More than five years ago California enacted the State Water Resources Control Board’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System General Permit (GENERAL PERMIT). Since its inception the trucking industry has been identified as one of many industries required to comply with the mandates of the GENERAL PERMIT.

However, because of recent proposed revisions in this law, many California truckers are only now becoming aware of the GENERAL PERMIT and its impact on their operations.

The regulation, in a nutshell, requires captured industrial operations to do the following:

1. Obtain a storm water discharge permit.

2. Develop and implement pollutant control practices designed to reduce or eliminate industrial pollution from coming into contact with storm water discharge.

3. Conduct sophisticated site monitoring as well as analytical testing and evaluation of storm water discharge activities.

4. Document the results of these efforts in a report that is submitted to the State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) for review and evaluation annually.

Historically, the SWRCB has advocated voluntary compliance by industry. The logic being that industry is best qualified to determine what pollutant control standards will most effectively meet the objective of the GENERAL PERMIT on an industry-by-industry basis. As of 1992, the SWRCB has allowed like industrial operations to meet the complicated compliance requirements under a “group” approach. This approach encourages voluntary compliance and proved to be the most cost effective means by which to achieve compliance to the GENERAL PERMIT for many industries.

The original (and as of this publication date existing) GENERAL PERMIT was to be in place for a period of 5 years, at which time the regulation would be reviewed and, if deemed necessary, revised.

With more than 5 years of documented results by hundreds of industrial facilities that demonstrated the effectiveness of the efforts being made by industry, the expectation was that the regulators would have “proof” that voluntary compliance was working and thus there would be some relief from the rigid and costly monitoring and testing requirements. Based on the latest issuance of the the draft GENERAL PERMIT, this will not be the case.

The Regional Water Boards are being pressured by environmental watch dog groups, such as Baykeepers and Deltakeepers, and are recommending that the existing regulation be revised to give the Regional Water Boards the authority to dictate to industry not only that they must comply, but also how they must comply to the GENERAL PERMIT. It appears that the Regional Boards are expecting to be given this broad authority without the requirement that they review or consider the efforts that industry has put forth over the last 5 years.

How will this impact you, a highway carrier?

If these proposed revisions go through, you will lose the ability to determine how your facility can most effectively and affordably comply with this regulation. The Regional Boards will be authorized to direct what operational practices and engineering controls you must have in place to continue to operate your business. Additionally, the compliance standards could vary from one region to another, if the administration of this regulation is moved down to the regional level. This type of inconsistency would create competitive disadvantages for those facilities that are regulated by an inflexible area Regional Water Board.

It’s now up to you and other regulated industrial facilities to step up to the plate and give attention to this serious issue.

Reference: Vol. 34, No. 1 - UHCA Newsletter Highway - Strmh20