On July 25, 1975,¹ the Army Corps of Engineers promulgated interim final regulations governing the granting of permits for activities in United States inland and ocean waters, including, inter alia, the discharge of dredged and fill materials. The Corps' action came in response to a court order² invalidating the agency's previous rules that restricted its regulatory jurisdiction over the latter category of activities to "navigable waters" as traditionally defined.

Man has been dumping his wastes into the oceans since time immemorial, but the quantity and toxicity of these discharges has increased steadily as our industrial society has become more complex. Though scientists have just begun to study the environmental impact of these personal and industrial wastes and though tracking the paths of discharged metals and bacteria through shifting ocean currents is a frustrating and difficult task, the results thus far obtained from such investigation are not encouraging.

"Only Nixon loves a coyote" seems to be the message of recent political developments in Washington sanctioning increased use of sodium cyanide devices to kill these and other predators. To be specific, President Ford recently relaxed stringent limits imposed by his predecessor in a 1972 Executive Order¹ on the field use of toxic chemicals in federal programs against coyotes and other predators on federal lands, which form a large part of the habitat of the coyote in five southwestern states.

The Environmental Law Institute recently concluded an eight-month study of enforcement under the Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972 for the National Commission on Water Quality. The Institute's report was part of the Commission's effort under §315 of the Act to review issues related to the Act's implementation;¹ a draft Commission report to Congress is expected this fall.

The Environmental Law Institute has recently initiated a year-long National Science Foundation-funded project to investigate impediments to and incentives for solar energy development.

The question of whether and how to control growth has come to the fore in the last several years as one of the broadest and most serious environmental issues facing the United States.¹ In the area of land use, this abstract question reduces to the dilemma of managing or controlling the rapid and chaotic development at the perimeters of metropolitan centers that has drastically reshaped the face of our nation since 1945.

A pair of amendments to the National Environmental Policy Act has recently been signed into law. One of the acts, Public Law No. 94-83, seeks to clarify federal and state roles in preparing environmental impact statements, and will have a significant bearing on future litigation directed at NEPA statements on federal aid highway projects and other federal actions. The second act authorizes 1976 appropriations and several minor administrative changes for the Council on Environmental Quality, of interest primarily to the Council itself.

In a landmark decision¹ that may have far-reaching effects on the U.S. Forest Service's management of the nation's timber resources, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a lower court ruling that the Organic Act of 1897² bans clearcutting on federally owned land in the Monongahela National Forest in West Virginia. Conservationists have strenuously objected to the use of this harvesting technique, which consists of felling all trees within a designated area regardless of size, age, or health, in national forests.

The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), now approaching its sixth year as the cornerstone of legal efforts to protect the environment, is still under attack by federal agencies seeking to limit, transfer, or avoid their NEPA workload.

WILLIAM DRAYTON: How do we solve the problems society faces? We are not going to solve them with capital. The cost of capital has been rising gradually over the last several decades as we have moved into a world capital market. Capital is seeking higher returns elsewhere, and we are saving less. Nor will solutions come through further, more aggressive exploitation of natural resources. Our per unit cost of the natural resources we use is also gradually rising—as the very need for environmental protections demonstrates.