Regulatory Alert - RA 02-11 - EPA’S DRAFT STRATEGY FOR WATER QUALITY STANDARDS AND CRITERIA REQUEST FOR MEMBER COMMENT

AMSA Regulatory Alert (RA 02-11)

To: Members & Affiliates, Wet Weather Committee
From: National Office
Date: May 23, 2002
Subject: EPA’S DRAFT STRATEGY FOR WATER QUALITY STANDARDS AND CRITERIA REQUEST FOR MEMBER COMMENT
Reference: RA 02-11

Action Please By:
July 1, 2002

On May 7, 2002, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released for public comment its Draft Strategy for Water Quality Standards and Criteria: Strengthening the Foundation of Programs to Protect and Restore the Nation’s Waters (Draft Strategy). The Draft Strategy represents the culmination of the Agency’s review of the existing standards and criteria program, its functionality, and its interaction with other clean water programs. The Draft Strategy lays out a series of strategic actions to guide program activities for the next seven years. EPA will consider any comments received by July 15, 2002. AMSA will work through its Water Quality Committee to compile comments on this document, and we ask members to provide us with their feedback by July 1, 2002. Comments should be submitted to Chris Hornback, AMSA at chornback@amsa-cleanwater.org. The Draft Strategy can be obtained at: http://www.epa.gov/waterscience/standards/.

Early on in the review process, EPA identified AMSA as a key stakeholder for shaping the new strategy. On August 23, 2001, AMSA met with EPA Office of Science and Technology (OST) staff and provided a number of suggestions for the Agency to consider as it developed the Draft Strategy. The meeting was one in a series the Agency conducted with various stakeholders to collect information for the strategy. EPA’s Draft Strategy also considers the comments that were filed on the Agency’s Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) issued July 7, 1998 (63 Fed. Reg. 36741). AMSA filed extensive comments on that rulemaking and reiterated some of the same concerns during the August 2001 meeting.

The Draft Strategy addresses a number of the issues AMSA has raised over the last few years, including the need for guidance on designated uses and use attainability analyses (UAAs), the need for coordinating total maximum daily load (TMDL) development with the review of water quality standards, and the lack of analytical methods for evaluating bacterial indicators in wastewater. However, the proposed schedule for some of the key actions will leave a number of critical issues unresolved for the near future.

Draft Strategy – An Overview
Over the past year, EPA spent considerable time collecting and synthesizing information to formulate the Draft Strategy. The Agency’s broad review of the existing water quality standards and criteria program included an examination of EPA’s current goals for clean water; major needs of programs that rely on standards and criteria, including total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) and National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits; and current trends in water quality including emerging environmental problems. EPA’s effort to develop the Draft Strategy also involved more than 50 listening sessions with stakeholders and consideration of recent recommendations from the National Research Council, the General Accounting Office, EPA’s Inspector General, and EPA’s National Environmental Justice Advisory Committee.

EPA’s vision for the program recognizes that water quality controls must strive for the highest attainable use:

All waters of the United States will have water quality standards that included the highest attainable uses, combined with water quality criteria that reflect the current and evolving body of scientific information to protect those uses. Further, standards will have well-defined means for implementation through Clean Water Act Programs.

The Draft Strategy acknowledges that EPA and states will use the existing statutory and regulatory framework to “adjust designated uses where needed for waters that surpass the quality of the current designated uses and to designate the highest uses attainable for waters where current standards are not attainable.” From an extensive list of suggested ways to strengthen the standards and criteria program, EPA identified 28 strategic actions, organized into five main categories or “directions,” that appeared to be the most important for consideration over the next seven years.

EPA’s Five Strategic Directions and Proposed Work Plan
EPA’s five “directions” and corresponding strategic actions are designed to strengthen the water quality standards and criteria program and fill critical gaps and implementation needs. AMSA notes that the strategy does not include an action to revise the national water quality standards regulation to address implementation issues. Rather, the Draft Strategy focuses on key work products or actions OST and EPA feel will improve the existing program. EPA indicates that most of the concerns raised by stakeholders were derived from a lack of clarity in policy or guidance, and not from a defect in the regulatory requirements themselves.

The Draft Strategy includes as an appendix a proposed work plan that outlines the 28 action items and related products, a tentative schedule for each action, and the office(s) responsible for that action. OST will update the work plan as needed over time. A brief overview of the five elements of EPA’s Draft Strategy and some of the key actions the Agency plans to take and the associated timeframes follows.

1. Clarify program requirements where gaps and lack of clarity have led to uncertainty, inconsistency or inaction.
The Agency plans to develop clear guidance and provide ongoing support for state programs to set designated uses that reflect the goals of the Clean Water Act and help states decide where adjustments of uses should and should not be made (e.g., guidance for conducting use attainability analyses (UAAs)). The guidance is scheduled for development in 2003 and 2004. The Agency also plans to develop guidance on the recommended procedures for implementing antidegradation policies (planned for 2006). The other actions will be conducted on an ongoing basis.

2. Enhance implementation guidance and integration with other programs linked to standards.
In the near term, OST plans to develop guidance on implementing the duration and frequency components of existing numeric criteria (planned for 2003) and address the technical and policy aspects of flow considerations (2004), mixing zones (2005), and variances (no date set). EPA also plans to address interpreting and implementing standards in wet weather situations (ongoing) and work to complete the national consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service (2004).

3. Strengthen and maintain the scientific foundation of water quality programs.
EPA plans to provide additional guidance for implementing bacteria criteria (implementation guidance expected in 2002), and propose and finalize analytical methods for bacterial indicators in wastewater (planned for 2003 and 2004). EPA plans to release a number of technical manuals and additional criteria documents on nutrients (manual for wetlands expected in 2002). EPA also plans to coordinate research efforts on sedimentation (ongoing); update and refine the 1985 methodology for deriving aquatic life criteria (no date set); provide technical guidance for implementing the 2000 methodology for human health criteria, and develop new criteria (EPA will consider emerging pollutants, including endocrine disruptors; numerous actions planned for 2003 and 2004; ongoing criteria development for ranked pollutants); continue development and implementation of biological criteria (numerous actions starting in 2002, including a case study on biocriteria in enforcement); complete and begin implementing the Strategy for Waterborne Microbial Disease (publish in 2002); and continually update analytical methods to enable detection of pollutants at levels near the criteria values (plans include development of a method for PBDE during 2003 and 2004).

4. Link standards to watershed approaches at the state and local levels.
EPA plans to develop guidance for improving the sequencing and coordination of TMDL development with water quality standards reviews and encourage coordination of these activities where information sharing can make the processes more efficient. This guidance is currently scheduled for release in 2004. EPA also plans to provide additional guidance for making scientifically-valid site-specific modifications to criteria (planned for 2002), address issues of inter-jurisdictional differences in water quality standards for shared waters (no date set), promote increased use of biological criteria, and develop guidance on adapting and implementing water quality standards for intermittent, ephemeral, and effluent dependent waters (planned for 2004).

5. Build the capacity and share information among EPA, states and authorized tribes.
EPA plans to sponsor meetings, workshops, and electronic dialogues with stakeholders to assist in developing and implementing EPA policies and guidance; establish a clearinghouse for information sharing; expand training opportunities, among other things, to improve the skills and knowledge base of water quality professionals and maintain open lines of communication. Most of these activities are expected to continue on an ongoing basis.

If you have any questions relating to the Draft Strategy, please contact Chris Hornback, AMSA at 202/833-9106 or chornback@amsa-cleanwater.org.