ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
March 1, 1979
IN THE MATTER OF:
AMENDMENT TO THE
)
R77-13
PUBLIC WATER SUPPLY
)
PEGULATIONS
OPINION AND ORDER OF THE BOARD (by Mr. Dumelle):
The Board has received only two public comments since
it proposed these revisions on November 30, 1978 and adopted
a Proposed Opinion on December 14, 1978.
The Agency has asked the Board to reexamine its proposal
to exempt community water supplies which provide an average of
10,000 gallons of water per day or less from the new standards
for iron (1.0 mg/i) and manganese (0.15 mg/i). The Agency feels
that the proposed exemption will curtail its ability to use Rule
304Bl and Section 18 of the Act as enforcement tools. If the
Board chooses to retain an exempt classification, the Agency
asks that the exemption be based on something more definite,
e.g. number of service connections or population served.
Commonwealth Edison Company (Edison) pointed to its experi-
ence as owner and operator of a supply serving 18,500 persons in
Lincoln, Illinois. Edison claimed that the treatment costs cited
in Exhibit 9 were underestimated.
The Agency is correct in its assumption that creation of an
exempt class will rule out the use of Rule 304B1 to enforce iron
and manganese violations. When the Board adopted Rule 304Bl it
stated in part: “While no absolute limits on any contaminants
have been set in this subsection, it lays the ground rules for
Table 1” (In the Matter of: Public Water Supplies, R73—l3,
January 3, 1975, 15 PCB 103, 120)
.
In Exhibit 5 of R73—13
the Agency stated its rationale for proposing Rule 304Bl. The
Agency stated in part: “The list of substances given in the table
represents only a partial list of materials that could be harm-
ful to these people, but are considered to be those most probab-
ly to be found in the supply.” When these two statements are
read together, they show that since specific standards for iron
and manganese have been established, Rule 304Bl does not apply
to these contaminants.
The Agency’s concern over the use of Section 18 of the Act
is misplaced. Section 18 states in part that
“. . .
water shall
be
. . .
of satisfactory mineral character for ordinary domestic
consumption.” This statutory mandate cannot be abrogated by the
Board or the Agency. None of the values in Table 1 can survive
—2—
challenge in an enforcement action which shows that the public
is not receiving the protection which the law requires. This
conclusion would hold true even in the case of a supply which
complied with every provision of Chapter 6.
When the Board proposed an iron and manganese exemption for
supplies providing less than 10,000 gallons per day, it was not
creating a double standard based on the size of each Illinois
water supply. The Board was simply recognizing the fact that
smaller supplies face higher per capita treatment costs. These
costs should not be automatically imposed where the primary thrust
of the standard is protection of taste and the avoidance of laundry
staining. High cost protection of this nature should be provided
only when a significant number of consumers demands it. The
proper forum for a demonstration of this demand is the enforcement
process described in Title VIII of the Act.
The Board agrees with the Agency’s concern over the nature
of the proposed exemption. The 10,000 gallon per day figure was
based on an analysis of treatment costs. While the information
in the record on costs is valuable in a relative sense, the Board
recognizes Edison’s concern that relative costs are not reliable
when they are applied to a specific situation. An exemption
based on costs is further suspect since the volume of water pro-
vided does not necessarily correlate with a range of affected
consumers. In order to make any exemption manageable by the
Agency, it must be based on readily ascertainable information.
The Board is aware that Agency files contain information on popula-
tion served and the number of service connections for most
water supplies in Illinois. The population/service connection
cutoff must also be a manageable size so that the Agency is not
overburdened in its attempts to ascertain the concensus of each
affected community. The Board concludes that a population of
1000 affected consumers or 300 service connections constitutes an
appropriate exemption.
The Board hereby adopts its Proposed Opinion and this Final
Opinion as its Opinion in this matter.
ORDER
1) Rule 105 of Chapter 6: Public Water Supplies is hereby
amended to read as follows:
“Analytical Testing
To determine compliance with these rules and regulations,
all sampling and physical, chemical, bacteriological, and
microscopic analyses shall be made according to the methods
described in the National Primary Drinking Water Regulations
or any other method specifically approved by the Agency and
the United States Environmental Protection Agency. All
33—94
—3—
analyses for substances other than those listed in these
rules and regulations must be performed by methods acceptable
to the Agency.”
2) The definition of “Standards” in Rule 104 of Chapter 6: Public
Water Supplies is hereby amended to read as follows:
“‘Standards’ means the ‘Recommended Standards for Water Works,’
1976 edition, as adopted by the Great Lakes
-
Upper Mississippi
River Board of State Sanitary Engineers (commonly referred to
as the Ten—States Standards)
.“
33—95
—4—
3) Table I of Rule 304 of Chapter 6: Public
hereby amended to read as follows:
Water Supplies is
“TABLE I
-
MAXIMUM ALLOWABLE CONCENTRATIONS
-
Finished Water Quality
Arsenic
Barium
Cadmium
Chromium
Copper
Cyanide
Fluoride
Iron
Lead
Manganese
Mercury
Nitrate-Nitrogen
Organics
Pesticides
Chlorinated Hydrocarbon Insec-
ticides
Aidrin
Chlordane
DDT
Dieldrifl
Endrin
Heptachlor
HeptachlOr Epoxide
Lindane
Methoxychlor
Toxaphene
ChlorophenOxy Herbicides
2, 4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2
,
4-D)
2,4, 5-Trichlorophenoxypropionic acid
(2,4,5-TP or Silvex)
Selenium
Silver
Turbidity
Zinc
0.001
0.003
0.05
0.001
0.0002
0.0001
0.0001
0.004
0.1
0.005
0.1
0
.
01
0.01
0.05
1.0 (c)
5.
‘I
Substance
Reported
Maximum
As
.
Concentration
mg/ 1
As
0.05
Ba
1.
Cd
0.010
Cr
0.05
Cu
5.
CN
0.2
F
1.8 (d)
Fe
1.0 (a)
Pb
0.05
Mn
0.15 (a)
Hg
0.002
N
10. (b)
Se
Ag
NTU
Zn
33—96
—5--
4) Note a of Table I of Rule 304 of Chapter 6: Public Water
Supplies is hereby amended to read as follows:
“All noncommunity water supplies and those community water
supplies which serve a population of 1000 or less or 300
service connections or less shall be exempt from the stan-
dards for iron and manganese. All other water supplies shall
comply with these standards by July 1, 1981. Iron in excess
of 1.0 mg/l and manganese in excess of 0.15 mg/l may be
allowed at the discretion of the Agency if sequestration
tried on an experimental basis proves to be effective. If
sequestering is not effective, positive iron or manganese
reduction treatment as applicable must be provided. No
experimental use of a sequestering agent may be tried with-
out previous Agency approval.”
IT IS SO ORDERED.
I, Christan L. Moffett, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution
Control Board, hereby certify the above Opinion and Order
were adopted on the
________________
day of
________________,
1979
by a vote of ‘/-o
o~ü~f
Christan L. Moffe)?~)/~leik
Illinois Pollution c~ntrolBoard
3 3—97