The City’s wastewater system brings wastewater to the City's Wastewater Treatment Plant, where it is treated to remove contaminants before being discharged to the environment. Wastewater treatment plants can remove most contaminants from water, but they can’t remove everything. In order to prevent water pollution and damage to the Wastewater Treatment Plant and City wastewater system, it’s essential that we keep harmful items out of the wastewater.

The Pretreatment Program is responsible for providing regulatory oversight of wastewater discharges in our service area, with an emphasis on industrial and  commercial (non-residential) customers. The goal is to protect the conveyance system and the City’s Wastewater Treatment Plant from harmful discharges through permitting, sampling, enforcement and oversight related to industrial discharges. Additionally, the pretreatment program implements significant source reduction programs, outreach and education programs and incident response.

Regulatory Permits

The City of Davis Public Works Utilities and Operations Department is responsible for developing, implementing and reporting on three State-mandated regulatory programs aimed at reducing pollutants discharged into our wastewater (sewer) and our stormwater collection systems. The requirements of these programs are found in these regulatory permits:

• Statewide General Waste Discharge Requirements for Sanitary Sewer Systems (Order No. 2006-0003-DWQ)
• Waste Discharge Requirements for Storm Water Discharges from Small Municipal Separate Storm Sewer Systems (MS4s) (General Permit No. CAS000004)
• Waste Discharge Requirements (NPDES Permit No. CA0079049) issued to the City’s Wastewater Treatment Plant

 

These regulatory permits all contain general conditions to be implemented and identify specific targeted pollutants for reduction or control. The City is required by law to address the targeted pollutants through established measures. These measures may include, but are not limited to, prohibiting discharges, numeric limits, source control programs and establishing Best Management Practices (BMPs).