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NWI at 50: the Impact and Future of Wetlands Data

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 20:33:57 GMT

Image: Map displaying the difference between field-surveyed wetland boundaries using Ecobot against the outdated NWI wetland polygon.

If you're an environmental scientist, you've likely used the tools derived from the National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) many times for environmental assessments. But do you know how and when NWI data is collected, and how the program runs?

The National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) and Its Use Cases

Let's start with some background. NWI is a 50-year-old public geospatial dataset maintained by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). It was created in 1974 to record and monitor wetland area, location, type, and trends, to inform land use and conservation decisions at scale. The dataset covers the conterminous United States, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, the major Northern Mariana Islands and Alaska. Coverage varies by region, with some areas more recently mapped than others.

NWI data is disseminated via two primary outputs:

Status and Trends Reports These reports are released on a decadal basis to congress per a mandate by the Emergency Wetlands Resources Act (Public Law 99-645). These reports provide a view of long-term wetland evolution across the country to inform conservation and management strategies and policy implementation. Read our summary of the most recent report: Takeaways from the USFWS 2019 Wetlands Status and Trends Report
Wetlands Mapper This tool provides a map view of wetland and riparian areas across the country. Natural resources professionals can use this tool to prepare for site visits, and provide an idea of what to expect.

Note: The Wetlands Mapper was designed based on a biological definition of wetlands, and does NOT define regulatory scope or boundaries. Therefore, the map cannot be used for jurisdictional determinations in lieu of an official wetland delineation.
Status Mapper
This tool is a corollary to the Wetlands Mapper, and provides a separate view of when mapping efforts were completed or are currently underway.

These tools are widely used by consultants, agency staff, researchers, and NGOs for pre-field planning or scoping.

NWI data supports Clean Water Act permitting, conservation planning, ecological restoration, mitigation banking, infrastructure development, and long-term environmental research. Some recent use cases include:

Bioenergetics modeling: Ducks Unlimited uses NWI to model food availability for dabbling ducks at the HUC12 watershed level, informing conservation priorities through tools like the American Black Duck Decision Support Tool.
Climate resilience planning: New Mexico's Wetland Jewels initiative prioritizes wetland restoration and conservation in areas that mitigate drought, wildfire, and flooding.
Infrastructure risk reduction: Dewberry applies NWI data in FEMA hazard mitigation projects and storm surge modeling to support early-stage siting and permitting.

NWI Updates—Cadence, Technology, and Challenges

NWI data updates follow a biannual release schedule. USFWS says the data has been updated at a rate covering 50–100 million acres of project area per year. The May 2025 update included over 91 million project acres across 17 states. USFWS says that 2024 was one of the largest ever updates to NWI, and they expect 2025 to match or exceed that standard.

The NWI dataset is developed using remote sensing techniques and field verification. Trained analysts use aerial imagery to identify and classify wetlands. GIS tools are then used to digitize, classify, and distribute the data.

During a June 2025 NWI-focused webinar hosted by the National Association of Wetland Managers (NAWM), Megan Lang, Chief Scientist of the NWI program, described ongoing efforts to employ artificial intelligence for wetlands identification and mapping, though the results produced by AI do not yet meet NWI's spatial and categorical standards. Andy Robertson of St. Mary's University of Minnesota, said machine learning technology has already enabled 20-30% time savings when producing map layers, while Jes Skillman of Ducks Unlimited described the benefits of deep learning to support data interpretation. As Lang put it: “We have found [AI] to be useful in some respects…but it's not an easy button just yet.” Those working on NWI remain hopeful that improvements to the technology will increasingly bolster efficient and cost-effective data production in the future.

Some states like Missouri are driving modernization efforts by integrating Elevation-Derived Hydrography (EDH), leaf-off and leaf-on high-resolution imagery, and LiDAR-based topography, said Frank Nelson of the Missouri Department of Conservation. This allows for more precise mapping of wetlands, including small water bodies that were previously missed. In Missouri's Ozarks, recent mapping reclassified large areas of general “riverine” wetlands into distinct categories (emergent, forested, and shrub) demonstrating the power of better imagery and collaborative data layering.

Lack of Funding Hinders NWI Updates

Technologically, NWI has made enormous strides since its inception. Back then, the maps were drawn by hand, and staff used stereoscopes to identify low-lying land typical of wetland formations. Now, the tools used for NWI include automated approaches that rely on satellite imagery and artificial intelligence, and partnerships with private companies, nonprofits, universities, and other government agencies are driving ever faster innovations.

But even with these advances, much of the country relies on NWI maps derived from imagery that is decades old: as of February 2024, 63% of the NWI map data was over 30 years old, and 88% was over 10 years old. This is especially true in regions where updates have not been possible due to limited funding. Patchy coverage can make it harder to identify recent wetland changes and may complicate early-stage field planning or regulatory coordination, even though NWI data itself does not determine jurisdictionality.

These gaps matter, both for long-term monitoring purposes, and as an effective tool for land use planning in the short term. Better mapping supports better science and policy.

Funding the NWI is an ongoing problem. The budget has been flat since 2016, despite expanding data needs and technology costs. In early 2024, Ecobot joined NAWM, Ducks Unlimited, Environmental Policy Innovation Center (EPIC), St. Mary's University of Minnesota, and other environmental groups in Washington D.C. to advocate before Congress for funding the NWI. This effort, organized by partners in conservation, was grounded in a shared belief that accurate, accessible data is foundational—not optional—for environmental work.

During NAWM's recent NWI webinar, panelists discussed the patchwork nature of NWI funding and updates. Congressional funding has not historically addressed NWI's needs fully. Instead, state environmental leaders and major NWI data contributors described how ongoing updates are funded in parts by EPA, BLM, DOTs, universities, or other invested parties who benefit from the data, often by way of a “pass of the hat” fundraising effort to track down money as data needs arise.

Additional funding would allow USFWS to accelerate updates in under-mapped regions, expand QA/QC efforts, and modernize data access platforms. We know that the value of NWI is directly tied to its accuracy, coverage, and frequency of update. From field consultants to regulators to restoration planners, a robust NWI is in everyone's best interest. As wetland policy, restoration, and climate adaptation efforts grow more urgent, ensuring the NWI remains current and well-supported is essential to meeting those goals.

Ecobot's mapping tool includes the NWI data layer. This layer is updated with each NWI release.

Identifying Drained and Filled Wetlands

Wed, 28 May 2025 04:00:00 GMT

In the side-by-side aerial photos above, streams are highlighted in yellow. The site on the left features a linear creek which is actually a water-filled ditch, while the site on the right contains a natural, sinuous stream. The presence of the linear ditch like the one pictured on the left is a likely indicator that wetlands were previously present at the site, and were drained and filled.

Article adapted and shared with permission from Tom Biebighauser. Learn more about the author and his How to Build a Wetland series below.

Drained Wetlands Are Restoration Opportunities

Previously drained wetland sites, i.e. ones that no longer meet wetland hydrology, are prime opportunities for restoration, and offer significant advantages in the context of wetland mitigation. If you're a mitigation provider, it's helpful to familiarize yourself with signs that indicate a drained wetland to identify these opportunities.

Restored wetlands are given preferential regulatory treatment in the mitigation hierarchy. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and EPA's 2008 Final Compensatory Mitigation Rule emphasizes a preference for restoration over creation, particularly when it can return a previously drained wetland to its natural state. The rule states that in-kind, on-site, and in-watershed mitigation projects are generally preferred, and among types of mitigation, restoration is preferred over establishment, enhancement, and preservation (33 CFR Part 332.3).

In order to represent a good restoration opportunity, the site must have been drained in the somewhat distant past and not simply missing hydrology.* It's necessary to describe how hydrology has been manipulated in order to show how it would be restored.

*The passage of time since drainage matters, because it demonstrates that the wetland wasn't drained for the purpose of creating the restoration opportunity. Similar considerations exist for tree clearing to prevent bad faith environmental alterations.

In this video, Tom Biebighauser demonstrates how to identify signs of a drained wetland. We've also listed signs that indicate a drained wetland below.

54 Signs of a Drained Wetland

A shallow or deep ditch is present within or near the area.
A deep ditch or channeled stream is observed within 1-mile of the area.
Moved, straightened, or channeled streams are present.
Ditches or streams meet at a 90-degree angle.
Ditches are present along the edge or between old fields.
Streams in the area are basically straight when flowing over level ground where slopes are less than 6-percent.
The streams in the area contain vertical banks that are eroding.
Streams are flowing along the base of a hill or mountain.
Tributary streams turn at right-angles when entering larger valleys and then flow along the base of a hill.
Streams are flowing in straight lines along the edge farm fields, or between farm fields.
Streams entering existing wetlands contain head-cuts.
Streams contain head-cuts.
The flow from a spring basically follows the base of a hill or mountain.
The flow from a spring enters a ditch or buried drainage structure.
The land downhill from a spring is dry, indicating the presence of buried pipes and drainage structures.
Irrigation ditches are present that are bordered by sedges or rushes.
The lands pattern is present with dead furrows, or can be seen on historic aerial photos.
Adjoining land of different ownership contains wetlands, with ditches separating the properties.
Buried drains made from logs, poles, boards, rock, clay, or plastic are present
Pieces of clay tile or plastic slotted plastic drain pipes are found on the surface of the ground, or in nearby ditches and streams.
The open end of a pipe (outlet) is observed along a stream or ditch.
Surface blowouts (vertical holes) are present.
Crayfish burrows and chimneys are observed in a field.
A vertical pipe (surface inlet) is present.
A patch of rock, representing a surface inlet, is present in a field.
Pump station is present.
Historic aerial photos show the presence of a wetland, while recent photos do not.
Lidar images shows a basin with straight line or ditch on one or more edges.
Basins have smoothened surfaces where natural pits and mounds were filled and leveled.
Area contains a mixture of topsoil, soil, rock, or trash, showing it was filled.
Hydric soils are found buried beneath construction fill.
The site contains a thick layer of topsoil, showing it was filled by pushing in topsoil surrounding the wetland.
Test holes reveal that topsoil is buried on the site.
Test holes uncover trees and branches cut by beaver.
Ruts formed by rubber-tired vehicles are present, some containing water.
A motor vehicle has become stuck in the mud while driving over the location.
Crayfish burrows are present, either in a farm field, old field, or lawn.
Puddles of water are present in fields.
Very small wetlands are present.
The ghosts or shadows of drained wetlands are visible on aerial photos.
Scattered wetland trees, shrubs, sedges, or bulrushes are present.
Constructed farm or ranch ponds are present (many were made from natural wetlands).
A landowner or neighbor remembers a wetland on the site.
Hydric soil is present that is being farmed.
Unplanted depressions growing trees or shrubs are present within larger fields.
Area contains a shallow depression growing trees that are surrounded by farmland.
Depressions containing clay texture soils only contain water following a heavy rain, indicating that buried drainage structures have been installed to drain the wetland.
Shallow depressions in fields contain crops killed by standing water
Shallow drainages contain upland plants instead of sedges and rushes, indicating the presence of buried drainage structures.
An area is dominated by reed canary grass or phragmites.
Water flows from the wetland in a narrow stream with high banks.
Natural vernal pools are present that have a very short hydro-period.
The overflow from a natural wetland flows into a ditch.
Shells from crustaceans are present in the soil.

Download this list as a PDF from the Wetland Restoration and Training website.

About the Author

Tom Biebighauser has been enthusiastically restoring wetlands, lakes, streams, and rivers since 1979. A former wildlife biologist for the U.S. Forest and Wildlife Service, he has designed over 10,000 wetland projects and has successfully supervised the construction of over 3,000 wetlands and streams. Biebighauser founded Wetland Restoration and Training LLC in 2014 with the mission of encouraging and helping people build naturally appearing and functioning wetlands.

GeoJSON, Shapefile, or GeoDatabase for GIS: Choosing the Right Export Type for Your Environmental Project

Mon, 19 May 2025 04:00:00 GMT

GIS files are often a required component of environmental reports, whether you're delineating wetlands, mapping streams, assessing environmental impacts, or preparing regulatory submissions.

GeoJSON, Shapefile, and GeoDatabase formats each suit specific scenarios and applications. Understanding these differences will help ensure your environmental reports meet all requirements, and enable effective communication with colleagues, regulators, and clients—saving time and clearly conveying your findings.

Let's explore how to select the best GIS export type for your next environmental project.

1. GeoDatabase (GDB)

A File Geodatabase (GDB) is Esri's modern spatial database format. It supports advanced GIS data types, domains, versioning, and more.

GDB is Ecobot's recommended GIS export for most scenarios, thanks to lengthier character limits, and support for a variety of complex data types. Choose GeoDatabase when collaborating closely with GIS teams who manage data-rich permitting, restoration, or monitoring projects over time.

Best for:

Long-term monitoring with frequent updates
Projects requiring topologies or subtypes

Strengths:

High performance with large datasets and complex spatial relationships
Supports complex spatial logic and constraints
Stores multiple feature classes in one container

Limitations:

Not human-readable
Mostly usable only within Esri environments
Not ideal for lightweight sharing

2. Shapefile

The Esri Shapefile has been around since the early '90s. It remains widely used in consulting and government workflows. It's a multi-file format (.shp, .shx, .dbf, etc.) that stores geometric location and attribute information.

Shapefiles are often a safe choice if you're submitting GIS data to a DOT, USACE, or local government agency. However, due to the character limits, field data will be truncated within your Shapefile.

Best for:

Compatibility with legacy systems
Regulatory submissions that require it
Consultants working in Esri ArcMap or QGIS

Strengths:

Universally supported
Compact and fast
Accepted by most permitting agencies

Limitations:

File size and field name limits (e.g., 10-character attribute field names)
No support for complex relationships or topologies
Doesn't store projection info directly (needs a .prj file)
Null values not supported

3. GeoJSON

GeoJSON is a JSON-based open standard for encoding a variety of geographic data structures. It's easy to read, small in size, and plays nicely with modern web mapping platforms like Leaflet, Mapbox, and Esri's ArcGIS Online.

Use GeoJSON when sending quick previews to clients or team members who want to drop data into a web map viewer without heavy GIS tools.

Best for:

Simple spatial visualizations
Web mapping applications
Internal team review and quick previews

Strengths:

Human-readable and easy to debug
Compatible with most web-based tools
Great for prototyping or sharing simple map data

Limitations:

Doesn't support advanced spatial types like topologies or network datasets
Limited attribute schema compared to geodatabases

Summary Table

Format	Best Apps/Platforms	Use Case
GeoDatabase	ArcGIS Pro, ArcGIS Enterprise, ArcGIS Online (limited), ArcMap	Advanced spatial logic, ongoing monitoring projects, projects of all sizes
Shapefile	ArcMap, ArcGIS Pro, QGIS, Global Mapper, MapInfo, AutoCAD Map 3D, Civil 3D	Regulatory submissions, traditional GIS workflows
GeoJSON	Mapbox, Leaflet, OpenLayers, ArcGIS Online (partial), QGIS, Python (GeoPandas)	Lightweight sharing, client previews, web maps

Ecobot supports each of these export types, plus .csv files. Want to streamline your environmental assessment workflows and easily produce GIS files? It's free to sign up: https://manager.ecobot.com/get-ecobot/

Understanding Hydrological Zones for Wetland Delineation

Fri, 25 Apr 2025 04:00:00 GMT

Adapted and shared with permission from Marc Seelinger, PWS, of Swamp School. Learn more about the author below.

Accurately identifying and interpreting the different hydrological zones within the top 24 inches of soil is essential for wetland delineation, regulatory compliance, and ecological assessments under the Clean Water Act. This blog provides clear definitions and authoritative references for these critical zones: the surface water zone, root zone, capillary fringe, and zone of saturation.

Surface Water Zone (0–2 inches)

The surface water zone is the topmost soil layer, characterized by temporary ponding or accumulation of water following precipitation events. Mitsch and Gosselink (2015) emphasize that this zone is ephemeral, generally drying quickly after rainfall ceases. Indicators of the surface water zone include water-stained leaves, small puddles, and algal mats, essential for identifying recent hydrologic activity (USACE, 2010).

Root Zone (2–12 inches)

The root zone, located directly beneath the surface water zone, is where the majority of plant roots reside. Soil moisture here fluctuates frequently due to evapotranspiration and infiltration processes. Vepraskas and Craft (2016) note this zone's biological richness, highlighting its dynamic moisture conditions that support significant aerobic microbial activity critical for nutrient cycling.

Capillary Fringe (12–18 inches)

The capillary fringe is a transitional layer just above the water table. Water from the saturated zone below is drawn upward into this area through capillary action, keeping it consistently moist but not fully saturated. According to Richardson and Vepraskas (2001), the thickness and moisture content of this fringe vary based on soil texture, significantly affecting soil chemistry and plant water availability.

Zone of Saturation (18–24 inches and deeper)

The zone of saturation is marked by permanently or seasonally water-filled pores, defining the water table's presence. This anaerobic zone is critical in forming hydric soils, one of the primary indicators used in regulatory wetland delineation (USDA NRCS, 2020). Reddy and DeLaune (2008) highlight the zone's importance in biogeochemical processes, including iron reduction and denitrification, shaping soil morphology and ecological functions.

Why do hydrological zones matter for wetland delineation?

Recognizing these distinct hydrological zones enhances the accuracy and reliability of jurisdictional determinations and ecological assessments. It is vital for environmental professionals to understand and document soil-water relationships comprehensively, supported by established scientific literature and regulatory guidelines.

References

Mitsch, W. J., & Gosselink, J. G. (2015). Wetlands (5th ed.). John Wiley & Sons.
Richardson, J. L., & Vepraskas, M. J. (2001). Wetland Soils: Genesis, Hydrology, Landscapes, and Classification. Lewis Publishers.
Reddy, K. R., & DeLaune, R. D. (2008). Biogeochemistry of Wetlands: Science and Applications. CRC Press.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE). (2010). Regional Supplement to the Corps of Engineers Wetland Delineation Manual: Eastern Mountains and Piedmont Region (Version 2.0). ERDC/EL TR-10-9.
U.S. Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service (USDA NRCS). (2020). Field Indicators of Hydric Soils in the United States: A Guide for Identifying and Delineating Hydric Soils. Version 8.2.
Vepraskas, M. J., & Craft, C. B. (2016). Wetland Soils: Genesis, Hydrology, Landscapes, and Classification (2nd ed.). CRC Press.

About the Author

Marc Seelinger, PWS, is the founder, director, and lead instructor of Swamp School, which offers educational courses and skills development in environmental science, conservation practices, sustainable resource management, and ecological restoration. Learn more at swampschool.org.

Best Practices for Site Photos

Fri, 18 Apr 2025 04:00:00 GMT

Take Better Shots Everywhere

Photos for reports often have little room for optimization or creativity. But small tweaks to technique can make a standard observation pop, and better photos lead to more informed colleagues, clients, and regulators.

Use these basic tips to boost your professional field site photos—and level up your next t-ball game or vacation shots too!

Keep it Light

Sunrise & Golden Hour

Site visits happen when scheduled, and the light you're dealt with is what you get. But if you have control over taking photos on arrival vs. before departure, choose the one closest to dawn or dusk.

Colors Love Clouds

It may seem counterintuitive, but colors appear richer on cloudy days or in the shade. If you're trying to communicate the hue of something, try to cast a shadow over the area or wait for a cloud to pass - this is true for using AI to identify a wildflower too!

Frame the Shot

One Subject

Identify one clear subject per photo to communicate effectively. Whether it's vegetation, a landmark, or site features, make your subject the star.

Rule of Thirds

The 3x3 grid overlay on your device is trying to help! Place the subject at intersections rather than centered.

Horizon

An extension of the rule of thirds - horizons usually look best placed at 1/3 from the top or bottom, rather than dead center. Is the sky or terrain more interesting? Let that portion take up 2/3 of the shot. Or, for extra drama on a stormy day, take note from Dutch renaissance landscapes and drop the horizon to the lower 1/5.

Step Back

To level up your landscapes, include a foreground element to provide context, scale, and visual interest.

Perspective

Move Yourself

The easiest way to take your image from basic to notable is adjusting your position or sightline. Capture better lighting, clearer subjects, or more compelling perspectives by moving your own position or the direction of your gaze.

Subjects in Motion

Subjects in motion can be challenging - looking at you peregrine falcon or toddler on the move - but a simple trick can pay off: give them somewhere to go. Car ads, athletes, and wildlife are portrayed more naturally when granted a space to travel into within a photo (or video) shot.

Contrast is Key

Make it pop. Leverage contrast in color, tone, or texture to add visual interest. Consider where you're positioned to make the most of the light and background options.

Streamline Your Site Visuals

Creating high-quality site photos and detailed photo logs used to be tedious, requiring the time-consuming manual transcribing and copy/pasting photos into log templates.

Fortunately, creating photo logs has become a lot easier, thanks to digital data recording, photo capture, and automated logs within one platform, accessible via mobile device and web browser. Let's dig into best practices for taking photos at your job site and beyond, and how to consolidate your photo log workflow using Ecobot.

Consider Your Audience

Establish team standards for what to capture to ensure consistent quality. These could change based on the project type, client, etc. but it's great to have a baseline of what to include by default.

Key Elements to Capture:

All Projects

Cardinal directions at each sampling point (label clearly)
Manmade structures, roads, debris, wells (note location relative to site)
Unusual or unexpected site features valuable to clients or regulators

Wetland & Stream Projects

Key hydric soil/hydrography indicators
WOTUS connections
Prominent wetland vegetation species

Great field photos can prevent repeat site visits! Erring on the side of caution and capturing more than the minimum can come in handy later.

Optimal Photo Quality: Resolution and File Size

Photo quality is getting better over time, which means file sizes are getting larger. Most mobile device cameras take high quality photos that take up a lot of space (12MB - 48MB per image) and are slow to transfer in large batches. While high resolution photos are beneficial for advanced editing and printing large format photos, these file sizes become cumbersome for day-to-day business.

For submission to a client or USACE, a photo with about 250 pixels per inch (roughly 1MB of storage) is sufficient for printed or digital crisp photos in a photo log for delivery.

To ensure a great experience for customers without sacrificing on quality deliverables, Ecobot scales photos to about 1MB of storage per image. This achieves an ideal middle ground with the benefit of timely syncing of images between mobile devices and the cloud, while simultaneously retaining enough of the image to create a crisp photo log for digital and print delivery to regulators and clients.

Simplified Photo Log Workflow

Ecobot photo capabilities enable a streamlined experience for all stakeholders:

Taking photos directly within each data point automatically links them to that point.
Metadata such as lat/long, direction, and elevation are automatically captured and stored for display on logs.

Creating Effective Photo Logs

An organized photo log is a valuable visual companion to a field data sheet. Including vital standardized information with each photo expedites reviews, informs colleagues and clients, and builds a reputation for quality thorough project delivery.

Logs are delivered as PDFs in Ecobot, and can be downloaded or printed as needed. There are two formatting options - basic and detailed.

Detailed Format (2 photos per page; all metadata included)
Basic Format (4 photos per page; key metadata included)

One environmental team is generating photo logs 3X faster with Ecobot than their previous method. Learn how in the case study.

Does Your Data Sheet Need Every Hydric Soil Indicator?

Wed, 02 Apr 2025 04:00:00 GMT

Guest post by Adam Gailey, PWS, of Gailey Environmental. Read more about the author below.

If my soil profile meets more than one indicator but I only note one, is my data sheet incorrect? I still have a hydric soil, right?

Technically, yes: as long as the selected indicator meets the hydric soil definition, the soil is hydric. However, documenting all applicable indicators provides a more complete, accurate, and defensible assessment.

Let's use the examples below, which begin with a simple example and increase in complexity, to explain the situation a little bit better.

Example 1.

From 0-20”, we encounter very dark/black organic soil (muck), noting a strong hydrogen sulfide odor. On our datasheet, we select A4 (Hydrogen Sulfide).

A more complete selection would include both A4 and A1 (Histosol), given that texture and depth criteria are also likely met.

If we only select A4, would that make our profile non-hydric, and thus, not a wetland? No! It would still be hydric. However, we can provide a more complete answer based on texture, depth, and the conditions (i.e. saturated soil conditions for nearly all of the growing season).

It's important to remember that more than one or a combination of indicators can be met based on this specific profile, even for different soil textures. Let's examine this further in Example 2, and then consult the regional supplement.

Example 2.

Depth 0-5” Indicators Selected: F6 Redox Dark Surface
Depth 5-20” Indicators Selected: F3 Depleted Matrix; A11 Depleted Below Dark Surface

On our datasheet, the thorough and complete answer includes all indicators that meet the definition of a hydric soil based on this profile. If we only select the first indicator, F6, from our first layer, our soil is still hydric and considered a wetland—but we want to understand the importance of why an entire profile meets, or does not meet, an indicator.

Note how the indicators change if the matrix value in the first layer changes to 3, rather than 2, as shown below:

In this first layer of the profile, we wouldn't meet the F6 Redox Dark Surface or A11 Depleted Below Surface indicators at all. The only indicator in this instance would be the F3 Depleted Matrix. The subtle difference of the matrix value completely changes the outcome.

These excerpts from the Eastern Mountains and Piedmont Regional Supplement (p. 45) demonstrate how multiple indicators, or a combination of indicators across different soil textures, can apply to a given soil profile at a specific sample location:

In conclusion, it's important to select all hydric indicators that apply.

Remember our general guiding principles for hydric soil identification:

Color: Low chroma (≤2, Munsell).
Texture: Loamy, clayey, sandy, or organic.
Depth: Where indicators appear in the profile.
Redox Features: Mottling and its relation to the matrix.
Apply Hydric Soil Indicator Definition: Select all hydric soil indicators that apply.

Why Multiple Indicators Matter

Using multiple indicators strengthens the case for hydric soil designation. Always document all applicable indicators at the time of delineation for accuracy.

The same principle applies to hydrology indicators: If a site meets two secondary indicators (e.g., Geomorphic Position, FAC-Neutral Test) but lacks primary indicators (e.g., Water Marks, Drift Deposits, High-Water Table), the field evidence for wetland evaluation and permitting is weaker.

By checking all relevant indicators, we ensure a more defensible and scientifically sound determination of hydric soils and wetland hydrology.

About the Author:

Adam Gailey is President, Lead Scientist, and Training Instructor at Gailey Environmental. With more than 20 years of experience in the environmental consulting field, Mr. Gailey has provided scientific and regulatory expertise for natural resource assessments across the United States and Puerto Rico. He is a former president of the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of the Society of Wetland Scientists and an active member of the NAWM. Visit the Gailey Environmental Training page to learn about upcoming wetland delineation and permitting courses.

What's New in the 2024 USACE Wetland Determination Forms?

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 18:55:42 GMT

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has released updated Wetland Determination Data Sheets—known as ENG Forms 6116 (1-9)—effective September 2024. If you're submitting wetland delineations to USACE, it's important to use these updated forms to avoid rejection or delayed review of your delineations.

We've combed through the updates, and surfaced some key points.

Why Did USACE Update the Forms in 2024?

The 2024 updates were made to:

Renew the forms' federal approval through the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), extending their expiration date.
Align the forms with the latest regulatory guidance, including:
- 2024 USDA-NRCS Field Indicators of Hydric Soils (Version 9.0)
- 2022 National Wetland Plant List (NWPL)

These updates ensure the forms are current, consistent with the best available science, and valid for regulatory use.

You can find the official USACE announcement here.

Learn more: What's New in Version 9.0 of the Field Indicators of Hydric Soils?

What Changed in the 2024 Wetland Determination Forms?

While the structure and core methodology of the forms remain largely unchanged, the 2024 updates align the forms with the latest hydric soil and wetland vegetation guidance from USDA and NRCS. Several forms have removed indicators or added new ones, particularly in the category of problematic hydric soil indicators. The Alaska form saw the highest number of additions, with seven new problematic hydric soil indicators.

For a full breakdown of indicators that were added, removed, or modified by region, see our list below.

Do the 2024 Updates Apply to All Regions?

Yes. USACE released updated forms for all ten regions covered by the Regional Supplements. If you're delineating wetlands in any USACE region, you are now expected to use the 2024 versions of ENG Forms 6116 (1-9).

Why It Matters: Avoid Rejected Reports and Project Delays

Some regulatory agencies have already begun rejecting submittals that used outdated forms. Using the most current forms isn't just best practice—it's a requirement. Delays in approvals can mean costly project slowdowns.

How Ecobot Keeps You Compliant

When regulations change, Ecobot updates too.

The 2024 USACE Wetland Determination Forms are already available in Ecobot.
You'll have the correct hydric soil indicators and updated vegetation lists based on your project's region.
Ecobot ensures your data is collected, stored, and reported according to the latest standards.

Hydric Soil Indicator Updates by Region

We've broken down which hydric soil indicators were added, removed, or changed on each 2024 regional form.

Alaska

Removed:
- Alaska Color Change (TA4)
- Alaska Alpine Swales (TA5)
Added:
- Depleted Below Dark Surface (A11)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)
- Depleted Matrix (F3)
- Redox Dark Surface (F6)
- Depleted Dark Surface (F7)
- Redox Depressions (F8)

Arid West

Removed:
- Vernal Pools (F9)
- Red Parent Material (TF2)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Iron-Manganese Masses (F12)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain

Removed:
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
- Red Parent Material (TF2)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)
- Barrier Islands 1 cm Muck (S12)
- Coast Prairie Redox (A16)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Caribbean Islands

Removed:
- Problematic Soil: Other (Explain in Remarks)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Eastern Mountains Piedmont

Removed:
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Loamy Mucky Mineral (F1)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Great Plains

Removed:
- Coast Prairie Redox (A16)
- Dark Surface (S7)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
- Red Parent Material (TF2)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Hawaii and Pacific Islands

Modified:
- Sandy Mucky Mineral (S1) went from Problematic to plain Hydric Soil Indicator list
Removed:
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
Added:
- Stripped Matrix (S6)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Midwest

Modified:
- Dark Surface (S7) went from Problematic to plain Hydric Soil Indicator list
Removed:
- Coast Prairie Redox (A16)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Northcentral and Northeast

Modified:
- Red Parent Material (F21) went from Problematic to plain Hydric Soil Indicator list
Removed:
- Coast Prairie Redox (A16)
- Dark Surface (S7) (from Problematic Hydric Soil Indicators only; remains under Hydric Soil Indicators. Previously appeared in both lists.)
- Mesic Spodic (TA6)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
Added:
- Mesic Spodic (A17)
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- Marl (F10)
- High Chroma Sands (S11)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Western Mountains, Valleys, and Coast

Removed:
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (TF12)
- Red Parent Material (TF2)
Added:
- Iron Monosulfide (A18)
- 1 cm Muck (A9)
- 2.5 cm Mucky Peat or Peat (S2)
- Iron-Manganese Masses (F12)
- Red Parent Material (F21)
- Very Shallow Dark Surface (F22)

Curious about the full list of indicators on each form? Explore the SEP 2024 Wetland Determination Forms in Ecobot Collector. Sign up to use Ecobot for free.

The Seasonal Splendors of Vernal Pools

Wed, 19 Mar 2025 04:00:00 GMT

By guest author Jenny Adkins, PWS, MAD Scientist Associates. Learn more about the author below.

What are vernal pools?
What makes vernal pools difficult to recognize?
Which species inhabit vernal pools?
What makes a vernal pool a unique habitat?
How to identify a vernal pool during a wetland delineation

What Are Vernal Pools? – Definition and Characteristics

Have you ever heard the ensemble of frogs calling in the early spring, found yourself mesmerized by the quiet fluttering of fairy shrimp below, or felt the freezing cold water as you waded through stillness? Then you, my friend, likely experienced the magic of vernal pools.

Vernal pools, sometimes referred to as “ephemeral pools,” are special wetlands which are often present in woodland depressions and floodplains. These fill with water in the spring, and dry up during the warmer months. They play a critical role in sustaining amphibian and invertebrate populations, many of which are species that are vernal pool obligates and not found elsewhere.

How Vernal Pools Form, and Species They Support – Amphibians, Invertebrates, and More

What makes these wetlands unique can also be their undoing, as they are not always readily recognized in the field, and may be unknowingly impacted by land use changes.

These special ecosystems typically fill with inches to feet of water from snowmelt and rainfall in the spring. Once inundated, they're readily colonized by breeding amphibians like spring peepers, wood frogs, mole salamanders, newts, aquatic insects, fishing spiders, crustaceans, fingernail clams, and aquatic worms—just to name a few. The temporary nature of these pools deters inhabitation of major predators like fish and larger frog species, making them a relatively safe place to breed for many of these “denizens of the shallow.”

Identifying Vernal Pools During a Wetland Delineation – Field Indicators

When drier, warmer periods ensue, water levels drop via evapotranspiration and infiltration. The myriad of larval species metamorphose and travel to their next destination outside of the pools—or in the case of many invertebrates, take on a dormant form until the following spring.

What's left is often a dry depression with darkly stained leaf litter. To the trained eye, there are likely other clues that indicate “wetland.” These may include:

Water marks (dark staining) on tree trunks
Presence of clams (family Sphaeriidae) in soil
Presence of hydrophilic (i.e., water-loving) vegetation, such as buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis) and Brome-like Sedge (Carex bromoides)

Should you be performing a delineation or other ecological survey and notice some of these features, be sure to closely investigate. Many of the indicators of vernal pools are present in the Army Corps of Engineer Regional Supplement methodology as primary and secondary indicators of hydrology, which is often the least obvious characteristic of these wetlands in the drier months.

Tip: Use Ecobot's built-in reference tools from the USACE Regional Supplements to support your field identifications. Try it out.

Recognizing and properly characterizing these unique habitats will undoubtedly protect populations of vulnerable species, preserving biodiversity and keeping the sounds of spring alive.

Note from Ecobot: Current federal environmental policy excludes protection for the majority of vernal pools. Some state and local governments have laws and programs protecting vernal pools. Learn more about how wetland protections vary by state in the interactive StoryMap, "How does SCOTUS' Sackett v. EPA Decision Affect You?"

About the Author

Jenny Adkins, PWS, has served as Lead Ecologist at MAD Scientist Associates for over a decade. She is skilled in plant identification, restoration planting plans, and management practices for invasive species control. MAD Scientist Associates has served the state of Ohio since 1998, providing high-quality wetland and ecological consulting services to clients in the public and private sectors. MAD frequently shares their expertise on vernal pools at educational events across Ohio.

Spring Fieldwork Checklist

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 04:00:00 GMT

Spring field season is here. Use this quick checklist to make sure your gear, tech, and safety essentials are prepped before you head out.

Gear & Equipment

Inspect boots, waders, and waterproof gear for leaks or wear.
Clean and calibrate field instruments (e.g., GNSS, soil augers).
Account for all items needed for the field:
- Field Instruments:
  - Soil auger
  - GNSS device
  - Munsell Soil Color Book
  - Mobile device for data collection and photos
  - External power bank or solar charger
  - High-vis flags
- Personal Gear:
  - Backpack
  - High-vis vest
  - Waders and/or muck boots
  - Work gloves (optional, for hand protection from briars, etc.)
- Food and First Aid:
  - Water and snacks
  - Sunscreen
  - Bugspray
  - Hat
  - Sunglasses (tip: add flotation strap)
  - First aid kit
  - Patch kit or duct tape (for on-the-fly repairs)

Tech & Data Prep

Update fieldwork applications like Ecobot to the current version. If you've never tried a data collection and reporting app, now's a good time to explore!
Ensure compatibility and connection between GNSS device, mobile device, and field applications.
Review best practices for taking clear field photos and documentation.

Field Safety & Comfort

Refresh first-aid kits and check for expired supplies.
Stock up on insect repellent, sunscreen, snacks, and a reusable water bottle.
Be prepared for unpredictable weather (rain gear, layers).

What's New in Version 9.0 of the Field Indicators of Hydric Soils?

Thu, 20 Feb 2025 17:13:48 GMT

In late 2024, the USDA-NRCS released Field Indicators of Hydric Soils in the United States version 9.0. Here's what changed.

Adapted and shared with permission from Mike Callahan, CPSS of Soil Hub. Learn more about the author below.

New Indicator: A18 – Iron Monosulfides

The biggest update in version 9.0 is the addition of a new indicator: A18 – Iron Monosulfides.

This indicator applies to all Land Resource Regions (LRRs), meaning it can be used anywhere, affecting anyone identifying hydric soils. Here's the official indicator description:

"Positive identification of dark-gray or black iron monosulfide concentrations with a value of 4 or less and chroma of 2 or less, starting at a depth of 25 cm (10 inches) or less from the soil surface."

What does this mean in the field? In practical terms, you'll likely see black colors in freshly excavated soil that lighten with exposure to air. The key here is the relatively rapid change in color. Unlike organic matter, which can appear dark or black and do not oxidize rapidly, iron monosulfides oxidize quickly, shifting to lighter shades (i.e., increasing in value by at least one color chip).

Figure 21 from the Field Indicators book demonstrates this change. The left side (A) shows the soil upon excavation. The right side (B) shows the same soil after oxidation of the iron monosulfides. Notice how the black areas essentially go away in picture B.

To assist with identification, a flowchart in the glossary walks you through confirming FeS presence, shown below.

Here's A18 contrasted against F3 and S6:

Other Notable Changes in Version 9.0

The Test Indicators section has been removed. Some former test indicators have been incorporated into A, S, or F indicators, while others were discontinued or will be included in a forthcoming Problematic Soils document.
Text clarifications across multiple indicators aim to improve usability for field practitioners.

Using the Most Up-to-Date Indicators

Keep in mind that the Version 9.0 updates have not yet been incorporated into the USACE Regional Supplements (as of this blog post). While the supplements reference the Field Indicators, they don't always contain the latest language.

For the most current information, refer directly to the Field Indicators of Hydric Soils or use resources like Soil Hub's Hydric Soil Indicator App or Ecobot Collector's built-in soil suggestions for wetland delineations.

There's no constant but change, and that certainly applies to the science of the hydric soil indicators.

Ecobot supports accurate soil identification in the field with automated suggestions tailored to each USACE region. Try it out for free.

Check out other popular soil resources: Munsell Soil Reference Guide, Understanding Gley Soil

About the Author

Mike Callahan is a Certified Professional Soil Scientist with more than two decades of experience. He is the founder of Soil Hub, an online and in-person training resource for professionals who work in soil science related disciplines like on-lot septic, stormwater, wetlands, engineering, and geology. Soil Hub offers unique courses, resources, and community. Learn more at www.soilhub.com and explore the Hydric Soil Indicators mobile app.

5 Efficiency Tools for Environmental Assessments

Wed, 29 Jan 2025 05:00:00 GMT

Technology for environmental consultants has come a long way in just the past few years. Now, software can be used on your smartphone or tablet to facilitate easier decision-making and data collection in the field, and then simplify QA and reporting back at the office, making wetland delineations and stream assessments move smoothly. Many environmental consultants are able to produce reports twice as fast thanks to digital tools like Ecobot.

Ecobot includes regionally-specific reference tools, along with suggestions for vegetation identification afnd hydric soil indicators, minimizing the need to lug manuals around in the field. Here are a few of our favorite features that make field data collection and reporting easier:

1. Soil Suggestions

We know that soil identification can be complex. In collaboration with soil experts, Ecobot has built regionally-specific logic into the platform to support informed decision-making about hydric soil indicators. Soil suggestion are available for fieldwork and during QA to support accuracy throughout the workflow.

During QA and reporting, Ecobot's soil verification tool enables you to further validate your selections.

2. Photo Logs with Metadata

Field scientists create photo logs with Ecobot 3X faster than other methods. Ecobot makes it easy to 1) capture photos in the field along with data, and 2) generate a polished photo log that retains all that data. Ecobot automatically captures geospatial data when you use your smartphone camera, and your final photo log contains the following metadata:

Point association
Time and date
Coordinates
Direction
Project info

No more manually combining data with your photos or fiddling with a homemade word processor template!

3. Clone Your Data

Field scientists save hours on large projects using the clone tool, which enables them to copy data rather than enter it twice—especially on linear corridors where they encounter many of the same features for miles. If you see the same vegetation or soil profiles in different areas at your site, instead of re-entering the same data multiple times, you can clone your datapoint.

4. Auto-Fill Location Fields

Field scientists say this tool in Ecobot cuts out a lot of busywork and is a major time-saver that helps them produce reports twice as fast. Ecobot auto-fills top-of-form fields based on the lat-long of your sampling point, eliminating the need to look it up manually. Auto-filled fields include:

City/County
State
Subregion (LRR)
Section/Township/Range
Soil Map Unit Name
NWI Classification

5. AI-Powered Vegetation Identification

AI-powered vegetation identification enables field scientists to quickly validate species. The AI suggests a few possible species matches, organized by percent confidence, with a few pictures of each option so the scientist can make the final determination.

This tool can be used on barks and branches outside of the growing season to assist with tricky winter vegetation ID.

Learn more on our Product page about Ecobot's other efficiency tools—like automated calculations, GNSS compatibility, mapping capabilities, and more. Or, try it out yourself for free.

Quick-Start Guide to OHWM Assessments

Tue, 29 Oct 2024 19:38:18 GMT

Learn how to complete OHWM assessments with Ecobot's simple guide.

Prepare for your site visit: Utilize remotely sensed data from our list of resources
Identify key indicators: Learn to recognize and document geomorphic, vegetation, sediment, and ancillary indicators
Apply the Weigh of Evidence approach: Use this method to make accurate and reliable determinations.

Background and purpose of OHWM Form

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' jurisdiction over streams is limited to the area of water flow. The Corps published the Rapid Ordinary High Water Mark (OHWM) Field Identification Data Sheet to support the determination of jurisdictional boundaries. This process provides guidance for identifying stream boundaries by integrating scientific principles with a weight-of-evidence approach. The form's step-by-step instructions make it a practical and accessible methodology for environmental scientists.

Similar to a wetland delineation, which demarcates the boundaries of a wetland, an Ordinary High Water Mark assessment is designed to identify the boundary of a stream for regulatory purposes.

The OHWM form and accompanying manual are designed to be particularly helpful in ambiguous situations, when there are multiple possibilities for OHWM.

<div class="indent-image"> <img src="/images/collector-instructions-screenshot.webp" alt=""> <p>Ecobot has instructions built in to aid you during OHWM assessments. </p> </div>

<div class="indent-image"> <img src="/images/ohwm-paper-instructions.webp" alt=""> <p>The form itself includes step-by-step instructions on the final two pages, designed to make the assessment accessible. </p> </div>

Step-by-Step Process to Conducting an OHWM Assessment

Before arriving at the site:

1. Site overview and landscape context from remote and online resources: Use remotely sensed data and maps to prepare background information. Provide land use context and history if possible, as well as recent weather events and historical climatic conditions within the upstream watershed. Here are some fantastic online resources to get started:

NOAA: Aerial views, satellite imagery, LiDAR, and land use maps
USGS: Topo maps, Gage data*
NWS: Climate data
NRCS: Geologic maps

*For gage data, use onsite well data if available.

At the site:

2. Site conditions during the assessment: Broadly observe and contextualize the assessment area, including the location in the landscape, connections to any bodies of water or wetlands.

3a. List evidence: List specific evidence. You'll be tracking physical and vegetative indicators that are consistent with recurring high flows, including:

Geomorphic indicators, like a break in bank slope;
Vegetation indicators, like the transition from forbs and graminoids to woody shrubs;
Sediment indicators, like changes in soil texture or development;
Ancillary indicators, like deposits of litter.

<div class="indent-image"> <img src="/images/figure8.webp" alt=""> <p><strong>Cross section of a stream showing the identification of the OHWM.</strong> The OHWM is determined by weighing the body of evidence of four different kinds of indicators: geomorphic, vegetation, sediment, and ancillary. In this example, the physical changes labeled are (1) location of the break in slope and shelving, (2) vegetation, and (3) sediment. Sourced with permission from <a href="https://erdc-library.erdc.dren.mil/items/190ea825-622d-45ce-8709-93f8411daba0" target="_blank">National Ordinary High Water Mark Field Delineation Manual for Rivers and Streams : Interim Version</a>.</p> </div>

3b. Weigh Evidence: Using a Weight of Evidence approach, weigh each indicator by considering its importance based on the following: a) Relevance; b) Strength; c) Reliability. Weigh the body of evidence, and take photos of indicators.

<div class="blog-tip"><strong>Tip for efficiency:</strong> Ecobot makes it easy to take photos in the field and export organized photo logs with metadata. <a href="https://manager.ecobot.com/get-ecobot/">Check it out for free</a>.</div>

4. Assess whether additional information is needed or other resources to support the lines of evidence observed in the field: Repeat steps 3a and 3b as necessary, and evaluate the reliability of the online sources gathered prior to the site visit. If other sources are needed, describe your rationale. Attach any remote data and analysis to the spreadsheet.

5. Describe rationale for location of the OHWM: Explain why this combination of indicators represent the OHWM and add any additional site notes to your form.

<div class="blog-tip"><strong>Tip for efficiency:</strong> Identify the most distinct feature first and contextualize your observations from there!</div>

Applying Stream Assessment Methodologies to OHWM

Although the process for an OHWM assessment is consistent across regions, indicators have different significance across systems.

In certain geomorphologies, the OHWM and active channel will be in the same location. In areas with wetland presence, for example, the OHWM and active channel may be in different locations. Bankfull stage and the active channel limits are the scientific equivalents of the regulatory concept of OHWM.

<div class="indent-image"> <img src="/images/figure3.webp" alt=""> <p><strong>Low- and high-flow stages in braided, anastomosing, and meandering channels.</strong> The high-flow stage encompasses the active channel in each of these systems.” Sourced with permission from <a href="https://erdc-library.erdc.dren.mil/items/190ea825-622d-45ce-8709-93f8411daba0" target="_blank">National Ordinary High Water Mark Field Delineation Manual for Rivers and Streams : Interim Version</a>.</p> </div>

The OHWM is shaped by flows that are “well above mean annual flow but are not extreme”. <sup>1</sup>

In what regions or environments would you conduct an Ordinary High Water Mark (OHWM) assessment?

The procedure for OHWM assessments is standardized across all United States regions but may be necessary more often in drier environments.

Completing the OHWM Form even when no OHWM is found is a way to demonstrate due diligence. We sat down with an environmental science and legal expert to learn more. See the article: Ordinary High Water Mark: A Proxy for Regulatory Certainty?

The Corps' manual from November 2022 provides guidance on corner cases and complex or ambiguous scenarios. Access it here: National Ordinary High Water Mark Field Delineation Manual for Rivers and Streams : Final Version.

<br><br><br> Citations:

Eastman, J. (2022, November 29). Introduction to the interim draft of the National Ordinary High Water Mark (OHWM) field delineation manual for rivers and streams [Video]. Defense Visual Information Distribution Service. https://www.dvidshub.net/video/874184/introduction-interim-draft-national-ordinary-high-water-mark-ohwm-manual. Accessed via https://www.erdc.usace.army.mil/Media/Fact-Sheets/Fact-Sheet-Article-View/Article/486085/ordinary-high-water-mark-ohwm-research-development-and-training/.
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. (2022). Figure 3: Low- and high-flow stages in braided, anastomosing, and meandering channels and Figure 8: Schematic of a stream cross section showing OHWM identification. In National Ordinary High Water Mark Field Delineation Manual for Rivers and Streams (ERDC/CRREL TR-22-26) (p. 25). U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

*This article originally focused on the 2022 Interim Draft of the National Ordinary High Water Mark Field Delineation Manual for Rivers and Streams, and has been updated to reflect the final version released in January 2025. *

Ordinary High Water Mark: A Proxy for Regulatory Certainty?

Tue, 06 Aug 2024 21:24:51 GMT

In a regulatory landscape where scientific and legal terms don't always match up, the National Ordinary High Water Mark (OHWM) form stands in contrast, offering a clear, standardized environmental assessment across regions and states. OHWM is a valuable resource for professionals in civil engineering and environmental consulting to deliver high-quality assessments that use clear parameters, and ensure peace of mind for firms.

An OHWM assessment demonstrates that due diligence was exercised, and can serve as a proxy for regulatory certainty in states that rely exclusively on federal aquatic resources (i.e., wetlands and streams) regulations.

Why the OHWM Form Matters

From the Clean Water Act's enactment in 1972 to the Sackett ruling in 2023, the scope of federal water protections has been a moving target. The Sackett v. EPA decision of 2023 of rolled back protections, focusing federal jurisdiction on permanent bodies of water and adjacent wetlands, and leaving many isolated and less permanent waters unprotected in the 20 states without their own wetland programs. Those doing work in states with their own wetland regulations must comply with local requirements, which may differ from the federal standard.

An OHWM assessment may act as a proxy for regulatory certainty, since under current Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standards, if a wetland has an outlet with an identifiable OHWM, it is likely to qualify as jurisdictional. It's important to remember that while consultants can offer professional judgment based on their field observations, only the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and EPA can make determine whether a wetland is jurisdictional.

The OHWM form enables identification and documentation of the environmental conditions that are created by the flow of water in a “stream.” Perennial, and most intermittent streams, will be federal jurisdictional, and can be assessed using the OHWM form. The form provides detailed, standardized guidance for identifying the high water mark by focusing on hydrological indicators rather than the broader and sometimes more ambiguous wetland criteria. The high water mark is especially crucial in key drainage areas with intermittent or no wetlands, such as those commonly found in the Arid West.

Benefits for Your Projects and Clients

Clearer Assessments and Robust Documentation: The OHWM form offers a straightforward method to identify water marks, enabling teams to conduct accurate standardized assessments at each site that provide a basis for professional calls in the event of litigation. By clearly delineating high water marks, you can demonstrate compliance with federal regulations, reducing legal risks and showing due diligence in your assessments.
Consistency Across Regions: The OHWM manual represents a national effort to harmonize practices across the U.S. This consistency is vital for meeting best practices and ensuring thoroughness for clients to avoid legal trouble later, no matter where you're working.
Detailed Guidance: Packed with updated methodologies and technical guidance, the OHWM form is a reliable resource for field personnel. It helps you stay current with best practices and regulatory expectations.

Why Adopt the OHWM Form Now?

OHWM is a a powerful tool that protects your company and equips your client amid regulatory uncertainty. For civil engineering and environmental consulting firms, adopting this form isn't just about compliance—it's about providing top-notch service to your clients.

In states without their own wetland protections, this form becomes even more critical for environmental consultants. The Sackett ruling left a significant gap in federal protections, and the OHWM form helps fill that void, ensuring that your projects are assessed thoroughly and accurately. OHWM assessments are a smart, proactive approach that help environmental professionals deliver high-quality and defensible site reports and keep you and your clients in the clear.

March 14, 2025: This article has been updated since initial publication following the release of the final version of the OHWM form.

How to Protect Wetlands Post-Sackett

Sat, 29 Jun 2024 01:22:37 GMT

On Monday 6/19, White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair Brenda Mallory spoke at the NAWM Annual Conference, urging states to compensate for the lack of federal wetland protections. Even before Sackett v. EPA, nationwide wetland losses have increased by 50%, amounting to a loss of 670,000 acres of vegetated wetlands.

The Biden administration aims to overcome some of these gaps. Current initiatives include:

A goal to restore and reconnect 8 million acres of wetlands and 100,000 miles of streams and waters.
A plan by US Army Corps of Engineers to use compensatory mitigation to offset losses of aquatic resources and wetlands.

Mallory was clear that these federal efforts won't bridge the gap sufficiently, and that additional efforts, including better public education on the status and importance of wetlands; collective cooperation between states, Tribes, local and global entities, and both the private and public sector; and an eye for innovative solutions.

Learn more: Sackett v. EPA, One Year Later

Top Takeaways from the 2024 NAWM Annual Meeting

Thu, 27 Jun 2024 15:11:14 GMT

Did you make it to the NAWM Annual State/Tribal/Federal Coordination Meeting last week? If so, maybe you ran into Ecobot's Kim Nichols, MBA in a session or out in the field! We're proud to have sponsored this important gathering and knowledge exchange.

ICYMI, here are our top takeaways from the meeting

The environmental community is already repositioning after last year's Sackett ruling, identifying three key drivers to sustaining and growing our nation's vital wetlands: education, collective action, and policy at the tribe, state, and local levels. Learn more in our recap: Sackett v. EPA, One Year Later
With much of the Arid West outside of jurisdiction post-Sackett, collaboration, flexibility, and creativity are needed to tackle the complexities of connecting waters and wetlands more effectively, taking historical alterations into account. Learn more: A Year After Sackett v. EPA: Insights from D.C.-Based Environmental Lawyer Fred Wagner
Beavers: Champions of wetland restoration or destroyers of fledgeling mitigation sites? It seems like they came out ahead after Day 3's sessions! Check out BeaverCON 2024 to learn more.

A Year After Sackett v. EPA: Insights from D.C.-Based Environmental Lawyer Fred Wagner

Fri, 24 May 2024 15:29:12 GMT

Ecobot spoke with D.C.-based environmental attorney and WOTUS expert Fred Wagner about this first year in a post-Sackett regulatory landscape. Wagner offers insights on current and pending legislation, predictions for the future, and what it would take to swing the pendulum back toward environmentally favorable wetland protections.

We spoke with Wagner shortly after the decision was made last spring: check out the Ecobite episode.

Key takeaways:

Impact on Water Protection, and Ways to Outperform Weak Policy: Officials from agencies including White House Council for Environmental Quality, EPA, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and others expressed strong disagreement with the Sackett, and have proposed alternative efforts as a stopgap for the rollback to environmental protections.
Ongoing Litigation: There is ongoing controversy and litigation regarding the EPA and Army Corps' interpretation of the Sackett decision. Several cases argue that the recent changes to the rules, such as the removal of the Significant Nexus Test, are arbitrary and capricious.
Future Enforcement Trends: There is speculation that enforcement by agencies like the EPA may shift from preemptive to reactive, focusing more on actions after violations occur rather than preventative measures.
State-Level Actions: States are not precluded by Sackett from implementing more stringent environmental protections. There is an expectation that some states, especially those more vulnerable to environmental risks, may enforce stricter regulations.
Predictions for Business Responses: The business response to the changing regulatory landscape is uncertain. While some businesses may welcome the reduced federal oversight as a reduction in compliance costs, others may prefer a clear and consistent regulatory framework to navigate their operations across state lines.

WAGNER: I just recently had an opportunity to be on a panel at the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP). Somebody asked the CEQ chair [Brenda Mallory] about Sackett, and she said straight out that they strongly disagree with the policy. It's the law of the land, so they're abiding by it as the new legal standard, but they disagree with it. The important point is that their policies and their interpretations of their authority are largely driven by the fact that they disagree with the ruling.

There's broad agreement that the scope of waters that otherwise would have received protection under the Clean Water Act is much smaller. So the federal government is trying to figure out how they can fill the gap—if there are legitimate ways to fill that gap, ways that they can partner with our state agencies, those that are so inclined, to fill in that gap.

There's been a lot of controversy over that, and there's been additional litigation claiming that the EPA and the Army Corps are, in essence, either ignoring or misinterpreting the Sackett ruling. There are the generic general cases that are ongoing claiming that the December 2023 final rule is “arbitrary and capricious,” even with the very short update that the EPA and the Corps issued after Sackett.

There are two separate cases--one in Texas, one in North Dakota, where the states–mostly state litigants, some industries--are claiming that, even with the changes that made by taking out the Significant Nexus Test and anything related to Significant Nexus in the mini rule last summer, [the Corps'] final rule and interpretation of [their] authority under the Clean Water Act is still incorrect based on the plain reading of Sackett. We're going to have a couple of rulings very soon, and we'll hear whether the agencies are doing it correctly, at least in the eyes of those courts. And there may be further litigation over that. There may be appeals and all that sort of thing.

From the highest level, there's still a lot of controversy about whether the agencies went far enough to recognize the limits of jurisdiction according to Sackett and we'll hear about that. Then there are specific challenges. There was a property owner in North Carolina that filed a challenge based on enforcement action that said that the Army Corps is misinterpreting Sackett. I expect we're going to see more of those because either a property owner says, “I don't need you to tell me this is not Waters of the United States. It's as plain as the nose on your face. I'm just going to go ahead. This is not connected to anything. This is isolated, or it could be ephemeral or there's clearly nothing related to permanent waters. The waters aren't permanent in any way. I'm just going to go ahead and do what I want to do.” And then it'll be up to the agency to decide whether they're going to enforce against a property owner in that situation. It's not clear that they will, but things are going to come up that way.

ECOBOT: Do you think that rather than agency involvement happening ahead of time, the way it has historically, it's going to shift agency action to enforcement? I mean, can you go so far as to say that that seems to be where things are bent?

WAGNER: It's not a full-on trend yet, but I have heard enough from the sort of conservative legal foundation types, the industrial association types, where they see the Corps' position as, “We'll tell you when there's a Water of the United States, that's our call, and that's a call only that could be made based on a jurisdictional determination.” One of the rationales of Sackett was that this kind of uncertainty is crazy. It's expensive, it's time consuming. That's not fair for property owners out there to have to go through all that, just to find out if they could put up their home like the Sacketts wanted to do or something like that. So, my prediction is that it's going to head in that direction, because I think a lot of property owners are going to say, “Look, I don't need the blessing of the Corps and the EPA to say ‘no, we don't have jurisdiction.' We don't have to prove the negative.” It could very well be that if EPA and the Corps feel that that's been abused in some way, they may opt for an enforcement action.

Now, of course, all this is subject to whether there's a change in administration and change in the agency. In that case I'd imagine there would be no enforcement, except in the most egregious cases, and deferring largely to the interpretations of private property owners. That's a really big deal. One of the major implications of the upcoming election is in terms of how the agencies will interpret their role. If the team stays the same, they will work as hard as they can to press their authority in their jurisdiction as far as they can within limits. If the teams change, I don't think it would be an exaggeration to say that I would be surprised if there was even one enforcement action over the next four years.

ECOBOT: Are the states restricted by Sackett from picking up that authority?

WAGNER: No, and that's the thing. The states can always be more restrictive, and I think what we're seeing is that a lot of the approaches, a lot of the strategy from EPA and the Corps is to work with the more sympathetic states, i.e. blue states, to say, “Hey, look, we may not be able to do this under Clean Water Act, but you may be able to do it under state authority . And so are there ways that you can go ahead and figure out if you want to protect certain waters”

There are some strange bedfellows out there. I think of the Louisianas of the world, which you might not expect to be one of the jurisdictions that would be more aggressive. On the other hand, they're very protective for flood control and property protection. There may be surprises in terms of what states may or may not do.

ECOBOT: Just because of the personal interest, actual impact on their own backyard.

WAGNER: Exactly right. Some states may have to have a more aggressive posture, because they continue to suffer property loss or property damage, and they understand the importance of protecting these types of features.

ECOBOT: There's nothing about Sackett that will prevent states from being as aggressive as they would like with protections, right?

WAGNER: My current view is that that is correct. Does the Federal Standard act in such a way that it precludes or preempts states from doing something different? I'd imagine you may see some arguments there from folks who want to challenge if a particular state does something that's more restrictive. But if the state says that there are state waters or state features, or they pass legislation that says certain features need to be protected because of flood control or whatever, I believe they have that authority, and I don't think Sackett prevents them.

We have this crazy quilt application of rules in the U.S. There are 27 states that apply the old rule [pre-2015 regulatory regime], and there are 23 that apply the new rule [2023 WOTUS rule that was amended following Sackett]. Stuff like that is going to continue. It's never a good thing when you're trying to come up with advice for companies or property owners that operate in different places, to have to tell our prospective clients, well, it may be good here, but tomorrow when you approach me for a project in a different state, I may have to tell you something very different.

ECOBOT: Do you have any predictions on what business response to that will be? States, businesses that are in multiple states, are they just going to follow the more conservative approach regarding protections and collect more data and say, look, we're going to play it safe because we need a consistent corporate policy?

WAGNER: That's a hard prediction to make. On the one hand, for years, the business community has wanted a standard to apply, and the back and forth drives them crazy. Well, now they have a standard. I think that the reason it's hard to predict is that the posture of different businesses and different industries is not at all consistent. Some may continue to want to push the envelope to restrict jurisdiction and authority consistent with the Sackett ruling. Others may say, “Okay, I think we get it now. Let's operate under this framework.” But it's not a consistent approach. Some entities may push a little bit harder still and others may not. So that's a hard prediction to make.

ECOBOT: You talked a little bit about some of the different cases that have been up in different states where landowners are no longer answering to federal agencies. Have you seen Sackett cited in any subsequent environmental cases? What kind of precedent has it set? Is this having sort of a ripple effect for other sorts of policies, whether related to WOTUS, or other environmental policies?

WAGNER: There was a ruling a few months ago that was very critical of the Army Corps, saying in essence that they had ignored Sackett. It was pretty much asking, “What is it going to take you guys? How hard do we have to beat you over the head before you really understand this?” But there haven't been all that many yet. A year seems like a long time, but it takes a while for these challenges to percolate through the system to get some of these rulings.

ECOBOT: The Sackett decision has some finality that previous fluctuations of WOTUS didn't have.

WAGNER: Yeah, this one's going to be here for a while, and it's going to take several years to see how courts deal with it, how litigation deals with it. It's going to take the election outcome to determine how it's going to be interpreted. And for the pendulum to swing back in favor of environmental protections, it may take another major disaster that shows the value of some of these lands and the importance of protecting them. But it's not going to happen right away.

ECOBOT: So it's the economic impacts of climate change that are the only way to unify the opposing sides on protection?

WAGNER:I think so. Hard lessons. If what the preservation and conservation community has been saying for years pans out, that the absence of protection of certain these lands results in worse disasters, worse flooding, other sorts of environment-damaging outcomes, that's what it's going to take. In the interim, [wetland protections] will be done on a state-by-state basis. Private entities and nonprofit groups are going to bear the brunt of trying to encourage this type of conservation. They simply won't be able to count on federal protections and federal authority to do that. And then it's going to take a while, either through court interpretations again, or through some current news events or natural occurrences, for people to try to move in a different direction.

Remember, one of the things that's perpetuated this debate for decades is the uncertainty over the definition of the term “Waters of the United States.” Something that's come out of Sackett and some of the other recent Supreme Court cases is the court's instruction to Congress that if you want to be specific, you have to define it--you just can't throw out a general term like WOTUS and then leave it to agencies to do it. You have to do more. It's possible, one can envision, that with change of political fortunes, different parties controlling Congress and the White House in the future, that there could be the Wetlands Protection Act of 2028, that's specific and fills in that gap. That doesn't leave it to any doubt, and says, “These certain things need to be protected and here's why. And we're going to define it this way.”

If Biden wins and the agencies stay in the same control, you may see a much more aggressive posture to try to switch the standard, bring different challenges to try to get more clarity and so forth. But you're not going to see any of that in the next six months. It's too politically sensitive, but we'll see soon enough.

Sackett v. EPA: One Year Later

Thu, 23 May 2024 04:00:00 GMT

How has Sackett v. EPA affected your local regulations? Explore our interactive StoryMap.

May 25, 2024 marks the anniversary of the Sackett v. EPA decision that profoundly narrowed the definition of Waters of the United States (WOTUS) and limited federal wetland protections. The concept of WOTUS was coined 35 years ago and has been in flux ever since, but last year's decision brought an unprecedented level of finality and restriction, significantly limiting federal oversight—overwhelmingly to the detriment of environmental health.

According to White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) Chair Brenda Mallory, this ruling represents "one of the largest judicial rollbacks of environmental protections in U.S. history." It has effectively stripped federal protection from ephemeral and unconnected waters, constraining the EPA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' ability to oversee and enforce wetland regulations, in spite of protests from officials that this limitation ignores the science around the ecological importance of those water features.

Responses and Initiatives

The decision has been met with substantial criticism from federal agencies including representatives from the Corps, EPA, and CEQ, with officials advocating for innovative approaches to overcome lost protections. An internal memo from the Army Corps' Assistant Secretary of the Army (Civil Works) Michael Connor in March, and recent talks by CEQ Chair Mallory have called for creative workarounds and solutions for bolstering environmental protections to make up for the severely limited policy.These addresses have underscored the need for resilience and adaptability in water management strategies, reimagining water protection by utilizing every tool and resource at all government levels to protect our nation's waters.

Solutions to Overcome Policy Limitations

In light of the scaled-back federal oversight, Mallory and Connor have proposed workarounds including:

Cooperative Agreements with States: States can enact stricter environmental protections, especially those who face unique water-related challenges like increased flooding. 15 states already have broad water policies beyond WOTUS, and eight more have more limited water policies. The remainder are reliant on WOTUS protections at the federal level. Learn more in the interactive StoryMap, “How does SCOTUS' Sackett v. EPA Decision Affect You?”
Conservation Agreements with Private Parties: These partnerships can promote sustainable practices.
Incentives for Sustainable Development: Encouraging more sustainable land use and development practices through financial incentives.
Protective and Mitigation Actions: Strategies include Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration; Technical Assistance Programs that support development of water-related programs or regulations like watershed and restoration planning assistance; integration of nature-based solutions into Civil Works project planning, design, and construction; and support compensatory mitigation for impacts to WOTUS. Read more in Connor's memo.

Ongoing Litigation and Legal Challenges

There is ongoing litigation challenging how the Sackett ruling has been interpreted by the EPA and the Army Corps, with cases in Texas, North Dakota, and North Carolina arguing that recent regulatory revisions remain arbitrary. The outcome of these cases could clarify the scope of federal environmental oversight further. Since May 2023, Sackett has appeared in subsequent cases a total of 39 times: examined in five, discussed in 10, cited in 23, and mentioned in one.

The Road Ahead

Experts predict that agency responses may shift from proactive jurisdictional determinations to reactive enforcement measures, focusing on significant violations. The definitive nature of the Sackett decision suggests lasting impacts, yet future legal and political developments—such as election outcomes—could influence its interpretation and implementation.

Overall, while the Sackett v. EPA decision has set a new precedent, the dialogue it has initiated among policymakers, legal experts, and environmentalists is likely to spur ongoing debates and potentially pave the way for new legislative and regulatory adjustments. As we navigate these changes, the collective effort toward sustainable water management remains more critical than ever.

Read more: Ecobot spoke with D.C.-based environmental attorney and WOTUS expert Fred Wagner about this first year in a post-Sackett regulatory landscape. Learn Wagner's insights on current and pending legislation, predictions for the future, and what it would take to swing the pendulum back toward favorable wetland protections.

Understanding Gley Soil

Mon, 29 Apr 2024 17:21:51 GMT

What is Gley Soil?

Gley soil is the result of consistently waterlogged, iron rich soil, and is often identified by its characteristic bluish-gray or greenish-gray color .

Gleying or Gleyzation occurs when iron compounds are reduced by microorganisms in waterlogged, anaerobic conditions. The iron compounds are either removed from the soil completely or segregated out as mottles. Mottles appear as rust-colored splotches or streaks.

The characteristic bluish- or greenish-gray color is the result of the reduction of iron in soils that have been saturated for significant time periods. [1]

Identifying Gley Soil

Gley colors are identified using the Munsell Soil Color Chart. <a href="/pdf/MunsellColorChart.pdf" class="trackMunsellGuide">Check out our downloadable Munsell Soil Reference Guide</a>.

Common Misconceptions, or Tips for Honing Your Gley Identification Skills

Gley soil can be found in most climates. The key factor in gley soil formation is water saturation, not temperature. Therefore, any flat low-lying region that has prolonged soil saturation, regardless of its temperature, can potentially have gley soils.

Gley means more than gray, and gley soil can contain multiple colors. Gley comes from a Russian word meaning wet bluish clay. But Gley soil can be a variety of colors and should be identified using the Munsell Soil Color Chart.

The bottom rows aren't technically gley. Soils with a value of 3 or 2.5 are not considered as gley, but the presence of these values on the gley pages acknowledges the complexity and variability of soil conditions, and fulfills a practical need for including them.

Recording Gley Soil

Gley colors are recorded slightly differently than other pages in the Munsell Soil Color Chart. For any color found on pages Gley 1 or Gley 2, the page name does not equal the Hue.

To record a soil color from pages Gley 1 or Gley 2, follow the steps below:

Ecobot Collector

Ecobot Manager

Tips

One exception to the steps described above are soils identified the N column
N = neutral, which can include Pure BLACK, Pure WHITE, and the GRAYs in between4
Colors found in the N column by definition have no chroma
Example: Written as N 2.5/
N 2.5/0 is also acceptable

We know soils.

Ecobot makes soil data entry and QA/QC intuitive and accurate.

The latest version of Ecobot Collector for iOS and Android provides new ways to manage multiple matrix and redox colors. Ecobot Manager improves your accuracy with soil indicator suggestions.

<a href="https://manager.ecobot.com/get-ecobot/" class="tertiary-button" style="text-decoration:none">Get started for free</a>

Citations

Munsell Color Theory & Albert H. Munsell Fundamentals of Color. Munsell Color System; Color Matching from Munsell Color Company (2014). Available at: https://munsell.com/about-munsell-color/.
Schoeneberger, P.J., D.A. Wysocki, E.C. Benham, and Soil Survey Staff. 2012. Field book for describing and sampling soils, Version 3.0. Natural Resources Conservation Service, National Soil Survey Center, Lincoln, NE.
Guide to Texture by Feel. USDA, NRCS.
United States Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service. 2018. Field Indicators of Hydric Soils in the United States, Version 8.2. L.M. Vasilas, G.W. Hurt, and J.F. Berkowitz (eds.). USDA, NRCS, in cooperation with the National Technical Committee for Hydric Soils.
Ellefsen, D. B. S. W. F. C. L. G. W. F. S. a. K. J. (n.d.). USGS Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5118: Geochemical and Mineralogical Maps, with Interpretation, for Soils of the Conterminous United States, 2019 rev., https://pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2017/5118/sir20175118_element.php?el=26
Munsell Color (X-Rite). (2018). Munsell Soil Color Book, 2009 rev. Munsell, X-Rite.
Munsell Color (X-Rite). A Dictionary of Color Terms. https://munsell.com/about-munsell-color/how-color-notation-works/dictionary-color-terms/

Takeaways from the USFWS 2019 Wetlands Status and Trends Report

Tue, 26 Mar 2024 19:26:58 GMT

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Report Reveals Accelerated Wetland Loss (2009–2019)

Wetlands are precious: as vital ecosystems, hosts of biodiversity, and even as one of the planet's largest sources of carbon storage.

Yet, the latest report from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, covering the years 2009-2019, paints a concerning picture of wetland status across the contiguous United States.

In sum: The number of wetlands in the U.S. diminished significantly during the report term. There was a net loss of 221,000 acres of wetlands, primarily due to conversion to upland, representing a 50% acceleration in wetland loss rate compared to the previous study period (2004–2009).

Extent and Rate of Wetland Loss During the Study Period

The United States began the decade with approximately 116.4 million acres of wetlands, a treasure trove of biodiversity occupying less than 6% of the nation's area. This period witnessed an astonishing net loss of 221,000 acres of wetlands, predominantly converting to upland areas—a rate 50% faster than the preceding five years.

This loss not only diminishes the country's natural heritage but also signals a shift in the balance of wetland types, from the lush vegetated to the bare non-vegetated.

Shifts in Vegetation and Wetland Type Composition

Vegetated wetlands took the largest hit, with a net decrease of 670,000 acres. Non-vegetated wetlands expanded by 488,000 acres.

Saltwater wetlands mirrored this trend, with salt marshes dwindling by 2% as non-vegetated areas grew.

In the freshwater realm, forested wetlands retracted, leaving room for an upsurge in pond areas by 455,000 acres.

Ecological and Hydrological Consequences of Wetland Change

The ramifications of these changes are profound. Wetland loss not only undermines water quality and increases vulnerability to natural disasters but also impacts the intricate web of life they support. Many species, some already teetering on the brink of extinction, find their futures even more precarious in the face of dwindling habitats.

Policy Recommendations and Conservation Imperatives

This report is a clarion call for concerted conservation efforts.

To stem the tide of wetland loss and ensure the preservation of their myriad benefits, a strategic overhaul of our approach to wetland conservation is imperative.

As the report suggests, we must achieve a "No Net Loss" of wetlands and enhance wetland conservation practices, underscore the need for immediate and decisive action.

We need:

Policy that prioritizes wetland protection
Incentives to support environmentally friendly and sustainable development
Data to support strategic planning

The Role of Accurate Data and Monitoring in Wetland Strategy

At Ecobot, we understand the critical role technology plays in conservation efforts. By leveraging innovative tools and data analytics, we empower professionals to make informed decisions that contribute to the preservation and restoration of wetland ecosystems. Together, we can turn the tide, ensuring that wetlands continue to thrive for generations to come.

The first step to strategizing around wetland preservation is having the data to form a plan. Tools like Ecobot enable ground-truth data collection and long-term analyses of wetlands. Resources like the National Wetlands Inventory—the database on which the 2009-2019 report was based—are critical for monitoring large-scale wetlands trends like those identified in the report.

As we move forward, let's leverage robust data collection, recommit to the stewardship of our wetlands, not just for their ecological services but for the biodiversity and life they sustain, and strategize to promote wetland preservation alongside sustainable development.

We can safeguard these irreplaceable ecosystems for the health of our planet and future generations.

Greenbiz | Lionfish leather, pollution-free plastic and more: Whats your pick?

Tue, 12 Dec 2023 19:47:06 GMT

Five startups vying for exposure and support at Bloom 23 made rapid pitches for their tech to protect nature and boost biodiversity.

"We believe that we can help global companies meet their nature-positive goals, with environmental permitting as the market driver," said Lee Lance, CEO of Ecobot. "We're building the expert network data that we need to build better technology, enhanced by AI."

Ecobot, a startup based in Asheville, North Carolina, seeks to close a gap in measuring biodiversity: It's unrealistic to send 100,000 scientists into the field, but that many are already in the field collecting data for permitting purposes.

"But a permit is where data goes to die," Lance said. "All of the water and soil and vegetation data that is gathered is either siloed with an organization or just simply lost."

Ecobot has a "workforce enablement platform" that accelerates environmental permitting.

Its 250 customers include AECOM, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Agriculture.

Integrated Data & Analysis Tools for Climate-Resilient Infrastructure

Fri, 03 Nov 2023 13:42:38 GMT

Integrated Data & Analysis Tools for Climate-Resilient Infrastructure

This webinar aired on October 19, 2023 as the third installment of Esri's Environmental Regulation webinar series. Click here to watch the full webinar.

Panelists Sunny Fleming, Industry Specialist - Environment and Conservation, EsriLee Lance, CEO and Co-Founder, EcobotLaura Lloyd, Environmental and Transportation Planner, HNTBAdam Horn, Civil Integrated Solutions - Section Leader, HNTB Kevin McKeehan, Climate Resilience Project Manager, HNTB

Learn more about Ecobot & Esri integrations

Read the case study: ESE Partners Increase Project Efficiency with ArcGIS
Get the most out of your environmental permitting data

Start using Ecobot for free

Munsell Soil Guide: Understand soil color more deeply with the free guide.

Thu, 02 Nov 2023 15:45:43 GMT

Understanding the Munsell Color System in the Munsell Color Book

The Munsell color system is color theory based on a three-dimensional model. Each color has three components: hue (color or shade itself), value (lightness/darkness), and chroma (saturation). This numerical system is designed to provide logical, uniform steps for each of the three components.

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<a href="https://ecobot.com/pdf/MunsellColorChart.pdf" target="_blank" class="tertiary-button trackMunsellGuide" style="text-decoration:none">Click here to download our Munsell Soil Reference Guide.</a>

Developed by scientific thinker and artist Albert Munsell, the system was created to provide specific and consistent descriptions of color and is designed to work for a variety of industries.

Munsell colors written are as HUE VALUE / CHROMA

Hue refers to the color and is denoted by a letter code. Value refers to the lightness or darkness of a color.

The value scale is vertical with the darkest at the bottom and the lightest at the top. From bottom to top, values are numbered in increasing increments. Numerically, a value of 2 is darker than a value of 4.

Chroma refers to the saturation or brightness of a color. The chroma scale is horizontal with the dullest or weakest at the far left and the most saturated or brightest at the far right. From left to right, the number representing chroma increases, meaning that a chroma of 1 is duller or less saturated than a chroma of 6.

Munsell Hue Circle Comparison The Munsell Hue Circle displays the relationship of one color (or hue) to another. A letter code is provided for each color. The following hues are included in the Munsell Soil-Color Book:

Principle Hue: Red (R)
5R, 7.5R, 10R
Intermediate Hue: Yellow-Red (YR)
2.5YR, 5YR, 7.5YR, 10YR
Principal Hue: Yellow (Y)
2.5Y, 5Y, 10Y
Intermediate Hue: Green-Yellow (GY)
5GY, 10GY
Principal Hue: Green (G)
5G, 10G
Intermediate Hue: Blue-Green (BG)
5BG, 10BG
Principal Hue: Blue (B)
5B, 10B
Intermediate Hue: Purple-Blue (PB)
5PB
Neutral (N)
N represents the absence of color (or hue)

Gleyed Colors Gleying occurs when the iron present in soil is often reduced leaving behind a characteristic bluish or greenish gray color. Gleyed colors have a value equal to or greater than 4 on either of the Gleyed Matrix pages in the Munsell Soil-Color Book.

<a href="/blog/2024-04-29_understanding_gley_soil/" class="tertiary-button" style="text-decoration:none">Learn more about Gley Soil</a>

Redoximorphic Features Contrast Determination
Many indicators of hydric soil require distinct or prominent redox features (e.g. A11, A12, A14, A16, S5, S11, F3, F6, F8, F12, F16, F19, F20, and F21). To determine if redox within a matrix is considered distinct or prominent, the hue, value, and chroma of both colors must be compared. Delta (Δ) refers to the difference between.

Δv = Difference in value
Δc = Difference in chroma

Understanding Delta Hue (Δh) Use the diagram to help calculate Δh. The difference between each line is equal to Δh of 1.

Chart for Estimating Proportions

Use this chart to more consistently quantify the percent of redox concentrations, depletions, or mottling in the soil.

Soil Texture Triangle

The soil texture triangle provides a visual representation of the relationship between clay, silt, and sand concentrations in soil.

Soil Texture by Feel This flowchart uses an incremental approach determining the correct soil texture of a sample while in the field.

We know soils.

Ecobot makes soil data entry and QA/QC intuitive and accurate.

The latest version of Ecobot Collector for iOS and Android provides new ways to manage multiple matrix and redox colors. Ecobot Manager improves your accuracy with soil indicator suggestions.

Citations:

Munsell Color Theory & Albert H. Munsell Fundamentals of Color. Munsell Color System; Color Matching from Munsell Color Company (2014). Available at: https://munsell.com/about-munsell-color/.
Schoeneberger, P.J., D.A. Wysocki, E.C. Benham, and Soil Survey Staff. 2012. Field book for describing and sampling soils, Version 3.0. Natural Resources Conservation Service, National Soil Survey Center, Lincoln, NE.
Munsell Color, X-Rite. (2009). Munsell Soil Color Book (2019 Production).
Guide to Texture by Feel. USDA, NRCS.

Environmental Business Journal | Ecobot Streamlines Delineation of Aquatic Resources, Plans Expansion Into Other Environmental Segments

Mon, 18 Sep 2023 21:00:00 GMT

Ecobot (Ashville, N.C.) was designed from within the environmental and architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industries as a digital solution for mandatory pre-construction environmental assessments and reporting. Ecobot streamlines the process, eliminating errors and ensuring data consistency to support quicker project turnarounds. Ecobot also provides a framework for managing and analyzing environmental data over time and in a variety of contexts. Environmental data collected during permitting is valuable both for planners and engineers as they design and build climate-resilient assets and in terms of ecological insights and long-term planning for preservation and biodiversity. Ecobot has provided a tool for collecting and managing data at scale. Ecobot has been used to generate over 100,000 regulatory reports, encompassing more than 1 million biodiversity and water-related data points. Customers range from global enterprise companies to small businesses.

Lee Lance is Co-Founder and CEO of Ecobot. Lee is a communications and operations professional with 20 years of experience driving technology development and strategy, serving regional, national and international clients.

EBJ: How has fieldwork changed, and is technology providing efficiencies that were unavailable five years ago? Lee Lance: Fieldwork and permitting have, until quite recently, been paperdriven processes. Not only was this cumbersome, especially in an outdoor environment, but data was static and difficult to manage and use long-term. The availability of technology in the field has exploded in the past five years, from GNSS/GPS devices to field data collection applications installed on readily available mobile devices. There are lots of ways to get your data in – some better than others – and at Ecobot, our focus, beyond driving efficiency and saving time in the field and office, is on maximizing ways for our customers to utilize this data long-term, even beyond the permit.

EBJ: How has Ecobot's platform evolved since the company was founded? Lance: Ecobot originated as a digital solution for the wetland delineation process, one of the many mandatory environmental assessments needed before construction starts. The goal at the outset was to streamline this process, driving efficiency during fieldwork and reporting. As Ecobot has grown, we've expanded the platform to allow customers the ability to manage and utilize huge volumes of data in a meaningful way.

EBJ: Is Ecobot looking into incorporating additional products or technologies? Which problems are you trying to solve for your customers?

Lance: The most successful technology platforms across all industries are those that deeply integrate with the tools and applications already established within an organization. We believe that this is essential for technology in this space as well. We're ESRI partners, and our platform functions as an extension of ArcGIS FieldMaps by allowing our customers to push their data into the Esri tech stack as a feature service layer.

We are partners with all of the major GNSS/GPS hardware providers, ensuring geospatial accuracy during field data collection and reporting, which is essential to ensure further downstream value. As we expand the Ecobot platform, we are working to deepen our existing partnerships, and include others such as Autodesk and Bentley Systems. We view these integrations and partnerships as tools to help planners and engineers create a more climate-resilient built environment by providing them a platform to easily consume data regarding environmental resources occurring on a site.

EBJ: Can you share details about Ecobot's collaborations and partnerships?

Lance: We've worked closely with Esri since Ecobot's inception—we went through the Esri Startup Program, and we've since become Silver Partners. We work with GNSS providers like Hexagon/ Leica, Trimble, Juniper, Eos GNSS, and more. And we're always collaborating and learning from others in the conservation and policy research fields, like EPIC and NatureServe.

EBJ: What other key technology trends do you see in our industry?

Lance: While not currently considered a tech trend, permitting reform should be one. Sadly, better technology (and better data) are nearly absent from this conversation when they should be the drivers behind effective regulatory policy. Policy and permitting reform will only get humankind so far and it's better technology and better data that will help us accomplish the purpose of environmental policy: to conserve natural resources and better connect people to the planet.

EBJ: What impact are new regulations having on how you use technology? How have you used it as an opportunity to expand your services? Which of these are generating more demand and profit?

Lance: Ecobot allows our customers to spend more time being scientists. As a workforce enablement platform, the field consultant handles the assessment and data collection, while Ecobot performs the calculations and provides suggestions based on the regional guidance documents.

The recent Sackett v. EPA decision by the Supreme Court to roll back federal wetland protections and the uncertainty this ruling has created is extremely concerning. Environmental policy and permitting processes will continue to evolve, but the need to collect usable data and put that data to use in a more resilient manner becomes even more critical. Market tailwinds ranging from UN climate and biodiversity initiatives to ESG promises by companies to their stakeholders to the increasing awareness of how biodiversity and ecosystems impact capital markets are only increasing.

As we expand the Ecobot platform, we are working to deepen our existing partnerships and include others such as Autodesk and Bentley Systems.

Regulations are not the only drivers of technological advancements and integrations. Take, for example, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Both are demand-drivers for technologies like Ecobot. We need to modernize our infrastructure, and these bills task us to do that with sensitivity to the environment via sustainable and resilient planning. In order to spend the money flowing out of these bills and achieve the goals for our infrastructure, we have to address the fact that – in addition to the bottleneck of permitting processes – there is a need for a larger workforce than is currently available.

Applied environmental knowledge is going to be in high demand over the next five to 10 years, and the regulated community needs the right technology to more efficiently conduct their jobs and generate data that can help us make better decisions about economic growth, especially as it applies to the built environment.

Ecobot currently provides a solution for streamlining the documentation and reporting on aquatic resources, which represent some of the most highly regulated ecosystems we have. We're in the process of expanding our platform to address all other environmental-related sectors to address the broader need. While our operating footprint is currently restricted to the United States and portions of Canada, we believe our approach has a global application.

Georgia Low Impact Solar Siting Tool (LISST) with Amy Gutierrez, The Nature Conservancy

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 14:41:06 GMT

As the Climate and Lands Coordinator at The Nature Conservancy (TNC), Amy Gutierrez focuses on climate and stewardship issues in the state of Georgia. She believes that a rapid transition to clean energy could lessen the effects of climate change and protect critical biodiversity. But what about when the transition itself poses a threat to biodiversity? It doesn't have to—and that's where the Low Impact Solar Siting Tool comes in. At TNC, says Gutierrez, “we're looking for win-win scenarios.”

The Georgia Low Impact Solar Siting Tool, known as “Georgia LISST,” comes from the confluence of traditional land conservation and climate considerations. LISST originated from a collaboration between students and the NASA DEVELOP program, which gives students real-world challenges to solve using spatial data.

The Nature Conservancy became involved with the tool by way of the gopher tortoise, a state reptile of Georgia. The gopher tortoise is federally protected in a portion of its range, and has become a regular focus at TNC, as they manage land that encompasses the tortoise's habitat. Beginning around 2017, Gutierrez estimates, TNC partners began alerting them of conflicts between larger utility-scale solar siting facilities and gopher tortoises, in which tortoise boroughs were being impacted by solar development, and the tortoises needed to be relocated as a result.

Georgia ranks in the top 10 states for the yearly rate of solar installations. “In the process of accelerating the transition to clean energy, we need to also preserve biodiversity,” says Gutierrez. TNC aims to balance these priorities: “We're looking for win-win scenarios.” TNC began working to develop spatial tools and resources for developers and others in the space to improve the process of siting by making it easier to identify areas likely to present this conflict.

As LISST developed further, partnerships were formed with state and federal agencies, as well as experts from nonprofits, and finally utility companies to ensure that the tool suited their needs.

LISST takes a two-pronged approach to the challenge of solar siting: it considers environmental sensitivity, meaning the likely impacts of solar development, alongside solar suitability, which considers the physical land characteristics necessary for solar sites. The ideal solar site is one with low environmental sensitivity and high solar suitability.

LISST pulls data together and ranks areas into a color-coded system of “overall preference ranking” to source low-impact solar development areas, ensuring that sites are not in conflict with biodiversity. The ranking system provides an idea of the variation within the landscape, and helps decision-makers compare different locations and select ones with the least impact.

“One of our challenges...is that we do not have statewide environmental solar permitting here in Georgia,” says Gutierrez, “so many environmental considerations end up being dealt with either in agreements between a developer and the utility company, or in the local regulations, or in Stormwater and Erosion and Sediment Permitting. Our Natural Resources agencies don't get pulled in unless there's a concern.”

LISST aims to lend a proactive measure to the process by frontloading the identification of issues before a site is selected. This avoids the scenario of a solar developer investing multiple years and significant cash into a site only to find they'll need to relocate a number of tortoises, or come up with a Habitat Conservation Plan. Ultimately, the LISST tool benefits both developers and the environment, by helping developers to meet their renewable energy goals, timelines, and budgets in an environmentally-friendly manner.

Solar development has accelerated since LISST was published originally in 2019, and then updated with new data in 2021. Compared to the beginning, says Gutierrez, the tool has gained a lot of traction and active partnerships. LISST has established a strong foothold and established a methodology for siting solar, and she sees progress beginning to occur in areas beyond Georgia: South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, for example, has a Solar Habitat Certification, and has adopted and refined LISST methodology into a different tool, which they recently published. Gutierrez is in a number of conversations with regional partners from Fish and Wildlife Service, Department of Defense, and other state agencies seeking to adopt a version of LISST tailored for their region.

The future of LISST and similar initiatives is bright as investment in solar increases across the country. Gutierrez and her colleagues are working with partners to establish best management practice guidance for Georgia. They're also working with local governments and municipalities to brainstorm what kinds of ordinances they might want to write, what kind of approvals to provide, what permits would be necessary from a zoning perspective, and more. “We can provide them a tool that is publicly available and simplified, so that even if they don't have in-house GIS expertise, they can still use and interpret and incorporate their findings into their planning processes,” she says.

In some areas of Georgia, local jurisdictions have placed moratoria on solar development due to conflicts such as local opposition, species impacts, land and farmland conversion, and other hot-button issues, until they can determine a schematic for a sustainable process. TNC hopes that a tool like LISST can prevent the barriers to clean energy transition caused by moratoria like these. The slower the transition, Gutierrez says, the greater the impacts to biodiversity. “We're trying to make sure that we can go smart to go fast.”

Climate Tech 101 with Grace Donnelly of Climate Tech VC

Tue, 08 Aug 2023 17:45:00 GMT

As Executive Editor of Climate Tech VC (CTVC), Grace Donnelly tracks and reports on venture capital investment into climate technology companies. “Knowing where money is coming from is a great way that journalism helps track power dynamics in our world.” It's also a good indicator of what solutions the market believes will work.

“Climate tech” includes companies working on energy, on carbon management, land use, built environments, food and agriculture, and all kinds of different industries and sectors that need to reduce emissions in order to meet our climate goals, Donnelly explained. A business journalist by trade, Donnelly joined CTVC in February 2023.

CTVC categorizes climate tech as less of an industry and more of a theme, she says, and then breaks it into seven sub-sectors: energy; food and land use; transportation; built environment; carbon; climate management; and industrial. “A lot of innovation happens through start-ups,” Donnelly said, and the development of technology to address emissions and other climate issues is no exception. “At the early stages, many of these companies get funding from government grants and programs like that, but as they start to grow and scale, they need capital, and that typically comes from venture firms.”

“The data on how much funding is going into different sectors and different areas of climate tech really shows where the market thinks solutions are going, and which types of technologies will work,” said Donnelly. “Taking a look at the trends within venture capital and looking at where those investors are placing their bets, gives an indicator of which parts of this climate tech ecosystem are getting resources, are getting support, are kind of expected to grow. And I think it also importantly points out areas where the venture model might not be a good fit for scaling something that we really need.”

At the end of June, CTVC published a report on venture capital activity and climate technology for the first six months of 2023. Despite speculation that climate technology might be relatively insulated from macroeconomic trends and overall investment decline, the report did find that investments dipped in the first half of the year compared to the six months prior and the first half of 2022.

Check out CTVC's other resources here:

Engineering News-Record | Accelerate the Environmental Permitting Process With GIS

Mon, 31 Jul 2023 21:00:00 GMT

Every infrastructure project has a geographic component. Geographic information systems (GIS) technology has a long history of supporting environmental consultants to visualize, organize and analyze project data, streamlining the regulatory environmental review process and reporting.

Freese and Nichols Inc. (FNI), a national engineering, planning and consulting firm based in Texas, creates major infrastructure. The firm recently assisted a large city in the Southwest with environmental clearance for aviation infrastructure at its spaceport by using GIS. The project, already facing an aggressive schedule, had been stymied by regulatory hurdles. Previous work had yielded an unfavorable preliminary jurisdictional determination, risking additional permitting requirements and a compromised project schedule. FNI determined that GIS could pave the best path forward.

Under the direction of Michael Lane, a professional wetland scientist, the team relied on ArcGIS, Esri's mapping and analytics software, to visualize and manage data, as well as Ecobot's environmental assessment platform, to rapidly execute fieldwork and an approved jurisdictional determination (AJD) package. Ecobot Collector supported fieldwork with automated calculations and built-in QA, while Ecobot Manager's real-time access to results allowed for frictionless QA/QC and immediate report generation. Geospatial data collected in the field through Ecobot's integration with ArcGIS Online was leveraged into exhibits for the AJD request.

“Their urgency became our emergency,” Lane says. “Ecobot enabled us to translate field data into regulatory forms with a swift turnaround, and ArcGIS Online integration addressed our GIS needs seamlessly. These tools were critical to FNI's expediency.”

The power of these tools supporting Lane's team accelerated the AJD process, which was immediately adopted by the Federal Aviation Association to close up the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) action and release the project to proceed. With the regulatory roadblocks cleared by FNI's use of GIS tools, the spaceport was one step closer to launch.

Ecobot Surpasses Key Biodiversity Data Milestone

Thu, 13 Jul 2023 20:00:00 GMT

Ecobot Customers Have Generated More Than 100,000 Regulatory Reports; One Million Biodiversity Data Points

**ASHEVILLE, N.C., July 13, 2023 (Newswire.com) -**Ecobot, the premier digital solution for mandatory pre-construction environmental assessments, today announced that the platform has been used to generate over 100,000 regulatory reports, encompassing more than one million biodiversity data points. This milestone wraps up the end of a strong quarter for the company, following a series of industry award recognitions and the recent release of Ecobot Collector, the mobile component of Ecobot's comprehensive environmental permitting platform, for Android.

"Biodiversity tracking is critical to effectively protect ecosystems and mitigate climate change," said Lee Lance, CEO at Ecobot. "Environmental consultants collect incredibly valuable environmental data for permitting purposes, and for a long time, the permit was where that data went to die. Ecobot provides its customers with a framework for storing and analyzing biodiversity data over time, so this data can be leveraged as part of a comprehensive ESG strategy."

Environmental organizations including the United Nations' COP-15 have prioritized biodiversity tracking and preservation, citing the "pace, severity, and long-term implications of biodiversity loss," both in ecological and economic terms. Data and analyses, such as the frameworks provided by Ecobot, are necessary to plan and protect biodiversity at scale.

Other highlights from last quarter:

Awards:Ecobot was recognized with the 2023 Practitioner Award from the Society of Wetland Scientists (SWS) at its annual conference in June. "The review committee was very impressed by Ecobot's significant and enduring contribution to advancing wetland management practice," said SWS representative Amanda Nahlik.
**Conferences:**Staff scientists from the Ecobot team presented at conferences including the National Association of Environmental Professionals (NAEP) and SWS. Members of the team will present next at the Georgia Environmental Conference in August.
**Resource launch:**In June, Ecobot published an interactive StoryMap to help environmental consultants and citizens understand how the recent Sackett v. EPA decision by the Supreme Court of the United States will play out across the country based on existing state and local regulations.
Ecobite**news launch:**In April, Ecobot aired the first episode of Ecobite, a series of news shorts featuring experts from the environmental industry who break down news items, and how the industry will be affected.

About Ecobot Ecobot is a cloud-based platform that supports efficiency by optimizing data collection and management for environmental permits, and enables customers to utilize data in a variety of contexts. Ecobot helps customers deliver data consistency across a distributed workforce, and enables them to leverage field data for improvements to the construction lifecycle. See how Ecobot can transform your pre-construction permitting workflow at ecobot.com.

Media Contact:
Zoe Kovacs
Email: zoek@ecobot.com
Twitter: @ecobotapp
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/ecobot/
Instagram: @ecobotapp
Media-Approved Imagery: https://bit.ly/2TKeIfi

The Future of WOTUS with Fred Wagner, Partner at Venable LLP

Wed, 12 Jul 2023 18:34:44 GMT

Fred Wagner, Partner at Venable, LLC in Washington, D.C. has been a practicing environmental lawyer for 35 years. The debate around a definition of Waters of the United States (WOTUS) has persisted his entire career, and is likely to continue. The recent Sackett v. EPA introduces new uncertainty into an already fraught regulatory landscape.

“If you've been looking for certainty over the last three or four decades over the definition of WOTUS, you've been sorely disappointed.”

Fred Wagner saw the debate over what constitutes Waters of the United States (WOTUS) begin the year he graduated law school, and he's been at the center of his work ever since—on behalf of those trying to apply for permits under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act, on behalf of the government trying to enforce, Section 404 of the Clean Water Act. He's even written a Supreme Court Amicus brief in the second litigation dealing with the recent Sackett v. EPA case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

Sackett v. EPA is only the most recent case to come before SCOTUS. “There's been four chances—four chances!---for the Supreme Court to figure this all out, and they never really have,” said Wagner. The worst instance was the Rapanos v. United States case, where the court ruled 4-to-4-to-1. “They totally split over what the meaning of WOTUS is, and almost by default, they adopted Justice Kennedy's significant nexus test,” he said. “Significant nexus has been what the EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) have used for the last decade or so. But the Rapanos decision still wasn't very clear, and it got worse because the government tried to regulate based on that decision.”

Things have been in flux during the last three administrations. “The Obama administration tried rules, the Trump administration tried rules, the Biden administration rescinded those,” Wagner said. “Then the Biden administration tried rules. They came out at the very end of last year—almost at midnight on December 31st last year. And then, of course, the Supreme Court says, ‘You know, the basis for your rulemaking, we don't agree with that either.'”

In the Sackett case, said Wagner, SCOTUS did its best to make a bright line test for what WOTUS was going to mean for purposes of enforcing the Clean Water Act, and in most views, they did create a much narrower definition. The significant nexus test, which was rejected by all nine justices of the Court, contained concerns related to the technical aspects of a water resource and its relationship to other sources of water in the nearby area. Now, the test is whether there is a distinguishable difference between the water feature and a traditional navigable water, such as wetlands on the coast of Louisiana or the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

Some estimates propose that the scope of jurisdictional waters could have been reduced by half, a figure Wagner is uncertain about. What is more certain is what would have been regulated over the years is much smaller now than it was then.

How does regulation play out post-Sackett? What's at stake? It's still not 100% clear, said Wagner. EPA and USACE have publicly announced their plan to engage in a quick rulemaking to react to the decision, slated to come out in September. Wagner will believe it when he sees it: it would be “almost unheard of” for an agency to do a major rulemaking in that timeframe.

With that said, there's a lot of pressure on the agencies to provide some guidance. Currently, permit status and processing remains in the air, and the regulated community has lots of questions, said Wagner, like: “What about our pending permits? Are jurisdictional determinations gonna change? What about our plans?”

There's now also the question of how the Sackett decision affects ongoing and unresolved litigation related to the significant nexus rule. In some cases, said Wager, judges have put the cases on hold in anticipation of new regulations from the EPA—and even then, their decision will be subject to challenge.

“So, you know, I'm still going strong in my career,” Wagner laughed. “I'm not holding out hope that by the time I finish practice, there will be a firm, clear, and undisputed definition of WOTUS.”

Even so, Wagner says the Sackett decision provides more clarity and guidance than recent years have offered. “The implications of [the decision] for Clean Water enforcement, for water pollution management, and for the conservation of water resources are pretty severe.”

Along with the rest of the regulated community, Wagner will see what happens in September. “There's going to be plenty of other litigation and challenges to boot.”

Ecobot is Now Available for Android-Powered Devices

Tue, 11 Jul 2023 21:52:00 GMT

**ASHEVILLE, N.C., July 11, 2023 (Newswire.com) -**Ecobot, the premier digital solution for mandatory pre-construction environmental assessments, today released a version of Ecobot Collector, its field application for smartphones and tablets, for Android. The launch further widens access to the platform that has now been used to generate more than 100,000 regulatory reports, driving digitization in the Architectural, Engineering, and Construction (AEC); energy; transportation; and environmental consulting industries.

Collector is the most efficient and reliable digital method for capturing environmental field data for permitting ahead of infrastructure-scale construction. Ecobot streamlines the entire pre-construction assessment process from fieldwork through reporting. The platform supports collaboration among geographically distributed teams and provides tools to automatically recontextualize field data and maximize how it can be used by environmental consultants, engineers, and planners alike.

"This launch reflects our customer-driven approach to answering the needs of the industry," said Emmet McGovern, Chief Technology Officer at Ecobot. "We've added two key former customers as team members, including our product manager and senior solutions engineer, allowing us richer insights into our build-measure-learn approach to delivering impactful enterprise software."

According to Environmental Business Journal's"Perspectives On The Environmental Industry 2023" report, the industry is turning a corner with wider adoption of technology: Digital tools that facilitate the effective collection and deployment of environmental data have emerged as a major strategic factor in the success of environmental consulting firms. "Data management, deployment, and display are increasingly a differentiator for both internal efficiencies and client retention," said Editor-in-Chief Grant Ferrier.

In the wake of shifting policy, alongside increased development and environmental impacts, it is more critical than ever to maximize how we use environmental data.

Collector is available to download for Android on Google Play™ and for iOS via the Apple App Store.

Android is a trademark of Google LLC. Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google LLC.

About Ecobot
Ecobot is a cloud-based platform that supports efficiency by optimizing data collection and management for environmental permits, and enables customers to utilize data in a variety of contexts. Ecobot helps customers deliver data consistency across a distributed workforce, and enables them to leverage field data for improvements to the construction lifecycle. See how Ecobot can transform your pre-construction permitting workflow at ecobot.com.

Media Contact:
Zoe Kovacs
Email: zoek@ecobot.com
Twitter: @ecobotapp
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/ecobot/
Instagram: @ecobotapp
Media-Approved Imagery: https://bit.ly/2TKeIfi

Ecobot Launches StoryMap Demo Regional Effects of SCOTUS Ruling

Thu, 15 Jun 2023 21:55:00 GMT

**ASHEVILLE, N.C., June 15, 2023 (Newswire.com) -**Ecobot, the platform driving the digitization of mandatory pre-construction environmental assessments, today launched an interactive ArcGIS StoryMap to help environmental consultants and citizens understand how the recent Sackett v. EPAruling by the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) will play out across the country based on existing local, state, and federal regulations.

The StoryMap uses wetland datasets from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), overlaid with locations of active permits and jurisdictional determination (JD) applications in review by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Another layer indicates the stringency of municipal and state wetland regulations.

"What's been missing from the outpouring of media coverage about this is a resource for understanding how the decision may affect different areas based on a number of regulatory variables," says Chris Fleming, Senior Solutions Engineer at Ecobot, who designed the StoryMap.

At a high level, here's how the decision stands to affect environmental consultants, regulated communities, and average citizens, respectively:

Environmental consultants face uncertainty in the JD process until USACE/EPA guidance develops. Meanwhile, the delineation process proceeds as normal, with an increased need to thoroughly document landscape position and surface connectivity for delineated wetlands. Consultants must understand state or local regulations.
Regulated communities, e.g. Residential, Commercial, and Infrastructure,now face uncertainty regarding project timelines and permitting, and even previously issued jurisdictional determinations may be in question. There may be a reduction in impacts to jurisdictional resources (e.g., wetlands, ephemeral streams) and in compensatory mitigation requirements. There may be an increase in rigorous state and local regulations to counter the new limitations on federal jurisdiction.
Citizensmay see increases in residential and commercial developments, including greater home and commercial inventories, more job opportunities, and revenue generation from taxes and impact fees. Meanwhile, there may be losses to wetland function, including weakened flood control, disturbances to fish and wildlife habitats, and impacts to water quality, supply, and recreation.

Ecobot and affiliates have long advocated for better methods of documenting wetland status and loss. Currently data is collected only at coarse scale, with decades of information lost due to lack of modernization.

"Strategic planning and coordination are required to reverse long-standing wetland loss trends within the U.S.," said Megan Lang, Chief Scientist at USFWS, who contributed to the StoryMap.

Ecobot is designed to increase efficiency and help scientists be more effective, with rapid field data collection and reporting, a standardized digital scheme with Esri integration for geospatial analyses, and tools to understand relative wetland quality via floristic analyses.

About Ecobot

Ecobot is a cloud-based platform that enables customers in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry to speed construction starts by optimizing mandatory environmental permitting. Ecobot enables its customers to leverage field data collected during permitting into massive improvements throughout the construction lifecycle. See how Ecobot can transform your pre-construction permitting workflow at Ecobot.

Media Contact:
Zoe Kovacs
Email: zoek@ecobot.com
Twitter: @ecobotapp
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/ecobot/
Instagram: @ecobotapp
Media-Approved Imagery: https://bit.ly/2TKeIfi

Digitized Environmental Permitting in Virginia, with Mike Roldband of Virginia Department of Environmental Quality

Tue, 06 Jun 2023 13:17:19 GMT

Mike Rolband's environmental career has spanned more than 40 years. What started as a path in construction and real estate development eventually led to his development of one of the first mitigation banks in the country. Now, Rolband serves as Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin's Director of the Department of Environmental Quality.

Mike Rolband, now Director of the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) started his career in the construction and real estate development industry, where his niche focus on small sites with environmental problems led him to become a full-time consultant. By 1991, his company had evolved into a consulting firm for natural-cultural resource issues. At the same time, Rolband began developing his first wetland mitigation bank in Northern Virginia—one of the first in the country.

Rolband stayed the course for 30 years, eventually selling his consultancy to a large firm. He continued working at the firm full-time, then part-time, until he turned to teaching as a professor of practice for 3 years at Cornell University. Then, after a brief period of retirement—not his first, and not his last—Rolband saw an interview with newly-elected Virginia Governor Youngkin, who expressed interest in boosting the economy and the environment by encouraging economic development, thereby increasing jobs. To do this, Youngkin needed to streamline environmental permitting and ensure compliance with regulations at the same time.

“If you notice, around the world and in the U.S., areas that don't have strong economies can't afford to protect the environment,” said Rolband. “In Virginia, we have a notable law called the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act. In the preamble, Delegate Tayloe Murphy described the interconnection between a strong and healthy economy and a strong and healthy environment.” Rolband wrote Youngkin a letter in response to the interview, and was later appointed as director of the DEQ.

At DEQ, Rolband's priority is boosting the efficiency, effectiveness, and transparency of the environmental permitting process with PEEP: the Permit Enhancement and Evaluation Program.

Rolband's priority at DEQ is boosting the efficiency and effectiveness of the environmental permitting process. Earlier this year, DEQ launched PEEP, the Permit Enhancement and Evaluation Program. In addition to streamlining the process, Rolband wants to boost transparency, so stakeholders ranging from the permittee, the agent, the applicants, and even the local public can understand and see where a permit is in the process.

The PEEP platform provides a Gantt chart showing all of the major activities or actions that DEQ or related federal or state agencies must undertake to come to a permit decision. “That's the key that everyone always wants to know: When can we expect a decision?” Rolband says. “In my career, going back more than 40 years now since grad school, [permitting is] a black box: you submit an application, and unless you know the right people to call, it's very difficult to ever find out where you stand in the process. It's a very unclear and opaque process, in Virginia and every state I've ever worked in at the federal level as well.”

To address this, DEQ has begun establishing two key things for each permit:

1. A checklist showing what's required for a complete application
1. A schedule showing every task and every different agency a permit goes through to reach a final decision

Two programs are now live on PEEP: The wetland permitting program, and the mitigation banking program. “I picked [wetlands permitting] because it's the most complicated, in terms of having the most state and federal agencies involved in the process,” said Rolband. “We figured if we can make it work for that, we can make it work for simple ones.

“The second one, we picked because it's a joint program with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE). So the first step was establishing a schedule and aligning who is the lead—DEQ or the Corps.” Rolband says DEQ and USACE recently signed a Memorandum of Agreement that describes the mitigation process, describing each step, outlining who is responsible, which agency is the lead, and what are the associated timelines.They've also included timeframes for the applicant to respond to the questions different agencies may have. Any new permits within these programs that were submitted on or later than March 1, 2023 can now be tracked using PEEP.

PEEP pushes out automated notifications, including an alert a week ahead of the due date to the permit-writer. Each week, the alert goes to a higher level so that management can become involved and determine if there's an issue that someone can jump in and solve. This avoids delays and oversights, and helps direct resources where they're needed.

Internally, the DEQ uses the “My Permit” page to track and manage permitting workloads and evaluate the performance of each permit application.

“My Permit” enables permit writers to see the workload that's been assigned to them, the different tasks they've been assigned under each permit, and when each task is due. My Permit provides an overall director summary, where Rolband and other managers can track the project and see statistically, either with averages or with a statistical analysis package, the breakdown of every permit issued by office, by agency, or aggregate, along with a view of all the different elements: Is it the applicant holding it up? Is a particular agency slowing or speeding the process? Rolband's goal is to evaluate the performance.

DEQ has another program, 1DEQ, which supports workload sharing. The six regions and a central office now for the first time share a dashboard that shows workload by person and by office overall. A workload can be moved around within the system to boost efficiency.

Rolband says DEQ has already seen “an amazing improvement” in the process in terms of efficiency and effectiveness.

Rolband credits staff with contributing ideas and further refining the process to boost efficiency. These platforms have also given the public a window to see where they stand in the permitting process, and be held accountable as well.

“One thing we've found is that there's a fair number of people–typically consulting firms–who submit incomplete applications,” Rolband said. PEEP tracks the process and shows when an application goes back to the consulting firm, and how long it stays with them before a response is made. Internally, DEQ is allotted 15 days to respond to an application if it's complete in every program. They are also assigning 15 days to the agents to respond to their completeness review.

PEEP represents the permitting timeline using a vertical bar with the original target date. If the schedule changes due to delays, the projected target date moves out as well, and the vertical bar grows. “It's been very effective and motivating for everyone involved in the process,” said Rolband.

Rolband has long suspected that the most common delay a permit faces is incomplete information, and the data they've collected so far proves that. “A lot of people have this idea they just need to submit quickly, and get something in the door, and then certain people will just wait a month or two and submit another application. But that wastes regulators' time,” he said. “So what we're trying to do is get everyone upfront to know what's required, and then we can do an effective and complete review in a more efficient manner than start-and-stop.”

DEQ hopes to have all 12 programs and 60+ permits online by the end of 2023.

Looking ahead, Rolband hopes to see agencies continue to digitize. The end of 2023 will mark Rolband's second full year in office. By that time, he hopes to see every permit program at DEQ—land, water, and air, all—hosted within the PEEP program.

He'd also like to at least begin the process of developing a full electronic permitting system. “What people think is electronic permitting is really a fancy way of distributing PDFs,” he said. As early as 2005, Rolband served as a beta-tester for the Corps to develop a true e-permitting system, where applications would be hosted online, and the data in the application would feed into a database, along with all reviews and comments from agencies—an initiative that has still yet to come to fruition.

A fully digitized system of that sort would boost transparency and eliminate back and forth, Rolband said, and it would feed right into a PEEP-like tracking system. “Right now, we're taking an existing database that DEQ runs on the ORACLE platform, and adding a visualization system, using Tableau, to visualize the data going into this database. Obviously we've added a lot more key stops or metrics within that database to track, so we can really see the process, but if we could link that to full electronic permitting, the efficiencies would be phenomenal. Then, tie that eventually into a compliance electronic inspection system to see the future of compliance.”

DEQ has roughly 25,000 outstanding permits at any given time, sometimes a little more, says Rolband, issuing between 3,500-4000 permits per year of different kinds.

“The more efficiencies we could make, we could have less staff time spent on paperwork, and more time spent getting a good environmental outcome,” he said.

Making impactful environmental decisions, with EPICs Jessie Mahr

Wed, 03 May 2023 13:00:00 GMT

Jessie Mahr, Director of Technology at Environmental Policy Innovation Center (EPIC), has dedicated her career to all things wetland. She believes better technology and better data are the keys to impactful environmental decision-making.

Mahr realized the extent of the limitations of outmoded technology and field data during graduate school, where she studied environmental policy and water resource engineering: “There had to be a better way to do this.”

She was studying wetland restoration projects, determining how to site them for maximum benefit. To do this, she said, she needed “really good data”---about wetland locations, impacts, current land use, and regional specifics. “Each of the datasets were at least 10-15 years out of date,” said Mahr. “Some of them were 50 some years old. Alaska isn't even mapped.” This was her ‘aha' moment: “We don't have good data to inform and scientifically drive where we should be doing some of the most impactful work related to wetland restoration and conservation.”

Her research involved a large GIS model on prime locations for wetland restoration, which wove in current wetland locations, impacts, and areas that needed more stormwater management or support for coastal flooding. It also entailed fieldwork, for which Mahr visited existing restoration projects in Massachusetts, where she was based, to track developments at the site.

Then, during another bout of graduate fieldwork, she encountered yet more technological roadblocks, lugging an umbrella alongside her laptop and a USB cord into the field to extract data from remote monitors. “There had to be a better way to do this,” she said.

Mahr's path led her from fieldwork to a technology company, where she was able to apply satellites for use on environmental projects. Her efforts to share the technology within the environmental community were met with skepticism.

At Upstream Tech, Mahr employed satellite imagery to monitor large landscapes, where she considered their applications for wetlands. Satellites offered a lot, she realized, but weren't a one-size-fits-all solution, and drones could complement their efforts.

She was excited to educate stakeholders on what type of information and technology would fit their restoration design and project needs, but quickly hit some barriers: people didn't know what the technology was, and they were skeptical of her. “There was a real dearth of information in the wetland community and environmental community, writ large, around when emerging or established or innovative technologies could be useful,” Mahr said. When she was able to have those conversations, she discovered that “maybe one district or state was trying something, but there was no cross-sharing and there wasn't consistency in terms of when and how this information could be applied.” She found that perceived regulatory barriers often shut down the conversation entirely.

“At that point, I thought, where could better policy or process or folks with a technology background be helpful in making use of innovative tools for environmental decision-making.

Confident that technology and innovation could revolutionize environmental policy, decision-making, and processes, Mahr ended up at EPIC.

“At EPIC, what we think about all day is ‘what are the tools, people, processes, regulations changes that are necessary to complement environmental decision-making and complement our use of technology?'” said Mahr.

Her list of things to look forward to in the coming years includes:

-Availability of up-to-date information on wetlands locations across the U.S.
-Acoustic monitoring to hear the sites and sounds of restoration
-EDNA to track what is there if we can't necessarily see it
-Increased public access to information, so data isn't siloed within one consulting company or agency or one company.

“Some are hard, some are easy, but I think within the next five years we'll see a lot of progress on the technology front. I see a lot of value in technology complementing our restoration work.”

EPIC's Becca Madsen, Director of the Restoration Economy Center, discusses where innovations in the environmental permitting process are currently taking place, specifically the Permitting Enhancement and Evaluation Platform (PEEP) within the Virginia DEQ allowing applicants to view their permit status throughout the entire submission process. To access this portion, listen to the podcast here.

The Impact of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act

Tue, 04 Apr 2023 13:00:00 GMT

Sunny Fleming is Esri's Industry Specialist for Environment and Conservation for State and Local Government. She read the Infrastructure Bill so you don't have to.

Here's her two cents on what the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) is and what it means for environmental professionals and your everyday citizen.

Funding from the Infrastructure Bill primarily filters through programs that already exist, said Fleming. What's important is the shift in emphasis. The bill consistently brings up resiliency, sustainability, and equity**,** whichFleming sees as an emphasis in sensitivity toward the environment and all people within existing programs.

Environmental professionals are in greater demand than ever, and applied environmental knowledge is in high demand across all industries. For environmental agencies who carry out permitting, the funding coming down the pipeline means there will be more environmental review, and if there are inefficiencies in the existing operational processes, they're going to be exploited.

As a result of the increased demand, environmental agencies are looking to modernize their operations and streamline permitting processes. This is holistic, and requires location technology from field operations to work with stakeholders, public hearings, transparency, and everything in between, and moving the data around within the agencies. Fleming suggests environmental agencies assess their existing systems and understand how they work together (and how they don't), and identify areas ripe for improvement, especially using location technology that these agencies already own.

For the everyday person, the Infrastructure Bill coupled with the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) aims to tackle issues of environmental equity, sustainability, and resiliency using incentives and by infusing cash into existing programs.

These two bills do different things, and combined they offer a two-pronged approach. In simplified terms, the Infrastructure Bill authorizes a significant amount of funding to existing conservation and environmental programs, while the Inflation Reduction Act provides tax incentives.

This particular government has lots of leadership from local governments in it, said Fleming, so they're catering to local governments here and trying to reach out to communities that might not have taken advantage of these funds in the past for any number of reasons. Grant writing, for example, is a lengthy and complicated process, and there needs to be awareness of where funding is coming from and how to access it. That's where that equitability question comes in, and local communities right now have the opportunity to get federal funding directly to them.

There are many existing programs administered by state governments that are going to provide local communities and nonprofits and other industries with opportunities to achieve the goals of environmental sensitivity, sustainability, resiliency, and equity outlined in the bill.

At the local level, individuals can visit grants.gov to take advantage of programs. Many of these programs now have mechanisms built in to allow funding to be allocated for technical assistance such as grant-writing, which Fleming sees as a measure designed to increase accessibility and ease of tapping into the resources available. For the everyday person, there will be direct tax incentives on things like appliances, though the exact process for administering this is still being nailed down.

The Bird's Eye View At Esri, Fleming's three primary domains are (1) outdoor recreation; (2) land and wildlife management; and (3) environmental regulation. These bills will affect these three areas differently.

Outdoor recreation: This arena could see great benefits related to economic opportunities and equity, as has already been seen with the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).
Land and Wildlife Management: The IB and IRA puts an emphasis on private landowner conservation to support the achievement of the America the Beautiful Challenge, which aims to preserve 30% of America's lands and waters by 2030. This is an especially challenging goal given that American land is dappled by private ownership, and the days of large-scale, continuous land conservation are mostly in the past. There are voluntary opportunities available through the USDA Farm Bill, for one, which employ landowners to engage in initiatives such as reduction of hazardous fuel use to deintensify wildfires, biodiversity programs in key areas, and more.
Environmental Regulation: This division is likely to get the brunt of increased development, review, permitting to ensure that land, air, and water is kept clean and healthy. There has been lots of focus on hiring, but Fleming emphasizes the importance of optimizing operations to maximize efficiency. Agencies should evaluate how they implement location technology to improve permitting processes, addressing each step of the process from fieldwork, to stakeholder engagement, to how data moves internally within the organization, she said.

Hypepotamus | For Asheville -based Ecobot, Hiring top tech talent means finding fellow entrepreneurs.

Wed, 22 Mar 2023 21:00:00 GMT

It can be the most exhilarating or the most daunting time for an early-stage founder: Bringing on the first hire.

That time came in 2019 for Asheville-based Ecobot, an environmental and construction SaaS platform that launched a year earlier. The team needed to recruit sales professionals to drive more customers. For CEO and co-founder Lee Lance, focusing on non-job related skills helped him land the right first outside hire.

“I told my co-founder that we need somebody who can look at the long goal of where we're heading and just put one foot in front of the other and take this journey,” CEO Lee Lance told Hypepotamus. They found a candidate who, quite literally, did that. Leigh Rothermel had just finished hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and had previously hiked the daunting Appalachian Trail before joining the team.

While backpacking was definitely not a skill needed to work in business development at a startup, Lance said looking for talent with unique backgrounds was key for the young company.

“As an early stage company, you're often constrained by cost,” said Lance. “You're looking for not just people that have experience that can fulfill a certain task, but people who are also entrepreneurially minded, who are naturally curious, and have an interest and care about something so much broader than their specific area of expertise. It sets a pretty high bar.”

Lance said he had to find candidates that were “coachable, not defensive, but opinionated and confident.”

As a CEO, he said he is “doing more than just hiring, you're building a culture on which the company itself will rest. It's typical for a company to prioritize their customers and then their product and then their team. I'm very intentional about a flip of the typical model. It is team first. If you hire the right people, [they're] going to build a better product than our customers could have ever asked for.”

Hiring Entrepreneurs

Ecobot's payroll has grown to 13 full-time employees. As the team has scaled over the last three years, Lance told Hypepotamus that he specifically looks to hire other entrepreneurs. In fact, he said Ecobot goes so far as to not interview engineering talent unless they have a side hustle.

That's right. He actually wants employees to have other gigs.

It may sound counterintuitive to some founders, who often buy into the notion that early startup employees should live, breathe, and sleep what the company is working on. But Lance said that mentality doesn't actually help a company prepare for sustainable growth down the road.

“We want engineers that are passionate about using technology to solve problems,” he added. “If they don't do that for things that they're passionate about, then they're probably not going to engage in the way that you want to and the organization.”

Ecobot's CTO and lead engineer have a crowd sourced web app that tracks on a remote park in Maryland. VP of Sales Jeremiah Smith is leading the charge at an early-stage startup of his in town.

In fact, Smith will be pitching that startup, a cybersecurity venture called Edison Marks, on the same stage as Lance during next week's Venture Connect conference in The Research Triangle.

Now, Lance knows this type of arrangement isn't the standard. But he said that a people-first mentality will help his company grow stronger well into the future.

“My fiduciary responsibility to our shareholders is to build a durable, investable, acquirable company…and you don't build a durable company by expecting people to work 90 hour weeks and have no outside interests,” he said.

Ecobot Announces Free Subscription Option

Thu, 09 Feb 2023 20:40:09 GMT

Ecobot, the premier digital solution for mandatory pre-construction assessments, has launched a new version of the platform, enabling all environmental consultants across the country to leverage the core benefits of a proven digitized permitting workflow that has been used to generate over 85,000 regulatory reports. New customers can begin a free subscription using the self-service portal at ecobot.com.

Subscribers on the free plan can access Ecobot's core features, including the ability to collect field data using the mobile application, Ecobot Collector, and seamlessly execute QA/QC and generate Clean Water Act Section 404 wetland determination reports using the web-based Ecobot Manager. The launch of a free Ecobot subscription arrives as federal environmental agencies increasingly adopt digital permitting processes, while private industry calls for digitization to reduce permitting times for energy efficiency projects.

"Digitized environmental data is a crucial component to climate-informed development," said Lee Lance, Ecobot co-founder and CEO. "By unlocking Ecobot's core features for all environmental consultants, we are enabling the entire industry to have access to our proven framework for collecting, storing, and analyzing environmental data." With built-in features that promote accuracy and minimize errors, Ecobot shrinks permitting timelines and provides the data necessary for proper construction and mitigation efforts.

The free version of Ecobot includes:

**Collector:**Use Ecobot's intuitive, workflow-first mobile application to collect field data, with built-in reference tools and automated QA/QC for optimal efficiency.
**Manager:**Seamlessly QA/QC data and generate completed regulatory reports and geospatially-accurate shapefiles.

**Self-service subscription:**New users can subscribe to Ecobot without engaging with a salesperson.

Ecobot's free subscription plan is ideal for consultancies conducting small wetland determination projects (15 sampling points or fewer).

Ecobot is the trusted platform for natural resource identification.

Tue, 24 Jan 2023 15:39:19 GMT

Ecobot assists with digitizing federal and state agencies' field work around natural resource identification, reducing labor costs around natural resources regulation, and stretching federal funding and budgets to their fullest extent.

What government agencies use Ecobot?

Our customers, including state DOTs, the EPA, USDA, and USBR, are using Ecobot in the field to improve efficiency, predictability and performance, and reduce risk. Field scientists within government agencies utilize Ecobot to abide by USACE guidelines for standardized natural resource identification and make critical land use decisions.

As a true workflow-first solution, built from within the environmental consulting industry, Ecobot helps government agencies drive efficiency. For example, the NRCS utilizes Ecobot to complete wetland delineations twice as fast for compliance with swampbuster provisions.

"The big plus for me was the improved efficiency... In Alabama, we have a small number of biologists dedicated to wetland delineations, but with Ecobot, it's like we have an extra person on our team,” Hunter Nobles, Environmental Specialist, Alabama Department of Transportation.

Is Ecobot whitelisted?

Ecobot's cloud-based platform is on Amazon AWS East and customer data housed on this server is FedRAMP moderate compliant. The USDA and NRCS investigated Ecobot's security, more specifically the PII (Personally Identifiable Information) protection and whitelisted Ecobot for usage across the entire agency.

How do I implement Ecobot?

Ecobot removes the hassle of onboarding and continued maintenance by providing whitelisted efficiency software. When tasked with acquiring new software, onboarding efforts can be a pain point, especially at the early stages of the process. Ecobot is intuitive to the field scientist's workflow, allowing quick and easy adoption. After a short demo guided by one of our Ecobot specialist, your natural resources team will be ready to start their work.

“Ecobot is helping Davey Resource Group to standardize wetlands data collection across all offices, significantly streamlining our processes. Easily the most supportive and accommodating software vendor I deal with,” John Cooke, Engineering & Survey Technology Consultant, Davey Resource Group.

Ecobot effectively addresses the complexities unique to the wetland delineation workflow and eliminates the need for any internal development or maintenance. Start normalizing data collection across your entire agency, state, or region to better enforce and maintain regulations around natural resource identification and protection.

A Guide to Wetland Delineations (FAQ)

Tue, 17 Jan 2023 20:36:40 GMT

What is a wetland delineation? A wetland delineation is fieldwork that establishes the boundaries between wetlands and uplands on a property. A wetland is an area of land that is covered or saturated with water, either seasonally or permanently. Wetlands serve important ecological functions, affecting water quality and biodiversity, and are therefore regulated by Section 404 of the Clean Water Act.

Ecobot is the fastest wetland delineation app. With efficiency-boosting features and automations to ensure accuracy, Ecobot helps customers secure permits more quickly, ultimately reducing construction timelines and boosting profit margins.

Ecobot offers a free subscription. Get started today.

When is a wetland delineation performed? Wetland delineations are mandatory in advance of development projects regulated by federal or state permits. Projects can range in size from roadside utility line maintenance or home building, to large-scale infrastructure development.

A wetland delineation report is submitted to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), as well as to state and local agencies, before a permit can be issued. The regulatory agencies will assist in the jurisdictional determinations (JDs) of any wetlands on a given property, and issue the appropriate permits if a wetland will be temporarily or permanently impacted.

Wetland delineation and permitting is legally mandated if wetland presence is determined on a property and may be impacted by development. Projects can face serious delays if the delineation is not properly completed. USACE and local regulatory agencies must approve the wetland boundary in order to issue a permit to impact regulated wetlands.

Wetland regulations vary from state to state following the Sackett v. EPA decision that narrowed the definition and regulatory scope of wetlands under the Clean Water Act. This decision impacts how wetlands are identified and protected, emphasizing the importance of thorough and accurate wetland delineations to comply with federal regulations. See how strictly your state regulates wetlands in Ecobot's StoryMap, How does SCOTUS' Sackett v. EPA Decision Affect You?

Ecobot provides digital data normalization and real-time QA that can help to reduce delays in the permitting process. Explore the platform for free.

How do you perform a wetland delineation? Typically Professional Wetland Scientists (PWS), botanists, soil scientists, ecologists, and environmental scientists perform wetland delineations. To determine wetland presence, the delineator analyzes the vegetation, soil, and hydrology of a site. Consultants use the National Wetland Inventory (NWI) before heading into the field to identify known wetlands and prepare their expectations for the field.

A wetland is defined by having hydrophytic vegetation, indicators of wetland hydrology, and evidence of hydric soil indicators.

The USDA Plant List and the USACE National Wetland Plant List (NWPL) are used to identify hydrophytic vegetation. Vegetation is then evaluated for one of the following indicator statuses:

Obligate wetland (OBL) almost always occur in wetlands under normal conditions.
Facultative wetland (FACW) typically occur in wetlands, but can be found elsewhere.
Facultative (FAC) can occur in wetlands or non-wetlands (uplands).
Facultative upland (FACU) are typically found in uplands.
Obligate upland (UPL) are almost always found in uplands in normal conditions.

The USACE Wetland Delineation Manual and corresponding Regional Supplements are used to identify indicators of wetland hydrology including, high water tables, sediment deposits, and the presence of surface water. The Munsell Soil Color Book is used to identify the colors of soil matrices and redoximorphic (redox) features. Download Ecobot's Munsell Soil Reference Guide.

Ecobot automatically selects vegetation indicator status depending on which region you are working in. With regionally-specific customizations, automated QA, built-in reference tools, and efficiency-boosting features, Ecobot helps customers collect accurate pre-construction data and supports quicker permitting turnarounds. Sign up for a free subscription and simplify wetland, stream, and Ordinary High Water Mark assessments.

What other assessments are conducted with wetland delineations?
Depending on the site and region, consultants may need to conduct additional assessments, including stream assessments or Ordinary High Water Mark assessments. Ecobot supports wetland delineations, stream assessments, and Ordinary High Water Mark assessments. Sign up for free.

Why are wetlands protected? Wetlands are defined and regulated under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA), the primary law governing pollution control and water quality protections of waterways in the United States, due to their critical ecological value. Wetlands offer far-ranging benefits that surpass the boundaries of any single site, including flood control, groundwater recharging through aquifers, and water quality improvement via filtration. Wetlands also provide a unique habitat to many species. Some wetlands qualify as Waters of the United States (WOTUS) and face additional regulations.

Federal wetland regulations were restricted following the Sackett v. EPA decision in May 2023, and regulations vary state-by-state. Learn how wetland protections vary across the United States in Ecobot's StoryMap, How does SCOTUS' Sackett v. EPA Decision Affect You?

Ecobot ensures the protection and management of natural resources by providing quality data collection. Pair your GNSS device to the Ecobot app for sub-meter accuracy deliverable to GIS professionals and civil engineers. Our geospatial partners include Trimble, Eos Positioning Systems, Juniper Systems, Leica Geosystems, SXBlue, and Bad Elf, as well as direct integration with Esri's ArcGIS Online & ArcGIS Pro.

How long does a wetland delineation take? The amount of time a wetland delineation takes to complete depends on the size of the project and number of sampling points that need to be collected. Delineations are typically conducted during the regular growing season, approximately May 15-September 15.

It can take between a few months to a year for permits to be granted. Wetland delineations remain valid for five years after the survey takes place.

Ecobot is the fastest wetland delineation app, reducing wetland delineation timelines by up to 50%, with huge time savings during fieldwork and report preparation, amounting to higher profit margins and tightened development timelines. Firms that use Ecobot consistently deliver on tight timelines and budgets, and are able to win more bids.

How much does wetland delineation cost? The cost of a wetland delineation depends on the size of the project site. An area smaller than 5 acres can cost under $1,000, while a larger project can cost thousands of dollars.

Ecobot customers see significant time and cost savings due to boosted efficiency and reduced labor costs. With tighter budgets and timelines, companies that use Ecobot win more bids overall. Learn how Ecobot can support your environmental team and your wetland delineation workflow.

What is a United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) wetland determination form? Wetland determination forms are found in the Regional Supplements to the Corps of Engineers Wetland Delineation Manual, and are used to document the presence or absence of wetlands.

Ecobot supports wetland delineations in each USACE region, including: Alaska; Arid West; Atlantic and Gulf Coast Plain (AGCP, 4 or 5 strata); Caribbean Islands; Eastern Mountains and Piedmont (EMP, 4 or 5 strata); Great Plains; Hawaii and Pacific Islands; Midwest; Northcentral and Northeast; Western Mountains, Valley, and Coast; and the state of Florida via the FDEP 62-340 Form.

Can I perform a wetland delineation myself? If you're a landowner, you would need to hire an environmental consultant or Professional Wetland Scientist (PWS) to perform the wetland delineation. To ensure you are getting the best cost possible, ask if they are using Ecobot.

Where can I learn more about Wetland Delineations?

USACEs Antecedent Precipitation Tool (APT) For Wetland Delineations

Mon, 01 Aug 2022 13:20:00 GMT

Have you used USACE's Antecedent Precipitation Tool (APT)? With some USACE districts now recommending or requiring APT data alongside jurisdictional reports, the tool has an important place in the wetland delineation and monitoring process.

This topic was covered in the 24th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Why use USACE's Antecedent Precipitation Tool (APT)
Demonstration of the ATP

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Nevin Durvish, Senior Biologist, ESE Partners
Robin Bedenbough, PWD, Senior Project Manager, RES
Olivia Haney, Product Manager and Environmental Scientist, Ecobot

Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology The technology of wetland science—GIS software, field applications, GPS and GNSS receivers, drone technology, and more—has evolved rapidly in recent years. These tools provide more robust data, and therefore a fuller context for the site, says Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. “But the other crucial piece is the opportunity to potentially influence policy, and shape our future” using the robust data enabled by digital tools.”

The Antecedent Precipitation Tool (APT) Why Use the APT Tool?

The Antecedent Precipitation Tool (APT), developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), not only provides detailed precipitation data to regulators, scientists, and consultants, but also documents the climatic conditions of a site relative to a typical year.

The APT is site-specific, dictated by coordinates or a custom polygon input by the consultant. Based on this information, the tool extrapolates data from weather stations in the area, pulling information from the previous 30 years. The goal is to determine whether a site was experiencing normal or abnormal rainfall conditions, relative to a typical year, at the time of wetland delineation.

The APT informs on:

Whether fieldwork was conducted during the dry or wet season
Whether the water table is lower due to drought conditions
Whether there is less than or more than normal antecedent precipitation

Olivia Haney, environmental scientist and Ecobot product manager, worked on one project that necessitated a “deep dive into the drought conditions that were being experienced on site and within the watershed at the time.” Haney was able to run a date range and generate information evidencing the persistence of drought conditions and resulting problematic situations. That enabled her team to confirm that the site should be marked as jurisdictional, and supported their determination before USACE.

In some districts, USACE is now requesting or requiring that the output from APT be supplemented as part of a report.

Nevin Durvish, Senior Biologist, ESE Partners and his team have habitually submitted the APT's output report as an appendix alongside his reports since the Tool's inception. “Working here in Texas, we're in an area that is certainly prone to drought,” he says. “Having data that is tailored to a specific site, and the specific dates that the delineation took place” is invaluable.

Likewise, Haney and her former team included the APT output as an appendix to their reports as well, along with a section summarizing the conditions onsite.

Robin Bedenbough, PWD, Senior Project Manager, RES, says the APT provides background to his team for some of their mitigation sites, and helps in monitoring banks.

Before the ATP How did scientists gather this data before the ATP?

“To this day, there's not a lot of datasets we can readily access,” Bedenbough says. “[ATP] accesses so many data sources automatically and quickly. In the old days, all you could do was find the closest known NOAA weather station, and use that data because it was the only thing available to you. The technology and data available now is just mind-boggling. Just how much data this program is actually crunching and providing for you is pretty amazing.”

Using the ATP The APT is compatible with PC computers only. It was developed internally by USACE and then made available to the regulatory environment.

The ATP pulls data from regional weather stations within a 30-mile radius. The output spans the previous 3 months, and includes a yellow band demonstrating the normal precipitation range, alongside the actual data for easy comparison. The graph also includes daily totals for individual rain events.

The graphical output shows only the weather stations that the ATP pulls the 30-year average from, but the 30-day rolling precipitation average pulls from as many data stations as exist within the 30 miles, and the Tool shows how far away each station is. In the test demonstration, this comprised some 200 data stations, since many farmers nowadays have precise precipitation gauges on their farms that are linked to a data system other farmers can see as well. Many of these stations are close to one another, so the site-specific data is extremely accurate.

To view a demonstration of the ATP, and the following Q&A session, view the webinar recording.

Land Use Clarity via Advanced Mapping

Fri, 01 Jul 2022 13:14:00 GMT

Do you use Esri's ArcGIS Field Maps? Use Ecobot alongside ArcGIS Field Maps enables environmental consultants to streamline field data collection for wetland projects, make the data collected more accurate and robust, and easily collaborate with teammates.

This topic was covered in the 23rd episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Overview of technology in wetlands
Esri ArcGIS Field Maps capabilities
Ecobot and ArcGIS Field Maps

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Sarah Saint-Ruth, Senior Project Manager – Field Maps, Esri

Ecobot and Esri share a history of partnership.

In early 2022, Ecobot graduated from the Esri Startup Program to become an Esri Silver Partner
You can read about Ecobot's integration of Esri's GIS technology and how it bolsters customers' pre-construction workflows in the Summer 2022 edition of Esri's ArcNews magazine.
Find Ecobot in the Esri Marketplace, where you can bundle your Esri and Ecobot licenses together.
From July 11-15, attendees of the Esri User Conference in San Diego can visit Ecobot's booth in the Startup Zone. As part of a new feature release at the conference, Ecobot customers will be able to push projects directly from the platform into ArcGIS Online.

Tech in Wetlands

The Data Ecosystem for Wetland Science

The data ecosystem for wetland technology includes GPS receivers, GNSS receivers, and field applications including GIS software. These pieces fit together to “help us tell a better story of a place, whether from the regulatory side, the conservation side, or the interweaving of all those together, with these powerful tools augmented by satellites, drone technology, and lots of other subtle tools that help fit into this ecosystem,” says Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. Today's conversation focuses on field applications.

Drones

Increasingly more organizations are exploring the utilization of drones to gather information such as LiDAR data. Satellite imagery, available from both public and private sectors, can also provide high-resolution data. These tools “are playing a very important role in the collection of data for wetlands and other natural areas,” says Schewe, but “it does not replace the necessity for boots on the ground.”

GPS and GNSS Receivers

GPS units have developed rapidly in recent years, transitioning from large units into more compact ones that are Bluetooth-enabled and pair directly with phones, tablets, or iPads. This in turn augments the user's experience with field applications like ArcGIS Field Maps and Ecobot. GIS software then enables the scientist to model and convey data geospatially.

Mobile Applications

Mobile applications and management software like Ecobot and ArcGIS Field Maps bolster efficiency in the field by enabling greater accuracy and data normalization, allowing automated calculations and population of location data, and providing robust mapping and geospatial data. Additionally, field applications make collaboration easier than ever.

ArcGIS Field Maps

“The ArcGIS system is completely configurable,” says Sarah Saint-Ruth, Senior Project Manager of Field Maps at Esri. “You can design field workflows to match the exact requirements of your organization to meet regulations.”

ArcGIS Field Maps is utilized by organizations internationally and across industries. The platform has five high-level capabilities:

Coordination of teams to know exactly what they need to do in the field
Navigation to and around the project site
Awareness of location to facilitate the job
Data capture in the field and editing capabilities
Evaluation, the step between the field and office, which involves getting the data into the right people's hands efficiently, and then analyzing and reporting on it to eventually make decisions

ArcGIS Field Maps was created to give mobile teams a tool to facilitate data capture and digital representation. It was built to be accessible to team members with or without GIS training, such that it's intuitive to use and immediately streamlines the data collection workflow.

It's key that ArcGIS Field Maps allows synchronicity between the office and field teams, enabling real-time data to optimize field activities. Additionally, location-sharing can help boost worker safety in a case where someone goes into the field alone, for example. In questions of compliance, the coverage of field activities is proof that the work was done. In situations where cellular service is weak or unavailable, the platform works offline.

Field Maps is part of the ArcGIS system, so once a user shares data, it creates what's called a “web map,” which gives the same view to anyone accessing that user's information. This is crucial when coordinating activities between teams, and making decisions. This reduces processing time and removes the need for different systems.

The many integrations and compatible applications streamline things even further. ArcGIS Workforce, for example, works alongside Field Maps and provides a to-do list for the user. GPS and GNSS devices, laser rangefinders, and other tools can be integrated. Then, different mechanisms within the platform automate what to do with field data that is ingested.

To view Saint-Ruth's demonstration of ArcGIS Field Maps for Conservation Easements and T&E Habitat Capture, click here for access to the webinar recording.

Integration with Ecobot Ecobot is currently specific to the workflow for projects related to Waters of the United States (WOTUS). “Where Ecobot and Field Maps fit together really well is the precision-level mapping modeling, and offline utilization, and then being able to compile all of the data necessary for the Army Corps of Engineers Wetland Delineation Form,” Schewe says. Ecobot is launching an even deeper integration with ArcGIS Online, such that users will be able to upload results directly.

Once finished with field data collection, Schewe transitions from the mobile application to the Ecobot web dashboard, where he can view a geospatial model of his datapoints on a map, as well as QA his points and generate his USACE forms, Shapefiles, and more. Additionally, Ecobot automatically compiles a list of nearby mitigation banks pulled directly from the RIBITS database (Regulatory In lieu fee and Bank Information Tracking System), and generates a vegetation species list for monitoring purposes.

Geospatial WOTUS Project Management Made Easy

Thu, 02 Jun 2022 13:10:00 GMT

Learn about the software helping wetland scientists tighten project timelines by boosting efficiency in the field and back at the office.

This topic was covered in the 22nd episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Efficient WOTUS data collection
Geospatial data: field to office and office to field
Real-time data exchange and team management
Subcontractor and seasonal access

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Corinna Photos, PWS, Senior Project Manager, Spirit Environmental
Jodie Burns, PWS, Principal & Senior Scientist, Cattails Environmental
Sarah Lewis, Project Biologist, Lord and Winter
Kristin Wing, Environmental Analyst, Beam, Longest and Neff

The Wetland Science Digital Ecosystem “I want to launch this with a reminder,” says Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. “It's really important that we are ascending biological data into the digital ecosystem. Here in the 21st century, where most things are in some way data-driven, data is being utilized to understand better economics. It's being utilized to better understand how policy can be shaped. And if we're not contributing biological data, natural resource data, to help improve our understanding on a macro-scale on the landscape level, then we're doing our own future and the generations that are going to come after us a disservice.”

The digital ecosystem Schewe speaks of in respect to wetland science is the combination of GPS receivers, GIS software, field applications, satellites, drones, and more, which enable better understanding, interpretation, and recording of biological information, which can then be shared with laypeople, regulators, and policymakers.

The Essentials Schewe, along with colleagues Corinna Photos, PWS, Senior Project Manager, Spirit Environmental; Jodie Burns, PWS, Principal & Senior Scientist, Cattails Environmental; Sarah Lewis, Project Biologist, Lord and Winter; and Kristin Wing, Environmental Analyst, Beam, Longest and Neff, each share a handful of essential tools that they and their teams bring into the field. These are:

Hardware:

iPhone or iPad for running mobile field data collection platforms
An external power bank for backup battery power
External GNSS device, such as a Trimble device, Eos Arrow, Juniper Geode, or SXblue for highly accurate location data

Software:

With this combination of technology, the teams are able to work efficiently, especially across large project areas. With Field Maps, teams can bring along the detailed basemap they or their GIS team built in advance of fieldwork, and update the map once they're on the ground. Multiple teammates can use the same basemap, such as in the case of Wing's team, who tends to use the same large basemap all season long.

Ecobot enables efficient workflow-based data collection with or without a cellular connection. Project managers and coworkers back at the office can access the data and begin QA as soon as the project is synced to the cloud. Teams have seen the benefits from having their data centralized and easily accessible: Photos' team, for example, recently worked on a project that was across the street from a previous site. With the prior project at their fingertips, her team was able to easily check what features and conditions they were likely to see. Automated calculations and built-in reference tools bolster efficiency and accuracy during data collection, and data is automatically transferred to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) form with the click of a button.

How does Ecobot stack up to the automated data forms recently released by USACE? Burns has personally experimented with the automated data sheets, and is also a long-time Ecobot user. “It does [calculations] similar to what Ecobot does, but I tried to get the automated data sheets to work in the field with my iPad setup, and the Excel version that is iPad-friendly is not robust enough. … When I use those, when I come back to the office, I still have half a foot in the paper world.”

The critical difference: Ecobot is a workflow, not a data entry application. Built from inside the industry to be intuitive to wetlands scientists, the platform facilitates collaboration and streamlines the workflow between team members in the field and at the office. In addition to the features that simplify data collection itself, Ecobot's web dashboard enables PMs and teammates back at the office to access and QA project files remotely as soon as they hit the cloud. Ecobot generates completed USACE forms and CSVs for each project. It also creates Shapefiles and GeoJSONs, which can be easily transferred to Field Maps or ArcGIS. In other words, it fits in seamlessly with the other pieces of the workflow, making report generation and submission easier than ever.

Tighter Project Timelines with Ecobot Ultimately, clients of Ecobot customers see faster project turnarounds, thanks to the boosts to efficiency throughout the workflow.

“I've probably done, on my most efficient day in the field, 20-25 points or so…” Lewis says. “[We had] pre-mapped areas, going to check out a very large site. But that was Ecobot. We utilized Ecobot on that project.” In particular, says Lewis, the vegetation calculations and built-in QC were major efficiency boosters on that project.

Lewis has also saved time in the field using the cloning tool, which enables her to copy a sampling point if there is significant overlap in the features in multiple sampling points. She then manually changes, deletes, and adds data where the new point differs. As an example, she says, “If you're in a very similar hardwood forest, where it's pretty uniform throughout, I have definitely used clone…Then I'll update my point…change the percentage of the vegetation. Most of the efficient days I have, I was cloning a good bit of my sampling points.”

Wonderful Workflows Addressing 21st Century WOTUS Woes

Tue, 10 May 2022 04:00:00 GMT

Learn about the state-of-the-art technology making field data collection more accurate and efficient and ever, leaving time and providing more robust and secure datasets for navigating the ever-evolving landscape of Waters of the United States.

This topic was covered in the 21st episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Accessing geospatial datasets
Tools, software, and hardware for the regulatory and mitigation wetland workflow
Overview of field and office utilization if IPaC, Ecobot, Field Maps, and ArcGIS Pro

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Gale Shea, GISP, Mapping Representative, Seiler Instrument Co.
Scott Denham, Wetlands & Permitting Manager, ESI
Olivia Haney, Environmental Scientist, Burns & McDonnell

Geospatial Data & Tools The different layers and vectors of a GIS dataset can begin to tell the story of a place, says Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist at Ecobot, before the information gained from visiting a site refines that story and makes it more comprehensive. Using GIS datasets before heading into the field can inform expectations in advance of a site visit. There are a number of resources for these, including:

Web Soil Survey (U.S. Department of Agriculture)
National Wetlands Inventory Mapper (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)
topoView (U.S. Geologic Survey quadrangles)
ArcGIS Living Atlas (Esri)
IPaC (U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service)

Web Soil Survey First, using the Web Soil Survey made available by the USDA, Schewe locates his project area and pulls the soil layers, which provide specifics on the soil at the site. He can find, for example, how likely it is that there are hydric soils in the area.

NWI Mapper Wetland data is available through the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's (USFWS) National Wetland Inventory (NWI) Mapper. This tool provides geospatial files, and provides even more information about the likelihood of wetland presence at the site. Shapefiles are available for download through the Web Soil Survey and NWI Mapper, and Schewe can then pull into his GIS file and project the layers in his model. Shapefiles are available on multiple scales through the NWI Mapper, either by watershed (HUC 8) or by state. Once downloaded, the files can be clipped to the project area to limit file size.

U.S. Geologic Survey's topoView There are several sources for U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS) maps. Many regulatory reviewers like to see these maps as part of a jurisdictional report. topoView is a free resource with maps available from various periods in history. USGS maps are available for download in a variety of file types, including JPEG, KMZ, GeoTiff, or GeoPDF.

ArcGIS Living Atlas ArcGIS Living Atlas by Esri is the most robust and current collection of geographic information, featuring maps, apps, and data layers which are consistently curated. Living Atlas can be access for free through ArcGIS Online, ArcGIS Pro, and ArcMap. Data is stored on the cloud, enabling quick access and cloud computing. Data on elevation, NWI, soil (including hydrologic group, drainage class, and hydric class), and are readily available as layers. Other available wetland-related data includes hydrography, live stream gauges, flood hazard, green infrastructure datasets, land use and land cover, and water quality.

IPaC

Lastly, the IPaC program put out by the USFWS streamlines the environmental review process, specifically for Threatened & Endangered Species (T&E) assessments, Incidental Takes, Section 7 and Section 10 assessments, and Habitat Conservation Plans (HCPs). Users can build biological assessments for their projects, run initial screenings and practice tests, and more, helping to formulate their plan prior to visiting a site.

Putting the Data in Action

Using the Base Map Now that the preliminary GIS data has been compiled, the layers can be added to the base map on ArcGIS Pro, revealing to the scientist where they should concentrate their efforts. As a wetland scientist, Schewe is primarily considering the soil and wetland layers. As a final step before heading into the field, he uses the Mobile Map Export function in ArcGIS Pro to share the map with his teammates, who are then able to download the map to their mobile devices using ArcGIS Field Maps. This way, the team is able to geospatially reference themselves, and they have a sense of what to expect, such as what soils they're in at a given point, whether they're within property boundaries, whether they're in a known or supposed NWI wetland unit, et cetera.

GNSS Receivers GNSS is a robust geolocating system with access to hundreds of internationally operated satellites. The difference between GPS and GNSS lies in the number of satellites each system accesses: GPS is limited to North American Satellites, while GNSS geolocates using hundreds of internationally-operated satellites, and therefore achieves a much higher level of accuracy. Historically, GPS methods were bulky, cumbersome, and expensive. Fortunately, current GNSS devices are much smaller, cost-effective, and easier to use–many can be paired with applications on smartphones and tablets to enable seamless data collection. Data can be hosted in a cloud to keep it easily accessible to the data collector and their teammates.

Field Applications In the field, Schewe primarily uses three apps:

Ecobot: Schewe uses Ecobot for field data collection to save time, cut costs, and win more bids. It keeps data consistent across individuals and teams, and ensures data security. Ecobot makes data available to engineers and reviewers more quickly, and the increased efficiency and accuracy of jurisdictional reports facilitates quicker concurrence for WOTUS reports.
ArcGIS Field Maps: Schewe downloads his basemaps into ArcGIS Field Maps before heading into the field.
iNaturalist: Schewe makes a point to feed information into this app in order to improve the tool. iNaturalist is helpful for identifying unknown vegetation.

For hardware, Schewe and his colleagues Scott Denham, Wetlands & Permitting Manager, ESI, and Olivia Haney, Environmental Scientist, Burns & McDonnell, use:

An iPhone or iPad to run their field data collection software
An external battery pack to support their devices
An external GNSS device, such as a Trimble R1, Eos Arrow, or Juniper Geode

This combination of technology enables their teams to collect field data efficiently, accurately, and securely.

“[Digitizing field data] is our way as field scientists, as consultants, as conservationists, to be able to leverage our data, to potentially work together on projects, and conglomerate that data. And thus be able to tell a better story that can help to influence policy,” says Jeremy Schewe, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. “Biology, especially out in the field, does not have a lot of representation in respect to the digital sphere. And so I think this is really important as we understand the evolution of the digital ecosystem moving forward.”

Kelp Forest Monitoring & Remote Sensing

Tue, 12 Apr 2022 14:42:00 GMT

The KelpRes project in Galway, Ireland gives a glimpse of the ecological importance of kelp forests. This topic was covered in the 16th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Natural and Nature-Based Features (NNBF) for Coastal Resilience
Kelp Forest Monitoring and Remote Sensing

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Kathryn Schoenrock-Rossiter, PhD, Postdoctoral Researcher, National University of Ireland Galway
Aaron Golden, PhD, College Lecturer, National University of Ireland Galway
Stacy Krueger-Hadfield, PhD, Assistant Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Natural and Nature-Based Features (NNBF) for Coastal Resilience

Related USACE Initiatives United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE)'s Engineering With Nature (EWN)

USACE's Engineering with Nature (EWN) initiative enables the development of infrastructure that is resilient and maximizes the delivery of economic, social, and environmental benefits. The initiative aims to:

Use science and engineering to produce operational efficiencies supporting sustainable delivery of project benefits.
Use natural processes to maximum benefit, thereby reducing demands on limited resources, minimizing the environmental footprint of projects, and enhancing the quality of project benefits.
Broaden and extend the base of benefits provided by projects to include substantiated economic, social, and environmental benefits.
Use science-based collaboration to organize and focus interests, stakeholders, and partners to reduce social friction, resistance, and project delays while producing more broadly acceptable projects.

In 2021, EWN released international guidelines on NNBF for Flood Risk Management, which “provide practitioners with the best available information concerning the conceptualization, planning, design, engineering, construction, and maintenance of NNBF to support resilience and flood risk reduction for coastlines, bays, and estuaries, as well as river and freshwater systems.” The guidelines examine areas that have been or will be submerged, and projections for coastline changes due to climate change. This information is critical for scientists, policymakers, developers, and engineers in considering intelligent planning.

On September 14, 2021, USACE released a 20-chapter publication on NNBF guidelines, which is broken into 3 major sections:

Overarching themes
Coastal features
Fluvial Features

Tying it back to kelp, “kelp forests are the ecotone between the deeper open sea and our coastlines and estuaries,” says Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. “Kelp is a keystone species. It's a critical species in providing habitat, nutrients, and hunting grounds for many species that are on international critical and watch lists, as well as threatened or endangered, while also supporting species that are very common.”

Kelp Forest Overview Kathryn Schoenrock-Rossiter, PhD, Postdoctoral Researcher, National University of Ireland Galway; Aaron Golden, PhD, College Lecturer, National University of Ireland Galway; and

Stacy Krueger-Hadfield, PhD, Assistant Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham are each involved with the KelpRes grant in Ireland. They study the diversity and resilience of kelp ecosystems.

“We're defining ‘resilience' in this case as ‘the ability of an ecosystem to recover and maintain function,'” says Schoenrock-Rossiter.

Kelp forests are submerged marine algae, Schoenrock-Rossiter explains, and they are generally within the family of large brown algae seaweeds and in the order Laminariales. Although kelp may resemble an underwater plant, it is in fact a protist, the same family of organisms as molds and amoebas. Kelp forests are found on all continents except Antarctica, which is too cold for this kind of seaweed.

Today's discussion focuses on species within the Laminariales, which are dominant all over Europe, from the coast of Portugal to Svalbard and Greenland. They form a subsurface canopy. “Kelp forms this lovely kind of chaparral-like community, if we're to compare it to the terrestrial ecosystem,” says Schoenrock-Rossiter. Laminariales are about three meters tall and very dense, dominating rocky shorelines with moderate exposure. They're important ecosystem engineers, she says, meaning that they form a home and a food source for many species in the marine environment. They are sensitive abiotic and biotic stressors.

Kelp Forest Stressors

Abiotic stressors include storms and climate change. The distribution of kelp forests has changed due to climate change, and it is predicted that it will continue to do so. Biological stressors include harvesting (wild or human) or overgrazing by herbivores, such as purple urchins, which decimate kelp forests along the northern coast of Norway. Kelp forests can recover from these kinds of events as urchins die off, but damage can occur quickly, and it can be devastating to local fisheries, coastal protection, and more.

KelpRes The study species of KelpRes is L. hyperborea, known in Ireland as “cuvie” or “mayweed.” It is generally in the subtidal region, and can live between 10-15 years. The species is unique in that it can be aged like a tree: prolonged winter stages create bands on the kelp similar to that of tree rings. Thus far, the oldest specimen Schoenrock-Rossiter's team has found in Ireland is 15 years old, while others up to 18 years old have been located in Norway. As such, these individuals have the potential to structure ecosystems for a relatively long duration of time. Like all brown algae within the Laminariales family, says Schoenrock-Rossiter, they have a complex lifecycle.

L. hyperborea Lifecycle Stages L. hyperborea's sporophyte stage is what Schoenrock-Rossiter's team considers the kelp.

Structures ecosystem in this macroscopic form
Diploid (has two pairs of chromosomes), and forms reproductive structures on its blade, where meiosis occurs in producing the haploids of single chromosomes and set spores
Spores are mobile but microscopic; don't travel very far in strong currents. Move around for about 24 hours, then settle out onto the benthic environment (such as bedrock stones and other structures)
Spores develop into either male or female gametophytes, which produce gametes that recombine sexually to form a sporophyte.
A fertilization event allows recruitment of the sporophyte, which creates a macroscopic forest, theoretically the following year.

The kelp has a fairly complicated life cycle, says Schoenrock-Rossiter, with two crucial stages, macroscopic-microscopic. This is a seasonal pattern, such that these different lifecycle events occur on a seasonal scale:

Zoospore formation occurs in the winter
Gametophyte development occurs in winter and spring
New sporophyte generation starts in spring and continues through summer

Other species tend to start this process from early summer through autumn, so it's clearer for the researchers to identify which species are recruiting and developing in the ecosystem.

L. hyperborea Range RestrictionsThis species has experienced past range restrictions.

In the last glacial maximum, it is projected to have retracted its range all the way down to the southern Irish coast, the southern UK, Brittany, and Portugal down to Morocco.
Monitors recruitment habitats to determine what species preferentially settle into the ecosystems
Observes succession processes, i.e. how kelp forests recover
Conducts biodiversity transects, counting all organisms that are found in a certain area of the kelp forests to help define what lives there seasonally/annually, at different depths, and in different locations
Determines biomass and age of kelp forest
Studies pigments
Looks at proteins that will distribute into food webs in the near shore ecosystem
Observes growth rate to determine how biomass is produced and rate of production across the system
Currently, the kelp is distributed from the northern portion of the Portuguese coastline up to Svalbard (Norway). The most extreme projections from the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predict that the species will retract northward all the way up to the mid-UK and southern Irish coastline.

As such, climate change is a significant threat to this cold water kelp species.

KelpRes' Focus

Schoenrock-Rossiter's research is interested in where the kelp has been found in Ireland specifically, as the government attempts to manage this resource on a national scale. Focus questions are:

+ **Where have** ***L. hyperborea*** **ecosystems historically been found in Ireland?**
+ What has *L*. *hyperborea* been used for by humans?
+ How has it been observed and recorded in the past?
+ How are people interacting with this species?
+ **What is the genetic structure and connectivity across habitats in Ireland?**
		1. Is there genetic diversity within the populations? 
		2. What is the genetic structure in connectivity across populations within Ireland?
+ **Is there natural resilience in the lifecycle of** ***L. hyperborea*** **(i.e. from macroscopic to microscopic stages)?**
+ **How can these habitats continue to be monitored moving forward to keep tabs on kelp forest presence, ecosystem health, and distribution shifts?*****The History of Kelp in Ireland***

It has been challenging to source historical data about kelp presence and health in Ireland, since kelp are very large and difficult to preserve. Even in old textbooks and scientific records, there is sparing data on subtidal species. The earliest record of hyperborea is from 1913 in Wexford County on Hook Head Peninsula. Records intermittently appear throughout the 1900s, stemming from a research project called Biomark.

In the 2000s, a citizen science group, Sea Search Ireland, was founded with the purpose of expanding recordings of kelp observations. Schoenrock-Rossiter attributes recent progress in the understanding of kelp distribution to the development of technology like scuba diving and the internet, with its data-sharing capabilities. However, in the case of many citizen-run sites, the data is rarely updated, so kelp presence may be recorded once, but there is no further information on whether the kelp was alive at the time, ongoing ecosystem health, or even whether the ecosystem is still present.

From the perspective of cultural history, it's well established that kelp has played an important role in Ireland agriculturally and economically.

Hotspots for recording kelp are typically centered around institutes of higher education, such as in Galway and Cork. This creates somewhat of a bias in datasets, which could be addressed by expanding research across the coastline.

Monitoring Kelp

For the past five years, Schoenrock-Rossiter and her team have been working to create a modern baseline for kelp forest ecology in Ireland, create monitoring tools, contribute data to international networks, and ultimately develop long-term datasets to help understand and define the resilience of kelp habitats.

To accomplish these goals, the team established monitoring locations with subsurface buoys that wouldn't be disturbed by fishermen, which they have had difficulty maintaining so far. KelpRes team have placed data loggers to record environmental conditions that are found within kelp forests, which will support modeling efforts. As part of current research efforts, the KelpRes team:

Monitors recruitment habitats to determine what species preferentially settle into the ecosystems
Observes succession processes, i.e. how kelp forests recover
Conducts biodiversity transects, counting all organisms that are found in a certain area of the kelp forests to help define what lives there seasonally/annually, at different depths, and in different locations
Determines biomass and age of kelp forest
Studies pigments
Looks at proteins that will distribute into food webs in the near shore ecosystem
Observes growth rate to determine how biomass is produced and rate of production across the system

The KelpRes team has also looked at nearshore ecosystems to gain an understanding of the importance of kelp forests. In comparing kelp forests to reefs and rocky bottoms, the KelpRes team has found kelp forests to be quite unique. Each habitat is defined by the biological community associated with it. Even within kelp forests, different parts of the forests exhibit specific genetic characteristics and growth rates, allowing for unique kelp forest development.

Species That Define a Kelp Forest Certain species define kelp forests, and may indicate healthy kelp ecosystems, such as:

Blue-rayed limpet, which selectively recruits two kelp species (L. digitata and L. hyperborea) and is generally found at the base of the blade from spring to summer
Sea stars
Sea cucumbers
Common sea urchinsGastropods
Filter feeders, which suggest they're processing kelp organic carbon
Certain commercial species, including lobsters and juvenile cod (Gadidae spp.)

Kelp Productivity and Agricultural Impacts The highest kelp density corresponds to the highest calorie density. Harvesting kelp is an existing commercial industry in France and Norway, and is becoming increasingly so in Ireland. Highest density is found in shallower depths and stonier regions, 2-4 meters. This is where older individuals and communities are found, potentially implying that they're more stable at those depths. As in terrestrial forests, where there are old specimens, the density of individuals decreases due to the canopy shading effect.

KelpRes Tools Stacy Krueger-Hadfield, PhD, Assistant Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham has worked with the KelpRes team in Ireland for four years to define genetic diversity and structure in the kelp communities. Her tools are called “microsatellites,” which are repetitive regions across the genome that were previously used in paternity analysis. Microsatellites are polymorphic in variable regions across the genome, similar to what are used for 23andMe or similar ancestry sites. Using the same principles, Krueger-Hadfield is able to determine the structure and connectivity of the organism.

Popular genetic literature has increasingly revealed the importance of temporal sampling for understanding the resilience of populations and changes to genetic diversity. In terms of seaweed agriculture, there is little information available comparing kelp versus a land crop like corn in terms of productivity.

Thus far, statistical evidence suggests a strong relationship between genetic differentiation and geographic distance. The greater the distance between populations, the greater the genetic distinction. These analyses don't assume what's going on in the populations, but can provide a great deal of information about genetic diversity and structure. The implication that macroalgae diversity is highly structured based on location has important management and conservation implications.

Studying Succession, i.e. Kelp Community Recovery In order to study how kelp communities recover from a major disturbance, termed “succession,” Schoenrock-Rossiter and her team observed a native succession plots. This means that they cleared a plot of bedrock, coral, and algae, and scraped off all the invertebrates and visible seaweed and monitored recovery. They also created a sterile succession plot: a concrete slab conditioned in seawater, and observed how each plot recovered over time.

Native plot:

After 100 days, juvenile kelps established
After 208 days, kelps start to thin and get larger

Sterile plot:

After 40 days, a biofilm turf community has begun building up (microscopic or filamentous algae), but no kelp
By 115 days, invertebrate recruitment has begun, such as calcified worms, tunicates, and sponges
After a full year, kelps begin showing up, indicating that there has been opportunity for kelps to produce spores from the sporophyte, settle and produce gametophyte, then recombine and produce juvenile sporophytes

The trajectory of the sterile plot indicates that there is a microscopic bank of kelp stages already present on bedrock. The KelpRes project aims to see how this relates to kelp ecosystem resilience. In order to do so, the team took a three-pronged approach:

Placed settlement tiles. These are cement blocks that held microscope slide racks left for a full year in natural conditions. The team took some of them out seasonally to capture seasonal reproduction. They also counted gametophytes, zoosopheres, and anything settling seasonally and annually.

Removed bedrock from kelp forests and attempted to grow kelp in an aquarium system that mimicked environmental conditions. They thought if they removed the canopy, microscopic things might grow quickly in the artificial environment.
Barcoded and metabarcoded both bedrock samples and microscope slides from seasonal and annual experiments to determine what could be found in the microscopic boundary layer. It isn't possible to differentiate species of kelp based on microscopic stages, so barcoding can provide information about what the species might be.

Additionally, the team has bolstered citizen science efforts, so that divers can contribute records via an online submission platform.

Finding a Cost-Effective Way to Monitor Kelp Forests: Remote Sensing and Machine Learning The rugosity of the coastline, with regular storms and extraordinary rockiness, creates challenges for cost-effective monitoring and mapping. As such, the KelpRes team began exploring the availability of satellite imagery, of which there is a substantial amount. Irish weather complicates satellites' observation abilities, both in terms of visibility and resolution. As such, methods that work in places such as California are not applicable to the Irish context. Fortunately, Planet Labs, a remote sensing and imaging company, has pioneered the use of CubeSat, a small spacecraft launched in fleets of 2-300, which pass overhead 2-3 times a day and is able to capture images in high enough resolution to suit the KelpRes team's needs.

Additionally, the Irish government's Geological Survey of Ireland and the Marine Institute have been mapping the country's seabed from the coast to the deep Atlantic, which has been invaluable for KelpRes. Adam Golden, PhD, College Lecturer at National University of Ireland Galway is able to take data from CubeSat and overlay the bathymetry, emulating a dive one might take to the monitoring sites. KelpRes has been able to survey the kelp using CubeSat datasets, to the extent that they're able to put constraints on where the kelp is located. The team can then apply some straightforward machine learning algorithms to locate kelp, and have found the process to be strikingly accurate. Thanks to this innovative class of remote sensing, it is feasible to monitor the kelp from orbit. Planet Labs is working to produce a generation of CubeSat with new spectrum paths, enabling them to see greater depths into the water.

“You can use some very cool, dark arts in machine learning to take the data that we can work with at a high resolution here, and roll it back on to data taken with the Landsat spacecraft,” says Golden, referring to a spacecraft that has collected a great deal of data at lower resolution than is usable to the KelpRes team. “We have like 30 years of data or more from the Landsat program. We don't have the resolution, and we have spotty coverage. If we can ground-truth everything right now, we can go back in time, and to some extent we can track the predictions of how the kelp is gonna respond to the rising temperature in the actual ocean.”

Governance and Legislation of Kelp Forests in Ireland There are currently no regulations related to kelp ecosystems, though there are for fisheries and near-shore ecosystems. Governance like the water framework directive and marine strategy framework directive does include text on good environmental or ecosystem status within nearshore habitats.

Moving forward, KelpRes is part of a global report on kelp ecosystem health. Schoenrock-Rossiter is hopeful that with the EU's Green New Deal, kelp ecosystems will get more attention, as they aren't currently as well-protected as they could be. KelpRes is working with the Environmental Protection Agency and National Park Service in Ireland to invest in more coastal and subtidal monitoring.

Pitfalls of Ping Pong WOTUS Policy

Fri, 01 Apr 2022 16:23:00 GMT

Ever-changing Waters of the United States (WOTUS) policy impacts both the regulatory and consulting spaces, as well as environment and infrastructure.

Topics

History of Waters of the United States and the Clean Water Act
WOTUS and the Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR)
Regulatory Changes Due to the NWPR
NWPR Litigation

Moderators Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters and Panelists Donna Downing, JD, Senior Legal Policy Advisor, Association of State Wetland Managers
Matt Stahman, PWS, Director of Regulatory, Resource Environmental Solutions
Gordon Shaw, PWS, Senior Wetland Specialist, Burns & McDonnell
Royal Gardner, JD, Professor, Stetson University College of Law

The Past is Prologue: Definition of WOTUS Over Time Waters of the United States (WOTUS) is a threshold term in the Clean Water Act (CWA), that establishes which waters are regulated by the Act's programs. The CWA regulatory programs address “navigable waters,” defined in the statute as “the waters of the United States, including the territorial seas.” Legislative history indicates that the term should be interpreted as broadly as the Commerce Clause allows. Whether a particular water body is jurisdictional as a WOTUS is a key threshold question for deciding if the water is subject to the regulatory provisions of the act. If it's not a WOTUS, it's not subject to those regulatory provisions; if it is a WOTUS, it is. The CWA does not define WOTUS; Congress left further clarification to the agencies. The EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers have defined WOTUS by regulation since the 1970s.

“With the inherent statutory ambiguities, and a great deal at stake, it's not surprising that scope of WOTUS has been the focus of extensive rulemaking efforts over the decades, and as well as subject to considerable litigation, including three U.S Supreme Court decisions so far,” says Donna Downing, JD, Senior Legal Policy Advisor, Association of State Wetland Managers. “With respect to Clean Water Act jurisdiction, the past is prologue.”

Many of the CWA jurisdiction issues raised today by the regulatory definition of WOTUS and challenges in the courts were present in earlier definitions. The regulatory definition of WOTUS has been reviewed by the federal courts many times, beginning with the 1975 case NRDC v. Callaway decision of the District of Columbia district court, which held that Congress intended the CWA jurisdiction to be as broad as the Commerce Clause allows. The EPA and the Army Corps also explicitly referenced the Commerce Clause in their definitions of water starting in the 1970s, including both navigation-based commerce and interstate commerce, generally.

EPA 1973 definition: Navigable waters and their tributaries; interstate waters; intrastate waters used for interstate commerce.
Corps 1975 definition, which replaces the initial definition focused on navigation: Navigable waters; waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide; coastal or adjacent wetlands; tributaries; intrastate waters used for interstate commerce.
EPA & Corps 1979 definition: Waters used for commercial navigation in the past, present, or future with reasonable improvements; waters subject to ebb and flow of the tide; interstate waters; intrastate waters use/degradation of which could affect interstate commerce; impoundments of WOTUS; tributaries of WOTUS; territorial seas; adjacent wetlands.

That final definition, which is often called “the 1986 definition,” despite being in place earlier, looked very similar to that in place until 2015, when the Obama administration changed it.

Initial efforts to narrow the definition of WOTUS resulted in a 1979 EPA regulation that excluded waste treatment systems from WOTUS , including treatment ponds and lagoons designed to meet the requirements of the Act. In other words, they had to be treating something. In 1993, EPA and the Army Corps promulgated a second exclusion from regulatory definition of WOTUS for Prior Converted Cropland (PCC). PCC includes wetlands manipulated to grow commodity crops sold in commerce prior to 1985. In federal register preamble language in 1986 and 1988, EPA and the Corps provided examples of WOTUS generally not considered to be Waters of the United States, including features such as: not entitled drainage and irrigation ditches; excavated and dry land; and artificially irrigated areas that would revert to upland if irrigation ceased. This preamble language affirmed the emerging agency's practice of the time. The scope, the applicability, and permanence of exclusions remain a hot issue today.

Another long-standing issue with WOTUS is the extent to which geographically isolated wetlands and waters can be Waters of the United States. In 1985, in response to a congressional inquiry, then-EPA counsel Frank Blake indicated that isolated waters can be WOTUS, if they're used by migratory birds or endangered species. This language was included in the Federal Register Preambles from 1986 and 88 by the Corps and EPA, illustrating the kinds of commerce lengths the agencies felt were sufficient to assert jurisdiction over a water as a Water of the United States. The examples included use of the water as habitat by migratory birds or endangered species, or to irrigate crops sold in commerce. These examples became known as the “migratory bird rule,” even though not a rule, but preamble language, nor is it entirely about birds.

Then the U.S Supreme court ruled in Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (referred to as SWANCC)in 2001. The Court held that an isolated, interstate, non-applicable water cannot be considered WOTUS based solely on the presence of migratory birds. This effectively invalidated the so-called “migratory bird rule.” SWANCC did not invalidate the regulatory definition of WOTUS, but qualified how it was applied to isolated waters.

The Supreme Court addressed the question of WOTUS again in 2006, in the Rapanos decision. Rapanos explored the extent to which non-navigable tributaries and their adjacent wetlands were WOTUS. The 4-1-4 split decision didn't help clarify the situation. There was not a majority opinion, in other words, although all justices seem to acknowledge that WOTUS was broader than just traditional navigable waters. Two standards emerged: the plurality's relatively permanent standard, and Justice Kennedy's significant nexus standard. The court, again, did not invalidate the regulatory definition of WOTUS, but qualified how it was applied.

After Rapanos, EPA and the Army Corp issued guidance indicating that a water should be considered a WOTUS if it met either Scalia's relatively permanent standard or Kennedy's significant nexus standard. Scalia and Kennedy standards use jurisdictional terms that differ from those typically used by aquatic scientists. There is “relative permanence,” “continuous surface connection,” “similarly situated,” “significant nexus,” “isolated.” The implementation challenge for agencies, as well as the regulatory community, was: does a particular water have the characteristics called for by the legal terms, as defined by the agencies and the courts? Rapanos resulted in a surge of scientific research and papers on connectivity among WOTUS, exploring in a scientific context the new legal concepts of significant nexus and relative permanence.

After Rapanos, the water's relationship to traditional navigable waters largely determined whether that water was a WOTUS, either because it flowed to the traditional navigable water at least seasonally, thus meeting the relatively permanent standard, or because it had a significant nexus to the traditional navigable water, satisfying the significant nexus standard.

Regarding the Obama administration's Clean Water Rule from 2015 and the Trump administration's Navigable Waters Protection Rule from 2020, it is notable that the two regulatory definitions differ in their approaches to the degree to which science informs the scope of WOTUS.

The Clean Water Rule acknowledged in its preamble that science alone could not determine jurisdiction, since the definition had to be within the authority granted by the Clean Water Act and consistent with the overall statutory framework and construct of the Act. Nevertheless, the Clean Water Rule relied heavily on aquatic resource science to inform its definition of Waters of the United States.

The Navigable Waters Protection Rule replaced the 2015 with one more consistent with Justice Scalia's relatively permanent standard from Rapanos. The rule preamble emphasizes the definition is based on law and policy objectives, including acknowledging states' primary responsibility and authority to manage its water resources, and downplayed the role of science. Indeed, the EPA science advisory board and independent body noted that the Navigable Waters Protection Rule “offers no comparable body of peer reviewed set evidence and no scientific justification for disregarding the connectivity of waters excepted by current hydrological science.”

The changing definition of WOTUS is a challenge. As EPA and the Army Corps considered revisions to the definition of WOTUS, debates over what the definition should be are likely to continue raising the role of commerce, exclusions from the definition of Waters of the United States, status of geographically isolated waters, and the role of science and informing the scope of orders among other issues.

Why is WOTUS such a complex and recurring issue? First, it's a threshold question, determining whether the Clean Water Act regulatory provisions apply or not. Its scope is tied to Congress's Commerce Clause authority to enact the Clean Water Act, so it evolves as the courts consider the scope of the commerce clause itself. WOTUS is posed and defined in legal terms, the interpretation of which are informed by science, but there's an imperfect fit between the law and the science in the terms of the terms. Some view WOTUS as a vehicle for raising other large issues, such as property rights or federal state responsibilities for environmental protection, and WOTUS has many institutional players with strong opinions.

From Obama's Clean Water Rule to Trump's Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR) “We've seen many different features on the landscape be considered Waters of United States,” says Matt Stahman, PWS, Director of Regulatory, Resource Environmental Solutions. “From the territorial seas, traditional navigable waters, and then up the watershed through perennial streams, intermittent streams, ephemeral streams, and all those adjacent wetlands and impoundments that surround all of those features on the landscape, including some that are separated behind the artificial or natural structures… every one of these features at some point in time has been looked at as a Waters of the United States or has been considered a potential Waters of the United States.

“Post-Rapanos 2008, there were many straightforward jurisdictional waters, but also gray features on the landscape or waters that were being considered on a case-by-case basis. This was a fairly complex landscape and navigate, for those of us who have dealt with wetland delineations, or jurisdictional determinations under the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Every project came with its challenges to figure out what was the Waters of the United States.”

Then came the Clean Water Rule during the Obama administration, EPA 2015. It attempted to lend some certainty to exactly what were Waters of United States, and take some of the case-by-case considerations out of the post-Rapanos landscape. The biggest difference was the addition of distances, meaning that waters were considered either jurisdictional, if they were within a certain distance from other jurisdiction of waters, or potentially jurisdictional on a case-by-case basis. The distance provision generated a lot of the concern and pushback from different interest groups around the country.

Under Trump's Navigable Waters Protection Rule (2020), areas that had formerly been considered jurisdictional for the first 40+ years of the Clean Water Act were no longer. A few phrases in particular have been treated as open to interpretation, which we delve into below.

The first paragraph of the rule reads:

Waters of the United States means:

(1) Jurisdictional waters. For purposes of the Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. 1251 et seq. and its implementing regulations, subject to the exclusions in paragraph (2) of this section, the term “waters of the United States” means:
(i) The territorial seas, and waters which are currently used, or were used in the past, or may be susceptible to use in interstate or foreign commerce, including waters which are subject to the ebb and flow of the tide;
(ii) Tributaries;
(iii) Lakes and ponds, and impoundments of jurisdictional waters; and
(iv) Adjacent wetlands.

The rule is very simple: if a water is not listed in these four sub-parts of paragraph A, it is not a Water of the United States.

The rule defines some key phrases that apply to these terms, including “inundated by floodwater,” “contributes surface water flow,” and “direct hydrologic surface connection,” in a typical year. “In a typical year” is defined as a rolling 30-year period of averages within normal periodic range. That raises a new consideration as to what is normal or what is a typical year, as it could change year to year as weather patterns shift across the country.

For wetland scientists, the most relevant of these terms is “inundated by floodwater” from an adjacent jurisdictional tributary or other Waters of the United States. If you're working with Navigable Waters Protection Rule, some of the most critical terms to consider, which have been clarified or tweaked in paragraph C, are:

Adjacent wetlands: Now includes wetlands that are inundated by flooding in a typical year by the territory seas, a jurisdictional tributary, or an impoundment of that tributary
Intermittent: Clarified somewhat to mean “surface water continuously flowing during certain times of a typical year, and more than indirect response to precipitation.” Those familiar with the definition previously used by the Army Corps of Engineers were used to “intermittent” being influenced by groundwater at some time of year in order to provide some of its flow, which is no longer the case.
Lakes and ponds, and impoundments of jurisdictional waters
Tributary: Redefined as “a river stream or similarly natural occurring surface water channel that contributes surface water flow in a typical year” (emphasis added.) By “contributes surface water flow,” tributaries, as far as jurisdiction is concerned, are limited to perennial or intermittent channels. They do not include ephemeral channels any longer. It is important to note that tributaries do not lose their jurisdictional status in certain circumstances, including a channel that might go through subterranean portions, or which has been channelized for some portion of its length.
Typical year

Regulatory Changes Due to the Navigable Waters Protection Rule Gordon Shaw, based in Kansas City, MO, works with Burns & McDonnell Engineering. In his capacity as an environmental consultant, he has seen the effects of changing WOTUS policy in his work with the 404 process. Many of the projects Burns & McDonnell works on receive authorization by nationwide permits, rather than individual permits. As a result of the changes brought about by the 2020 Navigable Waters Protection Rule, Shaw and his colleagues have seen that fewer waters are considered jurisdictional, there is less need for pre-construction notifications, and there are some permitting changes on the federal level.

Fewer Waters are Jurisdictional

“Waters in the upper reaches of the watershed are being excluded, especially ephemeral streams and wetlands adjacent to them,” Shaw noted. “These are waters where a lot of times farmers are not farming these areas, probably because they're too wet, or there may be a channel there.”

“We're also noticing a distinctive change in farmed wetlands. It seems like, before the rule, there was more of a gray area.” But now, Shaw says, it's more of a black-and-white issue, where farmed wetlands will not be included.

Fewer Pre-Construction Notifications Filed

Shaw has noticed a need for fewer pre-construction notifications, due to less stream, ephemeral stream, and wetland impacts. “That [previous] 300-linear-foot limit may be a moot point now, with the new nationwide permits that have just come out.”

There is less ambiguity and less concern on what's considered jurisdictional, Shaw says, including the definition of a waste treatment system, which is specifically addressed in the rule. It's given clients more confidence that htey understand the rule and regulations correctly.

State Responses to the Rule and Changes to Federal Permitting

“We're noticing some state responses to the rule, including the one in Colorado, where the states are concerned that fewer waters are going to receive protection. So the Navigable Waters Proection Rule was not effective there for some time. It has now become effective,” says Shaw.

Some states, including Florida, have assumed responsibility for the 404 program. Other states are assuming jurisdiction in those areas that are now excluded from federal protection, including in Ohio, where there is now an ephemeral stream permit, such that no federal permit is required to fill in an ephemeral stream in Ohio, but a state one is.

Effects for Clients

“With fewer permit applications, we've noticed that there's less costs, less mitigation, that makes her happy clients, happy applicants,” Shaw says. “Delineators at some point it may be easier to determine what's a Water of the U.S. and what's not. There's no certificate, significant nexus test now. You do need, however, to identify that direct connection to Waters of the U.S., and you may need to also prove that a stream is not a jurisdictional stream, and prove that it is ephemeral. In summary, we've found that fewer waters are considered Waters of the U.S.”

NWPR Litigation: Past and Future At least 12 cases have been filed challenging the NWPR. These include those filed by the Washington Cattlemen's Association and the New Mexico Cattle Grower's Association, which contend that the NWPR is too broad, and that the scope of the CWA should actually be narrower. Most, however, are challenging the NWPR as being too narrow, and not protecting enough waters.

“Cases have been filed from sea to shining sea,” says Royal C. Gardner, Professor of Law and Director, Institute for Biodiversity Law and Policy at Stetson University. That's because, when the regulated community challenged the Obama administration's Clean Water Rule, one of the cases went to the Supreme Court–”Not on merit,” Gardner said, “but on the question of which court had jurisdiction to consider Clean Water Act jurisdiction.” Ultimately, the Court held that challenges to the WOTUS must begin in district courts, rather than the court of appeals, where it could be consolidated nationally. This was a win for the regulated community, since groups can now file in any district court in the country.

In the future, says Gardner, “you'll see claims made that the rule is is arbitrary and capricious, for failing to consider comments, or arbitrary and capricious for failing to explain the rationale for the change. Or failure to consider the impacts of reduced jurisdiction. With respect to the substantive challenges, it would be that the Navigable Waters Protection Rule is an unreasonable interpretation of the Clean Water Act.”

What if the Biden administration decides not to defend the rule? Those cases don't go away, says Gardner, since industry groups will have intervened, and they'll defend the rule. “I think we will see some of these cases proceed, even if the Biden administration decides to go forward with a rulemaking.”

Now, if a Biden rule is issued, which can take a long time, “maybe they will go with the two-step approach that the Trump administration did with repealing the Navigable Waters Protection Rule first, which would then bring us back to the 2019 rule which is technically the pre 2015 status quo. If they do this, then that should actually move out this current round of litigation. And then of course we would then start a new round of litigation,” Gardner says.

But what if a court actually strikes down the NWPR in the interim, befure the Biden administration does anything? “Well, it will very much depend on the scope of relief, in terms of how broadly the injunction will apply,” explains Gardner. “Will it apply only to the parties that are before the court? Will it be limited to the state in which the court resides? Perhaps it might be as broad as the circuit in which the court resides, or it could be a nationwide injunction. This is a complicated controversial area in terms of the scope of these injunctions. So that is something to watch for as well. So we might actually see at least in the interim a ping pong patchwork policy.”

Florida 404 Assumption: Policy & Practice

Tue, 15 Mar 2022 14:30:00 GMT

Experts explain Florida's 404 assumption policy and practice. This topic was covered in the 15th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Florida Assumption of the Clean Water Act 404 Program

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Susan Roeder Martin, JD, Partner, Nason Yeager
Heather Mason, PWS, Environmental Administer, Florida Department of Environmental Protection
Kerri MacNutt, Senior Manager, Environmental Consulting & Technology, Inc.

Permitting Requirements in Florida Before 2021 Susan Roeder Martin previously worked with the South Florida Water Management District, one of the five water management districts in Florida. These districts worked with the Department of Environmental Protections (DEP) and had input on the Section 404 process as it was assumed by the State. Now, as an attorney at Nason Yeager, she represents clients seeking 404 permits from the DEP.

Split of Permitting Review Prior to 2021, Martin explains, a permit was required from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act (CWA) for discharges of dredge and fill materials into a water of the United States (WOTUS). Florida also required a second permit from the State called an environmental resource permit (ERP). ERPs can be granted by the Florida DEP or by one of the state's five water management districts (WMD), an authority granted to the state by Chapter 373 of the Florida statutes.

Rather than have applicants go through both the DEP or a water district for a permit, the two organizations entered into an operating agreement that the WMDs process most ERP permits, but DEP maintains a supervisory authority over the WMDs and the districts rely heavily on DEP expertise.

Florida's Comprehensive Program to Protect Wetlands and Other Surface Waters Florida has its own set of regulations in Chapter 373 Florida Statute, plus ERP rules, many of which overlap with those of the 404 program. The ERP rules protect three broad environmental categories:

Environmental

Wetlands
Other surface waters
Wetland-dependent species

Water quality
Water quantity and flooding

Today's discussion focuses on the first category.

“Surface waters” are defined as any water on the surface of the earth, whether contained in bounds created naturally or artificially or diffused. Water from natural springs shall be classified as surface water when it exits from the spring onto the earth's surface. Permits are required for “works,” which are defined broadly as all structures, ditches, canals, culverts, and any construction that connects to, draws water from, drains water into, or is placed in or across waters in the state, unless the project is otherwise exempt. “So, just about any activity affecting surface waters is covered under the ERP program,” says Martin.

A 404 permit is required pursuant to the CWA for any activity that will discharge dredged or fill material into a WOTUS. Under the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, WOTUS includes:

Territorial seas and traditional navigable waters
Perennial and intermittent tributaries to those waters
Certain lakes, ponds, & impoundments
Adjacent wetlands, i.e. directly abutting or having regular surface water communication with jurisdictional waters

Defined non-jurisdictional waters are set forth in 12 exclusion categories, such as features that contain water only from rainfall, groundwater, many ditches, prior converted cropland, and waste treatment systems.

The definition of WOTUS and the navigable Waters Protection Rule have changed many times under different presidential administrations, and may be set to change again under Biden's. For background, see our 12th webinar episode, Pitfalls of Ping Pong WOTUS Policy.

404 Assumption The DEP in Florida estimated that the USACE permit and State ERP overlapped 85% of the time, meaning that most applicants processed two sets of permits for the same activity, incurring additional costs and delays. This overlap prompted the state, through DEP, to seek assumption. On December 2020, the Environmental Protection Agency approved the assumption by DEP. DEP enacted a new set of State rules designed for 404 state permitting, which can be found in Chapter 62-331 of the Florida Administrative Code. DEP also adopted a State 404 Applicant's Handbook, which sets forth the roadmap for securing a permit, into the State administrative code. The Handbook must legally be followed by all applicants and the State agencies. DEP also entered into a memorandum of agreement with USACE and EPA, which set forth requirements for assumption and agreements with the wildlife agencies.

Challenges of the Assumption In spite of the assumption, challenges still exist. For example, two sets of permits–an ERP and state 404– are still required for most activities. Additionally, there is a significant backlog of applications at the DEP, as some 591 pending applications where transferred to the DEP when the court reassigned the program. Review for these pending projects was restarted no matter how far along USACE was in its review process, since State rules differ.

Delegation of Permits When DEP wrote the new state rule chapter, they placed provisions allowing for delegation by the EPA to the WMDs, which would allow permits to be issued by one state permitting agency. This additional layer of delegation has yet to go into effect.

What does USACE retain authority over? USACE has retained authority over permits related to certain waters and activities, including:

Traditional navigable waters
Wetlands adjacent to navigable waters within a 300' administrative boundary
Mitigation Bank and In Lieu Fee instruments
Projects that are in or will impact “Indian County,” Georgia, or Alabama waters
Projects requiring a Rivers and Harbors Act permit
Projects that will discharge to a retained water

The administrative boundary is a 300' guideline established from the ordinary high watermark or mean high tide line of the retained water. The administrative boundary marks the adjacent wetlands over which USACE retains jurisdiction. IF a project involves discharges of dredged or fill material both waterward and landward of the 300-foot guideline, USACE will retain jurisdiction to the landward boundary of the project.

To determine if USACE has jurisdiction over a project, Florida applicants can consult the following resources:

Appendix A of the 404 PRogram Applicant's Handbook lists waters retained by USACE
DEP includes three diagrams in Section 4.1 of the Applicant's Handbook
USACE has provided DEP with GIS layers depicting waters that are retained by them

Current Processes

Floridaapplicants now apply concurrently for an ERP and 404 permit, except where 404 activities are proposed to occur in a later project phase that will occur outside the maximum permit duration allowed under federal law.

In that case, the applicant can apply for the 404 permit later.

DEP has issued a joint applicant form for applying for an ERP, subject to review by both the WMD and DEP.

If the applicant notes that there will be wetlands or other surface waters involved, a 404 permit is presumed to be necessary. If the application was submitted to a WMD, the WMD will send the permit to DEP for 404 review while they keep the portion of it that pertains to ERP review.
The burden of proof is on the applicant to demonstrate whether or not a 404 review is necessary. If the applicant incorrectly suggests that a 404 review is not necessary, they could be subject to enforcement action later on.

Activities requiring both permits cannot commence without both authorizations.
If any part of a project requires a 404, a No Permit Required verification cannot be issued, and the applicant must provide DEP with information to demonstrate that on-site wetlands are not WOTUS and should use the “Information Required for a WOTUS Determination in State-assumed Waters” DEP form.

General Permits (GPs), Regional General Permits (RGPs), and Individual Permits State 404 general permits were modeled after the 2017 USACE nationwide permits (NWPs), rather than the 2021 modifications. These are for projects with minimal adverse environmental impacts. Notice of GPs are sent to the State Wildlife Agency, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), and the Tribal Historic Office. Any of these agencies can request that the project be elevated to an individual permit. Seven regional GPs were also assumed by DEP.

Individual permits require public notice within 10 days of a project's administrative completion. Notice is provided to adjacent property owners, interested parties, potentially affected states and tribes, and other affected agencies. Notice is posted on DEP's local district website. There is typically a 30-day public comment period, where anyone can request a public meeting.

EPA Review EPA will review certain categories of activities, with the review period beginning on the first day of a public notice. EPA also sends notice to USFWS, National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), and USACE, and then collects their comments to send to DEP. Within 30 days, EPA will comment, advise that it intends to comment, object, make recommendations, or reserve its rights to object.

Modification of Existing 404 Under the current Memorandum of Agreement, USACE retains authority to process minor modifications to existing 404 permits. If the modification is not minor, it must be processed by DEP as a new permit. Any new delineations in Florida must be done under Florida; DEP cannot accept federal delineations. Delineations must follow the Florida methodology found in the Florida Administrative Code. Any modification to a long-term USACE permit is limited to five years.

Mitigation Requirements Applicants must continue to purchase both state and federal mitigation bank credits. DEP follows the mitigation hierarchy from the federal 404 permit, but this hierarchy can be overridden if there is acceptable mitigation which is environmentally preferable based on a watershed approach.

Project Lasting Over 5 years For projects that will take more than 4 years to complete, it may need to be divided into 5-year phases to fall under State permits. Applicants must submit information on any “reasonably related” activities using a long-term planning document so the entire project can be reviewed (see 62-331.051(2) & A.H. 5.3.2).

There is also opportunity for listed species review. Applicants must provide information regarding listed species that may be affected. DEP then provides the information to the Federal Wildlife Commission (FWC) and USFWS, requesting review and comment. DEP and USFWS developed a technical assistance process through a programmatic biological opinion (State 404 BiOp), and the Florida State and federal agencies collaborate on their review. The Florida Wildlife Commision will consolidate the state and federal review into a comprehensive response to DEP.

How USFWSs IPaC Streamlines Environmental Review and Permitting

Tue, 08 Mar 2022 15:22:00 GMT

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's IPaC software makes environmental review and permitting more straightforward, efficient, and transparent than ever for the Service and users alike.

This topic was covered in the 14th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics Overview of IPaC (Information for Planning and Consultation)

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Victoria Foster, National IPaC Coordinator, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Chellby K. Johnson, PhD, Biologist, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Lane Masoud, MGIS, Project Manager, Michigan Department of Transportation
Michelle Hobgood, MEM, Environmental Specialist, North Carolina Department of Transportation

What is IPaC? IPaC is a project planning tool run by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Short for “Information for Planning and Consultation,” the program streamlines the environmental permitting process, specifically focused on Section 7, Endangered Species Act consultation. IPaC's vision, explains Victoria Foster, National IPaC Coordinator at USFWS, is to improve the process of Section 7 consultations. “IPaC will transform interagency cooperation by delivering efficient 21st-century consultations and greatly improving regulatory consistency, predictability, and transparency,” she says. “We think that if we can make the process easier, we can even drive better conservation outcomes.”

Additional IPaC objectives are as follows:

Improve the consultation experience for the public, federal agencies, and the USFWS
Reduce duplication in effort and plan for smaller workload
Minimize/streamline low benefit/low risk workload
Drive conservation and compliance through convenience
Improve public accountability and credibility
Reduce requests for information by providing access to high quality information and improve timeliness of decisions
Gain time for biologists to focus on conservation outcomes
Facilitate data integration

IPaC serves almost 900 visitors per day on average, with over 46,500 registered users. Users can collaborate on projects and share files.

On average, IPaC delivers approximately 300 Official Species Lists (OSL), including survey guidelines, general conservation measures, and Best Management Practices (BMPs) for species on the OSL. Over 275,000 OSLs have been delivered between 2018 and 2020. In this time, IPaC has helped users screen over 33,000 projects.

IPaC usage continues to grow, as do the number of available resources, which will grow to cover more areas, projects, and species over time.

There are currently Production (aka Live) and Beta (aka Test) IPaC environments.

Key Benefits of IPaC

Efficiency

In addition to OSLs, IPaC delivers Determination Keys (DKeys), which help streamline Section 7 consultations. These are logically structured sets of questions, which assist users in determining whether a project qualifies for a predetermined consultation outcome based on an existing programmatic consultation or internal standing analysis. These are essentially dichotomous keys, explains Foster, which predate IPaC, but with this technology, they're able to be delivered more efficiently and effectively. IPaC leverages geospatial data to automatically answer questions for the user based on their project intersect and the USFWS's background layers. It enables the USFWS to better track the use and implementation of these programmatic consultations. It also delivers automated concurrence letters, so that if a project qualifies with a DKey and is submitted by an action agency, consultation for a smaller project could be completed in a half hour or less, and a letter is delivered via email. A biologist from USFWS is notified to look over the material, and they reach out if they need any further information.

This process amounts to significant time savings on both sides, with project information logged immediately and consistently. In turn, the USFWS is able to accomplish better reporting with minimal administrative burden.

Consistency

If different offices are working on the same species, they are able to standardize which questions they're using. In other words, DKey users see consistent logic.

Transparency

When there are differences in the questions used for a species across its range, the USFWS adds information that helps clarify why they might ask something differently in one area versus another.

What's Next for IPaC? IPaC's Consultation Package Builder (CPB) helps users compile a complete Biological Assessment & Consultation Package before submitting a consultation request. “We envisioned this as a TurboTax process for a biological assessment,” says Foster. “It walks a user bit by bit, section by section, item by item, on everything we would think about wanting to ask. What do we want to know for these species? What do we need to know about your project?”

The most common delay for a consultation, Foster explains, is that not all the necessary information is included in a request. By helping a user think through each element of the request–everything necessary to make analyses and conclusions–the CPB hopes to alleviate this common pain point and ensure that the USFWS has all the information they need from the beginning.

Additionally, the CPB helps users think through, analyze, and document all potential effects and proposed conservation actions with a project. It leverages data from the Effect Pathway Manager (EPM) to provide helpful recommendations for analyzing a project, and provides a consistently formatted biological analysis document.

IPaC is moving to a cloud-based server, which will enable faster service. It is integrating with ECOSphere, the next generation of recordkeeping software for the USFWS. Existing tools such as the CPB, EPM, and DKeys will be built out and improved.

To view a demo of IPaC in both Beta and Production environments, use the button at the top of the article to access the webinar.

What is the Effect Pathway Manager (EPM)? The EPM is an internal-only USFWS software package which implements a structured approach to evaluating the causal relationships between activities and potential effects to federally listed species. USFWS biologists populate it internally, and then it feeds the CPB. The CPB leverages that data in a granular way and delivers prompts to users to explain resource needs for the species, and to analyze suggested stressors that frequently result from certain activity. This helps guide thinking on recommended conservation measures. With CPB, the user gets this information ahead of going back and forth with a biologist.

Currently, 219 species have published pathways, while 72 others are in progress. 13 of these are resolved taxons.

The EPM works through Activity Deconstructions, including 54 top-level activities such as road constructions or mining, and provides activity prompts. There are 30 additional activities being deconstructed and reviewed.

Finally, the EPM includes Conservation Measures, currently for 67 species.

Case Study: IPaC and Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT)

Lane Masoud, MGIS, is a project manager at MDOT, where he reviews local road projects for potential environmental impacts, and helps guide transportation agencies through the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process. These agencies are frequently rural road commissions or small cities and villages without many, if any, environmental staff.

These agencies must include relevant IPaC species lists with their submission for NEPA review. This ensures that the local agencies are aware of what species might be present in the project area, and how each species must be addressed. They use DKeys to do an initial assessment for potential impacts on threatened and endangered species, and to determine whether additional review is needed. “[The Michigan Determination Key] has been really effective at reducing how frequently I need to follow up with the agencies to get more information,” says Masoud. “Sometimes [the agencies] leave vague descriptions, but in reviewing their questions and responses to the questions and the Determination Key, I can find out a lot more about the project…It's been a big help, both for our review process on the DOT side, but also for the local agencies.”

Case Study: IPaC, North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT)Michelle Hobgood, MEM, Environmental Specialist at NCDOT, is the business team lead for Project Atlas. Project Atlas consists of three applications that provide NCDOT, its Metropolitan and Rural Planning Organizations (MPOs and RPOs), and other planning organizations with a means of accessing the most current GIS data. There are currently 800 data layers available through Project Atlas, one of which is IPaC data. IPaC data, says Hobgood, is valuable to biologists, as well as for upper management, program managers, and project managers for providing information about the potential effects of new roads or expansions, bridge replacements, and similar projects.

Habitat Conservation Planning BMPs

Thu, 03 Mar 2022 13:53:00 GMT

Experts from inside the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the environmental consulting world discuss Habitat Conservation Plans (HCP)–what they are, what factors to consider when creating an HCP, and best management practices for doing so.

This topic was covered in the 20th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Habitat Conservation Planning (HCP) Best Management Practices (BMPs)
Procedures for Successful HCPs: Low Effect HCPs
Prediction Modeling for EO's to Streamline HCPs

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Trish Adams, National HCP Coordinator, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Colleen Reilly, Senior Manager, Environmental Consulting & Technology, Inc.
Dale Sparks, PhD, Principal Scientist, Environmental Solutions, Inc.
Victoria Foster, IPaC Program Manager, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Introduction to Habitat Conservation Planning Habitat Conservation Plans (HCPs) arose from Section 10 of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), which regulates activities that affect endangered or threatened plants and animals. In order to understand the benefits and challenges of HCPs, says Trish Adams, National HCP Coordinator at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), it helps to first understand how Section 10 fits into the ESA.

The ESA, passed in 1973, forms the basis for endangered species protection in the United States. Intended to prevent endangerment and extinction of species due to human impacts on ecosystems, it protects species and their habitats. The USFWS and the National Marine Fisheries Service are joint authorities of the ESA. The sections of the ESA are as follows, with sections that primarily relate to HCPs bolded:

Preamble
Section 2: Findings and Purposes
Section 3: Definitions
Section 4: Listing, Critical Habitat Designation, Recovery Monitoring
Section 5: Land Acquisition

Section 6: Financial Assistance to States & Territories
Section 7: The Role of Federal Agencies

Section 8: International Cooperation
Section 8A: Convention Implementation

Section 9: Prohibited Acts
Section 10: Exceptions, including Permits
Section 11: Penalties and Enforcement

When the ESA was first authorized, only federal agencies could be exempted from Section 9 violations. Section 10 was added in 1988, providing a mechanism for non-federal entities to receive protections from violations under Section 9. This gave rise to the Incidental Take Permitting processes, which are described in Sections 10(a)(1)(A) and 10(a)(1)(B). Today's discussion focuses on Section 10(a)(1)(B).

Incidental Take Permits Seeking an Incidental Take Permit (ITP) is a voluntary aspect of an HCP. Once an applicant begins to pursue an ITP, they are subject to the current regulations, and the USFWS will evaluate their HCP in accordance with the policy and guidance at the time of the application. Section 6 of the ESA incentivizes participation in this voluntary process, as there is federal funding available to develop the HCP when the applicant works with their State agency. Once the permit is acquired, there is a land acquisition grant available only to permittees that help to augment the HCP. The grant cannot be used for mitigation, only to augment the success of the HCP.

Definitions

Take: harm, harass, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, collect, or attempt to engage in any such activity of a threatened and endangered species (defined under Section 9)
Harm: significant habitat modification which kills or injures a listed species through impairment of their essential behaviors, such as breeding, feeding, and sheltering
Incidental Take Permit: legal instrument through which incidental take of listed animal species is authorized
Habitat Conservation Plan: Demonstrates how the applicant will meet the permit issuance criteria. It is a requirement of the ITP and a legally binding agreement between the Secretary of the Interior and the permit holder.

The following criteria must be met to issue an ITP:

The taking will be incidental to an otherwise lawful activity;
Applicant will, to the maximum extent practicable, minimize and mitigate the impacts of the taking;
Ensures that adequate funding to fully implement the plan will be provided;
The taking will not appreciably reduce the likelihood of survival and recovery of listed species in the wild.

An HCP can:

Reduce conflict between endangered species conservation and the economic activities such as development
Streamline permitting processes.

Particularly if an HCP is programmatic and integrates other federal or state permitting, all permitting activities can be addressed under one plan, which can save years of time between permit applications and development

Provide a lawful mechanism for permitting non-Federal projects that will result in “incidental take” of federally-listed species
Describe anticipated impacts to protected wildlife, and how they can be minimized and mitigated
Reduce the risk of violation of the ESA and third-party lawsuits
Provide consistency for regulated activities and transparency for the permitting process
Streamline the permitting process
Support recovery implementation

In addition to the benefits listed above, HCPs support an adaptive management approach, such that changing circumstances can be over the course of long-term HCPs. They enable long-term comprehensive planning, with concrete plans to follow, thereby reducing uncoordinated decision-making. They also provide consistency of minimization and mitigation requirements.

Common Criticisms of HCPs

HCPs can be difficult and time-consuming to negotiate, depending on the complexity of the HCP and the number of species involved. HCPs are designed to be nimble and allow applicants to formulate a plan that works for them, but that flexibility can sometimes lead applicants to create plans that need refining.
HCPs can be expensive, but these upfront costs frequently outweigh the funds saved by the streamlined permitting process and regulatory certainty HCPs provide
Some NGOs have asserted that HCPs (particularly older ones) are not effective conservation tools, and that they fall short of some biological goals and objectives of the plan.

Applicants can alleviate concerns about difficulties and time spent negotiating the process by doing comprehensive research in advance of submitting an HCP. Adams recommends the 2016 HCP handbook as a key resource, and suggests working with the USFWS to evaluate the biological side of things and come up with a reasonable plan. It's helpful to identify key decision points and milestones, and consider who might need to be consulted as the plan is formulated, such as CEOs or other stakeholders, she says, and bringing solicitors and lawyers into the process early on can help identify and avoid potential pitfalls.

“I've seen [the process] get to the very end, and the decision-makers up the chain had no idea what the consultants had agreed to in the plan, and it wasn't acceptable to them, so we basically had to start over. It's really important to keep everybody in tune,” Adams says. “And find your HCP champions…those champions can be stakeholders, they could be biologists, they could be consultants…sometimes it's the people working in the county itself.” In those cases, applicants should take advantage of the short windows of opportunity between election cycles, since officials can turn over, and new officials may be unwilling to implement or approve what their predecessor had agreed to. Applicants can also utilize the resources provided by the National HCP Coalition, which has a mentoring program.

What's on the Horizon For HCPs?

Expansion of Section 6 Planning Assistance grants, such that projects under Section 10, such as Candidate Conservation Agreements with Assurances (CCAAs) and Safe Harbor Agreements (SHAs) can qualify

Revisions to the Section 10 implementing regulations, which have not been revised in 20+ years, by simplifying the CCAA and SHA processes in order to increase flexibility in the HCP program
Implementation of ECOSphere,a cloud-based tool for tracking HCP applications, and an ePermitting tool for all USFWS permits, including ITPs
Updates to the 2016 HCP Handbook
Revision of HCP training course at the USFWS National Conservation Training Center in West Virginia

Procedures for Successful HCPs: Low-Effect HCPs Colleen Reilly, Senior Manager at Environmental Consulting & Technology, Inc. (ECT), is well-versed in HCPs from the consulting side. “The HCP program is a Conservation Planning Program for imperiled species,” Reilly says. “It was not really designed to be a permitting program. Now, here in Region 4 and Florida specifically, project proponents sometimes really do need to use Section 10 as more of a permitting program. Meaning we often need to approach the process with the ultimate goal of obtaining an individual ITP, and sometimes there's no other avenue for obtaining it. There's no programmatic option, there's no umbrella HCP, or no federal nexus to go through Section 7…The low-effect HCP is one way the Section 10 process can be streamlined, and may therefore be considered more desirable by a project proponent. That's when minor impacts are involved.”

What are Low-Effect HCPs? Low-effect HCPs are a special category of HCPs for those involving minor or negligible effects on federally listed, proposed, or candidate species and their habitats, and minor or negligible effects on other environmental values or resources. The goal is to expedite processing of HCPs with inherently low impacts. Low-effect HCPs must still meet the issuance criteria under Section 10(a)(2)(B) pursuant to 50 CFR 17.22(b) and 17.32(b), as overviewed earlier.

Low-effect HCPs are evaluated on a case-by-case basis. It's important to note that the size of the permit area may not dictate the level of impact it has, so a small permit area could have a significant impact to an imperiled species, or a large permit area with minor impacts. The determination is based on the anticipated impacts prior to the implementation of a mitigation plan, but it does consider avoidance as part of the action. The biggest time savings with a low-effect HCP is that they do not have to undergo a complex National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process: because the impacts are minor or negligible, these HCPs are categorically excluded, pursuant to the department manual (516 DM 8.5(C)(2).) To determine whether a plan qualifies as a low-effect HCP or other categorical exclusion.

The average timeline for HCPs with minor impacts and categorical exclusion from NEPA can be approximately 14 months, dependant upon early planning, quality of information, available staff resources, and ongoing coordination and communication.

Like any other HCP, there are three main phases:

Phase 1: Planning (Pre-Application): This is the most critical phase, where the applicant is determining the extent and type of take they might anticipate as a result of their action. Ultimately, the applicant is determining if they must pursue an ITP. At this stage, the applicant coordinates with USFWS and confirms the requirements of the plan, and develops the draft HCP while the USFWS works concurrently on NEPA compliance, compliance with the National Historic Preservation Act, and the internal Section 7 process.
Phase 2: Public Review and Permit Decision: This phase is driven by the USFWS. The public review period for categorical exclusions is 30 days. In this phase, the applicant must resolve any outstanding issues, and once processed and approved, receives a permit decision and issuance.
Phase 3: Implementation: The applicant implements their conservation strategy from the HCP. They initiate covered activities, including implementation of avoidance and minimization measures, and provide monitoring and reporting.

Case Study: Low-Effect HCP for the Sand Skink Background

The sand skink is a threatened species of lizard endemic to the Sandy Ridges in Central Florida. It occurs primarily in native and degraded upland habitats that can include areas like agricultural areas and roadsides. Degraded habitats such as agricultural areas are frequently prioritized for development, since in many cases the land is lower, there is less clearing involved, and there is less likely to be wetlands or other sensitive features present. These habitats may still harbor a low density or remnant population of skinks. Because these habitats are upland, they frequently don't have an issue that would make it relevant for the Section 7 process. In this case, therefore, there is need for a Section 10 permit program, and it can typically qualify for a low-effect HCP.

Project Overview and Challenges

185 acres of proposed conversion of fallow and active citrus
Survey protocol for sand sinks is intensive and restricted seasionally
No federal nexus to facilitate Section 7 process
Short permitting timeline to hit deadline for large industrial development project, because species occurrence was initially overlooked

Process

Phase One: Applicant selected a knowledgeable local consultant, involved internal legal counsel and senior management to expedite internal decision-making related to the HCP, and facilitated proactive communication with USFWS. The consultant developed an innovative survey protocol and determined the extent and type of take, and together they formulated avoidance and minimization measures and a low-risk mitigation strategy by purchasing credits from a species conservation bank. Under the same plan, the applicant was able to get authorization to cover other covered species: the bluetail mole skink, the gopher tortoise (a candidate species), and the Eastern Indigo Snake. The HCP included minimization measures to avoid the likelihood of take, and ensured compliance with other laws, including the National Historic Preservation Act. The applicant provided funding assurances, and was able to prepare a draft HCP in 10 days.
Phase Two: Because there were no outstanding issues during the permitting process and no public comments were received, the permit documents were finalized and the decision timeline from start to finish was 12 months. The applicant obtained a five-year renewable ITP.
Phase Three: The applicant was able to implement the conservation strategy immediately. They provided receipts for the mitigation credits to USFWS, and were able to proceed with their activities with legal protection and regulatory certainty. They were able to implement avoidance and minimization measures as part of the action that benefitted multiple species, and were able to implement a minimal monitoring program to ensure that the take was not exceeded.

Best Management Practices

“Remember that this is an applicant-driven process,” says Reilly. “The applicant needs to take control and use the tools available. They need to understand the regulations, know the species and the biology, and build a solid team that will get them through the process. Plan early and identify issues early.”

Applicant drives the process
Know the regulations and build a strong team of stakeholders
Identify and address important issues
Detail the covered activities, including avoidance and minimization measures
Define impacts early, develop conservation strategy
Use good science, but get creative
Covered species (BGEPA, MBTA, Candidate, State-listed T&E)
Consider compliance with other laws
Provide quality information
Coordinate and communicate frequently

Prediction Modeling for EOs to Streamline HCPs

What are models?

To demonstrate what a model is and why they're useful, Dale Sparks, PhD, Principal Scientist at Environmental Solutions, Inc. (ESI), has a few illustrative quotes he likes to refer to. Steven L. Lima of Indiana State University calls them “the logical outcome of a series of assumptions.” This means, Sparks explains, that when putting together a model, one considers how things interact with one another, and capture that mathematically. The observations of how the model runs can inform the decision-making process in the regulatory environment.

Another authority on the subject, one of the most successful modelers and mathematicians of the 20th century, George E. P. Box, said, “Essentially all models are wrong, but some are useful.”

“This gets to the idea that models are tools,” Sparks emphasizes. “That's all they are. They are not an alternate reality. They're not a replacement for reality.”

Models and HCPs

Models for HCPs can be used to:

Estimate species distribution or abundance
Estimate the number of individuals taken
Understand the impact of the taking
Estimate value of conservation practices

Modeling for distribution and abundance are most common. Oftentimes, there is incomplete information available about where species occur. To address this, scientists can use Species Distribution Models (SDMs) to estimate the range. Some examples of SDMs are expert-based, MaxEnt, MaxLike, and Binomial General Linear Models (BGLIMs). “There are lots of statistical tools,” Sparks says, “and academics spend an enormous amount of time fighting over which of them is appropriate.” Most tools will work, he said, with different strengths and weaknesses, so it's important to figure out which is best for the case at hand.

One use of models is for estimating take. At its simplest:

Take = Number of Animals Present x Proportional Risk

Take is usually closely related to the estimate of abundance, i.e. how many members of the species are present. The scientist can then extrapolate from the SDM and assume that the risk is related to habitat quality. Occupancy/encounter models can account for unoccupied areas. Some activities have well-defined risk profiles, such as wind energy.

Once there's an understanding of how many individuals are being taken, it's time to estimate the impact of the taking, which is what must be mitigated. Teams like Spark's are often trying to estimate things like number of females, survivability, and reproductive success, since take of females is more impactful than loss of males in a polygamous species. Loss of juveniles is a minor concern for R-selected species.

Habitat and Resource Equivalency Analyses (HEAS and REAs) are tools for estimating the impact of the taking, and they also estimate the value of the conservation measures. The biggest challenge there is finding a fair exchange rate. HEAs compare the value of different habitats, while REAS are useful when it's necessary to change “currencies,” such as impacting individuals and mitigating habitat. In some cases, when an SDM reveals the presence of a population where it doesn't seem suitable to support it, it means that either the model is wrong, or, if the model is correct, the population isn't likely to survive without some kind of intervention.

Modeling Best Practices

Use the right tool for the job. Even if there is no perfect tool, a model can still provide useful information.
Be honest about the limitations. One possible approach is to use several approaches and average them.

If there is already a standard, don't change it unless there's a good reason to.

Deliver the most defensible estimate. “You want to make sure that the tools you're using capture the uncertainty and the reality that you're uncertain,” Sparks says.

Challenges & Successes of State 404 Assumption

Thu, 17 Feb 2022 13:46:00 GMT

Hear from practitioners in New Jersey and Michigan about the successes and pitfalls of state 404 assumption in both states.

This topic was covered in the 20th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Overviews of the Michigan and New Jersey assumptions
404 assumption resources

Moderator Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot

Presenters & Panelists Todd Losee, MS, Ecologist, Niswander Environmental
Susan Lockwood, Mitigation Unit Supervisor, NJDEP
Brenda Zollitsch, PhD, Senior Policy Analyst, Association of State Wetland Managers (ASWM)
Anne Garwood, Wetlands Unit Supervisor, MI EGLE
Ryan Anderson, Bureau Chief, NJDEP
Kerri MacNutt, Senior Manager, ECT

Michigan's 404 Program Anne Garwood is Supervisor of the Wetlands, Lakes, and Streams Unit at Michigan's Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE). EGLE administers the Section 404 program in Michigan, which is home to four Great Lakes covering over 3,000 miles of Great Lakes Shoreline, plus over 11,000 inland lakes, 36,000 river miles, and over 6.5 million acres of wetlands. Michigan's Wetland Protection Act was specifically written to support a state assumption of the program.

“Within our Wetlands Protection statute, the Michigan legislature clearly recognized the benefits of wetlands. In our statute, they're identified as functions and values right in the legislative findings incorporated into what we call ‘Part 303 Wetlands Protection,'” says Garwood.

Part 303 reads:

“A loss of a wetland may deprive the people of the State of some or all of the following benefits to be derived from the wetland:

Flood and storm control
Wildlife habitat
Protection of subsurface water resources and recharging ground water supplies
Pollution treatment
Erosion control
Nursery grounds and sanctuaries for fish”

“We felt it was important to have these functions and values identified in the statute to always bring back what wetlands serve for the people of the State,” adds Garwood.

Michigan Program Timeline and Overview

1972 - Michigan's Inland Lakes and Streams Act passed: This act regulates activities on inland lakes and streams.
1977 - Federal Clean Water Act amended to allow State Administration of the Section 404 Program
1979 - Michigan's Wetland Protection Act passed: The law was passed with the intention of assuming the Section 404 Program.
1983 - Michigan and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sign Memorandum of Agreement (revised in 2011): Provided approval of assumption of the Section 404 Program.
1984 - Michigan and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) sign Memorandum of Agreement: Designated navigable waters over which the Section 404 authority is retained by the federal agencies
1984 - Michigan assumes administration of its own regulatory program for most waters

USACE retains jurisdiction over traditionally navigable waters, including the Great Lakes, connection channels, other waters connected to the Great Lakes where navigational conditions are maintained, and wetlands directly adjacent to these waters. Activities in these waters require a joint permit application for approval by Michigan and USACE.

Michigan maintains consistency with the federal 404 program by implementing state statutes, including Part 303 Wetlands Protection, Part 301 in the Lakes and Streams Protection, and administrative rules for those state statutes, which fall under the Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act at the state level. The language in those statutes coincides with that of the Clean Water Act and 404 Guidelines, and Compensatory Mitigation Rule, and is consistent with definitions in the state program regulations and 404 program definitions.

Michigan statutes have clearly defined regulated activities, which include regulation or permitting of the placement of fill material in wetlands dredging, removing, or permitting the removal of soil or minerals from wetlands; construction, operation, or maintenance of uses or development in wetlands and draining surface water from wetlands. Part 301 has similar language for inland lakes and streams.

A permit from EGLE provides multiple authorizations, except in areas where USACE retains jurisdiction. A single permit, therefore, could include 404 authorization; 401 certification for water quality; and coastal zone certification, if it falls within the coastal zone boundaries. As part of their review, EGLE incorporates screening and coordination with state and federal Endangered Species and the Federal Historic Preservation programs.

The structure and levels of Michigan's permits are similar to those of USACE: both have three levels of permits, which are general permits, minor projects, and individual permits. Both general permits and minor projects can be issued for up to five years, which are expedited processes for those projects which have individual and cumulative minor impacts under both 301 and 303. These are roughly similar, but not identical, to the nationwide permits, regional general permits and individual permits issued by USACE.

Michigan's MOA with the EPA includes a definition for those projects which require additional EPA review. In simplified terms, this includes:

draft general permits and minor projects, both of which are considered general permits
projects which have major discharges, which are defined with certain quantities and impact amounts
discharges which are located in proximity to a public water supply intake
discharges within critical areas, which are identified under state or federal laws
projects which have a likelihood to impact federal T&E species
projects which are likely to impact waters of another state or tribe
projects which involve known toxic pollutants in toxic amounts

The application process and permitting program is now administered through an online database called MiWaters, a web-based application which is used for all permits offered by the Water Resources Division, not only 404 applications. It's used internally by EGLE staff, and is also visible to the general public. The system is used for permits, inspections, financial reporting, and compliance issues. The public can view applications and public notice materials, documents, issued permits, and more.

Michigan averages approximately 5,000 permit applications per year, with the average time for determining an application's completion is around 18 days, and the average processing time overall at about 41 days, commensurate with the complexity of the project. EGLE has about 82 full-time employees administering the program, which costs about $12.3 million per year, only ~20% of which is covered by the fees from the program.

Michigan has consolidated permit processing, such that each application requires just one permit and one fee, and is simultaneously reviewed under not only Wetlands, Lakes, and Streams statutes, but also any other applicable State statutes, including flood plains, dam safety, shorelands, Great Lakes, and critical dunes. “This allows us to address State priorities,” explains Garwood.

When determining 404 permits, Michigan officials weigh the language of how they've determined prior decisions, public trust responsibilities, and riparian rights. Policies and procedures are specific to Michigan's needs, while remaining federally consistent.

Benefits of Michigan's 404 program

Shorter permitting timelines: Unlike the federal process, Michigan has statute-mandated deadlines for the permit processing timeline. For example, the statutes require that a decision is made within 60-90 days of receipt of a complete application under the Wetlands statute and the Inland Lakes and Streams statute, or within 150 days if a public hearing is held. 30 days are allowed to determine administrative completeness.

Effective resource protection: Since Michigan's Wetland Protection laws passed in 1979, the rate of wetland loss has declined dramatically.

“We believe that our program offers effective resource protection, and includes cost and time savings and simplicity for applicants in Michigan,” Garwood says.

New Jersey's Assumed Wetland Program

“New Jersey is the most densely populated state in the nation. As a result, there've been many pressures and environmental issues that have occurred here in advance of what's gone on in other states, and we have a very vocal and active grassroots environmental movement,” says Susan Lockwood, Mitigation Unit Supervisor at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protections (NJDEP). It was these activist groups who drove the Coastal Wetlands law (1970), the Coastal Zone Management program which followed a few years later, and the more famous Freshwater Wetlands Protection Act (1987). A stream protection program had existed since the 1950s, leaving freshwater wetlands as the only important resource that didn't get attention until the ‘80s.

The Freshwater Wetland Protection Act passed on July 1, 1987 with the intent of preserving the purity and integrity of freshwater wetlands. In the year following, New Jersey officials put together their wetland regulations, and regulations for wetland buffers and transition areas.

When considering assumption, Lockwood explains, it was important to determine what areas the State could have sole jurisdiction over, and which would need to be shared and retained by USACE. They determined that, as interstate waters, the Delaware River, Greenwood Lake, and the Atlantic Ocean–within 1,000 feet of the ordinary high water mark of each body–fell into this category. USACE also retained jurisdiction over anything subject to the ebb and flow of the tide, with the determination of 1,000 feet correlated with what USACE considered “adjacent” when they determined how to regulate wetlands, waters and wetlands adjacent.

As in Michigan's case, New Jersey had to have a Memorandum of Agreement with the EPA, and identify the categories of review that the EPA would have oversight of. On top of those listed in Michigan's MOA, New Jersey added a handful of state-specific ones with impacts that were significant enough to warrant EPA oversight, including:

the filling of five or more acres of wetlands;
a significant reduction in the ecological commercial recreational value of five or more acres of wetlands;
culverts longer than 100 feet;
and the channelization of more than 500 feet of a river stream

When the State law passed, two areas were listed as exempt from jurisdiction, including the Hackensack Meadowlands in the northeastern part of the state, and the Pinelands in the southern portion. The Hackensack Meadowlands remained exempt from State law and in the jurisdiction of USACE because the waters are title waters and wetlands adjacent to title waters.

The Pinelands area of New Jersey created a different situation: because the area is inland freshwater wetlands, though some areas have tidal influence. Additionally, the Pinelands area was already a national reserve area, and therefore under protection. It had its own endangered species list, regulatory program, and wetland delineation program. In assuming the Pinelands, New Jersey would need to maintain these programs. They put together a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Pinelands Commission, such that for smaller impacts, like general permit-type impacts, the Pinelands Commission does the review and reports to the State on the results. For anything larger that would require an individual permit, the NJDEP conducts reviews. The Pinelands Commission still does their own jurisdictional determinations, because their definition of wetlands is more stringent than the state and federal definition. In sum: the Pinelands were not wholly assumable.

Once the NJDEP worked out how things would work in the Pinelands, and what was and wasn't assumable from USACE, they put together their package and submitted it to the EPA in 1993. The EPA declared the application complete in about two weeks, at which point the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) expressed concern about not having a direct role in the State's program, even though the State was coordinating with them. USFWS was not satisfied that the coordination process through EPA was enough, and instead wanted to coordinate directly with the State. Though not required to do so, NJDEP sat down with USFWS and worked out an MOU about the coordination process, after which the USFWS withdrew their objection. The State-led assumption program then became effective in 1994.

Prior to assuming the federal program, New Jersey had a program in operation from 1988-1994. Assumption changed how that program operated in a few ways:

When applications come in, they are screened internally for major discharges. Anything classified as a major discharge is immediately sent to the EPA, which then distributes it among USACE, USFWS, and National Marine Fisheries. If any of those agencies wishes to provide comment to EPA, New Jersey has to wait to receive and satisfy the comment before moving forward with the permit. There is a time limit for those comments to prevent the State permitting process from being held up indefinitely.
Resulting from what was worked out with USFWS, NJDEP has an internal Threatened and Endangered Species Unit, which conducts major and immediate screening of applications that could affect federally-listed threatened or endangered species. If a project comes in from a township where there are endangered plant species or a federally-listed Swamp Pink species, it is immediately screened to ensure that there's no Swamp Pink associated with the property in question. If it's determined that the application could affect a federal species, the applicant must coordinate directly with USFWS. Again, if the USFWS intends to provide a comment or conditions, the application is on hold until those comments are received. Time limits still apply.
NJDEP has to report annually to EPA on statistics including number of permits, and how coordination has gone.
NJDEP coordinates with the Historic Preservation Office.

Differences from the Federal Program

New Jersey uses the 1989 Federal Manual for delineating wetlands, which is beneficial because they aren't tied to the federal definition of Waters of the United States (see previous webinar for more background on WOTUS.)
Additional things NJ regulates:

Isolated wetlands, which requires more analysis on the federal level.
Transition areas, which are buffers to wetlands, and the upland area adjacent to a wetland. These fall under a separate regulatory scheme, and the permits are called “transitionary waivers.”
Vegetation cleaning, such that the trimming of vegetation within a wetland, even without intention to fill, must be permitted.

Assumption Resources Several years ago, the Association of State Wetlands Managers (ASWM) received funding to guide states and tribes as they considered assuming responsibility for the 404 process as it was expected that a new 404 rule would soon be in place. No rule was ever imposed, however, and it's unclear when or if one will be.

In lieu of a new rule, ASWM brought together 36 experts from across the country–from states, tribes, federal agencies, consultants, academia, and more–to examine what 404 assumption implied for different groups, how to fill gaps that 404 didn't address, and what alternatives there might be. This resulted ASWM's, a robust compilation of resources on the subject. The page contains links to EPA's 404 rule and guidance, frequently asked questions, a list of definitions, a checklist of assumption considerations, a matrix of 135 assumption examples, recorded webinars and trainings, and more.

Initial Considerations for Assumption

Defining state/tribal goals for assumption
Determining if there is public support for comprehensive administration of a Dredge and Fill permit program by states or tribes
Conducting an inventory of existing state/tribal statutes and regulations
Undertaking an initial side-by-side comparison of state/tribal and federal program
Identifying gaps
Identifying and securing funding mechanisms to support the assumed program guaranteeing adequate public participation processes
Identifying how the state/tribe will comply with other required federal laws

Future of Wetland Mitigation Banking

Tue, 01 Feb 2022 17:04:00 GMT

Explore the current state of affairs around wetland mitigation banking and respective policy with bankers, consultants, and policy-makers.

This topic was covered in the 10th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics

Overview of wetland mitigation banking
Case studies in the integration of tech with wetland mitigation banking
Wetland and stream mitigation current state of affairs
Roving policy changes and impacts to wetland mitigation banking

Moderators Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientific Officer, Ecobot
Daniel Martin, Consultant/Project Manager, Esri

Presenters and Panelists Susan-Marie Stedman, MS, Wetland Scientist/Policy Analyst, NOAA
Kae Hovater, President, EcoCredit Marketing and the Florida Association of Mitigation Bankers
Nichoel Church, PWS, Environmental Scientist, Snyder & Associates, Inc.
Tara Allden, J.D., Natural Resources Specialist, Kimley-Horn
Michael Sprague, CEO, Trout Headwaters, Inc.
Victoria Colangelo, CEO, The Mitigation Banking Group, Inc.
Drew Haley, Director of Operations, Mitigation Resources of North America

Overview of Wetland Mitigation Banking Wetland mitigation is the compensation for any loss of aquatic resources, including wetlands, streams, and species habitat. Mitigation is one of the tools society can utilize to offset land development impact on the ecological function and benefit of wetlands.

“Mitigation is what provides the delicate balance between economic development, and conserving our critical natural assets,” says Kae Hovater, President, EcoCredit Marketing and the Florida Association of Mitigation Bankers.

What Exactly is a Mitigation Bank? The EPA provides the following definition: A mitigation bank is a wetland, stream, or other aquatic resource area that has been restored, established, enhanced, or (in certain circumstances) preserved for the purpose of providing compensation for unavoidable impacts to aquatic resources permitted under Section 404 or a similar state or local wetland regulation. A mitigation bank may be created when a government agency, corporation, nonprofit organization, or other entity undertakes these activities under a formal agreement with a regulatory agency.

The value of a bank is defined in "compensatory mitigation credits." A bank's instrument identifies the number of credits available for sale and requires the use of ecological assessment techniques to certify that those credits provide the required ecological functions.

Mitigation banks represent a "third-party" compensatory mitigation, in which the responsibility for implementation and success of the project is assumed by a party other than the permittee. This transfer of liability has been a very attractive feature for Section 404 permit-holders, who would otherwise be responsible for the design, construction, monitoring, ecological success, and long-term protection of the site.

What is Fueling the Growth of Mitigation Banking? “Mitigation banks offer regulators the assurance of long-term success. There's little to no time lag between the environmental impact and restoration. For the impact project owner, bank credits provide predictable fixed costs, typically reduce time to permit by up to 50%, and completely transfers the cost, risk, and liability from the permit-holder to the mitigation banker,” says Hovater.

“Both private and public mitigation bank sponsors find value, both economically and environmentally, to develop mitigation banks,” says Nichoel Church, PWS, environmental scientist, Snyder & Associates, Inc. “Selling credits is an investment, and the average life of a mitigation bank is approximately 10 years. Continually meeting performance standards during the monitoring phase results in success. And eventually mitigation banks should be self-sustaining with minimal maintenance required.”

Policy and regulations are playing an increasing role in the sheer growth of mitigation banking, outpacing the extent of surface waters and evolving development trends—and their potential impacts.

Current State of Mitigation Banking and the Impacts of Roving Policy Changes There are currently 45 different USACE districts. Each district has a different protocol for:

Defining service areas
Assessment methodologies
Jurisdictional determinations
Bank credit types (i.e. wetland or streams vs cold water or warm water)

These multi-level complexities require us to fully understand the requirements of each in order to successfully navigate the labyrinth of varying rules and regulations.

“The market for mitigation credits is driven by policy and regulations. Nobody is doing mitigation banking solely for the good of the world,” says Tara Allden, natural resources specialist, Kimley-Horn. “[While] it does enable permits, it's a really neat thing to do, because we're [also] doing the good of world improvement. Yet, it does have a regulatory driver and it is required by permitting, and I think that's important to remember. So, you have to have a strong regulatory infrastructure to have successful mitigation bank projects.”

The Role of Compensatory Mitigation and IRT's “One of the interesting things that happens in the world of mitigation banking…the word ‘mitigation' is usually used as shorthand for ‘compensatory mitigation,'” says Susan-Marie Stedman, MS, wetland scientist and policy analyst, NOAA. “In NEPA, and then in the definition of ‘mitigation' that was later applied to the Clean Water Act, ‘mitigation' actually more broadly means ‘avoid and minimize', and then ‘compensate.' But in almost everything you will hear from us and from anyone working in this field, when they say ‘mitigation,' they mean ‘compensatory mitigation.' But one of the things that it is important to keep in mind is that ‘mitigation' actually means ‘avoid and minimize' first.”

“When putting in a mitigation bank, we're overseen by an Interagency Review Team (IRT), as laid out in the Army/EPA Mitigation Rule from 2008. Each of the (IRT's) governs a different set of natural resources or cultural resources. Each of them comes with that resource in mind, and also some understanding of the ecosystems. Therefore, everybody has a thought, or an opinion. Most of the resources are public trust resources,” says Allden.

Challenge of Multi-Layered and Jurisdictional Regulations “There are additional regulations in the Army/EPA Mitigation Rule. However, there are also state wetland regulations. There are some state mitigation requirements. There can even be county mitigation requirements, where counties don't want compensation for impacts that occur in their county to go outside their county. So, you're dealing with a pretty wide and layered landscape of policy and regulations when it comes to wetlands and mitigation,” says Stedman.

The evolving jurisdictional landscape between the last two administrations, in regards to the WOTUS Rule and the Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWPR), is driving uncertainty. Adding to the ambiguity is the fact that there is a provision in the Clean Water Act that allows states to assume the regulatory authority over most waters in a state. Meanwhile, work continues while the court takes up the Biden Administration's latest EO, and how the EPA and USACE decide to proceed as a result.

Needless to say, the uncertainty that results from roving regulation of the actual resources is not making life any easier for anyone. With extensive career experience spanning a wide array of roles in the field, Tara Allden shares an illustrative example that brings to life the current state of play.

“If you're a mitigation provider and you put your mitigation in the ground prior to 2020, and you included the ephemeral stream channels, and you were in a place where there was some other protection over connected wetlands, or your wetlands were connected but are now isolated—you've just lost a bunch of credits. So, from a mitigation provider [perspective], knowing what resources are regulated in your jurisdiction is extremely important for certainty,” says Allden.

The Name of the Game is Minimizing Uncertainty and Risk The uncertainty that stems from having so many different agencies involved [in the regulation and permitting process]—whether that be commenting on permits, or regulating resources, or serving as advocates.

“I honestly think that that's where the most risk and time and money sits in the mitigation banking world. It can be very individually driven, and it's where you can get a lot of things out of left field, which is why we go back to who we are as professionals, and scientists, and engineers, and policy makers, and attorneys. It is really important in building your reputation and starting from the beginning in relationship [building] with your Interagency Review Team. The name of the game is minimizing uncertainty and risk,” says Allden.

Case Study: Ecological Restoration Design Tye River Mitigation Bank
Michael Sprague, CEO, Trout Headwaters, Inc.

“How do you plan for ecological restoration at a watershed scale, and enable successful ecological improvement in perpetuity over the landscape? After all, that's what a mitigation bank really must achieve.”

Project Overview Trout Headwaters, Inc. was charged with co-management and oversight of the restoration services for the Tye River Mitigation Bank (TRMB). The mitigation project occupies approximately 440 acres southeast of Arrington, in Nelson County, Virginia, offering over 31,000 high-quality stream mitigation credits.

The TRMB was established to provide offset (mandatory) compensation for the loss of jurisdictional Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS), including approximately six miles of streams, riparian buffer, and their ecological functions from unavoidable environmental impacts. The bank's geographic service area operates under Section 404 of the Clean Water Act and Section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act.

The advantage of mitigation banks is readily apparent. Because they have already restored units of affected natural resources in the process of earning credits, there is no time lag between the environmental impact at a service area and its restoration at a bank site. The restoration is done in advance.

Challenges: Regulatory Compliance Requirements The first step was to gain a better understanding of the different variables across the landscape, and then the credit and economic values of the project. This required the capture and analysis of approximately 45 million environmental data points (with the help of an analytics platform).

Restoration design, execution, and continued monitoring for projects on streams, wetlands, and habitats is a huge challenge. Even with the inherent advantage of advanced technology—from data collection apps and drones, to ArcGIS and AutoCAD—the ongoing data collection and reporting function is monumental, in order to fulfill the vast amount of documentation required by the mitigation bank.

“Regulatory compliance requirements for mitigation banking are quite strict. The single project permit, the title work, the maps, the models, the property protections, the restoration plans and so forth, are probably something [upwards] of 1,100 pages,” says Michael Sprague, CEO, Trout Headwaters, Inc.

“To add to the challenge [presented by climate change], there is sometimes a challenging human environment, [which can be] subject to unexpected changes.”

Active Ecological Restoration: Giving Critical Building Blocks Back to Nature “There are a lot of ways to define the success of a project: the overriding goal for each and every project, beyond cost effectiveness, beyond whether it's scientifically defensible. And beyond [that], have we improved the resources on the property on the site? Have we done that ecologically? Have we initiated and enabled ecological lift,” says Sprague.

“Our strategy for more than 25 years now has been to jumpstart nature's processes of renewal and repair. We do this by taking away disturbances, by removing impacts, by restarting plant communities, by prudent management, by giving nature back those basic building blocks that she needs, and allowing development to occur naturally, and over time.”

Mitigation banking has become a vital resource for those spearheading the design and execution of ecological restoration.

“Informed adaptive resource management is, and it will always be, the silver bullet for successful ecological restoration here, now with the help of financial assurances and other things in perpetuity [from mitigation banking credits]. This is especially true as climate changes more rapidly—no manner of active restoration is ever going to survive or succeed without that prudent management,” says Sprague.

Updates and Future of NWI & NWCA

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 05:00:00 GMT

The National Wetlands Inventory and the National Wetlands Condition Assessment: What they are, how they're used, the challenges the programs face, and what's ahead

This topic was covered in the 18th episode of Ecobot's webinar series, Convergence of Wetland Science and Technology. View recorded episodes here.

Topics Comparison National Wetlands Inventory (NWI) and National Wetlands Condition Assessment (NWCA)
Updates to NWI and NWCA
Use cases of NWI and pushes for increased funding

Moderators Jeremy Schewe, PWS, Chief Scientist, Ecobot Presenters and Panelists Megan Lang, Chief Scientist, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and head of NWI
Gregg Serenbetz, Environmental Protection Specialist, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Robb Macleod, National GIS Coordinator, Ducks Unlimited
Lindsay Reynolds, Bureau of Land Management
Gina O'Neill, Technical Consultant, Esri

Background on the National Wetland Condition Assessment (NWCA) “The NWCA is an initiative of the EPA under the Clean Water Act to conduct statistical surveys that assess and report on the ecologic conditions of the nation's wetlands,” explains Gregg Serenbetz, MEM, Environmental Protection Specialist at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). “Condition is assessed by evaluating biological, physical, and chemical properties of wetlands and deriving indicators of condition based on field and lab sampling data.”

The NWCA is implemented through collaboration with state and tribal wetland agencies and federal partners. It was developed and supported in conjunction with soil scientists at the Natural Resources Conservation Survey, along with the Fish and Wildlife Service, who provided wetland maps and access to fish and wildlife refuges across the country. The EPA also worked with the National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management to identify and handpick reference sites.

Surveys are conducted at the sites every five years. The first was in 2011, followed by another in 2016, and most recently in the summer of 2021. A survey takes place across the 48 contiguous states. In 2011, special studies were conducted in Alaska's North Slope, and in 2021 sampling was done in the Pacific Island territories, with additional sampling there slated for 2022. These surveys are one of four companion surveys under the umbrella of the EPA's National Aquatic Resource surveys (NARS).

Key Features of the NWCA

The NWCA uses a statistically-based design that allows the results to be extrapolated to the entire population in the contiguous United States. A thousand sites are sampled each survey cycle, with 25-30% of these sampled across four successive cycles. For example, 270 sites were sampled in 2016, and those sites will be sampled again in 2021, 2026, and 2031.

The NWCA includes tidal and non-tidal, fresh and saltwater wetlands. The sampling protocols are specifically developed to be conducted during one day in the field, which can limit the types of data that can be collected. The same protocols are conducted at all sites across the country.

To date, 1,984 wetland sites have been sampled across two survey years (2011 and 2016). The compiled field and lab data for both surveys are publicly available on the EPA's NWCA webpage. The NWCA Survey was completed in 2021, and findings should be released in the future.

How the NWCA Uses Information from the NWI NWCA has relied extensively on the wetland mapping provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services NWI and their Status and Trends programs, using the NWI's wetland maps to select sites in NWCA. The NWCA takes the national digital data set of all mapped wetlands in the U.S., and categorizes every wetland polygon based on their Cowardin classification codes. Cowardin is a classification system that describes certain wetland habitats based on a series of descriptors, including vegetation and hydrologic regimes.

Certain Cowardin classification codes are grouped into seven wetland categories of interest to NWCA because they meet the definition for NWCA's target population. The definition: tidal and non-tidal wetlands within the contiguous United States, with rooted vegetation and, when present, shallow, open water less than one meter deep, which are not currently being used in the production of crops. Other Cowardin classification codes that are unlikely to be wetlands included in the NWCA target definition are grouped into five non-target categories.

Data Collection at NWCA Sites NWCA collects data on biological, chemical, and physical properties of wetlands.

Vegetation:

Sampled in five 100 square meter plots at the sites
Information is recorded on:

presence and cover of each vascular plant species
cover of all vascular species by strata
cover of bryophytes, lichens, and algae, tree counts, and covering snags
ground cover, considering the percent cover of water, bare ground, litter, and woody debris

Soil:

A soil pit 125 centimeters deep is excavated
Information recorded on soil morphology, including:

color
texture
Any redoximorphic (redox) features

Depth of the water table and hydric soil field indicators are reviewed, and soil samples are collected to measure physical and chemical properties, such as the percent sand, silt and clay, nutrients and metals.

Hydrology:

Surface water, if present, is characterized
Sample collected to assess for chemical properties, such as:

pH
Conductivity
Nutrients dissolved
Organic carbon
Sulfate chloride
Concentration of the algal toxin microcystin
Clorophyll A
Note*: about 2/3 of sites have water present. Water samples are taken even if there isn't surface water present at the time of the field sampling visit.*
Disturbances:anykind of human mediated physical alterations
- Alterations to vegetation (removal or replacement of natural wetland communities)
- Alterations to hydrology (activities that obstruct flow or relate to increases or decreases in water levels)
- Alterations to soil surface (activities that compact or harden the soil substrate or result in modifications to the surface typology of the wetland, such as sedimentation, excavation, or dredging)
Most data is collected within a 0.5 hectare area, representing a point location specified in the survey design. Layout can be a circle, a polygon, or a boundary of the wetland if <0.5 hectares. Layout shapes are dependent on size, shape, and location of the sampling point within the wetland. Physical alteration data is taken at three 100 square meter plots on transects extending a hundred meters outward in each cardinal direction.

Findings of the NWCA and How the Data is Used Data from the two previous surveys in 2011 and 2016 have been used to develop indicators to report on the condition of wetlands at national and regional scales.

The 2011 survey found that 48% of wetland area, nationally, was in good condition based on vegetation as expressed by the vegetation multi-metric index. Physical alterations to vegetation, soil compaction, and ditching were the most prominent stressors.

Findings from the 2016 survey are currently in preparation and should be released in 2022. The 2021 field season recently wrapped up, and is in the quality assurance stage. Once compiled, the data files will be publicly available.

Overview and Goal of the National Wetland Inventory Program “The NWI program sits within the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is the principal U.S. federal agency tasked with providing information to the American public on the extent and trends of U.S. Wetlands,” says Megan Lang, Chief Scientist at U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “We're mandated to produce this data through the Emergency Wetlands Resources Act of 1986. We meet our mandate to map wetlands through production of the NWI Geospatial Dataset, and our mandate to track wetland change through provision of Wetlands Status and Trends sets are distinct, but also complementary, and together they provide critical information on wetland and deep water habitats type, location, and trends to best support a broad array of decision support needs.”

The goal of the NWI project is to provide the public and Congress with decadal reports on the extent of U.S. wetland and deep water habitats and their change over time. This information is used to measure the net results of billions of dollars worth of policy and management actions, including regulations, compensatory and voluntary restoration, and conservation, plus the effects of other change drivers.

Overview and Uses of Status and Trends Report Data are collected for the Status and Trends reports by sampling 5,048 four-mile square plots across the contiguous U.S., regardless of land ownership. Within these plots, the Service assesses change for the study period using photos on two different dates. They then use statistical analysis to measure wetland and deep water gain, loss and type conversion.

The Status and Trend report has historically catalyzed wetland conservation, and in that way helped reduce net wetland loss. The 1984 Status and Trends report, for example, triggered the Swampbuster provision of the Food Security Act of 1985. This policy and subsequent others related to USDA policies have turned agriculture from the biggest driver of wetland loss to actually supporting wetland gain. +

The Service is in the process of collecting data to support the next report, which will be published in 2023, and will cover 2009-2019.

Overview and Uses of Wetlands Geospatial Dataset, AKA NWI Maps “The [Wetlands Geospatial Dataset, which is commonly known as NWI Maps], is our nation's most spatially and categorically detailed information on wetlands. It is identified by the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) and the Office of Management and Budget as the ‘Wetlands layer of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure,'” says Lang. “This might sound like word soup, but what's being implied is that the NWI dataset serves an important role within our nation's National Spatial Data Infrastructure, which is intended to provide geospatial knowledge to understand, protect, and promote America's national and global interests. So this is a big role for us.”

To date, it has taken approximately 40 years and $220 million in support from 165 contributors to produce the Wetlands Data Layer. Each year, between 50 and 100 million acres are updated. +

The NWI Maps website is viewed about a million times annually by members of the American public. The NWI mapper is the online portal maintained by the USFWS which is used to view the NWI geospatial datasets. The mapper is publicly accessible, and it is viewed over half a million times each year. In 2020, approximately 260,000 wetland maps were printed using the wetlands mapper, with usage like this increasing over the years.

Due in part to the flexibility provided by its substantial categorial detail, the NWI data has been used for a variety of applications, such as:
- Assessing ecological functions and related ecosystem services, including mitigation of natural disasters, provision of clean water, modulation of hydrological flows, support for nutrient cycling, and provision of recreation
- Supporting habitat assessments and species population modeling by biologists
- Maps are heavily used in urban areas and along transportation corridors like roads, and they are also used to support decision-making in more rural areas.The NWI program does not map the proprietary jurisdiction of local state and federal governments, though NWI data is regularly used by both the government and the private sector in a supporting role to streamline the planning, permitting, and mitigation actions associated with development while conserving wetlands and their environmental benefits. The states of Minnesota and Michigan recently reported that by using NWI data to enhance the efficiency of state planning and regulatory programs, they have saved approximately $1 million and $750,000 respectively.

Funding Challenges to the NWI program The NWI project has had a flat budget for about 40 years, with the exception of a pulse of funds around 1993, and the value of that budget has declined in value due to inflation. Its primary challenge is to support a contemporary dataset on this limited budget. The Service is working to meet this challenge by leveraging partnerships and advanced technologies.

One such partnership is with the National Geospatial Program, which produces the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD). Together, the NWI and NHD are developing comprehensive, contemporary, interoperable water data to inform projects related to climate change, water quality, infrastructure development, and more. They are also modernizing and aligning all aspects of NWI and NHD data management—from planning and outreach to data standards and distributions—in order to improve dataset utility and to gain cost efficiencies.

In order to stay on the cutting edge of wetland mapping technology and standard, the NWI is adaptively managing their targeting, acquisition, and maintenance procedures to leverage the best of all data sets and techniques within a semi automated framework. This effort is called the New Mapping Technologies project, with the ultimate goal of faster, cheaper, better NWI data production. Currently, NWI's products are created by comparing NWI data to other national land cover data sets, including NOAA's CCAP and MRLC's NCLD, in order to identify areas of likely wetland loss and gain since NWI data production.

Functional Comparison of the NWCA versus NWI “NWCA's direct purpose, more than anything other than just the general conditions, is really designed to help shape policy, and how wetlands are being managed from a national level,” says Jeremy Schewe, Chief Scientist at Ecobot. “With the NWI, we're looking at direct application for planning, for infrastructure for potential impacts or changes to the physical environment. Of course that also helps inform policy, especially since many of the datasets are being utilized to support NWCA efforts. The NWI is also directly utilized by the industry, by federal agencies, state agencies, regional agencies, and for many of you from the environmental consulting and engineering parts of this industry.”

“In the 21st century, so much depends on digital data, and that's going to help shape the future—the future of our policy, of conservation, of responsible development and sustainable development.”

Use Cases of the NWI and the Push for Increased Funding Ducks Unlimited
Ducks Unlimited is a nonprofit dedicated to the conservation, restoration, and management of waterfowl habitats and wetlands in the U.S.

“Ducks Unlimited has been using NWI since it started. It's super important for us to do our conservation planning,” says Robb MacLeod, National GIS Coordinator at Ducks Unlimited. “We use it a lot in our waterfall habitats, duck energies, figuring out where the ducks are, and planning for future projects for conservation of wetlands.”

“It's an excellent [resource] for us to use, but it's kind of out of date…so we're working without policy folks and others in the coalition from industry, from nonprofits, from organizations, to try and raise awareness for the NWI. We'd really like to get that $3.4 million the NWI gets every year and bump it to $15 million so we can have a complete update of the NWI in the next 10 years.”

Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
BLM is a government agency responsible for administering federal lands.

“[BLM] is interested in wetland and riparian management, and we use the NWI extensively to understand wetlands on our landscape…We've been involved in an initiative to help fund updated mapping our 13 western states where needed. Just like Ducks Unlimited and other folks who look at this data on large landscapes to understand the resource, we're keenly interested in the quality of the data, and so have been involved in trying to get those updated where we work.”

NWI & Esri Partnership to Improve Predictive Modeling “The Wetland Identification Model (WIM) is a framework that's part of the Arc Hydro toolset for predicting where wetlands are most likely to be in a landscape, given some remote sensing data,” says Gina O'Neil, technical consultant at Esri. “WIM looks at topographic factors, so those surface hydrologic drivers of wetland formation”

“We are actively developing WIM to make it a more useful tool for NWI…Specifically, how can WIM or similar predictive frameworks be used to take ancillary data for photo interpretation, and give you one distilled form of it that photo interpreters can use more efficiently, or to directly use some predicted wetland locations as a starting point to go and refine boundaries or classify wetlands?”

The 2020 NWPL Update is Live in Ecobot

Wed, 10 Nov 2021 19:47:03 GMT

The USACE's 2020 changes to the National Wetlands Wetlands Plant List (NWPL) is effective as of November 2, 2021 and should be used in wetland delineations after this date. Changes to wetland indicator status ratings for plant species in select regions and the addition of new plant species to the NWPL.

The Real Impact of the Navigable Waters Protection Rule

Mon, 16 Nov 2020 22:58:56 GMT

On June 22, 2020, the Navigable Waters Protection Rule (NWR) went into effect purportedly to clarify the US federal government's permitting jurisdiction of what waters are considered “waters of the United States" (WOTUS) under the Clean Water Act (CWA). The Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Army led the review and revision of the definition of WOTUS consistent with an Executive Order signed on February 28, 2017, titled ‘‘Restoring the Rule of Law, Federalism, and Economic Growth by Reviewing the ‘Waters of the United States' Rule.''

The NWR replaces the rule published on October 22, 2019. The new WOTUS rule in the NWR was intended to "increase the predictability and consistency of Clean Water Act programs by clarifying the scope of ‘‘waters of the United States'' federally regulated under the Act", and streamline the federal permitting of permanent or temporary impacts to WOTUS in construction, infrastructure, development, and utilities projects.

The Real Deal: More than anything, the executive order was intended to undermine environmental regulations in exchange for short term profit.

Regulatory changes to WOTUS and the Navigable Waters Protection Rule have not streamlined things whatsoever. In fact, since the implementation of NWR, environmental consultants are reporting much lengthier concurrence processes with USACE, whether via jurisdictional determinations (JDs, both preliminary and approved) or through nationwide permit applications.

Some consultants have noted very little change due to higher regulations on the state level (Florida, for example), or because in Colorado the NWR has been rejected. Additionally, some consultants are reporting getting pushback from developers or requests to re-conduct field work to reapply for JD's within the new rules. Olivia Haney, Assistant Environmental Scientist at Burns & McDonnell noted: “A lot of our projects that we had been working on or were in the process of permitting were impacted,” she recalls. “In some cases, the rule changes led to our project plans changing slightly, and as a result we had to go out and re-delineate some areas. That was a huge disruption to construction and permitting schedules. Our goal was to make edits without losing any time, and without Ecobot, it would have been a struggle to meet those deadlines.”

All in all, it is a confusing and frustrating time. The NWR may have clarified definitions of WOTUS and removed regulation of our country's headwaters areas on paper, but it has not streamlined the industry, it has created a logjam in the responsible management of our nation's and individual state's waterways.

NWR Regulatory Changes and their impact:

Some developers have been asking environmental consultants for wetland delineations and stream classifications to be reconducted in the field in hopes of obtaining new jurisdictional determinations, or for the purposes of reapplying for permits with USACE or the appropriate state department administering 401 Water Quality Certification. Additionally, with the NWR changes, some developers have been more aggressively pushing against even obtaining USACE concurrence of field findings of consulting scientists. In one recent case, a developer wanted to fill in the streams rather than consulting USACE.

Along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, consultants are seeing a massive slow down in the USACE concurrence process completely rather than streamlining. Any application for a JD is going to take a year at this point, one consultant based in Houston, Texas, mentioned. With the new NWR, the application processes are bogging down as states and the USACE determine how to best handle what is considered jurisdictional by USACE and this is extending the timeline of when an applicant can expect to receive a JD and even longer for a nationwide permit. Consultants are challenged with setting up longer project timelines with new strategies such as avoiding impacts to WOTUS or state waters altogether, or to apply for a PJD (preliminary jurisdiction determination) to move through the process quicker.
Some consultants as well as developers are already bringing environmental attorneys into the process. The USACE's goal is to authorize a nationwide permit within 60 days, and an individual permit within 120 days of an application. USACE has multiple ways that they can legally extend the review process which is being exercised in multiple regional USACE offices. Most legal cases, if they amount to anything, could go on for years while everyone figures out the new balance of jurisdictional power within the WOTUS regulatory space.
Colorado has played a wildcard and currently has an injunction against the NWR and so far remains the only state that does. In Colorado, almost all of wetlands would be considered non-adjacent to WOTUS and therefore not jurisdictional by USACE leaving little protection for the wetlands that they do have. The injunction against the NWR came out of a state-level necessity to protect the wetlands and headwaters streams that are so critical for the ecology of Colorado and for the protection of Colorado's water resources.
In juxtaposition, not much has changed in Florida as nearly the whole state would be considered “connected” in respect to WOTUS. Therefore the majority of all water in Florida would be considered jurisdictional as WOTUS by USACE. In December, the 404 permit application program is going to be assumed by the state as it seems that all ongoing legal hearings and trends are leading in that direction.

What does this mean for the industry? So far, it seems the new NWR is falling short of the goal to streamline the permitting process for USACE permit applications and increase the predictability and consistency of jurisdictional determinations for WOTUS. If anything, it seems that the only goal that has been met is in the word "increase". Environmental permitting has increased in cost to developers. The scope of work and length of an application process for consultants has increased. And, we have increased confusion in respect to USACE concurrence on projects.

To truly streamline the process, while at the same time maintaining important jurisdictional thresholds from the federal and state governments, we simply need better systems, not lower regulations. The first step would be to streamline the field process of classifying streams on a national level with a protocol similar to the USACE's wetland delineation process. The second step would be to digitize the whole process to normalize data, reduce errors, and allow swifter exchange of results. This would need to occur on the level of the field scientist to GIS managers, and from regulatory reviewers to data archivists.

Accurate field data and geospatial projections are the best route to efficiency and the best science, while also insuring the cost-effective, responsible management of waters of the United States, whether they are jurisdictional by the federal government, state agencies, or local government.

This is the 21st century. We have the necessary tools. Let's use them.

NWPL Update is Live

Thu, 28 May 2020 23:13:30 GMT

USACE finally implemented the pending 2018 changes to the National Wetlands Wetlands Plant List (NWPL) on May 18, 2020, effective immediately. Below you'll find the eight (8) plant species being added to the NWPL and the four (4) species with at least one regional indicator status change.

These changes are now live in Ecobot!

Be sure to download the latest version from the App Store.

New Additions to the NWPL 1 - Aristida palustris (Longleaf threeawn)

Newly listed Aristida palustris with the indicator status of FACW in the Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain region blooms from August through October and is found in bogs, moist savannas, wet pine flatwoods, bald-cypress depressions, and wet prairies.

2 - Artemisia dracunculus (Tarragon)

Artemisia dracunculus is now listed on the NWPL with the indicator status of FACU in the Arid West and Western Mountains Valleys & Coast regions. It blooms from July through November and is found growing from desert shrub/scrub communities to subalpine woods.

3 - Bromus nottowayanus (Nottoway Valley brome)

Bromus nottowayanus is newly listed in the NWPL with a FACU indicator status in the Midwest and Northcentral Northeast regions. Blooming period is from late July to early August. It's habitat is typically rich hardwood forests, usually near streams, but often above the lowest, wettest river bottoms. Occasionally it is found in drier forests on banks and slopes.

4 - Delairea odorata (Cape-ivy)

Delairea odorata is also newly listed in the NWPL with a FAC indicator status in the Arid West and Western Mountains Valleys & Coast regions. Blooming from November to March, it is considered a noxious invasive. It is especially problematic in coastal riparian areas, though it may also invade inland riparian areas, moist forests, and oak woodlands. Vines are known to form dense mats of vegetation over trees and shrubs that can kill plants underneath.

5 - Dichanthelium wrightianum (Wright's rosette grass)

Dichanthelium wrightianum is the fifth new species on the NWPL with the indicator status of FACW in the Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain region. It blooms from June through September and observable on the coastal plain along pond shores and in temporary/seasonal pools and puddles.

6 - Epilobium brachycarpum (Tall annual willowherb)

Epilobium brachycarpum, also a newly listed in the NWPL, has a FAC indicator status in the Arid West and Western Mountains Valleys & Coast regions. It blooms in July and August and can be observed along roadsides, as well as in grasslands, woodlands, disturbed ground and at elevations ranging from sea level to 10,000 feet.

7 - Polymnia canadensis (Whiteflower leafcup)

The seventh newly listed species on the NWPL is Polymnia canadensis, with a FACU indicator status in the Eastern Mountains & Piedmont and Midwest regions. Blooming period is from mid-May to early October. It's habitat is mesic woodland areas with calcareous soils from New England, southern Canada and Minnesota, south to Georgia and Oklahoma. It is listed as an endangered species in Vermont and Connecticut.

8 -Verbena brasiliensis (Brazilian vervain)

Verbena brasiliensis is the eighth and last newly listed in the 2018 NWPL with a FACU indicator status in the Atlantic & Gulf Coastal Plain, Eastern Mountains & Piedmont, and Midwest regions. The predominant bloom period of V. brasiliensis is April and May, but it may be found flowering up to the first frost. It grows in dry conditions on agricultural fields, disturbed areas, and riparian environments. Native to South America, largely from Brazil, it is considered an invasive weed in the US, Canada, and around the world.

8-NWPL 2018_0001_Verbena brasiliensis NWPL Indicator Status Changes

1 - Hymenocallis latifolia (Perfumed spiderlily)

The 2018 NWPL changed the wetland indicator status of Hymenocallis latifolia to FACU in the Atlantic & Gulf Coastal Plain and Caribbean regions. The flowering window of this species is early July to late August. It can be found growing on beaches, sand dunes, mangrove swamps and other wetlands along the coasts of Florida, Mexico, and the West Indies.

2 - Hymenocallis occidentalis (Northern spiderlily)

On the 2018 NWPL update, Hymenocallis occidentalis is now listed with a wetland indicator status of FACW in the Atlantic & Gulf Coastal Plain and the Great Plains regions, while listed as FAC in the Eastern Mountains & Piedmont and the Midwest regions. This species blooming period is from June to September. Sometimes it is found growing in wetlands, streams, bogs, and ponds, but also can be found growing in mesic and bottomland forests.

3 - Iva axillaris (Povertyweed)

The 2018 NWPL changed the wetland indicator status of Iva axillaris to FACU in the Arid West region. The flowering window is May to early October. It is most frequently observed in dry often alkaline places in plains, valleys, foothills, and on disturbed sites.

4 - Verbena incompta (Purpletop vervain)

Verbena incompta is now listed with a wetland indicator status of FACU in the Atlantic & Gulf Coastal Plain, Eastern Mountains & Piedmont, and Midwest regions. The flowering period is from June through October, or up until the first frost. It is most frequently observed growing along roadsides, new forest plantations, forest edges, right-of-ways, and other disturbed areas. It is considered to be an invasive species.

Click here to see the entire update from the Department of Defense.

Ecobot Version 2: Map Wetlands Inside of Ecobot

Mon, 11 May 2020 23:01:27 GMT

You can now map and name multiple wetland polygons on the fly, and use the built-in map to navigate between sampling points. Instantly generate Esri ArcGIS-ready points and polygons. With no manual effort, map features collected in the field can now be dropped directly into ArcGIS Pro or into other GIS software that can import Esri shapefile formats.

One year ago, Ecobot was excited to announce our partnership with Esri. Our combined efforts are now baring fruit with enhanced offline mapping functions and ArcGIS integrations available within Ecobot's version 2 release this week.

Here's how to use it:

Define Your Project Area
When creating a new project, tap the "Map: Define Project Area" button to download the aerial photos as a basemap from Esri. Zoom in to include all of your project area plus any buffer you may want to download as well. Everything inside the yellow box will be collected for offline viewing. Note: you need to be connected to data when collecting these basemap files.

If you have existing projects in Ecobot that you now want to add wetland areas to as polygons to export to GIS software, you will need to first collect your basemap. To do this, simply click on the "Add Wetlands Boundary" button beneath the "Add Sampling Point" button. You will be first prompted to download the shapefiles of the aerial photos in the defined area (in the yellow square). To add a wetland boundary, we will walk you through the steps in the app.

Add Wetlands Boundary
To add a wetlands boundary to your project, just tap the "Add Wetlands Boundary" button inside a project. Note: If you have not already collected the offline basemap for this project, you'll be prompted to do so first.

You have an option to walk your wetland boundary and tap the green "Add Point from GPS" button as you go, or switch to touch mode and tap the map to manually draw your wetland boundary.

Create Project Files
When you're back in data coverage or on WiFi, simply tap the "Create Project Files" button to send your data to the cloud. In mere seconds we'll create your USACE PDF and generate an ArcGIS-ready ZIP file of your shapefiles and project points.
Drag-and-Drop into ArcGIS Pro
With no manual effort, map features collected in the field can now be dropped directly into ArcGIS Pro, or imported quickly into other GIS software. It's that easy.

The Only Constant is Change: Upcoming Revisions to the National Wetlands Plant List

Fri, 13 Dec 2019 17:57:40 GMT

In today's fast paced world, probably more than any time in history, the essence of Heraclitus philosophy that the only constant in life is change has become the reality for most of Earth's citizens. Between technology, communications, and speed of travel, human reality is changing faster than most individuals can comprehend or keep up with. Change is constant. We can't step in the same river twice; the river changes and so do you.

We both step and do not step in the same rivers.— Heraclitus

Meanwhile, the ever-present evolution of nature and her adaptations to human pressure on natural resources never ceases to amaze me. As ecologists, it is our responsibility to recognize patterns and relationships in the interface of biotic and abiotic factors (or in non-scientific terms: between living organisms and the non-living elements of nature). Keen, consistent observations of the biotic and abiotic factors of our planet often reveal that patterns humans had assumed to be truth are often times subjective, or that not enough observations have been made to truly explain evolutionary rules, behaviors, and patterns of individual organisms, or a species as whole.

As ecologists and wetland scientists, it is in our purview to observe vascular species (known to those of you who aren't botanists simply as plants) in their natural habitat as part of interpreting ecosystem patterns. This is in part to help determine where one natural community begins and another ends. This expertise is called natural community classification, and efforts therein help people understand a landscape as well as to inform management planning. Knowing what type of natural community a project is likely located in can also help an ecologist determine what species will be present before even entering the site. And most importantly, natural communities classification help ecologists convey to the non-scientific community, areas that may be regulated by federal or state laws.

I have been working specifically in this nexus for the past sixteen years with projects that are regulated by the 1972 Clean Water Act (33 U.S.C. §1251 et seq.) and the 1973 Endangered Species Act (16 U.S.C. §1531 et seq.) When working on these projects, I am tasked with determining where one natural community starts and another ends. This is particularly crucial within sensitive communities such as wetlands. Impacts or disturbances to wetlands are regulated by the federal government via the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and by various state and municipal agencies. Wetlands, which are often jurisdictional under federal or state law, are determined to exist on a site through three scientifically observable criteria: hydrology, soil, and vegetation. These are determined by direct field observations and measurements, as well as plant species identification.

The history of plant lists and their impact on the laws that regulate the development industry may seem inconsequential, but it is important to know as it influences decision making in respect to our country's growth. In 1988, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) published the National List of Plant Species That Occur in Wetlands as a guidepost for natural resource managers. This list is a summation of plant data in respect to wetlands and the likelihood that a species will grow in a wetland, in an upland area, or somewhere in between. This list has been used to determine the presence of hydrophytic (wetland) vegetation by ecologists and wetland scientists ever since. FWS then developed a list entitled the National List of Vascular Plant Species That Occur in Wetlands: 1996 National Summary, which was a revision of the 1988 National Summary.

It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change.

— Charles Darwin

In 2006, USACE accepted administrative responsibility for the National Wetland Plant List (NWPL) from FWS since USACE regulates most wetlands and all "waters of the United States". USACE led interagency efforts to update the list in 2012, 2013, 2014, and 2016. Additionally, a 2018 draft NWPL (which still has not been published yet as of December 13, 2019) is expected to be released in the near future. Additions to and subtractions from the NWPL represent new plant species records, range extensions, nomenclature changes, newly proposed species, and wetland indicator status changes.

Changes in assumptions of what a plant species may indicate about the characteristics of a given natural community — such as a wetland — becomes refined with additional field observations. An updated National Wetland Plant List will help us make better decisions about how to protect our natural resources.

According to the USACE, for the 2018 NWPL update, the NWPL National Panel (NP) and Regional Panels (RPs), reviewed proposed wetland rating changes or additions for 20 species and 37 regional ratings (some species were reviewed for multiple regions) submitted by the general public. Eight of these species were proposed for addition to the NWPL, and 12 species were submitted for a rating change request in one or more regions. We expect the updated NWPL to replace the 2016 list in the near future.

Look to Ecobot to monitor changes to the NWPL and keep you on your feet and in the field.

Impacts of Proposed Revisions to WOTUS Rules

Thu, 05 Sep 2019 20:13:50 GMT

***Updated on 2/17/2020:***On January 23, 2020, the new WOTUS rules went into effect, limiting federal jurisdiction to wetlands that are connected via surface water, excluding ephemeral streams and isolated wetlands. With this new ruling, the US loses nearly 18% of its stream protections and as much as 50% of wetland protections. States like Nevada and Arizona lose upward of 85% of their water protections. Again, the question stands: if the impetus for this rule change is to save money and time on regulations, why is no one talking about technology?

Updated on 10/02/2019: On September 12, 2019, the US Environmental Protection Agency finalized its repeal of a 2015 Obama Rule for jurisdictional WOTUS by the federal government. This change will largely impact the 22 states where the Obama Rule has been in effect. This decision will create nationwide regulatory confusion and lawsuits. I will continue to stay abreast of the details and provide relevant updates on new publications.

As the Chief Scientific Officer of Ecobot, it is crucial that I address the pending changes to the rules of implementation of the Clean Water Act proposed by the current administration. While all regulations must be occasionally looked at in order to evolve with the times, the proposed changes, if implemented, would be a great tragedy to the both the environment and the economy of the United States. The proposed changes to the protection of “the Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) would be a major backward step in responsible progress of our country and the world at large.

The Clean Water Act of 1972 (CWA) and its implementation by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is currently under review by request from the Trump administration. As amended in 1972, the law established the basic structure for regulating pollutant discharges into the waters of the United States, or WOTUS. Implementation of the law gave the EPA the authority to implement pollution control programs such as setting wastewater standards for industry, and protecting other WOTUS from discharges and impacts. WOTUS are regulated by the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) on a federal level for any potential discharges or impacts, and also by various State agencies for water quality certification for similar discharges and impacts.

Due to various legal interpretations of the regulatory limits of the CWA by the USACE or EPA since its inception in 1972, the Trump administration has sought to undermine the clear establishment of what waters would be regulated by EPA and USACE. This comes partly in response to confusion in the regulatory industry, especially recently in 2006 in a Supreme Court case, Rapanos v. United States. US Justice Anthony Kennedy argued that CWA protection applied to wetlands that “significantly affect the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of other covered waters.” Simultaneously, US Justice Antonin Scalia argued that WOTUS protection only applied to wetlands “with a continuous surface connection” to a navigable water, thus a significantly smaller percentage of wetlands and streams in the US. It was never totally clear which opinion took precedence. In response, the Waters of the US Rule was published in June 2015 under the Obama administration. This outlined which WOTUS were automatically covered by the CWA, thus requiring permits for discharges, dredging, or dirt fill.

The EPA and the Army Corps has estimated that the Trump administration WOTUS reduction proposal would reduce federal protection of 18 percent of streams and 51 percent of wetlands in the United States. The proposal is rightfully causing uproar in the environmental community for a multitude of reasons, perhaps most important among them is this: one-third of the nation's threatened and endangered species live only in wetlands. Regardless of one's opinion of threatened species, every single resident of the United States should care about the impact of these changes for this reason alone: wetlands filter our water and buffer storm events – especially important as these events increase in frequency and severity and have an increasingly dramatic impact on urbanized areas. The proposed rule changes would seriously impair the protection of WOTUS across the entire nation due to newly proposed rules of what the definition of WOTUS corresponds to. Simply put, millions of acres of wetlands and thousands of miles of streams across the entire country would suddenly be threatened by unregulated development due to the loss of federal protection.

Many States have robust wetlands and streams protection programs in place that potentially could mitigate the losses of federal protection of WOTUS fairly smoothly; however, many States either do not have adequately funded protection of other waters, or have no State-level programs in place to buffer the loss of federal protection. The 2015 WOTUS rule is currently in effect in 22 states and the District of Columbia (California, Connecticut, Colorado, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington — New Mexico is under Federal Court consideration), while regulations from the 1980s are in effect in the other 28 states.

In a serious of images created by Matt Stahman, the Director of Regulatory Resources at Resource Environmental Solutions (RES), one can see how dramatic the loss of federal protection of WOTUS by the proposed Trump administration will be on all waters and wetlands across the country.

Image courtesy of Matt Stahman, Director, Regulatory at Resource Environmental Solutions

The loss of these other WOTUS on the macroscale would be devastating to the US ecology, economy, and resiliency to the impact of storms and other direct results of climate change. Billions of dollars are pumped ever year into storm and flood cleanups. Wetlands are directly responsible for the absorption of most major storms, floods, and hurricanes. With a loss of storm water retention due to development of wetlands and streams, and the increase of impervious surfaces as a direct result, FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund would need to be exponentially increased in order to pick up the lost storm buffering capacity of wetlands.

The reduction of regulated waters considered to be WOTUS by the Trump administration will be environmentally and economically devastating for the entire nation. Storm surges, sediment loading, pollution, flooding, and high velocity streams will be amplified while many species that are threatened and endangered will be come under more duress. And finally, our human access to clean water will be further diminished. Clean water is crucial for life.

Standing in the gap between valuable protections of environmental resources and enablement of progress critical to economic growth, you'll find an often unobserved but invaluable workforce: environmental consultants. These field scientists assess waterway impacts before construction companies can move dirt, before oil and gas companies can lay down pipelines, or before DOT or rail can do work on highways and railroads; and help to insure that any potential impacts to WOTUS meet all regulatory requirement to better protect our nation's water quality. Most scientific and regulatory conferences in 2019 have made a concerted effort to make a stance on the proposed rule changes, mostly pushing for the higher standards of WOTUS protection set into motion by the Waters Rule of 2015 for regulatory implementation.

At Ecobot, we have built a solution to help these environmental regulatory consultants spend a greater percentage of their time providing valuable scientific discovery and impact analysis. And when these field scientists do better work, industry can get this work done faster, cheaper and more accurately. We have created an app for iPhones and iPads that allows wetland delineations – as required by the USACE as part of the permitting process for impacts to WOTUS – to be completed in half the time, with greater accuracy. Through smart tools like we have created at Ecobot, we can help the environmental services industry to meet all of the regulatory requirements of the CWA as they stand under the Obama Waters Rule of 2015, as well as the requirements in any states that have yet to adopt the Waters Rule.

Additionally, Ecobot's app helps meet the actual call of the Trump administration's Executive Order (EO) 13778: Restoring the Rule of Law, Federalism, and Economic Growth by Reviewing the “Waters of the U.S.” Rule: to reduce the cost of the regulatory permitting process.

The regulations do not need an overhaul; the industry just needs better tools.

Ecobot Resources: Covering Technology, Policy, and News for the Environmental Industry

Tue, 30 Jul 2019 19:11:11 GMT

What kind of content is Ecobot is contributing?

Wetland and USACE regulatory updates, water quality, ecosystems monitoring, mitigation monitoring, unique projects, case studies, taxonomy changes, wetland indicator status changes, wetlands' role in climate change, conferences, environmental/ecological marketplace, Ecobot and Esri updates, and more.

Who might be interested?

Ecologists, botanists, wetland scientists, natural resource specialists, regulatory specialists, mitigation bankers, professional wetlands scientists, environmental consultants, project managers, business owners, principles, CEOs, CFOs, biologists, educators, students.

How can this benefit my work?

Awareness of global affairs as pertaining to wetlands, community building, opportunities for collaboration, tech advances, tools of the trade, regulatory updates, unique species observations, global conservation projects.