Stormwater is simply water produced from precipitation events such as rain or snowmelt. When it rains, impervious materials such as the concrete used in roads and buildings as well as metal such as those used for roofing prevents soil from directly absorbing excess water from precipitation. Instead, the excess water runs off carrying with it sediments and any number of pollutants.
Because companies understand the dangers posed by stormwater, they implement safety control measures in order to control the quantity and the quality of stormwater in their infrastructure, such as buildings or other construction projects. Those safety control measures are called stormwater best management practices.
Stormwater best management practices are methods used to control stormwater runoff, sediment control, and soil stabilization, as well as management decisions to prevent or reduce water pollution. The Environmental Protection Agency defines best management practices as techniques, measures or structural controls that are used for a given set of conditions to manage the quantity and improve the quality of stormwater runoff in the most cost-effective manner.