[Federal Register Volume 67, Number 101 (Friday, May 24, 2002)]
[Notices]
[Pages 36593-36595]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 02-13120]


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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[FRL-7217-8]


EPA Science Advisory Board; Notification of Public Advisory 
Committee Meetings

    Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, Public Law 92-463, 
notice is hereby given that the Drinking Water Committee (DWC) of the 
US EPA Science Advisory Board (SAB) will meet via public teleconference 
on the date and at the time noted below. All times noted are Eastern 
Time. The meeting is open to the public, however, seating is limited 
and available on a first come basis. Important Notice: Documents that 
are the subject of SAB reviews are normally available from the 
originating EPA office and are not available from the SAB Office--
information concerning availability of documents from the relevant 
Program Office is included below.
    The Drinking Water Committee of the US EPA Science Advisory Board 
(SAB), will conduct a public teleconference meeting on June 11, 2002. 
The meeting will begin at 1 pm and adjourn no later than 4 p.m. the 
same day. The meeting will be coordinated through a conference call 
connection in Room 6013 in the USEPA, Ariel Rios Building North, 1200 
Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20004. The public is 
encouraged to attend the meeting in the conference room noted above, 
however, the public may also attend through a telephonic link if lines 
are available. Additional instructions about how to participate in the 
conference call can be obtained by calling Ms. Mary Winston at (202) 
564-4538, or via e-mail at [email protected]. Presentation slides 
will be placed on the SAB Web site (www.epa.gov/sab/) prior to the 
start of the meeting.
    Purpose of the Meeting--The primary purpose of this meeting will be 
for staff from EPA's Office of Water to provide background briefings 
sufficient for the Committee to develop a systematic plan for 
responding to the agency request on two topics: (1) Six-Year Review of 
Existing Regulations Notice of Intent on Review Decisions (6-YR) and 
(2) Contaminant Candidate List Notice of Intent on Regulatory 
Determinations (CCL1). The review will NOT be conducted on this 
conference call. A draft agenda for this meeting will be available from 
the DFO or Management Assistant approximately one week before the 
meeting.
    Background Information about the 6-Year Review of Existing 
Regulations: EPA recently announced its preliminary revise/not revise 
decisions for 68 chemical National Primary Drinking Water Regulations 
(NPDWRs) and the Total Coliform Rule (TCR) (67 FR 19030; April 17, 
2002). The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) requires EPA to periodically 
review existing NPDWRs and, if appropriate, revise them [Section 
1412(b)(9) of SDWA, as amended in 1996]
    The primary goal of the Six Year Review is to identify, prioritize 
and target candidates for regulatory revision that are most likely to 
result in an increased level of public health protection and/or a 
substantial cost savings while maintaining the level of public health 
protection. To address this goal, EPA, in consultation with the 
National Drinking Water Advisory Council (NDWAC) and other 
stakeholders, developed a systematic approach, or protocol, for the 
review of existing NPDWRs. The protocol focused on several key 
elements, including: (i) Health effects (to identify potential changes 
in the Maximum Contaminant Level Goal (MCLG or health effects goal) and 
perhaps to the maximum contaminant level (MCL)); (ii) analytical 
feasibility (to identify potential changes in analytical feasibility 
for those contaminants where the Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL) was 
limited by the measurement feasibility and to review analytical 
feasibility limitations for contaminants that may have potential 
changes in the MCLG); (iii) treatment (to evaluate treatment 
feasibility if potential changes in MCLG/MCL are likely and to evaluate 
if there is an indication that the best available technology (BAT) or 
treatment technique (TT) requirements need review); (iv) other 
regulatory changes (to identify any potential non-MCLG/MCL or non-TT 
types of changes that apply to public water systems, are ready for 
rulemaking and are not being addressed under alternative mechanisms); 
(v) occurrence and exposure (to evaluate the extent of occurrence and 
exposure where a potential change in health or technology provides a 
potential basis for revising the regulation); and (vi) economics (to 
qualitatively consider economic impacts where a health or

[[Page 36594]]

technology basis may exists for revising the regulation). After 
receiving public comments and conducting a stakeholders meeting, EPA 
intends to publish final revise/not revise decisions by Fall of 2002.
    Tentative Charge for 6 Year Review of Existing Regulations--EPA is 
interested in having the EPA Science Advisory Board's advice on: (1) 
Whether EPA consistently applied its protocol for making determinations 
of whether or not to revise existing regulations, and (2) whether, in 
the SAB's view, EPA appropriately documented its analyses in support of 
the March announcement.
    Background Information on the Contaminant Candidate List Regulatory 
Determinations--The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA), as amended in 1996, 
requires EPA to publish a list of contaminants (referred to as the 
Contaminant Candidate List, or CCL) to assist in priority-setting 
efforts. SDWA also requires the Agency to select five or more 
contaminants from the current CCL and determine, by August 2001, 
whether or not to regulate these contaminants with a National Primary 
Drinking Water Regulation (NPDWR). EPA intends to announce its 
preliminary determination decisions in the Federal Register prior to 
June 11, 2002.
    The CCL was developed with considerable input from the scientific 
community and stakeholders and published in March of 1998. The CCL 
contains 60 contaminants (50 chemicals and 10 microbes) that are not 
subject to any current or proposed NPDWRs. In 1998, 20 of the 60 
contaminants were classified as priorities for regulatory determination 
because EPA believed at that time that there were sufficient data to 
evaluate both exposure and risk to public health, and to support a 
determination of whether or not to proceed to promulgation of an NPDWR. 
Since then, 12 of the 20 priority contaminants were found to have 
insufficient information to support a regulatory determination. In 
addition, sodium was added to the list of regulatory determination 
priorities.
    There are 9 contaminants that have sufficient data and information 
to consider a determination of whether or not to regulate: (i) 
Acanthamoeba (microscopic amoeba commonly found in the environment); 
(ii) aldrin and dieldrin (banned insecticides, used primarily on corn 
and cotton); (iii) hexachlorobutadiene (used primarily to make rubber 
compounds); (iv) manganese (essential nutrient, occurs naturally, and 
has a variety of uses); (v) metribuzin (herbicide used primarily on 
soybeans, potatoes, and alfalfa); (vi) naphthalene (intermediary 
manufacturing product and moth repellent; (vii) sodium (essential 
nutrient, naturally occurring element); and (viii) sulfate (present in 
the diet, naturally occurring element). After receiving public comments 
and conducting a stakeholders meeting EPA intends to publish a final 
determination (Fall of 2002). If EPA determines that regulations are 
necessary, they must be proposed within two years and promulgated 
eighteen months after the proposal.
    SDWA requires consideration of three areas when EPA makes a 
determination to regulate: (i) Projected adverse health effects, (ii) 
extent of contaminant occurrence, and (iii) whether regulation would 
present a meaningful opportunity for health risk reduction (see SDWA 
section 1412(b)(1)(A)) when EPA makes a determination to regulate.
    EPA's evaluation approach is based on recommendations from National 
Research Council (NRC) and the National Drinking Water Advisory Council 
(NDWAC). For each of the nine contaminants, EPA evaluated: (i) The 
sufficiency of current analytical and treatment methods; (ii) the best 
available peer reviewed data on health effects; and (iii) analytical 
records on contaminant occurrence. For those contaminants with adequate 
methods, as well as health effects and occurrence data, EPA employed an 
approach to assist in making preliminary regulatory determinations that 
follows the themes recommended by the NRC and NDWAC to satisfy the 
three SDWA requirements under section 1412(b)(1)(A)(i)-(iii).
    Specifically, EPA characterized the human health effects that may 
result from exposure to a contaminant found in drinking water, and 
based on this characterization, estimated a health-related bench-mark 
level for each contaminant. Then, for a given contaminant EPA estimated 
the number of public water systems and population served by those 
systems above these bench-mark values, and the geographic distribution 
using a large number of state occurrence data that broadly reflect 
national occurrence. Use and environmental release information, and 
ambient water quality data, were used to augment the State data and 
evaluate the likelihood of contaminant occurrence. The findings from 
these evaluations were used to make a preliminary determination on 
whether to regulate a contaminant based on the three SDWA statutory 
requirements.
    Tentative Charge for Contaminant Candidate List (CCL) Regulatory 
Determinations--EPA is interested in having the SAB's advice on (i) 
whether the protocol used by EPA in making regulatory determinations 
appear to be reasonable, appropriate and consistently applied, in light 
of limitations of available data and information, and (ii) if the data 
set used for both health assessments and occurrence assessments is 
adequate for responding to the 3 statutory requirements for 
determinations of whether or not to regulate a contaminant on the CCL.
    Availability of Review Materials: The availability of background 
materials for these topics is as follows: a) Six-Year project; contact 
Wynne Miller by telephone at (202) 564-4887 or by email at 
[email protected]; b) CCL1 project; contact Karen Wirth by telephone 
at (202) 564-5246 or by email at [email protected].

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Any member of the public wishing 
further information concerning this meeting or wishing to submit brief 
oral comments (3 minutes or less) must contact Thomas Miller, 
Designated Federal Officer, EPA Science Advisory Board (1400A), U.S. 
Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., 
Washington, DC 20460; telephone (202) 564-4558; FAX (202) 501-0582; or 
via e-mail at [email protected]. Requests for oral comments must be in 
writing (e-mail, fax or mail) and received by Mr. Miller no later than 
noon Eastern Time on Tuesday, June 4, 2002.

Providing Oral or Written Comments at SAB Meetings

    It is the policy of the EPA Science Advisory Board to accept 
written public comments of any length, and to accommodate oral public 
comments whenever possible. The EPA Science Advisory Board expects that 
public statements presented at its meetings will not be repetitive of 
previously submitted oral or written statements. Oral Comments: In 
general, each individual or group requesting an oral presentation at a 
face-to-face meeting will be limited to a total time of ten minutes 
(unless otherwise indicated). For teleconference meetings, 
opportunities for oral comment will usually be limited to no more than 
three minutes per speaker and no more than fifteen minutes total. 
Deadlines for getting on the public speaker list for a meeting are 
given above. Speakers should bring at least 35 copies of their comments 
and presentation slides for distribution to the reviewers and public at 
the meeting. Written Comments: Although the SAB accepts written 
comments until the date of the meeting (unless otherwise stated), 
written comments should be received in the

[[Page 36595]]

SAB Staff Office at least one week prior to the meeting date so that 
the comments may be made available to the committee for their 
consideration. Comments should be supplied to the appropriate DFO at 
the address/contact information noted above in the following formats: 
one hard copy with original signature, and one electronic copy via e-
mail (acceptable file format: Adobe Acrobat, WordPerfect, Word, or Rich 
Text files (in IBM-PC/Windows 95/98 format). Those providing written 
comments and who attend the meeting are also asked to bring 35 copies 
of their comments for public distribution.
    General Information--Additional information concerning the EPA 
Science Advisory Board, its structure, function, and composition, may 
be found on the SAB Web site (http://www.epa.gov/sab) and in The FY2001 
Annual Report of the Staff Director which is available from the SAB 
Publications Staff at (202) 564-4533 or via fax at (202) 501-0256. 
Committee rosters, draft Agendas and meeting calendars are also located 
on our Web site.
    Meeting Access--Individuals requiring special accommodation at this 
meeting, including wheelchair access to the conference room, should 
contact Mr. Miller at least five business days prior to the meeting so 
that appropriate arrangements can be made.

    Dated: May 20, 2002.
A. Robert Flaak,
Acting Staff Director, EPA Science Advisory Board.
[FR Doc. 02-13120 Filed 5-23-02; 8:45 am]
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