Richard Chinn Environmental Training, Inc.

07/26/2024

For those of you looking for work as a wetland scientist, the states with state wetland rules will be a better bet than states without wetland rules in light of the 2023 Sackett Supreme Court terrible ruling.

Those states with state wetland rules (to the best of my knowledge) are: California, Colorado (just passed), Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois (in process), Indiana, coastal Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, coastal South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin

05/28/2024

I am doing my first class in Charlotte in several years and reached out for site approval. One of my graduates from 1996 is the now the director. Amazing how 28 years fly by.

02/19/2024

The State 404 program whereby the Florida Department of Environmental Protection took over much of the Army Corps of Engineers Section 404 permitting in Florida (basically, all but hte non-coastal 404 permitting) was not done legally, according to the courts, and is immediately suspended.

The EPA and the US Fish and Wildlife Service violated the Endangered Species Act when the Trump administration turned over a federal wetlands dredge-and-fill permitting program to the state of Florida, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

12/26/2023

I hope everyone is having a safe, healthy holiday season!

10/30/2023

The EPA was too lazy to rewrite the definition of Waters of the US, so I did:

Waters of the United States means waters which are:

(a)(1)(i) Currently used, or were used in the past, or may be susceptible to use in interstate or foreign commerce, including all waters which are subject to the ebb and flow of the tide;

(ii) The territorial seas;

(iii) Interstate waters;

(2) Impoundments of waters otherwise defined as waters of the United States under this definition, other than impoundments of waters identified under paragraph (a)(5) of this section;

(3) Tributaries of waters identified in paragraph (a)(1) or (2) of this section that are relatively permanent, standing or continuously flowing bodies of water:

(4) Wetlands adjacent to the following waters:

(i) Waters identified in paragraph (a)(1) of this section;

(ii) Relatively permanent, standing or continuously-flowing bodies of water identified in paragraph (a)(2) or (a)(3) of this section and with a continuous surface connection to those waters;

Adjacent means having a continuous surface connection.

(5) Intrastate lakes and ponds not identified in paragraphs (a)(1) through (4) of this section that are relatively permanent, standing or continuously flowing bodies of water with a continuous surface connection to the waters identified in paragraph (a)(1) or (a)(3) of this section;

The terms tidal waters and waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide mean those waters that rise and fall in a predictable and measurable rhythm or cycle due to the gravitational pulls of the moon and sun. Tidal waters and waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide end where the rise and fall of the water surface can no longer be practically measured in a predictable rhythm due to masking by hydrologic, wind, or other effects.

10/20/2023

I have been awarded a 5-year contract to provide Environmental and Leadership Training Services in Wetlands and Streams to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

05/10/2023

If you see me in Spokane, be sure to stop and chat.

05/10/2023

Thank you for the well wishes. I am mostly recovered but will make a full recovery.

02/15/2023

I submitted two abstracts for oral presentations recently: one to the South Atlantic Chapter annual meeting and one to the Society of Wetland Scientists annual meeting.

02/01/2023

New stuff: where to begin?

The EPA and ACOE published their new definition of Waters of the US on January 18, 3023. It will go into effect 60 days later later which I think is March 19, 2023.

I am the Chair of the South Atlantic Chair of the Society of Wetland Scientists.

The South Atlantic Chapter will hold its conference since before Covid. I have submitted a paper to be presented.

I will be submitting a paper and hopefully presenting at the Society of Wetland Scientists Annual Meeting in Spokane this summer.

Richard

12/31/2021

For those of you who know about my Irish peat brick, with the hair, and my fascination with it potentially being from a Pleistocene mammal, well, the results are in. The sample was radiocarbon dated and is 4650 - 4850 calendar years before present, slightly older than the Pyramids and the extinction of the last wooly mammoths in Siberia, however, not old enough to be from the great Pleistocene megafauna.

12/11/2021

The Biden administration has just posted a proposed new definition of waters of the US. I haven’t had a chance to digest it yet, but there are several references to the 1986 definition which was mostly apolitical.