(a) Industrial waste discharge permits required. All persons proposing to connect and/or discharge industrial wastes into any part of the wastewater system must first apply for and, if required by the Public Works Director, obtain an industrial waste discharge permit. Those users proposing to discharge outside the City limits but within the area serviced by the City's wastewater system must file an industrial waste permit application prior to being issued a "will-serve" letter from the City for wastewater service.
(b) Permit application. The user seeking an industrial waste discharge permit shall complete an application form provided by the Public Works Department and pay the required fee as set by Council action. The Discharger shall include: a list of any environmental control permits held by or for the facility, information showing the measured or proposed average daily and maximum daily flow, in gallons per day, to the POTW from regulated process streams and other streams, as necessary, to allow use of the combined wastestream formula set out in 40 CFR 403.6(e).
(c) Trade secrets and Confidential Information. When requested by the person furnishing a report and as permitted by laws, those portions which may disclose trade secrets or secret processes shall not be made available for public inspection. Wastewater constituents and characteristics shall not be recognized as confidential information. Information and data on a User obtained from reports, surveys, wastewater discharge permit applications, individual wastewater discharge permits, and monitoring programs, and from inspection and sampling activities, shall be available to the public without restriction, unless the Discharger specifically requests, and is able to demonstrate to the satisfaction of the Public Works Director that the release of such information would divulge information, processes, or methods of production entitled to protection as trade secrets under applicable State law. Any such request must be asserted at the time of submission of the information or data. When requested and demonstrated by the Discharger furnishing a report that such information should be held confidential, the portions of a report which might disclose trade secrets or secret processes shall not be made available for inspection by the public, but shall be made available immediately upon request to governmental agencies for uses related to the HCTP-NPDES program or pretreatment program, and in enforcement proceedings involving the person furnishing the report. If City withholds such information and suit is filed to obtain such information, User shall defend City in any litigation. Wastewater constituents and characteristics and other effluent data, as defined at 40 CFR 2.302 shall not be recognized as confidential information and shall be available to the public without restriction.
(d) Permit conditions. The permit shall constitute the performance specification to which each discharger must conform in order to maintain authorization to use the wastewater system. Permits shall be expressly subject to all provisions of this section, Federal pretreatment standards and regulations pursuant to the Clean Water Act, and all other regulations, user charges, and fees established by the City. Permit conditions shall be uniformly enforced in accordance with this section and applicable State and Federal regulations. Permit conditions shall include the following as applicable:
(1) Limits on the average and/or maximum wastewater constituent concentrations and other relevant qualitative characteristics;
(2) Mass emission discharge rates or any more stringent Federal pretreatment standards based on the user's average daily wastewater discharge for the past three (3) years. When not available, data for a year or that which is mutually acceptable to the user and the City will be used;
(3) Limits on rate and time of discharge or requirements for flow regulation and equalization;
(4) Requirements for installation of inspection and sampling facilities, and specifications for monitoring programs;
(5) Requirements for maintaining and submitting technical self-monitoring reports and plant records relating to industrial waste discharges;
(6) Compliance schedules including any requirements for the installation of pretreatment technology, pollution control, or construction of appropriate containment devices, designed to reduce, eliminate, or prevent the introduction of pollutants into the treatment works;
(7) Applicable Federal pretreatment standards which are more stringent than local limitations;
(8) Self monitoring, sampling, reporting, notification, resampling and record-keeping requirements. These requirements shall include an identification of pollutants (or best management practice) to be monitored, sampling location, sampling frequency, and sample type based on Federal, State, and local law.
(9) All wastewater samples must be representative of the User's discharge. Wastewater monitoring and flow measurement facilities shall be properly operated, kept clean, and maintained in good working order at all times. The failure of a User to keep its monitoring facility in good working order shall not be grounds for the User to claim that sample results are unrepresentative of its discharge.
(10) Other conditions to ensure compliance with this section.
(11) Proposed new, increased or additional contributions may be conditioned or denied by the Public Works Director.
(e) Compliance schedules.
(1) A compliance schedule included in the industrial waste discharge permit for those industries regulated by Federal pretreatment standards shall be based on the following conditions;
(i) A list of dates for the commencement and completion of major events leading to the construction and operation of additional pretreatment required for the industrial user to meet Federal pretreatment standards or local discharge limits as applicable. The time period between events shall not exceed nine (9) months.
(ii) Not later than fourteen (14) days following each date in the schedule and final date for compliance, the industrial user shall submit a progress report to the City stating whether or not it complied with the expected progress and steps which are being taken to correct any delays.
(iii) Within ninety (90) days following the date of final compliance with applicable Federal pretreatment standards, or in the case of a new discharge, following the commencement of the introduction of wastewater to the wastewater system, any industrial user subject to Federal pretreatment standards shall submit to the City a report indicating the nature and concentration of Federally limited pollutants and the estimated average and maximum daily flow for the processes which are subject to such Federal standards. A statement shall be included which indicates whether the industrial user is meeting the Federal pretreatment standard on a consistent basis and, if not, which steps will be taken to bring the discharge into compliance. Such a statement must be signed by an authorized representative of the industrial user and certified to by a qualified professional.
(2) A compliance schedule included in the industrial waste discharge permit for all industrial users not regulated by Federal pretreatment standards shall contain the following conditions:
(i) An expected date of compliance, which, if it is permitted to exceed six (6) months from the date of permit, must be supplemented by increments of progress such as acquisition of funds, equipment, etc.;
(ii) Within ninety (90) days following the date of final compliance with the applicable discharge limits or in the case of a new discharge, following commencement of the introduction of wastewater to the wastewater system, the industrial user shall submit to the City a report indicating the nature and concentration of those pollutants regulated by the industrial user's industrial waste discharge permit. The report shall include the results of a minimum of three self-monitoring analyses of the user's discharge, collected and analyzed within the allowable ninety (90) day period. The report must be signed by an authorized representative of the industrial user and certified by a qualified professional.
(f) Duration of permits. Permits are issued for no more than (3) three years, and may be issued for a period of less than one year or may be stated to expire on a certain date. The terms and conditions upon which the permit is issued may be modified during the period for which the permit is in effect. The user shall be informed of the permit changes thirty (30) days prior to the effective date of the change. Any new conditions in the permit shall include a reasonable compliance schedule proposed by the industrial user and approved by the Public Works Director.
(g) Transfer of a permit. Permits are issued to a specific user for a specific operation. It shall not be reassigned or transferred or sold to a new owner, new user, different premises or a new or changed operations. Any attempted transfer, assignment or other alteration shall render the permit null and void as to the transferor or transferee.
(h) Revocation of a permit. Any user who violates the conditions of his permit, this article or applicable State and Federal regulations is subject to permit revocation. Violations include, but are not limited to, the following:
(1) Failure of a user to accurately report their wastewater constituent concentrations and characteristics or to comply with their self-monitoring requirements.
(2) Failure of the user to report significant changes in operations.
(3) Refusal of access to the user's premises for the purpose of inspection or monitoring.
(4) Violation of permit conditions.
(i) Preliminary determination of and penalties for noncompliance with permit requirements. For those industrial users not regulated by Federal pretreatment standards, pollutant discharge limits enforced as concentration limits (mg/l) will be modified when user consistently attempts to use dilution of the waste stream as a means of meeting the concentration limits. In such a case and/or at the discretion of the Public Works Director, said user will be required to meet a maximum mass emission rate, based on the user's average water usage for the past three years and the applicable pollutant concentration discharge limits.
For all industrial users, initial noncompliance with permit requirements may be determined by an analysis of a grab or composite sample of the effluent of a discharger for any constituent or condition specified in the user's permit. If the effluent of a user contains prohibited substances or is found to be in excess of the required concentration or conditions of this article, then a sampling and evaluation program shall be initiated by the City. The industry shall be required by the Public Works Director to implement any changes necessary to achieve compliance within a time limit proposed by the user and approved by the Public Works Director. Any user that refuses to cooperate in this effort, shall pay penalty charges based on the results of the sampling and evaluation program, as established by Council action.
(j) Public notification will be by publication annually, in the largest daily local newspaper, listing all local industries regulated by pretreatment standards or requirements who, during the previous twelve (12) months, were found to be in significant noncompliance with applicable pretreatment standards or other pretreatment requirements. For the purposes of this provision, an industrial user is in significant noncompliance if its violation meets one or more of the following criteria:
(1) Chronic violations of wastewater discharge limits, defined as those in which sixty-six (66%) percent or more of all the measurements taken during a six (6) month period exceed (by any magnitude) a numeric Pretreatment Standard or Requirement including instantaneous limits as defined in 40 CFR 403.3(l) (as may be amended), the daily maximum limit or the average limit for the same pollutant parameter.
(2) Technical Review Criteria (TRC) violations, defined as those in which thirty-three (33%) percent or more of all of the measurements for the same pollutant parameter taken during a six (6) month period equal or exceed the product of the numeric Pretreatment Standard or Requirement including instantaneous limits as defined in 40 CFR 403.3(l) (as may be amended), daily maximum limit or the average limit multiplied by the applicable TRC (TRC = 1.4 for BOD, Suspended Solids, and Oil and Grease, and 1.2 for all other pollutants except pH).
(3) Any other violation of a Pretreatment Standard or Requirement including instantaneous limits as defined in 40 CFR 403.3(l) (as may be amended), that, as determined by the Public Works Director, has caused, alone or with other discharges, interference with treatment processes, pass-through (including endangering the health of POTW personnel or the general public) or violations of the City's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Permit.
(4) Any discharge of a pollutant that has caused imminent endangerment to human health, welfare or to the environment, or which has resulted in the City's use of its emergency authority to halt or prevent such a discharge.
(5) Failure to meet, within ninety (90) days of the scheduled date, a compliance schedule milestone for starting construction, completing construction or achieving final compliance.
(6) Failure to provide required reports within thirty (30) days after the due date.
(7) Failure to accurately report noncompliance.
(8) Any other violation of group of violations which, as determined by the Public Works Director, has adversely affected the operation of the pretreatment program.
(k) The penalties for noncompliance shall continue to accumulate on a daily basis until the industrial user can show corrective action has been taken or compliance achieved. If the period of noncompliance continues for more than ten (10) consecutive working days, or if the Public Works Director determines that the violation presents or may present imminent or substantial danger to the health or welfare of persons, to the environment or causes interference with the operation of the treatment plant, the City may proceed with the following:
(1) Amend the existing permit only when the discharger has shown good faith in trying to comply and requires additional time for construction and/or acquiring equipment. The permit may be amended for a period not to exceed one hundred eighty (180) days.
(2) Proceed with enforcement action.
(Ord. 1515-NS, eff. June 5, 2009)