The following words and terms, when used in this subchapter, shall have the following meanings, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise.

1. (1) Agronomic rates--The land application of animal wastes or wastewater at rates of application which will enhance soil productivity and provide the crop or forage growth with needed nutrients for optimum health and growth.
2. (2) Air contaminant--Particulate matter, radioactive material, dust, fumes, gas, mist, smoke, vapor, or odor or any combination thereof produced by processes other than natural. Water vapor is not an air contaminant.
3. (3) Animal feeding operation--A lot or facility (other than an aquatic animal production facility) where animals have been, are, or will be stabled or confined and fed or maintained for a total of 45 days or more in any 12-month period, and the animal confinement areas do not sustain crops, vegetation, forage growth, or postharvest residues in the normal growing season. Two or more animal feeding operations under common ownership are a single animal feeding operation if they adjoin each other, or if they use a common area or system for the beneficial use of wastes.
4. (4) Animal unit--A unit of measurement for any animal feeding operation calculated by adding the following numbers: the number of slaughter and feeder cattle and dairy heifers multiplied by 1.0, plus the number of mature dairy cattle multiplied by 1.4, plus the number of swine weighing over 55 pounds multiplied by 0.4, plus the number of weaned swine weighing 55 pounds or less multiplied by 0.1, plus the number of sheep multiplied by 0.1, plus the number of horses/mules multiplied by 2.0.
5. (5) Aquifer--A saturated permeable geologic unit that can transmit, store and yield to a well, the quality and quantities of groundwater sufficient to provide for a beneficial use. An aquifer can be composed of unconsolidated sands and gravels, permeable sedimentary rocks such as sandstones and limestones, and/or heavily fractured volcanic and crystalline rocks. Groundwater within an aquifer can be confined, unconfined or perched.
6. (6) Best management practices ("BMPs")--The schedules of activities, prohibitions of practices, maintenance procedures, and other management and conservation practices to prevent or reduce the pollution of waters in the state. BMPs also include treatment requirements, operating procedures, and practices to control site runoff, spillage or leaks, sludge, land application, or drainage from raw material storage.
7. (7) CAFO general permit--A general permit issued or adopted by the commission in accordance with Chapter 26 of the Texas Water Code for the express purpose to regulate discharges from CAFOs on a statewide or geographic basis.
8. (8) Chronic or catastrophic rainfall event--For the purposes of these rules, these terms shall mean a series of rainfall events which would not provide opportunity for dewatering and which would be equivalent to or greater than the 25-year, 24-hour storm event or any single event which would be equivalent to or greater than the 25-year, 24-hour storm event. Catastrophic conditions could include tornados, hurricanes, or other catastrophic conditions which could cause overflow due to the high winds or mechanical damage.

9. (9) Concentrated animal feeding operation ("CAFO")--Any animal feeding operation which the executive director designates as a significant contributor of pollution or any animal feeding operation defined as follows:

   1. (A) any new and existing operations which stable and confine and feed or maintain for a total of 45 days or more in any 12-month period more than the numbers of animals specified in any of the following categories:

      1. (i) 1,000 slaughter or feeder cattle;
      2. (ii) 700 mature dairy cattle (whether milkers or dry cows);
      3. (iii) 2,500 swine weighing over 55 pounds or 10,000 weaned swine weighing 55 pounds or less;
      4. (iv) 500 horses;
      5. (v) 10,000 sheep;
      6. (vi) 55,000 turkeys;
      7. (vii) 100,000 laying hens or broilers when the facility has unlimited continuous flow watering systems;
      8. (viii) 30,000 laying hens or broilers when facility has a liquid waste handling system;
      9. (ix) 5,000 ducks; or
      10. (x) 1,000 animal units from a combination of slaughter steers and heifers, mature dairy cattle, swine over 55 pounds and sheep.

   2. (B) any new and existing operations covered under this subchapter which discharge pollutants into waters in the state either through a man-made ditch, flushing system, or other similar man-made device, or directly into the waters in the state, and which stable or confine and feed or maintain for a total of 45 days or more in any 12-month period more than the numbers or types of animals in the following categories:

      1. (i) 300 slaughter or feeder cattle;
      2. (ii) 200 mature dairy cattle (whether milkers or dry cows);
      3. (iii) 750 swine weighing over 55 pounds or 3,000 weaned swine weighing 55 pounds or less;
      4. (iv) 150 horses;
      5. (v) 3,000 sheep;
      6. (vi) 16,000 turkeys;
      7. (vii) 30,000 laying hens or broilers when the facility has unlimited continuous flow watering systems;
      8. (viii) 9,000 laying hens or broilers when facility has a liquid waste handling system;
      9. (ix) 1,500 ducks; or
      10. (x) 300 animal units from a combination of slaughter steers and heifers, mature dairy cattle, swine over 55 pounds and sheep.
   3. (C) Poultry facilities that have no discharge to waters in the state normally are not considered a CAFO. However, poultry facilities that use a liquid waste handling system or stockpile litter near watercourses or dispose of litter on land such that stormwater runoff will be transported into surface water or groundwater may be considered a CAFO.
10. (10) Control facility--Any system used for the retention of wastes on the premises until their ultimate use or disposal. This includes the collection and retention of manure, liquid waste, process wastewater, and runoff from the feedlot area.
11. (11) Dairy Outreach Program Areas--The areas include all of the following counties: Erath, Bosque, Hamilton, Comanche, Johnson, Hopkins, Wood and Rains.
12. (12) Edwards Aquifer--That portion of an arcuate belt of porous, waterbearing predominantly carbonate rocks known as the Edwards (Balcones Fault Zone) Aquifer trending from west to east to northeast in Kinney, Uvalde, Medina, Bexar, Comal, Hays, Travis and Williamson Counties; and composed of the Salmon Peak Limestone, McKnight Formation, West Nueces Formation, Devils River Limestone, Person Formation, Kainer Formation, Edwards Group and Georgetown Formation. The permeable aquifer units generally overlie the less-permeable Glen Rose Formation to the south, overlie the less-permeable Comanche Peak and Walnut formations north of the Colorado River, and underlie the less-permeable Del Rio Clay regionally.
13. (13) Edwards Aquifer recharge zone--Generally, that area where the stratigraphic units constituting the Edwards Aquifer crop out, including the outcrops of other geologic formations in proximity to the Edwards Aquifer, where caves, sinkholes, faults, fractures, or other permeable features would create a potential for recharge of surface waters into the Edwards Aquifer. The recharge zone is identified as that area delineated as such on official maps located in the appropriate regional office and groundwater conservation districts.
14. (14) Flushwater waste handling system--A system in which freshwater or wastewater is recycled or used in transporting waste.
15. (15) Groundwater--Subsurface water that occurs below the water table in soils and geologic formations that are saturated, and is other than underflow of a stream or an underground stream.
16. (16) Hydrologic connection--The interflow and exchange between control facilities or surface impoundments and waters in the state through an underground corridor or connection.
17. (17) Lagoon--An earthen structure for the biological treatment for liquid organic wastes. Lagoons can be aerobic, anaerobic, or facultative depending on their design and can be used in series to produce a higher quality effluent.
18. (18) Land application--The removal of wastewater and waste solids from a control facility and distribution to, or incorporation into the soil mantle primarily for beneficial reuse purposes.
19. (19) Liner--Any barrier in the form of a layer, membrane or blanket, naturally existing, constructed or installed to prevent a significant hydrologic connection between liquids contained in retention structures and waters in the state.
20. (20) Natural Resources Conservation Service ("NRCS")--An agency of the United States Department of Agriculture which includes the agency formerly known as the Soil Conservation Service ("SCS").
21. (21) New CAFO--A CAFO which was not authorized under a rule, order, or permit of the commission in effect on August 19, 1998.
22. (22) No discharge--The absence of flow of waste, process generated wastewater, contaminated rainfall runoff or other wastewater from the premises of the animal feeding operation, except for overflows which result from chronic or catastrophic rainfall events.
23. (23) Nuisance--Any discharge of air contaminant(s), including but not limited to odors, of sufficient concentration and duration that are or may tend to be injurious to or which adversely affects human health or welfare, animal life, vegetation, or property, or which interferes with the normal use and enjoyment of animal life, vegetation, or property.
24. (24) Open lot--Pens or similar confinement areas with dirt, concrete, or other paved or hard surfaces wherein animals or poultry are substantially or entirely exposed to the outside environment except for small portions of the total confinement area affording protection by windbreaks or small shed-type shade areas. For the purposes of this subchapter, the term open lot is synonymous with the terms dirt lot, or dry lot, for livestock or poultry, as these terms are commonly used in the agricultural industry.
25. (25) Operator--The owner or one who is responsible for the management of a concentrated animal feeding operation or an animal feeding operation subject to the provisions of this subchapter.
26. (26) Permanent odor sources--Those odor sources which may emit odors 24 hours per day. For the purposes of this subchapter, permanent odor sources include but are not limited to pens, confinement buildings, lagoons, retention facilities, manure stockpile areas and solid separators. For the purposes of this subchapter, permanent odor sources shall not include any feed handling facilities, land application equipment or land application areas.
27. (27) Permittee--Any person issued or covered by an individual permit or order, permit-by-rule or granted authorization under the requirements of this subchapter.
28. (28) Pesticide--A substance or mixture of substances intended to prevent, destroy, repel, or mitigate any pest, or any substance or mixture of substances intended for use as a plant regulator, defoliant, or desiccant.
29. (29) Process wastewater--Any process generated wastewater directly or indirectly used in the operation of a CAFO (such as spillage or overflow from animal or poultry watering systems which comes in contact with waste); washing, cleaning or flushing pens, barns, manure pits, direct contact swimming, washing, or spray cooling of animals; and dust control), and precipitation which comes into contact with any manure or litter, bedding, or any other raw material or intermediate or final material or product used in or resulting from the production of animals or poultry or direct products (e.g., milk, meat or eggs).
30. (30) Process generated wastewater--Any water directly or indirectly used in the operation of a CAFO (such as spillage or overflow from animal or poultry watering systems which comes in contact with waste; washing, cleaning or flushing pens, barns, manure pits, direct contact swimming, washing, or spray cooling of animals; and dust control) which is produced as wastewater.
31. (31) Qualified groundwater scientist--A scientist or engineer who has received a baccalaureate or post-graduate degree in natural sciences or engineering and has sufficient training and experience in groundwater hydrology and related fields as may be demonstrated by state registration, professional certification, or completion of accredited university programs that enable that individual to make sound professional judgements regarding groundwater monitoring, contamination fate and transport, and corrective action.
32. (32) Recharge feature--Those natural or artificial features either on or beneath the ground surface at the site under evaluation which, due to their existence, provide or create a significant pathway between the ground surface and the underlying groundwater within an aquifer. Examples include, but are not limited to: a permeable and porous soil material that directly overlies a weakly cemented or fractured limestone, sandstone, or similar type aquifer; fractured or karstified limestone or similar type formation that crops out on the surface, especially near a water course; or wells.
33. (33) Retention facility or retention structure--All collection ditches, conduits and swales for the collection of runoff and wastewater, and all basins, ponds, pits, tanks and lagoons used to store wastes, wastewaters and manures.
34. (34) 25-Year, 24-Hour rainfall event/25-Year event--The maximum rainfall event with a probable recurrence interval of once in 25 years, with a duration of 24 hours, as defined by the National Weather Service in Technical Paper Number 40, "Rainfall Frequency Atlas of the United States," May 1961, and subsequent amendments, or equivalent regional or state rainfall information developed therefrom.
35. (35) Waste--Manure (feces and urine), litter, bedding, or feedwaste from animal feeding operations.
36. (36) Wastewater--Water containing waste or contaminated by waste contact, including process-generated and contaminated rainfall runoff.
37. (37) Waters in the state--Groundwater, percolating or otherwise, lakes, bays, ponds, impounding reservoirs, springs, rivers, streams, creeks, estuaries, marshes, inlets, canals, the Gulf of Mexico inside the territorial limits of the state, and all other bodies of surface water, natural or artificial, inland or coastal, fresh or salt, navigable or nonnavigable, and including the beds and banks of all watercourses and bodies of surface water, that are wholly or partially inside or bordering the state or inside the jurisdiction of the state.

38. (38) Well--Any artificial excavation into and/or below the surface of the earth whether in use, unused, abandoned, capped or plugged that may be further described as one or more of the following:

    1. (A) Excavation designed to explore for, produce, capture, recharge or recover water, any mineral, compound, gas, or oil from beneath the land surface;
    2. (B) Excavation designed for the purpose of monitoring any of the physical or chemical properties of water, minerals, geology, or geothermal properties that exist or may exist below the land surface;
    3. (C) Excavation designed to inject or place any liquid, solid, gas, vapor, or any combination of liquid, solid, gas or vapor into any soil or geologic formation below the land surface; or
    4. (D) Excavation designed to lower a water or liquid surface below the land surface either temporarily or permanently for any reason.

Source Note:The provisions of this §321.32 adopted to be effective April 1, 1987, 12 TexReg 904; amended to be effective September 18, 1998, 23 TexReg 9354; amended to be effective July 27, 1999, 24 TexReg 5721.