Wisconsin Statutes 299.01 – Definitions
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In this chapter, unless the context requires otherwise:
Terms Used In Wisconsin Statutes 299.01
- Corporation: A legal entity owned by the holders of shares of stock that have been issued, and that can own, receive, and transfer property, and carry on business in its own name.
- Land: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments and all rights thereto and interests therein. See Wisconsin Statutes 990.01
- Municipality: includes cities and villages; it may be construed to include towns. See Wisconsin Statutes 990.01
- Partnership: A voluntary contract between two or more persons to pool some or all of their assets into a business, with the agreement that there will be a proportional sharing of profits and losses.
- State: when applied to states of the United States, includes the District of Columbia, the commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the several territories organized by Congress. See Wisconsin Statutes 990.01
- Town: may be construed to include cities, villages, wards or districts. See Wisconsin Statutes 990.01
- Village: means incorporated village. See Wisconsin Statutes 990.01
(3) “Department” means the department of natural resources.
(4) “Environmental pollution” means the contaminating or rendering unclean or impure the air, land or waters of the state, or making the same injurious to public health, harmful for commercial or recreational use, or deleterious to fish, bird, animal or plant life.
(5) “Groundwater” means any of the waters of the state occurring in a saturated subsurface geological formation of rock or soil.
(6) “Hazardous substance” means any substance or combination of substances including any waste of a solid, semisolid, liquid or gaseous form which may cause or significantly contribute to an increase in mortality or an increase in serious irreversible or incapacitating reversible illness or which may pose a substantial present or potential hazard to human health or the environment because of its quantity, concentration or physical, chemical or infectious characteristics. This term includes, but is not limited to, substances which are toxic, corrosive, flammable, irritants, strong sensitizers or explosives as determined by the department.
(7) “Industrial wastes” include liquid or other wastes resulting from any process of industry, manufacture, trade or business or the development of any natural resource.
(8) “Municipality” means any city, town, village, county, county utility district, town sanitary district, public inland lake protection and rehabilitation district or metropolitan sewage district.
(9) “Other wastes” include all other substances, except industrial wastes and sewage, which pollute any of the surface waters of the state. The term also includes unnecessary siltation resulting from operations such as the washing of vegetables or raw food products, gravel washing, stripping of lands for development of subdivisions, highways, quarries and gravel pits, mine drainage, cleaning of vehicles or barges or gross neglect of land erosion.
(10) “Person” means an individual, owner, operator, corporation, limited liability company, partnership, association, municipality, interstate agency, state agency or federal agency.
(11) “Sewage” means the water-carried wastes created in and to be conducted away from residences, industrial establishments and public buildings, as defined in s. 101.01 (12), with such surface water or groundwater as may be present.
(12) “Sewerage system” means all structures, conduits and pipe lines by which sewage is collected and disposed of, except plumbing inside and in connection with buildings served, and service pipes from building to street main.
(13) “Wastewater” means all sewage.