Marine Discharge Waivers for Publicly Owned Wastewater Treatment Facilities

The Clean Water Act allows the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to grant waivers to publicly owned wastewater treatment facilities so that they can discharge primary treated municipal wastes into the marine environment when it can be shown that costly secondary treatment is not necessary. EPA has not yet made any waiver decisions but estimates that $1.5 billion in federal, state, and local construction costs could be saved if all 70 of the final applicants were given waivers. GAO identified hundreds of additional potential waiver applicants who have been prevented from applying for waivers because of legislative restraints and restrictive EPA regulations. As a result, billions of dollars may be wasted on unneeded but federally required secondary treatment facilities since the federal government usually pays 75 percent of eligible construction costs. GAO estimates of potential construction cost savings range from $4 billion to $10 billion depending on whether waivers are applied to communities that have only domestic wastes or whether they apply to communities with both domestic and industrial wastes. Small communities, especially those that have little or no industrial wastes, would be the most logical communities to receive secondary treatment waivers as they have a relatively small volume of waste discharge, the wastes discharged are often nontoxic, and generally these communities have greater difficulty paying for pollution control improvements than larger communities. EPA could promptly grant waivers for small communities where the degree of risk to the environment is low and apply more rigorous waiver requirements for larger dischargers who have industrial wastes. Thus, Congress should amend the act to make the provisions for filing waiver applications less restrictive.