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Brief Descriptions and Links to Office Water Oceans Watersheds (OWOW)

State Water Monitoirng, Guidance for 2006, Guidance for 2004, 2002 Integrated WQ Monitoring, CALM, RF3/NHD, OWOW Home

Elements of a State Water Monitoring and Assessment Program, Regas, D.C., and J.A. Hanlon, USEPA, March, 2003, "recommends the basic elements of a State water monitoring program and serves as a tool to help EPA and the States determine whether a monitoring program meets the prerequisites of CWA Section 106(e)(1)." Complete text. Relative to Survey Designs the document includes:

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Guidance for 2006 Assessment, Listing, and Reporting Requirements Pursuant to Sections 303(d), 305(b), and 314 of the Clean Water Act [2006 Integrated Report Guidance (IRG)]. This guidance is for states, territories, authorized tribes, and interstate commissions that help prepare and submit section 305(b) reports (hereinafter referred to as "jurisdictions"). It outlines development of biennial Integrated Reports (IR) that would support EPA's strategy for achieving a broad-scale, national inventory of water quality conditions.

In Chapter 3 (and other sections) of the IR guidance, OW recommends that the results of probability monitoring be used 1) to explicitly report results of probability monitoring efforts in table 3-3 and 2) to provide more comprehensive (from a coverage perspective) state wide use support summaries requested in table 3-6, as applicable. OW would like the site-specific findings georeferenced so that OW can present increasingly specific layers of data, drilling down from state-wide probability monitoring, to basin-level probability monitoring, to specific sample points/assessment units. OWOW website

In a memo dated July 29, 2005, Diane Regas, Director, Office of Wetlands, Oceans, and Watersheds transmitted the above referenced document. This guidance replaces and supercedes many previous documents.

Guidance for 2004 Assessment, Listing and Reporting Requirements Pursuant to Sections 303(d) and 305(b) of the Clean Water Act; TMDL-01-03

In a memo dated July 21, 2003, Diane Regas, Director, Office of Wetlands, Oceans, and Watersheds transmitted the above referenced document. This guidance replaces and supercedes many previous documents.

The 2004 guidance addresses the use of probability-based sampling designs in the context of the State's monitoring program, including rotating basin approaches.

Complete text Guidance for 2004 Assessment (PDF) or from the web site PDF

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EPA Office of Water issues 2002 Integrated Water Quality Monitoring and Assessment Report Guidance

In a memo dated Nov 19, 2002, Robert H Wayland, Director Office of Wetlands, Oceans, Watersheds transmitted Guidance to State and Tribes for their 2002 Water Quality Reports:

Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 305(b) reports and Section 303(d) lists are highly visible ways of communicating about the health of the nation's waters. The quality and reliability of the information they contain becomes increasingly important as it is used to set priorities and to implement water quality controls and protection activities. For the first time, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is providing states, territories, and authorized tribes with guidance for integrating the development and submission of 2002 305(b) water quality reports and Section 303(d) lists of impaired waters.

Complete text IWQM&A_Report (PDF) or from the web site  https://www.epa.gov/owow/tmdl/2002wqma.htm

Relative to the design and analysis tasks the memo includes:

Go to: Information on Survey designs to support 305(b) and 303(d)

The EPA also supports a website on bioindicators (www.epa.gov/bioindicators/index.html) including information on statistical issues (www.epa.gov/bioindicators/statprimer)

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The Office of Water has prepared a draft guidance document; Consolidated Assessment and Listing Methodology (CALM), that provides a framework for states and other jurisdictions to document how they collect and use water quality data and information for environmental decision making.  The CALM material is available on the website: https://www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/calm.html.  Chapter 11 and Appendix C address design and implementation issues.

Detailed information on RF3 can be found at www.epa.gov/owow/monitoring/databases

NHD information is available at nhd.usgs.gov Exit Disclaimer and www.epa.gov/watertrain/hydrogis

Home page for OWOW  www.epa.gov/owow

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