Links to Four Interrelated Water Quality Rule Packages

Overview of the four packages Water Quality Standards Antidegradation Section 401 Water Quality Certifications Stream Mitigation

Draft Rules

Water Quality Standards (OAC 3745-1)

Comment deadline - 5:00 p.m. on June 6, 2011
Following this initial public review and comment, Ohio EPA expects to craft and move forward on smaller rule packages comprised of selected rules and topics. Completing this initial review will afford the Agency the opportunity to consider the comments from affected parties and the public when assessing and prioritizing the content of future rulemakings.

This rule package along with the Antidegradation and Section 401 Water Quality Certification rule packages are three of four interrelated rule packages that have been available for interested party review since the fall of 2008. The fourth rule package, Stream Mitigation, is now available for interested party review. The release of the Stream Mitigation rule package starts a comment period for all four rule packages. As part of the notice of the Stream Mitigation rule package, updated versions of the draft Water Quality Standards rules are being released for review and comment.

Background

Water quality standards are state regulations or rules that protect lakes, rivers, streams and other surface water bodies from pollution. They contain: beneficial use designations such as warmwater aquatic life habitat, public water supply and primary contact recreation; numeric levels and narrative statements (water quality criteria) protective of the use designations; and procedures for applying the water quality criteria to wastewater dischargers.

Water quality standards serve as: the water quality goals for water uses and cleanliness; the benchmarks to measure and report on meeting Clean Water Act goals; the water quality targets to meet when setting wastewater permit limits and total maximum daily loads.

Draft rule changes include new beneficial use designations for aquatic life, recreation, agricultural drainage and navigation. The draft rule changes also include: incorporation of the national methods for calculating water quality criteria for the protection of human health; new human health criteria for about 135 chemicals; statewide application of criteria based on maximum contaminant levels; and new and revised aquatic life criteria for seven chemicals. See the fact sheet below for more information.

For additional information about Ohio EPA's water quality standards program, visit the Ohio EPA Water Quality Standards Program Web page.

Available documents

Fact sheet - updated December 2010 [PDF 232K]

• Human health criteria support documents [ZIP 13M]
  Unzip this file for the documents that support the draft human health water quality criteria in Attachments 3 and 4 of the fact sheet.

Interim Response to Comments - December 2010 [PDF 143K]
This includes the comments received as of December 1, 2010. Responses are provided to some of the comments; the other comments remain under consideration.

Technical Support Document: Nutrient Criteria for Inland Lakes in Ohio. March 2010 [PDF 427K]
This document summarizes the methodology used to develop the nutrient criteria for lakes in draft rule 3745-1-43 (table 43-12) . 

Draft Rules
For an amended rule text to be deleted is struck out and new text is underlined. For a new rule, all text is underlined. For a rescinded rule, text is left unchanged and “To Be Rescinded” is at the top of the first page of the rule.

Download all the draft rules to be rescinded here [PDF 130K] or download individual rules below.
Download all the draft amended and new rules here [PDF 651K] or download individual rules below.

 See all currently effective rules in Chapter 3745-1 here.

For additional information or to submit comments

Please submit any comments you have on the draft rules in one of the following manners.

If you would like further information about this rulemaking, please contact Dan Dudley at dan.dudley@epa.state.oh.us or (614) 644-2876.

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