Company fined for fuel leaks

A Georgia company will pay $725,000 for spills of jet fuel and gasoline in Virginia, Georgia and North Carolina. Alpharetta, Ga.-based Plantation Pipeline company also agreed to $1.3 million in new spill prevention safeguards. The fines settle a federal lawsuit over alleged Clean Water Act violations. The lawsuit cited failure to have a spill prevention plan, a leak of jet fuel from a pipeline, and spills. In Georgia, there was a spill in Hull in 2003.

(Associated Press)

Judge grants protection for forested wetlands

Georgia’s forested wetlands get greater protection. A federal judge ruled in favor of environmentalists yesterday who took the Army Corp of engineers to court for allowing logging in a private lake area in Southeast Georgia without a permit.

The Corp wrongly waived the permit in 2006; opponents argued the logging would harm the lake’s habitat as a wetland.

The ruling clarifies a vague exemption in the federal Clean Water Act which allows permit exemption for “ongoing” tree harvesting. The judge said landowners failed to show they had logged their lake in the past, and there was no guarantee the trees would grow back.