The Clean Water Act’s Nurdle-Shaped Gap: Using the CWA to Address Primary Microplastic Pollution

The term “nurdles” may sound like a silly made-up word lifted from the pages of a children’s book, but unfortunately nurdles are all-too real, with trillions of these microplastics ending up in our oceans each year. Nurdles spill into the environment at every step along their supply chain, allowing them to end up in fish and on our plates. Despite the known danger nurdles pose to both wildlife and humans, they are virtually unregulated. In the absence of regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), some states and their citizens have begun trying to wrangle rogue nurdles, and hold nurdle dischargers accountable, on their own. Unfortunately, due to the sheer volume of nurdles escaping into the environment and their mobility once out there, even the most successful local efforts are unable to make a dent in the nurdle problem. However, the Clean Water Act (CWA) already provides the tools needed to address nurdle pollution at the federal level — it just needs to be used in the right way. This Note offers two such ways the CWA can be utilized in the fight against nurdle pollution. To curb everyday spills caused by improper handling at plastics facilities, the EPA should promulgate a zero nurdle discharge standard for relevant industries. To ensure proper nurdle cleanup in the wake of major shipping accidents, in which millions of nurdles spill directly into a waterway all at once, the EPA should consider classifying nurdles as a hazardous substance under CWA Section 311. As the plastics industry prepares to ramp up North American production, and research increasingly shows the hazards of nurdle ingestion, it is imperative that we address the gaps in our regulatory system that thus far have allowed nurdle pollution to go unchecked.