Letters to the Editor: The mussel invasion of California waterways that didn’t have to happen

To the editor: Halloween brought news of a scary new alien invasion — the discovery of golden mussels in California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, likely introduced in a ship’s ballast water. That needn’t have happened.

If the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency had done its job as the Clean Water Act required and implemented effective regulations to control ballast water discharges, the mussel would never would have reached U.S. waters. In 2022, 34 members of Congress and 180 environmental, fishing and public health organizations and Native American tribes begged the EPA to establish effective ballast water rules, but the agency never responded.

Now, water supply systems and freshwater ecosystems throughout California — and potentially throughout much of North America — are at risk. This invasion was both predictable and predicted, and fully preventable.

There will be further, potentially more harmful, invasions if EPA doesn’t finally act as the Clean Water Act directed.

Andrew Cohen, Richmond, Calif.

The writer is director of the Center for Research on Aquatic Bioinvasions.