Conditional Waivers of Waste Discharge Requirements

For

Discharges from Irrigated Lands

Within the Central Valley Region

Note:  The Central Valley Regional Water Board’s Irrigated Lands Waiver Program is a developing program.  The following synopsis of the waiver program is current as of February 2005.

What is the Irrigated Agricultural Lands Program?

What is a Conditional Waiver?

What is Waste?

What is Discharge?

Who is a Discharger?

What are Irrigated Lands?

What are Waters of the State?

Rationale for Conditional Waiver of Waste Discharge Requirements for Discharges from Irrigated Lands

What is a Conditional Waiver?

A conditional waiver is a regulatory process under California’s Nonpoint Source (NPS) Program Plan, dated January 2000, to meet the requirements of the California Water Code (CWC).  The California Water Code (CWC) requires any person who is discharging waste, other than to a community water system, which could affect the quality of the waters of the state within the Central Valley Region, to file a Report of Waste Discharge (ROWD) with the Regional Board.  The CWC requires the Regional Board to prescribe Waste Discharge Requirements (WDRs), or waive WDRs, for the discharge.

The CWC authorizes the Regional Board to waive WDRs for a specific discharge or specific type of discharge if:

1. the waiver is not against the public interest;
2. the waiver does not exceed 5 years in duration;
3. the waiver is conditional and may be terminated at any time, and
4. a public hearing has been held.

Therefore, what is being waived is the requirement to file ROWDs and obtain WDRs for discharges from irrigated lands.  A waiver is an alternative regulatory option to WDRs.

What is Waste?

Waste is defined in the California Water Code.  Waste includes, but is not limited to, earthen materials including soil (sand, silt, and clay) and rock; inorganic materials such as metals, salts, boron, selenium, potassium, nitrogen, etc.; and organic materials such as organic pesticides. 

What is Discharge?

A discharge occurs when water that contains waste leaves your property, if it could ultimately enter surface waters.  Water containing waste is considered a discharge if it enters surface waters from a piece of property, flows over other lands first, or enters a drain.  Discharges from irrigated lands include surface drainages (tailwater), operational spills, subsurface drainage generated by irrigating crop land or by installing drainage systems to lower the water table below irrigated lands (wastewater) and storm water runoff flowing from irrigated lands.  Tailwater runoff and storm water runoff may contain pesticides, nutrients, salts, selenium, or soil.  There is no minimum amount or frequency of discharge.  If any waste is in water that leaves the property and can enter and affect water quality, coverage under a waiver or a permit is required.

Who is a Discharger?

A discharger is any person who releases waste that could affect the quality of the waters of the state.  “Persons” may include individuals, corporations, cities, and special districts.  A discharger can be the owner of the property or a tenant farmer.

What are Irrigated Lands?

Irrigated lands are lands where water is applied for producing crops.  It includes, but is not limited to, land planted to row, field and tree crops as well as commercial nurseries, nursery stock production, managed wetlands and rice production. 

What are Waters of the State?

Waters of the state include any surface or groundwater within the boundaries of the state.  Waters of the state include natural streams, irrigation ditches or canals, ponds, and waters in privately operated channels.  The Waiver applies to discharges to surface waters, but not to groundwater. 

Rationale for Conditional Waiver of Waste Discharge Requirements for Discharges from Irrigated Lands

• In 1982, the Regional Board adopted a resolution (No. 82-036) that conditionally waived WDRs for 23 categories of discharges, including irrigation return water and storm water runoff.  These waivers terminated on 1 January 2003.  The Regional Board adopted a resolution on 5 December 2002 (Resolution No. R5-2002-0201) establishing a new Conditional Waiver of Waste Discharge Requirements for Discharges from Irrigated Lands within the Central Valley Region.

• Within Resolution No. R5-2002-0201, the Regional Board adopted two Conditional Waivers – one for Coalition Groups, which form on behalf of individual dischargers, and a second Conditional Waiver for individual Discharges.

• The purpose of the Waivers is to provide an interim program until a 10-year implementation program can be developed for Dischargers covered by this Resolution.  The Waivers establish conditions that will require individual Discharges and or Coalition Groups to conduct activities required by a monitoring and reporting program to determine affects on water quality and to implement and evaluate management practices that will result in achieving compliance with water quality objectives in the waters of the state.

• It is appropriate to adopt a waiver of ROWD and WDRs at this time because:
1. The Regional Board has limited facility specific information, and limited water quality data on facility specific discharges.
2. There are more than 25,000 individual dischargers who discharge waste from irrigated lands.  It is neither feasible nor practical, due to limited Regional Board resources, to adopt WDRs within a reasonable time. 
3. Although there is information that dischargers of waste from irrigated lands have impaired waters of the state, information concerning the specific locations of impairments, specific causes, specific types of waste and specific management practices that mitigate impairments, improve and protect water quality is generally not available. 
4. The conditions of the Waivers will result in the development of new and additional information that should provide a more reasonable basis for the adoption of individual or general WDRs, where necessary, in the future.

• It is appropriate to regulate this category of agricultural facilities under Waivers rather than individual WDRs of general WDRs in order to simplify and streamline the regulatory process while additional facility and water quality information is collected over the term of the Resolution and Waivers, and an EIR for a ten year implementation program is prepared.