Clean Water Act; Contractor Access to Confidential Business Information, 9070-9071 [05-3528]

Download as PDF 9070 Federal Register / Vol. 70, No. 36 / Thursday, February 24, 2005 / Notices agency within each State (generally, where delegated authorities for Federal environmental regulations exist) is eligible to receive these grants. DATES: State environmental regulatory agencies will have 60 days until April 25, 2005, to respond with a preproposal, budget, and project summary. The environmental regulatory agencies from the fifty (50) States; Washington, DC, and four (4) territories were notified of the solicitation’s availability by fax and e-mail transmittals on February 24, 2005. ADDRESSES: Copies of the Solicitation can be downloaded from the Agency’s Web site at: https://www.epa.gov/ innovation/stategrants or may be requested by telephone ((202) 566– 2186), or by e-mail (Innovation_State_Grants@epa.gov). Proposals submitted in response to this solicitation, or questions concerning the solicitation should be sent to: State Innovation Grant Program, Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (1807T), 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20460. Proposal responses or questions may also be sent by fax to ((202) 566–2220), addressed to the ‘‘State Innovation Grant Program,’’ or by e-mail to: Innovation_State_Grants@epa.gov. We encourage e-mail responses. If you have questions about responding to this notice, please contact EPA at this e-mail address or fax number, or you may call Sherri Walker at (202) 566–2186. EPA will acknowledge all responses it receives to this notice. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Background: In April 2002, EPA issued its plan for future innovation efforts, published as Innovating for Better Environmental Results: A Strategy to Guide the Next Generation of Innovation at EPA (EPA 100–R–02–002; https://www.epa.gov/opei/strategy). In Fall of 2002, EPA initiated the State Innovation Grants Program with a competition that asked for State project proposals that would create innovation in environmental permitting programs related to one of the Strategy’s four priority environmental issues: reducing greenhouse gases, reducing smog, improving water quality, and ensuring the long-term integrity of the nations’s water infrastructure. This assistance agreement program strengthens EPA’s partnership with the States by assisting State innovation that supports the Strategy. EPA would like to help States build on previous experience and undertake strategic innovation projects that promote larger-scale models for ‘‘next generation’’ environmental VerDate jul<14>2003 20:54 Feb 23, 2005 Jkt 205001 protection and promise better environmental results. EPA is interested in funding projects that go beyond a single facility experiment to promote change that is ‘‘systems-oriented’’ and provides better results from a program, process, or sector-wide innovation. EPA is particularly interested in innovation that promotes integrated (cross-media) environmental management with high potential for transfer to other States. Following the pilot round of State Innovation Grants in 2002, EPA consulted with the States through the Environmental Council of the States (ECOS) and through a comment period announced in the Federal Register (FRL 7510–7, June 11, 2003) (see https:// www.epa.gov/innovation/stategrants). EPA received support in comments from a large number of the responding States for maintaining innovation in permitting as a subject of the next solicitation in order to build and sustain a stable resource base for testing new ideas that can improve this critical core function. Within this topic there was considerable support for EPA assistance to help States explore the relationship between Environmental Management Systems (EMS) and permitting (see: https://www.epa.gov/ems/) and to support adoption of the Environmental Results Program (ERP) model (see: http: //www.epa.gov/ooaujeag/permits/ masserp.htm). Additionally, in October 2004 EPA through a subsequent Federal Register notice (FRL 7827–4, October 13, 2004) asked states to provide additional input on topic areas for this solicitation. EPA received continued support for maintaining innovation in permitting as a subject of the next solicitation. During the months of October and November 2004, EPA held a series of six informational calls for the states. The purpose of the conference calls was to offer a streamlined proposal development workshop to all States prior to publication of our solicitation, and to answer any questions that the States may have prior to the competition, in keeping with Federal requirements that we afford assistance fairly in a competition process. Through this effort, our primary focus was to encourage individual States (and/or State-led teams) to submit welldeveloped pre-proposals that effectively describe how their project would achieve measurable environmental results. Questions and answers from these six calls are posted at the program Web site at https://www.epa.gov/ innovation/stategrants. Sixteen projects that received awards in prior competitions included: seven Environmental Results Program (ERP) PO 00000 Frm 00040 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 models, six Environmental Management Systems (EMS) projects, two WatershedBased Permitting projects, and one Enhanced Permitting Through Application of Innovative Information Technology (IT) Systems. For more information on the prior solicitations and awards, please see the EPA State Innovation Grants Web site at: https:// www.epa.gov/innovation/stategrants. Dated: February 17, 2005. Elizabeth Shaw, Director, Office of Environmental Policy Innovation. [FR Doc. 05–3529 Filed 2–23–05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6560–50–P ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY [FRL–7876–6] Clean Water Act; Contractor Access to Confidential Business Information Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). ACTION: Notice of intended transfer of confidential business information to contractors and subcontractors. AGENCY: SUMMARY: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) intends to transfer confidential business information (CBI) collected from the pulp, paper, and paperboard manufacturing; iron and steel manufacturing; and other industries listed below to Eastern Research Group, Inc. (ERG), and its subcontractors. Transfer of the information will allow the contractor and subcontractors to support EPA in the planning, development, and review of effluent limitations guidelines and standards under the Clean Water Act (CWA), and the development of discharge standards under Title XIV: Certain Alaskan Cruise Ship Operations (33 U.S.C. 1902 note). The information being transferred was or will be collected under the authority of section 308 of the CWA. Some information being transferred from the pulp, paper, and paperboard industry was collected under the additional authorities of section 114 of the Clean Air Act (CAA) and section 3007 of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). Interested persons may submit comments on this intended transfer of information to the address noted below. DATES: Comments on the transfer of data are due March 3, 2005. ADDRESSES: Comments may be sent to Mr. M. Ahmar Siddiqui, Document Control Officer, Engineering and Analysis Division (4303T), Room 6231S E:\FR\FM\24FEN1.SGM 24FEN1 Federal Register / Vol. 70, No. 36 / Thursday, February 24, 2005 / Notices EPA West, U.S. EPA, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20460. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. M. Ahmar Siddiqui, Document Control Officer, at (202) 566–1044, or via e-mail at siddiqui.ahmar@epa.gov. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: EPA has previously transferred to its contractor, ERG (located in Chantilly, Virginia and Lexington, Massachusetts), information, including CBI, that was collected under the authority of section 308 of the CWA. Notice of the transfer was provided to the affected industries (see, for example, 59 FR 58840, November 15, 1994). EPA determined that this transfer was necessary to enable the contractors and subcontractors to perform their work in supporting EPA in planning, developing, and reviewing effluent guidelines and standards for certain industries. Today, EPA is giving notice that it has entered into additional contracts, numbers 68–C–02–095 and 68–C–01– 073, with ERG. The reason for these contracts is to secure additional contractor support in engineering analysis, survey and database development, economic analyses, and ecological analyses. To obtain assistance in responding to these contracts, ERG has entered into contracts with their subcontractors. In particular, ERG has obtained the services of the following subcontractors: Abt Associates (located in Cambridge, Massachusetts); AH Environmental Consultants, Inc. (located in Newport News and Springfield, Virginia); AmDyne Corporation (located in Glen Burnie, Maryland); Amendola Engineering, Inc. (located in Westlake, Ohio); Analytica Alaska, Inc. (located in Juneau, Alaska); Applied Geographics, Inc. (located in Boston, Massachusetts); Avanti Corporation (located in Annandale, Virginia); CK Environmental (located in Atlanta, Georgia); DRPA, Inc. (located in Rosslyn, Virginia); GeoLogics Corporation (located in Alexandria, Virginia); Hydraulic and Water Resources Engineers, Inc. (located in Waltham, Massachusetts); N. McCubbin Consultants, Inc. (located in Foster, Quebec, Canada); Stratus Consulting, Inc. (located in Boulder, Colorado); Tetra Tech, Inc. (located in Fairfax, Virginia); Versar, Inc. (located in Springfield, Virginia); and independent consultant Danforth Bodien. All EPA contractor, subcontractor, and consultant personnel are bound by the requirements and sanctions contained in their contracts with EPA and in EPA’s confidentiality regulations found at 40 CFR Part 2, Subpart B. ERG and its subcontractors adhere to EPA- VerDate jul<14>2003 18:49 Feb 23, 2005 Jkt 205001 approved security plans which describe procedures to protect CBI. The procedures in these plans are applied to CBI previously gathered by EPA for the industries identified below and to CBI that may be gathered in the future for these industries. The security plans specify that contractor and subcontractor personnel are required to sign non-disclosure agreements and are briefed on appropriate security procedures before they are permitted access to CBI. No person is automatically granted access to CBI; a need to know must exist. The information that will be transferred to ERG and its subcontractors consists primarily of information previously collected by EPA to support the development and review of effluent limitations guidelines and standards under the CWA and the development of discharge standards under Title XIV. In particular, information, including CBI, collected for the planning, development, and review of effluent limitations guidelines and standards for the following industries may be transferred: Airport deicing; aquaculture; concentrated animal feeding operations; centralized waste treatment; coal mining; drinking water; industrial laundries; waste combustors; iron and steel manufacturing; landfills; meat and poultry products; metal finishing; metal products and manufacturing; nonferrous metals manufacturing; oil and gas extraction (including coalbed methane); ore mining and dressing; organic chemicals, plastics, and synthetic fibers; pesticide chemicals; pharmaceutical manufacturing; petroleum refining; pulp, paper, and paperboard manufacturing; steam electric power generation; textile mills; timber products processing; tobacco; and transportation equipment cleaning. In addition, for the development of standards under Title XIV, EPA may transfer information, including CBI, about large cruise ships that operate in the waters around Alaska. EPA also intends to transfer to ERG and its subcontractors all information listed in this notice, of the type described above (including CBI) that may be collected in the future under the authority of section 308 of the CWA or voluntarily submitted (e.g., in comments in response to a Federal Register notice), as is necessary to enable ERG and its subcontractors to carry out the work required by their contracts to support EPA’s effluent guidelines planning process; development of effluent limitations guidelines and standards; and discharge standards from cruise ships. PO 00000 Frm 00041 Fmt 4703 Sfmt 4703 9071 Dated: February 15, 2005. Geoffrey H. Grubbs, Director, Office of Science and Technology. [FR Doc. 05–3528 Filed 2–23–05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6560–50–P ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY [OW–2003–0028; FRL–7876–9] RIN 2060–AD86 Drinking Water Contaminant Candidate List 2; Final Notice Environmental Protection Agency. ACTION: Notice. AGENCY: SUMMARY: The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), as amended in 1996, requires the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to publish a list of contaminants that, at the time of publication, are not subject to any proposed or promulgated national primary drinking water regulations, that are known or anticipated to occur in public water systems, and that may require regulations under SDWA (section 1412 (b)(1)). SDWA, as amended, specifies that EPA must publish the first list of drinking water contaminants no later than 18 months after the date of enactment, i.e., by February 1998, and every five years thereafter. The EPA published the first Candidate Contaminant List (CCL) in March of 1998 (63 FR 10273). The second draft CCL (CCL 2) was published on April 2, 2004 (69 FR 17406) and announced EPA’s preliminary decision to carry forward the remaining 51 contaminants on the 1998 CCL as the draft CCL 2, provided information on EPA’s efforts to expand and strengthen the underlying CCL listing process to be used for future CCL listings, and sought comment on the draft list as well as EPA’s efforts to improve the contaminant selection process for future CCLs. Today’s final CCL 2 carries forward the remaining 51 contaminants proposed on April 2, 2004. ADDRESSES: EPA has established a docket for this action under Docket ID No. OW–2003–0028. All documents in the docket are listed in the EDOCKET index at https://www.epa.gov/edocket. Although listed in the index, some information is not publically available, i.e., CBI or other information whose disclosure is restricted by statute. Certain other material, such as copyrighted material, is not placed on the Internet and will be publically available only in hard copy form. Publically available docket materials are E:\FR\FM\24FEN1.SGM 24FEN1

Agencies

[Federal Register Volume 70, Number 36 (Thursday, February 24, 2005)]
[Notices]
[Pages 9070-9071]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 05-3528]


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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[FRL-7876-6]


Clean Water Act; Contractor Access to Confidential Business 
Information

AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

ACTION: Notice of intended transfer of confidential business 
information to contractors and subcontractors.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

SUMMARY: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) intends to transfer 
confidential business information (CBI) collected from the pulp, paper, 
and paperboard manufacturing; iron and steel manufacturing; and other 
industries listed below to Eastern Research Group, Inc. (ERG), and its 
subcontractors. Transfer of the information will allow the contractor 
and subcontractors to support EPA in the planning, development, and 
review of effluent limitations guidelines and standards under the Clean 
Water Act (CWA), and the development of discharge standards under Title 
XIV: Certain Alaskan Cruise Ship Operations (33 U.S.C. 1902 note). The 
information being transferred was or will be collected under the 
authority of section 308 of the CWA. Some information being transferred 
from the pulp, paper, and paperboard industry was collected under the 
additional authorities of section 114 of the Clean Air Act (CAA) and 
section 3007 of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). 
Interested persons may submit comments on this intended transfer of 
information to the address noted below.

DATES: Comments on the transfer of data are due March 3, 2005.

ADDRESSES: Comments may be sent to Mr. M. Ahmar Siddiqui, Document 
Control Officer, Engineering and Analysis Division (4303T), Room 6231S

[[Page 9071]]

EPA West, U.S. EPA, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 
20460.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. M. Ahmar Siddiqui, Document 
Control Officer, at (202) 566-1044, or via e-mail at 
siddiqui.ahmar@epa.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: EPA has previously transferred to its 
contractor, ERG (located in Chantilly, Virginia and Lexington, 
Massachusetts), information, including CBI, that was collected under 
the authority of section 308 of the CWA. Notice of the transfer was 
provided to the affected industries (see, for example, 59 FR 58840, 
November 15, 1994). EPA determined that this transfer was necessary to 
enable the contractors and subcontractors to perform their work in 
supporting EPA in planning, developing, and reviewing effluent 
guidelines and standards for certain industries.
    Today, EPA is giving notice that it has entered into additional 
contracts, numbers 68-C-02-095 and 68-C-01-073, with ERG. The reason 
for these contracts is to secure additional contractor support in 
engineering analysis, survey and database development, economic 
analyses, and ecological analyses. To obtain assistance in responding 
to these contracts, ERG has entered into contracts with their 
subcontractors. In particular, ERG has obtained the services of the 
following subcontractors: Abt Associates (located in Cambridge, 
Massachusetts); AH Environmental Consultants, Inc. (located in Newport 
News and Springfield, Virginia); AmDyne Corporation (located in Glen 
Burnie, Maryland); Amendola Engineering, Inc. (located in Westlake, 
Ohio); Analytica Alaska, Inc. (located in Juneau, Alaska); Applied 
Geographics, Inc. (located in Boston, Massachusetts); Avanti 
Corporation (located in Annandale, Virginia); CK Environmental (located 
in Atlanta, Georgia); DRPA, Inc. (located in Rosslyn, Virginia); 
GeoLogics Corporation (located in Alexandria, Virginia); Hydraulic and 
Water Resources Engineers, Inc. (located in Waltham, Massachusetts); N. 
McCubbin Consultants, Inc. (located in Foster, Quebec, Canada); Stratus 
Consulting, Inc. (located in Boulder, Colorado); Tetra Tech, Inc. 
(located in Fairfax, Virginia); Versar, Inc. (located in Springfield, 
Virginia); and independent consultant Danforth Bodien.
    All EPA contractor, subcontractor, and consultant personnel are 
bound by the requirements and sanctions contained in their contracts 
with EPA and in EPA's confidentiality regulations found at 40 CFR Part 
2, Subpart B. ERG and its subcontractors adhere to EPA-approved 
security plans which describe procedures to protect CBI. The procedures 
in these plans are applied to CBI previously gathered by EPA for the 
industries identified below and to CBI that may be gathered in the 
future for these industries. The security plans specify that contractor 
and subcontractor personnel are required to sign non-disclosure 
agreements and are briefed on appropriate security procedures before 
they are permitted access to CBI. No person is automatically granted 
access to CBI; a need to know must exist.
    The information that will be transferred to ERG and its 
subcontractors consists primarily of information previously collected 
by EPA to support the development and review of effluent limitations 
guidelines and standards under the CWA and the development of discharge 
standards under Title XIV. In particular, information, including CBI, 
collected for the planning, development, and review of effluent 
limitations guidelines and standards for the following industries may 
be transferred: Airport deicing; aquaculture; concentrated animal 
feeding operations; centralized waste treatment; coal mining; drinking 
water; industrial laundries; waste combustors; iron and steel 
manufacturing; landfills; meat and poultry products; metal finishing; 
metal products and manufacturing; nonferrous metals manufacturing; oil 
and gas extraction (including coalbed methane); ore mining and 
dressing; organic chemicals, plastics, and synthetic fibers; pesticide 
chemicals; pharmaceutical manufacturing; petroleum refining; pulp, 
paper, and paperboard manufacturing; steam electric power generation; 
textile mills; timber products processing; tobacco; and transportation 
equipment cleaning. In addition, for the development of standards under 
Title XIV, EPA may transfer information, including CBI, about large 
cruise ships that operate in the waters around Alaska.
    EPA also intends to transfer to ERG and its subcontractors all 
information listed in this notice, of the type described above 
(including CBI) that may be collected in the future under the authority 
of section 308 of the CWA or voluntarily submitted (e.g., in comments 
in response to a Federal Register notice), as is necessary to enable 
ERG and its subcontractors to carry out the work required by their 
contracts to support EPA's effluent guidelines planning process; 
development of effluent limitations guidelines and standards; and 
discharge standards from cruise ships.

    Dated: February 15, 2005.
Geoffrey H. Grubbs,
Director, Office of Science and Technology.
[FR Doc. 05-3528 Filed 2-23-05; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6560-50-P
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