Source: http://openjurist.org/567/f2d/661
Timestamp: 2015-11-27 21:14:05
Document Index: 530286992

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 101', '§ 1251', '§ 101', '§ 101', '§ 101', '§ 1313', 'art 4', '§ 303', '§ 1313', '§ 309', '§ 1319', '§ 402', '§ 1342', '§ 402', '§ 509', '§ 1369']

567 F2d 661 Ford Motor Company v. United States Environmental Protection Agency | OpenJurist
567 F. 2d 661 - Ford Motor Company v. United States Environmental Protection Agency HomeFederal Reporter, Second Series 567 F.2d.
567 F2d 661 Ford Motor Company v. United States Environmental Protection Agency 567 F.2d 661
11 ERC 1018, 8 Envtl. L. Rep. 20,082
FORD MOTOR COMPANY, Petitioner,v.UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY, Respondent,andState of Michigan, Intervenor.
Argued June 21, 1977.Decided Dec. 6, 1977.
Before WEICK and ENGEL, Circuit Judges, and WEINMAN, Senior District Judge.*
* In order fully to understand the issues, a review of the pertinent provisions of the FWPCA is necessary. Congress declared that the objective of the Act was "to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the Nation's waters" § 101(a), 33 U.S.C. § 1251(a). One of the national goals of the Act was to eliminate by 1985 "the discharge of pollutants into navigable waters." § 101(a)(1). Furthermore, Congress proclaimed by the Act its policy to have the States participate in the prevention, reduction and elimination of pollution. § 101(b). Congress also stressed the need for public participation "in the development, revision and enforcement of any regulation, standard, effluent limitation, plan or program established by the Administrator or any State" and required the publication of "regulations specifying minimum guidelines for public participation in such processes." § 101(e).
First, the Amendments are aimed at achieving maximum "effluent limitations" on "point sources," as well as achieving acceptable water quality standards. A point source is "any discernible, confined and discrete conveyance . . . from which pollutants are or may be discharged."9 An "effluent limitation" in turn is "any restriction established by a State or the Administrator on quantities, rates, and concentrations of chemical, physical, biological, and other constituents which are discharged from point sources . . . including schedules of compliance."10 Such direct restrictions on discharges facilitate enforcement by making it unnecessary to work backward from an overpolluted body of water to determine which point sources are responsible and which must be abated. In addition, a discharger's performance is now measured against strict technology-based11 effluent limitations specified levels of treatment to which it must conform, rather than against limitations derived from water quality standards to which it and other polluters must collectively conform.12
Section 303(a), 33 U.S.C. § 1313(a) provides for state-adopted water quality standards including those state standards adopted prior to the FWPCA, which standards meet the requirements of the FWPCA unless otherwise determined by the EPA Administrator. For instance, on September 21, 1973 the State of Michigan, pursuant to the FWPCA, approved new water quality standards which went into effect on December 12, 1973. Michigan Water Quality Standards, Michigan Administrative Code Part 4; Rule 323.1041, et seq. Because EPA took no action on the Michigan standards, they became the federal water quality standards in that state. See § 303(c)(3), 33 U.S.C. § 1313(c)(3).
Second, the Amendments establish the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES)13 as a means of achieving and enforcing the effluent limitations. Under NPDES, it is unlawful for any person to discharge a pollutant without obtaining a permit and complying with its terms.14 An NPDES permit serves to transform generally applicable effluent limitations and other standards including those based on water quality into the obligations (including a timetable for compliance) of the individual discharger, and the Amendments provide for direct administrative and judicial enforcement of permits. §§ 309 and 505, 33 U.S.C. §§ 1319, 1365 (1970 ed., Supp. IV). With few exceptions, for enforcement purposes a discharger in compliance with the terms and conditions of an NPDES permit is deemed to be in compliance with those sections of the Amendments on which the permit conditions are based. § 402(k), 33 U.S.C. § 1342(k) (1970 ed., Supp. IV). In short, the permit defines, and facilitates compliance with and enforcement of, a preponderance of a discharger's obligations under the Amendments.
The aggrieved party has ninety days from the date of denial of the permit under § 402 in which to seek review of the Administrator's action, by petition therefor filed in the appropriate United States Court of Appeals. § 509(B)(1) (F), 33 U.S.C. § 1369(b)(1)(F).II
Ford operates a stamping plant in Monroe, Michigan. Each day the plant produces 40,000 steel automobile wheels, 16,000 bumpers and numerous coil springs. The plant discharges into the Raisin River less than one mile above the river's point of entry into Lake Erie, various metals, such as chromium, copper, nickel and zinc.
On June 30, 1971 Ford applied for a NPDES discharge permit for its Monroe plant.1 On the application form at the place noted for intake sources, Ford indicated that it planned to pump 147 million gallons (MGD) of water per day from Lake Erie, treat 10 MGD for the plant millwater supply, and discharge the excess (137 MGD) into a plant-owned canal, a dilution water canal, which in turn discharges the water into the Raisin River. Later, in November 1973, Ford revised its permit application.
In August, 1974 EPA questioned among other things, Ford's proposed use of the entire Raisin River as a "mixing zone." Under Michigan Water Quality Standards Rule 1043(n) a "mixing zone" is "a region of a water body which receives a wastewater discharge of a different quality than the receiving waters, and within which the water quality standards as prescribed by these rules do not apply." The State of Michigan does not allow use of more than 25% Of the stream as a mixing zone "unless it can be demonstrated (to the MWRC) that designation of a greater area or volume of streamflow will allow passage of fish and fishfood organisms so that effects on their immediate and future populations are negligible or not measurable." Rule 1082 of the Michigan Water Quality Standards.
EPA, based on a bioassay conducted by the MWRC in April, 1973, also questioned Ford's ability during the Raisin River's low flow period, to meet the water quality standard concentration limits.
In September, 1974 EPA again questioned the use of the entire width of the Raisin River as a mixing zone and suggested that Ford use only one-half of the river. MWRC soon responded to the EPA suggestion and revised the mixing zone to include "the total flow in the River Raisin from the point of discharge to the Detroit Edison Power Plant intake" (which intake is about 900 feet distant from the Ford discharge). MWRC stated that "(t)he effluent restrictions placed on the Ford Motor Company Monroe Plant discharge are more restrictive than the promulgated guidelines."
On December 20, 1974 the State of Michigan, pursuant to the approval of MWRC, issued Ford the NPDES permit on its Monroe Plant. The permit included the mixing zone as suggested to EPA by MWRC, supra. EPA did not veto the permit and it became effective.
On July 11, 1975 MWRC at Ford's suggestion, sent to EPA a proposed modification of Ford's Monroe Plant permit. Among other things, MWRC proposed use of flow augmentation for Ford to meet water quality standards. Ford, in its brief to this Court, stated:
The term "flow augmentation" as described in the proposed permit refers to the mixing of the treated effluent from the plant with other waters (from a mixing canal on the plant property (which water was obtained from Lake Erie)) in order to reduce the concentration of pollutants to levels specified in the permit and to assure compliance with the concentration limits in the water quality standard for the river into which the effluent is ultimately discharged.
The proposed modification was succinctly stated by Jeffrey G. Miller, EPA Deputy Assistant Administrator for Water Enforcement:
The relevant facts are that the best practicable technology will achieve necessary reduction in pounds of pollutants discharged but that the resulting concentration in the volume of process effluent is still greater than concentration limits specified in the Michigan Water Quality Standards. The State proposes to allow flow augmentation (dilution) to meet the water quality standard concentration limitations. Monitoring for compliance with the BPT limitations is to be done prior to dilution. Monitoring for compliance with the water quality standards concentration limitations is to be done at the downstream edge of the mixing zone. The mixing zone for purposes of evaluating compliance with the State's water quality standards is defined as the total flow in the Raisin River from the point of discharge to the Detroit Edison Power Plant intake, a distance of approximately 900 feet. The State concedes that a mixing zone generally should not include an entire river but claims that Michigan biologists are confident that fish passage will be assured if the concentration limits are not exceeded.
Initially, in August, 1975 in a telephone conversation between Harry J. Clemens of EPA's Region V Permit Branch and Carl Schafer of EPA's Washington headquarters, EPA believed that use of flow augmentation in the mixing zone and receiving water was proper so long as the best practicable control technology (BPT) currently available was being applied and that the flow augmentation was not being used to "dilute to meet (the best available technology economically achievable)". In fact, in the next three communications between EPA and MWRC, no objections were raised with respect to the use of flow augmentation.
On October 1, 1975 however, in a letter from Dale S. Bryson, the Region V EPA Deputy Director Enforcement Division, to Roy Schrameck, MWRC's Division Permit Coordinator, EPA again questioned whether fish passage on the river was possible due to the large size of the mixing zone, and requested studies from MWRC pursuant to Rule 1082 of the Michigan Water Quality Standards to demonstrate fish passage in the river. More importantly, EPA expressed displeasure with the use of flow augmentation to meet the water quality standards. Mr. Bryson said:
The plan to allow the company to treat their metal plating wastes to the BPT level and then dilute with cooling water and possibly flow augmentation to meet water quality standards is in conflict with the intent of the Federal 1972 Amendments and EPA Policy. Dilution should not be utilized unless additional treatment is unavailable or economically unreasonable. Treatment at the BPT level is not usually the point at which additional treatment is considered economically unreasonable. Therefore, please submit any documentation which purports to demonstrate that additional treatment is unreasonable and that flow augmentation is the only available approach. This should be done on a process by process and parameter by parameter basis and should also include the anticipated effect this additional pumpage would have on entrainment and impingement impacts on the fish population in the surrounding nursery and spawning areas and migratory routes.
Despite the above letter, on October 7, 1975 Robert J. Courchaine, Chief Engineer of MWRC formally submitted to EPA (Bryson) the proposed modifications on Ford's Monroe Plant permit which included a cont