ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
March
4,
1982
IN THE MATTER OF:
)
R8l—6
PROPOSAL FOR RULEMAKING FOR CHAPTER
6:
)
R81-28
PUBLIC WATER SUPPLY REGULATIONS OF
)
THE ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
)
1ST NOTICE PROPOSED OPINION (by I. Goodman):
The Board’s authority and regulations concerning public water
supplies are premised on two state statutes:
the Environmental
Protection Act,
Ill.
Rev. Stat.,
Ch. 111½,
Sections 1001 et
~
and “An Act to Regulate the Operation of a Public Water Supply,”
Ill.
Rev.
Stat.,
Ch. 111½,
Sections 501 et
~
(“Act” and
“Certified Operators Act,” respectively).
On September
4,
1981,
both statutes were amended by Public Act 82—393,
Effective
January 1,
1982,
this law changes the definition of a public
water supply (“supply”),
limits which supplies can be required
to chlorinate,
and relaxes the requirements that a supply retain
a certified public water supply operator.
On November 24,
1981, the Illinois Environmental Protection
Agency (“Agency”) proposed amendments necessary to conform the
Board’s Chapter 6:
Public Water Supplies with this new legislation.
The
Agency’s proposal also included some corrections to minor
errors appearing in the current regulations.
The Board docketed
this proposal as R81—28 and ordered hearings set.
Shortly
thereafter, the Board requested that the Agency submit a codified
version of Chapter
6 pursuant to the Illinois Administrative
Procedure Act,
Section 1007, incorporating
its proposed changes.
The same was received by the Board on January 19,
1982.
Public hearings were held on January 27,
1982 in Springfield
and on February
8, 1982 in Chicago.
To the extent possible, the
contributions by the public at the first hearing have been
incorporated into the Board’s Order.
No public participants were
present at the second hearing.
Economic hearings are not necessary
in this rulemaking, the Department of Energy and Natural Resources
having issued a Declaration of Negative Impact Statement pursuant
to Section 4(d)(4) of “An Act in relation to natural resources,
research data collection and environmental studies”
(Ill,Rev.Stat.
Ch.
96½, par.
7404, 1979 as amended).
The Board acknowledges the assistance of Marili McFawn in
drafting this Opinion and for serving as hearing officer.
45-507
2
In both the Certified Operators Act and the Act,
the defini-
tion of public water supply has been amended.
While the physical
description of a public water supply,
i.e., mains, pipes, wells,
etc., has been retained, the definition now depends on how many
service connections or persons serviced, rather than the number
of lots serviced or to be serviced.
The new definition also
created two categories of a public water
supply.
A public water
supply is now either a “community water supply” or a “non—community
water supply.”
When a public water supply is the former, the scope
is expanded to include not only the number of existing service con-
nections, but also the number of connections intended.
Alternative-
ly, the definition can be based on the number of residents serviced.
The definition of a “non-community water supply”
is couched in the
negative.
If
a public water supply is not a “community water
supply,” then it is a “non—community water supply.”
Considered
collectively, these legislative amendments make the scope of the
Illinois regulatory scheme for water supplies the same as that
found in the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, 42 U.S.C.
300(f)
~
The amendments distinguishing the two categories of public
water supplies exclude non—community supplies from their provi-
sions.
Therefore,
the Board no longer has jurisdiction over
non—community supplies for the purpose of the Certified Operators
Act or the Act.
Accordingly, Section 601.102, Applicability, has
been added to Chapter 6.
This section makes clear that Chapter
6
does not apply to those public water supplies classified as non-
community water supplies, and that certain regulations, such as
monitoring radiological quality, are applicable only to public
water supplies classified as community water supplies.
As amended, Section
17(b)
of the Act requires that the Agency
grant exemptions to qualifying community water supplies from “any
mandatory chlorination requirement of the Board.”
The Board had
such a chlorination requirement, former Rule 305, which has been
retained in the codified version of Chapter
6 at Section 604.104.
This Section now also lists qualifying criteria for community
water supplies seeking exemption from chlorinating the drinking
water.
A community water supply can qualify for such an exemption
in one of two ways,
First, an exemption is automatically granted
if a community water supply buys all its water from a regulated
supply which chlorinates and the supply seeking exemption regular-
ly monitors sufficient chlorine residuals in its own distribution
system.
The second means
is for the supply to submit a written
request to the Agency and satisfy eight statutory criteria.
These
criteria have been adopted by the Board at Section 604.403.
Five of these criteria are self—explanatory, while three
require some further explanation.
Subsection
(c) of Section
604.403 requires that the community water supply’s raw water
source not be subject to contamination.
To fully understand
the implications of this criteria,
it must be read in conjunc-
tion with Section 604.501(e) and the Chapter’s new definition of
45—508
3
“confined geologic formation”.
It is clear that the requesting
supply’s raw water source must be groundwater, specifically
protected.
Subsection
(d) requires that the supply not have a
history of persistent or recurring contamination.
This is the
same language used in the statute.
Definitions of “Persistent
Contamination” and “Recurring Contamination” are included in
this rulemaking to specify which sampling histories prohibit
a supply an exemption from chlorination.
The last criteria
requiring explanation is found in Section 17(b)(6) of the Act,
and now in Section 604,403(f).
What is meant by and what would
be approved by the Agency as an “active program” to educate con-
sumers on preventing contamination is contained in former Rule 314,
now Section 605.112,
The Agency had been instructed therein to
adopt Technical Policy Statements about approving cross—connection
control programs.
These same guidelines are now to be followed
by supplies seeking exemption from chlorination to satisfy the
“active program” requirement.
Once the exemption from chlorination is obtained, it can only
be lost if the supply continuously fails to sustain any of the
qualifying criteria,
According to the Act and Section 604.104(c),
when this occurs the supply must immediately initiate chlorination.
This language is not intended to imply that the supply must provide
stand—by chlorinating equipment.
It should be recognized that if
during the interim between loss of the exemption and chlorinating
public health is endangered,
the supply is required by statute and
elsewhere in Chapter
6 to take the necessary steps to alert its
consumers of the danger,
e.g.,
issue a boil order.
Formerly,
the Certified Operators Act required that all
regulated public water supplies retain the services of a certi-
fied public water supply operator, properly qualified under that
act.
The new statutory amendments relax this mandate.
Now
certain public water supplies and those in the category of com-
munity water supplies can instead retain a registered person in
responsible charge.
Furthermore, those public water supplies
categorized as non—community supplies need neither a certified
operator or registered person in responsible charge.
These
statutory changes have been reflected in Part 603,
~s~i
and Responsible Personnel,
The Certified Operators Act sets out the type of public water
supplies automatically granted such an exemption and the conditions
under which public water supplies and community water supplies can
seek such an exemption.
Chapter 6 has not been amended to include
these criteria,
the Act itself has been referenced instead.
Chapter 6 at Section 603.103, Registered Person in Responsible
Charge, does require that those supplies not statutorily exempted
request this status from the Agency.
If such a supply qualifies
under the statute, the Agency is then to issue a written exemption.
Supplies receiving written exemption or automatically exempted
must then file a signed statement with the Agency identifying its
registered person in responsible charge.
That person must also
sign this statement.
45—509
Apart
from those amendments statutorily required, rules
pertaining to the Agency placing supplies on restricted status
have been added at Section 602~l06.
The Agency disagreed with
their inclusion in this Chapter
(R.
48, 49).
No public comments
were received on this issue either at the hearings or in writing,
despite the fact that such comments were solicited
by the Board.
These rules are being included for two reasons,
First,
the Agency
is currently placing supplies on restricted status pursuant to its
authority under §39 of the Act, in an effort to forwarn supplies
of their deficiencies,
Although commendable, this may be insuf-
ficient notice to such supplies,
By providing rules
for this
practice in Chapter 6,
all supplies should now be equally notified
that it is a permanent part of the Agency’s permitting authority
and issuance.
Secondly,
such a rule provides supplies
so affected
Board review of the Agency’s decision
in this area,
As stated at the outset, the Agency proposed minor changes
to Chapter
6 to correct typographical errors, to update statutory
references and to clarify a number of ambiguities existing
in the
regulations.
These changes have been adopted, along with changes
necessary to Chapter 6’s codification.
However,
two
minor changes
require brief explanations.
The
Agency proposed reducing the
number of bacteriological
samples required from supplies servicing
populations of
100
or less,
The reduction from two samples per
month to one was requested by the Agency to relieve its laboratory’s
workload
(R.
47) and to make the Board’s requirement consistent with
that of the National Interim Primary Drinking Water Regulations
(R.
21).
This change is reflected in Section
605,102,
Secondly,
the Agency proposed specifying that representative
samples of finished water for bacteriological analysis be taken
from the supplies’ distribution system.
Since it also is in
accordance with the National
Interim Primary Drinking Water
Standards
(R,
21)
it is accepted and found at Section 605,101(a).
The Agency proposed ten additional definitions for Chapter
6.
Five of these were adopted by the Board and relocated along with
the definitions which were retained to the end of Chapter
6.
However, the other five proposed were not adopted because the
terms did not appear in Chapter
6, were already defined in the
Statutes,
or were explained within the applicable rules,
The
Board also deleted seven existing definitions:
community water
supply,
dose equivalent, engineer, non—community water supply,
operational testing,
safe, and Standards,
The definitions of
community and non—community water supply were deleted because
they are defined in both applicable statutes,
“Standards” was
deleted because
it
does not appear anywhere in Chapter
6.
The
remaining terms were removed because their meanings are contained
within the provisions of Chapter 6.
Similarly,
language which
did
not constitute rules, but rather provided introductory remarks,
has been deleted from Chapter
6 by this rulemaking,
e.g.,
Former
Rule 101, ~
and former Rule 102, ~
45-~510
5
To summarize,
this rulemaking was initially intended to
amend the Board’s regulations to conform with the statutory
changes of P.A.
82—393.
That was accomplished.
It has also
provided a vehicle for the Chapter
6 to be corrected,
refined,
and codified.
It should now provide the Board, the Agency,
the owners, official custodians,
operators and responsible
personnel
revised and simplified regulations by which to
exercise their responsibilities involving
public water supplies.
I,
Christan L,
Moffett, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution
Control Bo~rd,hereby certify
hat the above Opinion was ad
ted
on the
______
day of
~Y)
,
1982 by a vote of.___
Illinois Poll
.trol Board
45—511