HomeMy WebLinkAbout1998-07-13 City Council (10)City of Palo Alto
C ty Manager’s Report
TO:HONORABLE CITY COUNCIL
FROM:CITY MANAGER DEPARTMENT: PUBLIC WORKS
DATE:JULY 13, 1998 CMR:297:98
SUBJECT:REGIONAL WATER QUALITY CONTROL PLANT (RWQCP)
DISCHARGE PERMIT UPDATE
This is an informational report, no action by Council is required.
BACKGROUND
Palo Alto, Sunnyvale and San Jose operate the three sewage treatment plants south of the
Dumbarton Bridge. The San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board
(Regional Board) established discharge standards that are specified in these plants’ permits.
Establishing these standards has been controversial. The old copper standard, 4.9 parts per
billion (ppb) was invalidated by the courts, leaving the permits for the three cities without
a water quality based effluent limit (WQBEL) for copper. Palo Alto’s permit was set to
expire in July 1998, which triggered a series of meetings during the first half of 1998 to
arrive at new permit language. The San Jose and Sunnyvale permits were also on the same
time schedule, therefore, the meetings included the three cities, State and Federal regulatory
agencies, and environmental advocacy organizations. Data from the three plants collected
over the past three years was used as the basis for these discussions.
DISCUSSION
A consensus on all points was not reached at the meetings, but much progress was made.
Permit language for copper limits was crafted based on three concepts:
Effective immediately, an interim limit has been established holding the three
dischargers to the current levels (based on the last three years data). During this
period, January 1, 1995 through December 31, 1997, Palo Alto has been at or below
the selected interim limit of 12 ppb.
San Jose, under the Santa Clara Basin Watershed Management Initiative, is funding
Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) studies to establish an effluent limit within five
years. When these studies are completed, permit limits will be based on these
findings.
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If the Watershed Management Initiative’s TMDL study is not successful, a default
value will go into effect in five years. The default value for Palo Alto is 8.2 ppb,
which the City achieved 95 percent of the time over the past three years.
Environmental groups believe that the default value of 8.2 ppb is too high, and that the
previous limit of 4.9 ppb should be used. Despite this disagreement, the new permit based
on the above concepts was adopted by the Regional Board on June 17, 1998. This permit
will expire on June 17, 2003.
Palo Alto believes that the 8.2 ppb default value is substantially lower than the effluent limit
that will be extablished through the TDML studies. The City submitted to the Regional
Board detailed scientific studies demonstrating that the effluent limit should be at least as
high as 12 ppb, and that a Bay water dilution factor (mixing zone) should also be applied.
This dilution factor would raise the standard even further. However, the City did not object
to delaying a decision on the effluent limit until the matter could be considered by the Santa
Clara Basin Watershed Management Initiative and its subcommittees. In the meantime, Palo
Alto will continue to implement its extensive source control programs for copper and other
’ pollutants.
ATTACHMENT
CMR:461:97
PREPARED BY: Philip Bobel, Manager, Environmental Compliance Division
DEPARTMENT HEAD: ~L
GLENN S. ROBERTS "~
. Dire or of Public. Works
CITY MANAGER APPROVAL:
gi~’iCY HARRISON
Assistant City Manager
CMR:297:98 Page 2 of 2
TO:
FROM:
City
City of Palo Alto
Manager’s Report
HONORABLE CITY COUNCIL
CITY MANAGER DEPARTMENT: PUBLIC WORKS
DATE:NOVEMBER 10, 1997 CMR:461:97
SUBJECT:REGIONAL WATER QUALITY CONTROL PLANT (RWQCP)
DISCHARGE PERMIT UPDATE
This is an informational report on the discharge permit for the Regional Water Quality
Control Plant (RWQCP). No action by Council is required.
BACKGROUND
The RWQCP discharges treated wastewater to San Francisco Bay. The discharge is
permitted by the Regional Water Quality Control Board (Regional Board) under the
National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit program. Discharge
limits for many of the pollutants are based on standards for San Francisco Bay which were
invalidated by a State court. Efforts by State and Federal regulatory agencies to adopt new
standards for the Bay have fallen behind schedule, but several important activities are now
occurring which are addressed below.
Because the State had not acted to put new Bay standards in place for toxic pollutants, e.g.,
copper~ nickel, mercury, PCBs, dioxins, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
proposed standards the "California Toxics Rule," or "CTR" on August 5, 1995. Palo
Alto staff worked through a statewide organization of sewage treatment plants (Tri-TAC)
which provided in depth comments on. the proposal and the. cost/benefit study which
accompanied it. Based on these extensive comments, staff believes it will take EPA many
months or even a year or more to finalize the rule. The fundamental concern of sewage
treatment operators is that the rule would ultimately require massive new capital projects
to treat the wastewater to new, ultra-low pollutant levels.
Knowing that EPA was Working on the California Toxics Rule, Palo Alto staff and other
Tri-TAC members encouraged the State to develop a policy which would explain how to
translate EPA’s Bay standards into effluent limits. Detailed recommendations were made
through a year-long task force process. Formulas for considering averaging times, data
uncertainty, dilution, toxicity reduction, and numerous other technical issues were
CMR:461:97 Page 1 of 3
addressed. The State released its proposed Policy in mid-September and Palo Alto and
others are preparing comments for a November 17, 1997, hearing. The State’s Policy is
as important as EPA’s CTR because both are needed to calculate the discharge limits
which would be placed in the NPDES permit. Many changes to the proposed Policy will
be sought, because it fails to incorporate many of the recommendations of the task force,
a group consisting of dischargers and regulators. Anticipating major comments, it is
predicted that it will take the State many months to finalize its policy.
The RWQCP’s current NPDES permit was issued July 21, 1993, and expires July 21,
1998. Palo.Alto believes that the toxic pollutant portion of the permit was invalidated and
rendered unenforceable by the State court action referenced earlier. It does not appear
likely that the California Toxics Rule and the State Implementation.Policy (Policy), will
be finalized before the expiration permit date. Thus, it would not be possible to utilize
new Bay Standards to develop toxic pollutant discharge limits for Palo Alto’s permit. Two
scenarios are possible: 1) the State could take no action, causing the old permit to remain
in effect indefinitely; or 2) the state could issue a revised permit, albeit without the new
toxics limits.
Under the first scenario, the existing permit would remain in effect and the lack of
enforceable standards for toxic pollutants would continue, at least until the CTR and Policy
were finalized and the permit was reopened. It is not known exactly how many months
would pass before the CTR and Policy would be ready.
Under the second scenario, the permit would be revised in July 1998 to do one of both of
the following:
1.Include a schedule for conducting studies to support use of the CTR and Policy
and develop final effluent limits.
2.Include interim discharge requirements to keep. pollutant levels at current
discharge rates until the new standards and limits are ready.
The first scenario imposes no new requirements upon the RWQCP in the July 1998 time
frame (as contrasted to the second scenario) and is therefore preferable with respect to
RWQCP operations. However, depending on the exact nature of the new requirements
imposed in the second scenario, .the second scenario could also be acceptable.
CMR:461:97 Page 2 of 3
Watershed Management Initiative
The Cities and other stakeholders with interests in the Santa Clara Basin have formed the
Santa Clara Basin Watershed Management Initiative (the Initiative) to prepare a plan to
protect beneficial uses. The Santa Clara Basin has been defined as the watershed draining
to San Francisco Bay south of the Dumbarton Bridge. It includes much of Santa Clara
County and small, areas in San Mateo and Alameda Counties.
A portion of the planning being conducted by the Initiative is designed to determine
acceptable.pollutant loadings to the Bay from the three sewage treatment plants (Palo Alto,
San Jose, and Sunnyvale). Certain permit modifications could be made immediately after
f’malization of EPA’S CTR and the State’s Policy. But for some pollutants, detailed source
identification, mathematical modeling, and control strategy evaluation studies will be
needed. This work will take several years to complete and has just been initiated. Palo
Alto staff and consultants are involved in this process. The UAC and Council will be
updated as the work proceeds.
FISCAL IMPACT
This is an informational report and has no fiscal impact.
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSME.,h~
No Environmental Assessment is required as this report is informational.
PREPARED BY: Philip Bobel, Manager, Environmental Compliance Division
DEPARTMENT HEAD REVIEW:
GLENN S. ROBERTS
Director of Public Works
CITY MANAGER APPROVAL:
Assistant City Manager
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