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<br />determined by the Commission after public hearings. At a minimum, uses are <br />deemed attainable if they aze can be achieved by the imposition of effluent <br />limits required under the Federal Act for point sources and cost-effective and <br />reasonable best management practices for nonpoint source control, in <br />accordance with duly adopted regulations." <br />Certainly there is no recognized economical method to reduce the concentrations of water- <br />quality parameters in natural spring or ground water ("nonpoint" sources of water) that <br />comprises most of the flow in Arequa Gulch or in storm-water runoff from natural areas of <br />either the granite or the volcanic diatreme that describes the Cripple Creek Mining District. <br />Thus, when and if Arequa Gulch is classified, this quoted provision will prevail. In the <br />meantime, one should meet, with any NPDFS-authorized dischazge, a combination of (1) <br />ambient water quality, (2) Cripple Creek water-quality criteria translated to Arequa Gulch, <br />and (3) Table Value Standazds developed on asite-specific basis. <br />Arequa Gulch has not been classified by the Water Quality Control Commission. The water- <br />quality criteria that should apply to, and protect, Arequa Gulch should be a combination of <br />the criteria applied to Cripple Creek, into which Arequa Gulch flows, and ambient-based <br />water-quality standazds. This protection is afforded through the application of the intake <br />credit provisions of section 25-8-501(3) C.R.S. of the Colorado Water Quality Control Act <br />and subsection 6.9.2(4)(a) of the Water Quality Control Commission's Rules. . <br />With respect to the classification of Arequa Gulch, Segment 21 of the Upper Arkansas Sub- <br />basin of the Arkansas River has been, on occasion, cited as the governing classification. <br />This Segment is described in the Commission's Rules as the "Mainstem of Fourmile Creek, <br />including all tributaries, lakes, and reservoirs, from the confluence with Cripple Creek to the <br />confluence with the Arkansas River, except for the specific listing to Segment 23." This <br />Segment 21 does not apply to Arequa Gulch because the word "tributaries," in the sense of <br />water-quality criteria, is used to designate a stream that flows directly to the named stream <br />without an intervening and independently-classified segment. <br />It is incorrect to extend this classification for Segment 21 for tributaries to Fourmile Creek, a <br />third-order tributary, upstream to a fvst-order stream such as Arequa Gulch because there is <br />an intervening classification of the tributary to Fourmile Creek into which Arequa Gulch <br />flows, namely Cripple Creek. We stress that Arequa Gulch does not flow into Fourmile <br />Creek. Rather it flows into Cripple Creek which then flows into Fourmile Creek. <br />Further, Cripple Creek has a differen classification than Fourmile Creek (Class 2 aquatic life <br />rather than Class 1 and has different water-quality standazds). Cripple Creek is classified in <br />the description of Segment 22 which is tided, in the Commission's Rules, as the "Mainstem <br />of Cripple Creek from the source to the confluence with Fourmile Creek." <br />Given the small and intermittent flow and limited aquatic habitat of Arequa Gulch (the stream <br />is quite narrow and shallow) plus the intervening classified stream, there are no data to <br />7 <br />