[Federal Register Volume 74, Number 158 (Tuesday, August 18, 2009)]
[Notices]
[Pages 41697-41698]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E9-19752]


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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[FRL-8946-6]


Science Advisory Board Staff Office; Notification of a Meeting of 
the Science Advisory Board Drinking Water Committee

AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Science Advisory 
Board (SAB) Staff Office announces a public face-to-face meeting of the 
SAB Drinking Water Committee (DWC) to provide advice on the Agency's 
draft Protocol for Microbial Risk Assessment to Support Human Health 
Protection for Water-Based Media and to discuss its draft advisory 
report on the Agency's supporting analysis for the proposed revised 
Total Coliform Rule.

DATES: The SAB will hold the public face-to-face meeting on September 
21, 2009 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (Eastern Time) and will continue on 
September 22, 2009 from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. (Eastern Time).

ADDRESSES: The September 21-22, 2009 face-to-face meeting will be held 
at the SAB Conference Center, 1025 F Street, NW., Room 3705, 
Washington, DC 20004.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Any member of the public wishing to 
obtain general information concerning this public meeting should 
contact Mr. Aaron Yeow, Designated Federal Officer (DFO), EPA Science 
Advisory Board (1400F), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 
Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20460; via telephone/voice 
mail: (202) 343-9878; fax: (202) 233-0643; or e-mail at 
[email protected]. General information concerning the EPA Science 
Advisory Board can be found on the SAB Web site at http://www.epa.gov/sab.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee 
Act, 5 U.S.C., App. 2 (FACA), notice is hereby given that the SAB 
Drinking Water Committee (DWC) will hold a public meeting to provide 
advice on the Agency's draft Protocol for Microbial Risk Assessment to 
Support Human Health Protection for Water-Based Media and to discuss 
its draft advisory report on the Agency's supporting analysis for the 
proposed revised Total Coliform Rule. The SAB was established pursuant 
to 42 U.S.C. 4365 to provide independent scientific and technical 
advice to the Administrator on the technical basis for Agency positions 
and regulations. The SAB is a Federal Advisory Committee chartered 
under FACA. The SAB will comply with the provisions of FACA and all 
appropriate EPA and SAB Staff Office procedural policies.
    Background: EPA's Office of Water (OW) is responsible for 
protecting human health and the environment from contaminants in water. 
To achieve this goal, OW conducts risk assessments that apply 
scientific principles and methods to determine the nature and magnitude 
of health risks from contaminant exposures. OW performs microbial risk 
assessments (MRA) to support new regulations for microbial

[[Page 41698]]

pathogens in drinking water under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). 
MRAs also support the development of health-based ambient water quality 
criteria and biosolids criteria under the Clean Water Act (CWA). These 
criteria protect against adverse human exposures to infectious disease 
microorganisms in recreational waters, shellfish growing waters, and 
wastewater biosolids.
    Because of the importance of MRAs, OW developed a Microbial Risk 
Assessment Framework and is developing a draft Protocol for Microbial 
Risk Assessment to Support Human Health Protection for Water-Based 
Media to provide Agency guidance for performing microbial risk 
assessments. Current Agency risk assessment guidance is geared towards 
chemical risk assessment. MRAs do not fit easily within that framework 
because of microbial and host factors that do not affect chemical risk 
assessments. A separate protocol is needed to help risk assessors 
address these factors in a consistent way.
    The draft Protocol for Microbial Risk Assessment to Support Human 
Health Protection for Water-Based Media will be used as guidance for 
preparing qualitative or quantitative MRAs for recreational water 
exposures, evaluation of biosolids application to land, and drinking 
water regulation development applications. OW may also make the 
Protocol available to States, non-governmental organizations, and 
international agencies to use in conducting risk assessments related to 
water media. In addition to supporting new regulations under the SDWA 
and supporting the development of criteria under the CWA, the MRA 
Protocol may also be used for a number of different applications such 
as assessing the potential human health risks associated with a known 
pathogen, determining critical control points for risk mitigation/
control measures, identifying and prioritizing research and 
development, assisting in epidemiological investigations, and 
determining consequences of management options to reduce risk.
    The Office of Water is requesting that the SAB provide advice on 
the draft Protocol for Microbial Risk Assessment to Support Human 
Health Protection for Water-Based Media and to provide recommendations 
on: how to improve the overall approach, the applicability of the 
Protocol, the reasonableness of the protocol, the clarity of the 
Protocol, the completeness and robustness of the protocol, and the ease 
of use of the Protocol for conducting water-based microbial risk 
assessments.
    The SAB DWC will also discuss its draft advisory report on the 
Agency's supporting analysis for the proposed revised Total Coliform 
Rule during this meeting. The Committee met previously on May 20, 2009 
and on June 9-June 10, 2009 to deliberate on the Agency's charge 
questions regarding the supporting analysis. A Federal Register Notice 
dated May 1, 2009 (74 FR 20297-20298) announced these meetings and 
provided background information on this advisory activity.
    Availability of Meeting Materials: The meeting agenda and other 
materials, including a link to access the EPA review document(s) 
related to the draft Protocol for Microbial Risk Assessment to Support 
Human Health Protection for Water-Based Media and draft advisory report 
on the Agency's supporting analysis for the proposed revised Total 
Coliform Rule, will be posted on the SAB Web site (http://www.epa.gov/sab) in advance of the meeting. For questions and information 
concerning the Agency's documents relating to the Protocol, please 
contact Dr. Stephen Schaub at (202) 566-1126 or [email protected]. 
For questions and information concerning the SAB's draft advisory 
report on EPA's proposed Total Coliform Rule revisions, please contact 
Dr. Suhair Shallal at (202) 343-9977 or [email protected].
    Procedures for Providing Public Input: Interested members of the 
public may submit relevant written or oral information for the SAB to 
consider on the topics included in this advisory activity and/or group 
conducting the activity. Oral Statements: In general, individuals or 
groups requesting an oral presentation at a public SAB face-to-face 
meeting will be limited to five minutes, with no more than a total of 
one hour for all speakers. To be placed on the public speaker list for 
the Microbial Risk Assessment Protocol, interested parties should 
contact Mr. Aaron Yeow, DFO, in writing (preferably via e-mail), by 
September 14, 2009 at the contact information noted above. To be placed 
on the public speaker list for the draft SAB advisory report on the 
Total Coliform Rule revisions, interested parties should contact Dr. 
Suhair Shallal, DFO, in writing (preferably via e-mail), by September 
14, 2009 at the contact information noted above.
    Written Statements: Written statements should be received in the 
SAB Staff Office by September 14, 2009, so that the information may be 
made available to the SAB for their consideration prior to the face-to-
face meeting. Written statements on the Microbial Risk Assessment 
Protocol should be supplied to the DFO via e-mail to [email protected] 
and written statements on the draft SAB advisory report on the Total 
Coliform Rule Revisions should be supplied to the DFO via e-mail to 
[email protected] (acceptable file format: Adobe Acrobat PDF, 
WordPerfect, MS Word, MS PowerPoint, or Rich Text files in IBM-PC/
Windows 98/2000/XP format). Submitters are requested to provide two 
versions of each document submitted with and without signatures, 
because the SAB Staff Office does not publish documents with signatures 
on its Web sites.
    Accessibility: For information on access or services for 
individuals with disabilities, please contact Mr. Aaron Yeow at (202) 
343-9878 or [email protected]. To request accommodation of a 
disability, please contact Mr. Yeow preferably at least ten days prior 
to the meeting, to give EPA as much time as possible to process your 
request.

    Dated: August 6, 2009.
Anthony F. Maciorowski,
Deputy Director, EPA Science Advisory Board Staff Office.
[FR Doc. E9-19752 Filed 8-17-09; 8:45 am]
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