Brett Walton

About Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club's Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

Entries by Brett Walton

St. Louis Sewer District and U.S. Justice Department Reach Record $4.7 Billion Clean Water Act Settlement

August 8, 2011/in Infrastructure, North America, Water News, Water Policy & Politics/by Brett Walton

The sewer district joins more than 40 American municipalities renovating their sewer systems to comply with the CWA. The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District, the nation’s fourth-largest system, will overhaul its sewer infrastructure at an estimated cost of $US 4.7 billion over 23 years, according to a settlement announced on Thursday by the U.S. Justice […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, August 8: Drought in East Africa, Dead Zones in the Gulf

August 8, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Make Way for Aid At an August 3 hearing on the Horn of Africa drought, a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee received testimony from the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development, Mercy Corps, the Atlantic Council, and CARE USA. The representative from USAID said because of signals from a drought early-warning system, the agency […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, August 1: Flooding

August 1, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Federal Flood Insurance Program Could Go Underwater Climate change could devastate not only landscapes and structures, but a national insurance program that pays for their rehabilitation, according to a soon-to-be-released report from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The study estimates that areas described as ‘flood plain’ could grow by 40 to 45 percent by the […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, July 25: Tar Sands Pipeline Review

July 25, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Pipeline Update The State Department expects to release a final environmental impact statement next month for the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, a department official said on Friday during a teleconference from Washington, D.C. After the final EIS is released, federal agencies will have 90 days to comment on whether building the 1,700-mile pipeline […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, July 18: EPA Under Pressure

July 18, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

House Takes On the EPA The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would bar the Environmental Protection Agency from overturning state decisions on water quality, the Huffington Post reports. Sixteen Democrats voted with the Republican majority. GAO Rebukes the EPA The Government Accountability Office says that the Environmental Protection Agency ‘has not effectively […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

American Arsenic: After a Decade, Small Communities Still Struggle to Meet Federal Drinking Water Standards

July 11, 2011/in North America, Pollution, Sanitation/Health, Water Law, Water News, Water Policy & Politics/by Brett Walton

When the EPA lowered the arsenic standard for drinking water from 50 parts per billion to 10 in 2001, there were 3,000 water systems in violation. Today, nearly a thousand still are.

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, July 11: Funding and Management Proposals

July 11, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Proposed Water Funding Cuts The House Appropriations Committee released its fiscal year 2012 funding proposal for various land, water and environmental agencies. The Interior and Environment Appropriations bill would cut most deeply from the Environmental Protection Agency, Water World reports. The bill would fund the EPA at $7.1 billion, or $1.8 billion less than the […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, July 5: Monitoring the Environment

July 5, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Montana Oil Spill Only a small fraction of the oil spilled from an ExxonMobil pipeline into the Yellowstone River in Montana is likely to be recovered, according to an Environmental Protection Agency staff member, speaking with the Associated Press. In the last year, several pipeline breaks have fouled waterways in the U.S, most notably the […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

The Stream, June 30: Water Highs and Lows in the U.S.

June 30, 2011/in The Stream/by Brett Walton

Georgia officials are smiling after Tuesday’s verdict from a federal appeals panel that overturns a lower court’s ruling that metro Atlanta does not have legal authority to use Lake Lanier for its water supply. The Associated Press reports that the Army Corps of Engineers, which operates the reservoir, will re-evaluate Atlanta’s request for water under […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Israeli Data Company Makes a Splash in the Water Industry

June 29, 2011/in Middle East, South America, Water News/by Brett Walton

TaKaDu uses algorithms to save water, energy, and money for utility companies around the globe.

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

FOIA Lawsuit Seeks Release of U.S. Department of Energy’s ‘Water-Energy Roadmap’

June 28, 2011/in North America, Water & Energy, Water Law, Water News, Water Policy & Politics/by Brett Walton

The report, one of two ordered by Congress on water and energy, has been delayed for years.

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

Federal Water Tap, June 27: Water, Nuclear Oversight

June 27, 2011/in Federal Water Tap/by Brett Walton

Taking the EPA’s Authority Away A House committee approved a bill that would gut much of the EPA’s power to enforce clean water standards. The Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act, approved by the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, would transfer regulatory power over water, wetlands and mountaintop mining to the states, Greenwire reports. The House leadership […]

Brett Walton

Brett writes about agriculture, energy, infrastructure, and the politics and economics of water in the United States. He also writes the Federal Water Tap, Circle of Blue’s weekly digest of U.S. government water news. He is the winner of two Society of Environmental Journalists reporting awards, one of the top honors in American environmental journalism: first place for explanatory reporting for a series on septic system pollution in the United States(2016) and third place for beat reporting in a small market (2014). He received the Sierra Club’s Distinguished Service Award in 2018. Brett lives in Seattle, where he hikes the mountains and bakes pies. Contact Brett Walton

circleofblue.org/author/brett

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About Brett Walton

Entries by Brett Walton