The proposed Sanitary Sewer Overflow Rule and the final Radon Rule have been delayed for review by new Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman, according to EPA sources.
Within hours of taking office, President George W. Bush directed federal agencies to withhold publication of all newly adopted regulatory proposals until they had been reviewed and approved by the new administration.
The SSO proposal, which was adopted by the agency Jan. 5, formally was withdrawn in mid February before being published in the Federal Register. According to EPA, the proposal is designed to improve the operation of municipal wastewater collection systems, reduce the number of SSOs, and provide more effective public notification when SSOs occur. The proposed regulations would impact about 19,000 municipal collection systems, the agency said. No date has been set for publication.
The proposed rule and related documents are available at http://www.epa. gov/owm/rulmakef.htm. For additional information about the proposal, send e-mail to Kevin Weiss at [email protected].
The Radon Rule was returned to EPA along with many others from other agencies under a directive from new OMB Director Mitchell Daniels in response to the Bush administration memo.
Also as a result of the Bush memo, the effective dates the Energy Department's new Clothes Washer Energy Conservation Standards and the Department of Transportation's final pipeline safety rule that protects sensitive drinking water source areas were to be delayed by 60 days.
Whitman Praises President's Budget Plan
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman praised President Bush's budget plan, saying the budget would allow her agency to "build on the premise that environmental protection and economic prosperity should go hand in hand."
The proposed budget for EPA is $7.3 billion, $56 million more than the previous Administration's 2001 request. It would increase grants to states for wastewater projects to $1.3 billion, with a portion of the total designated for combined sewer overflow controls. The proposal also would allocate $2 billion to the Clean Water State Revolving Fund loan program.
Whitman said she is reassured by the proposed budget that the agency's mission would not be hindered in any way. In fact, EPA's program grants to state and tribal governments are funded at the highest level ever, at more than $1 billion.
"It is these grants that help states to administer programs delegated to them under federal environmental statutes. As I can attest, states enforce most environmental laws through delegated state programs," Whitman said.
To help reach its goals, EPA will place a greater emphasis on innovative approaches to environmental protection, such as market-based incentives, and will request $25 million in grant funding to help states better integrate their environmental information systems. At present, the data collected on various systems are done separately.
"There are air data and water data but they are not easily integrated," Whitman said. "Doing a better job of integrating these systems will facilitate results-based management and multimedia approaches."
EPA Publishes New TMDL Guidance
A new EPA technical guidance document provides a framework for completing the technical and programmatic steps required to develop total maximum daily loads (TMDLs) for pathogens. The new guidance, Protocol for Developing Pathogen TMDLs: First Edition (EPA 841-R-00-002), is the third in a series of three technical guidance documents published by the agency's Office of Water to help state, regional, territorial, tribal, local, and federal agency personnel develop TMDLs. The document may be downloaded from the EPA Web site at http://www.epa.gov/owow/tmdl/techsupp.html, or a paper copy may be obtained by calling the National Service Center for Environmental Publications at 800-490-9198.
EPA Releases Atrazine Risk Assessment
The levels of atrazine and its chlorinated metabolites to which adults are exposed by drinking water from surface supplies typically do not exceed EPA's health risk levels of concern, according to the agency's preliminary revision of its atrazine risk assessment.
However, the assessment found that some 9,000 infants served by 24 surface water systems in Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Louisiana and Missouri are exposed to seasonal and annual levels that do exceed the agency's level of concern. EPA said it will conduct a more refined assessment to reduce the uncertainty of the risk estimate for these systems.
EPA said its drinking water risk estimates, which are based on new toxicity and occurrence data, are conservative and reflect a high degree of confidence.
For groundwater sources, EPA provided a partial risk assessment based on data from private wells but opted to wait for more data before completing a risk assessment for atrazine in groundwater.
Conducted by the Office of Pesticide Programs as part of a pesticide reregistration process and for an ongoing special review of triazine, the assessment also downgrades atrazine from a "possible" to a "not likely" human carcinogen and details its acute developmental and chronic hormonal health risks.
EPA hopes to finalize an atrazine risk assessment later this year. EPA's Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water will use the assessment as part of its ongoing review of the atrazine drinking water standard, which in 1991 was set at 3 micrograms/L as an average annual concentration.
EPA Publishes "Stressor" Guidance
EPA has released a new Stressor Identification Guidance Document designed to help water quality managers identify unknown causes of biological impairment in any water body.
The Clean Water Act has a goal of restoring and maintaining the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the nation's waters. To achieve this objective, numerous states are using biological assessments and biocriteria to help protect water bodies. In the process, water quality experts are finding water bodies where the fish, invertebrate, algae or plant communities (or other aquatic life) have been impacted detrimentally by different single or multiple causes. In many cases, the cause of these biological impairments have not yet been identified.
The Stressor Identification Guidance Document provides a logical, scientific process by which water quality experts can evaluate available information to identify the stressors causing the biological impairment. The guidance is advisory in nature and its use is not mandatory.
The process has three main steps: List candidate causes of impairment; analyze the evidence; and characterize the causes. When evidence is adequate, investigators should be able successfully to identify the likely cause of impairment. The guidance also will help investigators identify where evidence is weak or lacking and needs to be developed to be successfull in identifing the stressors.
Once the causes of the biological impairment are identified, water resource managers will be better able to locate the sources of the stressors and take management action aimed at improving the biological condition of the water body.
The guidance document is being published by EPA with the title and document number, Stressor Identification Guidance Document (EPA-822-B-00-025), dated December 2000. Paper copies can be obtained from the U.S. EPA, Water Resource Center by phone at: (202) 260-7786, or by sending an e-mail to the Center at [email protected]. The document and fact sheet also are available on the EPA website at www.epa.gov/OST/biocriteria.
