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Rules & Regulations: Definitions

For the purpose of these Rules and Regulations, unless it is plainly evident from the context that a different meaning is intended, certain words and phrases used herein are defined as follows:

"APPROVED RECYCLED WATER USE SITE" refers to an area approved by the Department on which recycled water is applied.

"BOARD" shall mean the policy-making body, consisting of seven members, of the Board of Water Supply.

"MANAGER" shall mean the Manager and Chief Engineer of the Board of Water Supply or his authorized representative.

"BOARD OF LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES" shall mean the policy-making body, consisting of six members, of the State Department of Land and Natural Resources.

"CESSPOOL" refers to an excavation in the ground which receives domestic sewage and/or discharges of a drainage system or part thereof, so designed as to retain the organic matter and solids discharging therein, but permit the liquids to seep through the bottom or sides.

"CHIEF ENGINEER" shall mean the Director and Chief Engineer of the Department of Public Works, City and County of Honolulu.

"CITY" shall mean the City and County of Honolulu.

"CONSERVATION DISTRICT" refers to those lands within the City and County of Honolulu bounded by the Conservation District line as established under the provisions of Act 187, S.L.H. 1961, and Act 205 S.L.H. 1963 and subsequent amendments thereto.

"CONSUMER" shall mean the person, firm, corporation, association, governmental department, or other legal entity whose name appears on the records of the Board of Water Supply as the party responsible and liable for receiving water service.

"CROSS-CONNECTION" shall mean any actual or potential connection or structural arrangement between a public or a consumer's potable water system and any other source or system through which it is possible to introduce into any part of the potable system any used water, industrial fluid, gas or substance other than the intended potable water with which the system is supplied. By-pass arrangements, jumper connections, removable sections, swivel or change-over devices and other temporary or permanent devices, through which or because of which "backflow" can or may occur, are considered to be cross-connections.

"DAILY RECORDS" means information and data collected during a defined and consistently observed 24-hour time period such as 6:00 am to 5:59 am.

"DEPARTMENT" shall mean the governmental unit known as the "Board of Water Supply."

"DESIGNATED GROUNDWATER CONTROL AREA" means an area in which the State's Board of Land and Natural Resources finds that the groundwater must be regulated and protected for its best utilization, conservation, and protection in order to prevent threat of exhaustion, depletion, waste, pollution, or deterioration by salt encroachment or an area in which the Board of Land and Natural Resources finds that the groundwater must be regulated and protected in order to protect the groundwater resources from exhaustion, depletion, waste, pollution, or deterioration by salt encroachment.

"DEVELOPER" shall mean an owner or other person or legal entity with written authorization from the owner who intends to improve or to construct improvements upon his property. The term shall also mean a subdivider.

"DEVELOPMENT" shall mean the improvement of, or construction of improvements on, a lot. The term shall include subdivisions, planned development projects, cluster developments, site development plans and condominium projects.

Planned development projects, cluster developments and site development plans shall be as defined under the Comprehensive Zoning Code (CZC) of the City and County of Honolulu.

"DIRECTOR" shall mean the Director of Land Utilization of the Land Utilization Department, City and County of Honolulu.

"DISPOSAL WELL" refers to any excavation that is drilled, cored, bored, washed, driven, dug, jetted or otherwise constructed into the ground for the diversion, injection, or disposal of wastewaters or other liquid wastes into any underground formation, except for shallow excavations in soil formations used for the disposal of irrigation tail water.

"DOH GUIDELINES" refers to Hawaii Department of Health's Guidelines for the Treatment and Use of Recycled Water.

"DOMESTIC USE" or "DOMESTIC WATER" refers to water meeting the requirements of P.L. 93-523 the "Safe Drinking Water Act" and all amendments thereto.

"HEAD LEVEL" means the groundwater elevation in feet at designated monitoring points in relation to sea level or as calculated by reference to bulkhead pressure measurements.

"INDIVIDUAL HOUSEHOLD AEROBIC TREATMENT UNIT" refers to a watertight receptacle which receives the discharge of domestic sewage, and is constructed so as to retain solids, digest organic matter through a period of detention and aeration, and allows, the aerated effluent to discharge outside the tank into a subsurface disposal field or seepage pit.

"IRRIGATION TAIL WATER" refers to water remaining after irrigation of agricultural lands which the user intends to dispose of.

"MAIN" or "MAIN PIPE" shall mean the supply or distribution pipe to which service laterals are connected.

"NO PASS ZONE" means areas in which the installation of waste disposal facilities, which may contaminate groundwater resources used or expected to be used for domestic water supplies, shall be prohibited.

"NONPOTABLE WATER" shall mean water that does not meet State Department of Health drinking water standards.

"OWNER" imports the plural as well as the singular, and includes both the person, permittee operator, firm, partnership, association, estate, corporation or other legal entity that:

a. Owns the land on which the well is or will be located.
b. Operates the well under a lease, license or other similar form of agreement.

"PERMITTED USE" refers to the use or uses of land as permitted and defined under Regulation No. 4, Department of Land and Natural Resources, State of Hawaii.

"PESTICIDES" refer to toxic chemicals used to control insects, other pests and unwanted vegetation.

"PONDING" means retention of piped recycled water on the surface of ground or man-made surface for a period of 2 hours following the cessation of an approved recycled water use activity.

"PREVIOUS 12-MONTH MONTHLY AVERAGE" means the recorded consumption for billing during the last complete 12-month billing period prior to the declaration of a low water condition by the Board divided by twelve (12). Once the previous 12-month monthly average has been established for each consumer, it shall remain in effect, unchanged, for the duration of the declared low water condition or conditions.

"PRIVATE WATER SYSTEM" shall mean mains, valves, hydrants, pumps, tanks and all appurtenances beyond the master meter which are necessary to provide water and fire protection, and which shall be owned, operated, and maintained by the Association or other legal entity.

"PRIVATE WELL" means any well that is not owned by the Department.

"PROJECT WATER SYSTEM" shall mean the water system, to and within any development, including mains, valves, hydrants, laterals, pumps, tanks, reservoirs and all appurtenances necessary to provide water and fire protection for such development and, where necessary, sources of supply.

"PUBLIC WATER SYSTEM" shall mean the water system owned and operated by the Department.

"RECYCLED WATER" refers to oxidized wastewater that is filtered and disinfected to achieve bacterial concentrations consistent with DOH Guidelines for R-1 Water.

"REFUSE DISPOSAL DUMPS" refer to any specific land site where solid wastes or refuse of any type, except rocks, soil and agricultural leaf trash, are deposited, and where the site is not thereafter managed as a sanitary landfill.

"RESTRICTED WATERSHED" ("RW") shall refer to those areas defined by the State of Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources Regulation No. 4, dated October 2, 1964, and any subsequent legal revisions of said definition; such areas being delineated on maps on file at the Office of the Department of Land and Natural Resources and the Office of the Lieutenant Governor, State of Hawaii.

"SANITARY LANDFILL" refers to a method of disposing of refuse on land by confining the refuse to the smallest practical area, reducing the refuse to the smallest practical volume, and covering the refuse with a layer of earth at the conclusion of each day's operation.

"SEPTIC TANK" refers to a water-tight receptacle which receives the discharge of domestic sewage, designed and constructed so as to retain solids, digest organic matter through a period of detention, and allow the liquids to discharge outside the tank into a subsurface disposal field or one or more seepage pits.

"SERVICE LATERAL" shall mean the main tap, pipes, fittings, valves and appurtenances from the main to, and including, the meter box and consumer's shut-off valve.

"SERVICE LIMIT" shall mean the maximum elevation to which adequate water service is available. The service limit shall be that elevation which is 100 feet below the spillway elevation of the supplying reservoir for the area.

"SEWAGE DISPOSAL SYSTEM" refers to an individual household treatment unit such as a cesspool, septic tank, or individual household aerobic treatment unit, with the effluent discharging into subsurface disposal fields or into one or more seepage pits.

"SEWAGE TREATMENT PLANTS" refer to man-made structures which subject wastewater to treatment by physical, chemical, or biological processes, or to a combination of such processes, for the purpose of removing or altering objectionable constituents, rendering it less offensive or dangerous to humans or other forms of life, and includes the reclamation of such wastewater at a level of quality suitable for reuse in some beneficial way.

"STABILIZATION POND" refers to a pond designed for the treatment of sewage by natural biological processes, with or without the addition of supplemental aeration or chemicals.

"STATE" shall mean the State of Hawaii, except where reference is clearly to another State, Territory, or possession of the United States.

"SUBDIVIDER" shall mean a person, firm, corporation, partnership, association, trust or other entity, or any combination thereof, who is the owner of the land to be subdivided or consolidated, or the duly authorized agent or lessee of the owner.

"SUBDIVISION" shall mean the division of land into two or more lots, parcels, sites, or other divisions of land, including designation of easements, for the purpose, whether immediate or future, of sale, lease, rental, transfer of title to or interest in, any or all of such lots, parcels, sites, easements or other division. The term shall include resubdivision, and, when appropriate to the context, shall relate to the land subdivided.

"TEST BORINGS" refer to holes drilled for geologic-hydrologic exploration and not originally intended as water producing wells.

"USER" means any person, firm, corporation, association or agency receiving recycled water service.

"USER SUPERVISOR" refers to a person who is responsible for the day-to-day management and operations and maintenance of recycled water on the approved use site.

"WASTAGE OF WATER" is defined as causing, or permitting, the water in any well to reach any porous substratum, or to flow from the well upon any land, or directly into any stream, or other natural water course or channel, or into the sea or any bay, lake or pond, or into any street, road, or highway, unless to be used for beneficial purposes; provided, that this section shall not be so construed as to prevent the beneficial use of water by direct flow, or from storage reservoirs served by wells for irrigation, domestic and other useful purposes, except for driving machinery; provided, that water may be used for driving machinery, in case it is utilized afterwards for irrigation or other useful purposes.

"WASTEWATER" refers to water discharged after it has been used insome beneficial way, and which the user intends to dispose of in some manner. This definition excludes irrigation tail water to be disposed of as provided under the definition of "Disposal Well."

"WATER RESOURCES" refer to all waters on or below the ground surface, regardless of quality.

"WATER SERVICE" shall mean the complete installation of pipes, fittings, appurtenances and meter necessary to provide service to a consumer. This term also refers to the delivery of water to consumers.

"WATER SYSTEM FACILITIES CHARGE" shall mean the fee to be paid by developers and consumers as their share of the cost of developing water system facilities.

"WELL" is defined to be, but not limited to, any excavation that is drilled, cored, bored, washed, driven, dug, jetted, or otherwise constructed into the ground for the location, exploration, diversion, or acquisition of any groundwater by natural pressure or artificial means; provided, that if and whenever groundwater is encountered in an excavation, for whatever purposes made, such excavation shall be considered a well and subject to these Rules and Regulations.

[Eff 5/10/76; am, renum and comp BWS Res. No. 427, 1976; am BWS Res. No. 472, 1979; am BWS Res. 475, 1980; am BWS Res. No. 502, 1982; am BWS Res. 528, 1985; am BWS Res. No. 598, 1991; am BWS Res. No. 610, 1992; am BWS Res. No. 722, 2001]

Jump to: TOC | Definitions | Ch. 1 | Ch. 2 | Ch. 3 | Ch. 4 | Ch. 5 | PDF version (2010 with Amendments)