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Upcoming EPA Survey Results to Determine Regulation of Water Utilities, Official Says
NEW ORLEANS--The Environmental Protection Agency is uncertain whether it will go forward with rules for pollutant discharges from drinking water utilities, and the agency will make a decision after it completes a survey of large and medium-sized plants, an EPA official said Oct. 4.
Data obtained from 18 on-site visits to drinking water
facilities has revealed "no nationwide problems," said Mary Smith, director of
EPA's engineering and analysis division within the Office of Water's science and
technology section.
"We'll have to think about what to do when we get survey results back," Smith
told participants at the 2006 National Pretreatment & Pollution Prevention
Workshop organized by the National Association of Clean Water Agencies. The
workshop runs through Oct. 6.
EPA is waiting for the White House Office of Management and Budget to approve
the agency's information collection request, Smith said. The request was made in
conjunction with the agency's 2004 Effluent Guidelines Program Plan to establish
effluent guidelines for drinking water utilities and two other unregulated
industries, she said (129 DEN A-6, 7/7/05) .
EPA is required under the Clean Water Act to develop regulations, known as
effluent guidelines, to limit pollutants discharged directly to surface water.
The Clean Water Act also directs EPA to identify industries not regulated by
effluent guidelines that may be discharging more than trivial amounts of toxic
or nonconventional pollutants, such as nutrients.
In 2005, EPA requested OMB's permission to survey all drinking water utilities
serving populations of more than 50,000, and a sample of those serving between
10,000 and 50,000 people, to determine the need for effluent guidelines. Smith
said she is expecting a response "any day" from OMB.
After conducting the survey, EPA will make a final decision in December 2007
whether to regulate pollutant discharges from drinking water utilities, she
said.
Following her remarks, Smith told BNA that despite the data from the on-site
visits, the agency is still awaiting the survey results before deciding on the
need to regulate the drinking water facilities. "Each facility is very, very
different" and needs to be assessed based on its location and its type of
treatment, she said.
Water utilities often discharge pollutants such as suspended solids, aluminum
salts, organic matter, radionuclides, iron salts, polymers, lime, arsenic, or
other residuals.
The treatment is more extensive and the discharges more pronounced in utilities
that serve heavily populated areas, according to EPA.
By Amena H. Saiyid