Article I — General Provisions

These wastewater discharge regulations set uniform requirements for discharges of domestic, industrial waste and storm drainage water into the city sewerage system to enable the city to comply with the administrative provisions of the Clean Water Grant Regulations, water quality requirements set by the Regional Water Quality Control Board and the applicable effluent limitations, national standards of performance, toxic and pretreatment effluent standards, and any other discharge criteria which are required or authorized by state or federal law, and to derive the maximum public benefit by regulating the quality and quantity of wastewater discharged into those systems. To the extent federal or state requirements and any amendments thereto are more stringent or different than the provisions provided herein (including 40 CFR 403) such provisions shall control.

(Ord. No. 1819, 2-18-2009)

Unless otherwise defined in this chapter, terms shall be as adopted in the latest edition of Standard Methods for the Examination of Water and Wastewater, published by the American Public Health Association, the American Water Works Association, and the Water Environment Federation. Waste constituents and characteristics shall be measured by the approved methods as defined below. The following words shall have these meaning(s):

"Approved methods" means the analytical methods listed in the Federal Register 40 CFR Part 136, unless expressly stated, or as established by federal or state regulatory agencies.

"Authorized representative" means a person duly authorized by corporate resolution or other legally enforceable authorizing document on file with the POTW to perform all acts required by this Chapter.

"Bedroom(s)" means room(s) of a residential user designed or used primarily for sleeping purposes, as determined by the city, based on criteria such as those rooms having closets.

"Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD)" means the amount of dissolved oxygen required to meet the metabolic needs of aerobic microorganisms in water containing organic matter as determined by approved methods and, unless otherwise noted, exerted in a period of five days at twenty degrees Celsius.

"By-pass" means an intentional diversion of waste or wastewater from any portion of an industrial user's treatment facility.

"Capacity" or "impact fee" means a charge as described in this chapter, levied on construction or on new, expanded, or ongoing activity, which uses publicly-owned treatment works (POTW) capacity and other wastewater facilities associated with growth. The fee is normally paid at the time of issuance of a building permit.

"Chemical oxygen demand (COD)" means the oxygen equivalent of that portion in a sample that is susceptible to oxidation by a strong chemical oxidant as determined by approved methods.

"Commercial user" means any user of the sewerage system except those specifically classified as residential user or industrial user.

"Community sewer or collection system" means a sewer owned and operated by the city tributary to the treatment plant. It includes, but is not limited to, sanitary and industrial, pumping stations, siphons, canal crossings, manholes and sewers leading from the property line or easement line to the collection sewer.

"Compatible pollutant" means biochemical oxygen demand, suspended solids and fecal coliform bacteria, plus additional pollutants identified in the city's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit.

"Contamination" means an impairment of the quality of the receiving waters by waste to a degree which creates a hazard to the public health through poisoning or through the spread of disease.

"Control authority" means the White Slough Water Pollution Control Facility.

"Dissolved solids" means residue upon evaporation of water after filtration as determined by approved methods. Also termed "total dissolved solids" or "TDS."

"Domestic sewage" means the waterborne wastes derived from the ordinary living processes and of such character as to permit satisfactory disposal, without special treatment, into the domestic system.

"Domestic system or sanitary sewer system" means a portion of the sewerage system and treatment facility used primarily for domestic sewage.

"Employee" means, for "unit of measure" purposes, the total number of all classifications of employees from all shifts that physically work at the site producing the wastewater discharge. Temporary or part-time employees shall be prorated to their time equivalent to a full time employee.

"Federal Act or Federal Regulations" means the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, PL 92-500, and any amendments thereto; as well as any guidelines, limitations and standards promulgated by the Environmental Protection Agency pursuant to the Act including the Federal Register, 40 CFR Subchapter IV for pretreatment regulations and the Federal Clean Water Act.

"Fixed total dissolved solids" means residue upon evaporation of water and heating to five hundred and fifty degrees centigrade after filtration as determined by approved methods.

"Gpd or gpd" means gallons per day.

"High strength user" means a user with discharge volume in excess of 2.0 MGY or a daily average waste strength in excess of the limitations in Section 13.12.110 or in excess of either three hundred milligrams per liter BOD or three hundred milligrams per liter SS or nine hundred milligrams per liter COD or as determined by the public works director.

"Holding tank waste" means any domestic waste from holding tanks, contained in vessels, chemical toilets, campers, trailers, septic tanks, vacuum tank trucks, or other stationary or mobile sources.

"Industrial system" means the portion of the sewerage system used primarily for industrial waste, which is compatible for discharging directly into the ponding and irrigation system at the treatment plant. Waste not suitable for direct application to land is prohibited in the industrial system, which includes, but is not limited to, contents of chemical toilets, septic tanks, waste holding tanks, waste sumps, and domestic sewage.

"Industrial user" means a user subject to regulation by Clean Water Act Section 307(b), (c) or (d) or 40 CFR 403.3(i) and (j) who discharges industrial waste into the sewerage system.

"Industrial waste" means the waterborne waste and wastewater from any production, manufacturing or processing operation of whatever nature, including institutional and commercial operations, where water is used for the removal of significant quantities of waste other than from human habitation of premises connected to the domestic or industrial sewers. Contents of chemical toilets, septic tanks, waste holding tanks and waste sumps shall not be classed as industrial waste.

"Interference" means the inhibition or disruption of the sewer system, treatment processes or operations of the treatment plant which contributes to the violation of its discharge requirements including inhibition or disruption of sludge disposal practices or compliance with any of the statutory authorities listed in the Federal Register 40 CFR Part 403.3(k).

"MGD" or "mgd" is the abbreviation for million gallons per day.

"MGY" is the abbreviation for million gallons per year.

"Mass emission rate" means the weight of material discharged into the sewerage system during a given time interval. Unless otherwise specified, the mass emission rate shall mean pounds per day of a particular constituent or combination of constituents.

"Moderate strength user" means users with a wastewater strength of less than three hundred milligrams per liter of BOD and SS and having a waste flow less than 2.0 MGY.

"National pretreatment standard, pretreatment standard or standard" means any regulation containing pollutant discharge limits promulgated by the EPA in accordance with Clean Water Act Section 307(b) and (c) which applies to industrial users. This term includes prohibitive discharge limits established pursuant to 40 CFR 403.5.

"Natural outlet" means any outlet into a watercourse, ditch, pond, lake or other body of surface water or groundwater.

"New source" means an industrial user discharging, or planning to discharge, from a source at which:

a.

Construction is carried out at a site at which no other source is located;

b.

Construction totally replaces the process, or production equipment that produces, the wastewater at an existing source; or

c.

The wastewater producing process constructed is substantially independent of an existing source at the same site.

"Nuisance" means anything which is injurious to health, or is offensive to the senses, or an obstruction to the free use of property so as to interfere with the comfort or enjoyment of life or property, or which affects at the same time an entire community or neighborhood or any considerable number of persons, although the extent of the annoyance or damage inflicted upon individuals may be unequal.

"Pass through" means the introduction of a pollutant by a user into the sewerage system which leaves the treatment plant in quantities or concentrations that alone or in conjunction with other sources, cause a violation of the city's discharge requirements.

"Permit" means wastewater discharge permit issued by the public works department.

"Person" means any individual, partnership, firm, association, corporation or public agency, including the state of California and the United States of America.

"pH" means the negative logarithm of the hydrogen-ion activity in moles per liter of solution as determined by approved methods.

"Pollutant" means any substance which can cause pollution.

"Pollution" means an alteration of the quality of the receiving waters by waste to a degree which unreasonably affects such waters for beneficial use or facilities which serve such beneficial uses. Pollution may include, but not be limited to, contamination.

"Pretreatment" means the treatment or flow limitation of industrial wastes prior to discharge to the city sewerage system.

"Pretreatment requirements" means any substantive or procedural requirement related to pretreatment, other than a National Pretreatment Standard, imposed on an industrial user (40 CFR 403.3(t).

"Private sewer, building sewer or house service sewer" means that part of the building sewer beginning at the junction, thereof, with the building plumbing or drainage system and terminating at the property line or at the easement line.

"Publicly owned treatment works (POTW)" means any devices and systems used in the storage, treatment, recycling and reclamation of municipal sewage or industrial wastes of a liquid nature. This includes sewers, pipes and other conveyances if they convey wastewater to a POTW treatment plant.

"Residential user" means a single-family house or each unit of a duplex, flat, group dwelling, apartment or any other living accommodation which has facilities for sleeping and the preparation of food, whether sanitary facilities connected to the collection system are provided for the occupants, thereof, whether or not such sanitary facilities are installed therein or connected thereto; living accommodations designed or used for short-term transient lodging which are rented to other than the controlling occupant of the premises shall be considered as a commercial unit.

"Settleable solids" means that portion of matter present in sewage, industrial waste or waters introduced into the storm drains that readily settles out of the carrier liquid in a quiescent state as determined by approved methods.

"Sewage" means the waterborne wastes received from human habitation and use of premises for residential, commercial, institutional and industrial purposes.

"Sewage service charge" means a regular charge for each user based upon each user's proportional use of the sewerage system.

"Sewage service unit" or "SSU" is defined as each increment of flow equal to the flow from an average two-bedroom residence (one-hundred and ninety-four gallons per day) and having a strength less than three hundred milligrams per liter biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and suspended solids (SS).

"Sewer" means a pipe or conduit which carries sewage and/or industrial wastes and to which storm, surface and ground waters are not intentionally admitted. When used in this chapter, "sanitary sewer" means those pipelines operated primarily for the collection of domestic sewage. "Industrial sewer" means those pipelines operated primarily for the collection of industrial waste.

"Sewerage system" means all works for collecting, pumping, treating, disposing, storing or reclaiming sewage, industrial waste and/or storm water.

"Significant industrial user" means:

a.

All industrial users subject to categorical pretreatment standards under 40 CFR 403.6 and 40 CFR Chapter I, subchapter N; and

b.

Any other industrial user that: discharges an average of twenty-five thousand gallons per day or more of process wastewater to the POTW (excluding sanitary, noncontact cooling and boiler blowdown wastewater); contributes a process wastestream which makes up five percent or more of the average dry weather hydraulic or organic capacity of the POTW treatment plant; or is designated as such by the control authority on the basis that the industrial user has a reasonable potential for adversely affecting the POTW's

operation or for violating any pretreatment standard or requirement (in accordance with 40 CFR 403.8(f)(6)). (40 CFR 403.3(v)(1).

"Significant noncompliance" means a violation meets one or more of the following criteria:

a.

Chronic violations of wastewater discharge limits, defined here as those in which sixty-six percent or more of all of the measurements taken for the same pollutant parameter during a six-month period exceed (by any magnitude) a numeric pretreatment standard or requirement, including instantaneous limits, as defined by 40 CFR 403.3(I);

b.

Technical review criteria (TRC) violations, defined here as those in which thirty-three percent or more of all of the measurements taken for the same pollutant parameter during a six-month period equal or exceed the product of the numeric pretreatment standard or requirement including instantaneous limits, as defined by 40 CFR 403.3(I) multiplied by the applicable TRC (TRC=1.4 for BOD, TSS, fats, oil, and grease, and 1.2 for all other pollutants except pH);

c.

Any other violation of a pretreatment standard or requirement as defined by 40 CFR 403.3(I) daily maximum, long-term average, instantaneous limit, or narrative standard) that the POTW determines has caused, alone or in combination with other discharges, interference or pass through (including endangering the health of POTW personnel or the general public);

d.

Any discharge of a pollutant that has caused imminent endangerment to human health, welfare or to the environment or has resulted in the POTW's exercise of its emergency authority under paragraph (f) (1)(vi)(B) of 40 CFR 403.8 to halt or prevent such a discharge;

e.

Failure to meet, within ninety days after the schedule date, a compliance schedule milestone contained in a local control mechanism or enforcement order for starting construction, completing construction, or attaining final compliance;

f.

Failure to provide, within forty-five days after the due date, required reports such as baseline monitoring reports, ninety-day compliance reports, periodic self-monitoring reports, and reports on compliance with compliance schedules;

g.

Failure to accurately report noncompliance;

h.

Any other violation or group of violations, which may include a violation of best management practices, which the city determines will adversely affect the operation of implementation of the local pretreatment program.

"Slug" means a sudden large increase or decrease (factor of two or more) from normal waste volume or concentration.

"Slug discharge" means any discharge of a nonroutine, episodic nature including but not limited to, an accidental spill or a noncustomary batch discharge.

"Storm drain system" means any portion of the sewerage system used for the conveyance of stormwater or surface or subsurface drainage water.

"Storm sewer" means those pipelines operated primarily for the collection of stormwaters.

"Suspended solids" or "SS" or "TSS" means that portion of residue present in sewage, industrial waste or waters introduced into the storm drains that is retained on a filter (nonfilterable) as determined by approved methods.

"Treatment plant" means the White Slough Water Pollution Control Facility of the city, and includes but is not limited to the domestic sewage treatment facilities, industrial waste treatment facilities, sludge disposal facilities and irrigatable lands.

"Unpolluted water" means water to which no constituent has been added, either intentionally or accidentally, which would render such water unacceptable to the agency having jurisdiction, thereof, for disposal to the storm drain system or natural drainages or directly to surface waters.

"User" means any person that discharges, causes or permits the discharge of wastewater or stormwater into a sewerage system.

"Waste" includes sewage and any and all other waste substances, liquid, solid, gaseous or radioactive, associated with human habitation, or of human or animal origin, or from any producing, washing, manufacturing or processing operation of whatever nature, including such waste placed within containers of whatever nature prior to, and for purposes of, disposal.

"Wastewater" means waste and water, whether treated or untreated, discharged into or permitted to enter a sewer.

"Wastewater constituents and characteristics" means the individual chemical, physical, bacteriological and radiological parameters and such other parameters that serve to define, classify or measure the contents, quality and strength of wastewater as determined by a state certified laboratory, and the volume, rate of flow or other parameters that serve to define quantity.

"Wastewater discharge permit" means a permit issued by the city for a user to discharge into a sewerage system.

(Ord. No. 1819, 2-18-2009)