In its Second Annual Report, the Council on Environmental Quality offered the following assessment of the Refuse Act Permit Program:

The Refuse Act is an important mechanism for enforcing water quality standards because it permits swifter action against polluters than is possible under the enforcement provisions of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act (FWPCA) itself. Because it prohibits discharges into navigable waters in the absence of a permit and gives the Secretary of the Army broad discretion in establishing permit conditions, the Refuse Act could remedy some deficiencies in the nature and scope of standards adopted pursuant to the FWPCA. For example, standards for nonmunicipal discharges could be extended to all navigable waters and could be stated in terms of precise effluent limitations tailored to meet ambient water quality requirements.

However, because the FWPCA is the most recent and explicit congressional expression with respect to water quality, the Administration has asked the Congress to make major improvements in the Federal Water Quality program through that act. In the meantime, the permit and enforcement program under the Refuse Act is being used to enforce existing water quality standards. Environmental Quality: The Second Annual Report of the Council on Environmental Quality, Government Printing Office, August 1971.

In the two above paragraphs, CEQ gets to the nub of the central difficulty underlying the Administration's Refuse Act Permit program. At its heart, the program is an attempt to dovetail the quick and simple if underutilized federal enforcement approach represented by the Refuse Act section of the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899 with what CEQ itself describes as the "limited and cumbersome enforcement mechanisms for pollution abatement by the Federal Government," represented by the present FWPCA. See "Environmental Quality," The Second Annual Report of the Council on Environmental Quality, supra, pp. 10-13. See also Executive Order No. 11514, Administration of the Refuse Act Program, December 23, 1970, 1 ELR 45007. Earlier critiques of the proposed Permit Proigram appeared at 1 ELR 10009-12 and 1 ELR 10030-31.