§ 46-12-2. Administration. (a) It shall be the responsibility of the director of the department of environmental management to administer this chapter. Within the department of environmental management, the director may employ personnel who shall come within the classified service in accordance with the laws of this state for the purposes of this chapter, and may delegate to a subordinate or subordinates any or all the powers and duties vested in the director hereunder. The general assembly shall annually appropriate such sums as it may deem necessary for the expenses of administering this chapter.

(b) The department of environmental management is hereby designated as the state water pollution control agency for this state for all purposes of the Clean Water Act, as amended, 33 U.S.C. § 1251 et seq., and is hereby authorized to take all action necessary or appropriate to secure to this state the benefits of that act.

(c) The department of environmental management is hereby designated to operate the underground injection control program under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 300f et seq., and is hereby authorized to take all action necessary or appropriate to secure to this state the benefits of that program.

(d) The department of environmental management is hereby designated to administer the wellhead protection program as approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency and in accordance with the federal Safe Drinking Water Act, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 300f et seq., and is hereby authorized to take all actions necessary or appropriate to secure to this state the benefits of that program. The department of environmental management shall cooperate and coordinate wellhead protection program activities with the department of health public drinking water supply program.

(e) The department of environmental management is hereby designated to administer the underground storage tank program as approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency pursuant to the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 6901 et seq., and is hereby authorized to take all necessary or appropriate actions to secure to this state the benefits of this program, including participation via cooperative agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the leaking underground storage tank trust fund.

(f) The department of environmental management is hereby designated to establish, administer, and enforce standards for nutrients as necessary to protect, maintain and/or improve the ecological functions of the marine and aquatic resources of the state; and to prepare, adopt, and implement plans as necessary and appropriate to accomplish the purposes of managing nutrient loadings and preventing, abating, and/or eliminating the deleterious effects of nutrients, including, but not limited to, eutrophication, harmful algal blooms, hypoxia, anoxia, oxygen-stress-induced population shifts, and/or fish kills. To implement the purposes of this subsection, the department shall implement measures to achieve an overall goal of reducing nitrogen loadings from waste water treatment facilities by fifty percent (50%) by December 31, 2008, which date, in its implementation, may be adjusted to be consistent with compliance with permit modifications, through waste water treatment facility upgrades scheduled to be undertaken by December 31, 2006, and through proposed permit modifications, which shall be issued by the department on or before July 1, 2004. The department shall report on the implementation of these measures in the report required by § 46-12-3(25).

History of Section. (P.L. 1920, ch. 1914, § 16; G.L. 1923, ch. 125, § 16; G.L. 1938, ch. 634, § 16; G.L. 1956, § 46-12-30; P.L. 1980, ch. 239, § 2; P.L. 1983, ch. 149, § 1; P.L. 1995, ch. 149, § 1; P.L. 2004, ch. 146, § 1; P.L. 2004, ch. 222, § 1.)