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Pressure Wash / Power Wash Discharges
Section 301 of the Clean Water Act (CWA) prohibits a point source discharge of pollutants into waters of the United States without an NPDES permit. To legally discharge wash water, a pressure wash operator must obtain an NPDES permit for each discharge location. Due to the fact that many pressure washer operators are mobile, it is not realistic to pre-determine discharge locations and obtain permits for each location. Additionally, most NPDES permitted process water discharges require treatment and analysis of the discharge, which may not be practical for many pressure washers.
The
most common method of compliance with the CWA is to prevent process
wastewater discharges to waters of the United States. If your
discharge does not reach waters of the United States, then there are
no requirements under the CWA. Examples of compliance without
a discharge are vacuuming up the process wastewater or berming the process
water and allowing it to evaporate. An additional method of compliance
is to discharge the water to an NPDES permitted sanitary sewer system
(the municipality may have additional pretreatment requirements before
accepting your discharge). The most common form of non-compliance is to discharge the process water into a storm sewer system or into
a city street that drains to a storm water inlet. Most storm drainage
systems in Region 6 discharge directly to waters of the United States
without treatment, which means anything that discharges into a storm
drain is the same as putting it directly into the waterbody receiving
the storm drain discharge.
Vehicle Washing
Washing vehicles is an example of a process water discharge of pollutants requiring an NPDES permit if it reaches waters of the United States. EPA recommends that companies or individuals take their vehicles to car washes*. If a car wash is not available, NPDES permit requirements may be avoided and impacts on waters of the United States minimized if vehicles are washed in a vegetated or grassy area where the wash water will be absorbed into the ground instead of allowing it to run into the street and then into a storm drain. There may be additional requirements if chemicals (detergents, waxes, etc.) are improperly used or if the absorbed water will reach an underground water body.
*A properly operated car wash discharges all of its
wash water to a municipal sanitary sewer system that treats the wastewater
before discharging from the wastewater treatment plant to waters of
the U.S. Most municipalities have a pretreatment program requiring
car washes to perform some type of pretreatment such as discharging
through a sand filter and grease trap.