October 22, 2019 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The Postal Service is revising Mailing Standards of the United States Postal Service, International Mail Manual (IMM[supreg]), to reflect the prices, product features, and classification changes to Competitive Services and other minor changes, as established by the Governors of the Postal Service.

This action proposes to amend Class D airspace and establish Class E airspace extending upward from 700 feet above the surface of the earth at Buchanan Field, Concord, CA. This action also proposes to remove the Concord VOR/DME and the city listed before the airport name in the legal description header information. This action would ensure the safety and management of instrument flight rules (IFR) operations within the National Airspace System.

Pursuant to the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended (the Act), the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is publishing this regular biweekly notice. The Act requires the Commission to publish notice of any amendments issued, or proposed to be issued, and grants the Commission the authority to issue and make immediately effective any amendment to an operating license or combined license, as applicable, upon a determination by the Commission that such amendment involves no significant hazards consideration, notwithstanding the pendency before the Commission of a request for a hearing from any person. This biweekly notice includes all notices of amendments issued, or proposed to be issued, from September 24, 2019 to October 8, 2019. The last biweekly notice was published on October 8, 2019.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing changes to its test procedures required to be used by industries and municipalities when analyzing the chemical, physical, and biological properties of wastewater and other environmental samples for reporting under the EPA's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit program. The Clean Water Act requires the EPA to promulgate these test procedures (analytical methods) for analysis of pollutants. The EPA anticipates that these proposed changes will provide increased flexibility for the regulated community in meeting monitoring requirements while improving data quality. In addition, this proposed update to the CWA methods would incorporate technological advances in analytical technology. As such, the EPA expects that there will be no negative economic impacts resulting from these proposed changes.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of the Army (``the agencies'') are publishing a final rule to repeal the 2015 Clean Water Rule: Definition of ``Waters of the United States'' (``2015 Rule''), which amended portions of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), and to restore the regulatory text that existed prior to the 2015 Rule. The agencies will implement the pre-2015 Rule regulations informed by applicable agency guidance documents and consistent with Supreme Court decisions and longstanding agency practice. The agencies are repealing the 2015 Rule for four primary reasons. First, the agencies conclude that the 2015 Rule did not implement the legal limits on the scope of the agencies' authority under the Clean Water Act (CWA) as intended by Congress and reflected in Supreme Court cases, including Justice Kennedy's articulation of the significant nexus test in Rapanos. Second, the agencies conclude that in promulgating the 2015 Rule the agencies failed to adequately consider and accord due weight to the policy of the Congress in CWA section 101(b) to ``recognize, preserve, and protect the primary responsibilities and rights of States to prevent, reduce, and eliminate pollution'' and ``to plan the development and use . . . of land and water resources.'' 33 U.S.C. 1251(b). Third, the agencies repeal the 2015 Rule to avoid interpretations of the CWA that push the envelope of their constitutional and statutory authority absent a clear statement from Congress authorizing the encroachment of federal jurisdiction over traditional State land-use planning authority. Lastly, the agencies conclude that the 2015 Rule's distance-based limitations suffered from certain procedural errors and a lack of adequate record support. The agencies find that these reasons, collectively and individually, warrant repealing the 2015 Rule. With this final rule, the regulations defining the scope of federal CWA jurisdiction will be those portions of the CFR as they existed before the amendments promulgated in the 2015 Rule.