Ocean Cleanup May Reach More Than 100 Miles Inland

State water officials will likely declare ocean waters off Huntington Beach so polluted that tough limits on pollution discharges will be required.

While a final decision could take several years, every city, factory and commercial development that has a permit to drain storm water into the Pacific Ocean off Huntington Beach could ultimately be subject to sweeping new limits on discharges, according to the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board.

An area extending more than 100 miles inland to the San Bernardino Mountains could be affected.

Water quality at Huntington Beach has been in the spotlight since a two-month beach closure there in the summer of 1999. The board is conducting $60,000 worth of tests to see whether the waters there are “impaired” under definitions of the federal Clean Water Act, a rare move for ocean waters, executive officer Gerard Thibeault said Tuesday.

Although it will take some time, he said, the declaration is likely because of continued high levels of unhealthy pollutants in the water.

There are already 509 waterways in California--15 in Orange County--that have been declared impaired. If a waterway is on the list, state officials must set limits on the types and amounts of pollution that flow into it and enforce limits with clean-up orders and fines.

Other state and federal officials must also concur with the impaired designation, with a final decision expected in 2002. The regional board would then begin determining maximum amounts of pollution allowed.

Shirley Dettloff, a member of the Huntington Beach City Council and the California Coastal Commission, said she needs more information before she can comment directly on pollutant limits.

But, she said, “economically and aesthetically, it’s absolutely critical that these beaches are clean. We recognize that.”

For years after the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972, the EPA was reluctant to establish pollutant limits for polluted waterways. It first pursued more obvious sources of pollution, such as oil refineries, manufacturing plants and sewage treatment plants.

But after dozens of lawsuits across the country--including one filed by Defend the Bay over pollution in Newport Bay--the agency mandated that states set limits for pollution sources such as farms, nurseries and cities that were largely ignored in earlier enforcement efforts.

These limits--known as TMDLs, or total maximum daily loads--are now gradually are being set by environmental agencies throughout California and the nation. They are similar to the air pollution credits now widely used in regulating smokestack industries, and environmentalists say they are an effective, measurable way of improving water quality.

Limits That Have Teeth

David Beckman, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Los Angeles said, “This is cutting edge. . . . [The limits] are intended to actually accomplish the fundamental goal of the Clean Water Act--to make water safe for swimming, fishing and other uses people like. It’s because they have teeth that there’s opposition to virtually every TMDL I can think of.”

Developers and other opponents say the limits are useless, adding little extra protection for water quality while creating enormous extra costs.

“It’s a great goal, but it’s going to be incredibly expensive to get there,” said Laer Pearce, spokesman for the county chapter of the Building Industry Assn. “We could . . . still have better water quality overall and not cripple the economy in the process.”

He said compliance with government regulations already adds $95,000 to $115,000 to the cost of a $300,000 new home in Orange County.

Although individual residents won’t be legally responsible for meeting required limits, their tax dollars could be required to pay for whatever improvements or other measures are taken to meet them.

Newport Bay is the first impaired body of water in the county where limits are being set. For example, 250,000 tons of sediment carried by rain and urban runoff now flows into Newport Bay and its tributaries annually, choking marine habitat, hindering navigation, and requiring regular, costly dredging. By 2008, that amount must be reduced to 125,000 tons.

But the water board is still wrestling to determine sources of the discharge before deciding who would be required to undertake the costly, difficult task of cutting it in half.

Potential ways to decrease bacteria in runoff include diverting tainted runoff to sewage treatment plants, letting the runoff sit in the sun to bake off pollutants and doing comprehensive sewer surveys to ensure that leaking pipes aren’t sending bacteria-laden sewage into storm water systems.

*

Times staff writer Meg James contributed to this report.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Washing Out to Sea

If the Pacific Ocean off Huntington Beach is declared “impaired,” state water officials could place tough new standards on runoff from municipalities and others in three watersheds below.

Sources: Orange County Planning and Development Services Department, Los Angeles and Santa Ana Watershed Project Authority