## Facts

- The South Florida Water Management District operated flood-control infrastructure including the C-11 canal and the S-9 pump station adjacent to Water Conservation Area 3 (WCA-3).
- The C-11 canal collected stormwater and groundwater from developed areas containing agricultural, residential, and urban runoff.
- The S-9 pump moved canal water across levees into WCA-3, a wetland area impounded to protect habitat and prevent flooding in the C-11 basin.
- Water entering the canal carried contaminants, including phosphorus from fertilizers.
- Pumping that water into WCA-3 altered the wetland ecosystem by stimulating growth of non-native algae and plants.
- The Miccosukee Tribe and other plaintiffs sued under the Clean Water Act (CWA), asserting the District needed an NPDES permit because S-9 discharged pollutants from a point source into navigable waters.
- The District argued no “discharge of a pollutant” occurred because the pump did not itself create pollutants and merely moved water.

## Issues

1. Whether a pump that conveys polluted water can be a CWA “point source” even if it does not originate the pollutants.
2. Whether pumping contaminated water from the C-11 canal into WCA-3 constitutes an “addition” of pollutants requiring an NPDES permit, depending on whether the canal and WCA-3 are distinct water bodies or parts of the same water body.
3. Whether the CWA treats all “navigable waters” as a single unit such that transferring water among navigable waters cannot be an “addition” (the “unitary waters” theory).

## Decision

- The Supreme Court vacated the Eleventh Circuit’s judgment and remanded for further proceedings.
- The Court held that a point source need not be the original source of pollutants; it is enough that the point source conveys pollutants to navigable waters.
- The Court held that if the canal and WCA-3 are parts of the same water body, moving water between them would not be an “addition” of pollutants to navigable waters and would not require an NPDES permit on that theory.
- Because the record did not adequately establish whether the canal and WCA-3 were distinct water bodies, the Court required factfinding on that question.
- The Court declined to decide the federal government’s broader “unitary waters” theory.
- Justice Scalia concurred in part and dissented in part.

## Legal Principles

- Under the CWA, a “point source” may be a conveyance that transports pollutants; it need not generate the pollutants.
- An NPDES permit requirement depends on whether there is an “addition” of a pollutant “to navigable waters from any point source.”
- Whether an “addition” occurs may turn on how the relevant waters are characterized: transferring water within a single water body is not an “addition,” while transferring water from one distinct water body to another can be.
- The Court may remand where the legal outcome turns on unresolved hydrologic or environmental facts regarding the identity of the receiving and source waters.
- The Court left open whether all navigable waters must be treated as one for purposes of the “addition” inquiry.

## Conclusion

The Court held that a pump can qualify as a point source by conveying pollutants, but vacated and remanded because liability and permitting depend on whether the C-11 canal and WCA-3 are distinct water bodies such that pumping constitutes an “addition” of pollutants under the Clean Water Act; it also declined to resolve the broader “unitary waters” theory.


S. Fla. Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Miccosukee Tribe of Indians, 541 U.S. 95 (2004)