Federal Register / Vol. 63, No. 146 /Thursday, July 30, 1998 / Notices 40709

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION

AGENCY

[FRL–6132–7]

Review of Monitoring Requirements for

Chemical Contaminants in Drinking

Water

AGENCY: Environmental Protection

Agency.

ACTION: Notice of review of monitoring

requirements.

SUMMARY: Under the Safe Drinking

Water Act (SDWA), as amended in 1996,

the Environmental Protection Agency

(EPA) is, by August 6, 1998, and after

consultation with public health experts,

representatives of the general public,

and officials of State and local

governments, to review the monitoring

requirements for not fewer than twelve

contaminants, and promulgate any

necessary modifications. EPA has, with

the assistance of a number of States and

in consultation with the public and

others, conducted an extensive review

of monitoring requirements for 64

contaminants as part of its chemical

monitoring revisions (CMR) effort. EPA

published an Advance Notice of

Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) (62 FR

36100, July 3, 1997) that described a

number of possible changes to the

current monitoring requirements for

these chemicals and solicited public

input. The Agency received

considerable new data in response, and,

on initial review, these data do not

appear to simply confirm and provide

additional support for the revisions

discussed in the ANPRM. EPA is

completing its analysis of these new

data, and at this time has not identified

any necessary revisions to the

monitoring requirements for twelve of

the chemical contaminants. Before

publishing this document the Agency

consulted with numerous stakeholders

representing state public health and

environmental departments, drinking

water utilities, environmental

organizations, and public health service

representatives.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For

information on the activities related to

this document, contact: Ed Thomas,

U.S. EPA at (202) 260–0910 or E-mail to

thomas.edwin@epamail.epa.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: EPA first

regulated chemicals in drinking water in

1975 by establishing maximum

contaminant levels and sampling

requirements for fifteen contaminants.

Thereafter, EPA revised the standards

for these chemicals and established new

standards for other chemicals in a series

of drinking water regulations in 1987,

1991 and 1992. In the course of

developing these regulations, EPA

established a Standard Monitoring

Framework that was intended to

provide a uniform structure for

monitoring requirements for current and

subsequent drinking water regulations;

the Framework is currently in effect.

Because of concerns expressed that the

Framework was too prescriptive in some

areas and too complex, EPA and a

number of States began to discuss ways

to reduce unnecessary monitoring

requirements and to use chemical

monitoring resources more efficiently.

This activity was referred to as

Chemical Monitoring Reform. During

this effort, EPA also sought input from

outside organizations through public

forums. EPA gathered one of the largest

collections of sampling data then

available, representing thousands of

public water systems. In addition,

several States volunteered compilations

of their sampling results for organic

chemicals. While recognizing the

shortcomings of these data (which

include the fact that they may not be

representative of the nation), EPA

believed that the data indicated that

relatively few systems are contaminated

and therefore revisions to the Standard

Monitoring Framework should be

considered.

CMR was based on six concepts: (1)

some systems are not sampling at the

appropriate time of year or with

sufficient frequency to detect significant

levels of contamination; (2) the

percentage of systems that are

contaminated is very low; (3) public

resources should be focused more on

the systems that are contaminated or at

risk of contamination; (4) because of

their first hand knowledge, States are

best able to determine which systems

are at risk of contamination and when

sampling is most likely to detect

contamination; (5) source water

protection measures should be

expanded; and (6) current monitoring

requirements should be streamlined.

Thus under the CMR approach,

monitoring requirements would be

consolidated, ‘‘at risk’’ systems would

be targeted for increased sampling, and

sampling would occur when systems

were most vulnerable to contamination.

The objective was to both strengthen

public health protection and reduce

unnecessary monitoring.

While EPA was developing the CMR

approach, Congress enacted the 1996

amendments to the SDWA. These

amendments reflected a number of the

issues being addressed in the CMR, and

in particular, source water protection.

The amendments authorized States with

a Source Water Assessment Program

approved by EPA to tailor monitoring

requirements for public water systems

that had completed their source water

assessment under the State program.

Prior to these amendments, the CMR

was envisioned as a free standing

initiative for monitoring revision and

burden reduction. In response to the

statutory changes, EPA proceeded with

separate but related activities:

Development of Alternative Monitoring

Guidelines associated with source water

protection (which were published on

August 5, 1997) and the CMR.

In July 1997, EPA provided public

notice of its plan to propose a revision

of the monitoring requirements based on

the CMR. In the ANPRM, EPA described

in detail the sampling data it had

gathered as well as data from a number

of States and other sources, and the

possible changes to the current

requirements. The Agency sought public

comment on the CMR approach and,

recognizing that the data used to

develop the new approach for

monitoring were limited in scope,

solicited additional sampling data.

In response to the ANPRM,

commenters identified 17 potential data

sources. EPA has completed an initial

review of these data sets and presented

a summary of that review at a

stakeholders meeting on April 6, 1998

in Washington, D.C. On the basis of its

initial review and consultation with

stakeholders representing state drinking

water departments, health advisory

departments, water utilities,

environmental organizations, and public

health representatives, EPA is not able

to say that the new data are simply

supplementary data that support and

confirm the possible changes to the

monitoring requirements set forth in the

ANPRM. For that reason, EPA believes

it is inappropriate to proceed with the

ANPRM until it has completed its

analysis of the new data. Stakeholders at

the April 6 meeting agreed with this

approach.

Thus, EPA has completed an

extensive review of the current

monitoring requirements for 64

chemical contaminants in drinking

water which covers the 12 contaminants

referred to in section 1445(a)(1)(D). At

this time, EPA has not identified any

necessary modifications to those

monitoring requirements for twelve

contaminants.

J. Charles Fox,

Acting Assistant Administrator, Office of

Water.

[FR Doc. 98–20414 Filed 7–29–98; 8:45 am]

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