San Francisco Fights Erosion as Coastal Cities Watch Closely

Excerpt from an article in

The New York Times

Sunday, March 25, 2012

San Francisco Fights Erosion as Coastal Cities Watch Closely

By FELICITY BARRINGER

SAN FRANCISCO — The explosive waves of Ocean Beach, a 3.5-mile stretch separating the city from the gray edge of the Pacific Ocean, have long been a draw for tourists, local families and an international tribe of surfers.

But every few years, stormy surf driven by the weather pattern known as El Niño grinds away at a thinning section of beach, pulling sand out to sea. Some comes back, but two years ago, bluffs collapsed and massive amounts of sand disappeared for good.

Holding back the sea here seems as impossible as holding back the fog. But planners see Ocean Beach as a top priority in a long roster of Bay Area sites threatened by inundation because of what lies on its landward side: the Great Highway, a $220 million wastewater treatment plant and a 14-foot-wide underground pipe that keeps sewage-tainted storm water away from the ocean.

The question facing at least eight local, state and federal agencies boils down to this: With California officials expectingclimate change to raise sea levels here by 14 inches by 2050, should herculean efforts be made to preserve the beach, the pipe and the plant, or should the community simply bow to nature?

“We are in some ways the tip of the spear for this issue,” said Benjamin Grant, a city planner who is leading a study of the problem for the nonprofit San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, or SPUR.

Mr. Grant describes the beach’s south end as “an erosion hot spot.” But, he said, all coastal communities will have to grapple with rising seas.

EPA Issues New Construction Stormwater General Permit

News release from EPA:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 16, 2012

EPA Issues Permit for Stormwater Discharges from Construction Sites

New permit includes more protections for waterways, shaped by important public and stakeholder feedback

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is issuing a new permit, in accordance with the Clean Water Act, that will provide streamlined permitting to thousands of construction operators, while protecting our nation’s waterways from discharges of polluted stormwater from construction sites. Stormwater discharges from construction sites can contain harmful pollutants, such as nutrients, that contaminate waters, increase drinking water treatment costs, and damage aquatic ecosystems. The new permit was shaped by important input from the public and stakeholders to ensure that it provides important protections for waterways, while also providing flexibility to operators.

The 2012 construction general permit (CGP) is required under the Clean Water Act and replaces the existing 2008 CGP, which expired on February 15, 2012. The new permit includes a number of enhanced protections for surface waters, including provisions to protect impaired and sensitive waters. Under the Clean Water Act, national pollutant discharge elimination system (NPDES) permits are typically issued for a five-year period, after which time EPA generally issues revised permits based on updated information and requirements, as is the case with today’s announcement. NPDES permits control water pollution by including limits on the amount of pollutants that can be discharged into waterways by specific sources. The permit also provides new flexibilities for operators. For example, it allows for emergency projects (e.g., restoration following a flood or other natural disaster) to begin immediately without permit authorization from EPA, while still retaining full authority for EPA to ensure that the project proceeds in an environmentally responsible manner once it has commenced. The permit also enables operators of already permitted projects flexibility where compliance with a new permit requirement is economically impracticable.  

The 2012 CGP updates include steps intended to limit erosion, minimize pollution sources, provide natural buffers or their equivalent around surface waters, and further restrict discharges to areas impaired by previous pollution discharge.

Many of the permit requirements implement new effluent limitations guidelines and new source performance standards for the construction and development industry that became effective on February 1, 2010, which include pollution control techniques to decrease erosion and sediment pollution.

The permit will be effective in areas where EPA is the permitting authority: Idaho, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Washington, D.C., and most U.S. territories and in Indian country lands.

EPA invited the public to comment on the draft permit. The agency also had a webcast to introduce owners and operators of construction sites, members of the public, and State or Tribal permitting authorities to the new requirements of the proposed CGP.

More information on the proposed construction general permit:
http://cfpub.epa.gov/npdes/stormwater/cgp.cfm