Meeting Minutes
and Recommendations for a Meeting Held on June 14, 2000
Denver Convention Center
Denver, Colorado
A conference call meeting was held at the Denver Convention Center, 12:00
Noon Mountain Standard Time (MST). The purpose of the meeting was to complete
recommendations tabled at the May 2000 meeting in San Francisco on the
Proposed Long Term 1/Filter Backwash Regulations and to complete the first
phase of work being done by the Contaminant Candidate List (CCL)/6-Year
Review Working Group, acceptable of the protocol for making regulatory
determinations from the current and future CCLs. The following persons
were present:
National Drinking Water Advisory Council Members:
In person:
Bill Bellamy
David Spath
John Scheltens
Tom Yohe
L.D. McMullen
Ken Merry
Jeffrey Griffiths |
By phone:
Henry Duque
Diana Neidle
Cindy Roper
Valerie Lemmie |
Attendees:
James Taft (Acting DFO), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
Evelyn Washington (EPA/Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water (OGWDW))
Karen Wirth (EPA OGWDW)
Bill Zilli (City of Dayton. Ohio)
Maria Tikkanen (East Bay Municipal Utility District)
Richard Haberman (CA State Health Dept.)
Welcome
L.D. McMullen called the meeting to order at 12:10 p.m. (MST) and took
attendance. He indicated that a quorum existed and proceeded to consider
each item on the agenda.
Public Participation
The first order of business was public participation. The only member
of the public who wished to speak was Mr. Zilli of Dayton, OH. He offered
several comments on the draft protocol for making regulatory determinations
from the CCL. He said the he believed that Chapter 2 needed to be emphasize
that the route of exposure was an important consideration when judging
the importance of a contaminant. He also felt that the analytical capabilities
of laboratories should be fully considered when analyzing various contaminants
on the CCL. Finally, he stated that he felt that Chapter 3 of the document
need to clearly indicate that the effectiveness of treatment in removing
microbiological contaminants needed to be carefully evaluated.
Discussions/Recommendations on Long Term 1/Filter Backwash
The NDWAC was asked to consider and approve or amend a document entitled
"Report of Ad Hoc NDWAC Subcommittee on Issues regarding the Proposed
Long Term 1 Enhanced Surface Water Treatment Rule and Filter Backwash
Rule" (see attached). The Council agreed that items 2, 4, and 5 were acceptable
without change. However a discussion ensued about the wording of items
1 and 3.
Regarding item #1, Dave Spath argued that early implementation of the
rule is not specifically required and thus the implication that states
that couldn't accomplish accelerated implementation could get an extension
was inappropriate. He suggested, and the Council agreed, to omit this
sentence.
Regarding item #3, Tom Yohe suggested that the words "is illogical" be
struck from the first sentence and that "logical" be struck from the second
sentence and replaced with "allowed." Mr. Yohe argued that, whether or
not direct washwater recycling is practiced is not a question of logic,
but rather one of sound engineering practice. The Council agreed with
the report with the above-described changes.
Therefore, the following recommendations are forwarded to EPA:
Council Recommendations
ISSUE #1: Is it appropriate for EPA to require systems
to perform (and require States to administer) disinfection profiling
beginning two years after promulgation of the final rule?
Yes, if it is mutually agreeable to the States. The
states and small systems are under numerous deadline pressures from
rulemakings related to the 1996 SDWA amendments. EPA should negotiate
a letter of agreement with each state for early implementation of the
profiling and should provide incentive(s) to the states for participation.
The NDWAC recognizes that disinfection profiling provides valuable information
to the water system operator and supports early implementation of this
process.
ISSUE #2: Can combined filter effluent monitoring be used
in lieu of individual filter monitoring for small systems with only
two filters?
No, data averaging will not provide adequate information
on individual filter performance and may give a false sense of security
regarding filter performance and filtered water quality.
ISSUE #3: What additional data should be collected to aid
States in identifying and addressing risks associated with direct recycling?
The concept of direct washwater recycling (with no solids wasting,
flow equalization or treatment) in a direct filtration plant (no sedimentation)
should not be allowed. In systems where recycling of washwater is allowed,
it would be valuable to determine the variability in hydraulic loading
on filters that is attributable to (adjacent) filter washing and collective
recycle.
ISSUE #4: Should specific language be developed to define
recycle return locations?
No, the proposed LT1FBR requires that recycle streams
receive all treatment unless an alternative is approved by the State.
It is important that the States maintain the flexibility to approve
(and not preclude) configurations that optimize treatment performance
while protecting public health.
ISSUE #5: What specific areas of guidance would be beneficial
for small systems, what level of detail should be included and what
avenues of distribution should be utilized?
Initially, the EPA and the primacy agencies should develop fact sheets
on early implementation activities regarding disinfection profiling.
This should be followed up with training programs for States and technical
assistance to Public Water Supplies. NDWAC acknowledges EPA's innovative
use of the Internet and would encourage continued utilization of this
resource for communications and identifying areas of concern during
implementation of the LT1ESWTR.
Discussions/Recommendations on Contaminant Candidate List Working
Group Report
The Council reviewed the proposed recommendation (see attached) and agreed
to accept it with a modification to 1st paragraph under "Outcome" (see
attached). The Council felt that the statement that cost impacts were
not a key consideration may be somewhat confusing, without appropriate
modification. The Council, led by Mr Yohe, agreed that cost impacts are
not a consideration at the regulatory determination, but wished to be
clear that public health impacts are the principal consideration at this
stage. Thus, the following sentence was agreed to be substituted for the
last sentence in the first paragraph under "outcome": "The working group
determined that public health impacts (and not economic impacts) should
be the key consideration in the decision of whether or not a National
Primary Drinking Water Regulation is developed."
The report submitted follows, ending in the Council's recommendation:
SDWA Requirements
The Safe Drinking Act (SDWA), as amended in 1996, requires the United
States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to publish a list of contaminants
(referred to as the Contaminant Candidate List, or CCL). The first CCL
was published on March 2, 1998 (63 FR10273), and must be published every
five years thereafter. The SDWA also requires that the Agency select at
least 5 contaminants from the CCL and determine by August 2001 whether
or not they should be regulated. Regulatory determinations for at least
5 contaminants must be made 3½ years after each new CCL. If the
determination is to regulate a contaminant, proposals and subsequent final
regulations must be developed. If the determination is not to regulate
a contaminant, the decision is considered final Agency action.
Section 1412(b)(1)(B)(ii) of SDWA specifies that the determination to
regulate a contaminant must be based on a finding that each of the following
criteria are satisfied: (i) the contaminant may have adverse effects on
the health of persons; (ii) the contaminant is known to occur, or there
is substantial likelihood that the contaminant will occur, in public water
systems with a frequency and at levels of public health concern; and (iii)
in the sole judgement of the Administrator, regulation of such contaminant
presents a meaningful opportunity for health risk reduction for persons
served by public water systems.
In addition, under Section 1412(b)(9) of SDWA, the EPA must periodically
review existing National Primary Drinking Water Regulations (NPDWRs) and,
if appropriate, revise them. SDWA states, "The Administrator shall, not
less often than every 6 years, review and revise, as appropriate, each
national primary drinking water regulation promulgated under this title.
Any revision of a national primary drinking water regulation shall be
promulgated in accordance with this section, except that each revision
shall maintain, or provide for greater, protection of the health of persons."
Task of the Working Group
The Working Group on CCL and 6-Year Review was formed to make recommendations
to the National Drinking Water Advisory Council regarding specific provisions
of the SDWA addressing regulatory determinations from the CCL and the
review and revision of existing regulations. The first task of the Working
Group was to provide recommendations for a protocol for making regulatory
determinations from current and future CCLs.
Outcome
The Working Group has developed a protocol and specific recommendations
for analyzing and presenting the available scientific data. SDWA Section
1412(b)(1)(B)(ii) served as the basis for the protocol development. The
protocol is not specifically tailored to the contaminants on the current
CCL, but is sufficiently robust to accommodate regulatory determinations
from current and future CCLs. Similar but separate approaches are being
recommended for chemicals and microbiologicals due to the unique characteristics
of these two types of contaminants. The working group determined that
public health impacts (and not economic impacts) should be the key consideration
in the decision of whether or not a National Primary Drinking Water Regulation
is developed.
The protocol provides a consistent approach to evaluating contaminants
for regulatory determination, and is a tool that organizes information
in a manner that it will clearly communicate the rationale for each determination
to stakeholders. The protocol identifies factors and associates significance
and weights to each of the factors. It does not score or rank contaminants,
but provides EPA with a semi-quantitative evaluation tool that highlights
the relative importance of the various factors in making a finding based
on the three statutory criteria. The protocol is not meant to substitute
for the need of Agency judgement in making regulatory determinations,
but is means to assist EPA in making these decisions.
Council Recommendation
It is recommended that the protocol and recommendations developed by
the Working Group on CCL and 6-Year Review be used by EPA for making regulatory
determinations.
The protocol is attached to these minutes.
Adjournment
L.D. McMullen adjourned the Council meeting at 1:00 p.m. (MST).
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