A TMDL Alternative Approach is a near-term water quality restoration plan that achieves water quality standards more quickly than a TMDL Report.
Kentucky communities taking the initiative to develop and implement water quality restoration plans to clean up their impaired waters may defer or even bypass the need for a TMDL. TMDL alternative approaches are developed and carried out by the local community, which allows for flexibility in the water quality restoration process.
Two types of TMDL Alternative Approaches are TMDL Alternative plans and Category 4b plans.
TMDL Alternative Plans
A TMDL Alternative plan is a near-term water quality restoration plan with a schedule of actions and milestones that are more immediately beneficial or practicable to achieving water quality standards than a TMDL.
TMDL alternative plans are accepted by the EPA. The impaired waters in a TMDL alternative plan will remain in category 5 on the 303(d) list, but will be assigned a lower priority for TMDL development. If water quality standards are not achieved, a TMDL is still required.
To learn more about TMDL alternative plans, read the Clean Water Act Section 303(d) Program Vision, a new collaborative framework developed in 2011 by the Environmental Protection Agency and state TMDL program managers.
The EPA-accepted TMDL Alternative plans for Kentucky may be downloaded from the table below.