Revised Draft of the Industrial Storm Water Permit – Comments Period Extended

September 2012

The California State Water Resources Control Board has released a revised draft of the Industrial General Permit. The comment period for this revised draft was extended, with comments now due on or before noon on October 22, 2012. You can review the draft (all 376 pages of it, with attachment and appendices) and provide comments (under 15MB) to the:
Clerk of the Board via e-mail at commentletters@waterboards.ca.gov.

The revised industrial permit contains many new requirements that will significantly change the management of storm water at industrial facilities in California.
Key new requirements for industrial sites contained in the draft permit include:

• Numeric Action Levels (NALs). The new permit incorporates USEPA benchmark values as NALs. When NALs are exceeded, appropriate Exceedance Response Actions (ERAs) are required. For repeat NAL exceedances dischargers must design and implement treatment and/or structural controls in compliance with BAT/BCT, unless they can demonstrate the application of one of three situations (one of which is that the exceedances are caused by background sources).
• Monitoring for Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL). Monitoring of additional parameters is required for dischargers who discharge into receiving waters that are listed as impaired for those pollutants (CWA 303(d) listings).
• Electronic Filing of Documents. All permit-related documents will be required to be submitted electronically to the State Board, including sampling data, exceedance notices for numeric limits, etc. Electronically submitted information will be available to the public.
• Minimum Best Management Practices (BMPs). The permit establishes specific minimum BMPs. Failure to implement consistently the minimum requirements will be considered permit violations.
• Increased inspections and sampling. Inspections, under the draft permit, will increase to quarterly – one storm event must be sampled per quarter. Group monitoring is not available under the new draft permit. The concept of compliance groups is introduced in the new permit. Compliance groups may prepare consolidated ERA Technical Reports that draw on the experience of all sector members in a compliance group.
• Minimum training requirements. SWPPPs must be developed, and pollution controls must be implemented by Qualified Industrial Storm Water Practitioners (QISP) who have completed State Board-approved training courses or by registered civil engineers, geologists, or engineering geologists.
• No Exposure Certification (NEC) Dischargers with no industrial activities exposed to storm water must electronically file a NEC, and annually evaluate and renew the NEC.

If you would like additional information, please contact Scott Bourne at sab@weiss.com or 510.450.6191.