## Facts

- Idaho submitted revised Clean Water Act (CWA) water quality standards designating certain waters for uses less protective than the CWA’s “fishable/swimmable” goals.
- EPA regulations require a use-attainability analysis (UAA) when a state designates uses less protective than fishable/swimmable to show the higher uses are not feasible.
- Idaho did not perform UAAs for certain waters, including waters in and around the Coeur d’Alene basin.
- EPA partially disapproved Idaho’s standards, identified the deficiency (less-protective uses without UAAs), and provided the statutory 90-day period for Idaho to adopt required changes.
- Idaho did not cure the disapproval. EPA then promulgated federal standards designating the disputed waters for fishable/swimmable uses, relying on the regulatory premise that such uses are the default unless rebutted by a UAA.
- The Idaho Mining Association sued under the APA and the CWA’s review provisions, seeking to set aside EPA’s promulgated designated uses and remand the matter to EPA.

## Issues

1. Whether EPA may treat fishable/swimmable uses as presumptively attainable and promulgate those uses when a state assigns less-protective uses without conducting required UAAs.
2. Whether EPA complied with CWA § 303(c) procedures, including providing a cure period and “promptly” promulgating a federal replacement after the state failed to act.
3. Whether EPA’s promulgation of fishable/swimmable designated uses was arbitrary or capricious under the APA, including whether EPA properly applied its water quality standards regulations.
4. Whether EPA unlawfully relied on considerations outside the CWA framework (including Superfund-related context) in setting the federal standards.

## Decision

- The court granted judgment for EPA and upheld the promulgated federal water quality standards.
- The court held EPA could apply the regulatory default that fishable/swimmable uses are attainable unless the state demonstrates infeasibility through a UAA.
- The court held EPA followed the statutory sequence: disapproval, a 90-day opportunity for state correction, and federal promulgation after the state failed to act.
- The court found EPA’s action consistent with its Part 131 regulations and not arbitrary or capricious.
- The court rejected the claim that the standards were unlawful because of overlap with Superfund concerns, concluding the action was supportable on CWA grounds.

## Legal Principles

- Under CWA § 303 and EPA’s water quality standards regulations, fishable/swimmable uses function as the default designated uses “wherever attainable,” and a state must justify less-protective uses through a UAA.
- When EPA disapproves a state’s water quality standards, EPA must identify required changes; if the state does not adopt them within 90 days, EPA must promulgate a federal replacement standard.
- EPA does not create a new substantive rule by applying the existing regulatory premise that less-protective uses require technical justification; applying that premise in federal promulgation is permissible.
- Under APA review, a federal standard will be upheld when the agency reasonably interprets and applies the CWA and its implementing regulations and follows required procedures.

## Conclusion

The court sustained EPA’s authority to impose fishable/swimmable designated uses for Idaho waters after Idaho failed to provide required UAAs to support less-protective uses, and it upheld EPA’s promulgation as procedurally proper and not arbitrary or capricious under the APA.


Idaho Mining Ass’n v. Browner, 90 F. Supp. 2d 1078 (D. Idaho 2000)