Republic Act No. 9275, otherwise known as the Philippine Clean Water Act of 2004, more particularly, Article 2 thereof on Water Pollution Permits and Charges, provides, thus: 

      “Section No. 13 Wastewater Charge System – The Department (sic. Department of Environment and Natural Resources) shall implement a  

      wastewater charge system in all management areas including Laguna Lake Region xxx through the collection of the wastewater charges/fees.”

 Accordingly, the LLDA Board of Directors approved Resolution No. 322 on March 22, 2007 “Approving the Modification of Certain Provisions of the Environmental User Fee System” in the Laguna de Bay Region, which took effect on April 19, 2007. Thus, BR 322 modified certain provisions of BR 106 dated April 25, 1999 “Approving the Policy Guidelines Governing All Industrial Estates/Parks within the Laguna de Bay Region”, thereby necessitating the need to clarify the application of Board Resolution No. 322 to industrial parks, economic zones, and similar areas in the Laguna de Bay Region, to allow a more effective flow of implementation.

 Therefore, in the interest of achieving consistency in environmental governance and in order to guide the operating and enforcing units of the Authority in the implementation of pollution control law and the rules and regulation implementing the Wastewater Charge System in the Laguna de Bay Region, particularly Section 4, No. 3 of LLDA Board Resolution No. 322, Series of 2007, in all industrial parks, economic zones, and other similar areas, the following guidelines are hereby adopted:

I.  Scope and Coverage

These clarificatory guidelines provide for the permitting requirements, monitoring, inspections and assessment protocols for implementing Board Resolution No. 322 in all industrial parks/estates and individual locators with separate wastewater treatment or sewage treatment facilities, within the Laguna de Bay Region.

II.  Definition of Terms

For the purpose of these guidelines, whenever any of the following words, terms or phrases are used herein or in any amendment or supplementary thereto which may be issued hereafter, they shall have the following meaning:

Industrial estate/park refers to a tract of land subdivided and developed according to a comprehensive plan under a unified continuous management and with provisions of basic infrastructure and utilities, with or without pre-built standard factory and community facilities for the use of a community of industries.

Centralized Wastewater Treatment Facility or CWTF refers to a facility designed to treat both domestic and process wastewater generated from individual locator within the Industrial Estate/Park Centralized Sewage Treatment Plant

Central Sewage Treatment Plant or CSTP refers to a facility designed to treat domestic wastewater only, generated from individual locators within the Industrial Estate/Park.

Industrial Wastewater means all the wastewaters from any producing, manufacturing, processing, trade or business or any other operations/activities from industrial establishments.

Domestic wastewater means wastewater discharges from water closets, bath tubs, showers, sinks, wash basins and similar sanitary conveniences in a building.  It is synonymous to “domestic sewage.”

Discharge Permit (DP) is the legal authorization granted by the LLDA to discharge wastewater, specifying the quantity and quality of effluent that are allowed to be discharged to a particular water body, the monitoring requirement and compliance schedule.

Disconnection means the sealing, blocking or severance, whether temporary or permanent of sewer connections of a locator to prevent the discharge of untreated or partially treated wastewater into the environment. 

Inactive locators means locators within an industrial park/estate whose sewer connection has been sealed, blocked or severed, or those locators without valid certificate of interconnection.

III.  Requirements for a Discharge Permit

All new and existing industrial park/estate with CWTF or CSTP within the Laguna de Bay Region which discharge, in any manner, liquid waste into the environment are required to secure Discharge Permit from LLDA, among others, the required clearance/permits, in accordance with Board Resolution No. 322.   Locators within an industrial estate/park with industrial wastewater treated in their own and separate WTF or whose wastewater (not covered by RA 6969) are hauled and treated by DENR accredited hauler/treatment contractor shall still covered by the Discharge Permit requirements.

On the other hand, those individual locators which are interconnected to operational CWTF and those locators with no industrial wastewater discharge interconnected to the CSTP are exempt from securing Discharge Permit from the Authority.   

LLDA shall issue Certificate of Exemption to such DP-exempt locators upon request and submission of a valid certificate of interconnection clearly stating the validity period thereof, from the industrial estate/park, for whatever legal purpose it may serve including but not limited to applications for ISO certifications, and nominations for awards, among others.  All locators exempted from the DP requirement are similarly exempt from the requirement of engaging accredited Pollution Control Officers (PCOs).

IV.  Compliance to Discharge Permit Conditions

Locators under paragraph 2 of Section III hereof are no longer required to comply with the conditions stipulated in existing/valid Discharge Permits issued by the LLDA such as submission of Self-Monitoring Reports (SMRs) and the accreditation of their Pollution Control Officers (PCOs).  However, their PCOs’ attendance to the Continuing Education Programs shall be on a voluntary basis.

V.  Compliance Monitoring of Industrial Estate/Park and Locators

For purposes of Board Resolution No. 322, both CWTFs or CSTPs of industrial parks/estates, and individual locators with industrial wastewater shall be covered by LLDA’s monitoring and inspection requirements.  Interconnected locators will not be covered by LLDA’s compliance monitoring, unless the administrator/owner of the industrial park/estate reports to the LLDA in writing the disconnection of the locator from the CWTF/CSTP.  Upon receipt of such report and upon notice, inactive or disconnected individual locators shall automatically be covered by the LLDA monitoring and inspection protocols.

VI.  Frequency of Monitoring  

Monitoring and inspections by the LLDA on CWTF shall be on a monthly basis during the first year of implementation, to commence in the third quarter of 2008.  The LLDA will continuously assess the environmental compliance of all covered industrial parks/ estates as defined above, and as warranted may reduce the frequency of monitoring and inspections.

Industrial park/estate with CSTP and those locators with industrial wastewater not interconnected to the centralized CWTF shall be subjected to quarterly or semi-annual monitoring/inspection depending on daily volumetric rate of discharge.

VII.  Application of Effluent Standards

In general, all industrial parks/estates shall comply with the standards for Inland waters Class “C” under DAO 35 and NPCC Effluent Regulations of 1982, or the revised effluent standards which may be subsequently issued by the DENR pursuant to the Philippine Clean Water Act. For monitoring and self-regulatory purposes, industrial parks/estates may set their on internal effluent standards provided they have a CWTF.

VIII.  Additional Requirements for Industrial Estate/Parks

The industrial estate/parks are required to submit in writing list of locators and list of locators interconnected to their system within thirty (30) days upon approval of this circular. Any addition to the list shall be reported during submission of SMRs. However, in the event of disconnection of its locators, the park/estate administrator shall immediately inform the LLDA of such disconnection without waiting for submission of their SMRs. 

IX.  Repealing Clause

All circulars, orders, rules and regulations, memoranda and other issuances inconsistent with or contrary to the provisions of this circular are hereby repealed, amended or modified accordingly.

X.  Effectivity

This Memorandum Circular shall take effect immediately.

Approved on April 3, 2008.