TRANSCRIPT
REGIONAL PUBLIC MEETINGS ON THE
RESOURCE CONSERVATION AND RECOVERY ACT of 1976
February 28 and March 1, 1977,'Pittsburgh, Pa,
These meetings were sponsored by EPA Region III,
and the proceedings (SW-13p) are reproduced entirely as transcribed
by the official reporter, with handwritten corrections
by the Office of Solid Waste
U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
1977
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An environmental protection publication (SW-13p) in the solid waste management series.
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
In the Hatter Of:
Public Participation Meeting,
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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""" Transcript of Proceedings in the above-entitled
f*^ matter, held on Monday, February 28, 1977, commencing
r» at 7:00 o'clock p.m. in the Monongahela Room, William
, Penn Hotel, Pittsburgh, Pensylvania.
BEFORE:
Gordon Rapier, Director, Air and Hazardous
Materials Division, EPA, Region III
Moderator
11 SPEAKERS:
Thomas Williams, Chief, Technical Information and :
Communications Branch, Office of ;
Solid Waste Management, EPA '.
Truett DeGeare, Chief, Land Protection Branch, j
Systems Management Division, Office)
of Solid Waste Management, EPA
Alfred Lindsey, chief, Implementation Branch,
Hazardous Waste Management Divisior
office of Solid Waste Management,
Robert Lowe, Chief, Technical Assistance Branch,
Resource Recovery Division, Office
of Solid Waste Management, EPA
William Bucciarelli, Director, Pennsylvania State
Solid Waste Proaram
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PROCEEDINGS
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MR. RAPIER: Ladies and gentlemen,
good evening. I hope that everybody here has registered.
The young ladies out there have three by five cards for
any people who would like to make statements at the end
of our presentation.
What we propose to do tonight is to have a
number of prepared presentations for you, each followed
by a question and answer period. At the end of our
presentations and the Q and A period, we will have a
general discussion and for any people that would like to
make statements, prepared or extemporaneous, you may do
so .
We would ask you, however, to limit the
statements to about five minutes.
My name is Gordon Rapier, 1 am the Director
of the Air and Hazardous Materials Division of the
Environmental Protection Agency, Region III in
Philadelphia. With me are members of our regional staff,
whom I will introduce shortly, and also representatives
of the Office of Solid Waste in Washington, D.C. These
members from the Office of Solid Waste will be making
individual presentations, so that I will introduce them
as they make their presentations.
I also have with me tonight
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Mr. William Bucciarelli, the Director of the Pennsylvania
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Solid Waste Program. He will give a few prepared and
unprepared remarks in a few moments also.
The purpose of the meeting is to explain the
provisions of the new Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act, which was signed into law October, 1976. There are
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copies available and if you ask for one, you should have
a copy of that Act and other hand-out materials.
The new law might more appropriately be called
the Solid Waste Disposal Act since it deals with all
aspects of solid waste management, including land disposal
of solid and liquid wastes and the management of
hazardous or chemical wastes.
The Act includes provision for maximum public
participation in writing the guidelines, regulations
and standards, so we are here to receive your comments
and answer questions about the various aspects of the Act.
In passing this new Act, Congress intended that
the full range of disposal methods for unwanted materials
be regulated. In prior years, we have had laws
regulating disposal into air, water and the oceans, and
now this bill will regulate land disposal for the first
time at the federal level. The law encourages states to
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take over the administration of the program. Your views
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Following are a few of the crucial areas of
on this should be conveyed to your state officials.
a
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implementation where we feel that your views and
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guidance are most critical:
Number 1 precisely how should "hazardous
wastes" be defined? Since much of the damage from
hazardous wastes occurs before they reach treatment,
storage and land fill disposal facilities, and since the
Act focuses only on upgrading land disposal facilities
to take care of those wastes which fall outside the
"hazardous waste" definition, it is clear that how
hazardous wastes are defined is a critical element in
implementing the Act.
Number 2 in which ways, if any, would the
definition of hazardous waste have a bearing on the
states' willingness to take over responsibiiity for the
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program, which under the Act, is not mandatory but of
course highly desirable?
Number 3 what would be the best ways to
ensure that hazardous wastes are defined to the fullest
extent possible on standardized objective criteria and
associated tests, and at the same time not put too great
a burden on many potential hazardous waste generators
who are small businesses?
Number 4 wastes are mixtures of many different
materials. To what extent can criteria and tests be
applied to wastes and to what extent to suspected
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1 hazardous components?
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Number 5 the RCRA requires a definition of a
sanitary land fill and of the obverse, an open dump, to
apply/ we feel, to both municipal and industrial wastes
and possibly others from agriculture or mining. Should
pits, ponds and lagoons used for disposal of industrial
wastes be defined as open dumps?
Number 6 what kind of process should EPA
establish to determine which guidelines should be written
or updated?
Number 7 with regard to £tate and local
planning, what process should be employed to enable
governors and local government heads to decide who does
the planning and implementation for which aspects of
solid waste management, and which percentage of planning
funds each should receive?
Number 8 how should the waste disposal
inventory be carried out? Who should do it? How
decentralized should it be? How can we survey facilities
on industrial property?
Number 9 what is the degree of need for
full-scale demonstration projects for resource recovery?
Number 10 the Resource Conservation Panels or
technical assistance panels are important to the success
of the Act. How comprehensive should they be? How much
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should they focus on research conservation and recovery
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in relation to a focus on hazardous wastes and land
disposal of all wastes? What should be the proper
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composition of such panels to ensure appropriate
representation from ^tate, regional and local levels of
government?
Number 11 the Act mandates several special
studies and directs that a broad range of supportive
research and development activities be carried out.
Can new research and development be performed in time to
influence the formulation of mandated guidelines and
regulations? Which activities should be considered
essential in the development of solid waste management
alternatives,and;thereforejconsidered high priority for
research?
Number 12 unlike the Federal Water Pollution
Quality Act and the Clean Air Act, this Act does not
mandate quantifiable objectives, but rather gives broad
guidance as to the law's intent. Open dumps are to be
closed, and hazardous wastes are to be regulated within
certain time frames, but no measures of environmental
or public health improvements are suggested. Should we,
however, try to assign meaningful, quantifiable objectives
to the solid waste management area? If so, what kind
of monitoring and feedback system should be provided to
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evaluate results?
Number 13 the Act mandates a high degree of
public participation in development and implementation of
the regulations, guidelines, permits and information
required by the law. How can we best obtain public
participation in a timely and meaningful way? What
avenues should EPA explore to ensure really widespread
and effective public participation?
Now we have with us a court reporter tonight,
who is here to prepare a transcript of the meeting. So
for all of your questions and any statements that you
might make, we would like for you to identify yourself
and if you are representing an organization, please also
mention that organization.
If you have a written statement, you may
submit it to the record or, as t said before, you may
present a brief oral summary.
Before I get to the first speaker of the night
let me introduce to you our regional staff. We have
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with us Miss jflene Glen, who is the Assistant to the
Regional Administrator, and she was very instrumental in
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helping us set up this program, ^lene, raise your hand,
would you?
Mrs. Alma Mullane and Mrs. Jean Jonas in
the back of the room, who are working on our desk tonight
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Bill Schremp, from our solid waste staff. Bob Allen,
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Chairman of the Air and Hazardous Materials Branch.
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And Mr. Thomas Fielding, who should be out there somewhere
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is in our enforcement division.
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Let me now introduce to you
Mr. William Bucciarelli for a few words.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: Thanks, Gordon.
A lot of you have heard this story before,
but I am going to give it again, so bear with me. I have
a very short period of time in order to give you what
has taken over ten years to develop. I don't know
whether I can cover everything that is done, or even
fairly represent the tremendous amount of activity and
interest that has been generated in the State of
Pennsylvania over the past 10 or 11 years.
But we did have our inception as far as an
expanded waste program is concerned, when we passed, or
when the legislature passed the Act 241, Pennsylvania
Solid Waste Management Act. This essentially gave us
planning and regulatory responsibilities, both at the
state and local level.
Over $3 million was spent in the development --
this is on a 50-50 matching basis, now -- in other words
we put out better than a million and a half, and this is
matched by local communities. So over $3 million was
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1 spent to develop the 67 county plan, and there are also
2 three regional plans in the process of being developed.
There have been great improvements, technically
and 'from a management point of view, especially when you
are talking in terms of institutionalizing, of creating
ayencies that will take control or command, or at least
be interested in planning solid waste management
activities for a number of years.
Back in 1966 when we started we only had one
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county that had a management agency at the county level.
We now have almost 30 management agencies thoughout the
Commonwealth.
We have, as far as the s.tate is concerned,
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since we passed Act 241, we have issued over 550 permits.
We have closed over 400 open dumps, and this is
community dumps, not the indiscriminate roadside dumps
that you are well aware of, and we have processed over
1700 applications and reviews, and some of them are
reapplicationa and so on.
That sounds very easy, just rolling it off the
tip of my tongue. But this represents a tremendous
amount of time and effort on the part of many different
types of personnel and people at the state and local
level.
The Department also was slightly interested in
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resource recovery. Back in 1964 the legislature passed
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Act 198, the Resource Recovery Act, Pennsylvania Resource
Recovery Act, which in effect was a $20 million revolving
low interest loan program. The unfortunate thing about
that is the $20 million portion was never funded. So we
still are hoping that some time that does get funded.
But in addition to that, still trying to
promote ,resource recovery, there is at least $260,000
that was spent, this is on a matching basis again, to
develop 13 market studies across the Commonwealth. These
are not in—depth studies that you might want to think of
in terms of when you are thinking of terms of specific
facilities, but they do give some indication as to the
general market areas that could be further explored.
In addition to that, an amendment to Act 198
gave us $4 million in demonstration grants, $2.5 million
was awarded here some time ago the first go-around,
about a year ago to four projects. And we got an
additional $1.5 million, and currently we are evaluating
applicants for distribution of those funds.
Now this represents, again, and I reiterate
this, this represents a tremendous effort on a state,
local and private enterprise and citizens, and everybody
in the Commonwealth. And this is not the only interest,
after all, the reason you are here tonight is because of
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the federal interest. And the federal interest is
because of many other interests that come from all
corners of the nation, and even within Pennsylvania itself
when you look at the state level, we have the Governor's
Solid Waste Advisory Committee; we have the Citizen's
Advisory Council.
Now the Governor's Solid Waste Advisory
Committee has worked with this program since 1968, when
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it was first formed. The Citizen's Advisory Council
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has been in and out of the solid waste program, and has
made certain recommendations to the solid waste agencies.
The Governor's Energy Council, although it's
involved in energy in general, and conservation, is also
getting involved in certain matters in solid waste.
We have the Governor's Science Advisory
Council, who has just completed, through its waste
utilization panel, a study and is making certain
recommendations to the solid waste program.
The joint legislative and Air, Water and
Pollution Control and Conservation Committee has been
interested, and we have developed liaison with those
people. And they are wanting certain things done, or
at least the way they see it in the solid waste picture.
The House Conservation Committee held a
meeting with DER, this is kind of a public meeting, wanting
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to know how DER is carrying out the solid waste
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program, especially in the enforcement area. But they
are also quite interested in the Resource Recovery
Development Act.
The Senate Committee that was set up to
investigate the solid waste industry, they were not only
interested in how the program is being carried out, but
is Pennsylvania getting its fair share of whatever it
is entitled to from s_tate and federal sources?
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And we have 94-580, as Gordon pointed out,
this is the federal act. And he has also rightly
pointed out that there is a tremendous amount of
developmental work that needs to be done before this
Act can be properly implemented.
They are seeking a lot of input, this is one
of a series of meetings in which they are trying to seek
that input. I imagine they will have hearings later on,
but also other agencies at the national level of which
we are a member, such as the National Governors'
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Conference, the Admii'iis Lid Lien of State and Territorial
Solid Waste Management Officials, and the National Solid
Wastes Management Association are all interested.
As a matter of fact, the National Governors'
Conference and the Association I just mentioned, are
cooperating in a series of meetings that we have set up
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with their task force. They have five task forces that
they set up; one is a solid waste management planning
area, planning task force. Another is a land fill
technology task force, there is another on resource
5 ' recovery, one on hazardous wastes, and one on funding.
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There are lead states in each one of these
task forces. Pennsylvania happens to be the one in the
land fill technology development. And we have one of
the members of our staff, in fact our director,
Donald Lazarchik, is involved in the hazardous waste
committee. Wesley Gilbertson is the -- represents
Pennsylvania as the lead ^state in the land fill technology
committee. And I am a member of the solid waste
management planning task force.
The whole idea here is obviously to provide
assistance and input to the EPA in order to assist them
in coining up with the guidelines and all the other things
that they need to do in order to implement the act. And
this total effort, it seems to me, represents a mandate
on the part of the people, because when you look at all
these agencies and look at what they represent, in effect
the people and the interest groups and the local
government and jstate government are all represented, and
they are all saying, "We need to do something in solid
waste. We need to do more in solid waste." And this
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is essentially what we are doing here tonight.
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MR. RAPIER: Thank you. Bill.
The next presentation will be by
Mr. Tom Williams, who is the Chief of the Technical
Information and Communications Branch, Office of Solid
Waste Management in Washington. And Tom is going to talk
about public participation, public information and
training.
MR. WILLIAMS: These slides were
made while I was off work, so if there is any conflict
between what I say and what the slides say, I win.
I am a believer in the obverse of the Chinese
proverb, one word is worth a thousand pictures.
The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of
1976 contains an unusually complete array of provisions
which could bring about a high degree of public
understanding and participation. I say, "could bring
about" because while this provision has appeared in many
other pieces of legislation during the past several years,
it has not, very often, brought about very much real
public participation. There are all kinds of ways of
aborting that, and the government knows all of the ways.
But these provisions, taken together, make it
clear that the Congress understood it is impossible for
the public to participate meaningfully unless the
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government first produces valid scientific and technical
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data, and then processes and publishes the information
in such a way that everyone can have real access to it.
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And it's not entirely my fault, but in part
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I will take credit for some of the fault, that the solid
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waste management of the Environmental Protection Agency
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has traditionally done a much better job of that than
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many other federal components have, that is of letting th
public and everyone know what they have done, what they
think, what they have researched and what they have
deduced.
Only in this way can the public have a
reasonable chance of influencing the social, economic
and political changes which this law is intended to
bring out.
In section 8003, the Administrator of EPA
is required to develop, collect and coordinate informatio
on nine key elements which are crucial to the act's
purposes. He is not only to implement a program for
the rapid dissemination of this information, but he is
also to develop and implement educational programs to
promote citizen understanding.
This makes it quite clear that someone in
the Congress understood that information is not to be
developed for the exclusive use of those who, for one
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reason or another, may be considered experts in the
field.
In Earth Day, 1970, I think the American
public indicated that it had had quite enough of experts
telling them how the world ought to be running and what
we ought to do about the environment. Moreover, the
Administrator is asked to coordinate his actions and to
cooperate to the maximum extent possible with jtate and
local authorities, particularly with state authorities,
and to establish and maintain a central reference library
for virtually all the kinds of information involved in
solid waste management, for the use of jstate and local
governments, industry and the public.
To ensure that the public participation
process does not become lopsided we felt it would be
necessary to identify major categories of interest
groups who represent the public at large. Under the
act we regard these to include consumer, environmental
and neighborhood groups, trade manufacturing and labor
representatives, public health, scientific and
professional societies, and governmental and university
associations. This spectrum of categories of
representative groups will be altered and supplemented
as necessary, if in the course of implementing the _act
it appears necessary to do so.
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1 It is our intention to ensure that no matter
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possible, representatives of all of the types of interest
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participate and to let their views be known before a
regulation is published, before a guideline is published,
or before any serious effort is made to implement any
mandatory provisions of the act.
Section 7004 (a) of the a_ct states that any
person may petition the Administrator for the promulgatior
amendment or repeal of any regulations under this act.
And section 7004(b) has to do with public
participation. The act says that public participation
in the development, revision and enforcement of any
regulation, guideline, information or program shall be
provided for, encouraged and assisted by the Administrator
and the states.
And further, that the Administrator, in
cooperation with the states, shall develop and publish
minimum guidelines for public participation in such
processes
Section 7002(a) states that any person may
commence a civil action on his own behalf against any
other person, including the United States, who is alleged
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to be in violation of this act, or against the
Administrator if there is alleged a failure by him to
perform any act or duty under the act.
The techniques which can be used to involve
the public in governmental actions fall into three major
categories. The first is to ensure that appropriate
public meetings, hearings, conferences, workshops and
so forth are held throughout the country, and more
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importantly that they are planned and conducted in
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accordance with the unfolding of the Act's key provisions
The second technique is the use of advisory
committees and review groups which may meet periodically,
but which may also be called upon to review and comment
upon major programs, regulations and plans, no matter
when these occur, and no matter whether a specific
meeting is convened or not.
And the third is the development of
educational programs so that the public has an opportunit
to become aware of the significance of the technical
data base and the issues which emerge from it. Effective
public education programs depend on the use of all
appropriate communications tools, techniques and media.
These include publications, slides, films,
exhibits and other graphics, media programs, including
public service television and radio announcements, and
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releases, of course, to the daily and professional press.
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And public education projects carried out by civic and
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1 service organizations with EPA technical and financial
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Without those three things, advisory groups
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'of all varieties, you don't really have effective public
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assistance.
and committees, public education programs and meetings
participation. All you need do is do only two of them
or one of them, and you have aborted the process.
Section 7007(a) and (b) authorize the
Administrator of EPA to make grants and offer contracts
with any eligible organization for training persons for
occupations involving the management, supervision, design,
operation or maintenance of solid waste disposal and
resource recovery equipment and facilities, or to train
instructors. "Eligible organizations" means a state or
any state agency, a municipality or educational
institution capable of effectively carrying out a training
program.
Section 7007(c) says that the Administrator
shall make a complete investigation and study to
determine the need for additional trained state and local
personnel to carry out plans assisted under this act and
to determine means of using existing training programs
to train such personnel and to determine the extent and
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nature of obstacles to employment and occupational
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advancement in the solid waste disposal and resource
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recovery field.
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The Administrator is required to report the
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results of such investigation and study, including his
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recommendations to the President and the Congress. No
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particular time is indicated.
That, in a nutshell, is what the Act says
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about public education, participation and training.
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We will be happy to accept questions or
suggestions. We would prefer the latter.
Thank you.
MR. STRONG: Jim Strong, Butler
County Community College.
Has any thought been given to how member
personnel for the advisory committees and the review
groups will be handled?
MR. WILLIAMS: How they will be
selected?
MR. STRONG: Right.
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, to have an
official advisory committee for the headquarters office
can consist of no more than 15 people, and it has to be
approved by the Office of Management and Budget, and takes
quite a bit of time to get through.
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Undoubtedly what we will have to do, or try
to do, is try to find 15 people who, in the opinions of
others, represent the whole spectrum of interest groups --
and we are going to miss some — but 15 people who would,
if you will excuse the expression, will go from the left
of the environmentalists and consumers, to the far right
where you have trade associations and all those in
between.
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In the meantime, we are planning to have a
large ad hoc committee meeting or two, and that might go
as far as 30 people.
We will probably select them on the basis of
which we have three major divisions carrying out the
provisions of the^ct. Probably mainly on what the
divisions are, the major interest groups that are
affected by what they have to do.
That is ensuring all the while that we don't
end up with a lopsided group that does not represent
the full public, so to speak.
MR. MEHR: Harold Mehr, Mehr
Research and Development Corporation, Greenville,
Pennsylvania.
Is there actual funds ready to be disseminated
for grants, training grants in the graduate areas at
universities today?
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MR. WILLIAMS: No, sir, I am sorry
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to say at this moment there are no funds whatsoever for
training. What our budget for fiscal year '78 is going
to be, is not actually known.
We now have the Ford budget and we have the
Carter budget, and we are waiting for the Congress budget
which we think will be the best of the three.
In the meantime, we barely have enough budget
to carry out, or to attempt to implement those provisions
of the Act which are mandatory. Unfortunately for those
of us who care a good deal about training, no time limit
was placed on it. So as of now, we simply don't have
budget or manpower to do much about training.
I hope in fiscal '78, the situation will be
different.
To make another comment on training, if you
have any ideas on training or anything that you think we
ought to be thinking about, please don't hesitate to let
us know. We just brought a specialist in from one of
EPA1s regions to stay with us for a couple of months,
to try to develop some preliminary thinking on how we
ought to implement these training provisions under the
Act, because we have had no training capability for
several years now in the program, until this Act was
passed.
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1 MR. ZADAN: Walter Zadan, Group
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Against Smog and Pollution, GASP.
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In reviewing the subtitles under the Act, I
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see no mention made of the fact that there should be a
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study made of the tax structure. It seems to me if we
are to divide the solid waste disposal problem into two,
hazardous and non-hazardous problem areas, it seems to
me that the tax structure discussing depletion allowances
and so on, is the most serious problem faced with solving
that aspect of the solid waste problem. That does not
deal with hazardous materials, and I see no mention in
the Act.
MR. WILLIAMS: There is mention. I
will say very briefly there is important work to be done
under the Act that pertains to that problem. Do you
want to comment further, Bob?
If you don't mind, Bob I/owe will comment on that
when he is up here in the frying pan.
Come on, we have got to have another question
or suggestion or something. I don't want to go back to
Washington with a record like this, for God's sake, we
will lose the public participation entirely and never get
any training done.
MR. MEHR: Excuse me, but you
really can't get much accomplished unless you have the
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funding to go ahead and accomplish something with. Don't
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you think you sort of got the cart before the horse?
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, when you have an
Act, sir, that is supposed to require $180 million to
implement, and maybe three or four hundred people, and
you have a hundred million people, that is $39.47, and
the Act says in 6 months get this out, in 18 months
regulate this, in 18 months regulate this, define this,
you better do some things. Because they come around
saying, "You haven't done those, we will put you in jail,"
or something. They say, "Do training and give a report
to Congress." They don't say when.
It's just unfortunate, but nevertheless
mandatory on the managers in the agency that they do those
things that have to be done.
I think as a matter of fact possibly when they
start getting out some of these regulations and some of
these definitions, the need for training will become
so apparent that there will be some provision made for
it.
MR. STRONG: Jim Strong again. I
am still a little bit concerned about the citizen
participation aspect of this. As we were going through
the slides, it seemed to me there would be many other
areas besides this one, what I might call king pin
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advisory committee of 15 people, that would be needed
to ensure public participation, or would be actually
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involved in public participation.
Now perhaps I missed, and maybe this is lookim
down the road too far, but has any thought gone into,
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say in Western Pennsylvania where there may be certain
highly specialized solid waste programs or problems, having
Western Pennsylvanians in that area involved in the
particular aspect, or is the public participation mainly
going to be centered around this one 15-person committee
that you hope is going to represent the spectrum of
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people?
MR. WILLIAMS: A 15-member panel is
very small, which I would never be under the illusion
that it would represent everybody. It is a formal
advisory council, which is very good for us to have, it
beats no council at all, believe me. But as I said,
there are three kinds of activities that would have to
be carried on to ensure minimal public participation.
Also, remember the divisions in the states and
others will be holding meetings, will be holding all
kinds of meetings, workshops, et cetera^as they implement
provisions of the Act, or plan provisions of the Act,
there will literally be hundreds of meetings in the
next couple of years in this country by us alone, not
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to mention the meetings that s,tates will hold and others
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will hold. There will be all kinds of opportunities.
As I said in the first remarks I made, there
will be opportunities for organizations to comment on
proposed guidelines, even if we don't have meetings, in
addition to having the formal advisory committee is
just the icing on the cake, frankly. And the Act says,
"States ought to develop public participation strategies
and plans," and we will encourage them to. And I think
most of the states will do so.
Any more questions, please?
MR. DeGEARE: Truett DeGeare, I am
with EPA in Washington.
While it sounds not especially likely we would
get the full funding that Tom has mentioned in the Act,
it is likely we would get some funding. And-> therefore^
it's also logical to assume that part of our funding
will be diversified into various areas and activities
called for under the law. One of these areas would be
training.
Therefore, it's important for us to obtain
your viewpoints on how we would prioritize the amount of
resources we do have, and the directions that you would
take in implementing the provisions of the Act which
call for training.
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And with that in mind, I would like to
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solicit your viewpoints on one issue that wag raised in
a similar meeting we had last week in Atlanta, and that
is: Where should the training efforts be localized as
far as delivery is concerned?
That is, should our agency at the federal level
implement a short course training program, or should that
be more appropriately done by the s.tate agencies
throughout the nation, or how would you best see the
area carried out?
MR. WILLIAMS: It depends very much,
I think, on what the resources are. Offhand, it seems
all the things you mention ought to be done. That is one
of the reasons we brought Tom Gibbs in from the region
to try to help us figure out.
But we have also just asked for a
representative from each of the divisions to help us make
an appraisal of where in the various areas there are going
to be real problems if we don't have trained people,
what kind, what aspects of hazardous waste management,
for example, would be so deficient as to make the
implementation of the law difficult if they were not
trained people, whether these be trained people in
government or private industry?
I would think if we had the appropriate
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funding for it, that we would have some training of our
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own, but training by states and training by other
institutions under grants.
May I make one more comment before I say
anything else?
I think what Truett said is very important
from another viewpoint, and that is: We are here to get
your views. Nobody has decided how this Act is going to
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be implemented. And what happens in these meetings and
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why I said, not totally jokingly, that I wanted some
comment, the transcripts of each of these meetings is
going to be analyzed by someone under contract, who we
are hiring, to determine what you thought in each city
where we have had meetings. What seemed to be -- what
did the public think, in effect, we ought to be doing?
We are going to have that analyzed, condensed, then have
a cross section made of all the ten regional meetings,
and that is going to be given to the Administrator of
EPA, to the head of the solid waste program, the head of
our work forces strategy, and so on, before they make
any further decisions about how to proceed under this
Act. So it's quite serious.
MR. BARBUTOS: George Barbutos,
solid waste manager for Dallas County.
I would suggest that the federal program set
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up a sharing program with the states in order to do the
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training at the regional level, and that you actually
start with the government officials and the consultants
involved in solid waste, before you get to the public.
That would be my recommendation.
MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you.
Yes, sir?
MR. BERN: Joe Bern, U. S.
Utilities Service, Monroeville, Pennsylvania. In other
words, I am the industry or trade association vested
interest here.
MR. WILLIAMS: We are all vested
interests.
MR. BERN: Having been with the
j^tate as an enforcement officer, I feel the biggest
problem the agency faces is knowledgeable enforcement,
uniformly and competent. And I feel that the training
should start at the ^tate level where the program now
resides, at least in Pennsylvania, and that the manpower
be adequately trained so that there can be a hazardous
waste disposal industry. Until that occurs, there never
will be.
MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, sir.
MR. MEHR: I have a suggestion
also, that some concentration be made on training people
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who are problem solvers, rather than enforcers. Because
I think enforcement is one thing, but actually we have
Q
a problem which not only needs enforcement, it needs
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solved. I don't think there has been enough effort in
problem solving; there has been an awful lot of effort
placed on enforcement.
MR. HERMAN: Don Berman, Allegheny
County Works Department.
The gentleman here just mentioned problem
solvers, and I think one of the areas that we can use
training, and this is particularly true of Allegheny
County and Southwestern Pennsylvania, and I don't know
how you do this, but a training course for local elected
officials to apprise them of what is in the Act and what
their responsibilities are. I don't think they know.
I think they have got so many other things going around
in their minds at the present time, that they just don't
care.
And I think that is where the decision is
going to be made about what is going to happen, and
therefore those people should become very knowledgeable,
either them or their staffs.
MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. We agree,
even though we don't have a formal budget or money set
up, we do have some small but significant contracts with
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NACO and the ICMA and such groups, to ensure that local
and state officials, county officials, become aware of
what this Act means.
Okay, thank you very much.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Tom.
That last suggestion Don Berman made I think
is an excellent one. I am not sure that we can't do
something about it soon. Maybe you and Bill and I can
talk about it and we can see if we can't do something.
I think one of the vital, major, new initiatives
of the Act is subtitle C, which deals with the development
and implementation of a hazardous waste management
regulatory program. We are fortunate to have tonight
with us to discuss the hazardous waste management area,
Mr. Fred Lindsey, who is Chief, Implementation Branch,
Hazardous Waste Management Division, Office of Solid
Waste Management.
Fred?
MR. LINDSEY: Thank you, Gordon.
May I say, like Tom Williams indicated, that we are really
very pleased you came out this evening to share with us
your thoughts, and give us your suggestions.
As Gordon mentioned, I am here to mention
subtitle C, the hazardous waste requirements within the
..'
Act. I am going to go through and discuss as I go, some
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of the Act's requirements. And I am going to throw out
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what some of the issues are that we are going to have
to face as we try to deal with these requirements.
Subtitle C mandates a regulatory program,
the objective of which is to control hazardous wastes
from the point of generation, usually in an industrial
concern, to ultimate disposal at a permitted facility.
Now this is a very clear mandate, there is
a lot of latitude as to how we can carry that out, but
the mandate is very clear what we are supposed to do.
The first thing we have to do, and one of
the more important parts of the Act and one of the more
difficult parts of the Act is to come up with and identif
shall I say characteristics of wastes which make them
hazardous or not hazardous. And in so doing, the Congres
has mandated, that we consider such things as toxicitv,
presistence in the environment, deqradability,
bioaccumulation in tissue, flammability, corrosiveness
and other similar properties.
Once having identified what the criteria are
that make a waste hazardous or not hazardous, then we
have to issue a listing of wastes which are hazardous,
a hazardous waste list, as it were. However, I should
point out it is the criteria which will determine what
is and is not a hazardous waste.
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As with the hazardous waste part of the Act,
we are given 18 months within which to come up with these
criteria, with these standards, 18 months from passage
of the Act, which was October 21, 1976, which will bring
us to April the 21st, 1978.
Gordon earlier mentioned some of the problems
we have in trying to identify what is and what is not a
hazardous waste. A number of people have pointed out
that before you decide what is and is not hazardous,
you have to decide when a waste is a waste. And while
it may sound a little ludicrous, if you think about it,
it's a difficult question.
There are a number of materials which, for
example, are sold at a very low price and used for such
things as, and I am including some potentially dangerous
chemicals, for example, that are sold occasionally for
road oiling, keeping down dust in horse arenas, and things
like that, and have cause many, many problems in the
past. So it's very important to us to determine when is
a waste a waste, so we will be able to deal with that,
as well as to be able to determine what is and is not
hazardous.
Wastes are mixtures of many different materials
In dealing with air pollution and water pollution, we
are typically dealing with lead, or we are dealing with
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copper, or we are dealing with asbestos or some other
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easily identifiable substance. In wastes, we are usually
dealing with ooze and gunk and yellow goodies, things of
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that nature, sludges of various types. And the question
arises: To what extent can our criteria and tests which
we develop for determining what is a hazardous waste,
be applied to the waste? And to what extent will they
have to be applied to suspected hazardous components?
And how does one go into setting up standardized tests
for things which vary all the way from things like
molasses, to things like a waste solvent, for example?
The next part of the Act requires us to
develop standards for generators, for those people who
generate hazardous wastes. And in so doing, we must come
up with reporting and record—keeping requirements which
will consist of identifying quantities, constituents
and disposition of waste materials which are generated at
a given site where you have to come up with standards
for labeling, standards for containers, the use of perhaps
design of containers, and perhaps most importantly under
this Act, we have to develop a manifest system.
The manifest system is designed to track waste
from cradle to grave. That is: Prom the point of
generation to the point of disposal. It is to give
pertinent information from the generator to the transporter
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and disposer so that they can more adequately handle
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their function.
Q
In those states which already have and use
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manifest systems, this has typically taken the form of a
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trip ticket. Some of you may be familiar with these.
OLr^ff
There are a few problems in- issues in this area also,
for example, how can record— keeping and reporting burdens
be minimized, and yet provide adequate control of the
hazardous waste management problem?
In the manifest area, should manifests be
uniform nationwide, or should there be permitted to be
some variation from area— to-area and section— to -section?
This is some of the things we are going to have to deal
with, on which we would like your thoughts.
Similar standards are required for those
people who transport hazardous wastes, including again
record— keeping . Records which would be kept here would
include things like the source of the waste and the
delivery point to which the transporter delivered the
waste, again labeling requirements for containers,
compliance also with the manifest system, which would
impact upon the transporters, also.
And then there is a provision which requires
that whatever we come up with in the area of transport
standards will have to be consistent with Department of
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Transportation regulations. And we have very close
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liaison, at this point, with those people.
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Section 3004 of the Act is probably one of
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the more important parts of the Act, because it is here
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that standards must be developed for those people which
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own or operate treatment, storage and disposal facilities
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And it is by such standards that improper disposal will
be made illegal. So this is a very important area.
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Congress has mandated a number of regulations
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in this area, including again record-keeping and reportin<
including how much was received at a facility and how
was it disposed? Again, compliance with the end of the
manifest system, requirements for monitoring and
inspection. This will include requirements for minimum
requirements, minimum testing and sampling protocols
to determine if a site is in fact polluting.
We must come up with regulations for location,
design and construction of such facilities which would
include such things as where facilities can and cannot
be placed, what design options may be restricted, or
otherwise controlled. We must come up with maintenance
and operating standards. Contingency plans are called
for. What to do if something goes wrong at a facility
must be identified ahead of time.
Then there is a broad area of what we call
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"ownership requirements" which could consist of such
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things as performance bonds, long-term care funds,
training requirements at hazardous waste facilities,
perhaps site closure plans, things of that nature.
And then there is a general overall section
that says, in effect, such other standards as may be
necessary to protect the public health and the
environment. So it's an extremely broad mandate.
Some of the questions in this area, which we
would appreciate your thinking about and sharing your
thoughts with us, what are the main problems at the
implementation end of all this which are associated
with integrating hazardous waste facility standards
with the present Air, Water and OSHA Standards with
which many of these facilities must comply at this
point? Should performance standards for hazardous waste
storage, treatment or disposal facilities apply at the
fence line of a hazardous waste facility, or other
places?
Should the standards take the form, for
example, of non-degradation of a medium such as ground
water beyond some specified point, or should there be
equipment standards, "Thou shalt have Venturi scrubbers,
or the equivalent, if you are going to burn chlorinated
hydrocarbons," for example?
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There are a variety of ways In which we could
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put together regulations which would affect this area.
Should hazardous waste facility standards
be uniform nationally, or should there be allowances for
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the difference in climate^et cetera?
Many citizens automatically oppose the siting
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of hazardous waste facilities in their locale. I think
a gentleman back along the aisle mentioned that earlier,
or alluded to a problem along this area. For example,
we can come up with the best standards going, and do a
very good job of setting standard, but if there is no
place to put the wastes, where are we going?
So the problem of monolithic opposition, even
for acceptable facilities, may be a serious problem for
us. I suspect it will. How can we overcome that? How
can we effect that?
Someone mentioned perhaps training for local
officials and so forth, who must deal with the problem of
disposal facilities in their locale might be helpful.
I don't know, that is a good suggestion. In any event,
this may be a problem.
On the other hand, would very stringent
facility standards have any appreciable influence on this
issue? Should regulations published by EPA require
certification of employees to work at a hazardous waste
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facility?
We certify boiler water operators; should we
certify the operators at a hazardous waste facility?
That is the question we are facing.
Should EPA require bondinq and insurance for
hazardous waste and disposal facilities?
What routine monitoring should be required at
a waste facility, and who should do it; the enforcement
authority, or should the facility itself do it?
What should be the reporting requirements?
These are some of the problems, and as you
can see, some of them are rather substantial that we
are facing over the next few months.
Under section 3005 of the Act, we are required
to develop a mechanism for bringing facilities into
compliance with these standards. And this is through
the use of a permit system.
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21 3004, the standards for facilities, it will become
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have to show to the regulatory agency, whether that be
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EPA or the appropriate s,tate agency, will have to show
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that they comply with the standards which we just got
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done talking about for treatment facilities. These are
requirements within the Act.
Now the Act also states that in order to
receive a permit, a certain amount of data will be
required, including the manner of disposal of the waste
at the facility or treatment, the types and amounts of
waste which are expected to be received, the frequency
of treatment or the rate of application in case of
disposal.
There will have to be certain amounts of
information on the site, probably hydrogeology,
climatology, demography, et cetera.
There is the provision in the Act for the
granting of interim permits for those facilities,
treatment, storage and disposal facilities which are in
business as of the passage of the Act this past October.
And those facilities should have notified the s.tate or
EPA, under section 3010, of their existence, which we
will talk about in a minute, and those facilities that
have applied for a permit. So for facilities which have
done all three of those, they will be granted an interim
permit to continue operating until all the paper work
clears. Because I think as you can understand, there are
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probably going to be quite a number of applications in
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the beginning, probably in the same sense there was for
the water pollution permit systems.
One of the major problems we are facing in
this area is the question of whether or not there should
be different classes of permits, which would depend perhaps
on the amounts and type of wastes which are handled,
which would then have different requirements in order to
receive permits.
Section 3006 of the Act is where Congress has
dealt with the desirability of turning the permitting
and enforcement part of this Act over to the sstates to
carry out. Now we, within EPA, will be developing
guidelines to assist the sstates in setting up acceptable
programs under the Act. In order to be authorized to
carry this out, the state program will have to be
equivalent to the federal program? it will have to be
consistent with any other jtate programs which have been
authorized, and it will have to contain adequate
enforcement provisions.
Now Congress didn't say what "equivalent,
consistent and adequate" are, so that is what we will
be wrestling with in the next few months.
Section 3010 requires that anyone within three
months after we identify what is and what is not a
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hazardous waste, which is required, as I say by April 21
of 1978, within three months after that time, anyone who
generates, transports, treats, stores or disposes of
hazardous wastes, under the definition, will have to
notify EPA or the appropriate state agency, that they do
this. Now this will probably be a very simple operation,
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a one time notification.
Section 3011 of the Act outlines procedures
for assisting the ^states to assist them in developing
and implementing the state program, to carry out the
permitting and enforcement parts of this Act. It
authorizes $25 million to do this for each of two years.
Unfortunately, that particular amount of money hasn't
been appropriated as yet, and probably will not be,
although there will certainly be a certain amount of
money in this area, it probably will not be anywhere
near what we would like. How much will be appropriated,
no one knows at this particular point.
The allocation will be made to ^tates, based
on a formula which we will devise, based on the amount
of the hazardous wastes which are generated in the _state
and the extent of public exposure to those wastes.
In brief, that is what we are up against for
the next few months. And as you can see, I think it's
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quite a formidable task on our part, and we do mean it
when we say we will listen and are interested in anything
you have to say, any comments you might have, any guidanc
any suggestions you might h-ave on any of these issues,
or any of the things which I have talked about this
evening.
So I am here to receive any suggestions you
might have, and to answer any questions that you might
have.
MR. SHAPIRO: /V1,fl. Shapiro from the
grad school of public health.
Nowhere do I find anything related to the
establishment of centers for conservation or for re-use
of the materials. Is there anything in the Act, in the
hazard£>'portion of it, which will allow for the
establishment of such centers, either voluntarily, or
under the Act?
MR. LINDSEY: There is no provision
which specifically addresses hazardous wastes in that
sense, although any of the resource -- »a*Y of the
Resource Recovery provisions, which Bob I«0we is going
to talk about later, could also apply to the hazardous
waste section.
Now if I understood you correctly, your
question was: Would it be possible, either with support
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from the Act, or without support from the Act, to
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undertake recycling facilities for these kinds of wastes?
And the answer, at least to the latter, without support
under the Act, is yes. That would certainly be possible.
There are a number of facilities now in existence whose
major business is just that; taking various types of
hazardous wastes, treating them and making salable
products out of them.
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One of the more common approaches is
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distillation of solvents to reclaim solvents. There are
others, copper reclamation, et cetera. But there is no
money available to give to people to do that.
There will, however, probably be some funds
available for demonstration work for that type of thing.
Other questions?
MR. SCHMIDT: Ray Schmidt, Bethel
Engineering.
On your question about operating standards,
I have worked with Pennsylvania Standards for land fills,
and trying to design them around it, I might suggest they
be set up in two parts:
One, the results are desired, or the
undesirable results which you don't want from the
operation or design of a land fill.
And then second some "cookbook" or standard,
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agreed upon approaches, which might be acceptable.
MR. LINDSEY: Okay, so what you are
saying, then is in that area, the standards in that area
should take the form of prohibitions, such things as
perhaps --
MR. SCHMIDT: We don't want any
ground water, wherever water is being drawn from in that
aquifer, that should net be polluted. But if there is
ground water below a hundred feet, therefore you don't
have to worry about it.
MR. LINDSEY: Is that an example,
or a suggestion?
MR. SCHMIDT: That is both. Since
the Pennsylvania requirements call for hundred foot
monitoring wells, and many parts of the s_tate do not
have any usable water in the first hundred feet, if any
water at all, of any consequence.
By the same token, there are many ways of
getting rid of hazardous and non-hazardous wastes which
are not spelled out in specific detail in the Pennsylvanie
regulations. For example, shredding is not even
discussed; composting is. But shredding, which I believe
Dover, Delaware is one of the prime examples of this
approach, but nowhere does Pennsylvania have it in their
regulations.
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MR. SCHMIDT: It's not mentioned,
therefore it is not acceptable.
MR. LINDSEY: Are you talking about
shredding and spreading of what types of materials?
MR. SCHMIDT: Of both hazardous
and non-hazardous, where it is possible if you take a
large amount of non-hazardous waste and mix in an
appropriate small amount of hazardous waste, your unit
level, if you will --
MR. LINDSEY: Application rate?
MR. SCHMIDT: Right, becomes
acceptable.
By the same token, you get into the problem
if you start allocating specific times when you can take
and mix them, for example^, toxic sludges will agglomerate
with other materials, an example might be fly ash, or
very absorbent materials that are left over. These things
could be used to dispose of a toxic, and tie it up.
MR. LINDSEY: Should these specific
procedures be addressed in the form of guidelines, or
should they be some sort of regulation as to how they can
or cannot be carried out, as you say?
MR. SCHMIDT: Well, the preference
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is guideline, because by regulations you have no choice,
that is it, it's black and white. But if you set it up
as guidelines, which DER's regulations had been for
quite a while, you have the option, if you will, to have
some leeway.
MR. LINDSEY: So your recommendation
is, then, that we set performance standards which would
be regulations, and then we set guidelines relative to
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MR. SCHMIDT: Right.
MR. LINDSEY: Thank you.
Others?
p
MR. LARUE: Dennis LaXue,
Youngstown Vindicator, Youngstown, Ohio.
In Mahoning County, which is about 50 miles
from here, for the last two years Browning-Ferris
Industries have proposed carting solid waste from
Montgomery County, Maryland and from Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania to Mahoning County to have it disposed of
in abandoned strip mines. And both times the local
board of health has waited to see what would happen before
asking or considering a lawsuit against Browning-Ferris.
I am wondering here with the development of
standards, if the federal EPA is going to take over the
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whole ball of wax, if Browning-Ferris will be able to
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bring it in, as long as they complied with the
requirements under the Act?
MR. LINDSEY: First of all, you are
talking now about a situation which was a municipal
trash and garbage, as opposed to the hazardous wastes.
And Truett DeGeare, who spoke a few minutes ago and
will speak again, will address that point.
But you are getting to a whole other area
which is important, and that is: Whether or not
hazardous wastes should be permitted to move great
distances? Some s.tates have tried to, and I think
certain localities have tried to permit the movement of
those materials, either into their jurisdiction for
treatment or disposal, or even through it in some cases.
And this issue has been raised by others you know, what
is EPA's position on that?
Well, our position has been all along, although
we have no regulatory position in that at this point, but
our position has been all along that these types of
wastes should be treated and disposed in those areas
where they can be handled from the best standpoint
environmentally and economically. Where the trade-off
is the best, where they can be handed safely from an
environmental standpoint, and cost, even if this requires
transportation.
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And in fact, these materials do move today
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vast distances; across half the nation is not uncommon.
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Part of the reason for that is that in order to treat,
detoxify many of these materials requires a relatively
specialized piece of material, in some cases. So the
movement to an area which is large enough to support such
a facility may be quite larger than one state, or even
larger than one region.
MR. MEHR: You have an equal
problem with radiation wastes. There are only maybe a
dozen localities in the entire United States that suit
geologically for that type of hazardous waste. What
type of movement do you have to take as a federal
government, to say to a group of environmentalists,
"This is one of a few spots that remains in our nation
and we have got to use it, and that's all there is to it",
like the salt mines of Ohio?
MR. LINDSEY: Are you suggesting
that EPA should take this kind of positive approach in
handling facilities?
MR. MEHR: I am not suggesting,
I am pointing out a problem where it may be the necessity
of the federal government to make a choice for everyone,
because no one really wants hazardous waste in his
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MR. LINDSEY: That is true. I don't
think there is any authority, the way the Act is written,
for us to say, "Okay, we are going to put it here."
That authority doesn't exist.
Also, you are dealing with radioactive waste
which, generally speaking, most radioactive wastes are
not covered under this Act. There are certain nuclear
wastes which are.
The wastes which are covered under the
Atomic Energy Act are not covered under this Act. The
wastes which are covered under this Act include such
things as naturally occurring radioactive wastes, such
as radium and probably as we read the Act, the phosphate
slime piles in Florida, the piles of radioactive overbore
et cetera, in Western Colorado, anything which is
generated out of a cyclotron, would be covered under
this Act.
But as I say, most of the nuclear wastes are
covered under the Atomic Energy Act, and it is up to the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission and ERDA to identify
disposal sites for that. But the question of what impact
EPA can have on siting of facilities, which I think I
mentioned a little earlier, we see as a potentially
major problem, is something we are very interested in.
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And where there are good suggestions in this area, we
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would like to have them. But we don't have the authority
to say, "This is where this has got to be."
MR. SCHMIDT: Ray Schmidt, Bethel.
On that subject, I explored it on some other cases, and
the answer I have always gotten back is the state or
federal government will permit a site to be used as far
as meeting their regulations or guidelines, as far as
whether or not it can indeed be used because of other
things, such as the local health department taking suit,
that is beyond their interest and jurisdiction. They
will simply permit it from the standpoint of, "Yes, it
does meet the criteria for an acceptable site." Whether
or not you can actually use it is another story.
MR. LINDSEY: That is true. There
are some zoning requirements and things of that nature
where permits could be required that could cause problems
For example, we are trying now, under a
demonstration grant from our office, to site an
environmentally acceptable facility in Minnesota, and
we are having a heck of a time doing it because of
things like that,
MR. BERN: Joe Bern, U. S.
Utility Services.
With regard to the guidelines or regulations.
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or whatever you want to call them, it is ray opinion that
o
they should be directed toward an acceptable environmenta
impact, rather than a particular treatment or a particula
4.
facility, or a particular kind of process. Because the
hazardous wastes, and wastes in general are BO varied,
almost infinite in nature, that they can't even be
designed as such.
Now, as far as our activity with the
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Department of Environmental Resources, this has always
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been the approach in trying to dispose of a waste, we
feel we have to comply with any regulations with
regard to any discharges or any situations. And this
has still been the case and still is, regardless of
what the waste is.
Consequently, what level of treatment is
required will be dictated by the environmental impact,
and not by the characteristics of the waste only.
MR. LINDSEY: Again, the suggestion
being that we stick with performance type standards,
as opposed to equipment standards.
Okay.
MR. SCHMIDT: This is a support of
that statement. The Coast Guard has a book about that
thick (indicating) which lists all the materials which
are "hazardous" by their definitions.
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DOT has a similar sized document with all the
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labels for those; so once you begin to get that large a
number of potentially hazardous materials trying to
dictate a system, you completely wipe out, you get lost.
MR. LINDSEY: The problem, as I
think I may have mentioned earlier, with dealing with
those lists, the Coast Guard list and DOT list are
hazardous lists of chemicals, as it were, whereas the
wastes we are dealing with occasionally are those, but
more occasionally there are some goo's or glop which has
some two or three or five of these materials in them,
which may tend to be antagonistic or synergistic with
each other.
We feel that the criteria for hazardous wastes
are probably going to have to address the waste itself,
as opposed to the materials which are in it. Although
this is still an open question we are addressing at
this particular point, but it is a difficult problem.
Are there any others?
MR. SHAPIRO: I think you made one
of your first questions concerning minimum record^keeping
systems. And it appears to me that in a sense, it's
already in the Act, and in fact other acts like the
Safe Drinking Water Act or other like acts, have already
set standards that you must establish minimum standards.
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then allow the ^,tates, if they care to, to upgrade it
or make them more strict, in the other sense, that that
would be acceptable.
But in trying to ascertain what is going to
be available as knowledge of what happened in the past,
I just can't see you getting around without getting some
minimum of the record-keeping system for the whole
country. Otherwise, it's not going — we are not going
to be able at all to identify anything in the future.
And since that is what I believe you are trying to do,
then a set of minimum standards, uniformly applied,
will have to be available.
MR. LINDSEY; In the case of
disposal facilities, would you like to tell us what kinds
of things they should keep records of, or have you
thought about it?
MR. SHAPRIO: Well, I was reading
what was in the Act here, in the sense that it states
record'keeping practices that accurately identified the
quantity of such hazardous wastes generated, the
constituents thereof, and which are of significant
quantity or potential harm to human beings, I think it's
spelled out. The transfer of records from the source
to the disposal site should be more or less a mechanical
operation.
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MR. MEHR: May I caution the
2
government from making the record-keeping so difficult
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and so voluminous that you have the same paper problem
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developing in the EPA as you have in other federal
agencies? One of the things that you have is that when
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you handle the record-keeping portion of handling wastes,
7
you find it's more expensive to keep the records than it
is to go ahead and make a buck disposing of the wastes.
Then it becomes profitable for a man to cheat and lie
and do all the things that the enforcers don't like to
have done.
So if you make your record-keeping too
strenuous, too difficult and too mean and expensive,
you are going to get more and more enforcement necessary
because people are going to cheat.
MR. LINDSEY: Okay, good point.
17 MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I resent that.
18 I don't think anybody else caused any more records to
19 be kept than EPA does.
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MR. MEHR: I didn't imply that,
21 I am sorry.
22 MR. LINDSEY: Does anyone have
any suggestions they might make on whether or how we
might integrate our record—keeping at these facilities,
as compared to whatever the requirements there are on
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these types of facilities from pollution discharge
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systems, or from the air or whatever?
3
ZADAN: I am subject to a
4
certain amount of record-keeping by the county, state
and federal government, and very often we have three
different forms that cover the same problem, but each
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form is different. So I would suggest that a good place
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to start would be perhaps to get your local forms and
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required state forms and federal forms, and perhaps use
a simple, one single form.
11 And I think the same thing exists as to
12 inspection. I have a city inspector, a county inspector,
13 a state inspector and a federal inspector. The Jederal
14 inspectors are today once a year a supervisor, once a
15 year another "super" supervisor, who comes in from half
16 a nation away. And I have at least five levels of
17 governmental agencies inspecting me for the very same
18 thing. And I think this is the problem that many people
19 who are in business object to.
20 MR. LINDSEY: I think in this
21 particular Act, under this Act, at least the hazardous
22 waste provisions, if the state takes over the program,
23 you won't see the federal inspector, in all likelihood,
24 as long as the state is managing the program.
25 I think that should help some, anyway.
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MR. STRONG: Since it's apparent
under^itle C that there is going to have to be a
tremendous amount of scientific impact, especially
characterizing what is going to a "hazardous waste",
are there plans for a specific advisory group to, again
representing a broad spectrum of the public, to be
involved in this establishment, or is this mainly
in-house.
MR. LINDSEY: Let me give a brief
outline of how we do things relative to developing
standards in EPA, or at least for this Act. We have a
variety of different people who impact upon us, in
other words, we don't sit in Washington and just do
this.
For example, there is first of all what we
call a working group. A working group is made up of
17 members, not only from our own office, we are the lead
office, but also members from other parts of EPA, a
19 number of other parts of EPA and any other part of air
20 pollution and water pollution.
21 The intent of these work groups and all
22 these various other experts on the group is:
23 ' Number 1, to give us the benefit of their
24 experience and their knowledge, and also to help
23 integrate, as we pointed out a little earlier, the
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requirements of this Act with the requirements of, some
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other acts where there may be some overlap, or some way
we can smooth the implementation of it.
In addition to that, we are holding, and have
held, a number of meetings with various segments of the
public, both one-on-one type meetings, which are meetings
with a public interest group of one sort or another, or
a trade association, to seek information, seek data, seek
viewpoints of that sort of thing.
We have held some, and will be holding very
soon within the next few months, some more of what we
call type 2 meetings. These are small group discussion
meetings in which having identified experts, we will
bring them together representing different viewpoints,
including public interest groups again, trade
associations, college professors, state personnel and
other experts we may have identified, to discuss a given
problem, like how do we best regulate emissions from a
site?
So there are a lot of those things going on.
There are public meetings like this, there will be
hearings as we get down the line.
Then there is something called an advanced
proposal &f rule making in which we will publish again
some of our concerns, some of these issues I have
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discussed, and we have an open document and ask people
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to respond to those issues, anyone and everyone to
respond to those issues.
So generally, in a general way is the way we
go about getting public input. On the other hand, there
is no reason why, at any time as a result of these
meetings or anything else, any thoughts that come along,
any time anyone has an idea they want to get across,
the way to do it is phone or send a letter to your
regional office, and they will see that it gets to the
proper person within our group.
MR. HEHR: Do you have an 800
number? That might be a suggestion that is wise, to place
an 800 number at the disposal of the public to call you
and give you suggestions.
MR. WILLIAMS: Call the region.
MR. LINDSEY: You can call the
region in Philadelphia, even though that is a toll number
from out here.
The phone number is 215-597-8114, 0980, 0982
and 8116.
MR. MEHR: You will get more
results if you have an 800 number.
MR. LINDSEY: Good suggestion. I
don't know if it's legal, but we will look into it.
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I think we are going to have to quit, because
2 we are getting way over our time.
3 MR. RAPIER: Take one more.
4 MR. SCHMIDT: I will keep it short.
5 One, your question about reporting procedures, I might
recommend rather than a whole series of trip tickets,
which fill file cabinets, you go to a quarterly or
8
semi-annual or annual report system similar with the
9 NPDS permit, or similar to the new potential reporting
10 methods of quarterly dumping amounts. That will make
11 it a lot simpler where you have incidental dumps of
12 miscellaneous items, you can have a special short form.
13 But where industry is constantly dumping the same type
of thing on a fairly routine basis, that would be a
15 far simpler operation.
MR. LINDSEY: In terms of reporting,
I would agree with you. However, the manifest and the
18 purpose of the manifest, at least from the commercial
19 background document, is to track the material, to be
20 sure that it gets from generator A when he gives it to
21 I a transporter, that it actually gets to disposer B.
22 In California, for example, where they have
23 this they use that as an enforcement mechanism. This is
24 one way of assuring that the transporter, when told by
25 the generator to deliver it to a permitted place, doesn't
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go off and dump it down the creek.
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MR. SCHMIDT: Understood, the
point being if you report out of the acceptor and
generator, the two should coincide and a simple
correlation of the two would take care of it.
The second major quick point was: Nowhere,
going through this, do I find any sort of tax incentives
to anyone, be it private industry or otherwise, to try
to somehow reduce or transform any of the hazardous
wastes.
There are a number of technologies, including
nitric acid generation, which, given some economic
incentives, such as tax write-offs, either direct
against tax or otherwise might become a viable way of
getting rid of it.
MR. LINDSEY: You are correct,
there is nothing in the Act which specifically relates
to hazardous wastes. However, there are things for
incentives which would also apply to hazardous wastes,
but it's not a program as such. It's a study that is
to be undertaken, but that's all the Act specifies.
MR. SCHMIDT: I notice it does
offer 5 percent for tire shredders. They give you a
grand total of $75,000.
MR. LINDSEY: I bet you there isn't
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any of that that has been authorized or appropriated
2 yet.
MR. MEHR: Harold Mehr again.
4
I remember the story of the man who had a
$4,000 race horse and a $20 customer. It appears that
industry, with hazardous wastes, has a multi-million
dollar solving problem, but only $20 customers that can't
really afford it. He finally solved his problem by
finding 200 raffle holders at $20 a ticket, and I am
wondering whether the government can consider district
treatment facilities for certain types of hazardous
wastes?
Mobay Chemical pointed out they had 4,000
pounds a day or 3,000 a day of some type of hazardous
chemical. I remember Exxon down at Bay City in Texas,
have put in some type of pipeline, they do it on a small
scale.
I wonder if you have considered this, or
looked at that situation?
MR. LINDSEY: I think you may be
talking about two different things. One is the so-called
"national disposal site concept" where the government,
either federal or state, for that matter, would set up
^ 4
plants which they would run to treat the wastes on
a regional basis.
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1 MR. MEHR: Combination private-
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federal, maybe industry?given certain portions of the
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funding with the government introducing certain portions,
and have it jointly operated with government and industry
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MR. LINDSEY: There are no provision
for any such thing under the Act. There potentially
could be a demonstration mechanism under the Act, if
there were funds to do it.
But the "hazardous wastes national disposal
cite concept" is not treated under the Act. It's
something that Congress felt was the responsibility of
the generating industry and it is a cost that should be
borne by them, generally speaking, and therefore it's
not included.
The other thin~Jc you talked about, I think
you indicated in Texas, was the possibility that one
waste may be another man's feed stock, and the concept
of what we call a waste exchange. Maybe I am wrong,
but I will say something about it anyway, since it has
come up.
In many of the European countries, this is
a common thing where the government, or in many cases
it's something like where the manufacturing chemists
association, or some other trade association uses a
technique where they advertise waste for somebody, and
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the characteristics of those wastes without naming
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names, so somebody on the other end who has a need for
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that type of chemical material can effect an exchange.
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And there is a fledgling operation of this type in
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St. Louis, and others around the country beginning to
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make some headway. We hope that will at least put some
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dent in the hazardous waste problem.
Well, thank you very much. If there are other
comments or suggestions, I would be pleased to have them
after this is completed.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: I would like a
second crack here, since there were some statements made
that might need a little clearing up.
First of all, I am glad you mentioned the
waste exchange business, because if you didn't, I would
have. And I think this is what Dr. Shapiro was alluding
to in terms of the whole area of industrial-agricultural
wastes. And there is the St. Louis regional exchange
outfit, and also Zero Waste Systems out in California.
We know this simply because DER has been
trying to interest certain agencies and groups into
adopting this concept and getting into the industrial-
agricultural waste field. And the beauty about that kind
of a system is that even if you only have one percent
success, if it is a particularly difficult and
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complicated and hazardous type waste, if you do recycle
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that, you do save a lot of time and effort and money that
3
would have had to have been invested in trying to solve
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that problem, and probably not solved it in the end.
5
The rate of success has not yet been determined
6
in any of these waste exchanges, even in Europe, because
7
it's difficult to track down what the ultimate conclusion
was, or what the ultimate arrangement was between the
contractor and the recipient. Because oftentimes, they
don't want you to know.
But any degree of success along that line,
and really it's in terms of running that kind of a
concept or exchange, it's relatively cheap for those
that are running it. So we are trying to promote that.
As far as things not being covered under our
Act or our rules and regulations, and naming them
specifically, such as the gentleman over here mentioned
shredders, yes, it's not mentioned. But that does not
mean it's not covered.
Now we do mention certain solid waste
technologies, but we don't mention all the equipment
or all the processing methods that are possible in the
solid waste game. But they are covered under equipment
and processing methods.
As far as 100-foot wells, well, they are not
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all a hundred foot wells, they vary in depth depending
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on where the water table is. So it's not a standard
requirement.
One more comment, and that is we are very
interested in a hazardous waste program in Pennsylvania.
Roy Weston has just completed a study for us, we have
just received a completed document, we are looking at it
now in terms of how it will fit, or what we can use out
of it to develop a state program. But the part of that
development of the jjtate program is dependent pretty
much on how the federal government wants to go under
-^
this Act.
And we, as states, would implore that in the
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implementation of the federal act, that they provide
-f;
the incentives for us as states to take over the program
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and be supportive to what has gone on in here in the
states in the past and in the present, and not disrupt
£
the tremendous, as I pointed out, the tremendous
commitments that have been made by state, local and
•v,
private and everybody else involved. Be supportive
and provide the incentive for us to take it over.
I think we can, in that kind of atmosphere.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you. Bill.
I should point out that subtitle C of the
4
Act has a mandatory requirement for implementation. If
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Bill Bucciarelli doesn't do it, I will have to, so I
want to assure you that I will do everything in my power
to see to it --
(Laughter.)
MR. BUCCIARELLI: Come on in, glad to
have you.
MR. RAPIER: One of the new things
of the Act is the requirement to look at the whole
land disposal question and the non-hazardous solid waste
18
management program.
Truett DeGeare, the Chief of the Land
Protection Branch in the Systems Management Division of
the Office of Solid Waste Management is going to talk
about the general land disposal area.
Truett?
MR. DeGEARE: It's nice to stand
up. If you would care to for a second, feel free.
With regard to land disposal of non-hazardous
solid wastes, some of the important features of RCRA
are significant new definitions, a requirement for the
21 ! Administrator of EPA to promulgate regulations containing
criteria for determining which facilities shall be
classified as sanitary land fills, and which shall be
24 i' classified as dumps. The requirement that the Administrator
publish an inventory of all disposal facilities which are
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open dumps, and the requirement that the Administrator
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publish suggested guidelines, including a description of
levels of performance to protect ground water from
leachate. The implication and requirements for state
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and local government will be discussed later under state
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and local program development provisions.
RCRA recognizes open dumps and sanitary land
fill as the only two types of solid waste disposal
facilities. They will be distinguished by criteria to
be developed under the provisions of Section 4004.
RCRA adds clarity by defining "disposal" and
"solid wastes." Disposal means the discharge, deposit,
injection, dumping, spilling, leaking or placing of
any solid waste or hazardous waste into or on any land
or water, so that such solid waste or hazardous wastes,
or any constituent thereoff, may enter the environment
or be emitted into the air or discharged into water,
including ground waters.
The term "solid waste" means any garbage,
refuse, sludge from a waste treatment plant, water supply
treatment plant or air pollution control facility, or
other discarded material, including solid, liquid,
semi-solid or contained gaseous material resulting from
industrial, commercial, mining and agricultural operations,
and from community activities. But it does not include
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solid or dissolved material in domestic sewage, or
solid or dissolved materials in irrigation return flows
or industrial discharges which are point sources subject
to permit under section 402 of the Federal Water Pollutio
Control Act as amended, or source nuclear or by-product
materials as defined by the Atomic Energy Act of 1954,
as amended.
I went to the trouble of reading through those
two definitions because they are significant in their
breadth. As I said earlier, the statutory definitions
of sanitary land fill and open dump refer specifically
to section 4004 of RCRA, which is entitled, "Criteria
for Sanitary Land Fills; Sanitary Land Fills Required
for all Disposal."
This section requires the Administrator to
promulgate the regulations containing criteria for
determining which land disposal facility shall be
classified as open dumps, and which shall be classified
as sanitary land fills. At a minimum, the criteria must
provide that a facility may be classified as a sanitary
land fill and not an open dump only if there is no
reasonable probability of adverse effect on public
health or the environment from disposal of solid waste
at the facility.
An important aspect of the implementation of
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RCRA, then, is further interpretation of what constitutes
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"no reasonable probability" and what constitutes "adverse
effect on health or the environment." The task of
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promulgation of these criteria will be particularly
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difficult for ground water protection because of technical
uncertainties and the general lack of ground water
protection policy.
This regulation is due by October 21 of this
year, after consultation with the ^states, notice and
public hearings.
The intent of this criteria is not to develop
a federal regulatory system for sanitary land fills,
^
but to provide guidance for ^.tate programs .
^
Section 4004 (b) requires each state plan to
prohibit the establishment of open dumps, and to contain
a requirement that disposal of all solid waste within
the state be disposed of in the sanitary land fills,
^
unless it is utilized for resource recovery.
Finally, section 4004(c) indicates that the
state prohibition on open dumping shall take effect
*s-
six months after the date of promulgation of the
criteria, or on the date of approval of the state plan,
whichever is later.
Not later than one year after promulgation
of the criteria for sanitary land fills and open dumps,
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the Administrator must publish an inventory of all
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disposal facilities in the United States which are open
dumps.
Section 4005 also prohibits open dumping when
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usable alternatives are available. If such alternatives
are not available, the jstate plan shall establish a
timetable or schedule for compliance which specifies
remedial measures, including an enforcement sequence of
actions or operations leading to compliance with the
prohibition on open dumping of solid waste within a
reasonable time. And this reasonable time cannot exceed
five years from the date of publication of the inventory.
If a state plan is not being undertaken, the
citizen suit provisions of 7002 provide recourse to
aggrieved parties.
Section 1008, solid waste management
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17 ' information and guidelines, requires the Administrator
to publish in one year, guidelines which provide technics
and economic descriptions of the level of performance
that can be attained by various available solid waste
management practices.
Congress, in the law, did not specify a
specific solid waste management practice to be addressed
in the guidelines, but addressed several areas which
the guidelines should include. These are appropriate
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methods and degrees of control that provide, at a
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minimum, for production of public health and welfare,
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water from run-off through compliance with effluent
limitations under the Federal Water Pollution Control
Act, protection of ambient air quality through compliance
with new source performance standards or requirements
9 of air quality implementation plans under the Clean Air
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protection of the quality of ground water and surface
water froNleachate, protection of the quality of surface
Act, disease and vector control, safety and aesthetics.
So as you can see, there is some linkage in
the suggested guidelines with other agencies with which
our agency operates.
The guidelines are seen as being descriptive,
as opposed to prescriptive, and could be used to suggest
alternatives for dealing with concerns and issues raised
by the criteria.
Section 1008 (c) requires minimum criteria to
be used by the states in defining and controlling open
-^
dumping of solid waste as prohibited under ^subtitle D.
In response to the general mandate of section
1008, the agency intends first to update the land
disposal guidelines we currently have on the books, and
initiate sludge disposal guidelines. We will also be
carrying out a process for determining which guidelines.
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1 that is guidelines on which other subject areas should
be developed. And we will solicit your input on that
prioritization of practices.
I will be happy to hear any views you might
5 have on the various provisions of subtitle D, regarding
land disposal.
Let me pose a couple of questions, then,
specifically with regard to criteria.
Would you say that each criteria should be
something general that would address, for example,
ground water pollution from any and all deposition of
12 I wastes on land, that is, from what we in the past have
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known as sanitary land fills and lagoons, pits, ponds
and other disposing methods, or would you see a series
of criteria addressing each of those practices? It
16 li seems those are two alternatives we could take in
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developing the criteria.
MR. WILLIAMS: I have a question for
you. Tom Williams, EPA.
Since a municipal land fill site, even if
through implementation of schedule C, would not receive
any so-called hazardous wastes, even if that were the
case, the wastes in municipal sites are hazardous under
certain circumstances. In ground water, how do you
propose to have anything less stringent for disposal
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than you can have with hazardous wastes, or with many
2
hazardous wastes? How can that be different?
3
MR. DeGEARE: It could be different
4
on the basis of differing hydrogeological conditions,
5
I would say, and soil types.
6
I would think using the criteria and guideline
7
which might be later promulgated, as back-up to the
criteria, develop potential for attenuation of substances
9
through the soil, and determining the potential for
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impact on the ground water, and I think depending on
those assessments, we could provide for different types
of disposal facilities.
MR. WILLIAMS: In different parts of
the country?
MR. DeGEARE: Yes.
MR. STRONG: Even though some
mention was made earlier about the radioactive mine
tailings being under this, are such things as deep mine
spoil piles in any sense covered under this Act, or have
those been covered under BU mine regulations, that they
are not included here, even though I didn't see any
mention? I realize this is a little early because of
these being guidelines. But is it the thought that these
will be covered under this particular act because there
is some rotten messes that are generated from these thing
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1
MR. DeGEARE: One reason I went to
2
the trouble of reading those two definitions for
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disposal of solid waste is to indicate the all-encompassirg
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nature of the law. And that is not to say that we are
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going to try to re-invent the wheel in terms of over-
regulating and taking over what is being done adequately
by other agencies and our agency.
We gee the law as directing us to oversee all
placement of wastes on land. That doesn't mean we are
going to implement new programs for those, we are going
to look at what is already being done and coordinate
what we think should be done with what is being done now.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: You are not going to
pre-empt any other act or statute, are you, in that sense?
This will cover wherever there are gaps?
MR. DeGEARE: The qaps will have
to be based on what the Act says is the criteria. No
adverse effects on health or environment.
MR. MEHR: I would like to go
back to a question he pointed out, because a few years
ago I attempted to do something that wasn't able to be
accomplished in the State of Pennsylvania for lack of
evidence, you might say. He mentioned the fact that in
some states you are permitted to shred, and then place
^
this in an open area without putting the three or four
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or eight inches of fill on top of it, because it has
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been proven in some areas that rodents are not attracted,
flies aren't attracted, water doesn't seem to deteriorate
it or anything like that. Yet in the State of
Pennsylvania, this can't be done because the law states
you must cover the land with so many inches of dirt,
or else it's not considered legal.
We attempted at one time to go ahead and
densify bales of material, and we ran into a legality
with the state. There was no evidence to prove that
water did not deteriorate these bales, and there was a
question in mind as to whether you could use bales or
place bales on the surface without having to cover it
with eight or ten inches of dirt.
The intent of the baler was to go ahead and
avoid this and cut the cost. It appears to me that some
technical proof must be devised that shredding and
densification is a viable technique, and that it should
be found acceptable in all states, so that you can go
ahead and utilize it. Maybe that is one of the things
that the federal government should do, because it appears
that the State of Pennsylvania says that dense bales is
not acceptable in Pennsylvania. But in Minnesota, it's
acceptable to put it in deep water and leave it lay there
in a swamp.
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Now if it's suitable in Minnesota, why
isn't it suitable in Pennsylvania? And if it's bad in
Pennsylvania, it should be bad in Minnesota.
MR. DeGEARE: I would like to
address the general tone of what you are getting at,
rather than the specific question in that it's something
we have been really perplexed with, and that is: What
degree of specificity do we go to at the federal level
with criteria such as we are charged with developing?
10 The problem is that we have to deal with different
11 spates and we have to deal with different level entitites
12 ] as well as the various soils and hydrogeological conditio
13 across the country. And what is accepted practice in
14 one area of the country is not necessarily the same for
15 another area.
And we are really wrestling with how specific
•|
17 I] we should deal with these criteria from a national
j
18 viewpoint.
19 MR. MEHR: That is what I was
20 saying, in the hearing part, in the part where the state
2i | can go ahead and solve their problems, that, I think
„, is federal jurisdiction.
22 ^
23 In areas where Bill Bucciarelli and his group
has done very successfully in solving problems in land
fills, it seems to be an extra cost to the federal
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government and repetition that shouldn't be done at the
2
expense of anyone. The area that you should concentrate
on in land fills is areas that are in doubt, that you
can resolve.
5
If you can do the technological work that is
6
required to prove it's safe to use bale fills, and then
standardize it so it's applicable in all states, fine,
that is great. That is something that Bill couldn't
accomplish himself because there wasn't the funds there
or the time, or whatever the reason was that they
weren't able to accomplish it.
But if it is successful in one ^tate of the
union, it ought to be fit for 50 states in the union.
If it's non-acceptable in thig state, then it's suited
for none.
MR. WILLIAMS: But you would agree
there are some things that can be done in one state and
not in another because of physical reasons?
MR. MEHR: But surface
application of shredded waste is either proven in one
state, or disproven in all, because it's on the surface
$>
everywhere. It doesn't make any difference whether it
lays on the sand or in the swamp.
MR. RAPIER: Not having the
responsibility for developing these guidelines, I can
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go ahead and state with all kinds of wisdom, it seems to
2
me under the question of jCederal pre-emption, EPA can
probably define a minimum level of standards that we
4
think are acceptable, whether it depends on climatic
situations or hydrogeologic s-ituations.
But I think I hear you raising the issue
should we insist that Pennsylvania not have whatever
criteria they want, over and above those minimum standard
MR. MEHR: You can't do that.
MR. RAPIER: Okay.
MR. MEHR: No, I don't say that.
MR. RAPIER: What you are suggestin
is we try to devise a minimum?
MR. SCHMIDT: This goes along with
my statement before of the difference between a
guideline and a regulation. In a guideline you can say
the following things, such as baling or ultra-high
density compaction, which has been shown in certain
areas to be a very fine way of getting rid of garbage.
I have seen some demonstrations where they shredded
newspaper, baled it in high density compaction, dropped
it from 30-some odd feet and it sits there. You soak it
with water, nothing happens, it just sits there ad
infinitum.
But perhaps through lack of funding or what
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not, there ia no promulgation of how good this is. And
2
19
necessarily Pennsylvania can't say, "Hey, go do it,"
unless they can be sure what they are saying, "Go do it"
has an acceptance to the environment, it does not
deteriorate it.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: I might add just a
little more to that. I am familiar with what you are
talking about. I don't think that we can say, though,
that the regulation prohibits baling per se, one thing.
The other thing is that up until now, we
had no mechanism to give us enough to try an experimentalj
1J method in our proposed regulations, which are currently
i
' ' being considered by the Environmental Quality Board.
!i We do have a mechanism whereby we think we can get
some experimental things.
1(1 The other thing I wanted to mention, this
17 did not stop us from wanting to try things. We did also '
I
18 agree to go ahead with this milling operation that you
are making reference to, like in Pompano Beach and also
20 ', Madison. However, that thing never turned out to be the
21 I true milling operation we wanted to see tested, so that
22 kind of died by atrophy as far as experiments is
concerned. It turned into a conventional system.
So we do want to try it.
Also since it is so extremely new to
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Pennsylvania, we are very, very concerned and will
probably demand a lot of the best evidence available,
best state-of-the-art on that particular methodology,
or that'particular system. And you might interpret
that as being so restrictive that it blocks it out, but
you might be right up to a point.
MR. MEHR: I wanted to take it
one further step. In our case, what happened to the
deal was that the costs grew so extensively, because of
10 I'
[i the lack of action, that you couldn't go ahead and
n i!
economically accomplish a result. And I think that that [
is going to be repeated over and over and over again. i
And I thought maybe guidelines that are there, that
can help, would help solve that problem.
" MR. SCHMIDT: In support of DER,
I might point out they did improve their regulations
for the six inch cover on fly ash. At one point, fly )
is
ash had to be celled just as regular garbage did. And
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as more experience was gotten, they did indeed remove
that restriction.
MR. BERN: I would like to ask
one question of anyone who can answer it for me. What
is the difference between a guideline and a regulation
with regard to the legal implementations? Because we
25 I have got a court.
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MR. RAPIER: A lot of our lawyers
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will say there is no difference.
MR. SCHMIDT: Legal solicitors have
pointed out the one is no argument, the other is you
can argue about considerably.
MR. BERN: Having been both an
enforcement officer, and I don't want to say polluter,
I would prefer to know what I could do.
MR. DeGEARE: The apparent
Congressional intent, as far as our guidelines are
concerned, versus the standards, criteria and regulations
which are required, is that the guidelines be more
advisory in nature and provide a discussion of options
and alternatives by which standards and criteria and
regulations can be met.
So from the viewpoint of one who is reviewing
the mandate of the law with respect to having to write
these things, that is the way I am looking at that.
From the viewpoint of an attorney or judge, I could only
guess.
MR. MEHR: Maybe when you write
that, you should have the viewpoint of an attorney or
judge before you write it.
MR. DeGEARE: We do, but decisions
in the courts hold that one judge may often view a
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situation completely different than another might, and
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you don't know the final answer until you get before the
judge.
MR. HERMAN: Don Barman, County
Works Department. Being an engineer, I won't comment
about engineers and lawyers, but it seems to me that
this particular section of the Act should be the easiest
to implement. I say that because I know the work
Bill Bucciarelli has done here in Pennsylvania with
defining an open dump versus a sanitary land fill, and
I am sure there are many other spates in the country
that have done that.
I presume that you are going to take what
the jjtates have done, and put it together, and draw from
that and come up with what EPA feels are either the
appropriate guidelines or regulations. And since there
has been so much of that work done, and it has been
proven state-to-state, I guess I go back to my statement
and ask a question: Isn't this going to be the easiest
section to implement?
MR. DeGEARE: I wouldn't disagree
that a lot of the work has been done. But we have certain
concerns as to how far a definition should go.
Now the criteria called for are, in my
viewpoint, something quite different from simply a
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84
definition which all the spates do have. And they call
2
for something more extensive than just a simple
3
definition. A criteria would imply something like
4
perhaps a limit or standard on any discharge, either
6 II
subsurface or surface, and that issue has not been
dealt with uniformly among the ^.tates , or within states
we found, especially with regard to placement of sites
relative to aquifers.
MR. MEHR: My point is there is
much more work that has been done in that area than,
say in the area of hazardous wastes. There is a lot
more to work with, and all you have got to do is find
your level, rather than try to start from scratch and
develop a whole series of parameters, and then pick a
level out of that.
MR. WILLIAMS: Probably more bad
habits to counteract in the municipal waste area than
in the hazardous waste area.
MR. MEHR: The definitions are
good.
MR. WILLIAMS: The definitions are
good, but I think the way the Act has been written, it
suggests that Congress feels, not in certain places,
but in the country as a whole, we have been handling
the municipal wastes as though they were a lot more
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benign than they were.
2
MR. ZADAN: May we go on to a
Q
new subject? I was led to believe that you would discuss
4
the restructuring of the tax structure, and what effect
that might have upon solid waste.
6
MR. DeGEARE: You might try on
7
the next guy. I know I am a hard act to follow.
8
MR. MEHR: Have you been in
9 ge^Tec
touch with Eugene Winingor of the National Solid Wastes
JQ .'VU"iyi,i« £>^.-e ;,,7~ Sr S3
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1
don't know what happenes to it as long as he is under
2
permit, yet if something bad happens, we are responsible
3
or we have the secondary liability. And I would like to
4
see in any law, something so that we don't have that
5
responsibility. That once they take it, they are the
responsible party, as long as we provide them with a
7
proper description.
And another thing, in the past we have dealt
with water and air agencies with EPA, and we find that
they seem to be concerned only with their special field,
as long as they can transfer it from a water problem to
an air problem, they don't care. And I would like to
urge you all that you don't take this problem and convert
it back to a water problem.
And you seem to have taken this, but
MR. DeGEARK: I believe you have
read the Congressional history of this law, that is one
of the primary purposes, from what we have been able to
deduce, for being in this business and having this law.
MR. MEYERS: DOT is another thing.
We had one of the samples that this gentleman alluded
to, which I tried to send a sample to Browning-Ferris,
and I couldn't get through our transportation department
to send the sample, because I couldn't describe it.
So that is a big problem
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1 MR. DeGEARE: . With regard to your
2
first question on liability, an answer was not given.
g
But that question was raised last week in Atlanta, and
4
this question was posed: Does liability transfer through
the manifest system? And we didn't have any preconceived
ideas at that time, and that is something we should
7
certainly look at, because it has been raised as a
question in other forms also.
Q
Thank you.
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MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Truett.
My schedule says that the discussion on
resource conservation is going to extend from 8:45 to
9:15, and by my watch I see it's almost 9:15. So I
thought m-aybe I would introduce you to Bob Lowe, and
move on.
No, not really, I am not going to do that.
A major thrust of the Act is, of course, the
control and the production of environmental degradation
due to the handling and disposal of various waste
materials. We have been talking here about some of the
major features of the Act for the explicit control and
reduction through the regulatory process, that is
hazardous waste measurement programs, strict regulatory
control over land disposal. But there is certainly
another and very significant aspect of the control and
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reduction of environmental degradation, and that is
2
through better management of our resources. Resource
conservation and resource recovery.
Bob Lowe, who is the Chief, Technical
Aissistance Branch, Resource Recovery Division of the
Office of Solid Waste Management is going to talk about
7
some of the significant features in the Act that touch
upon the whole resource conservation recovery aspect.
g
And he will probably talk about that tax structure
10 thing as well.
11 MR. LOWE: Thank you, Gordon.
I2 One of the major objectives of the Office
13 of Solid Waste Management is to reduce the amount of
waste requiring disposal. And there are two approaches
15 to this:
16 One is through waste reduction, and that is
reducing the. amount of waste that is generated in the
18 first place.
lfl And the second is through recycling.
20 I am going to review some of the sections in
2i the Act that address this, and provide us with the
22 authority to attempt to help the spates and the local
23 governments solve these problems.
24 There are two things I might add, one in
25 our favor and one not in our favor. The one in our
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favor, I think one of the most important incentives
2
for recycling is the development of strict criteria
3
for land disposal. The stricter the criteria for land
4
disposal, the greater the incentive to drive up the cost
of land disposal and therefore make resource recovery
more attractive.
7
The other factor working against us is the
level of funding and staffing we have to implement these
sections of the Act. We are actually in worse shape,
ii *_!_ * ^ ... 5iOix£v
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1 MR. MEHR: You can't reach them,
2 it doesn't mean a thing.
3 MR. LOWE: The President has an
4 800 number.
5 MR. MEHR: I have got letters
6 in my briefcase that are very, very nice from all these
7 people, that say, "We are sorry, we can't do a thing
8 for you."
9 MR. WILLIAMS: Not from those people,
10 the other group.
11 MR. MEHR: I wrote the
12 transition committee, and they don't know what is going
13 on. You write to Mr. Lance, he will tell you he is not
14 prepared yet.
15 MR. LOWE: I think writing to
16 Congress is effective, because your congressman, whether
17 he cares what you say or not, will write a letter to
18 an executive agency which has a certain obligation to
19 reply, and at least you get some attention.
20 MR. MEHR: Congress passed their
21 own increase and never went ahead and put a budget in
22 for you.
23 MR. LOWE: I would like to
24 review some of the sections of the Act that address
25 resource recovery and resource conservation, most of
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which are on this slide.
o
The guidelines in section 1008, which was
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mentioned earlier by Truett, call for, among other
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guidelines, for recycling.
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Section 2003 calls for -- I use the section
numbers for you who are bureaucratically oriented out
there, and really don't know how to think in terms of
concepts. The resource recovery and conservation
panels, the technical assistance -- that is a very
selective insult, you know, resource recovery and
conservation panels, which I will get into in a moment,
subtitle D, which includes the definition "requirements
^
for land disposal programs and statewide planning,"
requires that jrtate plans address resource recovery.
One thing that is not up here is section 6002,
federal procurement guidelines. We are obligated to
write guidelines to require the federal purchasing
agencies to review, and if necessary change their
purchase specifications to, in the long run, help
create markets for secondary materials. Now specifically
to remove any provisions that forbid the use of
secondary materials in products purchased by the
government, and more positively to encourage the increase
of recycled material in products purchased by the
government, resource recovery and conservation, is
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called for infection 8003, "information dissemination",
which Tom Williams covered earlier. And in all the 8000
section, 8002, 4, 5 and 6, all those are oriented toward
studies and demonstrations, which I will get to a little
bit in a moment.
Section 8002 calls for special studies in a
variety of areas, each of which requires a report to
Congress, which is the closest thing we come to a
specific mandate, unfortunately. One thing I would like
to put some emphasis on here is that the inclusion of
the small-scale, low technology, front end separation
items on here, that refers to source separation. For
those of you who are not familiar with that, that is
where the home owner or office or industry segregates
certain recyclable materials from all of the rest of
the waste, and directs it through separate collection
channels, back to a recycler. This is going to get
considerable emphasis. It has been getting some emphasis
and it's going to get more.
Section 8002(j) calls for the establishment
of a resource conservation committee, which is a cabinet
level committee. It's composed of the Administrator
of EPA and several cabinet secretaries, and a
representative of the Office of Management and Budget.
I find great irony in that that a mere representative of
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the Office of Management and Budget, who would be a
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representative at my level, is the equivalent of a
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secretary, for example.
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The establishment of this committee is good
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and bad. In a sense it's bad because it recommends more
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study, and therefore any further legislation in the
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areas of economic incentives and so on now is postponed
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for three years until the studies are complete.
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Obviously you can't do something if somebody
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is studying it.
On the other hand, this is the first time
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that studying of this nature has been brought into the
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administration. In the past, there were special
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| commissions, there have been about four or five, I think,
since 1950, special commissions for this purpose, all of
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which were more easily ignored than hopefully what this
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cabinet will do. And I guess the law comes at a good
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time, because we have a brand new cabinet and the
studies can be completed while these people are still in
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office, at least while the President is still in office.
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Some of the issues which this committee is
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authorized and required to investigate are Ixsted up
23 here. The existing public policy item on here I think
24 addresses the gentleman from GASP's questions directly.
25 This includes depletion allowance for timber, et cetera.
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I think I will go on, because we are running
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a little behind. I can take questions for this later,
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if you want.
The resource recovery conservation panels,
which is the part I am concerned with most directly,
even though it has the name "resource recovery and
conservation", it includes not only those areas, but
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also all of solid waste management, land disposal and
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hazardous waste management.
The resource recovery panels are a form of
11 technical assistance, which is bureaucratic language for
information and consulting and advice provided free of
13 charge by the federal government to whoever wants it.
Some of the purposes of this technical
15 assistance are to help ^tates design and implement
16 regulatory programs, and I think that addressed your
17 question earlier. Also to help state and local
18 governments develop alternatives to land disposal, such
19 as resource recovery systems.
20 The panels will be composed of — are
21 required to be composed of specialists in the following
22 fields; Technical, marketing, financial and institutiona
23 The teams will be composed of EPA staff people,
24 consultants under contract to EPA, and state and local
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local officials through a concept we call "peer matching.
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Through grants to national organizations of public
officials, such as the National Association of Counties,
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National League of Cities, and so on.
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Let me just clarify one thing: The word
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"panels", which is written into the law, I find that to
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be a misnomer. At least I am not interpreting it the
way the word is generally accepted. The word "panel"
is generally interpreted to mean a fixed unit of
individuals, maybe four individuals who work as a
unit and travel as a unit, and when called upon, would
go as a unit to a given city and sit down with the
officials in that city.
I don't see it working there. I see it more
as a pool of resources, or a stable, as some people
refer to it, where we have a list of people with all
kinds of expertise and all kinds of background who can
be provided as appropriate to anyone who asks for
assistance and meets our requirements, meets our
criteria for assistance. So that in any given situation,
we may send just one person, someone from our staff,
or we may extend a consultant or something like that.
The Act requires that 20 percent of the
general authorization be spent on technical assistance
programs. That could be 20 percent of a fairly small
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number, however, and that 20 percent could be accounted
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for in a variety of ways, and if you recognize the
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existence of creative accounting, it could be smaller,
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and I think it could happen to us here.
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An important issue within the agency, some
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of you may have some opinion on, is: What will be the
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relative emphasis that EPA places on regulations, on the
one hand, as a means of improving solid waste management
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and protecting the environment, regulation on one hand,
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versus non-regulatory subjects, such as recovery?
There is a tendency to pick the regulatory. We are
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concerned that the non-regulatory aspect not be
forgotten.
Now I have a few questions which reflect
some of the things we are trying to deal with now.
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Maybe I should wait on them for just a minute to see if
17 there are any questions from the floor, or any opinions
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from the floor on what I already said.
19 MR. HERMAN: Don Berman, Allegheny
20 County Works. First as a comment, you said that if
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somebody is going to study something, you can't do
22 something until the study is over. I just beg to differ
23 with you; we have got one local government in Allegheny
24 County who is doing three things at once. They are
25 preparing a RFB for a recovery system, they have got a
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study to get decided, and they are getting some money
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to get a solid waste management plan. So they are
doing all three things at once.
But in your investigations of front end
separation, I don't know if you are going to do this or
not, but I think it would be appropriate if you also
looked into the availability of the kinds of trucks,
the packers that are going to pick that material up if
it is separated. Now there is no sense in the home
owner separating, and then putting it all together in
the back of a 20 yard packer.
The truck industry has got to do something
to be able to move that material from its source where
its separated, to a resource recovery center. And I have
not seen anything like that major come along from the
industry.
MR. LOWE: Thank you.
Mr. Mehr?
MR. MEHR: Harold Mehr. One of
the reasons why you can't do that. Doctor, is because
in section 7008(b) it says, "Prohibition. No grant may
be made under this act to any private profit making
organization." And industry is not going to experiment
for the benefit of the public at a cost to itself, without
some subsidy or something that will help it along.
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So what you have actually done in the Act is
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put in a restraint which makes it impossible for industry
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to do what you want it to do.
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MR. HERMAN: My point is if you
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are going to have source separation, there has to be a
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truck available to move it. Don't forget that
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transportation item in your look at source separation,
that's all.
MR. LOWE: Tom, did you have
a comment?
MR. WILLIAMS: I would like to expand
what the second gentleman said. When we say "industry"
we are speaking about all different organizations doing
all kinds of things. One very influential segment of
industry claims that if we can recycle all these wastes
so well that we shouldn't be concerned about waste
reduction, the beverage container legislation and other
things of that sort.
Now the same industry that says we can recycle
so well, seems to me should be willing to --
MR. MEHR: Alcoa is making a
profit with the aluminum, but the guy that goes ahead
and makes the truck isn't going to profit from it.
MR. WILLIAMS: He will if the large
cities see a need to go to source separation, they can
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certainly ask for the proper kind of truck.
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MR. MEHR: Let me tell you
where, there is a weakness in your thinking. There are
two organizations that spend a tremendous amount of
money on resource recovery in the solid waste field.
One was very successful, one failed miserably.
If you take a look at the Saugus,
Massachusetts success versus the Baltimore failure, you
will find the reason the Baltimore failure was so
successful was that the public regulations that went
ahead and put in the bidding made them underbid the
project in Baltimore, and it failed because it was
under bid and wasn't built properly.
The reason why it was successful in Saugus
was that they went ahead and put in the redundancy that
was required at a cost to private enterprise who saw
the need, but wasn't hampered by regulation.
What I am trying to say is that you have
built into your regulations already, the things that
hamper, the things that Dr. Herman finds is so necessary,
you see, to succeed.
MR. WILLIAMS: No, I am sorry, sir,
there is nothing in the Act that prohibits a city or
any private industry from using any kind of truck it
wants to to collect and take wastes away for recycling.
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And if you are saying that EPA has had very successful
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failures, I could only agree.
MR. MEHR: I am saying o_ Mack
truck could do R & D on units they know will sell hundreds
and thousands of units, and will be reluctant to put
in the requirements to take care of the specific need
that Dr. Herman feels is essential, and we know is
necessary, but you don't find it profitable to do
without some kind of incentive that tells you to go ahead
and do it, because the need is there.
Eventually they may find the market is large
enough, but at present, the market analysis proves that
it's a waste of dollars to go ahead and do the
experimentation.
You won't get it. You may not get it for 20
or 30 more years.
MR. LOWE: Let me make a few
comments to respond to, there were about eight points
that were exchanged in the interchange. One, we do
recognize that the transportation link is essential to
the channel, and we are already working on that to some
extent.
With response to Mr. Mehr's comments, we
can promote, we are authorized to promote the development
of new kinds of equipment under the demonstration section
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of the Act. We can provide grants to municipalities for
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the purchase of new kinds of equipment. We can provide
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contracts to private industry, we can enter into new
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contracts with private industry for the development of
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new technology. That's all if we have the money.
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So the law does provide us with that avenue
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of stimulating the R & D in the private sector, if we
find the private sector is not going to take the ball
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themselves.
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You mentioned the failure of the Baltimore
project. And you mentioned that the procurement
restrictions, the local procurement restrictions had a
lot to do with that.
The procurement restrictions of most spates
and cities are not suited to the purchase of resource
recovery systems, because most procurement regulations
are suited to systems that don't involve such great
amounts of money, and such high risk, and therefore are
not suited. We recognize that.
We are going to be working, and part of our
technical assistance program will be oriented toward
helping states and local governments recognize this as
a problem, and then hopefully change their laws, or
at least their procedures to deal with this better. And
in that sense, the Baltimore facility was a success.
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The Baltimore project was a success because
it pointed that out.
MR. MEHR: $16 million worth
of success that isn't used or can't be used successfully
right now? That is a success? I would like to see your
failures .
MR. LOWE: I just said it was in
that respect. I resent cheap shots like that, when you
9 tend to generalize.
1° MR. MEHR: I didn't mean it as
11 a cheap shot.
12 MR. LOWE: All right. Technicall
13 it was a failure, but I would rather have one failure
14 at the federal government's expense, rather than one
15 failure at the local taxpayer's level where more people
16 can get hurt.
17 MR. BLUMCRBK-! Harold Bl
18 Northwest Engineering. You made one opening comment,
19 probably a small point, but you said one way to make
20 resource recovery more attractive was to make stiffer
21 regulations for land fills. I think probably as long
22 as the regulations make environmentally sound land fills,
23 that is probably not too good of a point to make,
24 especially for many rural areas that don't have the
25 amount of solid waste necessary to attempt to even make
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a try at resource recovery.
So I think that if you are looking at that
for a possibility of implementation, or stressing
resource recovery, that the small municipalities , or
relatively rural areas should be given some kind of
consideration because of their small wastes.
MR. WILLIAMS: May I comment on
8 tnat, Bob?
9 MR. LOWE: Sure.
10 MR. WILLIAMS: First, I don't believe
11
Mr. Lowe intended to say that anybody favors tight
12 regulations of disposal simply to encourage resource
13 recovery. It's just a by-product of that.
The reason for encouraging better disposal
15 practices are to protect the public health and
16 environment.
P>J~0o-r>i°ie<£t,'
MR. HI.UMGREH: I am saying if the
18 land fills are adequate at the present regulations,
19 then perhaps the regulations should be different.
20 MR. WILLIAMS: I think also we will
21 see, in the next five years or so, that the situation
22 with regard to small towns and rural areas is not
23 necessarily so positioned against resource recovery,
24 as we now tend to think. We tend to think too much in
25 terms of a large technological system, such as the
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Baltimore 1?ui Allfchlrfe— and some others.
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And actually some little work that has been
done recently by the WildCLife Federation, in looking
into some activities going on in rural areas, suggest
that there are tremendous possibilities, considering the
relatively small problems they have, for recovering
materials in rural areas.
Also, it's interesting in the discussion we
had a while ago about trucks, the manufacturers will
build what there is a market for. One of the ironies
to me is that while most people will concede that
recovering resources or separating resources, like
separating aluminum cans is probably a cheaper and a
better way to recycle huge quantities of material, if
you leavp out the thing of energy production, just the
materials to be used again, that almost none of it is
going on. And where it is going on is a couple of towns
in Massachusetts, small communities which the Resource
recovery division of EPA has given a grant to.
And I don't know why that can't be done in
large cities, such as Chicago and Philadelphia and
others, with a little imagination and a little risk
taking.
By the way, I hope you don't mind my talking.
This is supposed to be a discussion, I am a citizen also.
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Actually we ought to be sitting in a circle,
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this is a very bad arrangement, we sit here like judges.
I don't apologize for opening my mouth, I
just wanted you to know it's legal.
MR. LOWE: I would like to
apologize to Mr. Mehr for pouncing on you. In my
experience at these public meetings, you are one of the
most informed of all the people who have attended, and
we appreciate that very much, so I am sorry for what I
said.
MR. MEHR: I am sorry too, I
didn't mean to make it as a cheap shot. It was just
information.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: I would like to speak
as a citizen too.
MR. LOWE: Would you care to
move down there, please?
(Laughter.)
MR. BUCCIARELLI: Taking up what this
gentleman brought up here, in fact I was going to do it
there for a second, I agree if you are going to define
land fills in such a restrictive sense with your idea
being to drive attention toward resource recovery and
away from land filling, the only thing you are going to
do is drive us up a wall, for one thing.
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Secondly, after all, no matter what recovery
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system you have, you must have supplemental or supportive
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land fills for those items that cannot be recovered,
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number 1.
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And number 2, you must have the land fill as
a back-up system. There is no other methodology that
could act as a back-up system. So I don't think that
that would be a proper way of trying to encourage resourc
recovery.
As far as the rural area is concerned, one of
the things that we attempt to do in rural areas, is to
first centralize solid waste systems, then work and
phase in resource recovery over time.
And I agree with Tom here that there are
certain elements of resource recovery that you can
build in terms of separating maybe metal and that kind
of thing initially, but they are having a difficult time
supporting the cheapest alternative in solid waste
technology, and that is land fill, much less even
consider going into resource recovery.
MR. LOWE: I have a couple of
questions that reflect some of the issues that we are
trying to deal with. I don't know if I will have time
to get answers on this. I am not sure if you have ever
thought of this before, but we would appreciate it if
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you could give it some thought and let me know, either
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telephone me or write me, or telephone or write to
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Mr. Rapier's staff in region 3.
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Assuming that we do not have enough resources
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in our technical assistance program to help everybody
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who comes in with a request, how do we prioritize the
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requests? Which communities do we work with, and which
ones don't we work with?
Do we do it on the basis of the most tonnage,
or the basis of the most critical environmental problems,
or the basis of those communities most likely to succeed?
If we do it on the basis of most tonnage, that
means we will work with New York first, Los Angeles
second, Chicago third, Philadelphia fourth and so on,
and won't be able to help small communities.
If we do it on the basis of the most critical
environmental problems, then we are discriminating
against the communities that want to implement resource
recovery, let's say, or something else in the solid
waste management system, who are already doing a good
job and don't have a severe environmental problem, becaus
they are doing a good job. Or do we work with the
communities most likely to succeed, in which case we
don't necessarily help those who have the most critical
environmental problem, nor are we building the statistics
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that justify our existence in a bureaucracy. So that
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is one of the questions.
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Another thing, should technical assistance
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be given to a few states and governments in an in-depth
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way, in other words, give them all the help we can to
a few cities, or do we go an inch deep and a mile wide,
giving a little bit of help to as many cities as we
can get to? And that means without the kinds of
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follow-up to make sure our information is being
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understood.
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Also, what criteria should EPA use in
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evaluating resource conservation options, such as
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incentives, product regulations, that kind of thing?
Should we focus on those measures that address total
overall pollution, or resource scarcity, or employment
impacts, or balance of payment impacts? And there are
a bunch of others.
Those are the kinds of questions we are
dealing with now, and anybody who has an opinion on
that, I would love to hear it.
MR. STRONG: I come from an area
which is relatively rural. It seems to me one other
criteria for deciding who you would help first would be
to select the areas with the greatest level of ignorance,
and there would be your in-depth impact, whereas if you
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look at a larger urban center that has engineering
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support with in-house in those areas, maybe there would
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only need be a light level of support.
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I know in our areas, we have a county engineer
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who has to do everything from surveying bridges, to
designing swings in the park.
He tries to be knowledgeable, but again, he
could, you know, use quite a bit of support. I know
he is interested in this area, whereas perhaps in a
larger area where you have 20 engineers instead of one
engineer, maybe you have an engineer for park swings in
some areas, that the level of support there might not
be necessarily as intense.
MR. LOWE: Thank you, that is
a good point. Although I don't know, I am trying to
picture the words in which we announce the winners of
our technical assistance, those least able to help
themselves.
MR. BERN: In my opinion, the
government should not go into any resource recovery
concept that could be successful on its own, that is
already economically successful, because it will happen
anyhow with private capital.
MR. MEHR: I am going to go
against that.
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MR. MEHR: I think Japan has
proven to the world that federal assistance to private
enterprise for solving problems is really the only
intelligent route to take.
MR. LOWE-. Excuse me, could we
clarify what kind of assistance you are talking about?
MR. MEHR: Money to give private
enterprise an ability to succeed in an area that is so
risky it won't run the risk. Japan is one of the few
nations in the world that actually goes ahead and backs
private enterprise to a dollar and cents amount, and
succeeds.
I think this is a miserable failure in the
United States, where we are afraid to take dollars and
give it to the individual who has the greatest opportunity
for success in using those dollars to succeed. I think
what we should do is insist when this is done, that we
have a revolving credit type of system, you make money,
you pay back your debt, you understand. You lose your
tail, you are insured. This is sort of like an ex-ira
bank type of arrangement, where if you go to a country
and they expropriate your investment, the government
insures it.
Let's put on some type of guarantees that help
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private enterprise, risk takers to take those
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unreasonable risks to make something successful. Then
if he succeeds, make him pay back the debt at 2 percent
interest or 3 percent interest, and reinvest it on
somebody else.
I think you are wasting your money the way
you are doing it now. I think Japan has proven they
can succeed where we failed.
MR. WILLIAMS: Our vested interest
representative didn't say anything that you refuted. He
said the government ought to put it in on those that
private industry couldn't do it on.
MR. MEHR: How do you know?
MR. BERN: Secondary metal,
for instance, secondary fibers.
MR. MEHR: How about oxides?
In secondary metals, there are dozens of metallic oxides
that are hazardous, that get put into land fills, and
we close our eyes to these things and they seep into
the water systems and bust our spleens and reduce our
liver to jelly, and all this sort of stuff. And we
don't spend the money to solve the problem, but you
pretend it isn't there.
MR. BER"4: I happen to be private
enterprise.
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MR. LOWE: Could I recognize
Dr. Herman?
MR. HERMAN: If somebody calls me
doctor one more time, I am going to spit. It's
Don Herman, Director Herman.
The Lord may strike me dead with a
thunderbolt, because I am a member of a government agency
too, but I have been in Washington twice on this Act:
Once before it was passed and once after it was passed.
My comment, along with other government officials, was,
"Uncle Sam, keep your construction rates." All it's
going to do is slow us down. Help us with technical
assistance, help us do what we have to do, but keep your
money.
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15 I agree that industry should be paid for what
16 they do, but I don't think that money ought to come from
17 Washington. I think that money ought to come from mv
18 pocket and everybody else in Allegheny County, and if
19 the company moves in here and makes a profit, let them
20 pay it back to us.
21 MR. MKHR: How about the little
22 guy who doesn't have the dollars. One of the little
23 fellows in Japan, started out as a little fellow like
24 me and learned how to reclaim zinc successfully, and it
25 took $4 million to get him started.
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I am not talking about Wheelabrater-Frye or
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General Motors, I am talking about a little guy who
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can't get an idea off the ground, who is not General
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Motors.
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MR. LOWE: Just in response
to that discussion, let me clarify what the law does
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provide and doesn't provide. It does provide funding
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for planning, it provides financial assistance for
9 planning, both at the s^tate level and at the local
level. It also provides technical assistance, which
obviously is just for planning.
It does not provide for an'' construction or
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purchase of land, with the one exception of a
demonstration project, in which case that is technology
that in our judgment would not be done otherwise, which
16 is essentially what this gentleman recommended.
17 The issue of loan guarantees and construction
18 subsidies, generally a lot of people testified just
19 the way Mr. Herman did, and for that reason, the
20 Congress rejected them, even though there was great
21 support from, what do you call it "pork barreling" or
22 whatever the term is in Congress.
23 Okay, I see the hook coming.
24 Thank you.
25 MS. RAPIER: Thank you, Bob.
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I wonder if we could have just one last
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short presentation by Truett. Can you do it in ten
minutes, Truett? Will you try?
Truett is going to talk about state program
development issues.
MR. DeGEARE: The Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act recognizes that the major
roles in solid waste management lie with state and
local government. This is especially evident in
subtitle D.
^
The state may play a key role in limiting
open dumps, and also administering a hazardous waste
program. The governor, in consultation with local
elected officials, can structure a mechanism for
preparing and implementing solid waste plans that build
on existing efforts at the state and local levels. At
the federal level, the Administrator will publish
guidelines for identification of regions, j^tate plans
and state hazardous waste programs.
Section 4002 (a) of RCRA gives the Administrate
six months to publish guidelines for the identification
of those areas which have common solid waste problems,
and are appropriate units for planning regional solid
waste services. That is the kickoff of the three step
process, I believe taking 18 months.
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Within six months of those guidelines, the
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governor of each ^.tate, after consultation with local
elected officials, will promulgate regulations
identifying the boundaries of each area within the state
which, as a result of urban concentration, geographic
conditions, markets and other factors is appropriate
for carrying out regional solid waste management services
The §_tate then has another six months to
jointly, with the appropriate elected officials of local
government, identify an agency to develop the state
plan and identify one or raore agencies to implement the
plan and identify which solid waste functions will,
under the plan be planned for and carried out by state,
regional and local authority, or a combination thereof.
Where feasible, agencies designated under
section 208 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act,
will be considered for designation.
So the three step process is kicked uo by
our promulgating guidelines on identification of planning
areas. The governors and local officials then identify
the planning areas, and thirdly the governors and local
officials identify the respective roles of the
entities involved.
Section 4002 (b) requires the TVdministrator,
after consultation with appropriate federal, state and
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local authorities, to promulgate regulations containing
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guidelines to assist in the development and implementatioi
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of state solid waste plans. This is due in April of
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1978.
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The Act provides minimum requirement for
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approval of _state plans, which include the identification
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of responsibilities in implementing the s^tate plan, the
distribution of any federal funds to the approoriate
authority responsible for implementing the plan, and
means for coordinating regional planning and iraplementaticfn.
The prohibition of the establishment of new
open dumps within the state and requirements that all
solid waste, including solid waste originating in other
states, shall be utilized for resource recovery or
disposed of in sanitary land fills. Provision for the
closinq or upgrading of all existing open dumps within
the state, provision that no local government within the
state shall be prohibited under state or local law from
entering into long-term contracts for supply of solid
waste to resource recovery facilities. Disposal of
solid waste and sanitary land fills, or any combination
of practices as necessary to use or dispose of the solid
waste in a manner that is environmentally sound. RCRA
authorizes assistance to state and local governments in
a number of places. Section 4008(a)(l) authorizes
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1 $30 million for 1978 and $40 million for 1979 for grants
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to states to be distributed to ^tate, local, regional
and interstate authorities carrying out the planning and
implementation of the state plan, as discussed earlier.
This money would be distributed among the states on
a population basis, except that each state receives
one-half of one percent of the total available.
Section 4008 (a) (2) authorizes $15 million
each of the fiscal years 1978 and 1979 for ^tates,
counties, municipalities and inter-municipal agencies
and state and local public solid waste disposal
authorities for implementation of programs to provide
solid waste management services.
The assistance can include assistance for
facility planning and feasibility studies, expert
consultation, surveys and analyses of market needs,
marketing of recovered resources, technology assessments,
legal expenses, construction feasibility studies, source
separation projects and fiscal or economic investigations
or studies. But the assistance cannot include any other
element of construction or any acquisition of land or
land interests, or any subsidy for the price of recovered
resources.
There is also a provision for assistance to
what are identified as special communities. Funding is
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relatively low, and only/such community is allowed per
state and one project per state, and the project must
be consistent with the s^tate plan.
There is a special provision for rural
communities in order to assist them in meeting the
requirements of section 4005 dump closure requirements.
These funds would be provided in the form of grants to
spates, and could include construction, but not land
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There are specific criteria and distribution
formulas for distribution of funds in the s_tate provided
in the law. And one important is that all these "gee
whiz" figures on dollars authorized are simoly figures
on dollars authorized. They in no way reflect any money
available now, or necessarily in the future.
So with regard to funding potentials, if you
are doing something constructive now, don't stop and
wait for federal funding.
^
Do you have any thoughts or suggestions
relative to our encouraging jitate and local program
development as consistent with the new law?
MR. MATTHEWS: Jack Matthews, citizen
of Allegheny County.
As a non-engineer, how can I find out the
"state of the art" of certain of the programs that have
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been described, the Baltimore program, the Sauqus,
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Massachusettes program?
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Secondly, how can I find out how Allegheny
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County stacks up with comparable counties throughout
the country?
And third, if I should discover that it's
not moving as rapidly as I would like it to, how do I
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go about getting it to move a little bit more rapidly?
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I find it extremely difficult to get information.
It seems to me that one of the services that
should be provided by someone would be providing access
to information to novices like myself who want to do
13 an intelligent job as a citizen.
14 MR. DeGEARE: We try to do that,
15 provide that kind of information. In fact, Tom Williams'
16 office is intimately involved in that. We disseminate
17 that information through our headquarters office, as
18 well as the regional office, and the sj;ate solid waste
19 management office.
20 MR. MATTHEWS: How can the citizen
21 ultimately get a hold of it?
22 MR. DeGEARE: The most direct way
23 is to correspond with us, with the js.tate agency or our
24 regional office, ask the question, and we will do the
25 best we can to answer it.
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We have funded in the past, studies and
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demonstrations, and we have some experience ourself. And
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we can draw on our experience, as well as that of jstate
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agencies, to provide answers as best we can.
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We don't always have the answers, but we will
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do all we can to provide them. I think we have a pretty
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good track record in terms of response.
MR. BERMAN: Would a bibliography
help the gentleman, the free literature?
MR. DeGEARE: We have a lot of
publications that we have developed, and Tom again works
in distribution of this material. We have compiled a
bibliography of available information materials, which
includes publications as well as training films and
slide shows which are available to the public. And in
fact, if you would like to give me your name and address,
when I get back to Washington, I will send you a copy of
that bibliography which serves as a key to what we do
have.
We can also run a computer search for
literature in our computerized retrieval system, and
again that is initiated simply by request to us or to
the regional office.
MR. MATTHEWS: On the local scene,
who would be the key person that would be encouraged to
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move along these lines, or is there no one key person?
MR. DeGEARE: Can anyone in this
room address that? I can't speak for the local situation
MR. BERMAN: I can answer that
situation. The three county commissioners and the
elected officials in 129 local governments, that is the
key .
I will give you my telephone number, and we
can talk about it tomorrow or the next day.
MR. DeGEARE: Okay, I know of no
place that you can get the assessment of the relative
status of this county, you know, with other counties.
MR. MEHR: Would it be terribly
expensive for the federal government, through the
Environmental Protection Agency, to send a monthly
package of information to district libraries or public
libraries in all municipalities?
MR. WILLIAMS: I would like to
comment on that. I am glad we have a real citizen here,
by the way, sir. Glad you came.
I would like to make an editorial comment
before I answer your question. That is that we have a
marvelous system in this country, in my opinion, and
citizens just don't use it well enough. You have a
local government -- except in Texas, I don't know whether
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they have them — but in other places they have local
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governments, county governments, state governments
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and ^federal governments, and I think through any of
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those means you can get all kinds of information on
all kinds of problems. You really can.
I think you would be surprised if you would
go to your authorized local government information
office, the public works or whoever, and you would be
surprised at how much information you can get. And they
can tap jstate information sources, or they can tap the
regions and they can tap the headquarters. And there is
a lot of effort that goes on to try to make it possible
for the citizens to participate in and influence what
happens in his tax dollars.
Insofar as libraries are concerned, the
information that Truett DeGeare referred to a while ago,
not only can you obtain our own literature, but abstracts
of the world's literature free, anything written almost
anyplace in the world, we abstract at the taxpayers'
expense and make those abstracts available to anybody who
wants them, no matter who the person is.
I don't have the list of libraries with me,
but there are a great number of libraries throughout the
country in whose system we participate, so to speak.
You can go to many libraries and receive the same
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searches and receive solid waste information.
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We routinely make it available to them.
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I don't have a list, but I could get it.
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MR. BERN: How about the Federal
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Repository Library at the University of Pittsburgh?
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MR. MEHR: But it's not in public
libraries, that is why I was saying if that could be
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sent. Federal repositories are just special individual
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universities who carry them.
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MR. DeGEARE: We have a question
back here.
MR. LARUE: Dennis Lajrue. As a
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reporter, and my paper is more or less a specialist on
environmental problems, I find that I have to study and
concentrate pretty hard on many of these publications
which you say are accessible to the taxpayer, and I
17 try to put these into language which the general public
I Q
can understand, provided, of course, I can understand
it myself first. I think the publications, while they
20 will never be as interesting as "Playboy" or "Penthouse"
21 or "Hustler" they could be written more so that I could
22 understand it, and the people that I write for can
23 understand it.
2J I know tonight, I think I am fairly well
25 versed in solid waste land fills to a degree, I am not an
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1 'expert as many of the others are here, but I have had
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trouble following what is going on tonight. I know you
people understand it, and I am going to ask that you
stay afterwards tonight so that I can go through the
points that I don't understand, so for tomorrow's
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what we are talking about.
You people are intelligent, you know what
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paper, I can write and the people who read it will know
understand it.
MR. WILLIAMS: I would like to
comment on that comment.
MR. DeGEARE: There is a fellow who
just moved into our bureaucracy who had a similar comment
about that.
MR. WILLIAMS: I don't know whether
you are talking about all of EPA, but if you are talking
about the Office of Solid Waste Ma-mrqumtiiiL-, you are
mistaken because we do put everything out in very
accessible form for anyone. We have gone to the great
trouble of putting together all kinds of information,
complicated information on recycling, on source reduction
on how this relates to disposal problems and so on, in
five and six page brochures which is a lot of very hard
work, I might say, to put it out that way. We put out
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a popular pamphlet on hazardous wastes.
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But after all, these are bureaucrats and
technocrats who have a very complicated law to enact,
and it's almost no matter how hard we try, the citizen
who cares and wants to learn something about it is going
to have to learn something.
And I have been in the public information
business in the fjederal government almost since the
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element of this program. And that is one of the reasons,
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quite frankly, that I think the public education elements
will be the least successful.
There aren't too many people, other than this
gentleman, who are in this room solely because they are
citizens. In fact, I am surprised there is one, quite
frankly. And the public is not interested. I don't say
that disparagingly, they have got their problems and
they don't care, except that it hurts them in the
pocketbook.
And that is a very valid position to take,
and it's difficult to explain to somebody who is in
the field all the implications about tax rates and
freight rates and Monsanto and Saugus and the CPU400.
It doesn't come out nicely.
MR. DeGEARE: Would you explain the
CPU400 to me, please?
MR. HERMAN: I have been in the
field a long time, and I still don't understand it.
MR. BERN: Joe Bern. As a
researcher, in trying to write a doctoral disse/ation
on solid waste, I have taken advantage of the literature
and I can only comment on what Tom said, that the range
of literature embraces the whole field from a simple
4-page brochure to a 1200-page technical report, of which
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trying to establish land fills in places where there
aren't any.
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I can use each one. But for public information in
solid waste, it is difficult unless it is emotional,
and I have been involved in the emotional things too,
MR. WILLIAMS: We have a coloring
book that was a best seller at the GPO for many months.
And even the GPO can be a profit making organization.
We produced this coloring book at about 23 cents per
copy, and GPO was selling it for 75 cents because they
were getting rid of so many copies that way.
And this coloring book, I might say, covers
more than solid waste management. It addresses many
aspects of the entire environmental protection issues,
and I think it's a testimony to some bunch of school
teachers or somebody that they care enough about them
to use them.
Let me say, however, we have a representative
of the government, we have a representative of the
private sector, and in some ways there is nothing vrong
with the fact that there is a diversity here and in
our other meetings, who represent various organizations,
whose various organizations, in a sense, serve the
public too. We can't talk directly to 220 million
people, even if they were willing to listen to us and
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we were willing to listen to them.
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So I wouldn't dispair the system. I think
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the public can rest secure that the manufacturing
c,hemists association and the power industry and automobil
5 industry and the packaging industry are going to be
6 representing them at meetings such as this. They can
7 also rest assured there are going to be some
8 environmentalists here, consumer advocates and others
9 who will make sure the federal and sjtate bureaucrats
10 don't go too far one way or the other.
11 Let me say also I think the public, who we
12 sometimes think doesn't care, has, in my opinion, and
13 I have been in the business as I say for a long, long
14 time, that the general public has been right more
15 consistently than any of the rest of us have been about
16 environmental issues.
17 They have not trusted the sanitary land fill,
18 and they have been proven right recently. They thought
19 air pollution was bad for you before we could prove it.
20 They thought that the water was polluted before we
21 could walk on it, and
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public has not often been wrong environmentally, in
my book.
MR. RAPIER: Well, ladies and
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gentlemen, I want to thank you very much. This is the
end of our presentation.
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I hope you can see from the character of the
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presentations that we are nowhere near to the point
where we have promulgated the first guideline or
regulation or standard, so that we are truly here on
the front end with all of the people that we can get
together with us to discuss highlights of the new Act,
2 hopefully in language that everybody can understand it.
1 ^
If you want to stay, we will stay and chat
with you so you can make your edition tomorrow.
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We are soliciting your participation and
your support of the program that we are trying to
17 implement. I think it's a very important program to
18 close the loop on that sink in which we can put residuals
19 and incidentally one gentleman mentioned here about
20 putting things in the air, well, I represent the air
21 program as well as the solid waste program and the
22 radiation program in our regional office, so really what
we are trying to do is balance the total environmental
24 program so that we don't degrade one thing more than
25 another, to the extent we can do so.
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Now I am told that there are no 3 by 5 cards
filled out for people that want to make statements, but
let me just ask again, last call, are there any written
statements or any oral comments that anybody wishes to
make? If so, please raise their hand?
Are there any general comments or discussions
that anybody else wishes to make?
MR. BERMAN: Godspeed.
MR. RAPIER: Hearing none, I would
like to close the meeting and thank you very much for
coming out.
(10:15 hearing concluded.)
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1
HNITED STATES OF A.MFRIC>\
2
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
S
7
In the Matter of:
Public Particination Meeting,
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
6
Transcript of Proceedings in the above-entitled
matter, held on Tuesday, "larch 1, 1977, commencing
10 at 9:00 o'clock a.m. in the Monongahela Room, William
Penn Hotel, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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Gordon Rapier, Director, Air and Hazardous
Materials Division, EPA, Region ITI
Moderator
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BEFORE:
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5PEAKERS•
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Thomas Williams, Chief, Technical Information and
Communications Branch, Office of
Solid Waste Management, EP\
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Truett DeCeare, Chief, Land Promotion Branch,
Systems Management Division, office
of. Solid Waste Management,
Alfred Lindsey,Chief, Implementation Branch,
Hazardous Waste Manaaement Division
Office of Solid T-'aste Management, KP
Robert Lowe, Chief, Technical Assistance Branch,
Resource Recovery Division, DPA
of Solid Waste Management, F.PA
William Bucciarelli, Director, Pennsylvania State
Solid Waste Program
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!1 1 2 £ E 5. P. L i .1 !L
MR. RAPIER: Ladies and gentlemen,
good morning this beautiful, snowy day in downtown
Pittsburgh. Welcome. I am Gordon Rapier, Director of
the Air and Hazardous Materials Division, Region III,
EPA in Philadelphia. With me are members of our
regional staff, which I will introduce shortly, and
representatives from the Office of Solid Waste in
Washington, D.C.
The purpose of the meeting today is to explain
the provisions of the new Resource Conservation and
Recovery Act which was signed into law in October, 1976.
You should all have copies of the Act and other hand-outs
If not, or if you have not registered yet, please
arrange to do so at the reception desk.
The new law might more appropriately be
called the "Solid Waste Disposal Act" since it deals
with all aspects of solid waste management, including
land disposal of solid and liquid wastes and the
management of hazardous or chemical wastes.
The Act includes provision for maximum public
participation in writing the guidelines so we are here
to receive your comments and answer questions about
various aspects of the law.
In passing this new Act, Congress intended
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that the full range of disposal methods for unwanted
materials be regulated. In prior years, we have had
laws regulating disposal in the air, water, and the ocean
and now this bill will regulate land disposal for the
first time at the federal level. The law encourages
C-'
the states to take over the administration of the program
Your views of this should be conveyed to your state
officials.
Following are a few of the crucial areas of
implementation where we feel that your views and guidance
are most critical:
Number 1 precisely how should "hazardous
waste" be defined? Since much of the damage from
hazardous wastes occurs before they reach treatment,
storage and land fill disposal facilities, and since the
Act focuses only on upgrading land disposal facilities
to take care of those wastes which fall outside the
"hazardous waste" definition, it is clear that how
hazardous wastes are defined is a critical element in
implementing the Act.
Number 2 in which ways, if any, would the
definition of hazardous waste have a bearing on the
states' willingness to take over responsibility for the
program, which under the Act, is not mandatory but of
course highly desirable?
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Number 3, what would be the best ways to
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ensure the hazardous wastes are defined to the fullest
extent possible on standardized objective criteria and
associated tests, and at the same time not put too great
a burden on many potential hazardous waste generators
who are small businesses?
Number 4 wastes are mixtures of many different
materials. To what extent can criteria and tests be
applied to wastes, and to what extent to suspected
hazardous components?
Number 5 the Act requires a definition of
a sanitary land fill and of the obverse, an open dump,
to apply, we feel, to both municipal and industrial
wastes and possibly others from agriculture or mining.
Should pits, ponds and lagoons used for disposal of
industrial wastes be defined as open dumps?
Number 6 what kind of process should EPA
establish to determine which guidelines should be written
or updated?
Number 7 with regard to state and local
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planning, what process should be employed to enable
governors and local government heads to decide who does
the planning and implementation for which aspects of
solid waste management, and which percentage of planning
funds each should receive?
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Number 8 how should the waste disposal
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inventory be carried out? Who should do it? How
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decentralized should it be? How can we survey facilities
4.
on industrial property?
Number 9 what is the degree of need for
full-scale demonstration projects for resource recovery?
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Number 10 the resource conservation panels
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or technical assistance panels are important to the
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success of the Act. How comprehensive should they be?
How much should they focus on resource conservation
11 and recovery in relation to a focus on hazardous wastes
12 and land disposal of all wastes? What should be the
13 proper composition of such panels to ensure appropriate
14 representation from jjtate, regional and local levels of
15 government?
16 Number 11 the Act mandates several special
17 studies and directs that a broad range of supportive
18 research and development activities be carried out. Can
19 new research and development be performed in time to
20 influence the formulation of mandated guidelines and
21 regulations? Which activities should be considered
22 essential in the development of solid waste management
23 alternatives and therefore considered high priorty for
24 research.
25 Number 12 unlike the Federal Water Pollution
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Control Act and the Clean Air Act, this Act does not
mandate quantifiable objectives, but rather gives broad
guidance as to the law's intent. Open dumps are to be
closed, and hazardous wastes are to be regulated within
certain of the frames, but no measures of environmental
or public health improvements are suggested. Should we,
however, try to assign meaningful, quantifiable objectives
to the solid waste management area? If so, what kind
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of monitoring and feedback system should be provided
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to evaluate results?
Number 13 the Act mandates a high degree of
public participation in development and implementation
of the regulations, guidelines, permits and information
required by the law. How can we best obtain public
participation in a timely and meaningful way? What
avenues should EPA explore to ensure really widespread
and effective public participation?
We have a court reporter here today who is
preparing a transcript of these proceedings. I am asking
that anyone that wishes to make a statement, at the
end of our prepared presentations, fill out a 3 by 5
card that you can get from the reception desk. If
someone wants to make an oral statement, I would like
for you to limit it to five minutes.
If you have a written statement that you want
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submitted for the record, please give it to us.
Let me introduce our regional staff to you
—
now. Miss/i/lene Glen, who is the Assistant to our
Regional Administrator. We have two young ladies on the
desk in the back that you can't see right now, but I
am sure everyone saw when you came in, Mrs. Alma Mullane
and Jean Jonas. Mr. William Schremp and
Mr. Robert Allen of the Air and Hazardous Waste Materials
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Division and Tom Fielding from our Enforcement Division.
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We have a series of five presentations to make
today discussing the various highlights of the Act, and
we will solicit, at the end of each individual presentation,
your comments, your views, your questions.
As we proceed, I think you will see that what
we have come to you with today is not a series of
written regulations simply to wave them in front of
your face and give you a 30-day comment. We are coming
to you truly on the front end of this whole process of
planning and development to implement this Act, to
solicit your views.
Our first discussion today will be made by
Tom Williams, who is the Chief of the Technical
Information and Communications Branch in the Office of
Solid Waste Management. He is going to talk to you about
23 ;i public information, public participation and training.
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MR. WILLIAMS: Good morning. The
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 contains
an unusually complete array of provisions which, if they
are properly implemented, could bring about a
significantly high degree of public understanding and
participation. Taken together, these various provisions
make it clear that the Congress understood that it is
impossible for the public to participate meaningfully
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unless the government first produces valid technical
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and scientific data, and then processes and publishes
the information in such a way that almost everyone can
have real access to it. Only in this way, the Congress
seemed to feel, can the public have a real reasonable
chance of influencing the potentially profound significan
social, economic and political changes which this law
will help bring about.
In section 8003, the Administrator of EPA
is required to develop, collect, evaluate and coordinate
information on nine key elements which are crucial to
the Act's purposes. They cover every significant aspect
of solid waste management.
The Administrator is not only to implement a
program for the rapid dissemination of this information,
but it is important to all to develop and implement
educational programs to promote citizen understanding.
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This makes it quite clear that the
information called for is not to be developed for the
exclusive use of those who, for one reason or another,
may be considered experts in the field. Moreover, the
Administrator is asked to coordinate his actions and to
cooperate to the maximum extent with ^s.tate and local
authorities, and to establish and maintain a central
reference library for virtually all the kinds of
information involved in solid waste management for the
use of state and local governments, industry and the
public.
To ensure that the public participation
process does not become lopsided, we felt it would be
14 ; necessary to identify major categories of interest
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groups who represent the public at large. Under the
16 ! Act, we consider these to include consumer, environmental
17 ! and neighborhood groups, trade, manufacturing and labor
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representatives, public health, scientifics and
professional societies and governmental and university
20 associations. This spectrum of categories of representative
21 groups will be altered and supplemented, if necessary,
22 ' in the course of implementing the Act, if it appears
2:! i desirable to do so.
24 i Now this is not a meaningless list, as a
25 matter of fact, there will literally be dozens of meetings
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workshops and so on carried out by representative
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components of the Office of Solid Waste and EPA, by
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and by the regions, and with rare exceptions, it
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will be required that representatives from each of these
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interest groups be present to give their views to the
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government, and to hear what the government thinks it
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wants to do.
Section 7004)a) of the Act states that any
person may petition the Administrator for the promulgation
amendment or repeal of any regulation under the Act.
Section 7004 (b) has to do with public
participation. It states that public participation in
the development, revision and enforcement of any regulati(
guideline, information or program under this Act shall
be provided for, encouraged and assisted by the
Administrator and the j,tates . And further, that the
Administrator, in cooperation with the sjtates, shall
develop and publish minimum guidelines for public
participation in such processes.
Section 7002 (a) states that any person may
commence a civil action on his own behalf against any
other person, including the United States, who is
alleged to be in violation of this Act, or against the
Administrator of EPA if there is alleged a failure by
him to perform any act or duty under the legislation.
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The many techniques which can be used to
involve the public in government actions fall into two
major categories; One is to ensure that appropriate
public meetings, hearings, conferences, workshops and
so forth are held throughout the country, and more
importantly, that they are planned and keyed to the
unfolding of the Act's key provisions.
The second technique is the advice of
advisory committees and review groups which may meet
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periodically, but which may also be called upon to
review and comment upon major programs, regulations
and plans, no matter when these occur, and no matter
whether a specific meeting is convened or not.
And the third is the development of
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" assistance.
" Section 7007 (a) (b) authorizes the Administrate:):
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of EPA to make grants and offer contracts with any
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eligible organization for training persons in occupations
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involving management, supervision, design, operation
or maintenance of solid waste disposal and resource
recovery equipment and facilities, or to train
instructors. "Eligible organization" means a state or
any jjtate agency, a municipality or educational
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institution capable of effectively carrying out a
training program.
Section 7007(c) states that the Administrator
shall make a complete investigation and study to determin^
the need for additional trained Estate and local
personnel to carry out the plans assisted under this
Act, and to determine means of using existing training
programs to train such personnel, and to determine the
extent and nature of obstacles to emoloyment and
occupational advancement in the solid waste management
field.
The Administrator is required to report the
results of such investigations and study to the President
and the Congress.
Now as you were told earlier, we have called
this meeting not simply to, by any means, to lecture
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to you or to ask you to ask questions, but to really
get your views. And I should certainly like views on
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how you think we might bring the ideajr of public
participation into the area of reality.
You know, it isn't easy despite the fact
that the federal government is large and powerful, and
so are j^tates and other governments, there are
tremendous novations placed on our communicating with
the public. We have no way of competing with the
advertisers who entertain you through the increasingly
functional television programs throughout the nation,
and while we are attempting to do what we can do help
the public to understand that this Act is theirs, it
has a bearing on their lives that it will cost them
money unless it's carried out properly, that it will
bring them benefits only if it is carried out properly.
That is a pretty tough deal to try to make that
interesting and palatable when you compare it to others
whose main interest seems to be to convince you that
the only thing you really ought to do is sit back and
enjoy your favorite can of beer while you watch some
too often inane program that teaches you to be stupid.
So there is no way that we can give our
technical data base directly to 200-plus million people,
-"' |! yet we feel that the essence of what we have learned
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and used your money to do it, the reports we have
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already sent to Congress, the research we do, the
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technical assistance work we do, the investigations we
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do, the essence of what this really means ought to be
known to everyone.
We don't approach this provision of the Act
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with cynicism or with the idea of co-opting things,
which I have heard too much in the last six to eight
years, the idea that we let people in on what we are
doing, and then co-opt them and they won't get in our
way. We are not approaching it that way at all. If
you allow yourself to be co-opted, don't do it.
Furthermore, what comes out of this meeting
will not be confined to those who are fortunate enough
to be here and hear it and learn from it. This meeting
and all the others that are being held under this
Act, and all of them being held in all of the regions,
will be summarized and analysed, the transcripts will
be. They will be compared and a report will be put
together that will be laid before all of those in EPA
and elsewhere, who are involved in planning or
implementing any phases of the Act. As these meetings
indicate what the public thinks, it will be reported to
the Congress and President.
And now 1 will shut up, finally, and hope that
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you have some suggestions and comments for us.
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Looks like I have said it all.
Yes, sir?
MR. GRANEY: Any time I hear
"public participation", I have been in the local
government for 12 years, it's such a bag of worms and
such a tough thing to do, beyond a few special interest
groups, be they environmental or industrial, I am just
curious if you have any strategy to involve people?
I have seen hams given away, and still not be able to
get the people to come to the meetings.
Do you have any strategies involved beside
the media communication, which is relatively ineffective
unless there is a bulldozer beside somebody's house,
are there any other thoughts EPA has?
MR. WILLIAMS: Well, I came here
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( seeking thoughts, but I will give you a couple. For one
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18 ji thing, we go to a bit more trouble, I think, than some
19 agencies do, to try to get the essence of what our
20 ' work is all about into a format that most people can
21 understand and appreciate, whether it be pamphlets or
announcements or whatever. We go to a bit more trouble
to do that.
I think the reason a lot of public participation
is aborted or fails completely is that it's set off by
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itself and agencies will attempt to hold a lot of
meetings, but it will not do what the other part is,
to get the information out to the people, or work hard
enough to get the press to pay attention.
We had a reporter here last night who complained,
I think rightfully so, that he didn't understand half
of what was going on. And if he didn't., how could he
convey it to his readers?
I don't know any magic solution for it. I
think the public is more interested than we normally
give the public credit for being. The fact that it
doesn't get up in arms unless it's forced to do so is
no indication of the interest. I can imagine nothing
worse than 200 million people carrying placards at the
same time. It's discouraging at times, but I don't
dispair.
Agencies really don't try very hard. Most
bureaucrats in my opinion are technocrats, they have
a tough job to do to develop a lot of technical
information and to make sense of it and implement a law.
21 " at whichever level of government, and it's a kind of
a bother when you are doing all that, then, to have
somebody who is only half informed, you think, or
fully informed, to come in and tell you you should have
done it this way and that way. So the natural tendency
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recent years, at least insofar as federal regulation
is concerned. Congress is making that more difficult by
saying, "You must involve the public." And there are
all sorts of ways of aborting that. You have the
meetings, you don't pay attention to them or show it
to anyone, and so on.
But I think it's incumbent upon us who work
with the taxpayer's money, to work harder and try
harder to get the public concerned.
I don't think it's bad either'there are
interest groups who do represent the public, because
they do, provided all the kinds of interest groups have
a chance to understand what you are doing. I would say
that most environmental groups represent a much broader
constituency than the membership would indicate, and
I think the same is true of many industry groups.
18 I MR. GRANEY: There are currently,
19 because of the basin plans, instrumentalities in
20 i existance throughout most of Pennsylvania now to have
21 public participation in waste water treatment. Is there
any idea to utilize some of the mechanisms built up,
28 or do you anticipate there will be additional efforts
24 separate from that?
I know the emphasis for the basin studies is
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for waste water treatment, but there are mechanisms
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that have begun to be built up in that area. Or will
this Act be separate unto itself?
MR. WILLIAMS: It will be separate
to some extent, as it was intended to be by the principal
members of Congress who put it together. But we will,
in some ways, be working with the 208 program.
I met with a young lady from that part of
EPA yesterday. They have a tremendously greater budget
than we do for involving the public in the water planning
business, and to the extent that what we are going jibes
with that, we will participate in that also.
MR. RAPIER: Let me ask that each
person that asks a question or makes some kind of
comment, to identify themselves and the organization.
MR. GRANEY: Tom Graney, Lawrence
County Planning Commission, Pennsylvania.
MR. JONES: Tom Jones, Union
Carbide. I would like to suggest that in your public
presentations, that you stress the benefits of the
program to the public. You have a situation like the
construction grant program that is meeting with limited
success because many people don't understand what they
are building for, or the benefits they are gaining from
this. If they could understand that they are gaining
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something from this, rather than just have one more
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bond to vote on or against, or whatever, it certainly
would push the program much better on the municipal
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level.
MR. WILLIAMS: I certainly agree with
you. And I think part of the reason it is not is that
traditionally, certainly in the environmental area, the
major programs and even the minor programs have been
run by professionals who are dedicated to their work,
but who have really never thought of getting the public
involved, or the public's understanding, was a part of
their bag.
I think EPA has done a very poor job since
its inception of involving the public in things. Its
public affairs office is lower in esteem throughout the
agency, I think, than the lowest mouse in the garage.
And by and large, it deserves that level of esteem.
But it's not that office's fault only, it's
the lawyers and the engineers and the others who make
the major decisions, who have never regarded that aspect
of our business to be really as important as slipping
around on the sliderule, or otherwise trying to get the
work done.
EPA has done, in my opinion, dozens of
enforcement actions that have not been accompanied by
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sufficient opportunity for people to understand what
they were going to be enforced against for in the first
place, or without exhausting the possibilities that are
inherent in technical assistance and public participation
and public education activities.
So I think that is part of the problem, it's
just not considered a real important and vital part of
the business. And it should be.
Yes, sir?
MR. ATKINS: George Atkins,
Northwest Engineering. Our experience on solid waste
in Pennsylvania, to some degree, at least in our area,
is that part of the public does not like -- probably the
most important area is the public officials and
legislators, and until something else occurs, you are
never -going to get a unified program until you get to
those people. Now I know it's important to get to the
people at the lower level, but it doesn't do much good
to get to them if somebody above is telling them, "Well,
these programs don't really count all that much anyway."
MR. WILLIAMS: And I agree, and I
don't know whether we are going to get to them, but
certainly we are planning extraordinary measures, I
think, considering our resources, to ensure that officials
county officials and local officials understand, along
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with us and the states, what this Act really means,
2
what the opportunities for improvement are and so on.
Yes, sir?
MR. GILL: Max Gill, Erie County
Solid Waste Authority. I notice in the hand-out they
make reference to EPA's reference library, solid waste
reference library. I would like to emphasize thai
aspect. I think if that were generally made more
available to municipal and school libraries, I think
0 jj there are a lot of people who want to read about it and
11 | are looking for some piece of evidence, something they
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can cite as facts, I think that would help.
MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you. We now
can extend this service because we do have — not just
15 ij since this Act was enacted, but traditionally this
10 particular program, and not just information people, but
17 I the technocrats I was just complaining about, have
18 j, maintained a tradition of really producing information on
19 ! everything they do. And we have almost 500 publications
20 that have been put out since the solid waste program
21 began in 1965.
22 They are all available, or all that are still
-:i |, useful are still available. We also have an information
retrieval service where we can gather abstracts free of
charge, of the world's solid waste management. Those
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services or publications are available in the libraries
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that EPA communicates with. They are limited in number,
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and we will see to what extent we can get some of the
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basic information to other libraries. One of the
problems is the cost of it, but I know you are right.
Yes, ma'am?
7 MS. KEPFER: Laurie Keffer, from
Q
the group for recycling in Pennsylvania.
9
Just a little nitty gritty. Could you please,
10 especially on your more popular publications, put the
number and the address and the zip code so that people
can send for more of them? We have been foiled many a
13 time, not able to find the number or where to send for
14 things.
15 MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, ma'am.
16 Someone here?
17 MR. BOUSQUET: My name is
18 Woody Bousquet, I am from the McKeever Environmental
19 Learning Center in Sandy Lake. And I had a question
20 about your public education guidelines under section
21 7004, and that is you will be offering interest group
22 education programs.
23 Does that mean that EPA personnel will be
24 available to talk on the Resource Conservation and
25 Recovery Act, and other similar acts that deal with
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solid waste, if we request a speaker?
MR. WILLIAMS: Probably. It depends
on how many requests there are and how many people are
available, but we will do our best to do that.
MR. BOUSQUET: Who should we get
in touch with?
MR. WILLIAMS: You can get in touch
with me, Tom Williams.
Yes, ma'am?
MS. NEVIN: Eliza Neven, Allegheny
County Environmental Coalition. I was wondering if you
all will have time for having a personal contact with
1:5 people, like heads of organizations and environmental
groups and neighborhood groups? Because they are the
15 people who can get all of the people in their groups
16 ij to participate and to be interested. And we get in
I? from these 208 things, we get masses of mailings that
18 | are impersonal, I get them under different names at
19 my home, a variety of things, every misspelling they
20 ' write down. And that doesn't make me want to participate
21 I But if somebody did call you up and you had
22 somebody say, "Won't you come to a meeting," then that
23 i is the kind of thing that you can get into.
24 MR. WILLIAMS: You know, it's a very
25 big country, and your first move is toward your local
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and state governments to get things done. We are a
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small group, we are approximately a hundred people,
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including everybody who can walk and crawl, in Washington
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and we have tried to extend our information farther
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by -- we have given training grants for the past five
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years to national environmental and similar organizations
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who have local or state affiliates, the League of Women
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Voters, Conservation Foundation and others, in the hope
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that what they learn and what they decide to do about
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these problems and how much education they plan to do
for the rest of the public, would get down to other
levels of government.
13 MS. NEVIN: I think that type of
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15 MR. WILLIAMS: But there are
6 literally, as you know, tens of thousands of local
environmental organizations. I would love to have them
18 all on the mailing list and go to all their meetings, I
19 really would. It's just impossible.
20 | Yes, sir?
21 MR. JACKSON: David Jackson,
22 Chester County Health Department. I think it would be
23 helpful, you indicated municipal groups, that contacts
24 are made primarily with them. And I have found,
23 particularly with the Federal Safe Drinking Water Act,
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that that didn't occur to us, particularly the county
level or the municipal level. And while I do receive a
lot of your publications on solid waste, I think it would
be very beneficial if you would work particularly with
the county groups, county health departments, the heads
of county solid waste operations and so forth.
It seems to me with EPA, in the past, that
hasn't occurred.
MR. WILLIAMS: I can't defend the
rest of EPA, as a matter of fact, I wouldn't if I could,
but in our program we have, I believe we have had a
grant for the last four years, at least each year, with
the National Association of Counties for the purpose
of trying to encourage understanding on the part of
15 i countv officials, and at least access to our information.
1(5 ! We have done the same thing with the
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International City Managers Association, Conference of
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Mayors, with the Council of State Governors, and of
course we have other ways of keeping in touch with
ao j state authorities.
21 j But we do it. As I say, we are a hundred
people, plus the regions, which I should not mention --
which I should mention, and they are a handful altogether
in all ten regions.
So I think we try to work with the states.
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and if there are things that we have to become involved
in, then we probably do it as some crisis really dictates
that we have to, you know.
MR. JONES: Tom Jones, Union
Carbide again.
I would like to suggest that I believe there
is an office in Cincinnati, a solid waste office in
Cincinnati that does handle publications, that they
may be more responsive. I have called, on several
occasions, to be met with a recording, which is fine.
But that is as far as it went. I never got a call back
or publication or whatever.
MR. WILLIAMS: If you met with the
recording, you were calling not anything out of the
Office of Solid Waste, you were calling for a publication
that the research and development oeople of EPA had.
I cannot account for that. I do not use
that service. If you call Cincinnati, or write Clncinnat
for anything in the available list of available materials
that we have, which is now about this thick (indicating),
I assure you you will get a response.
We don't have -- and we only have one man
and two part-time workers manning that thing. I don't
know what to say about that, sir. It was a research and
development publication.
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Yea, sir?
MR. ATKINS: Do you have a
schedule on the regulation production process, a tentativ
schedule yet, other than the statutory involvements?
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes. It's news to
me that we have really a schedule, but our region boss
says we do.
MR. ATKINS: Is that available?
MR. RAPIER: Not here today, but
if you will give us your name, we will send you one, sir.
MR. WILLIAMS: We don't have very
firm schedules yet, do we?
MR. ALLEN: The time frames in
the Act.
15 MR. WILLIAMS: We can give you what
16 the Act says we are supposed to do.
17 , MR. ATKINS: We know that. I just
18 j' wondered within that, if you had --
19 I MR. WILLIAMS: Within that, it
20 would take Houdini and three other mystics to figure
21 , out most of it.
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MR. ATKINS: What we are kind of
hoping is you don't do like you did under 92-500, it
comes down to the deadline is the first time anybody
25 sees regulations.
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MR. WILLIAMS: My God, that would be
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impossible. We are going to great lengths to ensure
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ad hoc advisory committees!", we are having each division
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have meetings with all kinds of organizations about
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this, we have given grants to NACO, ICMA and others to
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further public understanding and their participation in
the Act. It won't happen, sir, I assure you.
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All right, thank you very much.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Tom.
You know, the EPA talks about how we want
to work closely with federal, sjbate, regional, county
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people, how important it is for our jstate and local
4 representatives to be an active part of the program, and
then the first thing I did this morning was to get up
16 and fail to introduce the person sitting on my right,
who is the leading state representative here that will
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be working with us to implement the program. When I
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sat down, I said to him -- his name is William Bucciarell
20 for those of you who don't know him he is the Director
21 of the Commonwealth Solid Waste Program -- I said, "Bill,
22 my God, I forgot to introduce you." He said, "That's
23 one."
24 in order that we don't make ths mistake twice,
25 let me ask Bill to get up now and give the state views
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2 Bill?
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4 comeback, Gordon. Keep it up.
5 I guess my purpose for being here today is
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7 the solid waste efforts in Pennsylvania, two is to
159
MR. BUCCIARELLI: You are making a good
really threefold: One is to give some perspective to
provide input which this meeting is designed to do, and
three is to add impetus to the crying need there is,
and I am speaking for Pennsylvania, the crying need there
is to nurture the solid waste efforts that have been
developed over the last 10 or 11 years. And to develop
some kind of a rational approach at implementing the
federal law and meeting this need.
To give some perspective, I said 10 or 11
years, we had our start back in 1968 with the passage
of Act 241, Pennsylvania Solid Waste Management Act,
which provided essentially, primarily, planning and
regulatory activities. And with that as our base, we
spent, together with local governments over $3 million
21 to develop 67 county plans and currently 3 regional
22 efforts, 3 regional plans.
23 i Now these plans are at all stages of
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24 iimplementation. We have had some setbacks and slippages,
25 'we have had what somebody might call failures, but in
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the majority of instances, the level of implementation
that most of these plans are at today, I declare
successful. And even in those cases of slippages or
setbacks, it never slips back to the original level
at the time we started. So we get set back, then we
move forward, set back and move forward. And I am sure
there are some of you in here who know about some of
these failures.
We have had, as part of the implementation
I am talking about, we have had tremendous technical
and management improvements. For example back in 1966,
there was only one county that had a county-wide agency
that dealt in solid waste matters. Today we have almost
30, and I hear this one representative here of the
solid waste authority in Erie. Most of them are
authorities, but there are other agencies too that are
devoting almost exclusively their time to the solid waste
problem.
Now that, in itself, is tremendous in the
sense that I think one of the greatest accomplishments,
when you have an act and when you cause planning to
occur and when you cause implementation of that planning,
is that you are causing people to look further ahead
than one day, number 1.
Number 2, you are causing people to start
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thinking about a problem they have never thought of
2 before.
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And the other thing that you are doing is
placing and sharing some of that responsibility at all
levels where it should be. And if it does nothing but
that, I think we have accomplished a lot, even though
it raises a heck of a lot of controversy.
We have issued over 500 permits in this game,
we have closed over 400 open dumps, we have processed
over 1700 applications, reviews of that kind, and we have
initiated numerous legal actions at all levels. And I
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i might add that in the development of our program, we
llj have established pretty well some very precedent and
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legal cases in Pennsylvania.
I won't go into too much detail into these
areas, because I was warned by Gordon to keep it short,
17 several times.
Back in '64, then, the department was also
! concerned about resource recovery and its development
in Pennsylvania and as a result of the efforts of not
21 J! only the state staff, but other committees and other
22 jj people, we did manage to get the Act 198. This is the
Resource Recovery Act, and this is supposed to be a
$20 million revolving low interest loan program. The
only problem is, we didn't get the $20 million with it.
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We hope that will still be funded at some point in time.
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But along with that amendment to that Act,
we did get $4 million for demonstration grants. Now
$2.5 million of that has already been committed to four
projects, and they are in the process of being implemented
6 I hope.
$1.5 million, which we just recently got,
we are reviewing currently the applicants' submissions
at this time. The shut-off date has passed, and we will
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not consider any more applications for demonstration
11 grants unless we get more money in demonstration grants,
12 number 1.
13 Number 2, some of the projects do not move
ahead and implement, and we get the money back and
15 we will re-allocate, or some of the applicants turn the
16 grants down.
So what they represent is a tremendous state
18 and local commitment and the money, with the exception
19 of the demonstration grants I am talking about, did not
20 speak to the tremendous capital investment that has
21 | occurred in the implementation of this plan. So I have
no idea at this point what the figure might be, but it
23 is tremendous.
24 Now there is interest in all areas of the
25 state in terms of the solid waste program. So it's not
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just us banging the doors because we got an act at the
state level or federal level. For example, the Governor'
Solid Waste Advisory Committee, which represents all
governments, including federal, all levels, the academia
people, the consulting people, the private enterprise
and so on, has been working since 1968 to help develop
the Act 241 and Act 198.
The Citizen's Advisory Council, who has gotten
in and out of the solid waste game, of course they deal
with other matters too, is making recommendations in
their reports to the Commonwealth as far as solid waste
matters are concerned.
The Governor's Energy Council is getting more
and more into the problems of solid waste and how that
can be used in meeting the energy needs.
The Governor's Science Advisory Committee
just recently completed, or had completed a report
through their waste utilization panel. I served on one
of the task forces on that one, and now wa have got the
final draft of that report. And this will also make
21 j recommendations to the Commonwealth as to how they should
22 ' run their program.
We have had interest on the part of the
24 ,| House and the Senate. The House Conservation Committee
I!.-, i had a public meeting with DER to kind of try and find
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out what DER is doing and whether what they are doing
is proper. And also I would think they want to offer
their help in further implementing the Pennsylvania
program.
The Senate Committee was formed to investigate
the solid waste industry, and also to see whether the
state is carrying our a proper program, and also see if
Pennsylvania is getting their fair share of j3.tate and
Jederal support, financial or otherwise. And these two
will be making recommendations as to, I am sure, how
the program should be carried out.
Now some mention was made here about make sure
that you get the input way before you come down to the
final draft of your guidelines and your regulations,
and don't come at the last minute, then show it to us.
You know, I have been in this business a long time, and
I can truly say that this is a sincere effort, this
effort is a sincere effort on the part of the federal
government to get input, and they really have done this
in a lot of different ways.
And one of the ways that they are doing it
is that they are providing, as indicated here, liaison
with other groups, for example the National Governors
Conference developed a group of task force committees.
Three of us in Pennsylvania are serving on them, and this
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is in the areas of solid waste management planning and
2 hazardous wastes, resource recovery and funding, and
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4 They have staff people assigned that meet
land fill technology.
with these task forces on a regular basis. Each one of
these task forces have a different timetable, so they
are getting input from there.
They are getting input from the other
national groups and agencies, they are getting input
from all these meetings that they are holding across
the Commonwealth -- or across the nation. And I am sure
they are getting — they are soliciting from all other
avenues.
So I say it's a very sincere effort, because
there is a lot of, as was pointed out by the two
spokesmen, there is a lot of gaps, a lot of vagueness
17 |j and there has to be a lot of crystallizing of issues
and specificity has to be put into this Act before you
can begin to understand it. This is why they want this
to be this kind of a street, more than this kind
21 (indicating). Because they want to know what to do.
22 And I think that we ought to honestly support
2:5 i that request. From the state's viewpoint — and I will
24 quit after this -- from the spate's viewpoint, we would
:>,-> | hope that the program would be supportive of the past
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and present efforts that have occurred in Pennsylvania,
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and not in any way be disruptive to that effort, because
there has been too much time and effort that has gone
down the past. If you do disrupt that, you are going
to set up back that much more. And the solid waste
program will not progress as we think it should progress
in Pennsylvania.
The other thing is that remember that there
is nothing mandatory about this Act on the part of the
state or local government. It is mandatory on the
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federal government to develop a hazardous waste program,
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and they will do that whether the s,tate does it or not.
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But what I am trying to get at is that they should
develoo incentives for the states to assume the
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responsibilities under this Act, and you wouldn't want
to develop the kinds of incentives -- you can't develop
incentives if you are going to be very restrictive in
your definitions or requirements or so on. Because
what the states will do, if it's going to be that much,
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will say, "Come in and do it, we can't do it because we
can't live under those conditions."
So support and develop incentives. With
that, I will close.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you very much.
Bill. I just wanted to reinforce something that
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Tom Williams said earlier.
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about more of a one-on-one type relationship between
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federal officials and ^tate and local people, and
citizens. We would really like to do that. We do,
however, have an extreme paucity of resources.
For instance in our regional office now,
we only have two professional people who are working
in the solid waste media. This means, obviously, that
we have to very carefully allocate the resources, and
we have to very carefully prioritize everything we do.
If you have thoughts and ideas on how we
can work better with ^.tates, counties, localities to
apply a multiplier to the kind of things that they can
do more in a one-on-one fashion, we would certainly like
to hear from you after the meeting, or whenever. But to
the extent we can, we are really trying to optimize
the way we do things in the solid waste program.
Okay, the next speaker is going to talk about
something that I think is extremely important and one
21 i of the major thrusts of the Act, and that is the
management of hazardous waste materials, subtitle C
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of the Act has a broad and very comprehensive set of
initiatives for that hazardous waste management program.
So at this time, I would like to introduce
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Fred Lindsay, Chief, Implementation Branch, Hazardous
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Waste Management Division, Office of Solid Waste
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Manaqamont in Washington to talk about hazardous wastes.
Fred?
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MR. LINDSEY: Thank you, Gordon.
May I also say, as I think the others have said so far,
that we certainly do appreciate your turning out here
to give us the benefit of your suggestions and comments
relative to how we should carry out our mandates under
this Act.
I am going to present here briefly a summary
of the Act's requirements relative to the hazardous
waste provisions, and also touch upon some of the issues
which we would like to have your comments and suggestions
on.
As Gordon indicated, this is subtitle C of
the Act, the hazardous waste provisions. And ^ubtitle
t*> ^
C mandates that a regulatory program^established, the
purpose of which is to control hazardous wastes from the
point of generation, usually in an industrial operation,
to the point of the ultimate disposal at a permitted
facility. Now this is a very clear mandate, there is
a fair amount of latitude as to how we carry it out,
but the mandate, what it is we are supposed to do is
clear.
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First of all, the first thing we have to
do is to identify criteria or characteristics of wastes
which make them hazardous or non-hazardous. And we
are to include, according to the mandate from Congress,
toxicity, persistence in the environment, degradability,
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bioaccumulation in tissue, flammability, corr^sivity
and perhaps other criteria.
Once having done that, we will use those
criteria to determine what is and what is not a hazardous
waste, and then issue a listing of examples of hazardous
wastes. AS with most of the regulatory provisions in
the hazardous waste area, we are given, by Congress, 18
months in which to do this. That is 18 months from the
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17 Gordon already mentioned some of the issues,
18 | in the very beginning of his presentation, that we are
19 struggling with under how to identify hazardous wastes.
20 One of the problems is how do you identify a waste?
21 That is the first thing you have to do, when is a waste
a waste, and when is it a product?
If we follow that through a little bit, we
24 may be able to consider that certain materials, which
may be hazardous, are occasionally sold for very small
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amounts of money, to be used for such things as keeping
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dust down at baseball parks and horse rings, and perhaps
on roads and things of that nature. Now are they wastes
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or products? And how do we identify them?
In addition, what toxic and non-toxic
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parameters other than the ones that Congress mandated,
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should we include in our definition?
Toxicity is a broad subject; there is acute
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toxicity and chronic toxicity, carcinogenicity,
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teratogenicity and mutagenicity, and so forth. How do
we deal with them?
Wastes are not pure substances, as we are
talking about here when we are dealing with air and
water pollution problems, we are•talking about an
emittant of chemical species, or water is the same thing,
its cyanide or arsenic or something of that nature. And
it is that particular material that causes the problem.
Where we are talking about hazardous wastes,
we typically are talking about brown goo and red gunk,
and various materials of that genre, which may contain
more than one, maybe a number of potentially hazardous
materials in various concentrations. And it is this
combination that, through synergism or antagonism and
actual concentration, may release these materials into
the environment in some fashion.
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How do we deal with that problem, the fact
that we are not dealing with a pure substance? How can
we test wastes, for example, to determine whether or
not that waste is hazardous in the real sense?
These are some of the issues that we are
facing over the next few months.
Section 3002 of the Act requires that we put
together some standards for generators of waste, those
people who are responsible for the wastes in the be
beginning. And in so doing, we must come up with
record keeping and reporting requirements. This would
mean keeping track of quantities, constituents of the
waste and the manner in which they are disposed.
There will also be standards for the labeling
of containers which will also be developed, and perhaps
the standards for what is a suitable container and what
is not. And probably more importantly is the
requirement that a manifest system be developed.
Now the manifest system is designed to track
the waste from point of generation through the
transportation function, to the point of treatment or
"- ! disposal, so-called "cradle to grave" control. And
23 the manifest system will also give pertinent information
24 on the characteristics of the waste to the transporter
-5 , and to the disposer, which he requires to carry out his
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The manifest systems already exist in some
spates, and where they do, they take the trip ticket
form of approach initiated by the generator, carried by
the transporter and finalized by the disposer or
treater.
Some of the problems which we face here is:
How can record—keeping and reporting burdens be
minimized, and yet provide adequate control of hazardous
waste management problems and their solutions? Should
transport manifests be a uniform system nationwide?
It doesn't say that they must be in the
Act, it simply savs that there will be a manifest system
set up. It doesn't say that it must be uniform.
Similar standards are required for transporter^,
again including record keeping, keeping track of the
sources of waste which are oicked up, and where the
wastes are delivered. Labeling requirements again for
containers, compliance with that manifest section of
the system which deals with transportation, and they must
be consistent, according to the Act, with any
requirements that the Department of Transportation may
naive.
One of the more important sections of the Act
is section 3004, because it is here that we will be
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generating standards for treatment, storage and disposal
facilities. And it is by such standards that improper
disposal will be made illegal. So this is a very
important section of the Act.
Congress has mandated that within these
regulations, we must come up again with record keeping
and reporting provisions, how much material has been
received and how is it disposed of or treated? And the
disposers must also comply with the manifest system.
We must also set up minimum standards and
requirements for monitoring and inspection to determine
if a site is in fact polluting. And we must have
standards for location, design and construction, that is,
to identify where facilities can be place, what design
options may be restricted or otherwise controlled, and
16 j; so forth. Maintenance and operating standards contingency
17 |j plans must be set up identifying what to do if something
goes wrong.
Then there is the broad classification' of
ownership requirements, which might include standards
for performance bonds, requirements for performance bonds,
long-term care funds, training requirements and site
closure requirements, things of that nature. In addition,
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there is a broad mandate which says something to the
•2-, |effect that other standards may be developed, as necessary
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1 to protect public health and the environment. So it's
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a broad field.
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Some of the questions we are facing here,
and there are a great many, some of the more interesting
ones are: What are the main problems which a treatment
disposal firm may have which are associated with
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integrating hazardous waste facility standards with other
Q
health and environmentally related standards, such as
Q
the air, water and OSHA types of standards? How can
these be integrated? How can they be worked out? What
kinds of problems exist?
12 Should performance standards for hazardous
13 waste storage and treatment facilities apply only at
14 the fence line, or perhaps elsewhere? Should the
15 standards developed take the form of performance standard^,
16 for example, some limit on pollution of ground water,
17 "Thou shalt not pollute the ground water beyond some
18 acceptable level," whatever that is? Or, on the other
19 hand, should, they take perhaps the different approach,
20 that being what we may call equipment standards, if you
21 j are going to burn chlorinated hydrocarbons you must
22 have a scrubber with such and such a pressure drop,
23 that sort of approach? And what problems exist if one
24 approach or another is taken?
25 Should hazardous waste facility standards be
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1 uniform nationally, or recognize differences in climatology
2 and hydrogeology?
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Another problem which we feel will become
extant, as we go forward, is that many citizens
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automatically oppose the siting of hazardous waste
facilities around their near term locale. They may be
all for the concept, but when it comes time to put it
down the street or across town, they are totally opposed
to it.
We see this, even if we do an extremely good
job of putting together standards and setting up programs
to control this, we see siting of hazardous waste
management facilities, good, solid, well located
hazardous waste facilities as still being a major problem
And we are wondering, and interested in any comments
you may have as to how this problem may be overcome in
17 the future?
18 For example, would very stringent facility
19 standards have any appreciable influence on this issue?
20 | What about training and education programs, things of
21 that nature? Would that be likely to have any impact
22 ! on this type of problem?
23 I; Should regulations published by EPA require
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certification of employees working at hazardous waste
25 facilities? We have certification programs for boiler
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water operators; should we have them for waste management
operators? And if so, who within those facilities and
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which people, and how should that be carried out, or
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should it be carried out at all?
Should EPA require bonding and insurance for
hazardous waste treatment and storage facilities? Is
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insurance readily available for such facilities?
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What routine monitoring should be required
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at hazardous waste facilities, and who should do it?
What testing techniques, how often, what sort of
monitoring equipment should be used?
Those are just a fex* of the problems which
we are facing, and questions which we are facing at
the present time on which we would like to have your
opinions and suggestions.
Section 3005 of the Act sets up a permit
system which will be, in essence, a mechanism for
bringing facilities into compliance, then, with the
standards which are set up under section 3004, that we
just discussed.
Six months after we promulgate the standards
for treatment, storage and disposal, and for criteria
as to what is and what is not a hazardous waste, six
months after that time, it will be illegal to dispose
of hazardous wastes in a facility that does not have a
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permit. Assuming the 18 months time period is met for
the generation of the standards for facilities, that
would bring this to approximately October the 21st, 1978.
In order to receive a permit, a facility must
convince the regulatory agency, the state or the
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federal government, whoever is carrying out the problem,
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that they do in fact comply, or are expected to comply
in the case of a new facility, with the standards which
have been developed.
Congress also mandates certain requirements
for permit application, including information on the
manner of treatment, storage and disposal, information on
the types and amounts of wastes which are expected to
be handled, information on the frequency of treatment
and the rate of application in the case of disposal,
and information on the site itself. I suspect hydrogeolo
climatology, things of that nature.
There is also a provision for granting
interim permits. That is, for those facilities which
were in business as of the passage of the Act, who have
21 ,: notified the state or EPA in accordance with section
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3010 of the Act that I will talk about in a minute, and
who have applied for a permit, those people will be
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granted an interim permit which will be good until such
23 i time as the paper work for the actual permit has cleared.
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The idea here is to allow these particular facilities
to operate.
One of the questions we are facing in this
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particular area is: Should there be different classes
of hazardous waste permits, depending on the types and
amounts, et cetera, of the wastes which are handled?
1 Is there any reason for doing that?
8 Section 3006 of the Act authorized the states
9 to undertake the permitting and enforcement parts of
this Act. It's very clear that Congress intends
11 or hopes that the states will undertake this
12 responsibility.
13 In order to be authorized, a state will have
1* to have a program which is equivalent to the federal
15 program consistent with other j^tate programs that have
16 been authorized, and must contain adequate enforcement
17 provisions. Unfortunately, Congress didn't say what
18 "equivalent", "consistent" and "adequate" are. And they
19 seldom do, so we will be facing definitions of those
20 particular requirements as we go forth here.
21 we must come up with guidelines to assist
22 the j,tates in setting up these programs, and we are
"£•
23 beginning work on that now.
24 Section 3010 of the Act requires that within
25 | three months after we have identified what is and what is
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hazardous wastes, within three months after that time,
anyone who generates, transports, treats, stores or
disposes of hazardous wastes, under that definition,
must notify EPA of the fact that they do. It's a one
time provision, and it occurs three months after the
promulgation of standards under 3001, "Hazardous Waste
Identification".
Section 3011 of the Act provides assistance
to the states. In this case, $25 million has been
authorized for each of two years to get this underway.
But "authorized" is not the same as "appropriated", and
at this point how much money will actually be appropriate^
for this work is certainly not clear.
I think it's safe to say that it won't be
$25 million, but just what level that will be, as I say,
unclear.
In any event, we will be devising a formula
for allocating whatever amounts of money are available,
which will be based on the amounts of hazardous wastes
which are generated in a given state, and the extent of
public exposure to those wastes.
In brief, that summarizes the requirements
that we are faced with in developing a hazardous waste
program at the national level. And we really are
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interested in your thoughts on some of these issues
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that I have discussed, and I believe there is a
publication out there, which many of you may have
picked up, called, "Issues for Discussion'1, which contain
the same ones that I have discussed here, and perhaps
some more that we would sincerely like to have your
suggestions and so forth on today, or at a later time,
if you can.
In the interim, I am here to take any
suggestions you might have, comments you might have or
questions, as the case may be. Does someone want to
lead it off?
MR. WILLIAMS: Frank Williams from
DER. You have mentioned that after the regulations are
passed, you have six months in which to have oermits
issued. Do you plan simply to take applications and
issue the permits, or is there going to be a review?
And if so, can you realistically expect to be able to
issue those permits within that time?
MR. LINDSEY: That is a very good
question. Certainly there will be a review. But that,
I think, is the reason for the interim permit provision
that Congress put directly in the Act.
As I think I pointed out, it will be illegal
to dispose without a permit within six months after that
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period of time. However, as I say, for those facilities
which are in existence and which have notified us under
section 3010, and who have made applications, they will
be granted forthwith an .interim permit to continue
operating until the review, as you point out and the
other parts of the Act, or the other parts of the
permit have been studied and reviewed.
Yes, in the back?
MR. E&KHOSKY: Jim filrhosky, DER.
That sounds like a loophole, any operator of a dump
can submit an application and continue to operate his
dump for five years with no intent of complying anyway.
MR. LINDSEY: I don't want to
speculate whether it's a loophole or not. It's in the
Act anyhow.
There are also other ways in which the Act
can be enforced. For example, the standards under
section 3004 apply, notwithstanding whether a permit
section is ever set up.
20 I And there is — I can't remember what section
21 of the Act there is — but there is a direct enforcement
mechanism which carries fines, et cetera, for bringing
23 action against a given facility. And I think I would
24 have to look that up to be sure of what section that is,
25 I I think it's 3007 or 3008, something of that nature.
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Orders." Those facilities which are grossly not meeting
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3008, under ^.ubtitle C under "Compliance
hose facilities which are grossly not mee
the requirements of the Act, could be addressed under
There are citizen suit provisions under the
Act as well, which a citizen could bring suit on a
facility for not meeting the standards, under section
3004.
Yes, sir, over here?
MR. BANCROFT: Robert Bancroft,
Allegheny County Health Department.
How will your activities mandated to you
under ^subsection C, be coordinated and integrated into
activities also mandated under the Toxic Substances
Control Act? Will there be a duplication, or how will
this work?
MR. LIMDSEY: Let me say first of
all, there will not be a duplication. The Toxic Substanc
Control Act is oriented towards front end control of
hazardous materials, products and things of that nature,
not specifically toward waste as respects it, although
there are parts of the Toxic Substances Control Act
which could be laid to waste. This act really relates
directly to waste control.
Now in the sense that the two acts were passed
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roughly at the same time, it gives EPA the extraordinary
ability, for once, to coordinate things as we go.
Let me say something about how this occurs,
setting standards and regulations in the federal
government.
When we began to develop regulations, the
agency sets up a work group. The agency work group
will be led by the Office of Solid Waste, which we
represent; in the case of toxic substances, by the
of^-.ce
Agency- of Toxic Substances. But in each of these work
groups, there are the air pollution control, water
pollution, toxic substances and our own work group,
soid waste on there. And there is the method by which
we attempt to assure coordination and prevent overlap.
Also on those parts, for example, of the
CONTEOI-
Toxic Substances^Act which relate to solid waste, and
where they have been going forward in developing
regulations along those lines, technically our people
have been heavily involved in working on those
regulations directly, and as a matter of fact doing some
of the initiating work in those senses. So we hope
definitely there will not be any overlap.
MR. BANCROFT: Well, in both the
Acts, is there not a mandate concerning standards for
disposal?
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1 MR. LINDSEY: There can be. I am
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Act as perhaps you are. There can be requirements under
the Toxic Substances Act, and I am not certain there is
a mandate that certain disposal criteria be set up.
Maybe Gordon can speak to that better than
7 I can.
MR. RAPIER: There is one explicit
mandate, and that is for a disposal method to be defined
for PVC's, and I believe some of your people are going
to be writing those standards.
MR. LINDSEY: They are working on
that now. But I think PVC's is the only one, if I am
not mistaken.
Yes, sir?
MR. ATKINS: Georqe Atkins,
Northwest Engineering. You mentioned problems with
siting disposal facilities and processing facilities.
I think if the experience so far to date on sanitary
land fills is any criteria, that you are probably going
to have to consider some sort of a "last resort"
mechanism, where when a given region or area has exhausted
their capability to locate a site, some larger,
probably state or federal type of agency is going to have
to assume that responsibility. Because I think that you
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are going to be at a point on these where you are not
going to be able to do it with local mechanisms.
MR. LINDSEY: We have been hearing
that, sir, from other people as well. And that is why
5 I brought up, I guess, the issue.
There is no authority within this Act that
Congress has given us, to kind of, if you will, take
over and say, "This is where we are going to put this,"
or, "This is where we are going to put that." There is
no authority along those lines to do that?
So I am wondering what impact the federal
government could have or should have in that whole
process relative to trying to help identify where sites
would be.
MR. ATKINS: The alternative to
that may be to stop generating that type of waste for
17 ! which you can't find a home, which of course then would
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give you a constituency to get the things done you need
done.
MR. LINDSEY: Possibly, In other
words, in some cases that might lead to stopping making
or using products that generated this particular types
of wastes, because most of these wastes come about as
a direct result of manufacturing operations for given
products. And that would be a very drastic approach.
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I think that sort of thing could be addressed under the
Toxic Substances Act. It can't be addressed under our
Act, as such.
MS. KEFFER: I wonder if the
Act has any provisions at all, or mechanisms for waste
reduction? For instance, is there a mechanism in the
Act to establish a waste exchange, which has been done
in Central Europe to some extent, it has been started,
I don't know how extensive it is, but at least it has
been started? There is no such thing here.
MR. LINDSEY: In Europe, you are
quite correct, there are a number of exchanges handled
by either a chamber of commerce, various trade associatio
or in one or two cases, I believe directly by the
government, the idea being for those of you who may not
be familiar with it, that one man's waste may be another
man's feed stock.
Now in this particular country there are
several fledgling waste exchanges at this point. One of
the more well known ones is in St. Louis, the St. Louis
Regional Council -- I have forgotten exactly what the
organization is — has set up a waste exchange within
the past year, which has been initially quite successful
in effecting exchanges of waste for one plant to be used
as raw materials for another.
s.
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1
I suspect that this will be perhaps a help,
certainly will be a help in helping to solve these
problems. Because it's a beautiful solution if you
can exchange a waste and use it as a feed stock, why.
5
then, you no longer have the waste, obviously, to deal
with .
But it's probably not going to be a panacea.
There are probably going to be many, many ways which
have such a low value or concentration of materials, so
as to make them unusable. But it is an idea we would
like to foster, if we can. But there is no provision
i in the Act which allows us to either set up such a
thing or requires us to either study it or try and do
that sort of thing, although as a problematic approach,
we have performed some studies.
b MR. LOWE: Fred, couldn't we do
it under the demonstration provisions?
in
" , MR. LINDSEY: I suppose it could
i' be done if there were funds available under the
demonstration program, yes.
~ , MR. GRANEY: Tom Graney, Lawrence
County. When can we expect, you know, there is
i! i obviously a mechanism here in the Act to allow the
-4 state, which is already in the solid waste business, to
enforce certain provisions. I am a little fuzzy on when
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that decision might be coning down.
When will the state have the opportunity to
say yes or no, "We want to enforce this Act"?
MR. LINDSEY: That will be done
when we have come forward with the identification for
what is "equivalent, consistent and adequate" enforcement
under section 3006. We will be putting out guidelines
to the state saying, "This is what it's going to take
to be equivalent," and so forth.
And in generating these, we are dealing
directly with a number of jstates, as a matter of fact,
as advisors on that work group that is dealing with
that particular thing. We have five M:ates directlv
involved in giving us their thinking. These are states
who have been down this road and granting permits and
so forth before, and setting up hazardous waste programs.
And we have been in contact, and will be in more future
contact with neople like Bill over here, and representati\
of other state agencies as to what their problems are
with regard to assuming the program.
I suspect that one of our biggest problems
is going to be a lack of all of the funds for grants to
the states that we would like to have, because certainly
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in funding a program of this type, the states would like
to have as much funding from the federal government as
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possibly be achieved. But when will this occur? We
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have 18 months in which to do that.
I hope that we will be coming forward with
drafts of these things well before that time. I can't
give you an exact date, however.
In the back over there?
MR. LEWIS: Ken Lewis, Public
/forks Director, Sharon. I have been reading about it
for quite some time now, that they are going to cut out
a lot of this paper work. But I was wondering, is there
any truth to that? Because everv time you make an
application, you have to write a whole book.
MR. LINDSEY: The gentleman up
here says would you mind submitting that question in
^'' writing in triplicate?
, (Laughter.)
11 MR. LIMDSEY: It's a common coraolain^:,
18 | and there is no way, I don't think, that we can undertake
1!) l| the provisions of this Act, which require permit
~n applications, manifest systems and things of that
21 nature, without generating some paper work.
-- May I say that we would like to, if it's
-;! ; possible, and we have talked with some of the transporter^,
-' for example, on the manifest system, we would like to
-1 see if we can't organize the paper work in such a way
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that it can achieve several purposes so that there
aren't at least separate forms for everything that has
to be done. "\aybe we can combine some of the forms into
a slightly longer form, or something of that nature.
And in any event, you people who would have to deal with
these things, we would like to have your ideas.
We have already received from some of the
transporters in California who have already been using
the manifest system, examples on how trin ticket criteria
and things of that nature can be hooked into the
manifest system to cut down the volume of paper work.
But I don't see any way we are going to do it without
generating some paper work. But we will try to keep it
to a minimum.
MR. LECORCHICK: Bill Lecorchick,
Division of Solid Waste Management for DER. My question
is: Does EPA consider that the people in the treating
industry are sufficient, or there is enough companies
available today to handle the hazardous wastes that
we see, or is there intentions to promote possible state
treating facilities or national depositories, or sites
under the Act?
MR. LINDSEY: That is a many
faceted question. The first question is: Are there
enough facilities in existence now to environmentally
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and physically handle these wastes? And I think the
answer to that is: No, at the present time there are
not.
That was the reason for the generation of
my question as to how we are going to try to, in the
future, help to see to it that there are existing
facilities, particularly when we are *aced with, as I
8 say, the local opposition question virtually anyplace
9 j! we think one of these places should be placed.
10 And the second part of your Question was
11 whether or not under the Act, we would be espousing
I- j3,tate run or federally run national or s_tate disposal
l;> sites, or facilities for these operations? And there
U is no authority under the Act to do that, number 1.
15 Number 2, the policy has always been, both
Hi I think from the Congress and from our own agency, that
17 these particular wastes tend to be, or normally are the
18 by-product of manufacturing operations, and the costs
should be borne there, and the responsibility for the
~<> waste should b4 i would go ahead and do it.
•2, For example, in Minnesota we have a grant rightf
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now with the State of Minnesota to develop and implement
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a hazardous waste facility in that state. And the Estate
has taken the lead on doing that because of interests,
they don't have facilities which they feel are suitable,
so they have taken the lead in that case through a
demonstration grant of a. technique. We are supporting
that.
I might add, we are also running into the
Q
same siting problems there that has been a problem
elsewhere.
Yes, sir?
MR. HARRIS: Ted Harris, Allied
Chemical.
Do you anticipate a problem which is a
corrolary, if you will, to people not wishing disposal
sites adjacent to their homes in that state, would
tend to close their borders to wastes generated in
other states? And what would you intend to do about this
How could the program handle it?
MR. LINDSEY: That is an interesting
question. It's the whole question of what we call
"non-importation clauses" within ajtat* regulations and
standards. As you know, that particular question has
been before the Supreme Court as a result of New Jersey's
non-importation clause, for some number of months. And
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I understand just last week the Court remanded it back
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saying, "You ought to look at it again as to whether or
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not non-importation clauses were legal under the
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constitution."
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But it has been our policy that wastes should
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be handled where they can be handled best from the
standpoint of environmental adequacy, and including
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costs in part of that formula. If that means moving
10
from one town to the next, or moving across state lines,
it's our policy that that be done.
Relative to how that might fit in with
determining what is and what is not an equivalent
state program, we would be interested in your views on
that issue. We haven't taken any stand on that.
MR. HARRIS: Do you think you
might need legislation in order to gain this point?
MR. LINDSEY: From the federal
government?
MR. HARRIS: Yes. Or do you think
you can do it within the scope of the Act, for instance,
you would not certify a state program or not permit
them to take control if they had a non-importation clause'
MR. LINDSEY: A lot of that would
have to do, I think, with what the courts say on this
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matter, since it's in the courts right now.
MR. HARRIS: You may have to, then.
MR. LINDSEY: Anything would be
possible. I don't want to take a stand on it, as long
as the courts are still dealing with it.
MR. SPAULING: Bliss Spauling,
Mercer County Regional Planning.
Do I understand that there is a follow-up
to this siting question, the local officials will pretty
much have the deciding matter as to where or if a
particular waste facility is going to be sited in
their community, irrespective of what they need for
permit requirements under the Act, if that is the case,
then that is where perhaps the first gentleman who
was worried about citizen involvement will get in,
because that is sure as heck where it's going to come
from.
That means to me that you are having a
terrible impasse in siting some pretty important needed
facilities eventually that there is no provision in
the state or federal act to handle, and it probably
will be an impasse, despite the fact that they could
meet all the permit requirements. And along with that,
I wondered if there is going to be — or what is going
to happen in the case of the interim permit that is
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pending while this process is going on, in addition to
the question of the new facilities, which may very well
be turned down in a local area.
Is there any provision in the Act as to what
happens at that point? If you don't have the new
site, does your interim permit continue to run
indefinitely in willful opposition?
MR. LINDSEY: No, there is no
direct provision for that sort of thing. I think you
succinctly summarized the problem better than I did.
There is no, as you pointed out, there is no
authority under the Act for the federal government or
the state, really, directly as a result of assuming the
federal program, at least, to pre-empt local decision
making authority. That would require some additional
legislation, either at the federal level or j^tate level,
which I don't see as forthcoming.
So while we may grant a permit to a facility
because it's in the right area and has the right design
features, et cetera, it may be stymied as a result of
zoning restrictions or other local controls.
The second part of your question had to do
with -- well, suppose I am disposing of my waste at a
local land fill, or I am hiring "Midnight Joe" to haul
25 i it away, or whatever, and that then is closed off to me
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1
because that facility either does not want a permit or
is not able to get a permit. What happens unless I can
find another permit?
There is no provision in the Act which says
that that interim authority to operate a sub-par land
fill will go on forever. It's only supposed to go on
until we have had time to take a look at the application
for the full permit, and evaluate it, et cetera.
Now there will undoubtedly be provisions
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in our procedure which would allow for implementation
procedures, upgrading, compliance schedules, I think they
call them in the water program. Things of that type will
be permitted.
There will be a number of facilities which
exist already which will be permitable. The problem is
they may not be in a locality, there may not be one
in Pittsburgh, for example, or you may have to haul it
to Cleveland or something like that, and this is done
already.
Manv of these wastes move across half the
country to find appropriate treatment sites or disposal
sites, so it's not uncommon. But we do expect a short
fall for a period of time in the capacity that will be
available of permitted facilities. And just how we are
going to deal with that is one of the questions I have.
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If anyone has any good suggestions, I want to hear them.
2
hand up.
I think the gentleman in green has had his
MR. JONES: Tom Jones, Union
Carbide again.
I would like to address enforcement under
the Act. Historically I looked back at the Clean Air
Act and probably more so the Federal Water Pollution
Control Act, and there seems to be a disparity in
1 enforcement actions of industry versus municipalities.
11 ! Do you see an effective enforcement provision
*~ i in the Act, or when you develop the guidelines for the
llj i| states to implement, that will allow for an effective
!['
14 jj enforcement mechanism against municipalities. This seems
15 i, to be somewhat deficient, it's difficult to enforce
against a municipality presently, say under the NPDS
program.
It's easy to enforce against industry; it's
more difficult to enforce against a municipality.
MR. WILLIAMS: I would like to say
21 ,' I don't think there is anything comparable in this
Act, or any problem comparable to what you have in the
water pollution area. Municipalities don't generate
hazardous wastes, generally speaking.
MR. JONES: But they do, oftentime$,
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have open dumps.
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MR. LINDSEY: They do dispose, is
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes. That will be
taken care of through other provisions of the Act.
But I don't think there will be any comparable hazardous
waste enforcement efforts as it will with industry.
MR. GRANEY: I have just a comment
on the siting. There almost seems to be a belief that
certain land use controls are purely within the
province of local government, however, other
Pennsylvania zoning laws and other laws present a
mechanism for exempting of land use which is public
utilities, and it's built into the Pennsylvania Planning
Code.
For example, a procedure appeal to the POC
to set aside local regulations, I would like to offer
that as a suggestion, as a last resort in line with
some of the other comments on siting that might possibly
be felt.
MR. LINDSEY: Bill, you have that
kind of authority now, do you, in the sjtate?
That is a good suggestion, though, as a
possible way of getting around it.
MR. GRANEY: It's indigenous to
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public utilities, because they had excellent Lobbies
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when this law was passed.
MR. SPAULING: That is only peculiar
to public utilities, now. Even the jstate is not exempt
from local regulations unless there is something in this
particular statute that says they are exempt. So that
may have to still be amended at the jjtate level to give
some kind of ability to handle critical situations if
you really reach an impasse.
MR. LINDSEY: I have time for
two more, then they tell me they are going to get the
hook out.
MR. ATKINS: The gentleman just
made the comment that municipalities do not create
hazardous wastes. I think my question is moot, but
in Pennsylvania under Act 241, municipalities have the
responsibility for hazardous wastes? Is that not right?
MR. BUCCIARELLI: George, you didn't
have to ask that question.
We have gone through this many times. The
Act holds municipalities responsible to see that they
are handled right, not necessarily that they have to
handle them. That is the way we interpret the requirement
They have the responsibility to see that it's
handled.
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MR. ATKINS: But the crunch to
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shutting down an industry if they can't find a site,
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may well fall on the local municipality under Act 241.
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MR. BUCCIARELLI: If you want to take
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it that far, it has to be tested. But as far as I am
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concerned, this is the way we are looking at it right
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now.
And to speak to this issue of giving the
state or the federal government to put in a new site --
MR. LINDSEY: Pre-empt.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: Yes, I think that is
fine, except you are still not speaking to the question
of the baby carriages, because no matter how much power
you have got, if you have got those baby carriages
out there, that overrides almost everything.
A VOICE: That is a political
cop-out.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: The question has been
too that we start using some state land and ^federal land
to put this stuff on.
MR. LINDREY; I am not even sure
that would solve the problem.
MR. BUCCIARELLI: It didn't. And as
far as being a cop-out is concerned, you know, we did
use up in one of the counties, a federal national park.
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Allegheny National Park as a site for the county's solid
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waste facility.
g
But, you know, we still had a lot of static
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MR. LINDSEY: I can take maybe one
more question. This lady over here hasn't said anything.
MS. KERR: Virginia Kerr, I
am from the organization called GRIP. I wonder in you<"
Act, does it specifically state there should be no
dumping in the ocean?
MR. LINDSEY: That is handled under
the Marine Protection and Sanctuaries Act directly.
MS. KERR: Is it illegal,
supposedly?
MR. LINDSEY: It's illegal to
dump in the ocean without a permit given by the regional
office. And this gentleman can expound at what length
j! on what ground they grant a permit for that.
19 I think I am safe in saying that with the
20 exception of the Maryland, New York and New Jersey coast
21 | areas, most of the ocean dumping under that Act has
pretty well ceased. I don't think there is any great
amount of it, except right in the New York-New Jersey-
Maryland area where they still have quite a bit of
-5 j problem with the sewage sludge, or some industrial waste.'
i But that is not in the purview of this Act, and I am not
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really versed in this area. I suggest you contact the
2
regional office if you have an interest in that area.
3
Thank you verv much. If there are others
4
who have questions or comments they would like to give
me, I will be here until the end of this and I would be
6
interested in talking with you. Thank you.
7
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Fred.
8
As you can see subtitle C is a very
g
comorehensive, complex problem. And we don't have all the
answers and we are still in the process of thinking
about how we are going to write guidelines and regulation
and standards and so forth. So your thoughts and comments
13 certainly would be useful to us.
If you want to submit anything in writing,
either to the regional office or to Washington, I would
encourage you to do so.
17 I Fred just discussed the general hazardous
18 management concepts or initiatives in the Act.
19 Subtitle D talks about the major thrusts on disposal
20 | land.
21 That and other sections of the Act will be
22 highlighted now by Mr. Truett DeGeare, who is Chief
23 of the Land Protection Branch, Systems Management
24 Division, Office of Solid Waste Management in Washington.
25 Truett?
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Would anyone like to take a break?
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(Recess taken.)
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MR. DeGEARE: Could I have your
attention for a few minutes, please? I will try to make
a fex-7 brief remarks, and then we can have some more
interchange.
With regard to land pollution of land
disposal of non-hazardous solid wastes, some of the
important features of this law are significant new
definition requirements for the Administrator of EPA
to promulgate regulations containing criteria for
classification of disposal facilities as sanitary land
fills or as dumps; requirement that the Administrator
publish an inventory of all disposal facilities in the
country which are open dumos, and a requirement that
the Administrator publish suggested guidelines, including
a description of level of performance to Drotect ground
water from leachate. The implications and requirements
for state and local government will be discussed later
under state and local government orogram provisions.
RCRA, our new law recognizes open dumps
and sanitary land fills at the only two types of solid
waste disposal facilities. They will be distinguished
by criteria to be developed under the provisions of
-"> section 4004 .
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RCRA adds clarity by defining disposal and
2
solid waste. These two definitions are especially
2
significant in the breadth of their scope. "Disposal"
A
means the discharge, deposit, injection, dumping,
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spilling, leaking or placing of any solid waste or
hazardous waste into or on any land or water, so that
such solid waste or hazardous waste, or any constituent
thereoff, may enter the environment or be emitted into
the air, or discharged into any water, including ground
water.
The term "solid waste" is also defined in a
very comprehensive manner, in that it means any garbage,
refuse, sludge from a waste treatment plant, water
supply treatment plant or air pollution control facility
and other discarded material, including solid, liquid,
semi-solid or contained gaseous material resulting from
industrial, commercial, mining and agricultural operation
and from community activities.
But it does not include solid or dissolved
material in domestic sewage, or solid or dissolved
material in irrigation return flows or industrial
discharges which are point sources subject to permit
under Section 402 of the Federal Water Pollution Control
Act, or source special nuclear or by-product materials
as defined by the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 as amended.
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So by Congressional mandate, we are now dealin
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with a solid waste which is, by definition, solid,
3 liquid or gaseous.
As I said earlier, the statutory definition
of sanitary land fill and open dump refer specifically
to section 4004 of the Act, x^hich is entitled, "Criteria
for Sanitary Land Fills; Sanitary Land Fills Required
for all Disposal." This section requires the Administrat
to promulgate regulations containing criteria for
determining which land disposal facility shall be
classified as open dumps, and which shall be classified
as sanitary land fills.
At a minimum, the criteria must provide that
a facility may be classified as a sanitary land fill and
not an open dump, only if there is no reasonable
probabibity of adverse effect on public health or the
17 if environment.
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An important aspect of implementing the
Act, then, is further interpretation of what constitutes
"no reasonable probability" and what constitutes
"adverse effect on health or the environment".
Development of this criteria will be
particularly difficult for ground water protection
because of technological uncertainties, and a general
lack of ground water protection policy. This regulation
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is due by October 21 of this year, that is one year
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after enactment of the lav;.
The intent of developing this criteria is
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not to provide a federal regulatory system for sanitary
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land fills, but to provide a tool for use by state
solid waste management agencies.
Section 4004 (b) requires each state plan to
prohibit the establishment of open dumps and to contain
a requirement that all solid waste within the state
be disposed of in sanitary land fills, unless it is
utilized for resource recovery.
Finally, jsection 4004 (c) indicates that the
state prohibition on open dumping shall take effect
six months after the date of promulgation of the criteria
or on the date of approval of the state plan, whichever
is later .
There is a second provision in the law for
prohibition of open dumping. Not later than one year
after promulgation of the criteria for sanitary land
fills and open dumps, the Administrator shall publish
an inventory of all disposal facilities in the country
which are open dumps.
Section 4005 also prohibits open dumping
when usable alternatives are available. If such
alternatives are not available, the state plan shall
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establish a timetable or schedule for compliance, which
specifies remedial measures, including an enforcement
sequence of action or leading to compliance, of open
dumping of solid waste within a reasonable time which
may not exceed five years from date of publication of
the inventory.
If a s^tate plan is not undertaken, the
citizen suit provisions of section 7002 provide recourse
to grieved parties. Such recourse is in federal, as
opposed to other courts.
Section 1008, "Solid Waste Management
Information and Guidelines" requires the Administrator
to publish in one year, guidelines which provide a
technical and economic description of the level of
performance that can be attained by various available
solid waste management practices. The law does not
specify specific solid waste management practices for
which guidelines will be developed, but there are areas
specified which the guidelines are intended to address.
These include appropriate methods and degrees
of control that provide, at a minimum, for protection of
public health and welfare; protection of the quality
of ground water and surface water from leachate;
protection of the quality of surface water from runoff,
j! through compliance with effluent limitations of the
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Federal Water Pollution Control Act; protection of
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ambient air quality through compliance with new source
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performance standards, or requirements of air quality
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and vector control, safety and aesthetics.
Guidelines are intended to be descriptive
as opposed to prescriptive, and to suggest alternatives
for dealing with the concerns and issues raised in the
criteria.
Section 1008 (c) requires minimum criteria
to be used by the jstate in defining and controlling open
dumping of solid waste, as prohibited under ^subtitle D.
In response to the mandate of jection 1008,
the agency intends to deal first with the predominant
means of solid waste disposal by updating or current
land disposal guidelines, and also initiating sludge
disposal guidelines.
In order to determine what priorities should
be placed on development of guidelines to address other
practices, we are soliciting your viewpoints and we will
be carrying out a process for assessing needs for
additional guidelines.
I would be happy to hear your viewpoints on
these various provisions of the law.
Yes, sir?
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1 MR. B.£*HOSKY: Jim B^hosky with
the Division of Solid Waste Management, DER.
Q
Your definition of solid waste does not
exclude animal manures, as I read it, from the list of
solid wastes, which may come under regulation.
Was this intentional, or what ramifications
7 could this have?
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MR. DeGEARE: It is not excluded,
and our impression is that it is intentionally not
included. Ramifications are ootential guidelines for
dealing with animal manure.
Do you see that as a problem area?
THE B^RHOSKY: The agricultural
community might, if they feel that they might have to
submit applications for permits to use animal manure
on their property.
MR. DeGEARE: So you are concerned
with any potential action we might take inhibiting the
use of land spreading of animal manure?
MR. B^-tfHOSKY: Right.
21 , MR. DeGEARE: Well, we are not tryino
22 to inhibit such use of wastes, but another area we
are concerned with is land spreading of sewage sludge.
We wouldn't want to inhibit that where it's appropriate
as a practice, but again it can't be done improperly so
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as to cause damage. That is the intent of the law.
So it would be appropriate that the criteria
may provide for such practices, but specify the manner
in which it may be done without causing adverse effect.
MR. ATKINS: You mentioned in the
interim period, the prohibition of open dumping if there
was an availability of an alternative. I think if you
are going to address that in regulations, you are going
to have to clearly specify what is the availability of
an alternative, at least economically, because one of
the major arguments are at what economic point is it
not available anymore?
And I think you are going to have to address
that in the regulations, or it's going to be a major
point of controversy.
MR. DeGEARE: All right, that is
a very good point. I guess I have no other comment on
that.
Are there any other comments or suggestions?
MR. GRANEY: From what I read,
the federal government will, in essence, be layinq down
•*&•
the definition of a sanitary land fill, which will
eventually, from the way I interpret it, supersede
state -- in other words, it will get into the whole idea
of licensing sanitary land fills, thought it might be
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done by the state, it's going to be done through
federal definition of what a sanitary land fill is?
MR. DeGEARE: It will be done, it
could be done only through the s_tate, but you are correct
there is no provision for federal enforcement except
through citizens' suits, the Administrator suing as a
citizen.
MR. GRANKY: But you are obligating
the state to adopt a plan, and you are going to define
what a sanitary land fill is so you are going to pretty
11 |j well tell the j3_tate what they will license, I am
assuming.
MR. DeGEARE: Yes, that's correct.
Do you see that as a problem?
15 jj MR. GRANEY: Well, I just symphathi
1° a little bit with Bill. I hate to see untoward confusion
l7 ;' come into a program that has already been started and has
18 |j had its o\^n birth pains, and, yes, I see it could be a
problem if your definition significantly differs from
20 what the Pennsylvania DER states a sanitary land fill
21 ; is, definitely.
22 ! MR. DeGEARE: We realize that
2;s i Pennsylvania and other ^.tates have taken significant
24 I strides in developing this criteria, which I again say
2.'i is not going to be an easy task. We are working with
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the states and seeking their guidance and input, because
we recognize the potential impact on their programs
and on the states.
We have had some different suggestions on
what the criteria -- what f,orm the criteria could take.
One suggestion is that they be very broad criteria, and
allow interpretation by the various states in
application of the criteria.
MR. SCHREMP: Bill Schremp, Region
III of the EPA. I would like to point out that the
states' definition of sanitary land fills could be
~f-
tougher, but whichever one is more restrictive would
apply.
MR. ATKINS: Even if you assumed
that your definition of a land fill is to be considered
as a minimum standard for a state to adopt as a land
fill, we are going to have the same problems we have
now, and that is the s,tate can encourage or discourage
land fills merely by how they handle regulations in
the border areas and that is the major problem we seem
to be facing right now. It isn't going to disappear
any under this if your minimal standards are very
minimal, as they probably will be.
It's just a comment, I don't know what you
can do about it. But they can still encourage or
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discourage interstate flow of rubbish by virtue of
what individual states do with their regulations, and
this is not going to change the picture at all.
MR. DeGEARE: This is a trade-off
we would have to weigh in going with a very minimal
criteria.
MR. ATKINS: Or a very maximum
criteria. That is one reason maybe you don't want to be
too minimal.
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MR. DeGEARE: Any other questions?
MR. SMITH: George Smith, Jones
& Laughlin Steel.
•V
I understand the Act provides that a study
is to be made of the disposal of mining waste, and that
the promulgation of regulations relative to mining wastes
would then follow completion of that study. Could you
comment on the timing you have in mind for that?
MR. DeGEARE: There is a specified
deadline for that study in the Act, it's in subtitle H,
I can't remember what the date is. We are not jumping
right into that because of limitations on resources so
I really can't answer your question. We haven't formulat
any plans on completing that study.
The Congressional intent or history on this
25 ! law is a little confused in that there was no conference
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committee report. One of the legislative committee
reports on one of the three bills that was combined into
this law indicated that mining and agricultural wastes
should take a lower priority on our scale.
Any other comments or suggestions, questions?
Okay, thank you.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you very much,
Truett.
So far we have talked about public
information, public participation and training and
some of the major initiatives of the Act to control and
minimize environmental degradation resulting from
hazardous materials and disposal of both hazardous and
non-hazardous materials, yet there is nother strong
initiative I think is very important to discuss relating
to environmental degradation. And that is the whole
question of more efficient uses and management of
our resources through resource conservation and resource
recovery.
Mr. Robert Lowe of the Office of Solid Waste
in Washington is going to discuss some of those answers.
Let me get Bob's title for you. He is the Chief of
the Technical Assistance Brance, Resource Recovery
Division. He is going to talk about resource recovery
and resource conservation.
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MR. LOWE: Good morning. Before
you turn that on, Bill, just wait one second.
One of the objectives of the law, and therefor
the objective of our office, is to reduce the amount of
waste that requires disposal. And this is approached
through two avenues:
One is waste reduction, which is the term
we give to reducing x^aste before it's generated,
producing less waste in the first place by such means
as re-using products, extending the life of products
so that new replacement products don't have to be used
at all, and similar measures.
The second way to reduce the amount of waste
requiring disposal is through recycling. So with these
two measures, we have been given a number of provisions
in this law to attempt to achieve these things.
Before I go through the provisions of the
law that address recycling and waste reduction, I must
say one thing first: These provisions sound very good,
Z(J ; and a lot of them — we do have a lot of authority to
21 do a lot of good things, however, we don't have the
funding or the staffing to do these things. The agency
has a limited amount of resources right now, and does
not have prospects for many more, and most of the
I,
emphasis within our office is being given to the areas
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of the law that have specific mandates and guidelines,
primarily in the area of hazardous waste regulation and
management, and land disposal and open dumping criteria.
So what I an going to read to you, some of
these are empty criteria because they don't have
resources to back them up. We are making requests for
resources, and we hope we get them. And there are
things you can do to get that.
Now, having said that, I will go into the
first.
Resource conservation and resource recovery
is included in a variety of sections in the Act. The
guideline section which was mentioned earlier, requires
the guidelines be developed to explain recommended
practices in resource conservation and resource
recovery. We have already issued certain guidelines
under our earlier regulations, and will be re-issuing
them under this law.
The Act calls for the establishment of
resource recovery and conservation panels to provide
technical assistance to state and local governments.
^Z*
And I will go into this in a little more detail in a
moment.
In 3.ubtitle D, the Act requires that s^tate
plans, state and local plans consider and include to the
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greatest extent practicable, resource recovery and
resource conservation. And Truett will say more
about this when I am finished.
We have already discussed the information
development and dissemination plan, and resource recovery
is a big part of that effort. And all of jsubtitle H,
the 8000 series, sections 8002, 4, 5 and 8, call for
certain studies and demonstrations and evaluations of
certain issues and technologies and other areas.
One area that is not on this slide, that I
would like to mention, is a requirement under j_ection
6002 relating to federal procurement in an attempt to
increase the demand for recycled materials. Congress
would like the federal government to require greater
use of secondary materials in the products that it buys,
and we are required to issue regulations -- excuse me,
issue guidelines to help^federal agencies determine
what is practicable, and they will be required to review
their purchase specifications to eliminate any
restrictions about the use of secondary materials, and
to require the maximum amount of secondary materials
content.
This, of course, won't have a great impact
24 |i unless it's imitated by jjtate governments, local
-J governments and industry. It's our intent to have that
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ripole effect.
Just as an examole, under section 8004 and
related sections, just as an examnle of some of the
issues, some of the areas that are studied, they are
listed here, I would like to point out that snecial
emphasis is being criven to small scale low technologies
and front end separation, and another term for this
area is source separation where certain recyclable
wastes are segregated from the rest of the waste stream
by the person throwing those wastes away, be it a
household or office or industry or commercial establishment.
Then those wastes are kept separate from the
rest of the waste stream and collected seoarately, and
eventually qet to a user of secondary materials.
One very important area in section 8002 is the
establishment of a resource conservation committee to
investigate and reoort to Congress on the issues that
18 I' are listed here, incentives and disincentives existing
19 I public policies and other tonics concerning our use of
i
20 ; materials, and the resulting wastefulness as a result of
21 the use of the materials, and which mechanism might be
useful and nracticable and politically acceptable to
23 achieve waste reductions.
04 This is a cabinet level committee, meaning tha
.»-, ! the members of the committee include such peoole as the
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Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of Labor, the
Administrator of EPA, the Chairman of the Council on
Environmental Quality, and others. And a representative
from the Office of Management and Budget, which is
indicative of the status of the Office of Management
and Budget in that a mere representative of that office
is equivalent to the Secretaries of other cabinet
departments.
g
The formation of this committee is both
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good news and bad news. It's bad news in the sense
that since it calls for more study and not action, not
reversal of certain nractices and laws that encourage
use of virgin materials, since it calls for more study,
it's not likely we are going to have any legislation
to implement new measures for another tv;o or three years
until the studies are complete, because it's politically
just not possible.
On the other hand, Congress did take a step
forward in expressing its intent for the critical
examination of some of these laws and policies, and I
think it's significant that it designated a cabinet
level to do so. There have been studies of materials
utilization and wastefulness over the past 25 years,
there have been about four or five separate study groups,
most of whom were functioning as special commissions
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to the President.
This is the first time that this kind of
study ever has been brought into the administration
itself and given this is a brand new administration
which will be in business for longer than it will take
to the studying, it's likely that at least the doors
are open for implementing the recommendations of these
studies.
I would like to talk to you for a couple of
moments about the resource recovery and conservation
panels. I guess the first thing that strikes me is that
this title is misleading for two reasons:
First of all, the panels are created to
nrovide technical assistance, which is government talk
for providing information and advice to j^tate and local
officials on how to improve their waste management
practices, how to accomplish effective land disposal
and how to accomplish alternatives to land disposal.
The title is misleading because the function
of these technical assistance groups will not be limited
21 J to resource recovery and resource conservation, they
will also address all the areas of solid waste
23 management, including land disposal, hazardous waste
24 regulation and collection, injury reduction, that kind
of thing.
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I will just give you an example of some of
the things that this program, technical assistance
program will try to do is help states design and
implement regulatory programs which we believe, in many
cases, would fail or be ineffective without such help.
Because merely writing regulations will not implement
a program.
We also will attempt to help jtate and local
governments to implement alternatives to land disposal,
such as resource conservation programs and recycling
projects. These teams will include expertise in the
following areas:
Technical, marketing, financial and
institutional.
What is significant here is the specific
inclusion of marketing, financial and institutional,
recognizing that engineering alone does not solve all
problems. Engineering is necessarv, but not sufficient.
The teams will be composed of EPA staff,
consultants under contract to EPA and state and local
officials, whom we will include in the program under a
label called "peer matching" where we will send a local
official from one community to consult with his peer
who has the same kind of a problem in another community.
The reason I mention that the title of this
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program is misleading, the word "panels", when most
2 people think of the word "panels" they think of a fixed
unit of individuals, say four individuals who travel as
a unit, meet as a unit, and would go as a group to a
particular community. I don't interpret it that way,
and in general our office does not interpret it that
way.
We see it more as a pool of resources, a
stable, is the term that some people use; essentially a
list of people with known expertise and for any given
situation, the EPA technical assistance people will say,
"Well, we need an engineer in this case," or, "We need
a financial adviser," or "lawyer" or whatever is needed.
The EPA staff person responsible for that will call on
that degree of expertise.
The law requires that 20 percent of the genera
authorization for the solid waste program be dedicated
to technical assistance. That is an indication that
Congress ,intends for this program to be a viable program,
and there are very few ways to assure that. One which
they tried was to make this funding requirement. At the
moment, this is going to be 20 percent of a very small
number, and it's going to have a very small staff and
it's even possible, through some creative accounting.
25 the amount of money easily identifiable as technical
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assistance will be even smaller. And we are somewhat
concerned about that.
But we will do the best we can with the
4
resources we have, and we will prioritize, in some
fashion, the requests that we get. And we will handle
them as best we can.
There are a couple of other issues, questions.
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really, that we have in dealing with our program, which
I will ask in a moment. But I think first I will open
the floor to any suggestions that you may have about
how we should conduct this program, and any questions,
also .
MR. ATKINS: On your guidelines
on procurement --
MR. RAPIER: Would you give your
name again, please?
MR. ATKINS: George Atkins,
Northwest Engineering.
On your guidelines on procurement, do you
anticipate that you are going to be able to extend those
to follow federal funds, in other words to grantees,
assistance program1; and so forth, so the people can use
federal money in addition to direct federal procurement?
-^,
MR. LOWE: Did everybody hear
that question? I assume you did.
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I am not clear on that. I think the law
implies that, although as a practical matter I don't
think we can achieve that.
MR. ATKINS: Well, to some exent
you are doing that in other things, like your 92-500
program right now, you are imposing all kinds of
regulations on grantees -- of grants. Now this would
just be another apple in the same barrel, but I just
wondered if that is it, or if that hasn't been really
addressed yet?
11 ' MR. LOWE: I don't think it has
been addressed yet.
MR. ATKINS: That would make a
tremendous difference on the magnitude of that program.
15 j MR. LOWE: It would if it could
16 be effected, although the amount of money we are talking
I7 | about doesn't have the nolitical clout that the water
18 pollution construction grant nrogram does, for examnle.
19 MR. ATKINS: I am not talking
20 \ about that, I am talking about essentially the whole
21 ' federal budget would come under guidelines on procurement
22 as would the matching money that goes into programs
23 i where federal budget monev is involved. Then you are
24 ii talking about probably 70 percent of the gross national
2") product.
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MR. LOWE: I see what you mean.
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I will take that comment back and give it to the people
who are designing these guidelines.
Yes, sir?
MR. GILL: Max Gill again, Erie
County Solid Waste.
When might we, on a local level, we able to
draw upon these panels?
MR. LOWE: Right now. We have
been conducting technical assistance for years in some
form or another, and we have a program underway right
now which is a carryover from previous legislation, and
includes some of the elements of what we expect will be
the program under the new regulation. I might say we
are prepared to make any changes that seem necessary or
desirable that we get out of the meetings like this,
and a number of other meetings that we are having.
I might mention what some of those meetings
are. We are meeting next week with three groups of
representatives, we are meeting Tuesday with representatives
of industry, those companies that sell design services
or products, or complete systems. We are meeting
Wednesday morning with representatives of government
organizations. National Governors' Council, National
Association of Counties, National League of Cities and
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so on. And in the afternoon xve are meeting with
2
environmental and civic orouns, like Environmental Action
3
and League of Women Voters, and so on.
We are sending these oeople a copy of our
program plans as they exist in draft form right now, and
we are going to ask them for comments.
So if any of you are represented in Washington
the American Consulting Engineers' Council, or National
Association of Counties or any of these people, that is
the wav to plug in right there.
We are also going to have, in late April and
early Hay, we are going to have three meetings just on
the technical assistance nrogram alone. And those
meetings will be one in the east, one in the midwest
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lo i, and one in the west. We haven't picked a place for them.
1(i i, Getting back to the gentleman from Erie
11 | County's question about our current technical assistance
program, we have under contract now, consultants,
consulting teams consisting of management expertise,
engineering expertise, legal and financial expertise
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governments now.
This is kind of a prototype for the program
under the new law. If it's successful, we will repeat
it. If it's not, we will modify it or just scrap it.
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Yes, sir, in the back?
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MR. KELSEY: Ward Kelsey with
DER. Just a very simple follow-up question on that.
At this point in time, how would one go about making
contact if you wanted to request that assistance? Is ther
a name or phone number, address that we can contact?
MR. LOWE: You can contact
either Gordon's staff, which I guess would be
Bill Schremp, that is 215-957-0982, or you can contact
me. My name is Bob Lowe, L-o-w-e, and my phone number
is 202-755-9150. And I will see that your request gets
to the proper place.
My own field is resource recovery. If your
request involves other areas, I will have to direct it.
Keep in mind, though, one requirement we
make of people requesting technical assistance is that
the request come from elected officials. We can work
out the plan in advance at our staff level, but we want,
in order to assure success of whatever is going to happen
we want to make sure that the elected officials know
of what is going on, know why we are involved, so we
don't get trapped in some way.
MR. BOUSQUET: Woody Bousquet from
HcKeever Environmental Learning Center. At the beginning
of your presentation, you outlined two areas of concern
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under resource conservation and recovery. You said we
were concerned with waste reduction and recycling, and
under waste reduction you are concerned with re-usinq
products and developing products that would have a longer
life.
Does the Act mandate, or have you given any
consideration to developing programs that would encourage
people to consume less? That seems to be another area
that ought to be considered when you are trying to
conserve resources.
MR. LOWE: Yes, we have. I am
trying to think of some good examples.
A good deal of our literature points out the
fact that our comsumption habits, our purchasing habits
and our living habits result in higher consumption than
16 | it used to be. And we point out ways in which people
17 li can consume less.
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We have, I believe some of our grants that
come out of Tom's office to public interest groups and
environmental groups, have resulted in information gettin
out to the public on ways to do this. And some of the
studies will be oriented in that direction.
This is a monumental task, though, to really
achieve something when you think about where you go and
what you do during the day, what you buy. And when I
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think of where I go, what I buy, and everything else,
it requires a major change in lifestyle to make anything
but a very small dent.
Some things I personally have done and some
things I can recommend for everybody to do. But there
are other things that I can recommend, but when you get
into the point of governmental regulations, it's a
very difficult area.
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MR. BOUSQUET: Does any section of
the Act specifically mandate that?
MR. LOWE: It mandates studies.
MR. BOUSQUET: To reduce consumption?
MR. LOWE: It's all oriented
towards reducing consumption.
MR. BOUSQUET: I haven't seen that
in the Act anywhere. In other words, it seems to be
re-using material that has already been consumed, not
reducing the consumption of that material in the first
place.
MR. LONE: Well, I am not
familiar with the exact language. Tom, do you want to
comment on that? Maybe I will follow you.
-fa'^
MR. WILLIAMS: At the risk of -- I
hope not -- being as much undesired by the new
administration as I was by the old, I would simply say
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that the Congress is very, very wary about suggesting
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anything very specific that would reduce consumption
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habits.
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So when Bob says there is a study provision
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in there, that is exactly' what there is. There are
certain senators and representatives who advocate
reduced consumption in various areas, but the majority
certainly do not. If you look at the history of the
development of this legislation, at one time there was
tremendous concern that expressed itself at one of the
early drafts in a virtual prohibition of EPA to be
very specific in dealing with _states and local
governments.
Some of the congressmen felt that we had
overstepped the bounds of our previous Act by helping,
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10 ! particularly in the beverage container area, by giving
17 testimony on requests to j.tates, counties and cities
suggesting what we thought, or what our studies
indicated would be the result nationally of a re-usable
20 beverage container system, or recycling system. And
21 i there is still a shadow of that concern in the Act.
There is a small paragraph somewhere which
says that any representative of EPA, when dealing with
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the state or local government, must not advocate one
:>:> resource conservation method over another, but must
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instead give the full story, which is not really very
hard to live with. Because we always try to give the
full^story anyway.
In other words, they don't want us to go out
and advocate to communities that they should cut down
on the consumption of resources as the sole avenue for
their solid waste management costs and problems.
I might say, if you had to do it, and you
would stop, sit down and think just what kind of
legislation would you enact to make Americans cut down
on consumption, you would find it extremely difficult.
I think, personally again, we are moving
painfully and maybe more slowly than some people might
like, into a way of life that is somewhat different from
what it once was, without specific legislation. We are
buying smaller cars on the whole, we are insulating our
"homes, we are more concerned about those things for
economic reasons. And I think that the guys who
masterminded this Act felt those procedures are going
on, they couldn't think of anything specific they wanted
to suggest.
But notice how they really tried to grapple
with it. As Bob pointed out on one of his slides, there
is a very high level, cabinet level and this is the first
time we have had this, a cabinet level committee to
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grapple with these things.
I don't mean to be an apologist for either
wing of the political spectrum, but it would be very
difficult to put an act together for EPA to implement,
that would mandate certain things that would mess up
what the Department of State is trying to do or
responsible for, the Department of Commerce is working
in, the Department of Interior is working in, the
Department of Labor is concerned about, et cetera.
So they established this very high cabinet
level committee where a bunch of big shots will get
together and try to determine what in the devil can be-
done, to see that we don't inordinately waste materials
and energy in solid waste management. It's a pretty good
attempt to deal with it in a responsible way, I think.
16 j; MR. LOWE: Reduction in consumption
is mentioned explicitly in the definition of resource
conservation, which is mentioned explicitly throughout
the law. So when you read resource conservation, you
should read -- I mean, it should mean to you reduction
21 jl of overall resource consumption.
22 I Mr. Jones had his hand up before.
23 j MR. JONES: Yes, Tom Jones,
24 II Union Carbide.
In your resource reduction program, do you
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foresee the development of a program that is similar
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to like NPDS, effluent guidelines which would dictate
so many pounds of waste allowable per pound of product
for specific kinds of industries and so forth? Is that
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authority in there, or could there be an interpretation
such as that upon, say a party from the environmental
group, you would be forced to do that?
MR. LOWE: The authority oxists
to study that, the authority exists to fund demonstration
of something like that. If a state wanted to do somethin
like that and we evaluated that program and decided it
was xrorth funding, we could fund the demonstration of
something like that. There is no authority for fjederal
action in that regard. That is where Congress drew the
line.
Is there a question in the back, ma'am?
MS. KEFFER: I wondered, how come
the National Disposal Tax Provision got shot down? Where
did the opposition come from, or what was the decision
to leave it out? Because it was in the draft originally.
MR. LOWE: I don't know what the
discussion was on the National Disposal Tax. I do know
that our office has been studying for about a year --
by studying, I mean doing analyses — to be able to
predict what the affect of given types of measures would
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be. And in order to have data to present to people and
say, "This is what the result will be if we do take
certain specific measures," the specific measures that
have been under consideration so far, that will be in
the resource conservation committee as the study of
what we refer to as a product charge, which would be
actually two parts:
The first part would be an immediate charge
on the use of — well, it would be an immediate credit
for the use of recycled materials, which would be phased
out over a period of years, and a charge on the use of
virgin materials that would be phased in over a period
of years. So after a period of years, say ten years,
the relative economics of using virgin materials versus
15 I secondary materials, would tend to be equalized.
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16 || It would be equalized in the first place
by a credit on the recycling side, and eventually by a
charge or tax on the virgin materials side. That is
being evaluated by our office now, and we don't feel
our data is complete enough to make the case, yet.
In the back?
MR. KONSAVAGE: Greg Konsavage,
Department of Environmental Resources, City of Pittsburgh
What about the differing costs associated with the
hauling or transporting of virgin materials versus
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secondary materials? What type of action is being
taken in this area?
MR. LOWE: The Railroad
Revitalization Act of whenever, required the Interstate
Commerce Commission to study those rates and to report
what we found, and to make necessary changes. And they
required the ICC to consult with EPA to review what
they are doing. So we are looking over their shoulder
The catch word for what your question
addressed is "freight rates." And I would like to say,
I think the freight rate issue is one that has been
blown out of proportion. I don't think it's as important
as most people think.
For one thing, freight rates discriminate in
favor of recycled materials of certain products, certain
commodities, and they discriminate against secondary
materials in other areas.
So it's not really clear what the impact is.
The rates for common carriers have to be one of the most
complicated things ever attempted by anybody.
Yes, sir?
MR. HODGETTS: Graham Hodgetts from
RAD Services. You started off by saying, according to
my notes, I summarized it as underfunded and undermanned
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for the task in front of you, in which case you are
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going to have to establish some pretty critical priorities.
I am wondering how you set up those priorities
and how those priorities may interface with the "imminent
hazard" provisions of the Act?
MR. LOWE: Okay, the "imminent
hazard" provisions are a little outside of my line, but -
MR. HODGETTS: The reason I asked
that is because there are, I think, pretty well known
practices in industry whereby carcinogenic materials
are going to sanitary land fills, or even lower category
land fills . I would consider that to be an imminent
hazard, and yet such carcinogenic materials can be
reclaimed with the right technology. The technology at
the moment is marginal, but with funding and assistance,
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becoming a paying pronosition to recover.
MR. LOWE: The thing I thought
you were referring to were incidents of imminent danger.
Now that I hear your explanation, I don't think that is
23 what you are referring to. But the degree of severity
of the environmental aspect of a problem could be one
25 I of our criteria. Let me just give vou some of the
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issues that we are trying to deal with. The question is:
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How should we, just for example, how should we prioritize
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our technical assistance activities?
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If we get ten requests in, whom do we answer
first? Should we answer the person in a town that has
the greatest tonnage, in which case we would take New
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York first, Los Angeles second, and so on, and we would
probably never be able to help the small community?
Should we deal with those who have the most
serious environmental problems? Which is kind of what
you are getting at there, in which case we would never
help the City of Los Angeles, for example, because they
have, at least in the area of municipal wastes, they
have got one of the best land fills in the country.
And in a sense, we would be discriminating
against them if they wanted our help, we would say,
"No, you have done such a good job we can't help you,"
which maybe isn't fair.
VJe could give our assistance where there is
the greatest level of ignorance, in other words, where
we could have the greatest differential impact, bringing
somebody from 0 up to 10, although in order to be a
success, they may have to go to a hundred. We would
have a greater impact where there is a high level of
ignorance,
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Or we could give our technical assistance
in cases where the county is most likely to succeed,
in which case it's going to be where they -- well, it
could be a variety of things. That is the way we have
been evaluating things primarily in the past, that has
been the final decision point. But it takes into
account the critical environmental problem, to some
extent the size and amount of tons.
While we are on the criteria issue, there is
a different set of criteria that would be used in
11 j evaluating resource conservation ootions, in other
!- words, the options that resource conservation committee
l:' would be studying. Just as an example of some of the
14 issues, some of the criteria that they could use in
15 deciding which products or which materials to look at,
1G they could look at total overall pollution, not
17 necessarily the pollution associated with disposal, but
18 i the pollution associated with manufacturing, extracting
19 from the ground and manufacturing a given product.
20 , Another criteria could be resource scarcity,
21 which means we would never try to reduce — probably
22 never get to reducing glass. We would probably look
23 first at tin and other precious metals.
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We could look at employment impact, in which
case if there is an employment problem in a particular
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industry, we would look somewhere else. Or we would
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look at the balance of payment issues. If we had
enough of the resources internally, like, let's say
* coal, we have got the resources here, and it's just an
environmental, aesthetic and political question as to
whether we want to get to them.
We must not look at that, and look instead
at some product that we have to go abroad to get. Those
are the kind of issues that we have to look at, and if
anybody has any opinions on which ones we should look
at, I would really like to hear them because otherwise,
we will have to make the decision ourself, and we run
a greater risk of being wrong.
MR. HODGETTS: Another question that
I have, is there still a tax on reclaimed oil?
MR. LOWE: I am not aware there
ever was one, so if you say there is one, I don't know.
MR. HODGETTS: I think there is one
which most reclaimers are getting around by a variety
of means. But I would be surprised if the Resource
,
Conservation^Recovery Act did not promulgate guidelines
which said, "If there is a tax on oil, strike it," on
reclaimed oil.
MR. LOWE: We already have a
program underway in the area of waste oil recycling.
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We have been working with the Defense Supply Agency,
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which is the government organization that writes all
the procurement specifications for oil for the entire
government. We have given -- imagine this -- we have
given money to the Department of Defense, we have given
$150,000 to conduct a test of using recycled oil in
automobile engines.
And if the Department of Defense is satisfied,
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Defense Supply Agency is satisfied with the results,
then they will change their purchase specifications.
And that program is about six months old, and it's about
a year away from knowing what the results of the tests
are. And who knows how far away from whether or not
the specs will be changed.
We are trying to subsidize the Department of
Defense.
Other questions?
Thank you very much.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Bob.
Well, we are coming down to the wire, now.
We have one more prepared presentation for you,
Truett DeGeare is going to talk a little about _
program development, and then we will have general
comments.
MR. DeGEARE: The Resource
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1 Conservation and Recovery Act recognizes that the major
roles in solid waste management lie with state and local
governments. This is especially evident in subtitle D
the state may play a hero in eliminating open dumps and
also administering a hazardous waste program. The
governor, working with elected local officials, can
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solid waste plan that builds on existing efforts at the
state and local levels. At the federal level, the
set ^
Administrator must/public guidelines for identification
of planning regions, development of s^tate plans and
state hazardous waste nrograms.
Section 4002 (a) of RCRA, gives the
Administrator six months to publish guidelines for the
identification of those areas which have common solid
waste management programs, and are appropriate units
for planning regional solid waste services. This is
a kickoff step of a three phase process involving 18
months.
With six months after publication of these
guidelines, the governor of each_s^tate, after consultatior
with local elected officials, must promulgate regulations
identifying the boundaries of each area within the
state which, as a result of urban concentrations,
geographic conditions, market and other factors, is
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1 appropriate for carrying out regional solid waste
management.
3 The state then has another six months to
4 jointly, with appropriate elected officials of local
5 government, identify an agency to develop the state
plan and identify one or more agencies to implement
the plan, and identify which solid waste functions will,
under the plan, be planned for and carried out by the
state, regional or local authorities, or a combination
thereof.
Where feasible, agencies designated under
Section 208 of the Federal Water Pollution Control Act,
shall be considered for designation.
So in summary, the three immediate steps are:
First, our publication of guidelines on identification
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16 j1 of planning areas.
1"? j. Secondly, governors, in conjunction with local
18 l| officials, will identify planning areas.
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19 And thirdly, the governors and local officials
20 ; will identify the respective roles of the entities
21 j, involved.
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Section 4002(b) requires the Administrator,
after consultation with federal, jstate and local
authorities, to promulgate regulations containing
guidelines to assist in the development and implementation
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of state solid waste plans. This is due in April of
2 1978.
The Act provides minimum requirements for
4
approval of s,tate plans, which include the identification
of responsibilities and implementing the state plan,
distribution of federal funds to the authorities
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responsible for development and implementation of the
plan, and the means for coordinating regional planning
and implementation under the plan.
The prohibition of the establishment of new
open dumps within the s^tate, and requirements that all
solid waste, including solid waste originating in other
states, be utilized for resource recovery or disposed
of in sanitary land fill; provision for the closing,
or upgrading of all existing open dumps within the
state as required by section 4005; provision for the
^establishment of state regulatory powers as may be
necessary to implement the plan; provision that no
local government within the ^state shall be prohibited,
under _s.tate or local law, from entering into long-term
contracts for supply of solid waste to resource recovery
facility; provision for such resource conservation or
recovery and disposal and sanitary land fills, or any
combination of practices which might be necessary to
use or dispose of the solid waste in an environmentally
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sound manner.
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So in essence, the planning provisions of
D call for a workable plan involving both
spates and local governments.
•^
RCRA authorizes assistance to state and local
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governments in a number of places.
I want to preface my comments from here on
out by making it clear that I am going to be talking
about authorized levels of funding which are provided
directly in this law. And I want to point out that they
don't necessarily relate to funds which may become
available in the future, no one knows what level of
funding might be provided, if any, under these various
provisions.
Section 4008(a)(l) authorizes $30 million
for 1978 and $40 million for 1979 for grants to be
distributed to j>_tate, local, regional and interstate
authorities carrying out the functions as described in
the approved ^,tate plan. These funds would be distributed
on a population basis among the various states, except
that each s.tate would receive one-half of one percent
'^-
of any funds that would be available.
Section 4008(a)(2) authorizes $15 million
for each of fiscal years '78 and '79 for jtates,
counties, municipalities and inter-municipal agencies.
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and ^state and local public solid waste management
2
authorities, for implementation of programs to provide
solid waste management resource recovery and resource
4
conservation facilities, and hazardous wastes.
The assistance available under this provision
can include assistance for facility planning and
7
feasibility studies, expert consultations, surveys and
analyses of market needs, marketing of recovered
resources, technological assessments, legal expenses,
construction feasibility studies, source separation
projects and economic investigations or studies. But
the assistance cannot be used for any other element of
construction or acquisition of land or interest in land,
or for any subsidy for the price of recovered resources.
There is a provision in_subtitle D for
"^
assistance to what are called special communities. One
17 !j such community is allowed to be established for each
18 |j state, and there is allowed one project per state. And
the project must be consistent with the state plan.
The funding level for this is relatively low.
21 | two and a half million dollars.
22 Congress recognized special problems with
23 rural communities are going to face in meeting the
24 open dump closure requirements of section 4005, so there
is authorized $25 million for each of two fiscal vears
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to provide grants to the states. These funds could be
used for construction, and that is a little different
from the other funds that are authorized under the
Act. But again, they cannot be used for land acquisition
There are specific criteria and allotment
formulae provided under the law for any funds which might
become available under this provision.
I think it's important to advise you not to
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any federal subsidies through grants, because as I
mentioned, we have no idea as to whether any or what leve
of funding will be appropriated.
Okay, do you have any suggestions or questions
about this area?
Yes, sir?
MR. ATKINS: On your s_tate minimum
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requirements for s,tate management plans, you mentioned
regulations that would ensure contractual freedom for
municipalities. That is not very practical, is it?
MR. DeGEARE: I am sorry, would you
state that again, please? I couldn't hear you.
MR. ATKINS: In your mihimun
regulations that would be acceptable to state plans,
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you mentioned one element was the assurance of contractua
freedom to municipalities, which I would doubt very much
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that regulatory agencies would be able to handle. I
think that is a statutory matter in municipal codes, in
most instances.
MR. DeGEARE: Yes, that is a problem
in implementation in many areas, and it was directly
mandated in the Act that that be provided against by
the state plans. And you are right again, it's going to
be something that is going to have to be dealt with at
the local level, as well as state.
Any other comments or suggestions?
Thank you.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Truett.
I would like to remind everybody that we
have extra copies of the Act, and if any of you would
like to have additional copies, you will find them on
the desk. As a matter of fact, please take them, we
don't want to have to carry them back to Philadelphia.
All right, I stated at the beginning of the
meeting that we would ask for 3 by 5 cards to be filled
out for anybody who wanted to make a statement. And it
was my understanding a few moments ago that nobody filled
out a 3 by 5 card. If anybody, at this point, would like
to make a brief statement, would they please raise
their hands?
If there is anybody that would like to submit
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1
any comments, anything for the record, you can mail them
to our office to Mr. Robert Allen, Chief, Hazardous
Waste Branch, EPA, Region III, Sixth and Walnut Street,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 19106, I think it is. Or
can they mail them to you, Thomas?
MR. WILLIAMS: Yes, sir.
MR. RAPIER: Mr. Thomas Williams.
Would you give the rest of your name, rank and air speed
g
for them, please?
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MR. WILLIAMS: If I only knew it.
Tom Williams, Office of Solid Waste, United
States Environmental Protection Agency and there is a
magic formula you have to use, in parens after you
put down the "Office of Solid Waste" put AW-462. No
matter what else you do wrong, it will get to me then,
allegedly, Washington, D.C. 20460.
MR. RAPIER: Thank you, Tom.
We want to thank you all for coming out today,
We hope that the meeting was useful and meaningful to
you. It was to us.
Thank you very much.
(Thereupon, at 12:20 o'clock p.m., the
hearing was adjourned.)
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REGIONAL PUBLIC MEETINGS ON RCRA
Meeting
Date
Feb 15,16
Feb 17,18
Feb 23
Feb 23,24
Feb 25
Feb 26
Feb 28,
March 1
March 3
March 4
Mar 8,9
Mar 10,11
Mar 17,18
Mar 21,22
Meeting
Place
Kansas City,
Missouri
Richmond,
New York,
City
Atlanta,
Georgia
Worcester,
Massachusetts
Concord,
New Hampshire
Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania
Denver,
Colorado
Salt Lake City,
Utah
Dallas, Texas
San Francisco,
California
Seattle,
Washington
Chicago,
Illinois
Facility
Hilton Inn Plaza
45th & Main
Colony House
American City
Squire,
52nd & 7th Av
Sheraton-Biltmore
Hotel, 817 W.
Peachtree N.E.
Sheraton-
Lincoln Inn
Ramada Inn
William Penn
Hotel
Main Library
1357 Broadway
Hilton Hotel
150 W. South
Fifth Street
First Int'l Bldg
(29th Floor)
1201 Elm St
Holiday Inn
Union Square
480 Sutter
Seattle Center
O'Hare Holiday
Inn (Kennedy
Expressway)
Time
Evening Feb 15,
morning Feb 16
Evening Feb 17,
Day, 9 am-3 pm
evening 4-7 pm
Evening Feb 23,
8:30 am Feb 24
1 pm
1 pm
Evening Feb 28,
morning Mar 1
8:30 am-
12:30 noon
8:30 am-
12:30 noon
Evening Mar 8,
morning Mar 9
Evening Mar 10,
8 am Mar 11,
Evening Mar 17,
All day Mar 18
Evening Mar 21,
all day Mar 22
Sponsoring
EPA Office
Region VII
(Kansas City)
Region III
Region II
(New York City)
Region IV
(Atlanta)
Region I
(Boston)
Region I
(Boston)
Region III
(Philadelphia)
Region VIII
(Denver)
Region VIII
(Denver)
Region VI
(Dallas)
Region IX
(San Francisco)
Region X
(Seattle)
Region V
(Chicago)
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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
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