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Wastershed Plans

Development of a watershed based plan is the key step in the efforts to restore our rivers and streams from the impacts of nonpoint sources of pollution. The plans focus on addressing issues identified by the impaired streams list and TMDLs, with the ultimate goal of restoring the waterbody so it can meet water quality standards. The NPS Program may be able to provide technical and/or financial assistance for plan development; to learn more contact your regional Basin Coordinator.
The watershed based plan (WBP) is a document that includes an introduction (background and geographic extent of the watershed), followed by nine elements that must be included in order for the plan to qualify for § 319 funding. Click-Here to review West Virginia's WBPs.

Note: After a WBP is complete or nearly so, the next step is to determine if its restoration goals have been reached. Water bodies can be removed from the 303(d) list if the data shows WQ standards have been achieved. CLICK-HERE for the steps needed to ensure de-listing.

Watershed planning guidance Watershed Academy Web: Introduction to Watershed Planning USEPA: Resources for watershed planning Putting Together A Watershed Management Plan - A Guide for Watershed Partnerships A guide to using natural resource information in local decision making (Minnesota DNR) Guidance Manual for TMDL Implementation (Virginia DEQ) Users Guide to Watershed Planning in Maryland (Maryland DNR) Urban subwatershed restoration manuals (Center for Watershed Protection) Planning and managing a successful project to control nonpoint source polltion (NC State Cooperative Extension) WVDEP's watershed protection plan guidance and USEPA's Healthy Watershed Protection
Models and other resources related to watershed planning Load duration curve online provides a process to develop duration curves, which identify pollutant loading capacities relative to a target concentration (Purdue University) Load estimation models (Region 5 and STEPL - US EPA) STEPL online generates HUC12-level information on drainage area, land use, animal units, septics and soils AMDTreat is a computer application for estimating abatement cost of polluted coal mine drainage (OSM) Online Watershed Library (OWL): Center for Watershed Protection
Note: In certain cases § 319 funds may be available for healthy watersheds that are not yet impaired, but may be threatened. In this case the plan becomes a Watershed Protection Plan (WPP). The protection plan is similar in format to the WBP.