Rhode Island Code of Regulations › Title 250 - Department of Environmental Management › Chapter 150 - Water Resources › Subchapter 10 - Wastewater And Storm Water › Part 8 - Stormwater Management, Design and Installation Rules › Section 250-RICR-150-10-8.39 - Technology Assessment Protocol for Innovative and Emerging Technologies - Overview

Current through June 14, 2024
A. New treatment
				  practices must undergo a third-party evaluation using the Technology Assessment
				  Protocol prior to approval for usage for both primary treatment and
				  pretreatment purposes. Reciprocity is given for practices approved elsewhere
				  under Technology Acceptance Reciprocity Partnership and Technology Assessment
				  Protocol - Ecology provided that any deficiencies are addressed with respect to
				  the eleven Minimum Standards presented in §§
										8.7 through
				  8.17 of this
				  Part.
B. The Technology Assessment
				  Protocol describes testing and reporting procedures to evaluate the
				  effectiveness of innovative and emerging stormwater treatment technologies. The
				  objectives of this protocol are to characterize, with a reasonable level of
				  statistical confidence, an emerging technology's effectiveness in removing
				  pollutants from stormwater runoff for an intended application. The protocol
				  requires an independent third-party verification that will ensure stormwater
				  treatment systems meet the stormwater performance goals and criteria for new
				  development, redevelopment and retrofit situations established in this
				  Part.
C. Approval will be
				  contingent on submission of objective, verifiable data that meets the
				  Performance Standards and Criteria outlined in §§
										8.6 through
				  8.17 of this Part.
				  Stormwater treatment technologies will be designated as either i) primary
				  treatment practices for meeting water quality criteria, or ii) pretreatment,
				  and/or quantity control (CPv and Qp) stormwater management practices. Achieving
				  primary treatment designation is dependent upon meeting the Minimum Standard 3
				  in §
										8.9 of this Part. By
				  obtaining accurate and relevant data, the regulatory community can assess
				  performance claims for a particular BMP.
D. The Technology Assessment Protocol
				  strongly recommends parallel testing evaluation under rigorous and uniform
				  conditions. The utility of parallel testing is that site characteristics (land
				  use, contaminant loading, sediment characteristics) are consistent for all
				  tested practices and rainfall event characteristics (depth, intensity,
				  duration, antecedent dry period) will be uniform for given performance periods.
				  Identical site and rainfall characteristics enable rigorous performance
				  evaluations that would otherwise complicate direct performance comparisons.
				  This is especially critical given the well know limitations of stormwater
				  solids sampling and its implications on performance testing.
E. The Technology Assessment Protocol
				  requires independent third party work for all reports that contain field data
				  regardless of where this data were collected. Parties that do not have a direct
				  financial interest in the outcome of testing a treatment practice are not
				  required to obtain an independent third party review. At a minimum, an
				  independent professional must:
1. Complete the
				  data validation report verifying that monitoring was conducted in accordance
				  with an approved QAP; and
2.
				  Prepare a Technical Evaluation Report that includes a testing results, summary,
				  conclusions, and comparison with the standards and performance criteria
				  outlined in §
											8.9 of this Part (Minimum
				  Standard 3).