National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) - NPDES Facility/Permits Search

Below are several ways to search for information about NPDES facilities and copies of permits.

Search for NPDES facility information

The Water Boards' California Integrated Water Quality System (CIWQS) Database is a repository for regulatory information about facilities and their compliance. Below are links to two reports that pull data from the CIWQS database. The data is refreshed nightly. Both links are followed by a brief description of the information provided in the report.

  • Facility at-a-Glance Report
    This report allows users to view a wide range of information regarding a specific facility on one screen. This includes owner, violations, inspections, and orders and other regulatory measures issued to a facility. For more information about the report and how to navigate, we have developed a Fact Sheet.
  • Interactive Regulated Facilities Report
    This report allows the user to display information by city, county, or region. The user can select a program, agency type, and permit status. They are then shown a summary table based on their criteria, which enables them to drill down for more information.

Search for NPDES permits

The Water Boards websites contain electronic copies of permits they have issued. In addition, each board keeps copies of their permits on file. Therefore, if you want a copy of a permit, you first need to determine which board issued the permit before you can search for it. The Water Boards post their NPDES permits by the board issued order number called the Water Quality Order number (WQO) or Order No.

If you know the Order No., you can usually determine which board issued the permit.

  • If the first few characters of the Order No. contain characters like "R1", "R2", "R3"... to "R9", then a regional board issued permit.
    • You can use the Regional Water Boards Directory to navigate to the region's website. (There are nine regional boards.)
    • All orders will be located on the issuing board's website under the "Board Decisions" Tab, then on the"Adopted Orders" page.
  • If the Order No. contains "DWQ", then the State Board issued the permit.

If you do not know the Order No., you can do the following searches:

Note: Older permits may not be available online and therefore you can contact board staff for a copy.

(See the Stormwater page for more information about NPDES Stormwater General Permits)

Need assistance?

If you would like assistance, please contact:
Renan Jauregui
Water Resources Control Engineer
SWRCB/Division of Water Quality
NPDES Unit
(916) 341-5505
Renan.Jauregui@waterboards.ca.gov