Appeals Court Sets Back Suit To Limit Nutrients From Mississippi River

"A federal appeals court Tuesday (April 7) ordered a New Orleans federal judge to reconsider his ruling that the Environmental Protection Agency must decide whether more stringent rules are needed to curb the flow of fertilizer and other nutrient pollutants into the Mississippi River to stem the size of a low-oxygen "dead zone" that forms along Louisiana's coast each spring.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals sent the case back to U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey to reconsider his 2013 ruling that EPA must conduct a "necessity determination" of whether to put in place more stringent rules. But it ordered the new review to be "extremely limited" and "highly deferential" to the agency's reasons for not wanting to adopt more stringent standards.

That could be the death knell for the attempt by a consortium of environmental groups, led by the New Orleans-based Gulf Restoration Network and the national Natural Resources Defense Council, to force EPA to adopt rules that would require states to force farmers and businesses to reduce the flow of nutrients into the river."

Mark Schleifstein reports for the New Orleans Times-Picayune April 7, 2015.