§ 13.28.02 — Definitions and abbreviations
Code of Ordinances, City of North Las Vegas, Nevada (Supp. No. 146: codified through legislation passed and adopted on or before August 5, 2026) · North Las Vegas Municipal Code § 13.28.02
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13.28.02 - Definitions and abbreviations.
A. Definitions. In addition to definitions in Section 13.24.010, the following words, terms and phrases, when used in this chapter, shall have the meanings ascribed to except where the context clearly indicates a different meaning: "Act" or "the act" means the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, also known as the Clean Water Act, as amended, 33 U.S.C. 1251 et seq. "Approval authority" means the Regional Administrator of EPA Region 9 or, upon authorization of the Pretreatment Program to the State of Nevada, the Administrator of the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection. "Authorized representative" or "duly authorized representative of the industrial user" means: 1. If the industrial user is a corporation: a. The president, secretary, treasurer, or a vice-president of the corporation in charge of a principal business function, or any other person who performs similar policy or decision making functions for the corporation; or b. The manager of one or more manufacturing, production, or operating facilities, provided the manager is authorized to make management decisions which govern the operation of the regulated facility including having the explicit or implicit duty of making major capital investment recommendations, and initiate and direct other comprehensive measures to assure long-term environmental compliance with environmental laws and regulations; can ensure that the necessary systems are established or actions taken to gather complete and accurate information for industrial wastewater discharge permit requirements; and where authority to sign documents has been assigned or delegated to the manager in accordance with corporate procedures. 2. If the user is a partnership or sole proprietorship: a general partner or proprietor, respectively. 3. If the user is a federal, state, or local government facility: A district or highest official appointed or designated to oversee the operation and performance of the activities of the governmental facility, or their designee. 4. The individuals described in paragraphs a through c, above, may designate another authorized representative if the authorization is made in writing, the authorization specifies the individual or a position responsible for the overall operation of the facility from which the discharge originates or having overall responsibility for environmental matters for the company, and the written authorization is submitted to the city. "Best management practices" or "BMPs" means schedules of activities, prohibitions of practices, maintenance procedures, and other management practices to implement the general and specific prohibitions listed in 13.28.04 of this Chapter. BMPs may also include, but are not limited to, treatment requirements, operating procedures, and practices to control plant site runoff, spillage or leaks, sludge or waste disposal, or drainage from raw material storage. BMPs shall be considered local limits and pretreatment standards for the purposes of this chapter and Section 307(d) of the act as specified at 40 CFR Section 403.5(c)(4). "Biochemical oxygen demand—five day" or "BOD 5" means the quantity of oxygen utilized in the biochemical oxidation of organic matter under standard laboratory procedures in five days at twenty (20) degrees Celsius, expressed in milligrams per liter (mg/L) using methods approved under 40 CFR Part 136. "Bypass" is the intentional diversion of wastestreams from any portion of an industrial user's treatment facility and shall provide notifications to the city as required pursuant to 40 CFR Section 403.17 and 13.28.36.C. "Categorical industrial user" means an industrial user who is subject to a categorical pretreatment standard. "Categorical pretreatment standard" or "categorical standard" refers to any regulation containing pollutant discharge limits promulgated by EPA in accordance with Section 307(b) and (c) of the Act (33 U.S.C. § 1317) as amended, which apply to a specific category of industrial users and that appear in 40 CFR Chapter I, subchapter N, Parts 405—471. "Class I industrial user" means a "significant industrial user" as defined in this section. "Class II industrial user" is an industrial user that is not a class I industrial user and where the city has used its discretion to permit or otherwise control as specified in 13.28.10.D. "Composite sample" is a representative flow-proportioned sample generally collected within a twenty-four (24) hour period and combined according to flow. Time-proportional sampling may be approved or used by the city where time-proportional samples are believed representative of the discharge. "Cooling water" means: 1. Contact: Water used for cooling purposes which comes in contact with any raw material, intermediate product, waste product or finished product. 2. Noncontact: Water used for cooling purposes which does not comes in contact with any raw material, intermediate product, waste product or finished product and the only pollutant added is heat. "Daily maximum discharge limit" is the maximum allowable concentration of a pollutant(s) that may be discharged during a twenty-four (24) hour period or as specified in an industrial wastewater discharge permit. Where daily maximum limitations are expressed in units of mass, the discharge is the total mass discharged over the sampling period. "Direct discharge" means the discharge of pollutants to waters of the United States. "Director" means the director of utilities who is designated by the city to supervise the operation of the publicly owned treatment works and who is charged with certain duties and responsibilities under this chapter, or their duly authorized representative. "Environmental protection agency" or "EPA" means the United States Environmental Protection Agency, or, where appropriate, the term may also be used as a designation for the administrator or other duly authorized official of such agency. "Existing source" means any indirect discharge that is not a new source. "Fats, oil and grease" or "FOG" means non-petroleum organic polar compounds derived from animal or plant sources such as fats, non-hydrocarbons, fatty acids, soaps, waxes, and oils that contain multiple carbon chain triglyceride molecules. These substances are detectable and measurable using the approved method for hexane extractable materials in the analytical procedures established in 40 CFR Part 136. "Grab sample" means a sample which is taken from a wastestream on a one-time basis with no regard to the flow in the wastestream and over a period of time not to exceed fifteen (15) minutes. "Gravity grease interceptor" or "GGI" is an in-ground tank containing at least one baffle in which solids, greases and oils are separated from wastewater, located outside the industrial user's building and made accessible by at least two manhole covers. "Grease trap" or "hydromechanical grease interceptor" or "HMGI" is a small device hooked directly to the outgoing drains of sinks located inside a commercial food preparation facility that allows for the separation of fats, oils and grease of a non-petroleum nature from wastewater prior to being discharged into the POTW. "Hazardous waste" is any waste designated as hazardous under the provisions of 40 CFR Part 261. "Holding tank waste" means any waste from a holding tank, such as vessels, chemical toilets, campers, trailers, septic tanks and vacuum pump tank trucks. "Indirect discharge" means the discharge or the introduction of pollutants into the POTW from any nondomestic source regulated under Section 307(b), (c) or (d) of the Act (33 U.S.C. 1317), including holding tank waste from a non-domestic user discharged into the POTW. "Industrial user" means a source of indirect discharge, a user that has the potential to discharge non-domestic wastewater to the POTW or an industrial user that has a sewer connection for domestic wastewater discharge only. "Industrial" or "non-domestic" wastes means the liquid or solid wastes from industrial manufacturing processes, trade or business activities producing non-domestic or non-residential sewage as distinct from domestic wastewater. "Industrial wastewater discharge permit" means and shall refer to a permit issued by the city to an industrial user that allows, limits and/or prohibits the discharge of pollutants or flow to the POTW as set forth in this chapter. "Infiltration" means the water which enters the sewer lines from the ground, usually through pipe and manhole joints. "Inflow" means the water discharged into the wastewater system from such sources as but not limited to roof leaders, cellar, yard, and area drains; foundation drains; drains from springs, manhole covers; cross-connections from storm sewers and combined sewers, surface runoff; etc. "Instantaneous discharge limit" means the maximum or minimum concentration or measurement for a pollutant or pollutant property allowed to be discharged at any time for any length of time and is determined by use of a grab sample or a direct measurement. "Interference" means a discharge which, alone or in conjunction with a discharge or discharges from other sources, both 1. Inhibits or disrupts the POTW, its treatment processes or operations or its sludge processes, use or disposal, and 2. Therefore is a cause of a violation of the city's NPDES permit (including an increase in the magnitude or duration of a violation) or of the prevention of sewage sludge use or disposal in compliance with any of the following statutory or regulatory provisions or permits issued thereunder, or any more stringent state or local regulations: Section 405 of the act; the Solid Waste Disposal Act (SWDA), including Title II commonly referred to as the resource conservation and recovery act (RCRA); any state regulations contained in any state sludge management plan prepared pursuant to Subtitle D of the Solid Waste Disposal Act; the Clean Air Act; the Toxic Substances Control Act; and the Marine Protection, Research, and Sanctuaries Act. "Local limits" are any regulation containing pollution discharge limits promulgated by the city in accordance with 40 CFR Section 403.5(c) and (d), which are deemed to be pretreatment standards and contained in 13.28.04.C. "Medical waste" means isolation wastes, infectious agents, human blood and blood products, pathological wastes, sharps, body parts, contaminated bedding, surgical wastes, potentially contaminated laboratory wastes, pharmaceutical residues, and dialysis wastes. "National pollutant discharge elimination system" is the State of Nevada program for issuing, conditioning, and denying permits for the discharge of pollutants from point sources into waters of the state implemented by the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection pursuant to Section 402 of the Clean Water Act and the State of Nevada Water Pollution Control Law, NRS 445A.300—445A.730. "New source" means: 1. Any building, structure, facility or installation from which there is or may be a discharge of pollutants, the construction of which commenced after the publication of proposed pretreatment standards under Section 307(c) of the Act which will be applicable to such source if such standards are thereafter promulgated in accordance with that section, provided that: a. The building, structure, facility or installation is constructed at a site at which no other source is located; or b. The building, structure, facility, or installation totally replaces the process or production equipment that causes the discharge of pollutants at an existing source; or c. The production or wastewater generating processes of the building, structure, facility or installation are substantially independent of an existing source at the same site. In determining whether these are substantially independent, factors such as the extent to which the new facility is integrated with the existing plant, and the extent to which the new facility is engaged in the same general type of activity as the existing source should be considered. 2. Construction on a site at which an existing source is located results in a modification rather than a new source if the construction does not create a new building, structure, facility or installation meeting the criteria of subparagraphs 1.b. or 1.c. of this definition but otherwise alters, replaces, or adds to existing process or production equipment. 3. Construction of a new source as defined under this paragraph has commenced if the owner or operator has: a. Begun, or caused to begin as part of a continuous onsite construction program: i. Any placement, assembly, or installation of facilities or equipment; or ii. Significant site preparation work including clearing, excavation, or removal of existing buildings, structures, or facilities which is necessary for the placement, assembly, or installation of new source facilities or equipment; or b. Entered into a binding contractual obligation for the purchase of facilities or equipment which are intended to be used in its operation within a reasonable time. Options to purchase or contracts which can be terminated or modified without substantial loss, and contracts for feasibility, engineering, and design studies do not constitute a contractual obligation under this paragraph. "Normal domestic strength wastewater" means wastewater, when analyzed in accordance with procedures established in 40 CFR Part 136, as amended, contains no more than three hundred (300) mg/L of 5-day biochemical oxygen demand (BOD 5 ), three hundred (300) mg/L of total suspended solids and/or five (5) mg/L of phosphorus. Discharges to the POTW that exceed these concentrations may be surcharged for the concentrations above these levels. "Pass through" means a discharge which exits the POTW into waters of the United States in quantities or concentrations which, alone or in conjunction with a discharge or discharges from other sources, is a cause of a violation of any requirement of the city's NPDES permit (including an increase in the magnitude or duration of a violation). "Person" means any individual, partnership, co-partnership, firm, company, association, joint stock company, trust, estate, society, corporation, group, government, governmental agency or other legal entity, or their legal representatives, agents or assigns. The definition includes all federal, state and local government entities. "pH" means the intensity of acid or base condition of the solution expressed as the logarithm (base 10) of the reciprocal of the concentration of hydrogen ions expressed in moles per liter of solution and reported as standard units (SU). "Pollutant" means any dredged spoil, solid waste, incinerator residue, filter backwash, sewage, garbage, sewage sludge, explosives, munitions, medical waste, chemical wastes, corrosive substance, biological material, biological nutrient, toxic substance, radioactive materials, heat, malodorous substance, wrecked or discharged equipment, rock, sand, slurry, cellar dirt, untreatable waste, or industrial, domestic, or agricultural wastes and certain characteristics of wastewater (e.g. pH, temperature, TSS turbidity, color, BOD 5 , COD, toxicity or odor) discharged into or with water. "POTW treatment plant" means that portion of the POTW or any portion thereof designed to provide treatment of wastewater. "Pretreatment" means the reduction of the amount of pollutants, the elimination of pollutants or the alteration of the nature of pollutant properties in wastewater to a less harmful state prior to, or in lieu of, discharging or otherwise introducing such pollutants into the POTW. The reduction or alteration can be obtained by physical process, biological process, or by other process or means, except as prohibited by 40 CFR Section 403.6(d). Appropriate pretreatment technology includes control equipment, such as equalization tanks or facilities, for protection against surges or slug loadings that might interfere with or otherwise be incompatible with the POTW. However, where wastewater from a regulated process is mixed in an equalization facility with unregulated wastewater or with wastewater from another regulated process, the effluent from the equalization facility must meet an adjusted pretreatment limit calculated in accordance with 40 CFR Section 403.6(e). "Pretreatment requirement" means any substantive or procedural requirement related to pretreatment, other than a pretreatment standard, imposed on an industrial user. "Pretreatment standard," "national pretreatment standard" or "standard" means any regulation containing pollutant discharge limits promulgated by EPA, in accordance with Section 307(b) and (c) of the Act, which applies to industrial users. This term includes prohibitive discharge limits, local limits and best management practices that are established by the city. In cases of differing standards, the more stringent shall apply. "Publicly owned treatment works" or "POTW" is a treatment works as defined by Section 212 of the act (33 U.S.C 1292), which is owned by the city. This definition includes any devices or systems used in the collection, storage, treatment, recycling, and reclamation of municipal sewage or industrial wastes of a liquid nature and any sewers, pipes or other conveyances which convey wastewater to the treatment plant. The term also means the municipality having jurisdiction over the indirect discharges to and the discharges from the treatment works. "Sand/oil separator" is a plumbing appurtenance or appliance that is installed in a sanitary drainage system to intercept sand (or other aggregate) and petroleum-based oil and grease from a wastewater discharge and are designed considering retention times, volumes in gallons calculated for each facility, and gravity separation; such interceptors include baffle(s) and a minimum of two compartments. these sand/oil separator requirements may be found at 13.28.30 of this chapter. "Sector control program" is a program designed to control specific pollutants from industrial users with similar operations, waste generation or treatment through the implementation of pretreatment standards and requirements, including best management practices. These sector control program requirements may be found at 13.28.30 of this chapter. "Shall" is mandatory; "may" is permissive. "Significant industrial user" or "class 1 industrial user" means: 1. A categorical industrial user; 2. An industrial user that: a. Discharges making up five percent (5%) or more of the average dry weather hydraulic or organic capacity of the POTW treatment plant; or b. Discharges of an average of twenty-five thousand gallons per day (25,000 gpd) or more of process wastewater to the POTW (excluding noncontact cooling, sanitary, and boiler blow down); or c. Is designated as such by the director on the basis that the industrial user has a reasonable potential for adversely affecting the POTW's operation or for violating any pretreatment standard or requirement. 3. The city, at its sole discretion, may determine that an industrial user subject to categorical pretreatment standards is a non-significant categorical industrial user rather than a significant industrial user on a finding that the industrial user never discharges more than one hundred gallons per day (100 gpd) of total wastewater subject to categorical pretreatment standards (excluding sanitary, non-contact cooling and boiler blowdown wastewater, unless specifically included in the pretreatment standard) and the following conditions are met; a. The industrial user, prior to the city's finding, has consistently complied with all applicable categorical pretreatment standards and requirements; b. The industrial user annually submits the certification statement as found in 40 CFR 403.12(q), together with any additional information necessary to support the certification statement; and c. The industrial user never discharges any untreated concentrated wastewater. 4. Upon finding by the director that an industrial user meeting the criteria in paragraph 2. of this definition has no reasonable potential for adversely affecting the POTW's operation or for violating any pretreatment standards or requirement, the director may at any time, on its own initiative or in response to a petition received from an industrial user, determine that such industrial user is not a significant industrial user. "Slug load" or "slug discharge" means any discharge at a flow rate or concentration, which could cause a violation of the specific prohibitions in 13.28.04. A slug discharge is any discharge of a non-routine, episodic nature, including but not limited to an accidental spill or a non-customary batch discharge, or a discharge which exceeds the hydraulic or design of an industrial user's treatment system or any part of the treatment unit including a discharge which has a reasonable potential to cause interference or pass through or in any other way violate an applicable pretreatment standard or requirement or an industrial wastewater discharge permit issued by the city. "Standard industrial classification" or "SIC" code means a classification pursuant to the standard industrial classification manual issued by the Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget, 1972, as amended. "Total dissolved solids" or "TDS" are the "residue-on-evaporation" of the filterable solids in water or wastewater, otherwise known as that portion of solids that passes through a glass fiber filter and dried at one hundred and eighty (180) degrees Celsius using a method approved in 40 CFR Part 136. "Total suspended solids" or "TSS" means the solids that float on the surface of, or are suspended in the water, sewage, or other liquid, and which are removable by laboratory filtering in accordance with procedures approved in 40 CFR Part 136, as amended. "Toxic pollutant" means any pollutant or combination of pollutants listed as toxic in regulations promulgated by the administrator of the EPA under Section 307(a) of the Act or as otherwise listed in 40 CFR Part 122, Appendix D. "Upset" means an exceptional incident in which there is unintentional and temporary noncompliance with categorical pretreatment standards because of factors beyond the reasonable control of the industrial user and shall provide notifications to the city as required pursuant to 40 CFR Section 403.16 and 13.28.36.A. "Wastewater" means the liquid and water-carried industrial or domestic wastes from residences, commercial buildings, industrial facilities and institutions, together with any infiltrating groundwater, surface water and stormwater that may be present, whether treated or untreated, which are discharged to or permitted to enter the POTW. B. Abbreviations. The following abbreviations shall have the designated meanings: BMP | Best Management Practice BMR | Baseline Monitoring Report BOD 5 | Biochemical Oxygen Demand ºC | degrees Celsius CFR | Code of Federal Regulations CIU | Categorical Industrial User COD | Chemical Oxygen Demand CWA | Clean Water Act EPA | U.S. Environmental Protection Agency °F | degrees Fahrenheit FOG | Fats, Oils and Grease gpd | gallons per day gpm | gallons per minute GGI | Gravity Grease Interceptor HEM | Hexane Extractable Material HMGI | Hydromechanical Grease Interceptor (aka Grease Trap) IGA | Intergovernmental Agreement IU | Industrial User mgd | million gallons per day mg/L | milligrams per Liter NDEP | Nevada Department of Environmental Protection NPDES | National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System O&M | Operation and Maintenance POTW | Publicly Owned Treatment Works SIC | Standard Industrial Classification SIU | Significant Industrial User SNC | Significant Noncompliance § | Section TDS | Total Dissolved Solids TSS | Total Suspended Solids U.S.C. | United States Code
(Ord. No. 2771, § 1, 10-5-2016)
