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Builder Cites Shortcomings of EPA Storm Water Proposal
A proposal to require home builders and developers to make drastic and very expensive changes to manage the storm water discharge from construction sites is “a step backwards” for the environment, says Chuck Ellison, a longtime NAHB member who builds homes in the Washington, D.C. suburbs.
In response to a court order, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed effluent limit guidelines for the construction and development industry.
Home builders had been exempt from the guidelines, which have long been a requirement for some other industries, such as manufacturing facilities that must treat liquid waste materials and pollutants before discharging them, via a pipeline, into nearby bodies of water.
The pollutants involved in storm water discharge are the soil and sediments that can wash off the site after a rainfall — and the amount of rainfall in a given day or month cannot be controlled by the home builder. Instead, home builders and developers have relied on erosion and sediment control “Best Management Practices” — silt fences, ponds and similar measures — to keep sediment from entering the water stream.
They’re still the best solution, Ellison, a vice president for Miller & Smith home builders, said. “There are different reporting requirements with storm water and different fees, depending on where you build, but since water flows downhill, it’s done the same way everywhere: You collect water at a low point on the site, and you treat it,” he said.
Instead of building sediment ponds with passive storm water collection systems, the proposed effluent limit guidelines could require active systems — including the manpower to run them — in areas of the country where clay makes up more than 10% of the soil and there is a lot of rain, which includes where Miller & Smith builds.
“We excavate, discharge and let the water clean itself,” Ellison said. “Now, the EPA wants a big machine down there to clean it. We’d go from a passive system that requires very little human interaction to a mechanical system that would require a lot of expense to work,” he said.
NAHB estimates that the proposed requirements could cost developers up to $45,000 per acre to implement — with questionable environmental benefits. “There are a lot of questions about the mechanical systems that the EPA hasn’t researched yet,” he said.
To clean the storm water discharge, the machines that would be used to meet the new EPA guidelines pump a polymer into the sediment basin that binds to the sand and soil suspended in the water. “No one knows the results of putting polymers into the receiving system in such a concentrated matter,” he said. “There’s been no research at all in cold climates. Do we know if they work? I suspect they don’t.”
Another problem, he said, is that “It doesn’t always rain at convenient times; it happens at night, it happens on weekends, and somebody’s going to have to operate these things. I’d have to get the pumps started and I’d have to get people there. When it rains, I’d have to have multiple people everywhere. Do you cross train your staff? Figuring out how to do it is frightening to me,” Ellison said.
A current Miller & Smith project in Gaithersburg, Md., includes 11 sediment basins. “That means I would need 11 machines, and at least four people on site when they were pumping. If it rains all day, some may not be able to stay there for 24 hours. And Murphy’s law always applies, so something will break down, or you could run out of polymer, all sorts of potential headaches,” he said.
The proposal is “going to have a bigger risk of failure — and if there are enough failures it would be a disaster, from an environmental point of view,” he said.
“We’re doing a good job of managing storm water runoff today,” Ellison continued. “I don’t think EPA has made the case that we are not doing an adequate job. If this is a way to get rid of the bad apples — those who flaunt storm water regulations — these automatic system requirements won’t fix them. In fact, it may make it worse.
“Today, in most jurisdictions, the first thing you have to do is put in your sediment control measures and they are inspected by the county before you do any work. If I am a bad apple, even if I don’t do any construction for a while, it’s probably still safe” with a passive system, but a mechanical system requires immediate intervention for it to work, he pointed out.
The NAHB Environmental Issues Committee has been able to stave off effluent limit guidelines since the early 1990s, when they were first proposed for other industries. It’s only the lawsuit filed by an environmental group that forced EPA to act, Ellison pointed out.
“We as builders tend to look at things from a common sense point of view, whereas the environmental community relies on their interpretation of the law to get what they want,” he said.
For more information, e-mail Calli Schmidt at NAHB, or call her at 800-368-5242 x8132.
 Are You Ready for a Visit From the EPA?
“Storm Water Permitting: A Guide for Builders and Developers,” available through BuilderBooks.com, provides a starting point for builders and developers to use in locating and understanding storm water permitting requirements.
The publication has been prepared to help builders comply with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's storm water requirements, and includes information on state permitting programs and more than 50 of the most commonly used best management practices.
Also included are tips on compliance, including how to handle visits from inspectors.
To view or purchase this guide online, click here, or call 800-223-2665.
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