Industry Pushes Back Against EPA's 'Permit-By-Permit' Stormwater Policy

摘要

Wastewater groups and and storm sewer operators are pushing back against what they describe as a shift by EPA and environmentalists toward a permit-by-permit approach to enforcing strict limits on stormwater discharges across the country, despite the agency's decision earlier this year not to pursue a national stormwater rule. Provisions similar to the abandoned rule, which would have mandated on-site retention of stormwater at newly built facilities, are appearing in EPA-crafted municipal separate storm sewer system (MS4) permits, while industry sources say they are seeing increasing litigation over the stringency of effluent limits on the storm sewers' discharges. "All those concepts have not gone away. EPA has not given up on them; the activists have not given up on them. They're still very much in play," a wastewater industry source says.