U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 

Mail Code: 4203M Water Docket 

1200 Pennsylvania Ave, NW 

Washington, DC 20460 

Attn: Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OW-2008-0667 

Dear Administrator Jackson: 

I am writing to express concerns about the U.S. Environmental Protection 

Agency's (EPA) proposed new rule under Section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act to 

regulate cooling water intake structures (CWIS). Unless modified, the proposed rule 

will have unwarranted negative economic, environmental and energy effects on my 

state without producing corresponding benefits. 

The proposed rule would require most electric utility and manufacturing 

facilities that use cooling water to meet an array of new technology controls as well as 

new studying, monitoring, and reporting requirements. The CWTS at these facilities 

have been permitted and monitored on a site-by-site basis for almost forty years, first by 

the EPA, and, since 1995, by Florida's Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP). 

The proposed rule should allow a consideration of the knowledge and site specific 

information gained from decades of permitting and monitoring to be used in 

determining need for additional CWIS controls. 

Under the proposed rule, even facilities that use cooling towers or other closedcycle cooling with minimal impingement and entrainment impacts would be required 

to do more. The proposed rule redefines closed-cycIe cooling to exclude many cooling 

ponds and other such systems that have long been understood to meet the section 

316(b) requirements, and thus would impose new costs and requirements on those 

facilities. 

One unintended consequence is the rule's potential impact on our beloved and 

endangered manatees. Heated water from twelve of Florida's power plants creates 

warm-water refuges that are essential to manatee survival during winter months. The 

THE CAPITOL 

TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA 32399 (850) 488-2272 FAX (850) 922-4292 
considerations, the proposed rule could lead to the reduction or disappearance of these 

warm-water refuges and ultimateJy threaten the recovery of the manatees. 

In these difficult economic times, EPA must ensure that any new regulations are 

necessary, justifiable and will produce benefits that are at least commensurate with, if 

not greater than, the costs of compliance. EPA's own estimate of the total annualized 

cost for compliance with its proposed impingement control requirements, as well as the 

myriad permit application, monitoring, and reporting requirements, is $384 million 

nationally, for which EPA estimates only $18 million in annualized benefits. 

The proposed rule needs to provide substantial flexibility in evaluating 

impingement and entrainment at each facility, allow the use of site specific 

environmental and cost-benefit information, and avoid requirements that are not 

feasible, necessary, or have unintended consequences. FDEP will be providing more 

specific comments and concerns on the proposed rule. 

I encourage EPA to develop a flexible CWIS rule that will continue to ensure 

strong environmental protection, while maintaining eleckic reIiability and avoiding 

unnecessary rate increases for Florida's electricity customers. 

Sincerely, Rick Scott Governor