Rule-Making Notices
Notice of Hearing
Natural Resources
Environmental Protection—Wis. Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, Chs.
200—
(DNR # WT-28-10)
NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that pursuant to ss.
283.11(1),
(2);
283.21(2), and
283.31, interpreting ss.
283.11(1),
(2),
283.21(2), and
283.31, Wis. Stats., the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) will hold a public hearing on proposed revisions to ch.
NR 211, Wis. Admin. Code, relating to wastewater pretreatment requirements for DNR, pretreatment programs of publicly owned treatment works (POTWs) and for industries discharging wastewater to POTWs.
Hearing Information
Date: Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Time: 1:30 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Location: Wisconsin Dept. of Administration
101 E. Wilson St.
St. Croix Room
Madison, WI
Pursuant to the Americans with Disabilities Act, reasonable accommodations, including the provision of informational material in an alternative format, will be provided for qualified individuals with disabilities upon request as noted below. The public hearing sites are accessible to people with disabilities. If you have special needs or circumstances that may make communication or accessibility difficult at a hearing site or require other accommodation, please contact Robert Liska at (608) 267-7631 (email:
Robert.Liska@Wisconsin.gov) with specific information on your request at least 10 days before the date of the scheduled hearing.
Availability of Rules and Submitting Comments
The proposed rule revisions, including the Fiscal Estimate and the Economic Impact Analysis may be viewed and downloaded and comments electronically submitted at the following internet site:
https://health.wisconsin.gov/ admrules/public/Rmo?nRmoId=10943 [type “NR 211" in the “search" field].
If you do not have internet access, a copy of the proposed rules and supporting documents, including the Fiscal Estimate and Economic Impact Analysis may be obtained from Robert Liska, DNR-WT/3, P.O. Box 7921, Madison, WI 53707-7921 or by calling (608) 267-7631.
Place Where Comments are to be Submitted and Deadline for Submission
Written comments on the proposed rules may be submitted via U. S. mail to Robert Liska, DNR-WT/3, P.O. Box 7921, Madison, WI 53707-7921 or by e-mail to:
Robert.Liska@Wisconsin.gov.
Comments submitted on or before March 29, 2013, will be considered in developing a final rule. Written comments whether submitted electronically or by U. S. mail will have the same weight and effect as oral statements presented at the public hearings.
Analysis Prepared by the Department of Natural Resources
The Department is proposing changes to Wisconsin Administrative Code Chap. NR 211 (General Pretreatment Requirements) regarding wastewater pretreatment requirements for the Department, for municipal pretreatment programs at publicly owned treatment works (POTWs) and for the industries which discharge to them. The proposed changes incorporate new federal pretreatment requirements, collectively known as “the Streamlining Rule", into NR 211 and enable Wisconsin's pretreatment requirements to more closely conform to federal pretreatment regulations found in
40 CFR Part 403. The rule changes generally reduce the regulatory burden on municipal pretreatment programs and on industries.
In addition, the Department proposes to eliminate outdated requirements in NR 211 for industries operating as centralized waste treaters that conflict with newer federal pretreatment requirements.
Statutes interpreted
Statutory authority
Explanation of agency authority
Chapter
283 of the Wisconsin Statutes grants authority to the Department to establish, administer and maintain a Wisconsin Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (WPDES). Section
283.21 (2), Stat., authorizes the Department to promulgate pretreatment standards to regulate the introduction of pollutants into publicly owned treatment works. Sections
283.11 and
283.31, Stats. provide authority to promulgate rules to administer the WPDES permit program consistent with federal requirements in the Clean Water Act.
Related statutes or rules
Chapter
NR 211, General Pretreatment Requirements, relates to the regulation of industrial wastewater discharges to publicly owned treatment plants (POTWs) in the ch.
NR 200 series of rules and in ch 283, Stats.
Plain language analysis
On July 18, 2011, the Department received a letter from US EPA identifying seventy-five questions or potential inconsistencies between Wisconsin law and federal Clean Water Act requirements. Issue # 16 of the EPA letter identified inconsistencies concerning requirements for industrial discharges to POTWs in Wis. Admin. Code, ch.
NR 211, compared with its federal counterpart in
40 CFR Part 403. The Department is proposing amendments to ch.
NR 211 regarding pretreatment requirements for industrial users and POTWs, in response to issue #16 identified by EPA. The proposed changes more closely align Wisconsin's pretreatment requirements with revisions to the federal pretreatment regulations known as the Pretreatment Streamlining Rule, so named because many of the changes reduced federal pretreatment requirements for both regulated industries and their regulators (DNR or delegated POTWs with pretreatment programs).
The proposed Streamlining revisions to ch.
NR 211 would make the following significant changes:
1.
Remove sampling requirements for wastewater pollutants, discharged by industries to sanitary sewers, shown to be neither present nor expected to be present in the discharge.
2. Remove all pretreatment sampling and reporting requirements for industries never discharging more than 100 gallons per day (gpd) of regulated industrial wastewater to the sanitary sewer.
3. Reduce pretreatment sampling and reporting requirements (from twice per year to once per year) for industries which discharge less than .01 percent of the wastewater flow capacity of the municipal treatment plant they discharge to.
4. Reduce pretreatment inspection requirements (from once per year to once per 2 years) for municipal wastewater treatment plants, with industrial pretreatment programs, when inspecting industries which discharge less than .01 percent of the wastewater flow capacity of the municipal treatment plant they discharge to.
5. Require municipal wastewater treatment plants with industrial pretreatment programs to repeat sampling at industries if a test result from the municipal sample exceeded a limit.
6. Allow municipal wastewater treatment plants with industrial pretreatment programs to use a general discharge permit to regulate several similar industries rather than several individual discharge permits.
7. Require municipal wastewater treatment plants with industrial pretreatment programs to include applicable Best Management Practices and slug control measures in industrial discharge permits.
Summary of, and comparison with, existing or proposed federal statutes and regulations
Ch.
NR 211 is currently deficient in many respects compared with its federal counterpart,
40 CFR Part 403, which was revised in 2005 to include the changes collectively known as the Pretreatment Streamlining Rule. These changes include the above significant changes, along with a number of lesser changes which address more detailed aspects of pretreatment regulations such as signature requirements and record keeping.
In its July 18, 2011 letter, U.S. EPA stated that existing state pretreatment regulations did not incorporate the changes made by EPA to the federal pretreatment regulations in 2005. Some of these changes made the federal regulation less stringent than it used to be, by reducing requirements; others made it more stringent. EPA has stated that Wisconsin must adopt the more stringent provisions into NR 211. (These, more stringent, provisions are described at:
http://www.epa.gov/npdes/pubs/pretreatment_streamlining_required_changes.pdf.)
The proposed revision to NR 211 is intended to address EPA's concerns and also to incorporate those Streamlining changes that reduce pretreatment requirements for regulated industries and delegated POTWs without adversely affecting environmental protection.
Comparison with rules in adjacent states
The following U.S. EPA Region 5 states (Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota and Ohio) have adopted the 2005 changes to the federal pretreatment regulation into their corresponding state regulations. In Michigan, a streamlining rule has been drafted but the authority of the state's environmental agency to adopt such a rule has been removed.
Summary of factual data and analytical methodologies
The Department has compared Wisconsin pretreatment regulations in ch.
NR 211 with the federal rule,
40 C.F.R. Part 403, and has proposed these changes to ch.
NR 211 to make it consistent with its federal counterpart and to address recent EPA concerns about the lack of consistency between these two rules.
Analysis and supporting documents used to determine effect on small business or in preparation of an economic impact analysis
As part of its research in creating the federal Pretreatment Streamlining Rule in 2005, U.S. EPA was required to address the economic impact of the same rule changes on small entities, i.e., small governmental units, industries and not-for-profit organizations, as are being proposed here. EPA concluded, in its Final Rule published Oct. 14, 2005, in the Federal Register, at 70 Fed. Reg. 60134 (Oct.14, 2005), that the national economic effect of its rule, “will either relieve regulatory burden or have no significant impact for all small entities." It also estimated that, overall, governmental units and industries would save $10.1 million annually by implementing the Streamlining changes.
Effect on Small Business
The Department estimates that the biggest impact of the proposed rule changes on small business will be the small cost savings (<$100 per year) in reduced wastewater sample test fees available to those industries, both large and small, that demonstrate that one or more of the pollutants they are required to test for are not present nor expected to be present. This estimate is based on recent pricing information the Department received from two analytical laboratories for the most common pollutants pretreatment industries are required to test for.
Initial Regulatory Flexibility Analysis Summary
The Department is proposing these changes because state law (s.
283.11(2), Wis. Stats.) requires that state wastewater rules comply with – and not exceed – requirements in federal wastewater regulations. Because the current version of NR 211 has different requirements than its federal counterpart,
40 CFR Part 403, the Department is proposing this action. In addition, the Department has been notified by US EPA that Wisconsin's pretreatment requirements are not consistent with those in federal regulations. Also, all surrounding states have already adopted these federal pretreatment changes into their respective state pretreatment regulations.
Fiscal Analysis and Economic Impact Analysis Summary
From August 21, 2012 through September 21, 2012, the department solicited comments from industries and municipalities on the economic impact of the proposed rule change via a survey distributed to 108 DNR-regulated pretreatment industries and to 26 municipal pretreatment programs. The survey identified eight rule changes that could affect businesses and municipal pretreatment programs and requested comments from the recipients regarding the anticipated annual cost or benefit from the proposed changes
Based on the responses from 27 industries and four municipal pretreatment programs and Department estimates of the impact to commercial labs, the statewide economic impact of this rule appears to be minor. Totaling the costs and benefits reported by survey respondents, 224 industries likely to be affected by these rule changes may see average savings of $810 each, with total statewide savings approaching $181,000, three years after rule implementation; of the 20 municipal programs likely to be affected, two-thirds of them may see initial, one-time costs averaging $15,000 each and one-third, increasing annual benefits of $15,000 each, culminating in net, total statewide savings of $90,000 annually after 3 years. Finally, the ten commercial laboratories affected may see combined, total revenue losses of $33,000 per year after all affected industries have taken advantage of the rule changes in three years. While we recognize that these facilities are only a sampling of those in the state, we believe that their responses are representative of similar facilities throughout the state. Ultimately, the costs and benefits are both small enough that the economic impact of the streamlining regulations on the state is minimally positive at best, negligible at worst.
Environmental Impact
The Department has made a preliminary determination that this action does not involve significant adverse environmental effects and does not need an environmental analysis under ch.
NR 150, Wis. Adm. Code.
Agency contact
Robert Liska
Department of Natural Resources
P. O. Box 7921
Madison, WI 53707-7921
