“[Effluent] trading is an innovative way for community stakeholders … to develop more ‘common sense’ solutions to water quality problems in their watersheds.”

Environmental Protection Agency Office of Water,1998

“[Effluent trading] does not provide critically important safeguards to ensure that the trading of pollution credits will help meet the Clean Water Act’s goals of zero discharge.”

National Wildlife Federation,1997

In 1969, an ember from a passing railcar landed on an oil slick in the heavily polluted Cuyahoga River, sparking a blaze that burned for hours. Outcry over the burning river led to the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970, whose mission is to protect the nation’s air, water, and land. One of the EPA’s first programs was the Clean Water Act (CWA), passed by Congress in 1972, which dictated that America’s lakes, rivers, and...