wastewater treatment plant’s proposed permit that excludes an effluent discharge limit for 1,4-dioxane into their drinking water sources.

One after another, speakers at a public hearing the EPA hosted last Wednesday night asked the agency to force the state to reissue a permit that will limit discharges of the likely human carcinogen into surface waters that flow into tributaries of the Haw and Deep rivers, which converge to form the Cape Fear River.

Residents from Wilmington northwest to Fayetteville, Sanford, Pittsboro, Siler City, and Asheboro joined representatives of environmental organizations and downstream public water utilities at the hearing at Randolph Community College in Asheboro, the very city that fought to get 1,4-dioxane limits removed from its permit.

“Frankly I’m embarrassed that Asheboro is polluting the drinking water of as many as 900,000 people who live downstream from us,” longtime Asheboro resident Susie Scott said. “The solution, to me, seems simple. Our city should hold the companies producing this pollution to account and insist that they clean up their waste before we accept it into our treatment plant. People living downstream from us deserve safe drinking water.”

In August 2023, the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources issued Asheboro a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit limiting the city water treatment plant’s release of 1,4-dioxane.

The city sued, challenging the state’s power to include a water quality standard for the clear, odorless chemical solvent used in manufacturing processes.

In September 2024, the Chief Administrative Law Judge for North Carolina at the time, Donald van der Vaart, ruled in the city’s favor and revoked permit limits of 1,4-dioxane.

In his ruling, van der Vaart said that DEQ officials did not follow the letter of the law written in state statutes when they calculated discharge limits and established an enforceable water quality standard for 1,4-dixoane. He also noted anticipated high costs associated with monitoring and treatment of the chemical compound.

DEQ’s appeal of that ruling is pending in Wake County Superior Court.

Costs to treat 1,4-dioxane will fall on the backs of downstream water utilities customers if the pollutant is not controlled at the source, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority Executive Director Kenneth Waldroup said.

“The presence of 1,4-dioxane in our source water is just the latest example of how gaps in regulation can lead downstream communities exposed to risk,” he said. “1,4-dioxane is a synthetic, highly mobile compound that resists natural degradation and conventional water treatment. Once it enters our watershed, it is persistent and travels far downstream, all the way to our drinking water intakes. Removing 1,4-dioxane from our drinking water requires advanced and very costly treatment technologies. We’re talking millions of dollars in systems and additional millions in operations costs over a period of time.”

Waldroup said DEQ “took appropriate action” when it included 1,4-dioxane limits in Asheboro’s NPDES permit, but that the state Office of Administrative Hearings “inappropriately and inaccurately invalidated that move.”

“EPA is obligated to assume permitting authority if the state fails to comply with federal permits, and EPA must require the state of North Carolina to address this pollutant and protect 900,000 downstream users,” he said.

Public water utilities, including CFPUA, and businesses downstream of Asheboro’s wastewater treatment plant were notified by DEQ last January that the plant had discharged substantially high concentrations of 1,4-dioxane into Hasketts Creek, which empties into the Deep River.

Misty Manning, Fayetteville Public Works Commission’s chief operations officer for water resources, recalled to EPA officials last week of the Jan. 24 sampling results reported by the state and Asheboro.

“Asheboro’s own sampling result from that day was 3,520 parts per billion. This is more than 10 times higher than EPA’s calculation of what Asheboro’s discharge should be to protect public health at 22 parts per billion. Without enforceable limits, the city of Asheboro’s pretreatment program has yet to be successful in limiting 1,4-dioxane discharges to levels that meet water quality goals for a pollutant with a reasonable potential to cause or contribute to an excursion above state water quality standards,” Manning said.

She was one of several speakers at the hearing to point out that other municipalities in the state have successfully reduced 1,4-dioxane discharges through industrial pretreatment processes without bearing economic hardship.

“And Asheboro has the responsibility to do likewise, using its permitted authority over their local industrial users,” Manning said. “Downstream communities should not bear the financial burden of treating and removing pollutants introduced by unchecked upstream discharges.”

Last June, the Southern Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch and Haw River Assembly against Asheboro and the city’s industrial customer StarPet Inc., to stop their discharges of 1,4-dioxane into the Cape Fear River basin.

“As part of its antiregulatory fight, Asheboro has raised the absurd argument that it should not be the one that has to pay to control the cancer-causing pollution that it dumps upstream of drinking water supplies,” SELC attorney Hannah Nelson said. “I want to be clear. Asheboro could stop this pollution today by requiring its industries to treat for 1,4-dioxane, but it has chosen not to. In making that choice, Asheboro forces us, the families, the drinking water utilities, the local businesses, the schools, all of those who live downstream of the city, choose us to have to pay for their pollution.”

Stephen Bell, an attorney with Cranfill Sumer law firm’s Wilmington office and outside counsel for Asheboro, said that the city he represents believes steps DEQ took in implementing the August 2023 permit “set dangerous precedent with far-reaching implications.”

“Asheboro is not asking for no water regulation. They’re asking for regulation in accordance with the state law. As it stands today, based upon the court’s ruling, there is no water quality standard for 1,4-dioxane. The courts, our environmental rulemaking agency, they’re currently addressing this issue of limits for 1,4-dioxane and the EPA should respect that state-level process,” he said.

Once everyone at the hearing who signed up to speak addressed EPA officials, a member of the audience asked when the agency expects to make a final determination on the permit. The EPA may reaffirm its objection to the permit, require that the state modify the permit, or withdraw its objection of the permit.

Paul Schwartz, associate regional counsel in the Water Law Office at EPA’s Atlanta region office, said there is no statutory or regulatory timeline in which the agency must decide.

“In terms of specifying a date, certain that it would be done by, I don’t think we can do that,” he said. “And it doesn’t make it any easier that we’re operating during a period of government shutdown. But I think we want to give it immediate attention and focus on it so it doesn’t drag on too long.”

If the EPA decides to reaffirm its objection or require the permit to be modified, DEQ will have 30 days to submit a revised draft permit to the agency. If DEQ does not do that, the EPA will become the permitting authority.

The EPA is accepting public comments through Oct. 31 via email to R4NPDESComments@epa.gov or by mail to US EPA, NPDES Permitting Section, Water Division, 61 Forsyth Street, SW, Atlanta, GA 30303-8960.

State health and water quality officials urge the public to avoid contact with green or blue water on the Chowan River between Arrowhead Beach in Chowan County and the Occano community in Bertie County.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Division of Water Resources notified the public Thursday about the algal blooms that have lingered in the area since Oct. 6.

The bloom has been observed in the Chowan River at its confluence with Salmon Creek near Occano, near Whites Beach, and at the Arrowhead Beach boat launch.

Cyanobacterial blooms usually appear bright green, but when a bloom starts to decay, the color can change to a milky blue. Decaying algae may produce a strong, foul odor that can impact a large area. Algal blooms tend to move due to wind and wave action.

The division determined the blooms are dominated by species of Dolichospermum, or as Anabaena, and Microcystis, which belong to the algal group cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae.

“Dolichospermum and Microcystis can produce microcystin, an algal toxin that may cause adverse health effects in humans and pets,” division states.

Testing shows that the three sites exceed public health advisory levels. Results are on the division’s Algal Bloom Dashboard.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health recommends avoiding contact with large accumulations of algae and to prevent children and pets from swimming or ingesting water in an algal bloom.

The state health department suggests the following steps:

• Keep children and pets away from water that appears bright green, blue, discolored, or scummy.
• Do not handle or touch large mats of algae.
• Avoid handling, cooking, or eating dead fish that may be present.
• If you come into contact with an algal bloom, wash thoroughly.
• Use clean water to rinse off pets that may have come into contact with an algal bloom.
• If your child appears ill after being in waters containing an algal bloom, seek medical care immediately.
• If your pet appears to stumble, stagger or collapse after being in a pond, lake or river, seek veterinary care immediately.

To report an algal bloom, contact the nearest DEQ regional office or submit a report online. To view reported algal bloom events, visit the state Fish Kill & Algal Bloom Dashboard.

Officials also remind the public to take precautions as other microorganisms or pollution may be present in waterbodies that can lead to recreational water illness, see https://epi.dph.ncdhhs.gov/cd/water/prevent.html.

Acres of wetland habitat undergoing restoration need a few days to dry out after a rain-soaked weekend before volunteers can get to work planting at Carolina Beach State Park.

The North Carolina Coastal Federation has rescheduled a volunteer planting originally planned for Monday to 10 a.m. to noon Thursday.

Volunteers may register to help plant native vegetation within the 10-acre project area, which was selected by federal and state agencies to address environmental damages caused by decades of creosote contamination that occurred during operations at a former wood treatment plant in Navassa.

The former Kerr-McGee Chemical Corp. site in the Brunswick County town, which is a little more than 30 miles upstream of Carolina Beach, was listed on the federal Superfund’s National Priorities List in 2010.

The Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, and project contractor designed the native tidal wetland restoration project to include removing invasive species, creating a slough through the removal of fill material and grading, planting native vegetation, and monitoring the project once it is complete.

Rainfall from a system that began over the weekend and continues to sweep up the East Coast have flooded the trail and wetland area.

“That said, this flooding is actually a great reminder that the wetland is doing exactly what it was designed to do – absorbing, filtering, and holding stormwater to reduce flooding elsewhere and improve water quality,” according to the Coastal Federation. “Wetlands act like nature’s sponges, capturing runoff and allowing sediment and nutrients to settle before the water slowly filters back into our coastal systems.”

Volunteers are recommended to bring tall boots or waders and gloves. These items will also be provided on site to volunteers who may not have them. It is recommended that volunteers dress in layers they do not mind getting dirty.

More than $4.6 million will go to coastal conservation efforts such as property acquisition and living shoreline projects out of $36 million in statewide grants through North Carolina Land and Water Fund, the state announced earlier this week.

The fund gets appropriations from the N.C. General Assembly to support projects by local governments, state agencies, and nonprofit organizations that restore and protect the state’s natural and cultural resources.

“North Carolina is home to remarkable natural beauty,” Gov. Josh Stein said in a release. “These grants will help preserve that beauty.” 

These projects, which “will support North Carolina’s $28 billion outdoor recreation economy,” are broken up into four types: acquisition, stormwater, planning and restoration, the North Carolina Department of Natural and Coastal Resources said in the announcement.

Property acquisition projects selected for the coast are:

• $1.57 million to Kill Devil Hills for land at Nags Head Woods.
• $1.06 million to North Carolina Coastal Land Trust for land at Powells Point on the Albemarle Sound.
• $1.27 million to the town of Leland for the Silver Timber Tract – Nature Park.
• $752,000 to the North Carolina Coastal Federation for land in Carteret and Onslow counties.
• $3.5 million to Unique Places to Save for the St. James — Boiling Spring Lakes Wetland Complex, however this is a provisional award and depends on if the funds are available before July 1, 2026.
• $335,000 to The Nature Conservancy for land in Onslow and Pender counties. One of the three awards is provisional as well.

In addition to property acquisition, the Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, has been selected for just shy of $1 million for the following projects:

• An update to the Oyster Blueprint for Action Restoration and Protection Plan.
• A stormwater plan for the Ocean City Jazz Festival site on Topsail Island.
• The second phase of a living shoreline for Jockey’s Ridge State Park.
• A living shorelines cost-share program.

Sound Rivers Inc. has been awarded $243,200 for a stormwater wetland education site in Craven County and nearly $30,000 for a watershed plan for a section of Slocum Creek.

A North Carolina State University-sponsored program in Onslow County has been awarded $234,241 for a stormwater infrastructure maintenance robot.

New Hanover County has a $75,000 grant for a Pages Creek feasibility plan.

A statewide list is available online.

Previously the Clean Water Management Trust Fund, the fund was put in place in 1996 to protect the state’s drinking water sources. The General Assembly expanded the fund’s mission to include conserving and protecting natural resources, cultural heritage and military installations.

The N.C. Division of Water Resources has released for public comment a revised discharge permit for a quarry operation in Vanceboro.

Martin Marietta Material Inc.’s revised wastewater discharge permit for it’s Vanceboro quarry requires a biological integrity assessment once every two years through sampling for benthos, or small aquatic organisms that live in water.

The permit also includes a monthly monitoring requirement for pH, total suspended solids and turbidity in the discharge, or effluent, from the mine.

Permit revisions were made after the permit the division issued last February to the company was rescinded based on a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that “end-result” requirements imposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in permits were not allowed under the Clean Water Act.

Mining activity has not occurred at the Vanceboro site since the original permit was issued in 2013, according to a N.C. Department of Environmental Quality release.

The proposed permit would regulate 12 million gallons per day of mine dewatering and stormwater from two outfalls to unnamed tributaries of Blounts Creek. The creek is classified as a Class C, Swamp, Nutrient Sensitive Waterbody in the Tar-Pamlico River Basin.

The first benthic sampling would occur after the discharge begins between Feb. 1 and March 15, according to the release.

Public comments on the revised permit will be accepted through Oct. 29 by email to publiccomments@deq.nc.gov with the subject line “NC0089168 Vanceboro Quarry,” and by mail to Wastewater Permitting (NC0089168), 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, N.C. 27699-1617.

Details about the permit and a technical fact sheet are available at online DWR Vanceboro Quarry permit file.

An overwhelming majority of litter captured over the course of three years by in-stream traps set up in watersheds throughout the state was plastic waste, according to a recently published study.

About 96% of litter North Carolina waterkeeper organizations and their volunteers removed from trash traps between June 2021 and November 2024 consisted of plastics, said Dr. Nancy Lauer, lead author of the paper published in the journal Community Science.

“Plastic is lightweight, it’s buoyant, it floats easily,” Lauer, a staff scientist and lecturing fellow with the Duke Environmental Law and Policy Clinic, said in a recent telephone interview. “The plastic items, they can very well make their way through the stormwater system, through the stream and end up in the trash trap before they are ever going to biodegrade.”

During the course of the three-year study, 150,750 pieces of litter were removed from 21 traps.

The litter traps were funded through a 2020 North Carolina Environmental Enhancement Grant as part of a statewide microplastics research and pollution-prevention infrastructure project sponsored by Waterkeepers Carolina, a group of 15 licensed waterkeepers in the state.

By removing and documenting the litter that gets caught in the traps, waterkeeper organizations are able to get an understanding of the most prevalent types of litter entering North Carolina rivers. They are also able to look at correlations between litter accumulation and characteristics such as development, impervious surface, road density and human populations within different watersheds.

Using the data collected by those waterkeeper organizations, researchers can provide a big picture of riverine litter in the state and use that to shape policy.

For this study, seven waterkeeper organizations and their volunteers were tasked with separating and organizing the trash they removed from traps into categories.

Those categories included plastic film, hard plastic, polystyrene foam, metal, glass; and paper covering items, such as drink containers made of plastic, glass and metal, plastic straws and stirrers, cup lids, bottle caps and food wrappers.

Fragments of polystyrene foam from consumer products like Styrofoam cups, food takeout containers and packing materials were removed from all 21 traps in “very high” loads, Lauer said.

Those fragments and single-use plastic bottles made up about 83% of the litter that was collected and documented.

“If you do a cleanup of a roadside, you’re going to find a lot more plastic bags, a lot more food wrappers and we would find those occasionally,” Lauer said. “But I think that those just tend to snag on branches or get weighted down in the stream banks before they would ever be able to reach the trap. It was sort of eye opening to realize which of these plastic items, when they get into the environment, are extremely mobile. It seems like the trash traps are telling us that Styrofoam fragments and plastic bottles can really effectively be transported by surface waters downstream just because they made up such a large fraction of what we were finding in the traps.”

The paper is the latest to highlight single-use plastic pollution in the state.

A 14-page report published last March and created through a collaboration of nonprofits and the policy clinic concluded that state agencies, local governments and nonprofits spent more than $56 million in 2023 cleaning up more than 7,000 tons of litter.

Related: State’s fix for costly litter problem ‘not efficient or sufficient’

That same year, legislators injected language into the state budget prohibiting counties and cities from adopting rules, regulations, ordinances, or resolutions that restrict, tax, or charge fees on auxiliary containers.

The provision stopped locally elected officials in Asheville from voting on a proposed ban of single-use plastic bags and Styrofoam food containers. The law also barred local elected officials in Durham from deciding whether to require retailers tack on a 10-cent fee for each plastic bag given to customers in restaurants, grocery stores and shops.

That law “dealt a huge blow” to North Carolina, Lauer said.

The volume of single-use plastics removed from riverine traps clearly indicates that type of pollution is a huge issue in the state, she said

“I think what this data really highlights is that there’s still work that needs to be done and that work now, because of that preemption law, can’t necessarily be done on the local level in the same way that it could before,” Lauer said. “But there are state-level actions like banning Styrofoam, or a bottle bill that would incentivize people to return their bottles to receive a small deposit. Those could be really effective at reducing stream litter.”

She said it is important to keep in mind that there are types of litter that aren’t being captured in trash traps.

“These traps have a lot of positive aspects, but ideally we want to live in a world where we don’t need them because that trash is never ending up in our streams,” Lauer said. “I feel really strongly that there needs to be action by the corporations and the businesses and the government to stop these items from being provided in the first place. We go through life and you can make choices as an individual, but single-use plastics are still so prevalent that it can feel impossible to avoid them, no matter how hard you try.”

North Carolina Division of Water Resources officials are reminding residents to steer clear of water that looks discolored because it could be an algal bloom.

Water that looks bright green, blue, discolored or scummy could indicate the presence of an algal bloom.

Certain types of algal blooms can create toxins harmful to humans, pets and aquatic organisms. Harmful algal blooms are indistinguishable from nonharmful blooms by mere sight.

The state Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health encourages people to avoid contact with large algae accumulations. Children and pets should be prevented from swimming in or ingesting water in an algal bloom.

If you do come into contact with an algal bloom, wash thoroughly. If your child becomes ill after being in waters containing an algal bloom, get medical care immediately.

Pets that may have come into contact with an algal bloom should be rinsed off. Seek veterinary care immediately if your pet appears to stumble, stagger, or collapse after being in a pond, lake or river.

Blooms should be reported to your nearest Department of Environmental Quality regional office or online.

Algal bloom events that are reported to the state are available on the Division of Water Resource’s Fish Kill & Algal Bloom Dashboard.

Although algae naturally occur in all waterbodies, certain environmental conditions, including increased nutrients, elevated temperatures, increased sunlight and low or no water flow, can prompt rapid algal cell growth that causes algal blooms.

Wind and wave action can move blooms and decaying algae may create a strong, foul odor.

Saturday evening was one of celebrating coastal stewards, supporters and volunteers during North Carolina Coastal Federation’s annual Pelican Awards and Taste of the Coast fundraising event.

The nonprofit organization that publishes Coastal Review was established in 1982 with the mission to protect and preserve the state’s coast and has offices on the Outer Banks, the central coast and Cape Fear region.

Held in Carteret Community College’s Joslyn Hall, the staff presented 15 Pelican Awards to those who have shared “their time and talents, through leadership, education, hands-on projects, and volunteer efforts, to inspire others and create lasting change,” according to the organization.

The Taste of the Coast fundraising celebration followed the ceremony next door in the Crystal Coast Civic Center, where there was food, live music and a silent auction.

This is the 22nd year that the organization has recognized “exceptional contributions” with Pelican Awards.

Federation Board of Directors Vice President Kenneth Chestnut told the roughly 200 in the audience that the Pelican Awards annually “recognize and celebrate the organizations, agencies, partners and the extraordinary people who work together for a healthy coast.”

He continued that the awards are “about partnerships and coming together for a common cause, and that’s the protection and restoration of our beautiful coast.”

Federation Executive Director Braxton Davis presented one of the two Lifetime Achievement Awards this year to Dr. Hans Paerl, “For a Distinguished Career Dedicated to Coastal Research, Protection, and Restoration.”

Paerl, who recently retired after 47 years, is a Kenan Professor of Marine Environmental Sciences at University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences in Morehead City.

“Paerl has spent decades uncovering the secret of healthy waterways and applying that knowledge to protect the coast,” Davis said.

Paerl’s accomplishments include establishing the FerryMon program, where he turned state ferries into long-term water quality monitoring stations for the Albemarle and Pamlico sounds.

“His groundbreaking research has shown how nutrients and climate affect water quality, how harmful algal blooms form, and most importantly, what we can do to safeguard our estuaries and coastal waters for future generations,” Davis said of Paerl, whose work has appeared in 600 scientific publications. His many honors include the 2003 G. Evelyn Hutchinson Award for work in oceanography, the 2011 Odom Award in estuarine science, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Harmful Algal Bloom committee.

Paerl took the podium with ease and explained to the crowd that he was thrilled to be able to talk about the scientific achievements made in the state to help protect its waters, particularly going way back to the phosphate detergent ban enacted in the 1980s, and the establishment of a total maximum daily nitrogen load for the Neuse River, “which has been effective, and I’m glad to say that we’re seeing some really good results from that now.”

But, Paerl continued, “more importantly, I think I’d like to share this award with all the students, technicians, faculty and collaborators that have worked with me.” He called himself “more of a facilitator” who knocks on doors in the legislature to point “out that good science brings good management and good decisions.”

Though he’s retired, Paerl said he is indebted to those he has worked with and hasn’t stopped knocking on doors and talking to folks and collaborating.

“I’m still showing up at work, and we’re all dedicated — I’m really speaking for all the folks that I’ve worked with — we’re all dedicated, from the science perspective,” Paerl said, to make North Carolina an example for other states, the country and the world, “in terms of using science to really make a difference, in terms of protecting our environment, saving it and making sure it’s sustainable for the long run.”

Federation Coastal Management Program Director Kerri Allen of the Wrightsville Beach office presented to David Cignotti a Lifetime Achievement Award “For Outstanding Community Leadership, Collaboration, and Dedication to Coastal Stewardship.”

Cignotti is someone “who embodies the heart and soul of this community,” Allen said, and “is one of those rare people who leads a quiet strength, deep humility and a genuine love for nature that you can feel in everything he does.”

A lifelong educator, former mayor of Wrightsville Beach and dedicated steward of the Coastal Federation, he helped launch a membership drive that brought in more than 60 new families, has been a site coordinator with an international coastal cleanup effort for at least a decade, and is a cofounder of Save Our Seas NC. Cignotti also served on the Coastal Federation’s southeast advisory committee, its board of directors, and he chaired the audit committee.

“When the coast needs a voice, he speaks up,” Allen said, whether that’s bringing attention to the use of bird poison on Wrightsville Beach, protecting trees from unnecessary clearcutting, or making sure local businesses have a say in offshore drilling proposals.

Cignotti expressed his gratitude, adding that he couldn’t think of another organization with more than 40 years of advocacy for the coastal environment, and “cannot imagine getting an award that I would cherish more than what I’m getting tonight.”

He continued that one of his favorite quotes is from Jacques Cousteau, “that people protect what they love. And I think that pretty much sums up what we’re doing here tonight. Everybody that came tonight loves North Carolina’s coast and is here to support the coastal Federation’s mission.”

Northeast region awards

Alyson Flynn, coastal advocate at the Coastal Federation’s Wanchese office, presented three awards for the Outer Banks area.

“All three of our recipients in the Northeast embody the spirit of the Pelican Award in their own unique way, from on the ground restoration work to grassroots volunteerism, to forward thinking leadership that shapes the future of our coast,” Flynn said.

Volunteer Donnie Sellers was recognized “For Exceptional Contributions and Stewardship of Our Coast.”

Sellers said he appreciates what the Coastal Federation does and all the hard work of the staff, which he says he sees firsthand at the northeast office, “but mostly I’m grateful for how generous and kind they are, because that’s — It’s probably not what I should say — but that’s really what keeps me coming back.”

Volunteer Leonard “Len” Schmitz was awarded “For Outstanding Volunteer Efforts to Advance Oyster Shell Recycling.”

Schmitz told the audience he wanted to share the award with his fellow recyclers on the Outer Banks, adding “we couldn’t do this without the help of the restaurants.”

National Park Service’s Outer Banks Group Superintendent David Hallac was honored “For Leadership and Dedication to Coastal Protection, Recreation and Cultural Resources.”

The group includes Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Wright Brothers National Memorial and Fort Raleigh National Historic Site.

Flynn explained that Hallac had since 2015 managed one of the most iconic and dynamic barrier island systems in our nation and faces regular challenges, such as rising seas, chronic erosion, collapsing homes, petroleum contamination and increasing fragility of N.C. 12, the state highway, all while welcoming over 3 million visitors each year.

“From 1985 until 1999 I came from a small town right outside of New York City to the Outer Banks,” Hallac said as he accepted his award.

“I spent the entire year dreaming about coming to the beach there. I had no idea I would end up managing the three lighthouses there and 80 miles of beaches and 200 miles of incredible coastal marshes, it’s been just absolutely amazing,” Hallac continued. “It’s a little bit ironic at the same time that all of the things that shape these beautiful places, sometimes it appears we’re fighting against it. And so it’s my goal. It’s our goal, to find ways to change, to adapt to the things that are shaping our coastline, to be able to coexist in these places and also to preserve them for future generations.”

Central Coast awards

The nonprofit Friends of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail received a Pelican Award “For Dedicated Partnership to Protect and Restore Coastal Water Quality and Habitats.”

Water Quality Program Director Bree Charron, based in Carteret County, explained that the Friends group has, over the past five years, worked to secure and help purchase 787 acres to create an 11-mile-long trail through the North River Wetlands Preserve in Carteret County. The Friends supports the trail that connects Jockey’s Ridge and the Great Smoky Mountains.

Ben Jones, a project manager with the Friends group, said its members were excited to help restore and showcase the preserve.

“There’s lots of land we still need for the trail anyway,” he said, “and I hope this is just the beginning, too, because it’s really important for us to provide access for people to these special places that we’re protecting.”

Jessica Guilianelli with Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point was recognized “For Supporting, Promoting, and Advancing the Use of Living Shorelines.”

April Hall is with the salt marsh program and said when she joined the Coastal Federation staff a few years ago she took over a living shoreline project along the Neuse River at Cherry Point.

“At the time, the Federation had secured funding to support construction of roughly 2,000 feet of a much larger 12,000-foot living shoreline project led by Jessica Guilianelli,” Hall said. “And in case anyone is trying to do the math, 12,000 feet is about 2.3 miles. So to say this was an ambitious project would be an understatement.”

The site had experienced severe shoreline erosion, losing more than 100 feet in some areas since 1994, and worsened by Hurricane Florence in 2018.

Under Guilianelli’s management, air station brass committed to a hybrid solution to repair critical bulkheads while incorporating living shorelines and native marsh plants to reduce wave energy and restore natural shoreline functions.

“I’m in a really, really interesting position as natural resources manager for the Marine Corps,” Guilianelli said, adding it’s a balance that challenges her daily. “It’s such a cool thing to be able to balance our military mission with conservation, and I’m grateful to be in that role.”

Lauren Johnson and Tamarr Moore, who recently earned their master’s degrees from N.C. Central University, were recognized “For Partnership and Inspiration to Advance the Next Generation of Coastal Professionals.”

Coastal Educator Rachel Bisesi of the Coastal Federation’s Newport office noted that the two women are the first graduates of a new National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration program under their adviser, Dr. Caressa Gerald. The NOAA program supports students of color in environmental sciences.

“Lauren and Tamar have shown remarkable courage and resilience entering scientific spaces where representation is still far too limited. They broke barriers and paved the way for students of color to pursue coastal research. Their work has inspired others and opened the door for the next generation of environmental professionals and I can’t wait to see where their journey leads them, Bisesi said.

The graduates both thanked their parents and adviser, Gerald, who Moore said “opened a lot of doors for me and put me in many rooms that I would not have otherwise been in.” Johnson added that she was “very grateful to be in this room right now, along with other professionals” with the same drive and motivation.

Southeast region awards

Photographer Alan Cradick was honored “For Outstanding Volunteer Service to Our Coast.”

Coastal Education Coordinator Bonnie Mitchell explained that Cradick has been behind the camera “quietly and generously donating his time, energy and professional photography skills to help us tell the story of our work.”

Cradick, in accepting his award, said that it’s a privilege to be recognized, but that’s not why he volunteers. “I do it because I just love photography. I love the coast. I love working with professionals and professional volunteers who do so much wonderful things for the coast and for advancing the health of the of the ecosystems.”

Feletia Lee and Anna Reh-Gingerich were honored “For Dedicated Partnership and Commitment to Advance Watershed Restoration.”

Reh-Gingerich, watershed coordinator of Wilmington’s Heal Our Waterways Program, and Lee, chief sustainability officer at University of North Carolina Wilmington, have been working with the Coastal Federation on stormwater pollution in the Bradley and Hewlett creeks watershed.

Over the years, the project has resulted in rain gardens being installed and the use of permeable materials that absorb rain to retrofit parking lot drainage systems. The sites also serve as living classrooms, Coastal Federation Special Projects Manager Lauren Kolodij explained.

Reh-Gingerich said that she and Lee were honored to be recognized and thanked the Coastal Federation for supporting the effort. “This work is really easy to do when you have great partners to do them with.”

Paddling organization We the Water was honored for “For Excellence in Community Education and Inspiration for Coastal Protection and Restoration.”

The Wrightsville Beach Outrigger Canoe Club’s members paddled the state’s entire coast to advocate for clean water. The team paddled more than 340 miles along the coast over the course of three summers to raise awareness about the importance of clean water and raised more than $50,000 for the Coastal Federation, Kolodij said.

The Coastal Federation’s Kerri Allen, who is part of the outrigger club, accepted the award on behalf of the entire team.

“Every stroke counts, and when you get it right, you move as one, as a single force gliding through the waves,” Allen said, adding that “it’s a perfect metaphor for protecting our coast, we’re all on the same boat. Literally and figuratively, the threats and challenges we face are considerable, but we go farther and stronger when we move as one.”

Statewide awards

The N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries Habitat Enhancement Section was recognized “For Dedicated Service and Collaboration for Oyster Habitat Creation.”

Marine Debris Program Director Ted Wilgis of the Coastal Federation’s Wrightsville Beach office, said that the division’s habitat enhancement section had since 1996 built almost 800 acres of oyster sanctuary and a cultch-planting program, where oysters can be harvested.

Jason Peters, program supervisor for restoration work, said he and Enhancement Section Chief Zach Harrison were accepting the award on behalf of all of the dedicated and hardworking state employees who are involved.

“We’ve got a crew of vessel operators, equipment operators, divers, field biologists, supervisors all play an integral role in this work. And we’re just, we’re very fortunate to have such great staff,” Peters said.

Harrison added that he and his team were “honored and humbled to be just a small cog in such a big machine driving the North Carolina coast forward and environmentalism in the U.S. forward.”

Worth Creech of the firm Native Shorelines was honored for “For Advancing Community Oyster Shell Recycling and Coastal Restoration”

Coastal Resiliency Manager Sarah Bodin said Creech “has been an absolute transformative force in the world of oyster shell recycling and coastal restoration through tireless dedication, community engagement and innovative thinking.”

He did this by building public awareness, and relationships with restaurants, volunteers and restoration professionals. “His efforts have directly contributed to restoring oyster habitats, enhancing biodiversity and protecting shorelines from erosion,” Bodin said.

Creech told the crowd that you never know what you’ll get a passion for in life, and “you certainly don’t know whether it’s going to be something as stinky as oyster shells, but it happened to me with Native Shorelines,” adding he’s always “inspired by those who did this hard work before me.”

The Kenan Fellows Program for Teacher Leadership was recognized “For Cultivating Coastal Collaboration and Empowering Educators”

Bisesi said the program empowers “educators to lead in both the classroom and the community, and provide immersive experiences and professional development by equipping teachers to with the tools they need to inspire the next generation.”

Associate Director Mark Townley told the audience that since connecting eight years ago with the organization, “I can honestly say that the Coastal Federation is an exemplar of what a partnership should and can look like to really make a huge impact with K-through-12 public school education in the state of North Carolina.”

Attorney John Harris was recognized “For Outstanding Business and Community Collaboration to Advance Coastal Stewardship”

Coastal Federation founder and Senior Adviser to the Executive Director Todd Miller, said that Harris began working with the organization in 1997 on the Hoop Pole Creek project in Atlantic Beach. Harris is a partner in the Wyatt, Early, Harris, Wheeler firm’s Morehead City office.

“John’s legal work made it possible for the Coastal Federation to buy out a condominium and marina development and permanently protect 30 acres of rare maritime forests,” Miller said, adding that it was the first property ever purchased in the state using the North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund.

“Since then, John has finally helped us conserve nearly 15,000 acres of coastal lands, forests, marshes, creeks, all protected because he made sure every deal was done right,” Miller added.

Harris told the crowd that he was “honored to be able to preserve clean water in our wetlands and to help them purchase land for our grandchildren and generations to come to enjoy what we have Here at the coast.”

The North Carolina Division of Coastal Management has issued a permit for the proposed mid-Currituck bridge that would connect mainland Currituck County and its barrier island beaches.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality on Friday announced that the division had issued a Coastal Area Management Act dredge and fill law permit and that, in a separate action, the agency’s Division of Water Resources had issued a Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certification for the toll road and 6.7-mile-long bridge.

The project will connect the mainland at U.S. Highway 158 near Aydlett to the Outer Banks near Corolla with two-lane bridges spanning the Currituck Sound and Maple Swamp.

As previously reported in Coastal Review, the project has received wide support from Dare and Currituck counties and most Dare towns, though residents of Currituck County communities on either side of the bridge have expressed concerns about the impacts of more traffic on the neighborhoods’ infrastructure, environment and quality of life.

The N.C. Department of Transportation/North Carolina Turnpike Authority submitted the CAMA permit application one year ago. The Division of Coastal Management accepted the application as complete early this year.

CAMA Major/dredge and fill law permits must be obtained for projects that cover more than 20 acres, include activities that require other state or federal permits, or for construction covering more than 60,000 square feet.

Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certification determines whether a project complies with state water quality standards.

The Division of Water Resources issued a certification for the project with conditions, which include an agreement to offset unavoidable impacts to wetlands by creating, restoring or enhancing wetlands elsewhere from the construction area.

The applicants are also required to mitigate unavoidable impacts to submerged aquatic vegetation by monitoring for the effects of shading and replacing or restoring impacted vegetation as close to the area as possible.

“The certification also includes a condition that the applicant must submit an update to the project stormwater management plan prior to construction,” according to an NCDEQ release.

The North Carolina Coastal Habitat Protection Plan Steering Committee is scheduled to meet this month to discuss the recommendations in a recent study summary on the status of state fisheries.

The committee is set to meet from 1-3 p.m. by web conference Sept. 25.

Included on the meeting agenda is a presentation about the initial recommendations from the Collaboratory Study on the Coastal and Marine Fisheries of the State.

Related: Report: State needs more fisheries scientists to meet goals

The committee will discuss the proposed framework for the 2026 Coastal Habitat Protection Plan amendment as well as the timeline for the 2026 revision of the plan.

The plan is revised every five years to reflect changes in the status of habitat protection in the state. It was initially adopted in December 2004 by the North Carolina Marine Fisheries, Environmental Management, and Coastal Resources commissions.

The plan includes information on coastal habitat distribution and abundance, ecological functions and importance to fish production, status and trends, habitat threats, and recommendations to address those threats.

There will be a listening location at the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries Central District Office on Arendell Street in Morehead City.

For more information, contact Zach.Harrison@deq.nc.gov with the Division of Marine Fisheries.

The Environmental Management Commission voted unanimously Thursday to send a rule outlining health-based standards for three per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances to the state Rules Review Commission.

The 15-member commission also wrapped up the rulemaking process to “clarify” the definition of wetlands, as directed by a summer 2023 session law. The draft language now heads to the Office of Administrative Hearings. Per the session law, the rule is exempt from the Rules Review Commission.

During the environmental commission’s meeting held in Raleigh and streamed virtually, members voted on the draft rule that specifically targets PFOA, PFOS, and GenX in groundwater, which supports about half of drinking water in North Carolina.

Under the rule that is now expected to go before the rules commission at its Oct. 30 meeting, permitted releases of PFAS to groundwater will be limited. The rule also establishes goals for cleaning contamination in groundwater and ensures residents whose drinking water exceeds contamination limits receive alternative water supplies.

Comments the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality received on the rule through a public comment period late last year overwhelmingly supported the rule, but, as Commissioner Dr. Jackie MacDonald Gibson noted Thursday, the public also raised concerns that the rule did not set standards for additional PFAS.

“It’s a very emotional issue,” Gibson said. “I went to the (public) hearing in Wilmington and people there, their families have been directly affected by PFAS exposure to the point that some people were afraid to have their kids drink water at school. I think a lot of people are going to be glad that we’re moving forward with this. They’re going to wish we were doing more.”

The environmental commission’s groundwater and waste management committee last year voted to omit five of the eight compounds DEQ staff originally presented to be included in the rule.

The committee chose to focus on PFOS and PFOA, which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency classifies as likely carcinogens, and GenX, a compound specific to Chemours.

Commissioner Tim Baumgartner, who chairs the groundwater and waste management committee, explained that the compounds that were omitted – PFBS, PFNA, PFHxS, PFBA and PFHxA – are being regulated at the practical quantitation limit, or PQL.

PQL is considered the base line in testing laboratories.

“It’s not that we’re not regulating PFAS. It is a matter of what the quantitative limit is for remediation, or what the target level is,” he said.

Commissioner Robin Smith said she regretted that the commission did not adopt health-based standards for all eight PFAS as initially presented by DEQ.

“It would have actually helped some land owners and some responsible parties who need to clean up groundwater by providing them with a health-based standard that is above the PQL,” Smith said. “I’m going to vote for these. I think this is a good rule, but to me, I can’t follow the reasoning of dropping the other five when, in fact those would have made the rules less stringent, but still would have maintained a health-based standard for those other five.”

Environmental Commission Chair JD Solomon responded, saying that instead of using a health-based equation, one that is subject to change, for the compounds that were omitted, the commission “defaulted to PQL.”

“Keep as much PFAS out of the water as possible,” he said. “So, while PFAS is being debated at the national level, and whatever level, we decided as a body to keep it as stringent as possible, even for cleanups.”

If approved by the rules commission next month, the rule would become effective Nov. 1.

A proposed draft rule requiring monitoring and development of PFAS minimization initiatives for dischargers into surface water will be on the commission’s water quality committee’s agenda in November.

Members of that committee voted 4-2 Wednesday to include the draft rule on their meeting scheduled Nov. 12. The proposed rule would require industries that directly discharge compounds into surface water and all significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works to monitor their releases of PFOA, PFOS and GenX.

If the committee approves the rule, it will go to the full commission for consideration Nov. 13.

During staff comments, the commissioners were informed that DEQ is now requiring Chemours to expand the number of private wells eligible for PFAS contamination sampling to about 14,000 additional residences in New Hanover, Brunswick, Columbus and Pender counties.

Related: DEQ requires Chemours to expand PFAS well water testing

The expanded area was identified through additional data analysis conducted by the state and Chemours. Chemours’ Fayetteville Works plant in Bladen County discharged PFAS, including GenX, for decades directly into the Cape Fear River, ground and air.

Wetlands definition rule

The General Assembly with a June 27, 2023, session law directed the commission to adopt a rule consistent with language in the statute that read “Wetlands classified as waters of the State are restricted to waters of the United States as defined by” federal regulations.

Sue Homewood with the Division of Water Resources explained Thursday to the commission that, “We had the session law in 2023, the EMC requested that we move forward with this rule amendment, even though we were implementing the rule and are implementing the session law already.”

Around the same time this session law was drafted and making its way through the state legislature, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of an Idaho couple, the Sacketts, who sued the Environmental Protection Agency for putting a stop on work to backfill what the federal agency argued was wetlands.

The Sackett v. EPA decision on May 25, 2023, changed the definition of “waters of the United States,” which are navigable waters protected under the Clean Water Act. The definition now excludes noncontiguous wetlands, or those not connected to navigable waters. The EPA aligned its definition with the court case effective Sept. 8, 2023.

When the North Carolina General Assembly put the 2023 session law through that summer, commissioners worked with staff on how best to proceed. The matter was on pause between April 2024 to January of this year, when the water quality committee approved the language to go to the full commission. Members approved in March the proposed text rule and moving ahead to public comment, which was open April 15 to June 30. A public hearing was held June 26.

Homewood said 134 written comments were submitted and 13 oral comments were presented at the hearing, which are in summarized in the hearing officer’s report.

Of all the comments, she continued, only one was in favor of the rule amendment.

“In general, the comments opposed to the rule amendment were concerned about loss of wetland protection in North Carolina,” Homewood said, such as what the rule means for flooding, resiliency and wildlife habitat.

The public also commented that the state is investing in mitigation and flood resiliency that these wetlands could help provide, and there were some comments stating that the General Assembly should not dictate a rule making body on how to implement rules.

The wetlands definition rule was approved with 10 voting for the rule and commissioners Smith, Gibson, Dr. Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta, Dr. Ann Chelminski and Dr. Ilona Jaspers voting against. In a separate vote, the hearing officer’s report passed 13-1, with Orme-Zavaleta voting against no and Gibson abstaining.

Homewood said the next step is to submit the rule to the state’s Office of Administrative Hearings, then to General Assembly, which would be the 2026 session. After that, it needs to be approved by the EPA, because this definition is part of the state’s water quality standards.

Karen Higgins with the water planning section said that the EPA has 60 days to approve, 90 days to disapprove, or nothing happens if they take longer. If the EPA disapproves of the standards change, the agency sends it back to the state.

Solomon said he had been asked what could be done about the rule and the bottom line is “our rules have got to be consistent with state laws. And so while this is a little unusual to say, they did their action, we have to clean up our rules now to make sure the definitions fit.”

He continued by pointing out that the rulemaking process “is more or less procedural” and there are concerns but the commission has to comply with the state laws.

Baumgartner reiterated that it was a statutory directive from the General Assembly and the commission is following the Administrative Procedures Act by making this rule change, which Commissioner Kevin Tweedy acknowledged, but said he’s hoping that the state can disconnect from the federal definition.

“North Carolina has unique resources that I think a lot of people, obviously, from the comments, agree it should be protected. I think we can do that protection in a smart way that that takes into account everybody’s concerns and issues with wetlands. But I think connecting it to the (federal definition) and keeping it that way is just not a good long-term policy,” Tweedy said.

Smith, a longtime attorney, called this “bad policy” and part of the reason is that nothing at the federal level is about which or whether these wetlands are important for ecological or other purposes.

“The only issue at the federal level is federal jurisdiction, and that’s driven by the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, and it’s driven by the language of the Clean Water Act,” Smith said. “It’s a jurisdictional issue at the federal level. It has nothing to do with assessment of the value of these wetlands.”

Managing the wetlands is primarily a state responsibility, which is why “it’s a mistake to tie state decisions about the value and protection of wetlands to a federal jurisdictional issue,” Smith said.

Aside from bad policy, she said, it’s bad legislative practice, because there’s a section in the session law that causes the entire session law language to sunset as soon as this rule is adopted.

“What the legislature did not change,” Smith said, is the existing definition of waters of the state in a statute, which will continue to be in effect after the session law expires.

She reiterated a point Solomon made that the commission’s rules cannot be in conflict with state law. “But unfortunately, what the legislature has given us is a situation that will create a conflict with state law.”

Smith voted against approving the rule, saying that she understands “the realities of situation, but between the policy and the legislative process and the, in my view, misuse of the session law in this way, without clarifying a statute, makes this an easy vote against for me.”

This report has been updated to correct the area code in Chemours’ well sampling request phone number.

About 14,000 additional residences in the lower Cape Fear region have been added to the list of private drinking water wells eligible for PFAS contamination sampling.

N.C. Department of Environmental Quality announced Thursday that it is requiring Chemours to expand sampling eligibility to more areas of Brunswick, Columbus, New Hanover and Pender counties.

“This expansion comes after Chemours and DEQ staff completed an extensive review of existing residential well data as part of the ongoing assessment work and continued actions taken in accordance with the 2019 consent order between DEQ, Cape Fear River Watch and Chemours,” according to a DEQ release. “Current information provided by Chemours indicates that only a portion of these residences may receive their water from wells and need to be sampled.”

Residents within the newly expanded sampling area whose primary drinking water source is a private well may request well sampling by calling Chemours at 910-678-1100 or by completing the company’s online form.

Those who call are asked to live their name, phone number, email and mailing address if prompted to leave a message. The return call may come from Parsons Environment and Infrastructure, which is the authorized third-party contractor conducting the well sampling.

Newly eligible residents who previously requested sampling will be contacted soon by the third-party contractor to arrange sampling.

DEQ’s Division of Waste Management is scheduled to host a virtual public meeting at 6 p.m. Oct. 7 to provide more details about expanded sampling and answer questions.

The webinar number is 2435 548 5932 and the password is chemours (24366878 when dialing from a phone or video system).

Residents may also join the meeting by phone at +1-415-655-0003 (US toll) or +1-904-900-2303 US toll (Jacksonville), access code 243 554 85932.

Beginning next month, Brunswick County Public Utilities customers may notice discoloration and sediment in their drinking water as water lines are being flushed.

Utilities staff flush the lines annually by opening fire hydrants and allowing them to flow freely during a short period of time. This method cleans out sediment and helps maintain the more than 1,440 miles of water lines and more than 7,700 fire hydrants in the county’s service area, according to a county notice.

During the annual flushing program, Brunswick County Public Utilities makes a slight change in its water treatment process as required by the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.

The water provider adds combined chlorine throughout the year to the water as the primary disinfectant. But, during the flushing program, chlorine is added in an uncombined state, commonly referred to as free chlorine.

“Free chlorine is more effective than combined chlorine at reacting with sediments suspended during flushing,” according to the notice. “This common practice is also used as a preventative maintenance to kill bacteria that, though harmless when consumed by humans, can introduce unwanted taste and odor, and create issues with maintaining a disinfectant residual.”

Free chlorine will be used as the primary disinfectant from Oct. 7 through November.

“Depending on your location within the distribution system and usage patterns, it could take 7 to 10 days for your drinking water to transition from combined chlorine to free chlorine at the beginning of the flushing program,” the notice states. “You may experience a change in the taste or smell of your drinking water while free chlorine is being used as the primary disinfection agent. If you are especially sensitive to the taste and odor of chlorine, try keeping an open container of drinking water in your refrigerator. This will enable the chlorine to dissipate and reduce the taste of chlorine in your water. Remember – drinking water has a shelf life. Change out the water in your refrigerated container weekly.”

Any customer who has an aquarium or pond is reminded to always test water before adding it to an aquatic environment to ensure the water is chlorine free before adding fish or other animals. Chemical additives to remove chlorine from water are available at pet supply stores.

Questions regarding this process may be directed to Brunswick County Public Utilities at 910-253-2657, 910-371-3490, 910-454-0512, or by contacting your water service provider directly.

Three coastal-based water treatment plants are among those recently honored by the state for surpassing federal and state drinking water standards in 2024.

The North Carolina Division of Water Resources’ Public Water Supply Section awarded the N.C. Area Wide Optimization Program Award to 63 water treatment plants, including Brunswick County Northwest Water Treatment Plant, Cape Fear Public Utility Authority’s Sweeney Water Treatment Plant in Wilmington, and Pender County Utilities Surface Water Treatment Plant.

The awards, part of a state effort to enhance the performance of existing surface water treatment facilities, are given each year to water systems that demonstrate outstanding turbidity removal, which is a key test of drinking water quality, according to a N.C. Department of Environmental Quality news release distributed Thursday.

“While all drinking water systems must meet strict state and federal drinking water standards, these systems met performance goals that are significantly higher,” according to the release. “In 2024, more than 2.8 million North Carolina residents were served by these award-winning plants.”

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority was also recognized with the “Gold Star” honor, which is awarded to systems that have received the Area Wide Optimization Program Award for 10 more consecutive years. In all, 20 facilities received that recognition for 2024.

The Environmental Protection Agency is hosting a public hearing next month on a proposed permit for a municipal wastewater treatment facility that discharges 1,4-dioxane into the drinking water supplies for about 1 million North Carolinians.

Oral or written comments about the federal agency’s specific objection to Asheboro Wastewater Treatment Plant’s proposed National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, permit will be accepted at the hearing scheduled from 6 p.m. until 9 p.m. Oct. 22.

The hearing follows the EPA’s response to a ruling last year by former Chief Administrative Law Judge Donald van der Vaart that N.C. Department of Environmental Quality officials did not follow state law when they calculated discharge limits and established an enforceable water quality standard for 1,4-dioxane.

That chemical, one that cannot be removed through conventional water treatment methods, is deemed by the EPA as a likely human carcinogen.

The state has appealed the ruling.

The Asheboro Wastewater Treatment Plant has been discharging high levels of 1,4-dioxane upstream of the drinking water supply for several cities and counites, including Brunswick, New Hanover and Pender counties.

The hearing will be hosted both virtually and in-person at the JB and Claire Davis Corporate Training Center at Randolph Community College, 413 Industrial Park Ave., Asheboro. Doors open at 5 p.m.

Those who plan to attend in-person are encouraged to arrive early and preregister at least 72 hours before the hearing.

Virtual attendees may register online. Instructions are available on how to submit written comments during or after the hearing up until the close of the period for receiving comments. Those who attend virtually will not be able to present oral comments during the hearing.

The hearing will kick off with brief presentations by EPA officials and a neutral process facilitator. Oral comments will be limited to three minutes per person.

The agency does not guarantee that everyone who wishes to speak will get the opportunity to at the hearing, but will accept written comments from anyone who does not.

Written comments will be accepted through Oct. 31 and may be emailed to R4NPDESComments@epa.gov or mailed to US EPA, NPDES Permitting Section, Water Division, 61 Forsyth Street, SW, Atlanta, GA 30303-8960.

The North Carolina NPDES permit number is NC0026123.

He was a lawyer, Vietnam veteran, military judge, retired Marine Corps colonel, commercial fisherman, photographer, volunteer, mentor, advocate and, to some, an adversary.

Above his extensive resume, above all else, Rick Dove was a family man, one whose devotion to his wife, children and grandchildren ran as deep as the waters he fought decades to protect.

Dove, one of the first Riverkeepers in the Southeast and the original Neuse Riverkeeper, died Aug. 22. He was 86.

A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. Saturday at Cotten Funeral Home in New Bern, the riverfront city Dove called home. Visitation will be held an hour prior to the service.

In professional circles, Dove was regarded as a no-nonsense, straight shooter who unabashedly took on any industry, whether it was concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, or wastewater treatment plants, responsible for polluting the Neuse River.

Advocating for water quality protections is a hard job, he would say. Polluters are powerful, well-connected and well-funded, he advised. Fighting for clean waterways requires thick skin and unyielding tenacity, he stressed.

“One of the things I remember most about Rick is that he did not sugarcoat things,” said Coastal Carolina Riverwatch Executive Director Lisa Rider. “He said exactly how things are and that was incredibly beneficial for the folks who worked alongside him. We have a lot of tough Riverkeepers out there today because of how he taught.”

His connection to the water spanned back to boyhood, when he dreamed of being a fisherman.

Dove’s shot at doing just that came in the mid-1980s when he retired after 25 years in the Marine Corps.

He wasted no time tucking away his spit-shined shoes for what he described in a Sound Rivers publication as “the dirtiest clothes I could find and became a commercial fisherman.”

“Things were great until about 1990,” Dove said.

That was the year he and his son, Todd, who fished with him, started to notice their catch sick with sores.

Dove got out of the commercial fishing business. He couldn’t justify selling sick fish, he’d later tell people.

He returned to practicing law, opening R.J. Dove and Associates offices in Havelock and Jacksonville in 1991. Two years later, a job listing advertised in a local newspaper caught his eye.

It was a newly created position called Neuse Riverkeeper. In 1993, Dove became the first to bear that title, one he carried until 2000 when he became the Southeastern representative for Waterkeeper Alliance.

Larry Baldwin distinctly recalls his first impression of Dove after taking the job of Lower Neuse Riverkeeper in 2002.

“I first got to know Rick and it’s like, dang, this guy’s going to be tough to deal with,” Baldwin said. “At that point he still had a lot of the Marine in him. Not that that was bad, but it was just different and, with Rick, it was either you’re going to get into this full-speed ahead or you might as well not get in it at all. Rick would take you at face value, but you also had to prove yourself. You couldn’t just tell him, ‘This is what I am.’ He wanted to see it and he had a way of seeing it, even when you didn’t know he was looking. He could really kind of sense who you were. If you came at Rick trying to overly impress him, you were fighting a losing battle.”

But the sometimes gruff-speaking mentor quickly became a friend, and Baldwin got to see a side of that Dove perhaps revealed only to those whom he was closest.

Dove was a prankster at heart. He was, not surprisingly, also a good arguer.

He was a private man, reserving conversation about his family unless and until he was asked about them. He rarely spoke of his time as a Marine, but faithfully met with a group of fellow Marine Corps veterans well into his golden years.

If he loved you, you knew it. He and his wife, Joanne, shared 60 years together.

“His top priority was the love of his life, Joanne Dove,” Rider said. “His commitment to his family was incredibly important to him.”

They raised two children, Todd, who preceded them in death, and a daughter, Hollyanne.

“Everything for Rick came back to family,” Baldwin said. “That was his reason for being. He loved his family and seeing him and Joanne together, you could tell they just had fun.”

Dove was a “very warm” person, one who was as tenacious on the racquetball court as he was a waterkeeper, Baldwin said.

“I am a blessed individual for having spent almost 23 years with him,” he said. “I’m not sure it has hit me yet. Never has there been somebody in my life that impacted me the way Rick impacted me, and still does. There’s never been one like him and I don’t think there ever will be. In my point of view, we have the obligation to continue what Rick started and what he continued to do. That’s my promise to not just him, but to myself, that we’re not going to let his legacy end just because he’s not here.”

The state Environmental Management Commission is expected to vote during its September meeting on a legally mandated wetlands definition rule change and on groundwater quality standards for three industrial chemical substances discharged into the environment.

The commission’s committees are to scheduled to meet the afternoon of Sept. 10 and the full commission is to meet at 9 a.m. Sept. 11, both in the Archdale Building in Raleigh. The public may attend in person. To watch online, use this webinar link for the Sept. 10 committee meetings and this webinar link for the Sept. 11 full commission meeting. The password for both is NCDEQ.

The full commission is to consider adopting the revised definition of “wetlands,” which NCDEQ began applying when a 2023 law became effective on June 27, 2023. The law added to the definition the text, “Wetlands classified as waters of the State are restricted to waters of the United States,” to align the state with the federal definition that recognizes wetlands only as those that are connected to navigable waters.

The law dictated that the revision be immediately implemented and directed the commission to adopt a rule consistent with the revised definition. Division of Water Resources staff presented the proposed rule change in March and then proceeded to public comment and hearing. The proposed rules were published in the North Carolina Register and on the NCDEQ website on May 1, 2025, and a public hearing was held on June 26. The public comment period closed on June 30, according to agenda documents.

The three PFAS that the commission are to vote on for groundwater quality standards are PFOA, PFOS and GenX.

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, are long-lasting chemicals known to break down very slowly over time, and are used in a variety of industrial and commercial processes as well as consumers products, according to DEQ. Because of the widespread use and persistence in the environment, many PFAS are found in the blood of people and animals, at low levels in a variety of food products, and in the environment.

Committee meetings

The water allocation committee is to meet at 1 p.m. Sept. 10 to hear an update on the North Carolina Flood Resiliency Blueprint, which is part of a statewide flood mitigation planning process.

The groundwater and waste management committee will follow at 2:15 p.m. when they will hear a presentation on the PFAS treatment system reimbursement program.

The water quality committee at its 2:45 p.m. meeting Sept. 10 is to hear an update on PFOA, PFOS, and Gen X monitoring and minimization rules being drafted.

The committee approved a motion in November to “support the effort towards understanding the sources and levels of certain PFAS compounds in NC.”

Division of Water Resources staff were directed to develop a PFAS minimization initiative for industrial direct dischargers to surface water and all significant industrial users that discharge to publicly owned treatment works. Staff are to update the committee on their progress.

Hundreds of gallons of untreated wastewater discharged into the Calabash River in Brunswick County on Monday when a pump station lost power.

Brunswick County Public Utilities discovered the sanitary sewer overflow around 9 p.m. from a manhole near 1232 Riverview Drive in Calabash, according to a public notice.

Utilities staff repaired the pump station that experienced a power failure and recovered standing wastewater by 10:30 p.m.

About 1,100 gallons of untreated wastewater is believed to have reached the Calabash River near 1224 Riverview Dr.

“Downstream sampling and remediation of the affected site has been completed,” the Tuesday notice states. “No action is required by the public at this time. Additional information will be provided if action is necessary.”

Beaufort officials are looking to the federal government for another $6.5 million to pay for a water infrastructure project that’s running months behind schedule and millions over budget.

The Carteret County News-Times reported that the town board has also acted to replace the contractor handling the U.S. Department of Agriculture-supported improvements to the water distribution system because of the delays.

The Beaufort Board of Commissioners in July 28 gave the town manager approval to apply for the additional USDA loan.

The estimated need is based on the most recent calculations of the cost to complete the project. The town is looking at a 3% interest rate on the loan, which is typically a 40-year note.

The work is to reduce flooding, improve water quality, and repair aging infrastructure.

The town had contracted Sunland Builders of Newport for the water distribution and stormwater work to include laying more than 20,000 feet of water line for just over $6 million.

The company’s contract expired Dec. 24 with nearly three-quarters of the work incomplete, but it will be required to finish the work it had begun on Pollock, Gordon, Marsh and Live Oak streets.

The contract includes repair and replacement of damaged sewer lines, manholes and other work, repairing storm drains and replacing parts of the water distribution system.

Brunswick County has filed a lawsuit against the contractor the county hired to upgrade and expand its Northwest Water Treatment Plant.

The county on July 25 terminated its contract with Oscar Renda Contracting and filed suit, citing breach of contract and repeated delays on the expansion, which is to include a reverse osmosis, or RO, system capable of removing PFAS and 1,4-dioxane.

The Brunswick County Board of Commissioners on July 21 amended a contract with CDM Smith Inc. for about $1 million to continue overseeing the site while county officials search for a new contractor, Port City Daily reported.

The lawsuit follows an announcement the county made in mid-June informing residents that the initial anticipated completion of the more than $122 million project was being pushed because the contractor had repeatedly failed to meet its performance milestones.

The RO system is designed to remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, and 1,4-dioxane from the plant’s water source, the Cape Fear River. Such manmade, chemical compound pollutants have for years been discharged into the river by upstream industries and municipal wastewater treatment plants.

The project also includes doubling the water treatment plant’s capacity from 24 million gallons per day to 48 million gallons per day.

Brunswick County is seeking damages that include covering costs associated with hiring a new contractor and remediating insufficient work on site, legal fees associated with the lawsuit, and liquidates damages to the tune of $5,500 a day going back to June 30, according to Port City Daily.

County spokesperson Amber Merklinger told the newspaper in a statement that the county was “actively exploring the best legal methods to find a new construction contractor to continue the project as quickly and realistically as possible.”

“Brunswick County is committed to making sure the expansion and reverse osmosis project at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant is completed exactly as planned and designed,” Merklinger stated. “This action was necessary to protect the best interests of our residents who have waited far too long for a solution to removing PFAS from our drinking water.”

A handful of coastal communities have been awarded a chunk of state funding to be used for drinking water and wastewater infrastructure improvement projects.

Gov. Josh Stein announced Wednesday an award of more than $204 million in funding for 48 projects that include addressing PFAS and other chemical compounds in drinking water, identifying and replacing lead pipes, and improving resiliency following storms.

“When you turn on the faucet in your home, you shouldn’t have to worry about whether that water is safe for your family,” Stein said in a statement. “These investments will help ensure North Carolinians have access to clean drinking water and will help keep people safe when disaster strikes.”   

The funding is being dispersed to projects across 27 counties, including four along the North Carolina coast.

In Beaufort County, the town of Aurora is receiving more than $3.06 million to replace a force main and rehabilitate a lift station and lift station wells. Belhaven has been awarded more than $4.7 million for wastewater treatment plant improvements. And, Chocowinity will receive more than $4.8 million for water treatment plant and waste discharge improvements.

River Bend in Craven County is set to get $6.3 million in drinking water state revolving funds for phase II drinking water improvements.

Cape Fear Public Utility Authority in New Hanover County has been awarded $35 million to replace its southside wastewater treatment plant.

And, Carolina Water Service, Inc. will receive $5.5 million for six projects focusing on PFAS, lead service line identification and water lines across multiple counties, including Pender.

“This funding will address aging infrastructure and improve public health for communities large and small,” N.C. Department of Environmental Quality Secretary Reid Wilson said in a statement.

More than 130 applications requesting $1.57 billion in funding were reviewed by the agency’s Division of Water Infrastructure.

The projects that were selected were approved by the State Water Infrastructure Authority, an independent body responsible for awarding federal and state funding for water infrastructure projects, during its July 16 meeting.

Funds awarded this month came from the State Revolving Funds, which are funded by federal capitalization grants and revolving loan repayments and provide low-interest loans that may be partially forgiven for drinking water and wastewater projects, according to a release.

Funding rounds for Fall 2025 begin July 29 and applications are due by 5 p.m. Sept. 30. Funds for this round will come from programs to include evaluating options to address PFAS contamination, identifying and replacing lead service lines, and Viable Utility Reserve grants. 

The division is hosting in-person funding application training for the fall 2025 funding round in Clyde, Hickory, Boone, Fayetteville, Winterville, and Research Triangle Park/Durham. A virtual option will also be available as well as a recording of the training, which will be posted on the division’s training webpage.

The Holden Beach Turtle Patrol held its first-ever beach sweep July 19 with volunteers picking up 120 pounds of trash off the Brunswick County island’s ocean shoreline.

Each of the 40 volunteers who turned out for the event spent between 40 minutes to an hour collecting trash, gathering a host of plastics from commercial store bags, food wrappers and bottles to cigarette butts, paper and cardboard scraps, Holden Beach Turtle Watch Program member Donna McGowan said in an email.

The beach sweep was hosted during the peak of sea turtle nesting season, which generally runs from May through the end of October.

“It is important to keep Holden Beach clean and safe for everyone, but especially for nesting female sea turtles and their new hatchlings,” a patrol release states. “Sea turtles crawling along the beach can be impeded by trash and or worse they can become ensnared in it and die.”

There are currently 33 sea turtle nests on Holden Beach’s ocean shoreline, down 64 from last year, according to McGowan.

“Nesting at our local beaches has been low this year,” she said in the email. “Sea turtles don’t lay every year, rather they lay every 2-3 years so maybe it’s normal to have a low year. August is a busy month with new nests and hatching for existing nests. We are hopeful to get a few more nests before the season ends.”

Another beach sweep is being planned for September. Details for that sweep will be announced at a later date.

The nonprofit hosts informational programs about sea turtles every Wednesday through August at the Holden Beach Chapel.

More than 20% of the world’s wetlands have vanished since 1970, according to a report by the Convention on Wetlands.

The loss of wetlands, including freshwater and coastal marine systems, may equate to a $39 trillion loss in economic benefits by 2050, according to the intergovernmental report released last week.

The Global Wetland Outlook 2025 is based on current publications and information of inland, coastal and marine wetlands and global databases. Wetlands evaluated in the report include seagrass, estuarine waters, salt marshes, mangroves, tidal flats, kelp forests, coral reefs, peatlands, inland marshes and swamps, and lakes, rivers and streams.

“Wetlands are vital to water and food security, and human well-being, so recognising the links between global biodiversity, climate, and water targets and wetland conservation and restoration is critical,” the report states.

The report measures the globe’s wetlands in hectares, a metric unit that is the equivalent to about 2½ acres, where one acre is defined as 100 square meters.

Since 1970, an estimated 177 million hectares of inland marshes and swamps have disappeared, according to the report. And, indications are that the ecological character of wetlands in most regions, including North America, continue to deteriorate.

Declines in wetlands in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa are “notable,” according to the report, “however, the extent of degradation also increased in Europe, North America, and Oceania,” which is the cluster of Pacific islands that includes Australia and New Zealand.

Agriculture and urbanization are the lead contributors to the disappearance and degradation of wetlands on a global scale.

“Agricultural activities remain the largest driver of global wetland loss through conversion to cropland along with other industrial activities, and have resulted in stressed global water resources,” according to the report.

Pollution, invasive species, and climate change-related extreme weather events, including floods, fires, drought, and sea level rise, are also negatively impacting wetlands.

“Wetlands are a high-value resource and an asset to society. When we degrade or destroy wetlands, we reduce the ecosystem services and benefits they provide to people,” the report states.

Annually, the 1,425 million hectares of remaining wetlands across the world give an estimated $7.98 trillion to $39.01 trillion to people, according to the report.

If the world’s remaining wetlands are effectively managed through the next 25 years, they will provide a net present value greater than $205.25 trillion over that time.

The report calls for annual investments of between $275 billion and $550 billion to reverse threats to the remaining wetlands.

The Convention on Wetlands is also known as the Ramsar Convention and is an international treaty focused on wetlands conservation.

The public can hear an update on the work taking place to clean up the former Buxton Naval Facility site during the next Restoration Advisory Board meeting.

Doors open to the public at 5:15 p.m. and the meeting starts at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, July 17, in the Cape Hatteras Anglers Club, 47231 Light Plant Road, Buxton.

The public will be able to ask questions the last 15 minutes of the meeting, starting at 7:15 p.m. People from the community are encouraged to submit questions to CESAS-FUDS@usace.army.mil.

Now called the Buxton Formerly Used Defense Site, the area around the Buxton beach access on Hatteras Island was a base for both Navy and Coast Guard operations from 1956 until 2010, when it was returned to the National Park Service. The Formerly Used Defense Sites Program manages the environmental restoration, or cleanup, of properties formerly owned or occupied by the U.S. Defense Department.

Back on Sept. 1, 2023, officials with the Cape Hatteras National Seashore announced that the beach beside the former military site had eroded, uncovering potentially hazardous infrastructure associated with the military’s previous use. This was after surfers and visitors reported a strong smell of petroleum.

Gayle Garland, project manager of the Buxton FUDS property for the Army Corps of Engineers, is to provide an update about the current property environmental restoration projects during the meeting.  

The Corps said last fall that it had removed nearly 4,600 cubic yards of petroleum-laced soil; nearly 100,000 gallons of petroleum-contaminated water; 278,000 pounds of concrete; 1,153 feet of pipe; and 1,088 feet of metal cable and wire.

The section of beach was closed in 2023 because of health and safety concerns related to petroleum contamination and potentially hazardous remnant military infrastructure, until it reopened in June.

This is the second meeting of the advisory board that was selected March 25. The first meeting was April 10. The board does not make decisions, but allows for the community to take part in the cleanup process.

The state commission that adopts rules to protect natural resources is expected to hear this week updates on existing measures to improve air and water quality, but the bulk of the July 9-10 meeting will concentrate on the mandated periodic review process for several existing rules.

The Environmental Management Commission Committee meetings are scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Wednesday and the full commission is to meet at 9 a.m. Thursday, both in the Archdale Building in Raleigh.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality acts as staff and enforces rules for the commission. Meeting agendas and supporting documents, as well as steps to join the meeting virtually or by phone can be found on the commission’s website. 

When the full commission meets Thursday, members are to decide on moving through the multiple steps required to satisfy a general statute that requires existing state rules be reviewed every 10 years.

The rules under review include how the Environmental Management Commission is organized, water resources programs, and streams and wetlands mitigation. The full commission is also to hear an update on the Tar-Pamlico Wastewater Discharge Requirements Rule and progress on a nutrient criteria development plan.

Information on recent Environmental Protection Agency actions is to be delivered during committee meetings.

During the air quality committee meeting at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, Division of Air Quality Director Mike Abraczinskas is to give an overview of recent EPA actions relating to federal air quality regulations.

The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, or NPDES, committee is expected to review and discuss at its 12:30 p.m. Wednesday meeting the existing agreement between the state and the EPA on the permitting program.

On the state level, during the 10:45 a.m. groundwater and waste management committee meeting, DEQ staff will review the “2024-2034 NC Solid Waste and Materials Management Plan,” which assesses the status of solid waste and materials management in the state.

Aligning North Carolina’s wetlands definition with that of the federal government’s would put the state’s waterways at risk, erase nature’s pollution filtration systems from the land, and increase flooding, speakers at a public hearing said.

More than a dozen people commented during the Thursday night hearing in Raleigh on the revised wetlands definition the North Carolina General Assembly enacted into law two years ago.

In accordance with the 2023 Farm Act, the state’s definition of wetlands must correspond with the federal government’s, which narrows the description of a wetland to having a continuous surface connection to Waters of the United States, or those protected under the Clean Water Act. The federal definition was changed to be consistent with a May 2023 Supreme Court ruling.

In North Carolina, that alignment equates to the loss of protections for an estimated 2.5 million acres of wetlands, according to the state Department of Environmental Quality.

That agency has been implementing the definition since its approval in June 2023, but the state-appointed Environmental Management Commission, which is responsible for adopting rules that protect, preserve and enhance air and water resources, must go through the rulemaking process to amend the state’s existing wetlands definition.

The law legislators enacted two years ago explicitly directs that the Rules Review Commission cannot challenge the amendment.

Those who spoke at Thursday’s public hearing, a mandated step in the rulemaking process, urged the Environmental Management Commission to work with legislators to rescind the amendment. No one who spoke supported the definition revision.

“I think it’s a shame that the EMC does not have any discretion over what this rule looks like,” said Brooks Rainey, a lobbyist for the Southern Environmental Law Center. “Dictating the text of a rule to a rulemaking body takes away the whole point of having a rulemaking body. The North Carolina General Assembly are not experts on wetlands. The Home Builders Association is not an expert on wetlands. The Chamber of Commerce is not an expert on wetlands. But there are many experts on wetlands at DEQ. When rulemaking works as intended, the experts on the subject matter of the rule are involved in crafting the rule. Otherwise, we have ceded environmental rulemaking to political whims and lobby groups.”

Rainey went on to say that the majority party at the General Assembly make “the majority appointments” on the Environmental Management Commission and that the current commission “has greater sway” with this legislature than any in recent memory.

“I urge this EMC to use that influence and ask the General Assembly to stop sending over rules that have been pre-drafted. Take the politics out of rulemaking. Leave it to the experts. It is insulting to this commission, it is insulting to the agency, and it is insulting to the public who are effectively excluded from having any meaningful input at all,” she said.

That lack of input has frustrated residents, environmental advocates and scientists, who argue that ordering a one-size-fits-all definition will be detrimental to a state where wetlands, particularly on the coastal plain, are critical to reducing flooding, cleaning drinking water and supporting fisheries.

“Tying in wetlands protections to federal definitions that change with every administration leaves our communities vulnerable,” said Kerri Allen, a coastal advocate with the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review. “Why should we hand off our responsibility to protect North Carolina’s natural resources to Washington. Wetlands in North Carolina, like pocosins, Carolina Bays and cypress swamps, deserve to be protected under rules written for our state’s needs, not buried under shifting federal priorities.”

Wetlands provide a host of crucial benefits, said Dr. Adam Gold, coasts and watersheds science manager with the Environmental Defense Fund.

They act as natural flood buffers, provide habitat for recreationally and commercially important wildlife, and filter pollution from waterways.

“Just one acre of wetlands can store up to a million and a half gallons of floodwater,” Gold said.

He cautioned that the federal government may further narrow the definition of wetlands. Earlier this year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Lee Zeldin announced plans to revise the definition of Waters of the United States, also known as WOTUS.

“As someone who has worked in the intersection of environmental policy and coastal resilience for over two decades, I’ve seen firsthand how wetland loss leads to increased flooding, degraded water quality and disappearing fisheries habitat,” said Coastal Carolina Riverwatch Executive Director Lisa Rider. “These issues are already being impacted and many rural communities and working waterfront communities are already seeing the impact from what’s going on. Stripping protections further will only accelerate harm to ecosystems and the people here in coastal North Carolina.”

Chris Herndon, director of the North Carolina chapter of the Sierra Club, said rolling back wetlands protections will waste millions of taxpayer dollars in flood recovery and contribute to the loss of the state’s natural resources.

“The revised definition freely gives the decision of which wetlands to protect to the federal government. As a result, our state wetlands protections will be determined by federal officials based on federal priorities without any special consideration of the particular importance of wetlands in our state. North Carolinians should decide which North Carolina wetlands should be protected to the benefit of our local communities and local economies,” he said.

Southern Environmental Law Center senior attorney Julie Youngman said that, though the commission has been mandated to pass the rule, there is no deadline in when the rule must be established.

And, since the state’s leading environmental agency is complying with the law, there is “no harm being done to the will of the legislature by slowing it down and working with the legislature to try to fix the mistake that’s been made,” she said.

“It just defies logic that we are putting our fate in the hands of a federal administration that doesn’t seem to care about the same values that we care about here in North Carolina,” Youngman said. “There is not deadline in the statute. Take your time, work with the legislature, see if you can’t come up with a commonsense way to keep the wetland protections that we have in place, in place.”

DEQ will accept public comments through today via email with the subject line “Wetland Definition Amendment” to Sue.Homewood@deq.nc.gov and by mail to Sue Homewood, Division of Water Resources, 1617 Main Service Center, Raleigh NC 27699-1617.

The EMC is anticipated to hear recommendations on the revised rule during its Sept. 11 meeting. The 2023 Farm Act mandates that the rule cannot become effective until after legislative review, which is anticipated to take place during the General Assembly’s 2026 session.

The Environmental Protection Agency has final approval authority over the rule.

A coastwide clean water advocacy organization is urging the public to speak out next week during a hearing in Raleigh on a rule that would change the definition of what constitutes protected wetlands in the state.

The public may attend in-person or join the June 26 Division of Water Resources hearing by computer or phone.

The nonprofit North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, on Tuesday asked its supporters to comment on the rule change mandated by the legislature in 2023 that “limits wetlands protected under state water quality rules to those under federal jurisdiction.”

The North Carolina General Assembly, via the 2023 Farm Act, effective June 27, 2023, required “immediate implementation of the revision and directed the Environmental Management Commission to adopt a rule consistent with the revised definition.”

The commission has advanced the proposed rule and the Office of State Budget and Management approved the required regulatory impact analysis on the last day of December.

The Coastal Federation in its advocacy email urged people to “send a powerful message to state officials: the new definition puts millions of acres of wetlands – and flood protection, clean water, and wildlife they support – at risk.”

The organization said lawmakers need to understand “the real harm this rule will cause and the need to correct it.”

The Coastal Federation lists 10 issues it said will be made worse as a result of the rule change, including flooding, irresponsible development, rising insurance and other costs, water quality and the loss of natural resources and state controls.

“By forcing North Carolina’s Environmental Management Commission (EMC) to adopt a rule that ties state wetlands protections to federal limits, the General Assembly is leaving valuable state wetlands vulnerable to being developed without the developer having to apply for a permit that would contain protective conditions,” the organization said in its email.

The meeting will be 6-9 p.m. Thursday, June 26, in the ground floor hearing room of the Archdale Building, 512 N. Salisbury St., Raleigh.

To attend virtually, log in via WebEx using Meeting No. 2425 792 4510, password: NCDEQ; or by phone at 415-655-0003 and access code 2425 792 4510.

Register to comment online by noon June 26. Register onsite starting at 5:30 p.m.

Anyone may comment, but speakers may be limited to three minutes.

Written comments may also be submitted by June 30. Email comments to: Sue.Homewood@deq.nc.gov using the subject line: “Wetland Definition Amendment.”

The long-awaited reverse osmosis system designed to remove PFAS from Brunswick County Public Utilities’ drinking water supply will not be operational in the time frame originally announced.

County officials announced that, because the project contractor has repeatedly failed to meet its performance milestones, expanded capacity and the reverse osmosis, or RO, treatment system at the Northwest Water Treatment Plant will not be up and running by the start of summer, which officially begins Friday.

“We recognize that this is not the news that people wanted to hear, but it is an important and very much needed step to getting this project over the finish line,” Brunswick County Manager Steve Stone said in a news release. “This is the largest project in Brunswick County’s history, and we have to make sure it is done right. Our community has waited too long already to get a solution to removing PFAS from our water supply, and we felt this was the best step to getting our RO treatment system online as soon as possible.”

The upgraded treatment system will remove per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, including GenX, and 1,4-dioxane from the plant’s water source, the Cape Fear River.

The plant’s capacity is being doubled from 24 million gallons per day to 48 million gallons per day.

Work is continuing at the project site, but the completion date of that work “has continued to move into the future,” according to the release.

The county has directed the contractor and the surety to “ensure prompt completion of the work” and requested that the surety “take over the work and complete the performance” of the contract.

“Through this process, County staff, professional consultants and surety representatives will evaluate the remaining tasks in the project, develop a new completion schedule, and identify contractors as needed to finish the final tasks to ensure completion of the overall project as timely and effectively as possible,” according to the release.

The county does not have an estimated date of when it will receive a new project schedule, but anticipated receiving one “during the summer.” That schedule will be published as soon as it is available and the county will provide an update on the estimated completion of the remaining project milestones.

The delay is not expected to impact the original project cost of $167.3 million. The county plans to deduct an estimated $3.5 million in liquidated damages from that cost because of the delays. That amount may change “based on present or future factors,” according to the release.

The county does not plan to increase customer rates because of the delays.

If the water color looks a little off, don’t get in it.

The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Water Resources is reminding the public to steer clear of discolored water as we usher in summer and the warmer temperatures the season will undoubtedly bring.

Discolored would could be an indication of the presence of an algal bloom, certain types of which can create toxins harmful to humans, pets and aquatic organisms.

Such harmful algal blooms are indistinguishable from nonharmful blooms by mere sight. Blooms should be reported to your nearest DEQ regional office or online.

The state Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health encourages people to avoid contact with large algae accumulations. Children and pets should be prevented from swimming in or ingesting water in an algal bloom.

If you do come into contact with an algal bloom, wash thoroughly.

If your child becomes ill after being in waters containing an algal bloom, get medical care immediately.

Pets that may have come into contact with a bloom should be rinsed off with clean water. Pets that appear to stumble, stagger, or collapse after being in a pond, lake or river should receive immediate veterinary care.

Additional information on the potential health effects from algal blooms is available on the state health department’s website.

Agal blooms can have the appearance of spilled paint on a water’s surface, where colors may be bright green, red, brown or blue. They can also look like mats, or dense, macroscopic growths floating on the water surface, and can appear as discoloration throughout the water column.

Although algae naturally occur in all waterbodies, certain environmental conditions, including increased nutrients, elevated temperatures, increased sunlight and low or no water flow, can prompt rapid algal cell growth that causes algal blooms.

Wind and wave action can move blooms and decaying algae may create a strong, foul odor.

Algal bloom events that have been reported may be viewed at the Division of Water Resources’ Fish Kill & Algal Bloom Dashboard. Additional information about algal blooms is available on the division website.

The public is also reminded to take precautions to avoid recreational water illness caused by other microorganisms or pollution in waterbodies.