Illinois Food Cleanroom HVAC · October 8, 2026
Elk Grove Village: the HEPA scan is yours, the odor rule is theirs
You package food in the Elk Grove Village industrial park and someone told you section 7-3-4 makes you file a 99.97 percent HEPA certificate for $100 a year. That section is the penalty clause in chapter 3, Special Sewer Regulations. It does not mention filters. We opened the village code index on October 8, 2026.
What the village does publish, in zoning section 7-4, is a special-use path for food processing in the general industrial district and a condition that premises be kept clean, with waste removed daily and sprays or disinfectants used so you do not breed flies or an offensive odor. The village has also adopted the 2024 International Mechanical Code. Food-processing exhaust under that code family is a Type II system kept independent of other exhaust.
A gel-seal bypass still matters. It matters because unfiltered air can reach an aseptic or high-care pack, not because the village clerk collects a photometer tape. Unincorporated Cook County next door does not use Elk Grove’s special-use table. That is the local fact. The 99.97 percent figure is the usual definition of HEPA media. It is not a sentence in section 7-3-4.
- Do not pay a “village HEPA filing fee.” We found no such fee. Section 7-3-4 is a sewer penalty.
- Food processing in the I-2 district is a special use, with a written odor and sanitation condition.
- The sewer temperature that does apply inside the village is the MWRD 150°F limit at the point of entrance, which is a different number from Elgin’s plant ceiling.
| Who | Document | What they do not sign |
|---|---|---|
| Village, special-use process | Zoning section 7-4 | A HEPA efficiency affidavit |
| MWRD, if you are a significant industrial user | Sewage and Waste Control Ordinance, discharge authorization | A photometer report |
| Your quality lead | Your own integrity-test SOP | A $100 village filing we could not find |
What the rule says here
Start at the village code chapter list for special sewers. You will see 7-3-1 overhead plumbing, 7-3-2 separate sewers, 7-3-3 conflicts, and 7-3-4 penalty. Stop there if you came for filters. Then open section 7-5-3. The village adopts the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District Sewage and Waste Control Ordinance for the industrial pretreatment area, and where the district ordinance and the local ordinance conflict, the stricter one wins.
MWRD’s published local limits, which we read on the district site, include this line: temperatures of liquids or vapors at the point of entrance to the sewerage system shall not exceed 150°F. That is the washdown and coil-pan limit for an Elk Grove plant on the MWRD system. It is measured at the entrance, not at a treatment-plant basin. The pretreatment page is the short table. The ordinance PDF is the full text.
Zoning is the other local page. Section 7-4 puts food processing on the special-use line in the industrial table and repeats the clean-premises and offensive-odor condition. The codes-and-standards page says the village adopted the 2024 IMC, with local amendments. We did not find an amendment that sets a HEPA efficiency. Your photometer scan still belongs in the quality file, because a bypass at the gel seal is how dirty air skips the media. The village will not grade that scan.
If you skip it
Skip the housing test and a batch can see aisle air through a seal gap while the media itself still looks fine on a face average. That is a product loss. It is not, on the documents we read, a village environmental-health fine for “failure to file HEPA.” If you want a fine the code actually names, look at sewer penalties and nuisance enforcement, not a filter certificate.
Skip the odor condition and you have a zoning problem when the exhaust from a cook or a fry line smells at the lot line. That is closer to section 7-4 than to any cleanroom standard. Do not let the two findings get written on the same corrective action as if they were one rule.
How the next place differs
| Place | Filter filing | Temperature rule we could cite |
|---|---|---|
| Elk Grove Village | None found in 7-3-4 | MWRD 150°F at the sewer entrance |
| Unincorporated Cook nearby | No Elk Grove special-use table | Often still MWRD if the sewer is the district’s |
| Elgin | No HEPA ordinance either | FRWRD 104°F at the treatment plant |
Checklist for this job
Pull the last photometer scan of the gel seal and the knife edge. If you only scanned the center of the media, you did not look for bypass.
Throw out any quote that cites section 7-3-4 as a filter rule. Open the section and read the title.
If food processing is new or expanding, confirm whether you are in a special-use case under section 7-4.
Measure washdown and coil condensate against 150°F at the sewer entrance if you discharge to MWRD.
Keep Type II food-process exhaust independent of the toilet and the process-heater flue.
If the argument in the room is about 104°F, you are on the Elgin note, not this one.
Fee or timeline in the document
We found no annual certification filing fee of $100, and we will not print one. Section 7-3-4 is a penalty section for the sewer chapter. If a permit fee applies to your special use or your industrial discharge authorization, it will be on the village fee schedule or the MWRD ordinance, and you should read that line yourself. This page is silent where those schedules were not the document in front of us.
The integrity test you buy from a balancer is a private scope. See the rule page for how this desk describes that scope. It is not a village invoice.
Questions people type
Not in section 7-3-4, and not in the industrial zoning sections we read. You should still leak-test housings if the pack room depends on them. That test is your quality system. The village’s written interests are odor, sanitation, the mechanical code it adopted, and the MWRD discharge rules it incorporated.
Challenge the upstream side and scan the downstream frame, the gel seal, and the knife edge with a photometer. A hit at the seal is bypass. A hit in the middle of the pack is a hole in the media. Average face velocity will not show either one. Elk Grove does not prescribe the instrument.
On the code library index it is the penalty section under Special Sewer Regulations, sitting after overhead plumbing, separate sewers, and conflicting provisions. It is not a filtration efficiency. If your copy says otherwise, you are not looking at the Elk Grove Village code we opened.
No. That is the common definition of HEPA media. Putting it in a village ordinance citation is how a false filing fee gets born. Use it as a specification on the filter you buy. Do not attribute it to the village clerk.
Related
References
- Village of Elk Grove Village. “Chapter 3: Special Sewer Regulations,” including section 7-3-4 Penalty. Accessed October 8, 2026. codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/elkgrovevillageil/
- Village of Elk Grove Village. “Section 7-5-3 Preliminary treatment,” adopting the MWRD ordinance where stricter. Accessed October 8, 2026. codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/elkgrovevillageil/
- Village of Elk Grove Village. “Section 7-4 Industrial districts.” Accessed October 8, 2026. codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/elkgrovevillageil/
- Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. Pretreatment local limits, temperature 150°F. Accessed October 8, 2026. mwrd.org/doing-business/pretreatment-and-cost-re
How to cite this page
Illinois Food Cleanroom HVAC. (2026). Elk Grove Village: the HEPA scan is yours, the odor rule is theirs. https://illinoisfoodcleanr.xyz/elk-grove-village-food-packaging-hepa-bypass
Byline: Illinois Food Cleanroom HVAC.