Received, Clerk's Office 5/21/2018 ** R2018-032** BEFORE THE ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD IN THE MATIER OF: PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO: 35 Ill. Adm. Code 302.102 and 302.208{g) R18- WATER QUALITY STANDARDS FOR CHLORIDES NOTICE OF FILING TO: Don Brown Clerk of the Board Illinois Pollution Control Board 100 West Randolph Street, Suite 11-500 Chicago, Illinois 60601 (Via Electronic Mail) (See Persons on Attached Service List) PLEASE TAKE NOTICE that I have today filed with the Office of the Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control Board the attached PETITION TO AMEND 35 ILL. ADM. CODE 302.102 and 302.208(g) WATER QUALITY STANDARDS FOR CHLORIDES, INCLUDING PROPOSED RULE LANGUAGE, AND 200 SIGNATURES IN SUPPORT OF THIS PETITION, copies of which are herewith served upon you. Respectfully submitted, Huff & Huff, Inc. By~ £_ ~ for Consulta Dated: May 21, 2018 James E. Huff, P.E. HUFF & HUFF, INC. 915 Harger Road, Suite 330 Oak Brook, IL 60523 [email protected] 630-684-4444 Page 1 of 404 Received, Clerk's Office 5/21/2018 ** R2018-032** BEFORE THE ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD IN THE MATTER OF: PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO: ) 35 Ill. Adm. Code 302.102 and 302.208(g) ) R18‐ WATER QUALITY STANDARDS ) FOR CHLORIDES ) INTRODUCTION This Petition is intended to present the body of available information on the toxicity of chlorides to aquatic species under winter‐time temperatures experienced in Illinois streams. Based upon this information, much of it new data, alternative winter water quality standards are proposed for Illinois streams. STATEMENT OF REASONS The Illinois Pollution Control Board (Board), in R08‐9 (Sub docket D) adopted water quality standards on the Chicago Area Waterways (CAWS) and the Lower Des Plaines River (LDPR), including for chlorides. With the exception of the Chicago Sanitary & Ship Canal (CSSC), the Board adopted a chloride water quality standard of 500 mg/L from May 1st through November 30th, and the same standard for the remainder of the year, effective three years after the effective date of those rules. The intent of the three‐year delay was “to allow time for the work group to develop a proposal to address chloride and a water body wide variance.” (Final Notice Opinion and Order of the Board, R80‐9, p 32.) The focus of the various work groups has been on developing and implementing Best Management Practices (BMPs) to reduce the application of highway de‐icing salts, the principal cause of elevated chlorides during the winter (and spring) months in the receiving streams. Elevated chlorides are not unique to the CAWS and LDPR during the winter months; elevated chloride concentrations occur on all urban streams in Illinois. The General Use Water Quality Standard for chlorides, as found in 302.208(g), is 500 mg/L, identical to what the Board has adopted for the CAWS and LDPR, excluding the CSSC. More efficient application of sodium chloride for highway de‐icing is being implemented. However, as the 500 mg/L standard is a not‐to‐exceed standard, the question is: can BMPs achieve the necessary reduction under the worst storm events? For example, on the North Branch of the Chicago River, data from 2004 to 2014 reveal a maximum chloride concentration of 1,134 mg/L, necessitating a reduction of 55 percent in salt application during the worst events. (Huff, October 2015.) It is appropriate to question whether simply implementing BMPs can consistently achieve this type of reduction. For smaller streams, the required reductions can be even greater. For example, Hickory Creek at Vine Street reached 1,476 mg/L in 2014, necessitating a reduction of 66 percent in salt application during the worst storm events to ‐ 1 ‐ Page 2 of 404 Received, Clerk's Office 5/21/2018 ** R2018-032** achieve 500 mg/L. (Huff, Feb 2015.) Despite these elevated winter concentrations some of the impacted waterways still host aquatic communities who score at the upper end of the moderately impaired category of the state aquatic life scale. This observation supports the position that elevated winter concentrations are less destructive to aquatic communities than during elevated warm weather concentrations While focusing on efficient utilization of de‐icing salts is appropriate, there are concerns that implemented alone, BMPs will not achieve the target of 500 mg/L for these worst storm events. These concerns were the bases behind assembling a group of municipalities and sanitary districts, industries, The Salt Institute, a watershed group, and the Illinois Tollway to fund additional research on cold‐temperature toxicity of chlorides. The results from these additional toxicity tests form the basis behind this Rulemaking request, as the findings show chlorides are less toxic at colder temperatures thereby justifying a relaxed chloride standard during the colder months. Illinois already utilizes a similar approach for ammonia for which there are less stringent winter standards, so there is precedent for such an approach. In addition, the Board adopted higher winter chloride standards for the CSSC in R08‐9 (Subdocket D). Given the current water quality violations, chlorides are identified as a cause of impairment for nearly all urban streams in Illinois. The ones not identified as impaired due to chlorides are likely due to the lack of sufficient monitoring. The impact of chlorides being identified as a cause of impairment is a serious impediment to future growth of any kind in the urban areas of Illinois. If increased pavement, housing, or parking lots are planned, then the required de‐icing salts will need to be more than offset within the watershed. Finding these offsets is getting more difficult BMPs are being implemented and the offsets come at an additional cost. Alternatives to chloride de‐icing are not technically feasible on a region‐wide basis, when considering safety and mobility. This has been demonstrated by the Connecticut Department of Transportation, that for a seven‐year period used a mixture of sand‐salt (7:2) and compared the accidents to a seven‐year period with just salt and found a 19 percent increase in nonfatal injuries and a 33 percent increase in accidents with the sand‐salt mixture compared to just salt.1 So while a reduction in salt usage is certainly an achievable goal, it is technically infeasible to reduce its use for de‐icing practices sufficiently to consistently meet the 500 mg/L water quality standard. Another consideration would simply shut down the highway system during snow events where there would be a potential to exceed the water quality standard. From the information generated in the Technical Support Document (Attachment 2), this would vary from an average one storm per year to over five storm events, and the duration of each shut down would for multiple days. Nationwide, a one‐ day shutdown of the snowbelt states would yield a loss of $2.6 1 Mahoney, JU. D.S. Larsen, and E. Jackson. Reduction in nonfatal injury crashes after implementation of anti‐icing technology. Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 2613. Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2017, pp. 77‐86. See Attachment 4 ‐ 2 ‐ Page 3 of 404 Received, Clerk's Office 5/21/2018 ** R2018-032** billion per day, and a loss of retail of $870 million per day.2 Not only would this be economically unreasonable, the social impacts would not be acceptable to the citizens of Illinois. I. History and background to the present proceeding The 500 mg/L Illinois general use water quality standard for chloride was adopted by the Board in 1972 in R71‐14, based on the testimony of a “recognized expert in fish biology,” that 500 mg/L would be a safe limit. (Opinion of the Board, March 7, 1972.) This Illinois General Use Water Quality Standard has remained in effect for the past 45 years. U.S. EPA in 1988 published the Ambient Water Quality Criteria for Chloride‐1988 (EPA 440/5‐88‐ 001, February 1988) that recommended a four‐day limit of 230 mg/L and a one‐hour average limit of 860 mg/L that should not be exceeded more than once every three years on the average. However, nearly all of the toxicity data developed for chlorides have been generated at summer‐ type temperatures, and do not accurately reflect the toxicity of chlorides at winter temperatures. This proposal sets forth the findings of both a literature search and toxicity testing with the four most sensitive aquatic species (Fingernail clams, mayflies, Amphipod, and C. dubia) at 10oC. In addition, recognizing that if the Board is to entertain changes to the winter chloride water quality standard, it is appropriate to entertain changing the chloride water quality standard for the summer months as well. A. Purpose and Effect of Regulatory Proposal The Board’s existing 500 mg/L General Use Standard for chlorides is exceeded in all urban streams during snow melt periods in Illinois. For the CAWS and LDPR, the winter 500 mg/L water quality limit goes into effect on December 1, 2019. Other urban watersheds are also working on seeking watershed variances from the 500 mg/L standard. As noted in the introduction, the compliance plans are centered around BMPs for de‐icing practices. This is a sound and necessary approach that will reduce chloride concentrations in our waterways; however, it is not likely to consistently achieve the 500 mg/L standard in many of the urban streams. This petition will demonstrate that the 500 mg/L chloride standard is not required to meet the applicable requirements for protection of aquatic species in Illinois streams during the winter months. This work was undertaken to improve the understanding of chloride toxicity under winter temperatures.