(1) Upon receipt of notification by the department that the draft instrument is complete, the sponsor must provide an electronic and a hard copy of the complete draft instrument to each member of the IRT.

(2) The IRT will have thirty days to comment on the draft instrument to the department. The thirty-day comment period begins five days after the department receives its copy of the complete draft instrument as described in subsection (1) of this section.

(3) Following the comment period, the department will discuss any comments with the appropriate agencies and the sponsor. The department will:

(a) Notify the sponsor of the recommendations and comments received from the IRT;

(b) Identify any additional information that the sponsor must submit; and

(c) Identify additional terms and conditions required as part of the certification.

(4) If the department requests additional information, the certification process shall stop until the requested information is received.

(5) Within ninety days of receipt of the complete draft instrument by the IRT members, the department must notify the sponsor of the status of the review. Specifically, the department must indicate to the sponsor if the draft instrument is generally acceptable and what changes, if any, are needed.

(6) The department will seek to resolve concerns using a consensus-based approach, to the extent practicable.

(7) If there are significant unresolved concerns that may lead to a formal objection from one or more IRT members to the final instrument, the department will notify the sponsor of the nature of those concerns.