Enrolled Bill Summary

House Bill 3023 amends the Water Code to require the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission in setting water quality standards to designate watershed protection zones to clarify when a concentrated animal feeding operation is close enough to a sole-source surface drinking water supply to trigger water quality permitting requirements, including environmental permitting procedures. The bill sets specific distance parameters for relevant surface water bodies and streams, and the requirements are triggered if any part of a feeding operation pen, lot, pond, or other type of control or retention facility or structure is within such a protection zone. A land application area is not considered a control or retention facility.