Browner

Petitioners challenge the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) decision to issue National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits to five municipalities, for their separate storm sewers, without requiring numeric limitations to ensure compliance with state water-quality standards. Petitioners sought administrative review of the decision within the EPA, which the Environmental Appeals Board (EAB) denied. This timely petition for review ensued. For the reasons that follow, we deny the petition.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Title 26 U.S.C. § 1342 (a)(1) authorizes the EPA to issue NPDES permits, thereby allowing entities to discharge some pollutants. In 1992 and 1993, the cities of Tempe, Tucson, Mesa, and Phoenix, Arizona, and Pima County, Arizona (Interve-nors), submitted applications for NPDES permits. The EPA prepared draft permits for public comment; those draft permits did not attempt to ensure compliance with Arizona’s water-quality standards.

Petitioner Defenders of Wildlife objected to the permits, arguing that they must contain numeric limitations to ensure strict compliance with state water-quality standards. The State of Arizona also…