[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 245 (Wednesday, December 21, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 93681-93682]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-30760]


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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[EPA-HQ-OW-2015-0335; FRL-9956-93-OW]


Final EPA-USGS Technical Report: Protecting Aquatic Life from 
Effects of Hydrologic Alteration

AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and United States 
Geological Survey (USGS).

ACTION: Notice of availability.

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SUMMARY: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the United 
States Geological Survey are releasing a technical report: Final EPA-
USGS Technical Report: Protecting Aquatic Life from Effects of 
Hydrologic Alteration. Healthy aquatic ecosystems provide an array of 
services to individuals and society, including clean drinking water, 
irrigation supplies, and recreational opportunities. Sound and 
sustainable management of aquatic ecosystems is an integral part of 
managing water resources to meet the needs of society. Hydrologic 
alteration can be a contributor to the impairment of water bodies that 
are designated to support aquatic life. Stresses on aquatic life 
associated with hydrologic alteration may be further exacerbated by 
climate change.
    This report provides States, Tribes and territories with scientific 
and technical information on the natural flow regime and potential 
effects of flow alteration on aquatic life, and a flexible, 
nonprescriptive framework that state water managers might consider if 
they are interested in developing narrative or numeric targets for flow 
regime components that are protective of aquatic life. The report also 
provides information about States and Tribes that have adopted 
narrative water quality standards to protect their waterbodies' flow 
regimes and on the potential impact of climate change on flow regimes.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Diana Eignor, Health and Ecological 
Criteria Division, Office of Water (Mail Code 4304T), Environmental 
Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20460; 
telephone number: (202) 566-1143; email address: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. General Information

A. How can I get copies of this document and other related information?

    1. Docket: All documents in the docket are listed in the 
www.regulations.gov index. Although listed in the index, some 
information is not publicly available, e.g., CBI or other information 
whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Certain other material, such 
as copyrighted material, will be publicly available only in hard copy. 
Publicly available docket materials are available either electronically 
in www.regulations.gov or in hard copy at the Water Docket, EPA/DC, EPA 
West, Room 3334, 1301 Constitution Ave. NW., Washington, DC. The Public 
Reading Room is open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through 
Friday, excluding legal holidays. The telephone number for the Public 
Reading Room is (202) 566-1744, and the telephone number for the Water 
Docket is (202) 566-2426. For additional

[[Page 93682]]

information about EPA's public docket, visit EPA Docket Center homepage 
at http://www.epa.gov/epahome/dockets.htm.

II. What is this document?

    This document serves as a technical and informational resource for 
States, Tribes, territories, and other stakeholders that want to 
protect aquatic life from the adverse effects of flow alteration. To 
that end, this report provides technical information about the effect 
of altered flow regimes on aquatic life and a nonprescriptive framework 
that may be used to help quantify targets for flow regime components 
that are protective of aquatic life and their habitats. The report also 
provides examples of state and tribal water quality standards designed 
to protect such flow regimes and discusses the potential impact of 
climate change on flow regimes. This technical report is not a rule and 
it, therefore, does not impose any mandatory requirements. State and 
Tribal decision makers retain the discretion to adopt approaches or 
information presented in this report on a case-by-case basis that 
differ from the approaches described in this report.

III. Additional Information:

    EPA and USGS each conducted internal peer reviews of the report, 
and EPA managed a contractor-led independent external peer review of 
the Draft EPA-USGS Technical Report: Protecting Aquatic Life from 
Effects of Hydrologic Alteration. EPA will make the external peer 
review comments and Agency responses to these comments available in the 
docket at http://www.regulations.gov.

    Dated: December 14, 2016.
Joel Beauvais,
Deputy Assistant Administrator, Office of Water.
[FR Doc. 2016-30760 Filed 12-20-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6560-50-P