HONOLULU (AP) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has designated the waters of two remote beaches in Hawaii as being contaminated by trash, forcing the state to address the persistent problem of plastic deposited on its coastlines by swirling Pacific Ocean currents.

The decision will require authorities to establish a daily limit for the trash at the two locations, one of which is so notorious for collecting debris that some call it “Plastic Beach”î or “Junk Beach.î”

Hawaii had opposed the step, which finds the waterways ìimpairedî under the Clean Water Act, on the grounds there were insufficient criteria or guidelines for determining what amounts to plastic pollution in waterways. But the EPA overruled the state, saying a lack of formalized methodology was not an excuse.

The agency published a notice about the decision on Friday. It’s seeking public comment through Aug. 19. The state Department of Health did not respond to a request for comment.

David Forman, director of the environmental law program at the University of Hawaii’s law school, said the state of Hawaii initially didn’t want to list any water bodies as being impaired.

“So now, hopefully this will force Hawaii to to change that tune and start seriously addressing the problem of plastics in Hawaii,”î he said.

It may also add “fuel to the fireî” to a broader push to address plastics as a pollutant, he said. This could be at local levels, he said, like the state Legislature and city councils, and at global institutions like the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

The environmental groups the Center for Biological Diversity, the Surfrider Foundation and Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii sued the EPA to compel the decision.

Daily limits on trash will have to be incorporated into the state’s water quality management plan, said Maxx Phillips, the Hawaii director for the Center for Biological Diversity. The state will need to control the amount of plastic pollution at these sites so it doesn’t harm water quality, she said.

Both sites are far from population centers. Kamilo Beach, is on the southern point of the Big Island. The second, Tern Island, is an atoll 560 miles northwest of Honolulu that’s within a wildlife refuge and marine national monument.