Green groups are asking the courts to give EPA a deadline for publishing a rule limiting atrazine, a popular weedkiller explicitly targeted by the country’s newly confirmed health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Four environmental health advocacy groups filed a petition with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday that, if granted in full, would give the agency until June 30 to issue a revised decision on acceptable atrazine levels in waters.
Federal pesticides law requires EPA conduct periodic reviews of approved farm chemicals, and “EPA has dragged its feet” on “one limited aspect of its atrazine” review for more than three years, what the groups argue is an “unreasonable timeframe” in their legal petition.
At issue is the agency’s proposed decision that sets the level of concern for atrazine concentrations in watersheds at 9.7 micrograms per liter, a threshold the Biden administration unveiled last July, open for public comment until April 4. It’s more stringent than the Trump administration’s 15-microliter limit, but far looser than the Obama administration’s 3.4-microliter limit.
