![]() According to the EPA, just one acre of wetland can store about 1 million gallons of water. Wetlands provide critical habitat for fish and wildlife they filter nutrients, disperse sediment, and lessen flooding impacts. Runoff pollutants from farms, industry and urban development would create a perfect storm of water-quality degradation and an explosion of toxic algal blooms, threatening lives and livelihoods. Affording these waters less protection would devastate fish and wildlife habitats, potentially threaten drinking-water supplies and compromise the ecosystems of countless rivers, bays, lakes, streams and other waterways. If the petitioners prevail, more than half of wetlands in the United States would be in jeopardy. The Sacketts, in a legal battle spanning 15 years, argue the wetland is not subject to EPA regulation because it is not connected by surface waters to the lake, therefore it does not merit protection under the Act. The case stems from a dispute over whether an Idaho couple can build a home on their land, which the EPA argues contains a federally protected wetland within 300 feet of a navigable lake. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) centers around how wetlands should be defined under the Clean Water Act. The question before the high court in Sackett vs.
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