National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) San Diego Region

An individual NPDES permit is a permit specifically tailored to an individual facility. After receipt of a complete application, the San Diego Water Board develops a permit for a particular facility based on the information contained in the application (e.g., type of activity, nature of discharge, receiving water quality) for an effective period not to exceed five years. The discharger must reapply at least 180 days prior to the expiration date.

Information regarding the permitting process and the fee schedule is available on the State Water Board's webpage.

The individual NPDES permits issued in the San Diego region are listed below.

The Water Boards develop and issue general permits to cover multiple facilities within a specific category. The use of general permits allows the Water Boards to allocate resources in a more efficient manner and provide timely permit coverage for large numbers of facilities in the same category. In addition, the use of a general permit ensures consistency of permit conditions for similar facilities. According to 40 CFR section 122.28, general permits may be written to cover categories of point sources having common elements, such as:

• Stormwater point sources
• Facilities that involve the same or substantially similar types of operations
• Facilities that discharge the same types of wastewater
• Facilities that require the same effluent limitations or operating conditions
• Facilities that require the same monitoring where tiered conditions may be used for minor differences within class (e.g., size or seasonal activity)
• Facilities that are more appropriately regulated by a general permit

However, general permits may only be issued to dischargers within a specific geographical area such as the following:

• City, County, or State boundary
• Designated planning area
• Sewer district
• Standard metropolitan statistical area
• State highway system
• Urbanized area

Each general permit typically includes the following information:

• How to apply for coverage under a general permit - see the "Notice of Intent" (NOI) form
• How to request rescission from coverage - see the "Notice of Termination" (NOT) form

The general NPDES permits applicable to discharges to surface waters in the San Diego region are listed below.

• NPDES - Pretreatment Program

• San Diego Region General Orders Report

This report shows details about the Active and Historical San Diego Water Board General Orders and enrollees.

• California Integrated Water Quality System (CIWQS)
• CIWQS Login
• CIWQS NPDES Help Center
(ciwqs@waterboards.ca.gov)
• CIWQS Permittee Entree Template (PET) Tool
• Pivot Tool - Review your uploaded monitoring data in an easy to read format prior to certifying and submitting. Instructions | Excel 2010

• Limit Tool - Use after the Pivot Tool to compare your permit limits to your monitoring data. You must populate the limits in the Limit tool. Instructions | Excel 2010

• eSMR At-A-Glance Reports

Enter Order No. or NPDES Permit No. and Reporting Year. These reports display the details of the submitted and certified electronic reports. They include analytical and calculated data and attached documents.

• eSMR Data Reports

These reports provide analytical and calculated data provided by NPDES permit holders. The report allows the user to query by a specific facility, agency, or order, or more generally by report type, monitoring location type, or time frame.