2022 EPA Nutrient Reduction Memorandum

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2022 memorandum issued by the Office of Water outlined the agency’s plans to accelerate progress in controlling nutrient pollution in our nation's waters using five governing principles that lead to three main strategies and associated actionable items that will continue to drive nutrient reductions.

• Accelerating Nutrient Pollution Reductions in the Nation’s Waters (April 2022 Memorandum) (pdf) (384.42 KB)

• Strategy 1: Deepen Collaborative Partnerships with Agriculture
• Strategy 2: Redouble the EPA’s Efforts to Support States, Tribes and Territories to Achieve Nutrient Pollution Reductions from All Sources
• Strategy 3: Utilize the EPA’s Clean Water Act Authorities to Drive Progress, Innovation and Collaboration

Strategy 1: Deepen Collaborative Partnerships with Agriculture

• Actively collaborating with USDA leadership to build and maintain connections and momentum to help targeting funds whenever feasible to the locations and practices that will generate the most significant reductions in nutrient loads.
• Expanding engagements with agricultural stakeholders and highlighting their innovation and successes in reducing nutrient loads to waterbodies.
• Deepening on-the-ground collaboration with USDA, states, territories, Tribes, and stakeholders in key geographic areas to leverage the EPA’s current activities and identify additional opportunities to help reduce nutrient pollution.

Strategy 2: Redouble the EPA’s Efforts to Support States, Tribes and Territories to Achieve Nutrient Pollution Reductions from All Sources

• Strongly encouraging states to use a One Water approach to deliver a range of water quality benefits including protection of sources of drinking water.
• Championing innovative financing and using the flexibility of the Clean Water Act regulatory framework to spur development of more effective technologies, drive market-based approaches, including water quality trading, third-party credit aggregation and banking, and stronger agriculture-water sector partnerships.
• Prioritizing strategies to support small, rural and disadvantaged communities.

Strategy 3: Utilize the EPA’s Clean Water Act Authorities to Drive Progress, Innovation and Collaboration

• Urging more robust adoption of numeric nutrient criteria, particularly the newly published stressor-response based numeric criteria recommendations to address nutrient pollution in lakes and reservoirs, into Water Quality Standards.
• More fully using the CWA assessment and listing process support identifying nutrient-related impairments and assisting states in the development of robust and ready-for-implementation TMDLs and other restoration plans to reduce nutrient pollution.
• Further reducing nutrient loads from point sources by providing strong support of innovative permitting approaches that can drive deeper, sustained nutrient reductions.