EPA Moves to Reduce Storm Sewer Pollution

The Environmental Protection Agency, moving to reduce pollutants flowing from storm sewers into waterways, Wednesday proposed that 160 cities and thousands of industrial plants throughout the country be required to assess the problem in their areas and find solutions.

The agency’s action was the first step in a congressionally mandated program directed at water runoff pollution, which now is not monitored by the federal government.

The proposed EPA regulation calls for requiring those plants and cities--including Anaheim, Garden Grove, Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Los Angeles and 20 other municipalities in California--to receive federal permits for the use of storm sewers that discharge runoff into bodies of water.

If the EPA adopts the requirement after a 90-day period of public comment beginning next week, the agency will begin addressing possible limits for storm-sewer pollutants and necessary measures for controlling them.

Drawing up the list of cities and plants that would be covered by the program--a list primarily based on their size--is “the beginning of the process,” the agency said in a statement.

“Right now the focus is on program initiation and 5 years from now the (focus) may be on implementation,” EPA spokesman Kevin Weiss said in an interview.

Although cities are required to treat raw sewage before channeling it into waterways, water collected in storm sewers is often discharged without treatment. This water often contains fertilizer runoff, oil and other street residues. Los Angeles County began this year to warn against swimming in the ocean immediately after storms because of bacteria and other pollutants washed into Santa Monica Bay.

The EPA said its studies have shown that water quality in many lakes and streams would be significantly improved by curbing water runoff contamination.

Under the program being devised by the agency, cities with more than 100,000 population would be required to detail their system for collecting storm water, gauge the pollutants in the runoff and propose measures for dealing with it.

Industries that emit or spill contaminants that are washed into storm sewers would be required to devise methods for preventing that pollution.

The EPA would use the information to develop a specific permit and set of requirements for each situation, agency officials said. They also said that putting such a system in place will take years, but that the program is a crucial counterpart to a stepped-up federal effort to curb pollution from inadequate sewage treatment plants.

Other California cities affected by the regulations are Bakersfield, Berkeley, Concord, Fremont, Fresno, Glendale, Long Beach, Modesto, Oakland, Oxnard, Pasadena, Riverside, Sacramento, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Francisco, San Jose, Stockton, Sunnyvale and Torrance.