In support of its efforts to repeal the 2015 Clean Water Rule (“Rule”), the Trump Administration is attacking the Obama Administration’s studies touting the supposed economic benefits of implementing the Rule.

The Obama Administration had previously calculated that the annual benefits of implementing the Rule would range from $338 million – $554 million, with the vast majority of these benefits derived from the hypothetical market price for mitigating impacts to those wetlands that would now be subject to the Rule. This 2014 assessment noted that these potential benefits exceeded the administrative costs associated with the enforcing the Rule’s increased jurisdiction by several magnitudes.

In a June 2017 study by the Trump Administration-era U.S. EPA and Army Corps of Engineers, the agencies reduced the Rule’s economic benefits by nearly 90 percent, resulting in the costs associated with implementing the Rule being greater than the hypothetical benefits. The agencies specifically attacked the ten studies in support of the $338 million – $554 million figures, explaining that the studies were too old to accurately reflect current environmental attitudes and values.

This 2017 economic analysis accompanies the Trump Administration’s June 27, 2017 proposed regulations formally repealing the Rule and reinstating the pre-2015 language. The rulemaking process is expected to last several months at the minimum, and will likely be subject to litigation.

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