Fox News
Expand
Browse All Video
Watch Live

You're watching...

Virginia wins fight against EPA

Details

  • Description

    Molly Henneberg reports from Washington, D.C.

  • Duration 2:27
  • Date

Clips

Also in this playlist...

Editor's Picks

Auto-advance: ON

Auto-advance
View All

Transcript

This transcript is automatically generated

Virginia officials are applauding a judge's ruling in their battle against the Environmental Protection Agency.

The judge determined the EPA overstepped its bounds by trying to regulate storm water run off as a pollutants.

Attorney general can -- -- -- says the ruling could save taxpayers millions of dollars.

Molly Henneberg is live from our DC bureau with more on that -- -- EPA wanted to require the state of Virginia to restrict the amount of water storm water run off really that could float through a county creek.

As a way to prevent more sediment buildup in that creek but a federal judge said the agency couldn't do that.

Judge William O'Grady said his ruling quote.

EPA would like to create the impression that congress has given it loose rein to determine exactly what it could and could not regulate.

EP -- losses over the fact that the law only gives EPA.

The power to regulate pollutants as that term is defined by congress elsewhere and set statute.

Sediment is a pollutants for these purposes but storm water is not.

This is a big win for Virginia Republican attorney general Ken good to -- who had joined with the mostly democratic Fairfax Virginia county council to sue the EPA.

-- -- -- said it would have cost the county and state more than 300 million dollars to comply.

After the ruling -- -- said quote.

This EPA mandate would have been expensive cumbersome and incredibly difficult to implement.

And it was likely to do more harm than good as its effectiveness was unproven and would have diverted hundreds of millions of dollars.

Fairfax County was already targeting for more effective methods a sediment control.

But ETA supporters say the agency isn't trying to overstep its bounds but is trying to protect and preserve water ecosystems.

I think it's -- -- the.

EPA wanted to make sure that the local watershed is clean and it's something that polls show is the number one.

Environmental concern 80% of Americans according to -- -- concerned about.

Clean water clean local rivers and creeks and clean air and water so this is a real concern that a lot of Americans have.

And city EPA was looking for ways to keep the local watershed -- and that and by reducing a -- that was -- -- -- But in this case the judge found -- the EPA was trying to quote exceed its clearly limited statutory authority.

John Molly Henneberg in Washington when things.

Load More