Legislature(2013 - 2014)BUTROVICH 205
01/23/2013 03:30 PM Senate RESOURCES
| Audio | Topic |
|---|---|
| Start | |
| Who's Keeping the Lights and Heat On? Problems and Solutions | |
| Homer Electric Association Update by Bradley Janorschke | |
| SB29 | |
| Adjourn |
* first hearing in first committee of referral
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
+ teleconferenced
= bill was previously heard/scheduled
| + | TELECONFERENCED | ||
| *+ | SB 29 | TELECONFERENCED | |
SB 29-CRUISE SHIP WASTEWATER DISCHARGE PERMITS
5:01:27 PM
CHAIR GIESSEL reconvened the Senate Resource Committee meeting
at 5:01 p.m. and announced SB 29 to be up for consideration.
LARRY HARTIG, Commissioner, Department of Environmental
Conservation (DEC), introduced staff in the audience. He planned
to give a little history leading up to today, talk about the
Science Advisory Panel and then about the bill and permitting
facilities. While this bill deals with some aspects of that, it
primarily aligns cruise ships with other people who get
discharge permits from the department. It doesn't change the
laws on how it's done.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG recalled in 1999 when people became
concerned about the waste water discharge from cruise ship
vessels and that led to them being required to switch to advance
waste water treatment systems in 2004. They were known to be the
best water treatment at the time doing even better than land-
based facilities. In 2006, a citizens' initiative was put forth
taxing the industry to help pay for onshore infrastructure and
requiring a permit issued by the State of Alaska in order to
discharge treated waste water in Alaska's waters (no more than
three miles off shore, which is federal waters that has no such
requirement).
SENATOR FRENCH said Southeast Alaska has some enormously wide
passages much more than six miles across and asked if strips of
federal waters were located in those passages or do you have to
go to the outer coast of Alaska to find federal waters.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said the department has maps dealing with
those issues, but it is complicated. He needed a particular
location to give him an answer, but in general, some rules apply
and you don't just go to the outer beach.
SENATOR FRENCH asked where the nearest federal water to Juneau
is.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said he would have to get back to him on
that.
5:06:29 PM
He said the 2006 voters' initiative created the requirement for
a state permit in state waters; it required that a vessel
discharging water under that permit meet state water quality
standards at the point of discharge. He explained that water
quality standards originate in the federal Clean Water Act. Each
state is supposed to identify what uses its waters can be used
for such as drinking, recreation and acquatic life. Then those
uses are looked at to see what water quality has to be: how much
and what kind of pollutants can be allowed without impairing
that use. So, the state set water quality standards to protect
these designated uses of water bodies throughout the state. The
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reviews those standards
and approves them; then they get incorporated into permits.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG explained if someone needs a permit from the
state to discharge water, the department would look at the uses
of the waters they would be discharging into and what impacts it
would have on those waters and write limits into the permit.
Those permit conditions set water quality standards. So, "at the
point of discharge" means those standards have to be met before
their discharge hits the water. That is in contrast to other
dischargers of treated waste water around the state. Other
industries' water treatment plants that discharge into marine
water have mixing zones, which are an exception to water quality
standards. They are allowed by the EPA recognizing that it's
really difficult, if not impossible, for many dischargers to
meet the water quality standards at the point of discharge. So
they allow a limited area of mixing of the treated effluent with
the receiving water where the water quality standards have to be
met at the edge of the mixing zone. The permit would say what
the conditions for the mixing zone are, how much could be
discharged and where water quality standards have to be met and
how they would be monitored. Mixing zones are a typical
provision in a state permit that would be issued to a waste
water discharge facility anywhere around the state, and the 2006
initiative didn't allow DEC to give cruise ships mixing zones.
The question arose from vessels that weren't meeting state water
quality standards at point of discharge. In 2009 HB 134 passed
that gave DEC temporary (until the end of 2015) authority to
allow cruise ships to have mixing zones. So in 2016, they would
go back to the original citizens' initiative using the point of
discharge for criteria. Second, HB 134 required DEC to convene a
Science Advisory Panel to advise them about what is on the
horizon in terms of waste water treatment facilities. The
statute designates where the panel members come from and what
kind of expertise they must have.
5:12:46 PM
The panel held about 15 meetings including experts from Europe
and Alaska, DEC data and cruise ship system observations and
issued a preliminary report in November 2012 indicating what was
achievable and when. They concluded that the current systems
called "advanced waste water treatment systems" are state-of-
the-art in terms of what is available now.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG explained that advanced waste water
treatment systems are a class and that a number of manufacturers
approach waste water treatment a little differently. Some may
work better on different pollutants and ships are different in
terms of piping and spacing, so you can't say one system is the
best without studying the whole ship.
5:14:21 PM
The panel also looked at DEC water quality data and found that
these ships were doing pretty well with meeting the criteria at
the point of discharge except for treating ammonia and three
dissolved metals: zinc, copper and nickel. The panel couldn't
identify a system on the horizon that could be installed on
these vessels that would bring them into compliance with the
point of discharge requirement. They did recognize that there
certainly are opportunities for efficiencies and tweaking
systems for improvements. With the standard hanging out there
and the authority to do mixing zones sunseting in 2015, the
department would suddenly be back to using at the point of
discharge for all parameters. Maybe some affordable incremental
moves could be made, but you still wouldn't make that standard
by 2015. Would you tweak your system and try to stay in Alaska
or start making plans to leave?
The DEC has a number of ways to regulate dischargers; it isn't
just the treatment system. It can say where the discharge should
be, how often, when under way so you have the sea turning up
behind the ship and rapid mixing, and who goes when to name a
few. Other things can be done to minimize the impact of the
discharge besides just looking at the treatment system, itself,
Commissioner Hartig said.
The panel also looked at the environmental benefit with other
changes that might be made and found that it would probably be
hard to define that, particularly given DEC's other authorities
to minimize the impacts of discharging waste water. The
preliminary report was required in 2013 and a final one is due
in January 2015 - right before the sunset of DEC's mixing zone
authority with the idea that the legislature would come back and
revisit the situation and decide what to do. The DEC concurred
with the Science Advisory Panel's findings.
5:18:48 PM
The key points in SB 29 are:
-it removes at the point of discharge requirement.
-it would allow cruise ships to be able to get a mixing zone
permit only if they treat waste water in advance with an
advanced waste water treatment system.
-it gives DEC guidance on what an advanced waste water treatment
system is and the ability to approve of a system that does the
same thing in a different way.
One thing the panel didn't address is in SB 29 and that is
smaller vessels; less than 20 that operate in Alaskan waters.
Their discharges would be managed under "best management plans"
that would be submitted to and approved by DEC. The department
would still have the ability to require a permit if they thought
the vessel needed to do things differently. The plans can be in
effect for five years under SB 29 instead of the existing three,
which is consistent with all waste water permits. The five years
would also apply to the larger vessels.
5:22:22 PM
CHAIR GIESSEL asked if the small vessel section was section 2 on
page 2.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said he wasn't going to do a sectional
analysis but give an overview of how things worked together. He
went on to say that SB 29 also puts cruise ships in the same
category as other facilities that DEC issues waste water permits
for. Current law says when the department writes a new permit
for cruise ship vessels it can't have any condition in it that
is less restrictive than was in an earlier version of the permit
(the "anti-backsliding provision," that is based on federal
law). But there are a series of exceptions for when you are
allowed to backslide. Those exceptions are in current cruise
ship law and they are needed sometimes; for instance if a ship
did well on a bunch of parameters but not so well on one. The
department now has the flexibility to let them go ahead, so they
still want that flexibility.
5:24:56 PM
He said they had been writing permits during the last few years
the initiative was in effect and maybe some of them aren't
right. They basically want to have something similar to what
they do for other dischargers.
SENATOR FRENCH asked him to explain how the effects of copper
and zinc could be of concern to people who fish for salmon.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said all the parameters they talk about are
of concern which is why water quality criteria has been
established for them. Copper has the potential to impact
olfactory senses of fish and impair their ability to find their
home stream or change their response to prey.
He explained that the department is required to review its
standards at least every three years; it's called a tri-annual
review. They notice the public and list the things they think
need to be looked at for possible change. Copper has been on the
last couple of tri-annual reviews; so it's one they are
watching. The best advice he could give is that the science is
still emerging and moving on it now would be premature. When
they move it will be very informed, because copper is not unique
to cruise ships. It would be of concern for a mine discharge and
it's also what some water systems are built out of.
SENATOR FRENCH asked if all cruise ships have copper pipes.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG answered no. Copper has a variety of
sources; you could say copper came from the copper pipes in the
community where they got their bunkered water or from the copper
pipes or fittings in the ship. DEC sets water quality standards
for everybody, so when they look at the potential effects of
copper, it wouldn't matter where it came from. They would look
at the amount of copper that is discharged and if it would be
safe going into whatever the receiving environment is. They
couldn't require discharging under way for a shore based
facility. Copper can't be treated in the discharge, but other
approaches can be taken like looking at people putting in more
copper than the cruise ships do.
SENATOR FRENCH asked who that would be.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that he would have to look at the
historic mining reports. The City and Borough of Juneau plant
had problems with copper at one point that EPA was doing some
enforcement on.
5:30:08 PM
SENATOR MICCICHE said he was aware of mixing zones being
disallowed in anadromus streams for waste water discharges and
asked if there was another scenario in the marine environment
where mixing zones are disallowed in the state.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG answered that SB 29 doesn't change the law
that would allow DEC to decide where, when and how someone could
discharge waste water from a cruise ship. So they could prohibit
it that way. Mixing zone regulations don't go away with SB 29
and there are 17 requirements to get one; it can't bio-
accumulate or have toxic effects, it can't affect anadromus fish
going through the area, and it can't affect the water body's
ability to produce aquatic life in the future or affect
populations to name a few. A cruise ship has a right to mixing
zone, but it doesn't mean they automatically get one; it must
have an advanced waste water treatment system as well as meeting
all the conditions.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said SB 29 doesn't change water quality
standards and when the state changes them they can't be used
unless the EPA approves them. SB 29 would sunset the Science
Advisory Panel, but not change DEC's ability to impose permit
conditions or to look at best available technologies, putting it
in line with other dischargers.
CHAIR GIESSEL asked if the allowance for cruise ships expires in
2015.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG answered that it expires at the end of
calendar year 2015 and the DEC would lose its authority to allow
mixing zone for cruise ships and would go back to "at the point
of discharge" for all water quality standards.
CHAIR GIESSEL asked why it was important to address the bill
now.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that two things would motivate an
earlier look. First, the cruise ships themselves have various
systems and they are pretty packed in their spaces. If you make
a big change, the ship would have to be pulled apart; it would
have to go into dry dock and be cut in half or something like
that and that would require a fair amount of lead time and the
cruise ships are scheduled around the world. Also, nothing has
been identified to be any better than existing advanced waste
water treatment systems in terms of being available soon.
5:37:13 PM
Another point was that the current permit that was used for the
last cruise season expires in April 2013 and can't be extended
(beyond the three years). The first cruise ship arrives in April
2013. a week or two after the permit expires, and it will need a
permit to be legal under Alaska law because it needs to
discharge. DEC could issue a new permit for vessels coming to
Alaska that want to discharge before this upcoming season, but
it would be based on existing law. So if SB 29 passes there
would be a permit issued for the coming season that would be
based on the previous law. Ships would have to plan their cruise
season around that. It's all doable, but if SB 29 passes, then
the department would turn around and start running another
permit through the public process.
SENATOR FAIRCLOUGH asked how the department defines "advanced
waste water treatment" in regulation.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that it would look like the statute;
the only difference would be if some other treatment system
became available.
5:41:00 PM
SENATOR FAIRCLOUGH said she didn't see a definition in the bill.
Language on page 3, starting on line 13, provides two areas of
minimum standards and she asked if those were federal water
quality standards or approved Alaska water quality standards
that have been approved by the EPA or another federal agency.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that those are the federal
standards, sometimes referred to as the Murkowski Law, that
caused the ships to put advanced waste water treatment systems
in.
SENATOR FAIRCLOUGH said she was looking for specific Alaska
water quality standards and needed a better definition of
"advanced waste water treatment." She also wanted to know what
the department might consider as add-ons.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG said the water quality standards are in
regulation 18 AAC 70. Manuals are incorporated by reference and
are all available on the DEC website; he offered to help her
locate what she was looking for.
SENATOR DYSON said putting the existing standards in place was
hard to do and ships spent a lot of money to install those
plants that were only required for the Alaskan market. He said
that Anchorage's municipal waste water treatment is still only a
primary system and is pretty primitive and the only way they
stay in business is by being grandfathered in. He was sure
Anchorage must have 70,000 houses with copper pipe and he had
some information that said the Mendenhall River produces 23
times the amount of copper of all the cruise ships combined and
asked if that was true.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG responded that he read that in the panel's
report, but he didn't know the exact figures.
SENATOR DYSON asked if he knew how much copper was in the Copper
River that has a world-class salmon run.
5:45:18 PM
SENATOR BISHOP asked how many permits he writes for large
vessels.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that he writes one permit; it's
called a general permit and different types of vessels are
separated into subcategories within it.
SENATOR BISHOP asked for ball park information on the ratio of
people who discharge inside and outside state waters.
5:46:41 PM
MICHELLE BONNET HALE, Director, Division of Water, Department of
Environmental Conservation (DEC), Anchorage, AK, said that 40
percent of cruise ships go outside the three mile limit to
discharge.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG pointed out that may just be because of the
holding capacity they have in their itinerary and how much time
in port and between ports. It's difficult to reach a conclusion
on one fact.
SENATOR FAIRCLOUGH asked if the ferry system was excluded from
the permit requirement.
MS. HALE answered that ferries are small passenger vessels that
submit a best management practices plan.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG answered that most of those vessels are
regulated by the Coast Guard in terms of what kinds of systems
they have, which is a lower technology than an advanced waste
water treatment system.
SENATOR FAIRCLOUGH asked if he had recommendations for improving
ferry waste water discharge standards.
COMMISSIONER HARTIG replied that he hadn't looked at that.
[SB 29 was held in committee.]
| Document Name | Date/Time | Subjects |
|---|---|---|
| SRES Gas Supply Group. Moira Smith 2013-01-23.ppt |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM |
Railbelt Utility Gas Supply Study Group |
| SB 29 Sectional Analysis.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SB 29 Science Advisory Panel Rpt to Leg COVER LTR 1-8-13.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SB 29 DEC Preliminary Report on Cruise Ship Wastewater 1-1-13.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SB 29 Fiscal Note LL0987-DEC-WQ-01-17-13.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SB 29 Cruise Ship Wastewater Permits vs.A.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SB 29 Cruise Ship Wastewater Transmittal Letter 2013 01 17.pdf |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM SRES 1/25/2013 3:30:00 PM |
SB 29 |
| SRES HEA Janorschke 2013-01-23.pptx |
SRES 1/23/2013 3:30:00 PM |
Utility Presentation |