Some disheartening news: A CBF analysis of Virginia’s efforts over the past year to speed the cleanup of the Chesapeake Bay indicates the Commonwealth is falling short in doing what state officials promised just a year ago. This doesn’t bode well for achieving what all acknowledge will be even more ambitious commitments needed to save the Bay in the coming years.

First, some background. As most people know, because more than two decades of voluntary agreements, unmet commitments, and missed deadlines failed to restore the Chesapeake Bay, the Obama Administration and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are now aggressively pushing forward with a federal plan to clean up the Bay.

The crux of the federal plan is what’s called a Total Maximum Daily Load, essentially a scientifically derived limit on the amount of pollution the Bay system can safely tolerate. It’s often called a pollution diet for the Bay. Required by the Clean Water Act and court settlements from a decade ago and long anticipated, the diet specifies how much nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment will be allowed to go in the Bay and calls on the Bay states to devise plans to meet and maintain those limits.

Last year, the Bay state governors, including then Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, agreed with EPA that past cleanup efforts had failed, that an accelerated program was necessary, and that state cleanup plans to comply with the Bay diet should be completed no later than the end of 2010. The states then would begin implementing those plans, with phased two-year milestone goals, deadlines, and progress reports to EPA – a key tool to ensure everyone is doing what their plans called for. The end goal is a restored Bay by 2025.

So important is it to accelerate the cleanup that the Bay state governors and EPA agreed publicly last year to establish initial three-year milestones to be achieved by the end of 2011.

But CBF’s analysis found little evidence of an overall acceleration of Bay cleanup as Virginia pledged in 2009. In the first year of its initial milestones, little new was done. To make matters worse, Virginia has cut back on some restoration programs because of budget concerns.

Learn more at the Bay Daily website!