Nonpoint Source

{
  "id": "MLC-T-ENV-018960",
  "term": "Nonpoint Source",
  "field": "Environment",
  "definition": "1. Any source of pollution not associated with a distinct discharge point. Includes sources such as rainwater, runoff from agricultural lands, industrial sites, parking lots, and timber operations, as well as escaping gases from pipes and fittings.\n\n2. Refers to pollution that enters estuaries from many places, such as when rainwater washes over parking lots, lawns, or farms and brings pollutants from all these sources into the estuary.\n\n3. Pollution that is not released through pipes but rather originates from multiple sources over a relatively large area. Nonpoint sources can be divided into source activities related to either land or water use including failing septic tanks, improper animal-keeping practices, forest practices, and urban and rural runoff.\n\n4. Diffuse pollution sources (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). The pollutants are generally carried off the land by stormwater. Common nonpoint sources are agriculture, forestry, urban, mining, construction, dams, channels, land disposal, saltwater intrusion, and city streets.\n\n5. Any source of water pollution that does not meet the legal definition of point source. Nonpoint source pollution generally results from land runoff, precipitation, atmospheric deposition, drainage, seepage, or hydrologic modification.\n\n6. Diffuse pollution source; a source without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet. The pollutants are generally carried off the land by stormwater. Common nonpoint sources are agriculture, forestry, urban areas, mining, construction, dams, channels, land disposal, saltwater intrusion, and city streets.\n\n7. A diffuse pollution source (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). The pollutants are generally carried off the land by storm water. Common non-point sources are agriculture, forestry, urban, mining, construction, dams, channels, land disposal, saltwater intrusion, and city streets.\n\n8. Diffuse pollution sources (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). The pollutants are generally carried off the land by stormwater. Atmospheric deposition and hydromodification are also sources of nonpoint source pollution.\n\n9. Diffuse pollution sources (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). The pollutants are generally carried off the land by storm water. Common nonpoint sources are agriculture, forestry, urban, mining, construction, dams, channels, land disposal, saltwater intrusion, and city streets.\n\n10. Source of pollution that cannot be attributed to a clearly identifiable, specific physical location or a defined discharge channel. Non-point source pollution includes nutrients that run off croplands, feedlots, lawns, parking lots, streets and other land uses. It also includes nutrients that enter waterways via air pollution, groundwater or septic systems.\n\n11. A diffuse pollution source (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). The pollutants are generally carried off the land by storm water. Common non-point sources are agriculture, forestry, urban, mining, construction, dams, channels, land disposal, saltwater intrusion, and city streets. [EPA 2005b]\n\n12. A contributing factor to water pollution that cannot be traced to a specific spot; like agricultural fertilizer runoff, sediment from construction. [SRA 2004]\n\n13. A diffuse source of water pollution that is not collected and discharged through a discrete man-made conveyance. (i.e, any source of pollutants not considered a point source under the CWA.) Atmospheric deposition and hydromodification are also nonpoint sources of pollution.\n\n14. A diffuse source of pollution, having no single point of origin. This term is commonly used to describe water pollution caused by rainfall or snowmelt moving over and through the ground and carrying natural and human-made contaminants into lakes, rivers, streams, wetlands, estuaries, other coastal waters, and ground water. Atmospheric deposition and hydrologic modification are also sources of nonpoint water pollution.\n\n15. Diffuse runoff (i.e., without a single point of origin or not introduced into a receiving stream from a specific outlet). This document uses the term nonpoint source broadly, as EPA has in the past, to refer to sources that currently are treated as nonpoint sources in EPA's implementation of section 319 of the Clean Water Act. Some of these sources may legally be made subject to regulation as point sources under section 402(p) of the Clean Water Act. EPA has designated several categories of these stormwater sources for regulation, such as small municipal separate storm sewer systems, and may designate others for regulation in the future.",
  "subject": "Water",
  "references": [
    "Environmental Issues Terms & Acronyms; Pesticides Glossary",
    "Estuaries Glossary",
    "Sediment Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs) Glossary",
    "Urban Watershed Management Research Terminology",
    "Chesapeake Bay TMDL Glossary",
    "Watershed Planning Glossary of Terms",
    "EPA 2005b",
    "NPDES Permit Writers Glossary; NPDES Permit Writers Manual Glossary",
    "Aquatic Biodiversity Glossary",
    "Chesapeake Bay Glossary",
    "Thesaurus of Terms Used in Microbial Risk Assessment",
    "NSTEPS Online Glossary of Terms; N-STEPS Online Glossary of Terms",
    "Report on the Environment (ROE) Glossary",
    "Federal Land Management in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Glossary"
  ],
  "url": "https://mlchart.com/terminology/environment/nonpoint-source/"
}