EPA Urges Congress to Act on MTBE

Pressure is increasing for Congress to pass legislation phasing the additive methyl tertiary butyl ether out of reformulated gasoline.

In the 1992 Clean Air Act Amendments, Congress required that reformulated gasoline (RFG) contain 2 percent of oxygen by weight. RFG is about 30 percent of the nation?s gasoline supply and about 85 percent of RFG uses MTBE as the oxygenate.

After many complaints from around the nation, the Environmental Protection Agency has declared that MTBE is a significant risk to the nation?s drinking water supplies, since gasoline containing MTBE has leaked from underground tanks in many areas.

EPA Assistant Administrator Robert Perciasepe recently told the House Commerce Committee?s health and environment subcommittee that MTBE use should be reduced or eliminated as quickly as possible. He said EPA is considering administrative remedies, but meanwhile, Congress should act.

Mark Mazur, the Energy Department?s policy office director, said shifting from MTBE to other oxygenates could cost the nation?s oil refiners up to $2 billion. He said use of the additive should be gradually reduced ?to minimize impacts on gasoline production, gasoline supplies and prices.?

Mazur said removing all MTBE from RFG would be the equivalent of losing 400,000 b/d of gasoline production capacity, or closing four to five refineries.

A coalition of oil companies, Northeastern states and environmental groups have urged Congress to eliminate the 2 percent requirement (see March column).

The American Water Works Association (AWWA) has complained that EPA?s fiscal 2001 budget proposal had no special provisions for MTBE cleanups. AWWA estimates nationwide cleanup efforts could cost more than $1 billion.

TMDLs

The House Transportation and Public Works Committee?s subcommittee on Water Resources & Environment has held a hearing critical of EPA?s proposed regulations for Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs).

Rep. Sherwood L. Boehlert (R.N.Y.), subcommittee chairman, noted that the 1972 Clean Water Act Amendments provide TMDLs as a flexible tool to clean water in cases where technology-based controls alone do not do the job of attaining water quality standards.

Under a TMDL program, agencies determine how much of a pollutant a water body can assimilate without becoming impaired, examine the sources of that pollutant, and determine methods to achieve a cost effective way to reduce them.

Boehlert said, ?While I support the concept of TMDLs, I have some reservations about how EPA is proposing to implement this program. I am concerned that the agency is missing a real opportunity to move toward a performance-based system.

?In this regulation, EPA seems to be trying to address our remaining water quality problems by bringing more sources into the Clean Water Act permit system.

?I am concerned EPA?s TMDL proposal will not lead to cooperative or innovative solutions, developed by local stakeholders, even though these types of solutions have the best chance of improving water quality from hard to control sources, like nonpoint sources,? he said.

Bill Nielsen, president of the Eau Claire, Wis., city council, testified for the National League of Cities.

He said EPA?s TMDL proposal, if not amended, will severely limit growth and economic development in urban areas; obstruct compliance with remediation of sanitary sewer overflows and/or combined sewer overflows; and impose impossible requirements on discharges from municipal separate storm sewer systems.

Nielsen said the proposal also could halt conversion initiatives to bring septic systems into treatment facilities; shift the financial burden for pollutant reductions from nonpoint sources to local tax and ratepayers; and generate ?endless litigation.?

Urban Wet Weather Priorities Act

Representatives Steven LaTourette (R-OH) and Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) introduced the Urban Wet Weather Priorities Act of 2000, HR 3570, on Feb. 2. The bill would require EPA to follow nationally consistent standards for combined sewer overflows, sanitary sewer overflows, and stormwater and would provide $1 billion in grant money to implement watershed management techniques the first year with increased grant money in subsequent years.

The Water Environment Federation has worked closely with the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies and other groups in drafting the language and supports the bill.

?The bill would significantly reduce the alarming funding needs for urban wet weather programs, which EPA conservatively estimates at $150 billion over the next 20 years,? LaTourette and Pascrell stated.

In a press release, LaTourette cited the WEF/AMSA Cost of Clean estimates of over $330 billion of unmet wastewater infrastructure need over the next 20 years as the driving force behind the legislation.

Threatened Suit Opposed

The American Water Works Association (AWWA) has urged an environmental group to withdraw its threat of litigation against the EPA for not acting fast enough on a federal standard for arsenic in drinking water.

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is threatening to sue EPA and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for failing to propose an arsenic standard by January of this year, as is required by law. The Safe Drinking Water Act gives EPA until Jan. 1, 2001 to produce a final standard.

?Public health must always be everyone?s No. 1 priority,? said AWWA Executive Director Jack Hoffbuhr. ?Obviously, meeting deadlines is important, but AWWA is much more concerned that EPA weigh all the facts and address arsenic levels in drinking water appropriately in next year?s final rule.?

The rule-making process began in earnest last March with the release of the National Research Council?s (NRC) Arsenic in Drinking Water report, which recommended reducing the existing standard of 50 parts per billion (ppb). Despite some NRC experts commenting that a standard below 10 ppb was unsupportable, the final report did not specify a recommended level for the new standard. This lack of clear guidance has slowed the rule-making process.

Enforcement

Three employees of Johnson Properties Inc., which manages wastewater treatment facilities in Central Louisiana, have pleaded guilty in New Orleans U.S. District Court.

General Manager Glenn K. Johnson admitted to conspiring to violate the Clean Water Act (CWA) and to obstruction of justice for bribery and submitting false discharge monitoring reports. He will spend three years in prison and will pay $500,000 in fines plus $250,000 restitution to homeowners who were serviced by plants operated by Johnson Utilities.

President Montell Watkins pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the CWA and faces up to 5 years in prison and/or a $250,000 fine.

Water Laboratory Director Carol Rowell admitted to negligently violating the CWA by submitting reports to regulators without checking their accuracy; she faces up to 1 year in prison and/or a fine of $100,000.

The Justice Department said Johnson and Watkins failed to properly maintain wastewater treatment facilities from 1991-1998 and diverted customers? fees for their own personal use.