Wis. Admin. Code Department of Natural Resources NR 162.003

Current through October 28, 2024
Section NR 162.003 - Definitions

In this chapter:

(1) "Amendment" means a formal, written change to an existing legal agreement or contract executed by all parties to the original agreement or contract.
(2) "American Community Survey" or "ACS" means the nationwide survey conducted by the U.S. bureau of the census to collect demographic, social, housing, and economic data and produce 1-year, 3-year, and 5-year estimates based on population thresholds.
(3) "Applicant" means any municipality that submits to the department any of the following for financial assistance under this chapter:
(a) Intent to apply form and priority evaluation and ranking information as required by the department.
(b) A financial assistance application.
(4) "Approval" means the written approval of the department.
(5) "Best management practices" or "BMPs" has the meaning given in s. NR 151.002 (4).

Note: Under s. NR 151.002 (4), "Best management practices" or "BMPs" means structural or non-structural measures, practices, techniques, or devices employed to avoid or minimize soil, sediment, or pollutants carried in runoff to waters of the state.

(6) "Block group" means a subdivision of a census tract made up of a cluster of blocks having the same first digit of their 4-digit identifying numbers within the tract.
(7) "Board of commissioners of public lands" or "BCPL" means the organization comprised of the secretary of state, the state treasurer, and the attorney general that operates under the authority of ch. 24, Stats.

Note: The BCPL is also known as state trust funds.

(7m) "BOD" means the pollutant parameter biochemical oxygen demand.
(8) "Breach of contract" means the failure of the municipality to comply with any of the following:
(a) The terms and conditions of the financial assistance agreement or interest rate subsidy agreement.
(b) The terms and conditions of the municipal resolution authorizing the issuance and sale of bonds or notes to the clean water fund program.
(9) "Capital improvement" means construction resulting in improvements to real property or depreciable property, or both, and adding to the value or useful life of these assets, including structural improvements, or improvements that enhance usefulness or productivity. "Capital improvement" includes capital assets that are not structural but are necessary for water quality protection or improvement, such as trucks, street sweepers, land for buffer areas, and other tangible assets with a single item cost of greater than $5,000.

Note: The following are examples of capital improvements: constructing permeable pavement or an infiltration pond to control runoff; constructing an entirely new treatment works, or new clarifiers, aeration tanks, or other major components of an existing treatment works or BMP; upgrading existing equipment or installing new, more efficient process equipment, such as equipment for pumping, dewatering, aeration, scraping, skimming, or disinfection; constructing new process, administration, and storage buildings; adding to or constructing major renovations of existing facilities; replacing or rehabilitating aged or undersized sanitary sewer pipes; replacing a roof on a treatment plant building; constructing a new lift station or upgrading an existing lift station; installing security, a supervisory control and data acquisition system, or monitoring equipment as part of a scored project; or purchasing an existing treatment facility, land on which a treatment facility will be constructed, land for buffer areas, agricultural or industrial land taken out of production in order to improve water quality in the area, or necessary mobile assets, such as a street sweeper. Replacing an old pump with a new pump that is the same size and efficiency as the old pump is not considered a capital improvement; rather, it is maintenance.

(9m) "CBOD" means the pollutant parameter carbonaceous biochemical oxygen demand.
(10) "Census block" means the smallest unit for which the U.S. bureau of the census collects and tabulates population information in the decennial census and income information in the ACS.
(11) "Census designated place" means a statistical area delineated for each decennial census according to U.S. bureau of the census guidelines for the purpose of presenting census data and ACS data for a concentration of population, housing, and commercial structures that is locally identifiable by name, but is not within an incorporated place.
(12) "Census tract" means a small, relatively permanent statistical subdivision of a county used in the decennial census and the ACS, delineated for the purpose of presenting data, typically following visible features or governmental boundaries or both, including approximately 4,000 inhabitants, and designed to be a relatively homogeneous unit with respect to population characteristics, economic status, and living conditions.
(13) "Change order" means an action that specifies and justifies a change to a construction contract that alters the time of completion or the total price, or both.
(14) "Clean water fund program" or "CWFP" means the program established under ss. 25.43, 281.58, and 281.59, Stats., for the purpose of providing financial assistance to municipalities for the planning, design, and construction of treatment works and BMPs.
(15) "Compliance maintenance" means the program established and regulated under ch. NR 208, intended to prevent a permittee under ch. 283, Stats., from exceeding an effluent limitation contained in a permit issued under ch. 283, Stats.
(16) "Construction" means a set of actions taken to make a capital improvement, including any of the following actions:
(a) Building, erecting, extending, or assembling a treatment works or BMP or a new major asset for an existing treatment works or BMP.
(b) Preparing a construction site or sites of a scored project for work activities, including grading, staking, digging, and demolition or abandonment of existing structures.
(c) Purchasing a package wastewater treatment system or capacity in an existing treatment works.
(d) Altering, modifying, improving, upgrading, rehabilitating, or adding to existing treatment works facilities or BMPs.
(e) Performing major repairs or replacing major components of existing facilities.
(f) Installing new piping or mechanical, electrical, or electronic equipment or facilities.
(g) Remediation of illicit discharges to an MS4 or runoff treatment works.
(17) "Custom tabulation" means a special tabulation of income data from the ACS microdata files that is performed by the U.S. bureau of the census, is not part of the standard ACS data tabulations, and results in generation of a median household income for an area designated by the applicant as the boundaries of a town sanitary district, public inland lake protection and rehabilitation district, or metropolitan sewerage district, or of the area served by the treatment works if the treatment works serves only a portion of the place or minor civil division in which it is located.
(18) "Department" means the department of natural resources.
(19) "Design flow" means the average annual flow or average daily flow specified in an approved facilities plan or approved plans and specifications, the flow specified in a WPDES permit, or the flow required to meet performance standards.
(20) "Disadvantaged business enterprise" or "DBE" means a business entity certified as disadvantaged under the U.S. department of transportation unified certification program or other program approved by the U.S. environmental protection agency to certify disadvantaged businesses.
(21) "Discharge" has the meaning given in s. 283.01 (4), Stats.

Note: Under s. 283.01 (4), Stats., "discharge," when used without qualification, includes a discharge of any pollutant. Under s. 283.01 (5), Stats., "discharge of pollutant" or "discharge of pollutants" means any addition of any pollutant to the waters of this state from any point source.

(21m) "DO" means the effluent parameter dissolved oxygen.
(22) "DOA" means the department of administration.
(23) "Effluent limitation" has the meaning given in s. 283.01 (6), Stats.

Note: Under s. 283.01 (6), Stats., "effluent limitation" means any restriction established by the department, including schedules of compliance, on quantities, rates, and concentrations of chemical, physical, biological, and other constituents that are discharged from point sources into waters of this state. Flow rates and flow volumes are considered to be physical constituents restricted by WPDES permits.

(24) "Engineering" includes all of the following:
(a) Performing preliminary planning to determine the need for or the feasibility of building or modifying a treatment works or BMP, including preparing a facilities plan.
(b) Performing engineering, architectural, geotechnical, hydrogeological, environmental, archaeological, biological, fiscal, or economic investigations or studies.
(c) Identifying illicit discharges to an MS4, a BMP, or a wastewater treatment works if the identification work is directly related to the scored project.
(d) Preparing surveys, designs, plans, bidding documentation, working drawings, specifications, or as-built drawings.
(e) Coordinating, observing, inspecting, or supervising any of the activities under pars. (a) to (d) or under sub. (16).
(25) "Equipment replacement fund" means a separate fund established by a municipality for the purpose of making expenditures for major repair or replacement of equipment necessary for continuing operation of wastewater or runoff treatment works, or for maintenance of a BMP.
(26) "Financial assistance" includes one or more of the following actions taken by the department and DOA under ss. 281.58 and 281.59, Stats.:
(a) Providing a loan, principal forgiveness, interest rate subsidies, a guarantee, or credit enhancement to a municipality.
(b) Refinancing a municipality's interim debt obtained for the scored project.
(c) Purchasing insurance for a municipality.
(27) "Financial assistance agreement" means a written agreement between a municipality, the department, and DOA that contains the terms and conditions of the financial assistance provided to the municipality under subch. II or III.
(28) "Financial assistance agreement amendment" means a formal, written change to an existing financial assistance agreement executed by all parties to the original agreement.
(29) "Force account work" means engineering, construction, or other project-specific activities performed by a municipality's paid employees or use of equipment owned by the municipality in construction of the project, or both.
(30) "Groundwater" has the meaning given in s. 160.01 (4), Stats.

Note: Under s. 160.01 (4), Stats., "groundwater" means any of the waters of the state, as defined in s. 281.01 (18), occurring in a saturated subsurface geological formation of rock or soil.

(31) "Illicit discharge" has the meaning given in s. NR 216.002 (11).

Note: Under s. NR 216.002 (11), "illicit discharge" means any discharge to a municipal separate storm sewer system that is not composed entirely of storm water except discharges authorized by a WPDES permit or other discharge not requiring a WPDES permit such as landscape irrigation, individual residential car washing, fire fighting, diverted stream flows, uncontaminated groundwater infiltration, uncontaminated pumped groundwater, discharges from potable water sources, foundation drains, air conditioning condensation, irrigation water, lawn watering, flows from riparian habitats and wetlands, and similar discharges.

(32) "Industrial user" has the meaning given in s. 281.58 (1) (c), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.58 (1) (c), Stats., "industrial user" means any of the following:

1. Any nongovernmental, nonresidential user of a publicly owned treatment work which discharges more than the equivalent of 25,000 gallons per day of sanitary wastes, other than domestic wastes or discharges from sanitary conveniences, or discharges a volume that has the weight of biochemical oxygen demand or suspended solids at least as great as the weight found in 25,000 gallons per day of sanitary waste from residential users, and which is identified in the standard industrial classification manual, 1972, federal office of management and budget, as amended and supplemented as of October 1, 1978, under one of the following divisions:
a. Division A: agriculture, forestry, and fishing.
b. Division B: mining.
c. Division D: manufacturing.
d. Division E: transportation, communications, electric, gas, and sanitary services.
e. Division I: services.
2. Any nongovernmental user of a publicly owned treatment work which discharges wastewater to the treatment work which contains toxic pollutants or poisonous solids, liquids or gases in sufficient quantity, either singly or by interaction with other wastes, to contaminate the sludge of any municipal system, to injure or interfere with any sewage treatment process, to constitute a hazard to humans or animals, to create a public nuisance, or to create any hazard in or have an adverse effect on the waters receiving any discharge from the treatment works.
3. All commercial users of an individual system constructed with grant assistance under s. 281.57.
(33) "Infiltration" has the meaning given in s. NR 110.03 (16).

Note: Under s. NR 110.03 (16), "infiltration" means water other than wastewater that enters a sewerage system (including sewer service connections) from the ground through such sources as defective pipes, pipe joints, connections, or manholes. Infiltration does not include, and is distinguished from, inflow.

(33m) "Infiltration system" has the meaning given in s. NR 151.002 (20).

Note: Under s. NR 151.002 (20), "infiltration system" means a device or practice such as a basin, trench, rain garden or swale designed specifically to encourage infiltration, but does not include natural infiltration in pervious surfaces such as lawns, redirecting of rooftop downspouts onto lawns or minimal infiltration from practices, such as swales or road side channels designed for conveyance and pollutant removal only.

(34) "Inflow" has the meaning given in s. NR 110.03 (17).

Note: Under s. NR 110.03 (17), "inflow" means water other than wastewater that enters a sewerage system (including sewer service connections) from sources such as roof leaders, cellar drains, yard drains, area drains, foundation drains, sump pumps, drains from springs and swampy areas, manhole covers, cross connections between storm sewers and sanitary sewers, catch basins, cooling towers, storm waters, surface runoff, street wash waters, or drainage. Inflow does not include, and is distinguished from, infiltration.

(35) "Interest rate subsidy" means the subsidy provided by the CWFP under ss. 281.58 and 281.59, Stats., to reduce the interest cost of loans provided to municipalities by the BCPL under ch. 24, Stats.
(36) "Interest rate subsidy agreement" means a written agreement between a municipality, the department, and DOA that contains the terms and conditions of financial assistance provided to the municipality under subch. IV.
(37) "Interim debt" means a financial liability that is subject to repayment and incurred by an applicant to temporarily finance a scored project until permanent financing is obtained from the CWFP, including liabilities in the form of lines of credit, short-term bank or BCPL loans, bond anticipation notes, general obligation bonds, revenue bonds, general obligation promissory notes, and certificates of indebtedness.
(38) "Interim debt costs" means the net interest, fees, and charges associated with issuing interim debt, including municipal advisor fees, attorney fees, printing costs, bond rating charges, and trustee fees.
(39) "Lateral" means a sewer service line that connects a residence, commercial establishment, institutional facility, or industrial user to a municipal sewage collection system or individual system.
(40) "Maintenance" means activities or procedures that are established, commonplace, or repetitious, and are performed or should be performed frequently or on a schedule to sustain the functional integrity and efficiency of existing facilities and to provide upkeep for prevention of early decline or failure, or are performed as needed in response to minor emergencies, such as sewer pipe repair or replacement when a pipe bursts, including all of the following types of maintenance:
(a) Preventive maintenance, including scheduled service, repair, inspection, adjustment, or replacement of parts, to keep equipment or facilities in satisfactory operating condition, to avoid frequent breakdowns and premature replacements, and to achieve the expected life of constructed assets and installed building equipment, conducted with a frequency of one year or less.
(b) Corrective maintenance, including unscheduled maintenance repairs to correct deficiencies during the year in which they occur.
(c) Mobile equipment maintenance, including all corrective, preventive, emergency, or replacement maintenance work done on mobile equipment assets, except when performed at the time of purchase of used equipment to bring the purchased equipment to a fully functional or improved condition, or both.
(d) Recurring maintenance, including preventive maintenance activities that recur on a periodic and scheduled cycle of greater than one year, but less than 10 years.
(e) Component renewal, which is preventive maintenance activities that recur on a periodic and scheduled cycle of greater than 10 years, unless performed within the scope of a larger scored project.
(f) Emergency maintenance, typically initiated within a very short amount of time from when a need is identified, to correct an emergency need to prevent injury, loss of property, or human health impacts, or to quickly return an asset to service, subject to all of the following:
1. Unscheduled activities and repairs, such as repairing sanitary sewer breaks or mechanical malfunctions in aged or damaged infrastructure, are considered emergency maintenance under this paragraph.
2. Emergency repairs or replacement needed due to damage caused by severe weather, cyber-attacks, or other unforeseen serious emergency situations over which the municipality has no control are not considered emergency maintenance under this paragraph.
(g) Minor equipment replacement that substitutes or exchanges one existing asset, asset component, or item of installed equipment for another having the same specifications and the same capacity to perform the same function, except when performed within the scope of a larger capital improvement.
(h) Demolition occurring outside of the construction site of a scored project or that is not necessary for construction of a scored project.
(41) "Market interest rate" has the meaning given in s. 281.59 (1) (b), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.59 (1) (b), Stats., "market interest rate" means the effective interest rate on a fixed-rate revenue obligation issued by the state to fund a loan made under this section or, if the DOA determines that there has been a significant change in interest rates after the fixed-rate revenue obligation has been issued or if a fixed-rate revenue obligation has not been issued by the state to fund a loan made under this section, the effective interest rate that the DOA determines would have been paid if a fixed-rate revenue obligation had been issued on the date financial assistance is allotted.

(42) "Median household income" has the meaning given in s. 281.58 (1) (cm), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.58 (1) (cm), Stats., "median household income" means median household income determined by the U.S. bureau of the census as adjusted by the department to reflect changes in household income since the most recent federal census.

(43) "Minor civil division" means the primary governmental divisions of a county, including towns, as designated by the U.S. bureau of the census to collect and publish data.
(44) "Minority business enterprise" or "MBE" means a DBE that is owned or controlled on a daily basis by one or more minority group members.
(45) "Municipal separate storm sewer system" or "MS4" means a conveyance or system of conveyances, including roads with drainage systems, municipal streets, catch basins, curbs, gutters, ditches, constructed channels, or storm drains, that meets all of the following criteria:
(a) Is owned or operated by a municipality.
(b) Is designed or used for collecting or conveying storm water.
(c) Is not a combined sewer conveying both wastewater and storm water.
(d) Is not part of a publicly owned wastewater treatment works that provides secondary or more stringent treatment.
(46) "Municipal WPDES storm water discharge permit" means any permit issued to a municipality by the department under s. 283.33 (3), Stats., for the purpose of controlling storm water discharges from an MS4.
(47) "Municipality" has the meaning given in s. 281.59 (1) (c), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.59 (1) (c), Stats., "municipality" means any city, town, village, county, county utility district, town sanitary district, public inland lake protection and rehabilitation district, metropolitan sewerage district, joint local water authority created under s. 66.0823, Stats., or federally recognized American Indian tribe or band in this state.

(48) "New or changed WPDES permit limits" means an effluent limitation in a municipality's most recent WPDES permit that is a completely new limit previously not included in the WPDES permit or is a change to a previous limit with which the municipality was already complying.
(49) "Nonpoint source" has the meaning given in s. 281.65 (2) (b), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.65 (2) (b), Stats., "nonpoint source" means a land management activity that contributes to runoff, seepage, or percolation which adversely affects or threatens the quality of waters of this state and which is not a point source under s. 283.01 (12), Stats.

(50) "Operations" means labor, materials, and chemicals used regularly, and work activities performed on a recurring basis throughout the year that are intended to meet routine, daily functional needs. Work activities may include any of the following:
(a) Operational maintenance activities related to continuing normal performance of the functions for which a treatment works or BMP asset or item of equipment is intended, including activities to keep building systems such as HVAC, lighting, and electrical utilities working properly.
(b) Custodial maintenance activities, such as housekeeping duties, rodent and pest control, and lawn mowing, associated with general day-to-day care and cleaning necessary to maintain constructed assets.
(c) Trash removal activities to dispose of hazardous and non-hazardous waste and debris and to recycle products such as paper, cans, and bottles.
(d) Snow and ice removal and activities to treat surfaces to eliminate unsafe weather-related conditions.
(e) Office activities related to billing, collections, customer communications, personnel, and other types of work activities that support the administration of the treatment works or BMP.
(f) Routine walk-through and other surveillance activities associated with identifying operational anomalies and ensuring all treatment works or BMP components are working as intended.
(51) "Parallel cost percentage" means, for a scored project, the proportion of costs eligible for below-market rate financing, as delineated in s. NR 162.04 (1), relative to the total costs eligible for CWFP financing.

Note: The calculation of the parallel cost percentage is described in s. NR 162.04 (1) (c).

(52) "Performance standards" means nonagricultural performance standards established by the department in ch. NR 151, under s. 281.16 (2), Stats.
(53) "Place" means a concentration of population either legally bounded as an incorporated place, such as a city or village, or identified as a census designated place by the U.S. bureau of the census.
(54) "Plans and specifications" means project drawings and specification manuals for all construction work to be included in the financial assistance for the scored project.
(55) "Population" means the most recent year's final population estimate published by the DOA demographic services center for the city, town, or village that submitted priority evaluation and ranking information as required by the department. For a municipality other than a city, town, or village, "population" means the most recent population count or estimate done for the municipality and provided to the department by the municipality for purposes such as completing a sanitary survey or an estimate determined by multiplying the number of households served by the sanitary sewer system by the average household size in the area, as determined by the department.
(56) "Priority score" means the numerical value determined by the department that is assigned to each project in accordance with s. NR 162.50.
(57) "Professional services" means non-construction work provided under contract for the project, including engineering, archaeological, legal, financial, or technical services provided by a higher education institution or a formally certified member of a professional body, such as a trade association or organized profession.
(58) "Project" means a set of activities intended to result, or that has resulted, in completed construction of wastewater related or storm water related facilities or practices.
(59) "Project closeout" means the procedures described in s. NR 162.13 (4) for projects funded under subchs. II and III, and in s. NR 162.46 (4) for projects funded under subch. IV.
(60) "Project completion date" means the earliest date on which all of the following apply:
(a) Construction of the scored project is complete.
(b) The department or its agents have certified that the scored project was constructed according to department-approved plans and specifications.
(c) The department or its agents have certified that the facilities are operating according to design.
(d) The project closeout is complete.
(e) The department has notified the recipient that the scored project is complete.
(61) "Proportional share" means the costs of the operation and maintenance of the treatment works or BMP shared equitably and proportionately among the users through a user charge system.
(62) "Receiving municipality" means a municipality that owns a treatment works and accepts discharges from one or more other municipalities into its treatment works for treatment and disposal.
(63) "Recipient" means any municipality or group of municipalities that has been awarded or has received financial assistance under ss. 281.58 and 281.59, Stats.
(64) "Replacement" means obtaining and installing equipment, accessories, or appurtenances that are necessary during the useful life of the treatment works or BMP project funded through the CWFP to maintain or improve the capacity and performance levels for which the treatment works or BMP was designed and constructed.
(65) "Residential user" means a structure or part of a structure, including a mobile home or individual apartment unit, that is used primarily as a home, residence, or sleeping place by one or more persons maintaining a common household and that uses a publicly owned treatment works. "Residential user" does not include an institutional, commercial, industrial, or governmental facility.
(66) "Runoff" has the meaning given in s. NR 151.002 (40).

Note: In s. NR 151.002 (40), "runoff" means storm water or precipitation, including rain, snow, ice melt, or similar water that moves on the land surface via sheet or channelized flow.

(67) "Scored project" means a project for which the department reviewed the scope provided by the applicant and assigned a priority score based on the scope determined by the department to be eligible for financial assistance under a single CWFP project number.
(68) "Septage" has the meaning given in s. 281.58 (1) (cv), Stats.

Note: Under s. 281.58 (1) (cv), Stats., "septage" means the scum, liquid, sludge, or other waste in a septic tank, soil absorption field, holding tank, grease interceptor, privy, or other component of a private onsite wastewater treatment system.

(69) "Sewage collection system" has the meaning given under s. NR 110.03 (28), and includes individual systems, such as septic tanks, holding tanks, mound systems, and cluster systems, if the individual systems meet the criteria established under s. NR 162.03 (2).

Note: Under s. NR 110.03 (28), "sewage collection system" means the common sanitary sewers, interceptor sewers, and appurtenant equipment, such as lift stations, within a sewerage system which are primarily installed to receive wastewaters directly from facilities which convey wastewater from individual structures or from private property, and which include service connection "Y" fittings designed for connection with those facilities. The facilities which convey wastewater from individual structures, such as building sewers and private interceptor sewers, from private property to the public sanitary sewer, or its equivalent, are specifically excluded from the definition of "sewage collection system"; except that pumping units and pressurized lines for individual structures or groups of structures are included as part of a "sewage collection system" when such units are cost effective and are owned and maintained by the sewerage system owner.

(70) "Sewer" means a sewage collection system or an MS4, a portion of a sewage collection system or MS4, or other pipes that carry water to a treatment facility.
(71) "Sewer service area" means that area served by a wastewater treatment works, or an area for which an agreement has been reached for future wastewater service, or an area for which capacity is provided to allow disposal of septic tank or holding tank wastes.
(72) "Storm water" has the meaning given in s. NR 216.002 (33).

Note: Under s. NR 216.002 (33), "storm water" means runoff from precipitation, including rain, snow, ice melt, or similar water that moves on the land surface via sheet or channelized flow.

(73) "Subscribing municipality" means a municipality that discharges or plans to discharge all or part of its wastewater or storm water to another municipality for treatment and disposal.
(74) "Subsidy" means the amount provided by the environmental improvement fund to a recipient of CWFP financial assistance under ss. 281.58 and 281.59, Stats., for any of the following purposes:
(a) To reduce the interest rate of CWFP loans from market interest rate to a lower subsidized rate.
(b) To reduce the interest payments on eligible loans or portions of loans made by the BCPL.
(c) To forgive a portion of the principal of a CWFP loan.
(75) "Substantial completion" means the date on which construction of the scored project is sufficiently complete in accordance with the contract documents so that the owner can occupy or utilize the scored project for its intended use.
(76) "TSS" means total suspended solids.
(77) "Treatment work" has the meaning given in s. 283.01 (18), Stats.

Note: Under s. 283.01 (18), Stats., "treatment work" means any devices and systems used in the storage, treatment, recycling, and reclamation of municipal sewage or industrial waste of a liquid nature or necessary to recycle or reuse water at the most economical cost over the estimated life of the work, including intercepting sewers, outfall sewers, sewage collection systems, cooling towers and ponds, pumping, power and other equipment, and their appurtenances; extensions, improvements, remodeling, additions, and alterations thereof; elements essential to provide a reliable recycled supply such as standby treatment units and clear well facilities; and any works, including site acquisition of the land that will be an integral part of the treatment process or is used for ultimate disposal of residues resulting from such treatment. Additionally, "treatment work" means any other method or system for preventing, abating, reducing, storing, treating, separating, or disposing of municipal waste, including storm water runoff, or industrial waste, including waste in combined storm water and sanitary sewer systems. This definition of "treatment work" includes storm water BMPs for municipalities that are required to obtain a municipal WPDES storm water discharge permit under ch. 283, Stats., and other department-approved projects to reduce wastewater and storm water pollutants entering our waterways. This definition does not apply to nonpoint source projects funded under the department's pilot projects program created under s. 281.58 (6) (b) 9. and (7) (b) 7, Stats.

(78) "Treatment facility" means a structure or group of structures constructed and used for purposes of treating wastewater, including municipal biosolids, to reduce pollutants entering waters of the state.
(79) "Unsewered municipality" means a municipality in which some or all of the residential areas lack a sewage collection system.
(80) "Useful life" means one of the following:
(a) The period during which a treatment works operates, if the treatment work was constructed partially or wholly with U.S. environmental protection agency title II construction grants.
(b) The term of the financial assistance agreement for the project, if the treatment work was originally constructed partially or wholly with CWFP financing or financing other than that identified in par. (a).
(81) "User charge" means a charge levied on users of a treatment work or BMP for the user's proportional share of the cost of operation, maintenance, and replacement of the treatment work or BMP.
(82) "User charge system" means a system of charges meeting requirements established in s. NR 162.07, and s. 281.58 (14) (b) 1 and 7., Stats., for projects funded under subch. II, or a set of minimum control measure programs described in s. NR 216.031 (2) (c) to (e) for projects funded under subch. III.

Note: User charge system requirements for storm water utility districts may include a requirement for a system of charges.

(83) "Wastewater" means a waste stream conveyed to a treatment works via a sewage collection system, including a combined sewer conveying both sanitary wastewater and storm water, or the sewage sludge or other byproducts of wastewater treatment trucked or discharged to another treatment facility, such as a biosolids facility, for additional treatment.
(84) "Women business enterprise" or "WBE" means a DBE that is owned or controlled on a daily basis by a woman or women.
(85) "WPDES permit" means a Wisconsin pollution discharge elimination system permit issued under ch. 283, Stats.

Wis. Admin. Code Department of Natural Resources NR 162.003

CR 03-027: cr. Register November 2003 No. 575, eff. 12-1-03; CR 03-028: am. (27) and (75) Register July 2004 No. 583, eff. 8-1-04; correction in (23) made under s. 13.92(4) (b) 7, Stats., Register April 2013 No. 688.
Amended by, CR 14-043: cr. Register June 2015 No. 714, eff. 7-1-15; correction in (71) made under s. 13.92(4) (b) 7, Stats., correction in (94) made under s. 35.17, Stats., Register June 2015 No. 714, eff.7/1/2015.
Adopted by, CR 22-045: cr. Register October 2023 No. 814, eff. 11/1/2023