Pretreatment Program Reinvention Pilot Projects Under Project XL

This rule will change the National Pretreatment Program regulations to allow Publicly Owned Treatment Works (POTWs) that have completed the Project eXcellence and Leadership (Project XL) selection process, including Final Project Agreement (FPA) development, to modify their approved local Pretreatment Programs. These POTWs will be allowed to modify their programs, and implement the new local programs as described in their FPAs. In today's rule, EPA recognizes that many POTWs with approved Pretreatment Programs have mastered the administrative and procedural requirements of the National Pretreatment regulations. Several of these POTWs want the opportunity to implement local pretreatment programs with effectiveness measured against environmental results rather than strict adherence to programmatic and administrative measures. These POTWs have expressed an interest in Project XL to test new pilot ideas that focus resources on activities that they believe would provide greater environmental benefits than are achieved by complying with current regulatory requirements. This rule is intended to provide the regulatory flexibility that will enable these and other test programs to move forward. Currently, five POTWs are actively involved in this Project XL process. The flexibility provided by this rule revision is limited to fifteen POTWs that meet the Project XL criteria.