David Fridley, environmental health manager with the Three Rivers Health District, talked to Mathews County Supervisors during the Jan. 24 meeting about new rules for alternative sewage treatment systems.

Supervisor Janine Burns, who has long held an interest in regulations governing on-site alternative systems, had asked Fridley to offer the board some guidance on changes that took effect on Dec. 7.

Fridley said that there are many alternative septic systems in Mathews, so the changes will affect many homeowners in the county.

The Department of Professional and Occupational Regulation licenses all operators of onsite sewage systems, said Fridley. Under their regulations, only licensed operators may operate such systems, including providing routine scheduled maintenance and pumping out the tank.

Once a system is in place, said Fridley, the Virginia Department of Health is in charge of making sure the owner properly maintains the system so it doesn’t pose a threat to the environment. VDH regulations require that owners of all such systems provide a maintenance report within the first six months of operation and then at least annually after that.

Under the new regulations, owners of systems that were applied for after Dec. 7, 2011 will have to also have an effluent water quality sample collected by the operator and tested, said Fridley, and then provide the results along with each maintenance report.

However, while regulations previously required that a system owner establish a "business relationship" with an operator and inform the VDH if that relationship were terminated, said Fridley, now the owner may select any licensed operator to provide maintenance and sampling on the system without involving the VDH in that choice.

Another change is a two-year delay in the requirement to make sure that a system reduces nitrogen output by 50 percent either through certified treatment technology or through calculations showing reduced nitrogen from another type of system. Fridley said the health department is working to develop an EPA-approved list of best practices for nitrogen reduction, but it’s also trying to be flexible and give credit for nitrogen reduction from practices already in place.

Fridley explained that the Virginia Department of Health’s sewage regulations prohibit onsite sewage systems in swamps, bogs, marshy areas and very wet sites where drainpipes would be in contact with the groundwater. This is intended to protect public health and the environment, he said.

But a change in the law several years ago allowed professional engineers to design sewage systems "outside the limits of these rules," said Fridley, opening up many previously unusable sites to permitting and, therefore, to development.

This raised questions about whether such systems would be permitted directly in groundwater and wetlands, he said. He explained that when an alternative system releases effluent less than six inches above groundwater, it’s considered to be direct dispersal into the groundwater.

The Department of Environmental Quality governs groundwater quality, said Fridley, and the Department of Health agreed with DEQ that anytime sewage is permitted in groundwater, the quality of the groundwater must not be changed. VDH also added limits to fecal coliform bacteria and nitrogen in groundwater.

To avoid falling into the category of "direct dispersal," said Fridley, the installer may add fill material such as a mound of sand on top of the ground. Because of this technique, very few systems are actually installed that disperse directly into groundwater, he said, and such systems are expected to be "the rare exception."

Onsite septic systems are not allowed at all in wetlands, said Fridley, but the health department has nothing to say about that because a clarification of the relationship between the Department of Environmental Quality and the Department of Health confirms that wetlands are governed by the DEQ, not the Department of Health. He explained that the discharge of wastewater to surface water is a violation of the U.S. Clean Water Act and that Virginia’s definition of surface water includes wetlands.

Fridley said that wetlands are defined as "those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface or groundwater at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support, a prevalence of vegetation typically adapted for life in saturated soil conditions. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs and similar areas."

In short, said Fridley, "Wetlands must have a wet soil type, be saturated for a certain length of time, and have plant growth that belongs prevalently in wetlands."

There is no distinction between tidal and non-tidal wetlands when it comes to permitting, said Fridley, and VDH doesn’t have the authority to issue an onsite permit in a wetland. If a property owner needs a permit for a sewage system in wetlands, he said, it falls under the DEQ’s oversight, and the property owner must go to the DEQ for the permit.

Fridley said further that VDH doesn’t regulate wetlands and therefore doesn’t perform site assessments to determine wetlands delineations. That falls under the purview of the DEQ and the Army Corps of Engineers, he said. Whenever a project is developed by a soil consultant or engineer, he said, VDH will ask the designer to certify that the system is not in a wetland.

While wetlands are not currently on the list of possible discharge points for a joint VDH/DEQ septic permit, said Fridley, VDH regulations are being amended and may include wetlands in the future.