M00044758
New product
API Publ 4782 Petroleum Refining Industry Contribution to Nationwide Surface Water Nutrient Loadings, First Edition
standard by American Petroleum Institute, 08/01/2016
In stock
Warning: Last items in stock!
Availability date: 01/06/2022
API PUBLICATION 4782
AUGUST 2016
API publications necessarily address problems of a general nature. With respect to particular circumstances, local, state, and federal laws and regulations should be reviewed.
Neither API nor any of API's employees, subcontractors, consultants, committees, or other assignees make any warranty or representation, either express or implied, with respect to the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of the information contained herein, or assume any liability or responsibility for any use, or the results of such use, of any information or process disclosed in this publication. Neither API nor any of API's employees, subcontractors, consultants, or other assignees represent that use of this publication would not infringe upon privately owned rights.
API publications may be used by anyone desiring to do so. Every effort has been made by the Institute to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the data contained in them; however, the Institute makes no representation, warranty, or guarantee in connection with this publication and hereby expressly disclaims any liability or responsibility for loss or damage resulting from its use or for the violation of any authorities having jurisdiction with which this publication may conflict.
API publications are published to facilitate the broad availability of proven, sound engineering and operating practices. These publications are not intended to obviate the need for applying sound engineering judgment regarding when and where these publications should be utilized. The formulation and publication of API publications is not intended in any way to inhibit anyone from using any other practices.
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Contact the publisher, API Publishing Services, 1220 L Street, NW, Washington, DC 20005.
Copyright © 2016 American Petroleum Institute
Nothing contained in any API publication is to be construed as granting any right, by implication or otherwise, for the manufacture, sale, or use of any method, apparatus, or product covered by letters patent. Neither should anything contained in the publication be construed as insuring anyone against liability for infringement of letters patent.
iii
This analysis was commissioned by API to provide member companies and the public with a better understanding of the water quality problems associated with nutrient discharges to the nation’s surface waters, the current federal and state regulatory responses to nutrient-related water quality problems, the scientific and implementation challenges of nutrient controls, and the petroleum refining industry’s relative contribution to nationwide nutrient discharges to surface waters.
The overwhelming majority of total nitrogen (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) nutrient loadings to surface waters is from nonpoint sources. A significant contribution also comes from municipal wastewater effluents. Petroleum refineries contribute only 0.1 % of the nationwide TN loading and only 0.08 % of the nationwide TP loading to surface waters. Clearly, nutrient control efforts targeting the petroleum industry, though perhaps important in specific circumstances, will not resolve the majority of nutrient impairments of our nation’s waters; control efforts must focus on reductions in nonpoint source and municipal nutrient loadings if meaningful gains in water quality are to be achieved.
The key findings of this study are as follows:
The two so-called macronutrients, TN and TP, are almost always the growth-limiting nutrients for aquatic plant growth and are the focus of regulatory agency efforts to control such growth to protect water quality.
The quantities of TN and TP that cause aquatic plant growth sufficient to impair water quality and designated uses are inherently water body specific. The physical and chemical characteristics of each water body are important determinants of the type of aquatic plants, their growth rates, and the total density of such growth, which in turn determine impairment of water quality and/or designated uses of the water body.
The enrichment of surface waters with the plant nutrients TN and TP causes impairments of water quality and failure to attain designated water uses in a large number of surface water bodies in the United States, including rivers and streams, lakes and reservoirs, estuaries, and coastal waters.
The inherent water body–specific characteristics of nutrient enrichment have made it difficult for states to establish scientifically sound water quality standards for nutrients. Because of this difficulty, many states rely on narrative water quality standards to address nutrient enrichment.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been encouraging states to adopt numeric standards for TN and TP for the past 20 years. The water body–specific characteristics of nutrient enrichment have made a “one-size-fits-all” approach to numeric nutrient standards impossible, so most states have been slow to adopt numeric nutrient standards.
EPA’s most recent initiative is for states to adopt “independently applicable” numeric standards for both TN and TP, regardless of which one is the limiting nutrient in a specific surface water body. Many states have rejected this approach as not scientifically justified.
There are many sources of TN and TP that discharge to surface waters. These can be both natural and anthropogenic. However, the research shows that anthropogenic sources are the principal cause of excessive nutrient concentrations in surface waters. Nonpoint sources such as agriculture, fertilizer application in urban and suburban areas, urban runoff, and atmospheric deposition are typically cited as the source of 90 % or more of the excess nutrients discharged to surface waters of the United States.
This study of nutrient loading sources using data compiled from EPA databases, the scientific literature, technical textbooks, and several states has shown that on a nationwide basis (Figure ES-1):
v
84.6 % of the TP loading and 84.1 % of the TN loading on surface waters are due to nonpoint sources.
Municipal wastewater effluents (publicly owned treatment works [POTWs]) account for 14.1 % of the TP loading and 14.6 % of the TN loading.
The total industrial point source loadings of TP and TN are estimated at 1.3 % of the national totals.
Petroleum refineries contribute 0.08 % and 0.1 % of the nationwide TP and TN loadings on surface waters, respectively.
These relative loadings demonstrate that nutrient control efforts must focus on reductions in nonpoint source nutrient loadings if there are to be any meaningful results in reducing nutrient enrichment of the nation’s surface waters.
This analysis does not conclude that point source nutrient contributions are insignificant in all water bodies, and it is not intended to justify inaction in such instances. Rather, each water body must be evaluated by considering its physical, chemical, and biological characteristics; the point and nonpoint sources that contribute nutrients; and the effects of such nutrients on aquatic plant growth before establishing limitations on TN and TP for point source discharges.
vi
BMP Best Management Practice CWA Clean Water Act
DMR Discharge Monitoring Report ELG Effluent Limitation Guideline
EPA Environmental Protection Agency
EPCRA Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act NEIWPCC New England Interstate Water Pollution Control Commission NPDES National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System
PCS Permit Compliance System POTW Publicly Owned Treatment Works SAB Science Advisory Board
TBEL Technology-based Effluent Limit
TCEQ Texas Commission on Environmental Quality TKN Total Kjeldahl Nitrogen
TMDL Total Maximum Daily Load TN Total Nitrogen
TP Total Phosphorus
TPDES Texas Pollutant Discharge Elimination System TRI Toxics Release Inventory
WQBEL Water Quality–based Effluent Limit
vii
Nutrient Sources in Refineries 9
Municipal Treatment Plants (POTWs) 15
Other Industrial Point Source Categories 16
EPA Ecoregion Criteria 21
EPA “Urgent Call to Action” 22
EPA Region 5 Position Letter 22
EPA Letter on Nutrient Criteria and Independent Applicability 23
Framework Memorandum to Regional Administrators 24
EPA's Science Advisory Board Review of EPA's Methodology for Establishing Nutrient Criteria 24
Nutrient-impaired Surface Waters 26
United States Geological Survey (USGS) National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Report
on Nutrients in the Nation's Streams and Groundwater, 1992–2004 26
ix
Table 1—Refineries in DMR Database 11
Table 2—Effluent Flow, Ammonia Nitrogen, and Total Phosphorus Concentration and Load for the
23 Refineries in the DMR Data Analysis for the 1998 to 2010 Time Period 13
Table 3—DMR Effluent Concentrations (in mg/L) for Various Forms of Nitrogen 14
Table 4—TPDES Permit Application Data for Nutrients (mg/L) 14
Table 5—Municipal Point Source Nutrient Concentrations (mg/L) 15
Table 6—Municipal Point Source Nutrient Loads (Mlb/year) 16
Table 7—Industrial Point Source Nutrient Loads (Mlb/year) 17
Table 8—Nonpoint Source Nutrient Loadings (Mlb/year) 18
Table 9—Comparison of Nutrient Sources to U.S. Surface Waters 18
Table 10—Rivers Assessed as Impaired by Nutrient-related Causes 27
Table 11—Lakes/Reservoirs Assessed as Impaired by Nutrient-related Causes 28
Table 12—Bays/Estuaries Assessed as Impaired by Nutrient-related Causes 29
Figure ES-1—Percent Contributions to Total National Nutrient Loadings vi
Figure 1—The Aquatic Nitrogen Cycle 3
Figure 2—The Aquatic Phosphorus Cycle 4
Figure 3—Nutrients from Nonpoint and Point Sources Are Cycled Throughout the Hydrologic System, but May Be Affected by Different Chemical, Physical, and Biological Processes in Different
Parts of the System 6
x
Petroleum Refining Industry Contribution to Nationwide Surface Water Nutrient Loadings
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and many states have agreed that loadings of nutrients to surface waters are generally increasing and excess nitrogen and phosphorus levels are contributing to degradation of surface water quality in certain water bodies (EPA, 2009a). EPA and the states have been working for decades on approaches to controlling nutrients, and it is probable that more stringent water quality–based effluent limits (WQBELs) for nitrogen and phosphorus could be imposed on point source dischargers in future years. This report provides an overview of the national issue of nutrient enrichment of surface waters, the sources of such nutrients, and the significance of petroleum refining industry discharge contributions to nationwide nutrient loadings.
This study is based on using available published data on nutrient enrichment of U.S. surface waters; EPA and state nutrient control guidance, policy, and water quality standards; prior analysis performed for API by a third-party consultant; petroleum refinery effluent quality data from the EPA Integrated Compliance Information System/National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (ICIS-NPDES); and permit data collected from the files of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ).
Chapter 2 presents a description of nutrients and their effects on water quality and receiving water uses. The terminology describing nutrient enrichment in surface waters is presented, and the fundamental interactions among nutrients, aquatic biology, and other water quality constituents are summarized to provide a basic understanding of the issues and complexities involved in evaluating the effects of nutrients on water quality.
Chapter 3 presents the evaluation of the petroleum refining industry’s contribution of nitrogen and phosphorus, the primary nutrients of concern, to surface waters of the United States. The petroleum refinery contributions are compared with the contributions from other point and nonpoint sources of these constituents, including discharges from publicly owned treatment works (POTWs), agricultural sources, and urban runoff. A ranking of nutrient contributions from the petroleum refining industry relative to the other point and nonpoint source categories is based on the combined data available for nitrogen and phosphorus.
Chapter 4 provides an overview of the history of and recent developments in nutrient control policy and regulation. A summary of nutrient enrichment impacts of major point source categories and nonpoint sources on both national and regional scales is presented. The chapter also summarizes surface water body impairments and major nutrient total maximum daily load (TMDL) studies at the national level.
Chapter 5 presents a summary of the principal findings in the report and the conclusions of this evaluation.
The overwhelming majority of total nitrogen (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) nutrient loadings to surface waters is from nonpoint sources. A significant contribution also comes from municipal wastewater effluents. Petroleum refineries contribute only 0.1 % of the nationwide TN loading and only 0.08 % of the nationwide TP loading to surface waters. Clearly, nutrient control efforts targeting the petroleum industry, though perhaps important in specific circumstances, will not resolve the majority of nutrient impairments of our nation’s waters; control efforts must focus on reductions in nonpoint source and municipal nutrient loadings if meaningful gains in water quality are to be achieved.
1