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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Inspector General
At a Glance
13-P-0264
May 23, 2013
Why We Did This Review
We evaluated the U.S.
Environmental Protection
Agency's (EPA's) oversight of
regional and state compliance
with Clean Water Act (CWA)
§316(a) and (b) requirements.
These requirements are in place
to help protect aquatic
organisms from the impacts of
thermal discharges and cooling
water intake structures. CWA
§316(b) requires that NPDES
permits for facilities with cooling
water intake structures ensure
that the location, design,
construction, and capacity of the
structures reflect the best
technology available to minimize
harmful impacts on the
environment. The permitting
authority may issue a variance
under CWA §316(a) to allow
facilities to discharge cooling
waters at an alternative, less
stringent thermal effluent limit
that is still protective of aquatic
life.
This report addresses the
following EPA Goal or
Cross-Cutting Strategy:
• Protecting America's waters.
For further information, contact
our Office of Congressional and
Public Affairs at (202) 566-2391.
The full report is at:
www.epa.aov/oia/reports/2013/
20130523-13-P-0264.pdf
EPA Oversight Addresses Thermal Variance and
Cooling Water Permit Deficiencies But Needs to
Address Compliance With Public Notice Requirements
What We Found
Since the 1980s, EPA has had an oversight process, known as Permit Quality
Reviews (PQRs), to promote permit quality and ensure a reasonable degree of
national consistency with regard to core program requirements. The PQRs
EPA conducted from 2007 to 2010 identified a number of deficiencies in
NPDES permits, which EPA made recommendations to improve. Our review of
EPA's PQR oversight process found it has generally been effective in
determining the quality of permits. Like EPA, we found deficiencies in permits
or supporting documents. For example, 55 percent of the fact sheets in our
sample did not contain an explanation of the state's or EPA's decision in the
permit that facilities use the best technology available to minimize the
environmental impact of the cooling water intake structures regulated under
CWA §316(b). Conversely, 75 percent of the fact sheets we reviewed
contained an explanation of the state's or EPA's decision to approve the
facilities' requests for CWA §316(a) thermal variances. A fact sheet briefly
presents the principal facts and the significant factual, legal, methodological,
and policy questions considered in preparing the draft permit.
None of the public notices we reviewed contained all of the required statements
describing the proposed §316(a) thermal variance. We found that EPA's quality
assurance reviews are not designed to address whether public notices for
permits with a §316(a) thermal variance contain required information under the
Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) per 40 CFR §124.57. As a result, EPA's
quality assurance reviews did not identify deficiencies in public notices. EPA
established this regulation so that permitting authorities would use public
notices to inform the public about proposed thermal variances.
Recommendation and Planned Agency Corrective Action
We recommend that the Assistant Administrator for Water develop and
implement oversight mechanisms that will help states and regions consistently
comply with CWA §316(a) public notice requirements. The Agency agreed with
our recommendation and committed to implementing corrective actions by
June 30, 2013.
Noteworthy Achievements
The Office of Water is working to improve the quality of permits through its
PQR process. Quality assurance evaluations assess whether NPDES permits
written by states and regions comply with regulations. Through this review
process, the Office of Water works to promote national consistency in permits,
identify best practices in state NPDES programs, and recommend
opportunities for improvement in state and regional permit programs.

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