On March 19, 2015, President Obama signed Executive Order (E.O.) 13693 - Planning for Federal Sustainability in the Next Decade. The primary goal of this order is to maintain federal leadership in sustainability and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, E.O. 13693 may have implications for stormwater management design in federally funded projects.

Specifically, this new order is relevant to stormwater management requirements as it revokes E.O. 13514 that formally required the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to prepare guidance on Section 438 of the Energy Independence Security Act (EISA) of 2007. This section of the EISA directs federal agencies to implement and achieve pre-development hydrology to the maximum extent practical. Thus in December 2009, EPA published the Technical Guidance on Implementing the Stormwater Runoff Requirements for Federal Projects under Section 438 of the Energy Independence Security Act (EISA). As outlined in this guidance, federally-funded projects must meet this stormwater retention-based approach which requires on-site infiltration, evaporation/transpiration, or re-use of the runoff volume generated by the 95th percentile storm (i.e., 1.7 inches of rain in the Washington, D.C. area).

Though E.O. 13514 was revoked as part of this new order, the EISA and its associated Technical Guidance were not revoked. Text within the new E.O. implies no significant changes as there is no mention of stormwater beyond “installing appropriate green infrastructure features on federally owned property to help with stormwater and wastewater management (Section 3.f.iv)”. WSSI expects the retention-based requirements will remain in place, but we will review the details when the guidance for the new E.O. is issued (anticipated by fall 2015).

Contact Frank Graziano, Mike Rolband, or Kelly Petrey at WSSI for more information.