TRANSCRIPT
REGIONAL PUBLIC MEETINGS ON THE
RESOURCE CONSERVATION AND RECOVERY ACT of 1976
March 21 and 22, 1977, Chicago, 111.
These meetings were sponsored by EPA Region V,
and the proceedings (SW-21p) are reproduced entirely as transcribed
by the official reporter, with handwritten corrections
by the Office of Solid Waste
Environment;: 1 Pt o:? c'vra Jg
Region Vc I/V-;.u-y
230 South Dsc.ii.;.^n £;;r
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PUBLIC MEETING
ON THE NEW RESOURCE CONSERVATION
AND RECOVERY ACT, P.L. 94-580
March 21, 1977
7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
HOLIDAY INN, O'HARE KENNEDY
ROSEMONT, ILLINOIS
SPEAKERS:
MR. GEORGE ALEXANDER, JR.,
Regional Administrator,
EPA Region V
MR. KARL J. KLEPITSCH, JR.,
Chief of the Waste Management
Branch, EPA \Region V
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MR. KLEPITSCH: I think we have deferred
to the weather just about long enough. If those
of you who aren't seated could please take
your seats, take any seat, there are an awful
lot of them here. And if you would, please
move to the front of the room a little bit;
we will feel a little bit more together on this,
I think.
And any of you here who have
not registered, sometime during the evening
please take the opportunity to do so. We might
be able to use your attendance here for
additions to our mailing list or in terms of
other contacts for the future.
My name is Karl Klepitsch. I
am the Chief of the Waste Management Branch
for Region V of the U.S. EPA. I'd like to
welcome you all here on behalf of the agency,
especially in view of the weather tonight.
From your attendance, it sounds
as though -- or looks as though you do have a
significant interest in waste management issues,
snow notwithstanding.
I'd like especially to welcome
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those of you who have had to come from a great
distance away. Meetings such as this are being
held in ten regional cities around the country.
And in spite of a spring storm, we are bound
and determined to give people an opportunity
to make input to the proposed programs of EPA
and RCRA.
With this in mind, I'd like to
get right to the agenda, because of the weather,
and because this is an evening session, and
introduce Mr. George Alexander, who is the
Regional Administrator for Region V.
MR, ALEXANDER: Thank you, Karl. I would
like to reiterate what Karl has said about you
coming out tonight on this night of nice spring
weather we are having in Chicago.
Can you hear in the back all
right? Okay. We are going to see if we can
adjust this a little bit closer. Can you hear
now?
We might do a little bit better
if we could talk everybody into coming up a
little closer to the front. I'm not going to
speak except for a couple of minutes, then I am
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going to turn it over to the experts, but
why don't you move up a little bit closer to
the front so we can have a little bit better
interchange tonight.
One of the primary purposes of
this meeting tonight and tomorrow is to give
you, the public, an opportunity to input into
what the U.S. EPA ought to do in connection
with the Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act of 1976. EPA has had a history of implementing
new laws over the last six years since it was
formed. And just to be very honest with you,
we have been extremely criticized for some of
our implementation of laws and the lack of
public input. All of the laws on which we
function require public input. And I will be
very quick to admit that we haven't done the job
that we should in many cases.
I think as far as this new Act
is concerned, that the EPA has already done a
better job than it's ever done before. And I
think it's going to do & better job still
because for the first time we are really
listening to what the public has to say.
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It's very easy when you go to
implement a new law to theorize what would be
a good way to do it and what Congress intended
and what will work, when you sit back in an
ivory tower, if you will. And sometimes we do
that even though we say that we are out in the
field and know what is going on. It's sometimes
very difficult for us to realize what is
happening on the local level on very specific
things.
For that reason, it's most
important that you tell us what you think we
should do in connection with this Act. There
are many important things that must be done;
there are many important definitions that must
be met -- or made, and those things can be
critical to the future success of this Act,
the solid waste program, and all the programs
within the Act.
So, we are very anxious for you
to tell us what we should do. Let's be honest
about it, we may not do exactly what you say,
but we sure can't do what you say if you don't
say anything. And that's been the history of
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the participation that we have had in new
legislation in the past.
So I just can't encourage you
too much to tell us what you tnink tonight.
Don't worry about being critical, we are used
to that, that's what we want. We want to know
what you think we should do, what you think we
have done wrong in the past, if you will. This
is a very important piece of legislation, not
only to you, but to the Agency and to the
American public. So, it's just critical that we
have your input to it.
Tonight is going to be a rather
abbreviated session. Karl IClepitsch, who you
have just met, is going to give you a general
overview of the law. tfe have some people here
tonight from our headquarters who can go into
more detail, if you will. 3ut, we are here
primarily to listen to you and what you have to
say. vJe don't think it's good for us to sit
up here and lecture to you, if you will. It's
much better for you to lecture to us .
This meeting is one of
public meetings that we ara having throughout
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the United States. And we are seeking this
input everywhere we go.
The new legislation builds on
two previous Acts to try to insure that in our
efforts to clean up the environment and protect
the environment and the health of the people of
the United States that we will not be inhibited
through a failure to conserve and recover our
resources.
In this particular legislation,
as well as in all of our other legislation, we
look to State and local governments as the
primary implenenter, if you will, of the
legislation. Congress has written it that way,
and we at EPA feel very strongly that if we are
going to clean up our environment and protect
our environment in all ways, it must be done
at the State and local level.
That means that we have to have
your input to make it work.
I think I am going to quit. I
ara not used to making long speeches, and I think
it's not worth your while to listen to me. I'm
going to turn it over to Karl and ask him to
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briefly outline the provisions of the new
Act for /ou. And then we will move into
discussion.
Plaase feel free to say anytning
you want to. I just can't encourage you too
much. I was at .^jp^li'er meeting this afternoon
in which people were very critical, not only
of SPA, but the rest of the Federal Government
because of regulations that we have that affect
their way of doing business. But when we look
nack at the record as to when those regulations
were isromulgated and we asked for public comment
on them, this particular group never had one
conrnent in the public record saying what they
thought was wrong or what we should do. Yet now,
three or four years later, thay are very unhappy
about it.
So I just use that to emphasize
that now is the tine to say to us what you want
us to hear. And we will try to act on it.
Karl?
MR. KLEPITSCH: Okay. There isn't too
much I can add to this, but I am going to do it
anyway.
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At the outset and in the interest
of trying to maintain some semblance of order,
I'd like to reiterate a little bit of what
Mr. Alexander has offered, and perhaps take it
a little further. That is, we are not here to
argue the merits or disadvantage of anyone's
point of view. I don't want to engage in a
debate on the issues. I don't want to try to
devise solutions to problems. Instead, I'd
like to receive comments about what RCRA is
and what it means to you. I'd like to provide
everyone here a chance to offer either spoken
or written comments. And based uoon the time
available to us and the number of people here,
I don't think that time is going to be too much
of a problem.
Comments otherwise, if we see
that things are getting a little tight, I night
ask that one bring their commentary to a close,
if it seems to be going too long.
If specific language is desired
to be offered for a definition or other sort
of thing of that sort, please take the time to
write it down in addition to offering it in
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spoken word to help our reporter here to get
everything just the way you would like it to
be.
I'd like to utilize some slides
at this time to go into a little bit further
the natter of public participation under this
Act.
The Resource Conservation and
Recovery Act of '76 contains an unusually
complete array of provisions which could bring
about a high degree of public understanding
and participation. Taken together, these various
provisions make it clear that Congress understood
it's impossible for the public to participate
with understanding and impact unless the
Government first produces valid scientific and
technical data, then processes and publishes
the information in such a way that everyone may
have access to it. Only in this way can the
public really have a reasonable chance of input
in the social, economic and political changes
which the law will bring about.
In Section 8003, the administrator
of EPA is required to develop, collect, evaluate
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and coordinate information on the key elements
which are crucial to the Act's purposes. The
administrator is to do more than implement a
program for the rapid dissemination of this
information. He is also to develop and implement
educational programs to promote citizen
understanding.
This makes it clear that the
implementation called for is to be developed
for the use of others as well as the experts
in the field. Moreover, the administrator is
asked to coordinate iiis actions and to cooperate
to the maximum extent with State and local
authorities, and to establish and maintain a
central reference librar/ for virtually all of
the kinds of information that are involved in
solid waste management for the use in State
and local governments, industry, and the public.
To insure that the public
oarticipation process does not become lopsided,
we felt it was necessary to identify major
categories of interest groups who represent the
public at large. Under RCRA we regard these
to include consumer, environmental, and neighborhood
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groups, trade manufacturing and labor
representatives/ public health, scientific
and professional societies, and governmental
and university associations.
This spectrum of categories
is represented to the group to alter and
supplement as necessary if in the course of
implementing the Act it appears desirable to
do.
In Section 7004-A of the Ac*
it states that any person may petition the
administrator for the promulgation, amendment
or repeal of any regulation under this Act.
Section 7004-B has to do with
the public participation. The Act says that
public participation and development, revisions
and enforcement of any guidelines program under
the Act shall be provided for, encouraged and
assisted by the administrator and the States.
And further, that the administrator,
in cooperation with the State, shall develop and
publish minimum guidelines for public participation
in such processes.
Section 7002-A states that any
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person may commence a civil action on his own
behalf against any other person, including the
United States, which is alleged to be in
violation of this Act, or against the
administrator if there is an alleged failure
by him to perform any act or duty under the Act.
The many techniques which can be
used to involve the public fall into three
major categories. To insure that appropriate
public meetings, hearings, conferences, workshops
and so forth are held throughout the country
and that they are planned and held in accordance
with the unfolding of the Act's provisions.
The use of advisory committees
and review groups which may meet periodically
but which will also be called upon to review
and comment upon major problems, regulations
and plans, no matter when these occur and no
matter whether a specific meeting is convened
or not.
Development of educational
programs so that the public has an opportunity
to become aware of the significance of the
technical data business and the issues which
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emerge from it. Effective public education
programs depend on the use of all media tools,
communication and techniques.
Section 7007-A and B authorizes
the administrator of EPA to raake grants or to
make contracts within 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 organization means a
State or any State agency, municipality, or
educational institution capable of effectively
carrying out a project.
Section 7007-C states that the
administrator shall make a complete investigation
and study to determine the needs for additional
training of State and local personnel to carry
out plans assessed 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 employment and occupational advancement under
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the solid waste disposal and resource and
recovery field. The administrator is required
to report the results of such investigational
study to the President and to the Congress.
In view of the manpower and
funding limitations and the many time mandate
provisions of the Act, however, it's unlikely
that the training activity or the manpower
study will be started during this fiscal year.
As I mentioned earlier, the
agency is going to develop specific guidelines
for public participation, especially when your
comments on how and perhaps at what point in the
process you feel the public could become
effectively involved in this regulatory process.
To the best of our ability, we will consider
your views as these guidelines for public
participation develop.
How, I've several requests to
make before we take comments on this particular
issue. And that is, I would like for you to
please, if you have any comments, to identify
yourself by name, spelling your last name, and
give the affiliation that you have, company or
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organization, before making your comments.
A member of our staff will
also pick up written comments if you have
any. Or, if you would like a card to write
them on, just raise your hand and someone will
respond to your request.
If there are any persons here
who would wish to comment on the public
oarticipation aspects, please feel free at this
time to do so and we will take your input from
here on in.
Jim, can we have the lights
back up?
Don't tell me that all twenty
or thirty people that wanted to comment aren't
here .
Here's a lady right here in the
front row.
MS. STE3WEI1IS: Evelyn Stebweins,
S-t-e-b-w-e-i-n-s, Citizens for Clean Air and
Water in Cleveland.
I wondered what development of
plans you have at the moment toward public
participation?
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MR. KLEPITSCH: These meetings such as
we are having tonight are a specific outcrop
of the agency determination to involve the
public as early as possible in the process.
In addition to meetings like this, there are
other meetings being conducted on a less formal
basis at points around the country. These
meetings are more on an invitation basis, if
you will, seeking inputs from State agencies,
local representatives, environmentalists, industry
and the like.
Meetings such as this we have
had in Cleveland last week, I believe, and in
Minneapolis on the 9th and 10th, that would be
a week and a half ago. We had about twenty,
twenty-five people representing various aspects
of the waste management field, including
hazardous waste.
In addition to that, there are
specific one-on-one meetings being held with
representatives of specific industries or
industry associations, perhaps, to discuss
regulatory alternatives or options and to decide
or to learn what the impact of one option or
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another might be upon that particular group.
If there is any desire to input
the process at all, just let us know and we
will see what we can do. We can let you know
when other meetings of this sort are going to
be held.
MS. STEBWSINS: I might have one comment
about so-called public participation. As a
citizens group and knowing the financial
condition of most citizens' groups who do not
necessarily have enough money to even pay
transportation expenses for people to participate
in the meetings, is there any consideration
given towards funding for these public groups?
MR. KLEPITSCH: At this time I'm not sure
that there is any gross amount of funds
available to the agency that would allow us
to do that. Our own travel funds are extremely
restricted. In fact, I don't get to go to all
the meetings myself with respect to representing
my particular regional office operation. If
our headquarters is putting this on, I tend to
leave it in their hands. And where it's a
regional activity, we generally try to do it
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here .
MR. ALEXANDER: Let me speak to that just
a moment. EPA has just published in the
Federal Register a proposal for funding
public participation within all of the EPA's
activities. Actually, what that Federal
Register notice doas is take a proposal that
has been submitted to EPA, it does not enforce
it, say it's good or bad, but throws it open
to the public for methods of financing expert
witnesses, travel, et cetera.
I would suggest to you that this
is a very appropriate time for you to comment
on that proposal in the Federal Register because
this is something that concerns SPA and all of
its programs, financing public participation for
those people that want to participate but don't
have the wherewitlia] such as maybe some limited
groups do; industry, public officials and so
forth, because that is out for proposal right
now.
MR. KLEPITSCH: Yes, Ma'am?
M3. ROME: Louise Rome from the League of
'Jomen Voters.
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Could you tell us what Federal
Register and what the deadlines for comment is?
What is the issue?
MR. ALEXANDER: I can't tell you. The
Federal Register notice was in the last two
weeks. And it's about a sixty-day comment TUT i or5.
If you want to call the office, I will get it
for you.
MR. MILEY: My name is Dave Mi ley,
M-i-1-e-y, Beloit, Wisconsin. I am a private
contractor.
And our biggest trouble is to
get along with people. On handling this, how
do we get to the people?
MR. KL,i:PIT3CH: I'm not sure I follow
altogether --
MR. MIL'dY: Well, we work for municipalities
in the handling of solid waste and sludge. 3ut
our biggest trouble is with the people.
MR. KLEPITSCH: In terms of adverse
public reaction?
MR. MILEY: Smells and things of this
category.
MR. XLEPITSCH: I'm afraid that we have
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a significant job of education to do nationally.
That is not an uncommon problem at this point.
I don't know what I can say other than to agree
with you that any type of disposition generally
meets with adverse reaction.
(Unidentified Speaker:) Would you repeat
the questions from the floor before you respond
to them so that we can --
MR. KLSPITSCII: Yes, sir, I am sorry for
neglecting that.
Mr. Miley indicated that he was
a contractor engaged in the disposition of
sludge generally on farmland in the area in
which he works, and tnat his biggest problem
was an adverse public reaction to the practice,
namely smells and so forth -- of odor problems.
I don't know that we have a
ready answer for that other than it's going to
take a significant job of education to overcome
that.
Yes, sir?
MR. VEROSKI: Bill Veroski.
The goals that you are aiming
for in public participation are all well and good,
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but I envision some quite serious problems that
are going to continually crop up. And I'd like
to use the water pollution control system that
we are aware of right now and have had the
opportunity to go through.
Within the confines of the public
works grant system, there is a step one plan
that has to be put together. In doing so
there are two public hearings required, one
before you start and one when you have finished
the plans. Trying to get public input to
first of all agree that there is or there isn't
a problem and if there is a problem what you
should do about it and third, this is the
direction you should be aimed in trying to
solve that problem. Our experience with that
has been that number one, there is very little
interest at the study stage before the start
of the plan; there is very mild at best interest
when the facility's plan is completed.
Where we get the reaction from
the citizenry in general and from specific
organizations is at the time we come up with
the dollar sign, how much it is going to cost.
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This is where it becomes very traumatic.
I think we are going to find
the same thing here that fir. Alexander
mentioned before -- that he had a meeting with
some group that had no comments whatsoever
during the planning stages but at the level now
where all of a sudden it has an impact on the
financial basis -- that comments, adverse or
pro, whatever they happen to be, became available.
I think the same thing is what we are facing
here .
I very seriously doubt that you
are going to nave people opposing the intent of
the law.
Do we have a problem solving
waste disposal? I think that is very obvious.
You can drive down almost any street in the
nation and find that some kind of a problem
exists.
Anybody who happens to have a
disposal site or an open dump or sanitary
landfill, whatever, anywhere within a radius
of ten miles of where they live, is aware that
there is a problem. Anybody who pays to have
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their trash or garbage ramoved is aware there
is a problem.
So in sailing the program, I
don't think there is going to be any adverse
comments there. The problem I see arising
is when we go down the road and develop the
guidelines and say, "Ladies and Gentlemen, this
is what has to be done; tnase are the ways to
do it; these are going to ba the costs."
?Jow you are paying a dollar a month to collect
your garbage, hoping to get rid of it, if you
are a homeowner. Where it's an industry, it
is ten thousand dollars a month for maintaining
a disposal site of their own.
With the guidelines being
proposed now, the cost of the homeowner goes
to ten or fifteen dollars a month for disposal
and the industry, instead of paying ten thousand
dollars, is going to somewhere around fifty
or sixty thousand to maintain a proper site.
Then is when we are going to get comments.
And I don't see how through this
public participation dissemination of information
at this time -- how we are going to generate the
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kind of comments we are going to get that are
adverse after we have our dollar sign. What
the world is really thinking of is how much it
is going to cost us.
MR. KLSPITSCH: Well, we are seeking the
input from organized groups who do have an
impression as to what the various options might
begin to cost. In addition to that, the agency
is virtually mandated to analyze any of its
proposed regulations for the potential impact
they might have, if not an impact statement, at
least an analysis. And I would hope that the
figures you just used with respect to — for
impact sake, the move from a dollar to ten
dollars, would not be part of the options that
we would be looking at.
I don't see a tenfold increase.
The discussions that I have heard informally
so far have been that the impact of the likely
guidelines and standards would not at all come
to that order of magnitude.
MR. VE^OSKI: I used the figures that I
did strictly as an example. \nd they had no
bearing on the facts. I don't knov? what the
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dollars are, but I do wonder about the subsequent
time. And that is the tine when the reaction
comes forth. That's when the interest arises.
That's when the information comes through and
they say, "Why couldn't we do it this way?"
which might get the same job done but it's a
little bit cheaper.
This is when those ideas are
going to come forth simply because of the
experience we have had with the branch program.
;1R. KLEPITSCH: Any other comments?
Yes , sir?
MR. FORCADE: Bill Forcade, Citizens for
a Better Environment.
I have a question on the public
participation as it applies to the State programs.
I understand that both the solid waste program
and the hazardous waste program provide for the
State to assune control of the day-to-day
operation of the plant. It's much similar to
the Water Pollution Control Act.
Under the Water Pollution Control
Act, individual State governments, whether they
be city or county, have many decision-making
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responsibilities. It has cone about that they
contract out to engineering firns to supply
them with technical data upon which decisions
are made. The public is precluded from the
information until some time far after the
decision has in fact been made.
Under the Resource Conservation
and Recovery Act, is any effort going to be
made to insure that the public is made aware
of all of the facts that will go into the
selection of the sanitary landfill or an
appropriate method of incineration or containment
in the city or county level that is not currently
being done under the Water Pollution Control Act?
Are we going to be given the same access to
information that the local officials who are
making the decision have at the same time they
have rather than in fact much after the decision
has been made and as sort of a token gesture?
MR. KLEPITSCH: I think every opportunity
or every chance for that is going to be attempted
to be insured. However, the programs are
implementable at tne State level, particularly
the hazardous waste permit program. That is
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basically the major State program which would --
Federal program would be delegated to. And
the alternative to that -- or along with that,
I am sorry — the States are viewed as the
prime operating level for tne actions under
RCRA.
The intent of the State olan is
to include local and regional people in the
decision-making process. One of the items we
get into a little later, I believe, is we will
discuss the matter of how the funding for the
State plans and implementation would go within
a given State. We will discuss how much will
be available to State agencies, how much would
be available to local and regional planning
units .
These units of government
generally do have hearings. And I don't believe
they necessarily conduct their meetings in
secrecy, not in this State. And I think perhaps
the concern of people would be better -- could
be better represented by paying a little closer
attention to the units of government they do have.
I know in our own town, in fact,
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people seem to go to the City Council meetings
when they have something that they have is
of particular interest to them at that time.
And you don't see them often after that.
I think a little more watchdogging
of these agencies by people in general would
probably do them a little good.
MR. FORCADE: Specifically what I am
talking about -- I am not sure I got the idea
across -- in a large metropolitan area you will
have a commission or some section of city
government that will select the sanitary landfill
site. Mow, the information they will get from
their private contractors as to the available
sites in the area and potential for damage from
the site that is chosen will not be made available
to the public at the earliest available time
unless there is a regulation as part of the
administrative authority under this Act requiring
that information be made available to the
decision-maker and the public at the same time.
They have found a convenient
scapegoat in using private contractors which are
not subject to the Act.
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Does the administrator plan or
is it going to be part of the program to
encourage public participation at the very
early stages, before the sites have been
identified, so that the public can have
meaningful input?
MR. KLEPITSCH: I think by your asking it
right now that it's on the public record that
you would like them to consider that. Certainly
as they discuss the public participation
guidelines -- that is the whole idea of your
being here.
Any other comments? ^o? All
right.
(Unidentified Speaker:) You mentioned
about local communities' reaction of the people
to certain things when it's of interest to them
and other than that they don't. It reminds me
of something, and that is that most areas, and
I am talking about multi-governmental jurisdication,
where we have townships and counties and villages
and cities involved, they presently have some way
of disposing waste and it's usually at numerous
sites. And there are existing contracts for
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collection, transportation and disposal.
.Every one of those contracts, for whatever
reason, happens to expire at different times.
If any group could go into a resource recovery
system with the kind of capital investment that
it requires and the type of contents that have
to be delivered on a daily basis to make the
thing approach some kind of economic balance
how could we accomplish that end result with
the different expiration dates of contracts
and then never be sure that when the existing
contract with whoever it exists today will be
replaced by one with the resource recovery group
that we have set up in the area?
I don't know how we accomplished
that. It's almost like forcing an issue.
MR. KLEPITSCH: I am going to accept that
as a rhetorical observation. I'm not going to
be able to solve that kind of a problem here
tonight, but on the basis of the way you
phrased it, it will be in the record and it will
be considered by people that put together the
guidelines recommended for participation.
I'd like to move into the
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discussion now, if we nave no further questions
on )ublic participation, with what I hope will
be a brief overview of the Act. But inasmuch
as I am going to deal with the entire Act, it's
going to take me more than five minutes to do
it.
We are going to discuss the
hazardous waste management aspects of the Act
in basically the same fashion that we will do
them tomorrow only not in detail. I will move
through hazardous waste management, land
disposal, technical assistance, and resource
recovery, and the potential of the post-State
role. And I will then offer a few observations
in terras of what the regional goal has been and
what we might view it for the future.
If I could have the lights,
please? I'm going to extemporize from the
slides here.
As you can see, for those of you
who have not gotten a copy of the Act yet, the
objectives of RCRA arc to protect health and
environment and to conserve material and energy.
These objectives are expected to
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be achieved through technical and financial
assistance and through local government;
prohibition of open dumping, conversion of
existing dumps, and the regulation of hazardous
waste.
Further, they would go through
guidelines for solid waste management. There
is a provision for research and development,
special demonstrations, and to -- we are
actively engaged and have been for some time
even before RCRA in trying to develop Federal,
State — and not to quite a degree — local
government in terms of recovery.
There is a group out of our
Washington Office who has had this for some
time in a specific area of interest as regards
material and energy recovery. Mr. Lowe, from
our office in Washington, will deal tomorrow
with this in great specifics. I think if you
have an opportunity to be here tomorrow, he will
provide you with a great deal of information.
In addition to those objectives,
we will be served by the public education process.
One of the major, perhaps
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Federally significant issues here in the Act is
the placement of a hazardous waste management
Federal regulatory program. Most of the
provisions within this title of the Act are
supposed to be completed within eighteen months.
/Jithin this Section 3001, we have to develop a
criteria and a listing for what hazardous waste
is .
There will be an advance notice
of proposed rule-making issues soon -- I lost
track, since so many of these are due. Whether
or not this has been done yet, this escapes me.
But, the first notice of this will occur very
shortly. It is a discussion of the Agency's
intent to move into this area to establish its
criteria and listing. And based upon that, there
will be a series of meetings, hearings and so
forth prior to the issuance in the Federal
Register of a proposed notice of rule-making to
establish this list.
It's anticipated that the dates
at this time will be met. Every effort is
being entered -- every effort is being made
within the Agency to be able to meet the deadlines
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which the law has set forth.
Section 3002 deals with
standards for hazardous waste generators.
And in it, we have to promulgate recorclkeeping
and labeling of containers and establish a
manifest system which is the crux of a cradle
to grave management system for hazardous waste
which will follow the waste from the generator
to the transformer to the disposal for an
effective facilitv.
Section 3003 deals with
transporting standards. Regulations will be
promulgated relative to recordkeeping for
these type of operators largely in accordance
with the provisions of DOT.
We are trying to establish
these regulations in a coherent way, as best
we can, to avoid conflict with other Federal
agencies who may have regulations or systems,
some longstanding.
We are also looking at the
matter of the transporter of having to comply
with the manifest system called for in the
previous sections of the Act.
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Section 3004, along with 3001,
is perhaps one of the most critical. It's
certainly one of the most difficult sections
of the Act, where its standards are to be
derived for the owners or operators of treatment,
storage, and disposal facilities.
As you can see, regulations will
La called for for performance, for recordkeeping
and recording to take care of its part in the
manifest system. Monitoring^inspections,
location^ design , and construction criteria --
these will be broadly based—location design
and construction to discuss protection of ground
water, surface water, air constraints, all of
the things which suould go into the deliberations
on the locating of sites.
Contingency plans will be covered,
and tne manner of ownership will also be
discussed in terms of long-term liability
insurances and so forth that will be called
for in the operation of such treatment or
disposal facilities.
Section 3005 discusses the
permit system which is engaged with the 3004
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standards.
In this, the permit system is
directed just to the treatment, storage or
disposal facility. There is no permit, per se,
for a transformer or for a generator of waste.
They will be covered, however, by the manifest
system, which is another system.
The requirements of the permit
will be to list the hazardous waste data and
to discuss the site of the treatment and
disposal and storage.
And the matter of people who have
been in business as of the passage of the Act
is covered in what are called interim permits
where people who are in business at the passage
of the Act who have notified the State, if that
State has authorized programs, or the EPA if not,
and has subsequently applied for a permit, such
place will be considered to have an interim
permit until a formal action can be taken on
their application for a permit.
Section 3006 deals with the part
that is most dear to my heart, and that is the
fact that this program is intended for the
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operation by State agencies. I have been
through the NPDES program in the regional
office, and by golly, I don't like to see us
operating these programs. It's confusing to
people who are permittees and it's perhaps
upsetting to the State in terms of potential
for controversy that is a conflict between a
proposed Federal permit and their own permits
of longstanding. And the best alternative I see
is for these programs to be operated by the
State .
There will be guidelines to
assist the States to set up a program. There
will be a State-authorized program. A program
will be able to be authorized if it is
equivalent to the Federal program assessed with
other State programs and provides for adequate
enforcement with the other provisions of
Subtitle C.
In addition to the long-term
assignment of the program or authorization of
the program to the State, there is provision
for an interim authorization wherein a State
might not have all but the i's dotted and the
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t's crossed as regards full or permanent
authorization, but are well on their way and
have the interest and the backing of their
Stats to say, "We will identify the deficiencies
and set forth a schedule to overcome those
deficiencies." And they have the opportunity
for interim authorization which would last for
the period of two years. And during that period
of time, I would look for a State which obtains
all of the necessary program elements to be able
to be apolying for oermit authority and probably
to get it.
We are lookina for these programs
to be as convenient for the States wi th respect
to our analysis of what is the equivalent and
what is consistent. I am hopeful that as we
proceed with the development of our guidelines
and regulations that this will be keot in the
forefront of the agency.
I an serving as representative
on several of these groups for the region and
will take every opportunity to make this
expression so that the programs that we do
derive will come out to be rational and viable
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for the States to operate and for industry and
others to be able to live with.
Section 3010 deals with
notification wherein generators, transformers,
and people who treat, store or dispose of
waste must notify KPA of their activities.
This is required to be done with in the three
months after the promulgation of Section 3001.
Now, the Agency is not obliged
to notify industry in this section of the Act.
It is clearly industry's obligation to notify
the Agency. This does not mean, however, that
SPA is going to blindly stand by and make no
attemot to notify oeoole of their potential
coverage of the Act and not offer them opportunity
with some forewarning that appears there would
be a generator or transformer or handler of
waste that would fall under tnis system.
We are presently undertaking to
identify the most comprehensive and meaningful
mailing list of industries or users to let them
know of our concern for then and to provide them
with an opportunity to notify us.
One of the other major sections
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of the Act deals with land disposal, conventional
land disposal, if you will, municipal revenues.
There are major definitions called for relative
to the land disposal and they go into defining
what disposal is for purposes of the Act, what
an open dump is, what a sanitary landfill is,
and what solid waste is.
There are significant regulatory
activities under which to define an open dump
and the operators to that. One is a sanitary
landfill. In the Act it has already been defined
what disposal would constitute and what solid
waste is. I'd like to read you, for those of
you who are not familiar, what disposal means for
purposes of the Act.
"Disposal means the discharge,
deposit, injection, dumping, storing, leaking or
placing of any solid waste or hazardous waste
into or on any land or waters so that such solid
waste or hazardous waste or any constituent
thereof may enter the environment or may be
emitted into the air or discharged into any
waters, including ground waters. Solid waste means
any garbage, refuse, sludge from a waste treatment
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plant, water supply treatment plant, or air
pollution control facility and other discarded
material including solid, liquid, semi-solid
or contain gaseous material resulting from
industrial, commercial and agricultural operation
and from community activities, but does not
include solid or dissolved material and domestic
sewerage or solid and domestic sewerage or any
industrial discharges which are point sources
subject to permits under Section 402 of the
Federal vlater Pollution Control Act as amended
or source, special nuclear or byproduct materials
as defined by the Atomic Energy Act of 1954."
Section 4004 deals with the
establishment of criteria of sanitary landfills.
Criteria for classifying landfills and dumps are
called for, and, as I mentioned earlier, steps
are underway to undertake the specific activities.
We are again looking for these activities to meet
the mandate of the law. It's going to take some
time because of administrative inertia to derive
proposed rule-making and to force it through
the Agency's administrative procedure.
At this time, however, there are
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no concession* made to the one-year issuance
period. We are attempting everything that we
can to meet those dates. Disposal will be
required in sanitary landfills, and this is 21
major element of the State plans which are
required under RCRA.
4005 requires the upgrading of
open dumps and an inventory to be called for
to be completed within twelve months after
promulgation of the criteria. This is going to
take some significant activity by both EPA and
the States to complete. It may depend somewhat
upon how the definition is derived. An inventory
could be as comprehensive as municipal refuse,
disposal sites, industrial solid waste or
commercial disposal sites, industrial or hazardous
waste, liquid disposal, on-site disposal by pits,
ponds or lagoons, depending upon how broad the
initial definition is.
The inventory may be very difficult
if not almost impossible to complete within
twelve months. It's my hope that we will be
able to proceed in an orderly way to derive an
inventory which is meaningful in accordance with
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the resources available to the State and to
the Federal Government to conduct these things.
It is an open question at this
time, however, what the definition will be.
So, it doesn't really pay too much to be overly
concerned by it. I think recognition of some
of these restrictions will be made and it will
be such that we will be able to conduct an
inventory in a meaningful way.
As a result of that inventory,
it will be a requirement to publish a list of
open dumps and a commitment through the State
plan of either closing or upgrading of these
open dumps within five years after the list is
published. In the absence of completing that
in five years, the State's EPA places themself
in jeopardy of citizens' suits and whatever else
with respect to the filing of litigation for
failure to complete the activities called for
in the Act.
Section 1008 calls for solid
waste management guidelines within twelve months
and from time to time thereafter. Technical and
economic description levels of oerformance to
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protect the environment will be called for in
these guidelines.
Within twenty-four months,
guidelines will be called for to discuss the
levels of performance, the levels of control,
and to discuss the protection of ground and
surface waters in accordance with folding these
requirements in with previously enacted general
and public health considerations.
Section 1008 also calls for
establishing criteria for open dumps, land
disposal guidelines which are planned, and sludge
disposal guidelines.
One of the next major elements
of the Act deals with technical assistance and
resource recovery. With respect to that,
guidelines are called for under Section 1008,
the establishment of resource recovery and
conservation panels, development of State and
local programs under another Subtitle, information
available and dissemination. This is an activity
which the Agency has been quite good in, and I
think we have done a very good job in virtually
all areas of waste management at this point.
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Demonstrations are also called
for within the Act under Section 3004.
Under Section 6002, even Federal
procurement is affected and the various things
with respect to waste to energy, vendors,
specifications for procurement are to be perhaps
amended to call for routinely the use of
recycled materials where previously they had not.
And waste management services to maximize energy
and resource recovery are also called for.
As you can see, it is a very
comprehensive situation for resource and
conservation.
Special studies are called for
in a variety of things.
They continue with respect to the
establishment of a resource conservation at the
Cabinet level, which is an interagency panel
which would investigate, study and report on
various and sundry social and economic impacts
upon the ability to successfully look to resource
conservation as a real, viable instrument in
waste management.
You can see that there are things
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such as public policies that will be considered
by this activity. We will be discussing this
in much greater detail at tomorrow morning's
session for those of you who will be here.
In Section 3005, study and
demonstration of recovery of useful materials
will take care of the means for recovery and
waste reduction, collection, separation and
containerization and so forth.
In Section 2003, the resource
recovery and conservation panels are discussed.
And these panels basically will be put together
at the regional level, and this area of the
nrogram is intended to be imolemented at the
regional level. We will be trying to out
together panels responsive to individual requests
to help solve specific problems. These panels
will be composed of engineering talent, academic,
regional headquarters, State Agency personnel,
whatever the best mix seems to be able to try
to deal with local decision-makers. We are
looking to this with some high degree of
expectation with respect to the fact that if we
can do it and do it properly, it's an everybody
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wins situation. It is further looked upon as
an item of some significance in the Agency in
that the legislation itself calls for the fact
that about 20 percent -- I believe it's 20 percent
of the authorized operating budget for the
Agency is to be committed to this tyoe of
activity.
So, it wasn't as though the
legislators looked to the RCRA to be a heavily
and solely ragulatory-type Act. They did see
the significance, especially in the area of
waste management, of technical assistance, ant!
also recognized, I am sure through this, the
heavy investment of the private sector in the
area of waste management.
As I mentioned earlier, the
technical, marketing, financial, institutional
and EPA consultants nretty nuch raatch varieties
of people that we could think of who might be
able to helo us out with the oarticular oroblem.
These panels will also be able
to be usod to develop and implement the various
^arts of State plans and to heln to implement
local Jlans where oeople would nacd a little bit
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50
of a push or instruction in terms of the best
way that they might proceed. The panels would
also be able to be directed to these activities.
Okay. That takes care of the
three major program thrusts, if you will, the
technical program thrusts. And we would follow
this now with the role for the State and the
local governments, if you will.
Subtitle CAB provides the
mechanism for States to assume what I feel is
their rightful role. The States have been at
this for some time in a regulatory role, and
coupled with the general desire to be helpful,
I think most States heretofore have been as
strong at technical assistance as one would
expect them to be. Rather than to come down on
someone arbitrarily, most of the States saw the
waste management agencies and have tried to
work with people to help them solve problems
in the first instance.
I think RCRA is similarly
interested and would be looking for a continuance
of this particular mode. It provides a tool
for mechanism for local government to meet
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primary protection needs and, as you can see,
guidelines for regional planning areas are
called for to be issued in April of 1977.
That is only a few weeks from now.
In deference to the fact that
this is a short time constraint, the Agency is
intent upon issuing an interim final regulation
or guideline on identifying regional plan areas
rather than to go with a proposal and then a
final, which is much more time consuming than
the law meant for its time constraint.
The guidelines for State solid
waste management programs are due approximately
a year from now. This will help us to identify
the State program for the key elements that are
necessary for the State to be able to be granted
the Federal funds which will be made available
through various elements of the RCRA or funds
for grants and hazardous waste, State planning
and others, as you will see along the way as we
proceed through here.
As you can see-,- minimum
requirements for acceptable State programs will
be that there is a shared local and State plan
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and capability for implementation that dumps
and landfills will be -- dumps will be upgraded
and sanitary landfills will become the order of
the day. The regulatory authorities exist in
most of our States in this region, as a group
of our States are probably as well developed or
perhaps more developed than I think other groups
within any other region of the country.
Sanitary landfills or resource
conservation attitudes will also be called for
by the State plan. Contractual agreements,
frankly, is a major impediment in most of
Governmental regulations or laws. This has
generally been a rather serious impediment to
the ability to enter into long-term financing
agreements that are necessary to successfully
implement the capital intention of resource
recovery facilities.
Generally speaking, the States
are looking to this and are seeking revenues
within their State to be able to engage in these
long-term contractual arrangements and thereby
facilitating limitation of resource recovery
within their legal bonds.
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Financial assistance is provided
to States and local government under Section 3011.
We had the State hazardous waste program and
its twenty-five million dollars for each year
authorized. This, unlike some of the other
elements of the funding criteria, will be
measured on the degree of the oroblera in the
State rather than its population, necessarily.
Development and inolementation of
the plan calls for thirty and forty million
dollar authorization for the upcoming two years.
By and large, these will be based on the
population formula, at least in part.
Implementation for management
programs, solid waste management programs in
'78 and '79 is indicated at fifteen million
dollars a year. These will be to assist in
the planning feasibility studies, conservation
surveys, technology assessments and so forth.
'•Jo particular formula is called for.
Special communities are similarly
cared for under the Act. In '78 and '79,
two and a half million dollars is authorized
and there is a formula placed on small populations
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54
and waste coming in from the outside.
I'm not sure just how many
communities actually will be able to meet this
specific criteria. I think it's rather limited
in this region especially.
Rural community assistance is
called for for "78 and '79 to the tune of a
twenty-five million dollar authorization.
Grants to the States to assist are based uoon
community population of 5,000 or less.
Now, we get down to the realities
of life. Those were the authorizations. So
far, it's the -- let us say the F.Y. '73
budget has requested twelve million dollars for
planning under Subtitle D of the Act. This
money represents basically a four-fold increase
in ths monies which have been available in
recent years, basically for grants to State
agencies.
In consonance with the fact
that RCRA is mailing significant additional
demands upon State agencies, in particular,
these twelve million dollars are primarily
earmarked for the State agencies. It is not to
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say that they are solely for the use of
State agencies. The Governors of each State
will work together with the State solid waste
agencies and local and regional agencies to
determine the amount of money which will be made
payable by agreement to the various institutions
of government within their States.
Primarily, however, the regulatory
authority with the State and the additional
demands on their program under RCRA will be
attended to first, and whatever monies are left
over from that twelve million dollars will be
nade available for use by local and regional
agencies to conduct plans and so forth.
Now, even though the money may
initially go to the State agencies, there is
the potential for the State agencies to use
local agencies who have demonstrated ability in
solid waste management planning to perhaps
subcontract major portions of the activities
that the State otherwise would conduct on its own.
I think that the States will
probably have some difficulty in accepting
four-fold increases in funds without the use of
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56
contracts with consultants and for other elements
of planning agencies within the State to help
them to do the work that they have.
Now, some things probably will
be identified as best done by the State solid
waste management agency on a statewide basis.
But I think what we are going to see is a
utilization of the existing solid waste planning
authorities in our States, generally that means
counties. And the two hundred and eight agencies,
where the two hundred and eight agencies have
demonstrated ability in working cooperatively
with the States, these agencies who have
implementation capabilities to carry out plans
that are put together.
I don't have an" other slides
for what the law night involve. But with respect
to our regional activities and agency resources,
the twelve million dollars is additional monies
for grants. The '73 budget also calls for
twenty-five positions to be disseminated to the
regions. Our region will probably get, I would
think, a disproportionately small amount of
those resources if prior allegations have been
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made .
We are seeking to get a
rational disposition of these resources and
oerhaps we will.
I'm concerned, however, that
the twenty-five positions that are in the
level for all of the regions is generally rather
a low level of resources for the Agency to be
able to successfully conduct this program
without a great deal of help from the States
in terns of their ability and their willingness
to take over these programs where they have the
ability to do so.
The positions which we do get
through headquarters will be used primarily to
work together with the States, and where requested,
with the local governments to help to establish
and develop solid waste plans, soecifically
commensurate with the plans of P.CRA. So that
the States are not unnecessarily or artificially
constrained from receiving the amounts of money
which will probably be put to use or released
in subsequent years -- I am thinking of P.Y. '79
and actually, depending on the mood of Congress,
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F.Y. '73.
In Region V we are looking for
a grant program to reach the order of around
two and a half million dollars as compared with
about a half million dollars over the last
several years. In addition to the positions
which headquarters has, which it may be able
to formally give to us, while Mr. Alexander --
I see he is still here -- I'd like to take this
opportunity to thank him personally for the fact
that he has given us authority in the solid
waste branch to proceed to hire as many as
seven people for the program in the near term.
We are working against that
availability. And as long as he demonstrates
that largesse, I want to be able to fill his
position before he changes his mind.
I think that his recognition of
the waste management program in Region V is
significant. I believe that fir. Alexander's
recognition is probably one of the first
demonstrations by a regional administrator,
especially to the extent of the number of
positions which he has discussed for us, and
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we will do everything that we can do to put
together a program which is as service-oriented
as we can possibly make it. We are stretched
paper thin at this point in time, but we still
are trying to undertake the best way we can
a technical assistance program and a brokering
program, if you will, to put together people who
have problems with people who can help solve them.
And particularly when I say, "brokering," I
am suggesting that if people do have problems,
either from the State or from private industry
or from wherever, and we don't have the specific
skill in our staff, we will make every effort
that we can to work together with our headquarters
to identify where these resources might be and
put together a match so that we can help solve
problems rather than become a part of them.
At this point, I'd like to again
offer you the opportunity to offer your comments.
I hope more comments than questions, because
the demands and opportunities under RCRA are
very significant. In particular, I would be
interested in providing the people who have sent
in response cards indicating that they would like
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to make a statement at this time, if you
possibly can, to do so, because there will be
very little interruption at this point. I
think we have got a small enough group at this
point that if you have a lengthy statement to
make you will have the opportunity tonight.
I see by the clock here we have
roughly an hour. And the floor is all yours,
based upon your willingness to make use of it.
Questions or comments?
MR. WALTON: John Walton from St. Paul,
Minnesota, representing Champion International
Corporation. We are a paper recycling firm.
I'd like to ask for comment and
clarification on Section 4003 of the law,
particularly Section 5 that states the plan --
I guess it's referring to the State plan --
"shall provide that no local governments within
the State shall be prohibited under State or
local law from entering into long-term contracts
for the supply of solid waste to resource
recovery facilities."
I know that the law is only six
months old, but we are -- our company is quite
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active with municipal type governments in our
State, County and others. And we find that
they are unaware of this provision. So anything
that could be done to make this provision
clearly understood at the State level would be
helpful.
My second question for
clarification is where does the Federal
Government fit into this? We come to the same
difficulty with the Federal Government, either
an inability or a lack of awareness that they
have the ability to enter into a long-term
contract.
Mn. KLEPITSCH: Generally speaking,
Government regulations have precluded anything
but short-term, maybe one year accounting
authority. This, through RC^A, as much as
anytning else, has been recognized and GSA
in particular has taken steps to allow longer
term contracts, particularly for paper
separation programs and so forth.
I believe it's requiring a
change in their regulations and the establishment
of some contracting format which would put the
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language in the style to enable them to
proceed. We are at this time working with
GSA to implement a prototype Federal building
in each region around the country. In our
region, the prototype building is the building
in which we reside. It makes little sense for
us to try to go out and sell the program if they
say to us, "Who are you and what are you doing
here?"
At this time, frankly, I'm a
little bit concerned that I see forty stories
of paper at the bottom of the elevator shaft
because people haven't got the capability of
moving it away with as clean of a means as they
would in a commercial building. We are working
with the building management and with GSA
regional office to try to set the stage for a
successful implementation. I would anticipate
that in the next month, perhaps two months or
less, we will see at least an invitation for
proposal from GSA for contractors to provide a
waste desktop paper separation program for our
Federal building. This would be one which would
have a longer term contract.
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I think what you are going to
find is that GSA regional people, and more
importantly district people or whatever their
subgroups are below the regional level, have not
necessarily been sensitized to this until
recently and may still not have been sensitized
inasmuch as they may not yet be the prototype
building or the prototype area. We are working
with CSA to help to insure that they get the word
to their management at the local level to allow
these programs to go forth of their own volition.
We are responsible in this region
to see to it that these programs are implemented.
And based upon available resources and the
acquisition of resources by myself, we will have
people to specifically attend to working with
those units to assure they do get implemented.
But the basic problem, I think,
is between headquarters and the regions, and
after that to get the regions to move forward
with perhaps the assurance that it can be done
where it hadn't been done before. And after
that, to be able to point to the success of
this implementation. I think we will see the
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snowballing effect within this year, certainly.
Yes, sir?
MR. HUGHES: George Hughes, Victory
Steel Products, Indianapolis, Indiana.
Under the Clean Water Act, the
EPA has spent a good deal of money with outside
contractors studying various industries as far
as water treatment goes. 3y July of this year,
they were coning out with guidelines. By '33
they will be coining out with more stringent
guidelines. In all of these studies, they have
recommended various ways and means of treating
water to remove all of the contaminants. But
there is nothing that has been said about what
are you going to do with the solid waste
materials once you have removed them from the
water and you clean up your water so it can be
deposited in streams.
Granted this Act is only six
months old, but we are going to be in the middle
here. if hat are we going to do with all these
solid wastes that we remove from the water in
our processing? How much intercommunication does
the solid waste people -- do the solid waste
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65
and the water people -within EPA have?
MR. KLEPITSCH: If I might defer -- Jack,
if I could sneak up on you by suddenness and
ask you to respond to that?
Mr. Lehman from our headquarters
is here and he is in charge of the Hazardous
Waste Management Division who specifically has
undertaken at least fifteen industry studies
which are similar, perhaps, to the effluent
guidelines. He has conducted surveys of at least
fifteen industries for industrial waste.
Jack, could you offer a few
comments relative to your activities?
MR. LEHMAN: Be glad to, Karl.
The gentleman from Indiana is
quite correct in the sense that the studies
that were conducted by the Water Programs Office
of EPA did not go the last mile and deal with
the issue of what do you do with the sludge
and residue resulting from waste water treatment
systems.
We recognized that problem and
funded it, as Karl said, fifteen more studies
that did take that last mile and try to predict
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66
what the impact of the water uro.grams , new
regulations and also air program regulations
would have on tne generation of solid waste or
liquid waste which would be disposed of on the
land. Those reports are about 90 oercent
completed now. Most of them are available
through the technical information service. The
others will be available shortly.
As to the other part of the
question, the degree to waich the Solid Waste
Office and the Water Program Office within
EPA coordinate their activities, I think the best
way to answer taat is to say that obviously
they did not coordinate their activities very
well in the past. However, we have been
attempting to improve that coordination. And
the mere existence of a new law like the one we
are discussing this evening practically forces
that type of coordination. That didn't have to
haopen by law, anyway, before.
Also, the Solid Waste Office
has been very closely working with the 203
Planning System within the Water Programs Office
in the last year or so. And I think that that
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67
bridge has been made. We are also now beginning
to work more closely with the Effluent
Flotation Guidelines Division which is writing
these regulations the gentleman referred to
under Court order.
And so I think you will see
improvement in that aspect in the future.
(Unidentified Speaker:) What were the
fifteen categories?
MR. LEHMAN: Fifteen industrial categories,
if I can remember them, I certainly will try
to give you a list. I might not find all
fifteen. There was the organic chemical
industry, the inorganic chemical industry,
rubber, textiles, petroleum refining, primary
metals, there was one of manufacturing of
machinery, ono on electronic components, batteries,
Pharmaceuticals, tanneries, waste oil re-refining
was another one .
(Unidentified Speaker:) That was pretty
good, that was twelve.
"•!".. LKH">T.VI : But it was a fairly substantial
set.
M^. KLCPIT3CH: Yes, sir?
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MR. HARRIS: My name is Jack Harris. I
am with the International Minerals and Chemical
Corporation.
Concerning the definitions that
are included in the Act of both solid wasta
and disposal, I'd like to ask the question as
to pits, ponds, pools, puddles and lagoons,
since these are being attempted to be
regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act.
And from the definition, they would appear to
be covered here.
I request that given some
information as to whether or not there has
been any interaction between the water supply
people and OSWMP as to who is going to
end up having this?
MR. KLEPITSCH: Thare has been more than
just a little dialogue on that already. It
will probably be so that the responsibilities
may wind up being shared on that. I am not
positive. It hasn't been finally determined at
this point, I don't believe. But, the issue
is recognized but it has not been finalized in
terms of which group would manage that. It may
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69
'•>_> shared, i!_ nay be placed in one or the other.
Any other questions?
m. SW^JSO'J: Could I corno up and make a
few comHunts?
MR. ~;L"JP J^SCII: Sure.
MR. SWC'.'SOM: I an Arlen Swenson from Deere
arul Company, and I'd like to present a few
items here this evening and leave these up here
for ydur raview.
lumber one, in the area of public
information and public education, I would like
to submit our recent publication on refuse
control, whora to start, points to consider,
and operating methods. It's a basic approach
to solid wa°;te nanagerient, and I would like to
submit this to the Federal EPA for their
consideration and training programs.
In conjunction with that, I'd
like to also submit a copy of one of our newest
novies, "Compacts for the Life of your Landfill,"
once again a public information, public service
type movie explaining the merits of high density
compaction and its importance to successful
solid waste programs.
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73
In conjunction with those
two items, I'd also like to submit a recent
magazine article highlighting recent machine
testing and evaluation and the importance of
proper machine selection to the overall success
of solid waste programs. I might also add thase
publications and the movie are available to the
general public and I have included information
on that and how that is available.
I would also like to submit a
constructive critique on some Federal EPA
publications. Let me giva you a counle here,
the Sanitary Landfill Facts booklet and the
Sanitary Landfill Design and Operations booklet.
These are the 1971 and '72 editions.
Also, I believe it's important
that the Federal EPA consider communicating to
the public the full story on resource recovery,
both the benefits and the potential disadvantages,
potential disadvantages mainly being high cost,
present technology, how it's adaptable to
communities, and public information needed to
communicate the full story on resource recovery.
Along these same lines, I think
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71
the Federal EPA needs to examine and consider
the importance of high density conoaction to
the success -- successful operation of a sanitary
landfill, and also in conjunction with that
the proper selection of equipment for the
successful operation of a sanitary landfill.
I'd like to leave this material
with you. I have my name and address on the
movie, I'd like to get that back after you have
had a chance to examine it. Once again, the
movie, if you need to look at it again or
something, I have included information on how
to see it at another time.
Thank you.
(The documents referred to by
Mr. Swenson, excluding the movie,
can be found attached to the
original copy of this transcript.)
MR. KLEPITSCH: Thank you very much for
that offering. We will surely make use of it.
For the record, I'm just trying
to get through here. Some of the folks who
have indicated that they would like to make a
statement, it appears that practically all of
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72
them are anticipating being here for tomorrow's
longer session.
Bill Mitchell? If Bill is
here, you might take advantage of this
opportunity now.
MR. MITCHELL: I am here, but I prefer to
sneak tomorrow.
MR. KLEPITSCH: Okay.
Well, let's see what else we
have. Are there any questions? I'd prefer,
if we can, to get your inputs more in the form
of comments rather than questions. Frankly,
I find it difficult to try to do more exolaining,
if you will. We are trying to have you provide
the comments to the Agency of what you'd like
to see us do and when you'd like to see us do
it with respect to your involvement; how you
would like us to proceed against some perhaps
critical for you regulatory alternatives.
Maybe some of the folks that
are here by accident tonight, if you will, having
said they will be here tomorrow, will bring
those issues up tomorrow. We have a fair amount
of industrial and engineering concerns who have
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73
indicated a desire to speak. But please, if
you can think of your position and try to
phrase it in terms of a comment rather than
a question. It would be much easier, I think,
to deal with for the people in Washington and
for us here as we seek to utilize it in a
formulation of a proposed regulation.
Yes, sir?
MR. VEROSKI: One area that hasn't been
addressed anywhere in the presentation tonight,
and it was unfortunate because it has a dire
impact on the success of this program, and that
is the potential conflict that may exist between
the intent of this particular Act and existing
statutory local rules, regulations or policies.
I think addressing the questions of solid waste
disposal problems, part of it nust include what
the local laws, rules and regulations are that
prohibit something like this gentleman uo here
mentioned. -low we can enter into long-tern
contracts, that is fine as far as the Federal
Government is concerned, and we may have State
and/or local laws that prohibit that. They have
to be short tarm.
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74
I think that is going to be a
factor in the overall program.
MR. KLEPITSCH: I am not an attorney, and
I wouldn't want to try to offer a legal
opinion on that. But, in deference to your
observations, it's my feeling -- and maybe I
will say something to incite you here -- that
with the passage of RCRA, we don't have fifty
programs plus one. I believe that RCRA established
the program and it's up to us all to make it work.
And there is a significant role in sharing
responsibility called for by the Federal and
the State and the local governments.
I think that we're going to find
that the State and the local governments will
be amending their regulations and laws in
consonance with the requirements of RCRA to
enable us all to be working for it.
Now, this isn't going to take
place overnight, but I believe we will see
this type of movement at the State and local
level, based upon the presence of the Federal
legislation.
Yes, sir?
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75
;IR. TEiT.vJY -. M Tenn/, T-e-n-n-y, Byproducts
"lanagement .
'7e are in the waste reclamation
business, resourca recovery. And one of the
problems we face is capitalization. And there
was a nesting recently in Kansas City on the
same subject.
But are there plans for some
type of Federal funding, loan guarantees for
the cost necessary in resource regulations?
And if so, it has to be done early.
And the second thing I'd like
to bring out that should be considered is that
as long as you can have landfills such as
sanitary landfills whicn are ooerating on a
very low cost, I think they put a damper on
any type of resource reclamation. And you might
consider some type of tax on the landfill to
possibly subsidize resource and reclamation,
considering that the overall value may not be
irnnediate .
MR. XLSPITSCH: Thank you.
Yes, sir?
MR. HAiJKY : Tnis is because --
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76
•'.3. '.,in ' .
In developing e^uioment standards
which is normally done in docuTients but often
under the technology and the econo-ai.es of various
processes, we find through experience that these
quite often dwell on average costs and do not
go into the marginal cost or the specific cost
of certain processes. And that what see-is to
be justified in some o£ tnese documents, we
are not quite sure is really justified.
,7ould there be development
documents for solid waste handling that will
use different methodology for coming uv> with
the economics -- for justifying the economics?
'1R. "LFIPICSC:! : I can't speak to that
specifically, but would think that the intent
would be there to be as responsive to the real
world situations as we can. The Agency is by
and large familiar with the facts, particularly
with respect to hazardous waste Management.
There is a general lack of capacity in the
industry, and we are trying, through the
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77
development of all of the umbrella, if you
will, of the regulations and guidelines and
standards, to establish a climate which would
encourage and allow the develooment of capacity
in industry environment.
If you have specific criticisms
or comments to make, I would encourage you to
write specifically to me and elaborate on your
feelings, and I will see to it that they get
into the headquarters for consideration by
members of the staff which would be considering
the hazardous waste regulation standards, and
the standards and regulations that might apply
to conventional landfill technology or research
recovery facilities.
I'd be most appreciative to
receive your comments developed.
Any further questions?
MR. FORCADE: Bill Forcade, Citizens for
a Better Environment.
I notice that the presentation
that was made under Subtitle C, Hazardous
Substances, seemed to dwell on the bookkeeping
aspects. I would hope that that would not be
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73
the extent of the scope that the administrator
has in mind for regulations. The Act is
designed to orotect and enhance the health
and environment. And if it's just a bookkeeping,
it would just document, not orotect and enhance.
I would hope that they would make
some effort to try to contain material, to keep
it out of the environment.
MR. KLEPITSCH: Thank you.
Yes, sir?
M™. HARRIS: Jack Harris from IMC.
I go along with the statement
that was made earlier regarding economic
studies. And based on experience with the
Clean Air Act and the Water Pollution Act, we
find that most if not all of the economic studies
that have been done with cost-benefit ratios
have been based solely on the academic study
of economics and do not necessarily get down
to the nitty-gritty and the real world situation.
Granted, during recent months
EPA oersonnal and some of their contractors
have come to industrial trade associations
requesting this input. I would hope that the
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79
Office of Solid Waste Management Programs
would have their personnel get attuned to
the real economics before development documents
are published and taken as, you know, the
latest word.
MR. KLEPITSCH: Would you like to
participate, specifically?
MR. HARRIS: I have done that before through
trade associations, yes.
MR. KLEPITSCH: With the Office of Solid
Waste?
MR. HARRIS: Not with the Office of Solid
Waste , no .
MR. KLEPITSCH: If you would like to
participate, I'd do what I can to see that you
would be requested for your input, if you'd
like.
MR. HARRIS: Fine. Thank you.
MR. KLDPITSCH: See me afterwards with
your card and so forth and we'll make sure that
you get that consideration.
Any other comments? We still
have a half an hour to go here, let's make use
of it.
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80
Yes?
MR. HARRIS: One further question: do
you envision the establishment of State
program requirements on land use planning?
MR. KLEPITSCH: That's a term that is lost
on me in terms of what that can mean to almost
anyone .
We have people especially within
the office who carry that title, and I haven't
had much to do with them yet. We may, I don't
know what the ramifications of all of this will
be. The chances are that something akin to that
may be called something else.
Yes, Bob?
MR. LOWE: My name is Bob Lowe, and I am
with the EPA in Washington.
There are a nuriber of comments
that I think all relate to State planning.
I think it's important to understand how little
power is given to EPA through this law, with
the exception of the regulations of hazardous
waste. Outside of the regulations of hazardous
waste, the only thing EPA is really doing is
defining what a sanitary landfill is. And EPA
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81
has no regulatory authority in that regard.
The way that would be enforced
is through the State. All EPA can do is
write guidelines for State solid waste management
plans and planning processes, and then if, and
only if the States want Federal money to do
that, then EPA is in a position for approving
or disapproving plans. And the manner of
discretion that we have in the matter in doing
that is relatively limited.
So, a lot of questions about what
the Federal Government will do in relation to
State planning and so on is really moot because
we don't have very much authority. We have some
influence or we can provide technical assistance,
but as far as direct control, we don't have it.
It will be at the State level.
Just one example that you mentioned
earlier, I think, can we assure that there is
public participation in the State and local
process? Mo, we can't. We can put into our
State — into our guidelines that the States
take this into account, but I doubt that we even
have the authority to reject the State plan if
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32
it fails to meet that guideline.
There are five or six requirements
that a State ilan must have undor law, and I
don't think we can go beyond that other than
by ->ersuasion .
'II*. KI.TJPI73CU: Thank you, Bob. I aooreciatc
your consents, thay are most helpful.
Any othar comments? It cloasn't
appear that there are. ^ncl v;ith that, T think
we can draw the meeting to a close tonight.
T thank you all for taking the
trouble to got here in spite of the snow and
the bad weather. And perhaps more of you will
bo able to participate actively in tomorrow's
session, which I'm sure will be more animated
and a little longer because wa have industrial
representatives and State representatives
participating in the afternoon and headquarter
specialists to discuss their particular area of
expertise.
Thank you all very much for coming.
(Whereupon no further proceedings
were had.)
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STATE OF ILT.IVOIS }
) S F :
COL:1uly
sworn, on u-ith says that she is a court reporter
doir.c1 business in the- City of Chicaqo; and she
reporter! i r, shor Lh :ind t'u; testimony oivcn at
the hoariiu' of tho abov-j-.^ntitlec"' cause; and
that t!"i',v ft.i Of.'oir.f: is a true and correct
trar.scriot of her shorthand notes so taV.tui as
a f o r c s a i d .
Subscribed and Sworn to
before ne this / ' L; day
of April, A.D., 1077.
Notary Public
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PUBLIC HEARING
on the
NEW RESOURCE CONSERVATION
AND RECOVERY ACT PL 9l
before
THE UNITED STATES
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
March 22, 1977
9:00 A. M.
Holiday Inn O'Hare Kennedy
0'IIare International Room 3
54^0 N'-rth River Road
Rosenont, Illinois 60016
)iane ~Hromek
Court Reporter
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-2-
PRESENT:
HEARING OFFICER
Mr. Karl Klepitsch, Jr., Chief
Waste Management Branch
EPA Region V
Mr. Valdas V. Adamkus
Deputy Regional Administrator
EPA Region V
Mr. John P. Lehman, Director
Hazardous Waste Management Division
EPA Washington, D. C.
Mr. George Garland
Systems Management Division
Office of Solid Waste
EPA Washington, D. C.
Mr. Robert Lowe
Resource Recovery Division
Office of Solid Waste
EPA Washington, D. C.
Mr. Robert L. Duprey, Director
Air and Hazardous Materials Division
EPA Region V
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-3-
INDEX
SCHEDULED SPEAKERS
Mr. Valdas V. Adamkus
Deputy Regional Administrator
EPA Region V p. 6
Mr. Karl Klepitsch, Jr., Chief
Waste Management Branch
EPA Region V p. 10
Mr. John P. Lehman, Director
Hazardous Waste Management Division
EPA Washington, D. C. p. 25
Mr. George Garland
Systems Management Division
Office of Solid Waste
EPA Washington, D. C. p. 57
Mr. Robert Lowe
Resource Recovery Division
Office of Solid Waste
EPA Washington, D. C. p. 72
Mr. Robert L. Duprey, Director
Air and Hazardous Materials Division
EPA Region V p. 102
SPEAKERS FROM THE FLOOR (in order of appearance)
Mr. John Walton
Champion International Group
St. Paul, Minnesota p. 18
Mr. Roger Conner,
West Michigan Environmental Action
Council, Grand Rapids, Michigan p. 20
Mr. Bill Brenneman
Illinois Power Company p. 22
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-4-
IH_DEX_J; continued)
Mr. Martin Whitehead, Ford Motor Company p. 41
Mr. Malcolm Chester, Illinois
Manufacturers Association p. 43
Mr. Earl Robert, University of Wisconsin p. 46
Mr. Stanley Ingelsor, American Cyanimid p. 48
I
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-5-
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Good morning,
my name is Karl Klepitsch, I am the Chief of the
Waste Management Branch for EPA in Region V.
I would like to welcome you all
this morning for your perseverance -- the fact
that you got here at all is a tribute to your
interest. And I see we have a fairly decent group
here for as early in the morning as it is.
I trust that the hall will begin
to fill later.
For those of you who haven't
already noticed, on side is smoking, the other
side is not.
I would like to especially welcome
those of you who have had to travel a great distance
to get here.
I can understand the inconvenience
of travel and the expense, but I hope that today's
meeting will prove worthwhile for you.
I am looking for an active dialogue -
mostly from you. We are here mostly to receive
-------
information, not to give out an awful lot.
We are not here to solve problems today.
Without talking much further, I
would like to turn the program over for opening
remarks to Mr. Valdas Adamkus, Deputy Regional
Administrator for Region V.
Mr. Adamkus.
MR. ADAMKUS: Thank you, Karl.
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
10
This meeting is one in a series of ^^ public
meetings which have been held around the country
to discuss the Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act of 1976.
RCRA integrates the primary thrust
of the two earlier solid waste acts — the Solid
Waste Disposal Act of 1965 and Resource Recovery
Act of 1970.
It acknowledges the interrelation
of resource use and public health issues associated
with land disposal.
It mandates a series of actions
requiring effort on the part of all levels of
government, industry and the public -- over time to
insure that progress in protecting health and the
environment
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-7-
will not be inhibited by our failure to more forward
in the areas of resource conservation and recovery.
The Act was developed in full recog-
nition of the fact that how we deal with solid waste
influences far-reaching social and economic issues --
ranging from the attitudes of the individual citizen
and consumer -- through how we extract, manufacture,
and market products -- to such complex issues as
depletion allowances and international trade policies.
Accordingly, the Act calls for new
patterns of interreaction among all levels of gov-
ernment, the assumption of key responsibilities by
industry on several fronts, and for meaningful public
understanding and participation in all the major
activities mandated by the Act.
hhS
This series of public meetings Ja-a-a
provided an opportunity to discuss and evaluate
the major provision of RCRA, and please note that
I said the word "discuss."
Also, one purpose of these sessions
has oeen to present EPA's evolving implementation of
RCRA. An even more important objective has been
to solicit public comments on RCRA's various provisions,
I suspect that Congress had two major
-------
motivations in mind when they proscribed a compre-
hensive public participation program for RCRA.
For one, there is considerable
evidence that active public interreaction has been
fundamental in the successful introduction of other
najor environmental legislation -- and that a public
knowledgeable in both the development of a program's
content and its structure will be of more help in its
successful, harmonious implementation.
The second motivation for insisting
upon active public involvement is the recognition
of the substantial reliance which PCPA places upon
state and local officials to insure that its objectives
will be met.
The initial responsibility for imple-
menting RCRA rests with EPA, and the Agency will carry
out its responsibility to make many of the necessary,
basic decisions to write the regulations, set the
definitions, give the direction, and work with the
states to develop their nrogram.
But any nrogram developed must be able
to work in all governmental areas — state and local
-- as well as the private sector.
Your frank expressions on DPA's
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—9 —
approach to implementing RCRA and your discussions
as to how we can better achieve the Act's objectives
will insure that we have a practical solution to
the problems of solid-and hazardous-waste management.
The agenda for today's meeting is
printed in your program. Please note that the time
allotted for each speaker is to include an opportunity
for at least a few questions and comments.
There will be also the opportunity for
additional comments Just before lunch and at the
conclusion of the panels in the afternoon.
We are requesting that the length of
individual comments be limited so as to permit as
many questions as possible.
Of course, the Agency is most anxious
to receive substantive, lengthy comments as well.
If you would be willing to put it down
on paper, we would be most appreciative.
For the afternoon session, we are
trying something rather novel. We have asked indi-
vidual representatives of state and local governments,
private industry, and citizen groups to participate
on three different panels.
We have asked these individuals to
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-10-
speak for only a short time -- no longer than five
minutes -- and to address their remarks to specific
ways in which RCRA miqht be implemented.
At the conclusion of the presentations,
the moderators will address questions to the panel
members and field questions from the audience.
This format will provide an opportunity
for at least some dialogue to develop and permit
participants to follow up and develop specific points.
We encourage our own Agency representatives to
query the panel members for insights into the pre-
paration of guidelines and regulations.
And at this time, I would like to a£>k
Karl Klepitsch to take it over, who will offer some
brief comments for an overview of the public-parti-
cipation aspects of this program.
Thank you very much, and thank you
very much to all who came in to really severe spring
weather this morning. Thank you.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Thank you.
Let's see, I'm going to need the
proj ector.
May I have the lights, please, Jim?
The Resource Conservation and Recovery
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-11-
Aot of 1976 contains an Initially complete array of
provisions which would bring about a high degree of
public understanding and participation.
Taken together, these various provisions
make it clear that Congress understood that it is
impossible for the public to participate with under-
standing and impact unless the government first produces
the valid scientific and technical data, then processes
and publishes the information in such a way that every-
one may have access to it.
Only in this way can the public really
have a reasonable chance of influencing the social,
economic, and political changes which the law will
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.
The Administrator is to do more than
implement a program for the rapid dissemination of
this Information. He is also to develop and
implement educational programs to promote citizen
understanding.
This makes it clear that the information
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-12-
called for is to be developed for the use of others,
as well as the experts in the field. Moreover, the
Administrator is asked to coordinate his actions an.d
to cooperate to the maximum extent with state 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 insure the public-participation
process does not become lopsided, we feel it was
necessary to identify major categories of interest
groups who represent the public at large.
Under RCRA, we regard these to
include consumer, environmental and neighborhood
groups, trade, manufacturing and labor represen-
tatives, public health, scientific and professional
societies, and governmental and university associations.
This spectrum of categories of
representative groups will be altered and supple-
mented as necessary if, under the course of imple-
menting the Act, it appears desirable to do so.
This group of people will be a standing
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-13-
body -- representatives from these areas will be
a standing body beyond just the initial regulation-
writing process of implementing RCRA — as a matter
of fact, EPA feels strongly about this in spite of
the fact that government agencies are sometimes
criticized for having too many advisory panels.
We think that it will be a viable
instrument in helping to assure public-participation
process in an on-going way.
Under Section 7004, the Act states
that any person may petition the Administrator for
the promulgation, amendment, or repeal of any
regulation under the Act.
oh
Section 7004-J? has to do with public
participation. The Act says that public participation
and development, revision and endorsement of any
regulation, guideline, information or program under
the Act shall be provided for, encouraged and assisted
by the Administrator, and it states, "And further that
the Administrator in cooperation with the states
shall develop and publish minimum guidelines for
public participation of such process."
&
Section 7 002-,-ft' states that, "Any person
may commence a civil action on his own behalf against
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-14-
any other person, Including the United States, who
is alleged to be in violation of this act or against
the Administrator if there is alleged failure by him
to perform any act or duty under the act."
The many techniques which can be used
to involve the public in government actions fall
into three major categories. One would be to insure
that appropriate public meetings, hearings, confer-
ences, workshop and so forth are held throughout the
country and that they are planned and held in accor-
dance with unfolding of act's key provision.
Two would be to use the advisory
committees and review groups which may be periodically,
but which will also be called upon to review comments
upon major programs, regulations, and plans — no
matter when they occur and no matter whether a specific
meeting is convened or not.
Three is the development of educational
programs so that the public has an opportunity 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 communication
tools, techniques, and media.
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-15-
Section TOOT^A^and & authorized the
Administrator of EPA to make grants or to make con-
tracts 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 organization" means a state
or state agency, municipality, or educational insti-
tution capable of effectively carrying out a project.
Section 7000-^states that the
Administrator shall make a complete investigation
of -- and study to determine the need for additional
training of 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 nature of
obstacles to employment and occupational advancement
in the solid-waste-disposal or recovery field.
The Administrator is required to
report results of such investigation and study to
the President and to the Congress.
In view of manpower limitations, however,
and the time-mandated provisions of the act, it is
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-16-
unlikely that the training activity or the manpower
study be started during this fiscal year.
As I mentioned earlier, the Agency is
going to develop specific guidelines for public par-
ticipation. We essentially want your comments on
how and at what points in the process you feel the
public could be -- become effectively involved in
the regulatory-development process.
To the best of our ability, Agency
will consider your views as the guidelines for public
participation are developed.
Now, before I open the session to
public comments, I have several requests to make.
And, that is, for the benefit of our
court reporter, that when you begin to offer your
statement, you would identify yourself, giving your
name, spelling of your name, and your affiliation.
Also, at the outset and at the interest
of maintaining order, I would like to set some ground
rules for the meeting for the rest of the day.
Specifically, we are not here to argue
the merits or disadvantages of any particular point
of view or comment. We don't want to debate issues.
We are not going to attempt to devise
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-17-
solutions to problems of waste management. And we
are not going to engage in debate or discuss what is
not in RCRA.
Instead, I would like to limit our
discussion, our meeting, to receiving comments posi-
tively phrased upon what RCRA is, or what you feel it
is, and how you feel it may affect you.
I would like to provide everyone here
an opportunity to offer spoken or written comments
without editing or interruption, except in the
interest of time. As the Chairman, I may have to cut
people off in the event that time runs short. If
you are cut short, I would encourage you to submit
a written completion of your statement.
We have already received by mail
at least 20 requests or indications that people would
like to make a statement.
You will note that in the morning
session, there will be a specific presentation by
an EPA representative, which will be open to dis-
cussion or comments right after that. If you don't
get your comments in during the morning, there
will be a series of panels from which I would hope
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-18-
from the floor.
If you miss your opportunity to
comment in the morning, by all means try to take
advantage of the afternoon availability.
Again, comments from the floor
should be brief, positively stated, and to the point.
If specific language is desired to
be offered for a definition or other regulatory
language relative to a regulatory option you would
perfer, please take time to write it down on a
card .
If you would indicate your desire
to one of our staff, they will be glad to provide
you with a card so that we can be assured that the
exact statement or language you want to use is
recorded for you.
And now, I would like to throw the
floor open to comments on the issue of public parti-
cipation, and if there are any comments at this time,
MR. WALTON: My name is John Walton, Champion
International Corporation, St. Paul, Minnesota.
I wonder if you could please comment
on how the public-participation panels will be
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-19-
selected?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Public-participation
panels will be drawn up within the regions.
The Agency's specific program on this
has not been fully defined at this tine, but there
will be a management program out of our regional
office conducted by myself, and arrangements will
be made based upon the problem to acquire the proper
technical skills, be it on an experienced transfer
from someone who has had a similar problem, or if
it is something new, we would look for people from
the engineering field, academia, other expertise
within the Agency -- either at headquarters or other
regions, and particularly we would be discussing
any of these panels with the state agencies who
might also have expertise and be able to provide
assistance.
We will try to provide a proper mix
depending on the size of the problem.
The group might vary. It could be
as large as several people or small as only one or
two.
We will get into that a little bit
later in the program.
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-20-
I am sure when Mr. Lowe makes his
presentation, then you will be able to hear from
him and perhaps the exact type of information you
would desire.
Any other comments?
Yes, sir?
MR. CONNER: My name is Roger Conner, and I am
with the West Michigan Environmental Action Council
at Grand Rapids.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Could you spell
your name, please?
MR. CONNER: C-o-n-n-e-r.
And my suggestion is that the Agency
consider, as I say, the slide flash — by that you
are going to have public educational programs includ-
ing conferences, workshops, and the like — that not
all of the public-participation efforts should take
place at a regional level.
It is anywhere from difficult to
impossible for useful education of members of the
public to occur in Region V when workshops, confer-
ences, and the like are held here in Chicago.
And if we are going to have -- going
to build a public constituency for effective solid-
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-21-
waste management^it is going to have to be built
at a state level.
So I just offer the suggestion that
the Agency direct same of its efforts and a substan-
tial portion of its efforts to supporting citizen
participation at a state level and not at a regional
level.
This level, all the experts can fly
down to Chicago, but not the citizens -- especially
not those that you want to educate.
And I just have a question of whether
you have any appropriation at this time or whether
you have plans for what the scale of your citizen
participation is going to be?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Technical-assistance
panels, per se, will be treated later on.
The Agency has had for some time,
however, a grant-assistance program directed to people
in the public sector, and generally these conferences
and workshops have been administered at the local
level by the League of Women Voters and other
environmental groups -- specifically slanting their
meetings using expertise from their agency and other
places to enhance the public appreciation for what
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-22-
solid-waste-management issues are locally.
I would anticipate that with the
presence now of RCRA, we would be able to see an
extension of this activity.
I am not positive, however, to what
extent.
A VOICE: He asked about funds.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Your question about
funds I am not sure exactly how to respond to.
We have had an Agency budget submittal
on the order of $12 million for grants to state
agencies.
How much of the balance or a portion
of this money would be able to be earmarked for use*
at the local level, I am not absolutely certain yet
whether the specifics of that have to be worked out.
MR. DRENNEMAN: Bill Brenneman, Illinois Power
Company, B-r-e-n-n-e-m-a-n.
I may be showing my ignorance because
I -- I would like to know what you will consider
nonhazardous waste, what you would consider as
hazardous waste, and will you develop a list of these
wastes?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Those issues will
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-23-
be treated shortly by Mr. Lehman from our head-
quarters, who will deal with the matter of the
hazardous-waste program and its development.
No further inquiries on this issue?
All right.
The act sets forth several major
areas of involvement -- technical areas, and I can
proceed at this point to give you a very brief
overview of the objectives of the act and introduce
the next series of speakers for you.
I will proceed with the aid of a
couple slides, and then we will move on.
RCRA, as you could see, has everything
that people hold dear in mind when it starts off.
Its objectives are to protect health
of the environment, conserve material and energy
resources.
The objectives lined out in the act
are expected to be achieved through technical and
financial assistance to state and local government,
manpower development, prohibition of open dumping,
conservation and closing of open dumps, and the
implementation of tne first regulatory program into
federal level on the disposition of hazardous wastes
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-24-
and managements.
Mr. Lehman will treat this issue
specifically in Just a few moments.
Guidelines are to be provided for
solid-waste management on a variety of issues.
Research and development is called
for, a program of nondemonstrations is also set forth,
and an activity which is expressed in the law, but
which we have been engaged in for some time now, in
the -- solid wastes at the national level and at the
regional level, has been to try the best we can to
develop a federal, state, and local government and
industry partnership in terms of energy recovery.
Our headquarters on resource recovery
has been most active in this regard for some time,
and at the regional level, we have been working
constantly with the states to try to help them
develop programs which are going to be responsive
to the needs of their state.
Public education has been under way
in the Agency in terms of the production of numerous
educational materials and technical papers, and
with respect to the previously mentioned public-
participation grants for local seminars and the
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-25-
like.
And now, I am finished with that
overview.
The program would move from this area
into the specific technical program areas, and in
the order they are presented on your agenda, we will
deal with the elements of the act which cover the
hazardous-waste-management program, land disposal,
resource recovery, and technical assistance, and
finally with the state role in the overall program.
The speakers that we have are repre-
sentatives of our headquarters and a division director
from Region V.
Without further delay, I would like
to invite Mr. Jack Lehman, who is the Director of
the Hazardous Waste Management Division in Washington,
Office of Solid Wastes, to begin the presentation on
hazardous-waste management.
MR. LEHMAN: Thank you, Karl.
This morning I am Just going to very
briefly cover the hazardous-waste-management provi-
sions of the new law and throw the meeting open for
questions that you might have.
Karl mentioned that this is the first
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-26-
time the Congress has given EPA the authority for
a regulatory program in the area of land disposal
and waste management. And I think that is a signi-
ficant new addition to the quiver of arrows, if you
will, that EPA has.
We have had, as you know, the regula-
tions on air and water, oceans, and a number of other
media, but the land has always been outside that
,3
p^frview, at least from the federal level.
So we do have a significant new program
here, and let's get into that right now -- see if I
can -- Here we go.
Section 3001 of the new RCRA calls
for the definition of a "hazardous waste."
The gentleman Just asked, "What is
a "hazardous waste1?" and "What is a "nonhazardous
waste'?"
Well, that is indeed the question.
We do not have an answer for that gentleman or for
anyone else at this point because we are still deve-
loping the definition — The act calls for the regu-
lation defining a "hazardous waste" to be issued
18 months after the act passed, or in April of 1978.
And then, like most of these regulations,
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-27-
they go Into effect six months after that, or In
October of 1978.
So we have roughly 13 months left
to really arrive at a definition.
Rather than asking us what the defi-
nition is, In the spirit of this meeting, we would
like to get your comments as to what you think it
ought to be.
But I think it is very clear that what
we are talking about here is the keystone to the
program, because the way that hazardous wastes are
defined will in effect set the scope of the regulatory
program.
It really consists of three parts —
The first la to identify criteria to Identify
characteristics of hazardous wastes, then to identify
standardized sampling and analytical techniques by
which these criteria can be tested against, and then
to issue a listing of hazardous wastes.
Now, I would point out that the law
places some limits here in the sense that radioactive
wastes, by and large, are not covered by this law.
The traditional Issue of **&-wastes
covered under the Atomic Energy Act of 1951*, as
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-28-
amended, and covers all fission-and fusion-produced,
radioactive-produced materials.
And what we are talking about here
are especially the nonradioactlve hazardous wastes.
There are, I should point out, however,
some radioactive wastes that are covered under this
act — namely, those that are naturally occurring
like radium and those that are produced by other
means besides fission and fusion reactions, such as
those radioisotopes that are produced In cyclotrons
and things like that.
But by and large the rad-waste issue
is outside of the scope of this new law.
As for the criteria, there are a
number of parameters that we are considering. They
Include such parameters as flammabllity, exploslvlty,
corrosiveness, toxicity, persistence in the environ-
ment, and so on.
And some of these are called out in
the law as being required that we consider.
Here again, we would be very much
interested In your feelings about which parameters
should be covered and what type of criteria you
would think should be placed on those parameters.
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-29-
And one last thing before we move
on is that I wanted to call attention to the fact
that we are talking about wastes. We are not talking
about pure chemicals -- The Toxic Substances Control
Act, for example, deals primarily with pure chemicals
and commodities.
What we are talking about here are
mixtures of wastes that could, and often do, contain
dozens of chemicals all in the same waste stream.
Section 3002 gets us into the first
of a set of national standards. These national
standards apply to generators (Section 3002), trans-
porters (Section 3003) , and operators of hazardous
waste management facilities (Section 3004).
So these three taken together, Section
3002 being the first, are national standards. They
are enforceable standards, and various sanctions
exist for those that violate these standards.
Again, an 18-month promulgation
period, these regulations are to include record-
keeping and recording by generators, labeling of
containers, and a manifest system.
A few remarks about that.
The record keeping and reporting is
intended to cover the quantities and constituents
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-30-
and disposition of the hazardous wastes that are
generated, and the manifest system is a tracking
and control system primarily to make sure that the
wastes that are generated at point A arrived at
point B, ('which is a permitted hazardous-waste-
management facility), and don't get lost somewhere
along the way -- which they have been known to do.
One of the issues in the manifest
system concerns the uniformity of the manifest system -
several states already have such tracking systems in
existence, and one of the issues that we are facing
is whether or not we should require this manifest
system to be uniform nationally -- and this is not
an insignificant problem because these wastes, as
opposed to municipal wastes, these types of wastes
are highly mobile. They are transported across state
lines in a routine way, and in many cases across
several states, and so this whole issue of uniformity
is a serious one.
Section 3003 deals with the transporter
standards. Again, national standards, again an 18-
month promulgation time, again record keeping, label-
ing, and compliance requirements.
One of the major new departures of
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-31-
thls law is that we are -- we, EPA, were given
the mandate to write a regulation dealing with
transportation.
Now that in itself is a little unusual
because most transportation regulations are written
by the Department of Transportation, not by EPA.
So the law does require us to make
sure that whatever the transport standards are that
we come up with, that they are consistent with exis-
ting DOT regulations, and I can assure you that we
are doing that.
As a matter of fact, the working
group which is developing these regulations has a
member from the Department of Transportation on it.
So we are attempting to make sure,
right from the very beginning, that we are getting
the input from the Department of Transportation.
Section 3004 is the last of the three
sets, the last of the sets of three national standards,
again, that apply to owners and operators of treatment,
storage, and disposal facilities for hazardous wastes.
Again, an 18-month promulgation period.
Now I highlight the fact that these regulations are
intended to be performance standards.
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And when we are talking about
"performance standards," I would like to contrast
that with "technology standards," for example, or
other types of standards, and so what we are trying
to do here is say that if a facility is in the business
of storing, treating, disposing of hazardous wastes,
that it meet certain emission standards that will
protect the public health and the environment
surrounding that facility.
So, for example, we are considering
performance standards a-rein air emissions, surface-
water emissions, ground water, and probably even
noise.
And if we are talking about performance
standards, then there are various types of standards
that can be considered. These have been discussed
in the context of the water program, but they apply
here, too, and just for example, you can consider a
flow-discharge policy, a nondegradation policy, some
tie-in with drinking-water standards — for example,
if we are talking about water standards, and if none
of those apply, then what does?
We are very much interested in getting
your feeling about that, but it is a very complicated
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-33-
issue.
But this particular regulation is
In fact a series of subregulationa that cover those
various areas, record keeping, reporting, compliance
with the manifest system — another subset dealing
with monitoring and Inspection requirements around
these facilities — and we Just highlight that a
minute.
If we are going to have performance
standards, that means you are going to have to monitor
something someplace to determine whether or not you
are meeting those standards.
And if so, what kind of monitoring?
How often? Where do we do It, at the fencellne?
Do it at the emission from a stack? Where are we
going to do this monitoring? How often and who is
going to pay for It?
These are all issues related to
monitoring.
Also, location, design, and construction
standards.
This Is a very
Important part. There may be a requirement
that facilities of this type be located in certain
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-34-
places and not in others, for example, and that they
meet certain minimum design criteria.
Maintenance and operations is another
area that is called for in the j.ct.
Contingency plans, foreclosure, and
ownership standardsJ
This might include insurance require-
ments, performance bonding, a long-terra care, physical-
responsibility type of standards.
The reason that is in there is that
we have nad experience with people who have taken,
gone into business, taken on a large number of hazar-
dous wastes, collecting a fee as they did so. Once
they got the money, they closed their facility and
walked away leaving a big mess for somebody to clean
up — usually the local or state government.
And so this is one of the reasons —
This is one of the background as to why ownership
standards are required.
Section 3005 now gets into more the
intrastructure of this regulatory program, namely;
a permit system.
And I would like to highlight the fact
that the permits apply only to the facilities —
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-35-
Qenerators do not need a permit; transporters do
not need a permit.
The facilities do need a permit.
And again, an 18-month promulgation period. The
law says that after the regulations go into
effect, it is illegal to dispose of hazardous wastes
except at a permitted facility.
Now, this would be two years after
passage, or in October, 1978.
There are various requirements to
obtain a permit including the keeping track of the
hazardous wastes that is incoming into the facility
and what is done with it, and various site-related
parameters would have to be met.
You will notice that there is a very
close correlation between section 3005 and section
3004.
Three thousand four is setting up
the national standards, and section 3005 is actually
applying these standards to a permitting process.
There also exists within the law a
possibility to issue Interim permits, and the criteria
to get an interim permit are that the facility was
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-36-
open for business on the day the act was enacted --
namely: October 21, 1976.
Secondly, that the individual respon-
sibility has notified the state, if the state has
a program, or EPA, if not, that they are in business --
They are handling hazardous wastes.
And thirdly, that they have applied
for a permit.
If those three conditions are met,
you automatically have an interim permit to continue
operation according to the law.
The Congress, I am sure, put that
provision in there to prevent a company in the bottle
type of analogy where regulations go in, it's illegal
to take waste to anything but a permitted facility,
and yet there may be delays in getting permits issued
and so on.
So this is an interim situation to
help ease that problem.
I might also point out that associated
with permitting is the whole issue of citizen opposition
to hazardous-waste facilities.
There seems to be an almost universal
opposition, not only to waste-management facilities
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-37-
in general, but to hazardous-waste facilities in
particular.
And I think you will see that if we
have regulations that require generators to take
their waste to hazardous-waste facilities, and if
there are no facilities, we have a chicken and egg
problem here, and we have to break that cycle.
And part of the strategy, if you will,
to try to get better public acceptance of these
facilities, is, of course, the educational aspect
that had been mentioned before. But also we are
hopeful that the establishment of more stringent
facility and permit standards which are called for
here under section 3004, 3005, will provide a posi-
tive influence on the public in the sense that
achieving those standards and obtaining a permit
will have -- will imply a high degree of reliability
of these facilities that perhaps was not there before.
Three thousand six comes to a very
important part of the new law, which basically says
that -- "We want the states to take on the program."
The Congress made its intent very
clear that what their druthers were, if you will,
was that the feds set up information national standards,
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-38-
like I have just described, but that the states
take on the actual implementation of the program
in terms of permitting and enforcement of the law.
So what section 3006 does is -- it
issues a — or calls for EPA to issue guidelines
to assist states to take on these programs. It
calls for two different types of state-authorized
programs: one a full authorization that deals --
the criteria for which are those three there: that
first of all the state program be equivalent to the
federal program; second, that it be consistent with
other state programs; and lastly, that the state
have adequate enforcement provisions in its own law
to enforce this subtitle C of RCRA.
Now, surely you can see that one of
our big problems is how to define "equivalent" and
how to define "consistent," and we would ask for your
opinion put there.
Now, the second type of authorization
again is an interim authorization.
The idea here is that if a state is
not completely equivalent to the federal program,
they can still begin to operate the program on an
interim basis while they build their program and
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-39-
get up to full speed.
And this program would go Into effect —
In other words, In order to achieve an interim autho-
rization, the state would have to have a program In
being in July of 1978 and be working towards full
equivalency within two years.
In other words, by July of 1980.
One of the kickers here is Catch 22,
as the law says, that in order to get interim autho-
rization, that the state program must be substantially
equivalent to the federal program.
So not only do we have to define what
"equivalent" means, we have to define what "substantially
equivalent" means.
Again, your thoughts on that would be
helpful.
Here in section 3010 is a very
important provision that is often overlooked by
those that are skimming the law because it is sort
of buried in section 3010; unless you really read
it carefully, you might miss it.
And what It basically is is a one-time
notification, a registration, if you will, and what
it says is that three months after EPA publishes a
-------
-40-
definition of a hazardous waste under section 3001,
within those — within the 90-day period of that
point, everyone, any person who generates, transports,
treats, stores, or disposes of hazardous wastes is
required to notify EPA or the state, if the state
has the authorized or interim authorized program.
And so what we are talking about
here is probably tens of thousands of notifications
going on across the country.
And so one of the things we are trying
to do here is to get this notification system organized
so that it can be handled by ADP systems.
And lastly, section 3011 calls for
financial assistance to the states to assist them
in developing and implementing their state programs.
The allocation of funds is on a forriula
that is not based on population, but is based rather
on the amounts of hazardous wastes that are generated
within each state, and the exposure of the public to
those hazardous wastes.
So it is a very interesting alloca-
tion formula. It is different than the grants in the
other parts of the act.
Well, that is a very brief, perhaps
-------
not so brief, review of the hazardous-waste provi-
sions of the law.
I would like now to throw the meeting
open for discussion and comments.
MR. WHITEHEAD: My name is Martin Whitehead,
Ford Motor Company.
Two questions, Mr. Lehman.
The three months of notification will
be, I suppose, on a regular prescribed form. Might
it be possible that the federal form for notification,
that sufficient need -- that it would obviate redundant
reporting of various state and county agencies?
We have that kind of requirement
under air programs. Perhaps we could fill some of
the management -- management budgets directly to
have a single reporting for all programs -- federal,
state programs, to get its money from the feds. One.
And the second is: you touched on a
problem that is going to be quite real. People
don't want the landfill sites, particularly hazardous
sites, near them.
And under section 300^1, I don't know
how we could put performance standards to promulgate
in sort of a financial incentive light.
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-42-
And there may be hydrogeologically
acceptable landfills in the state, but people don't
want them.
Could you financially encourage the
states to develop, at least for the eminent domain,
and say, "I am sorry but this is where a site is going
to go," so that we avoid having lots of waste gene-
rated and designated as "hazardous" with no place
to put it.
MR. LEHMAN: Okay, well, thank you for your
comments. I will take these in the order that you
gave them.
After trying to make the notification
system consistent, that is our aim.
The notification is going to go to
one of two places — either the EPA or to the state.
The local government is not involved directly in the
notification system.
We are working on a program to make
that notification uniform and simple, you know,
throughout the country. All it basically is is a —
name, address, telephone-number type of situation --
for the moment anyway, that is the way it is shaping
up.
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-43-
As to the citizen acceptance, emi-
nent-domain type of issue, I think clearly the federal
government would have to be very, very careful in
about what it says — the states are going to do or
not going to do with regard to eminent domain. And
that is a prerogative that the states have tradition-
ally held.
I don't think that you are going to
see the federal government come in and require an
eminent-domain type of situation.
I don't mean to say "require," but
I think the EPA and the federal government has in
the past inherent in the state, you get so much
support if you do it one way and a little more support
if you do it another way. And it is up to the states
to decide however they want to do it.
MR. LEHMAN: Okay, thank you. Yes, another
question?
MR. CHESTER: Yes. Can you tell me how you
determine pre-emption issues -- if the state already
has existing regulations or state laws, will you be
considering what those state laws are, considering
in effect under this act?
MR. LEHMAN: The reporter would like to get
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-44-
your name and affiliation.
MR. CHESTER: Malcolm Chester, Illinois
Manufacturers Association.
MR. LEHMAN: Okay.
I guess your basic question is to
the degree of pre-emption of the federal law for
existing state laws.
The federal law, as I mentioned, is
intended to provide a uniform base so that everybody
is playing essentially by the same rules, and — in
terms of hazardous-waste management.
Now, at the same time, the Congress
made it very clear, as I have stated, that they want
the states to take on this program.
So what we are attempting to do is
accomplish both of those goals simultaneously, and
in the best way possible, such that existing state
programs will continue in effect wherever it is
possible to do that.
For example, we are urging states to
continue to develop their programs now even though
there is another set of federal regulations coming
up in another 18 months or so.
The reason for that is that we would
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like to see progress made during this period and
not have a hiatus, if you will, where everybody
sits around and waits for the feds to do something.
For example, the state of California
already has a fairly significant — well, a very
significant hazardous-waste program in effect, and
basically al] that they have done is fill in a few
holes in their program so that it will match the
federal program as they see it.
But as far as pre-empting, now, that
is your basic question.
The preemption will occur only to
the effect that the federal standards are greater
than existing state standards.
If the state standards are equivalent
to the federal program, then the state program would
not even have to change.
MR. CHESTER: You say the states are more stringent,
they will be granted, or if they are less stringent —
I am not exactly sure what you are saying.
You are saying —
MR. LEHMAN: Well, the Congress was solid on
the issue of more stringent — in other words, states
having a more stringent standards than the minimum
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federal standard.
I don't believe the federal government
is again going to place -- put itself in the posi-
tion of telling the state that it can't be more
stringent than the federal standards.
On the other hand, in order to get
an authorization for the state program, one of the
tests is consistency with other states. And so
that is going to have to be worked out among the
states -- it strikes me.
MR. CHESTER: Okay, thank you.
MR. LEHMAN: Yes, sir?
MR. ROBERT: Earl Robert, University of Wisconsin
in Madison.
What kind of controls, if any, will
be exercised by the EPA on incineration? And I am
concerned about incineration that takes place on the
generator's premises, or it involves trucking this
all over interstate highways, possibly, or state
highways?
Also, where it's operated by the
generator or operated independently , what is the
record-keeping requirements and so on? What kind
of control?
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MR. LEHMAN: All right.
The question concerned incineration
controls on the premises of generators, and I think
that was the main thrust of the question.
And what type of controls would the
program involve?
As a general rule, we consider what-
ever standards are developed to apply equally across
the board to public facilities, commercial facilities
that are service-type facilities, or facilities that
are operated on the site, that is, within the gene-
rator's premises.
The environment really doesn't care
where the pollution comes from, so, in other words,
we are not going to exempt from the requirements of
the act those facilities that are within a generator's
premises.
Now that — I mentioned the state of
California once earlier, that provision did exist
in the California state law -- that is, the law
did not apply to generator premises. They are
amending this law so that it will — so that it
will be consistent with the federal approach.
So I think, as far as incineration
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-De-
controls go, here again we are faced with the issue
of performance standards versus control-technology
standards.
One of the types of controls that we
might talk about is air-emission controls or that
type of thing as opposed to specifying what types
of incinerators could be used or what their operating
parameters should be.
So this is a basic issue that we are
faced with right now.
We would like to get again, get your
thoughts on that as to which type of controls are
more meaningful.
MR. ROBERT: What about the record keeping?
Does that have the incinerator right next to the
generator and still go through the record keeping?
MR. LEHMAN: Right.
The question concerned record keeping,
yes.
The same requirements for record
keeping would apply to a facility that is on a
generator's premises as it would apply elsewhere.
MR. LEHMAN: Yes, sir?
MR. INGELSON: Stanley Ingelson, American Cyanimid.
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A question on the listing of hazardous
waste.
Now, in 18 months you must come with
the possible listing of hazardous wastes, if I under-
stand this correctly — If I could find that my waste
is listed, I must notify the EPA of that fact, is
that correct?
MR. LEHMAN: Okay.
The question concerned hazardous-
waste listing. And if a waste is listed, then is
it true that whoever has that kind of waste must
notify the x^PA or the state of the program, is that
the question?
MR. INGELSON: Yes, I have a further question.
MR. LEHMAN: Okay.
Well, let's answer that one first.
The answer is "Yes."
If a generator finds that he has a
waste that is on the list that I mentioned, then it
is incumbent upon him to notify and apply for — or
start keeping records and so on -- in other words,
comply with the standards.
Now, let me point out, however, that
the way this definitional aspect is structured, the
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mere fact that a waste is not on a list does not
mean it is not a hazardous waste.
The basic definition is the criteria,
not the list.
MR. INGELSON: Right, that is where my main
question is centered.
If I have — If I suspect I have a
hazardous waste and it is not listed, ray understanding
from the previous question is that it is up to the
waste generator to determine if his waste is hazardous,
and then he must, once he has done that, then he must
also report that hazardous waste to the EPA or the
state government, and how much time does he have
to do -- to accomplish that?
You are allowing only three months
initially.
MR. LEHMAN: Okay.
The question is: Is it the respon-
sibility of the generator to find out whether or
not his waste is hazardous? And the timing issue
was brought up — in other words, we have a 90-day
period for the notification and a six-month period
for between regulations that are promulgated and
when they actually go into effect, and so on.
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Okay, the answer to the first one is
that as we are currently envisioning it, it is the
responsibility of the generator to determine whether
his waste is hazardous or not based on the criteria
or the list that is published, and as to the timing
of it, as I mentioned, the notification system is
really a very -- and intended anyway to be a very
simple registration in terms of, "Yes, I think I
do have hazardous waste. And I want to notify you
that that is so."
Now, if — if there is some question
about it, it would strike me that it would be, you
know, it would be the generator's choice.
But you can always notify EPA that
you think you have a hazardous waste, and then if
it turns out later that you don't, well then, you
are all right.
On the other hand, if you take the
other choice and say that you -- you guess that
you don't and you don't notify him, it turns out
that you do, then you are subject to some legal
sanctions.
So the safest course is the other one.
MR. INGELSON: What about the timing, though?
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MR. LEHMAN: What about the timing?
MR. INGELSON: In other words, if you suspect
you have a hazardous waste, you may want to run
some tests on it.
MR. LEHMAN: Yes.
MR. INGELSON: To see if you meet the criteria.
How much time are you allowed?
MR. LEHMAN: Well, as I say, the timing is at
least -- Now the notification is 90 days. However,
you also have six months after the regulation is
promulgated until the prohibition of disposal in
other than a permit facility goes into effect.
So there is — If there is some ques-
tion, I would recommend that people notify. Then
there is a six-month period to make these determi-
nations in a final way.
Yes, sir?
MR. BAYR: Robert Bayr, B-a-y-r, Velsicol
Chemical.
How much detail will be required in
analyzing the waste notification?
MR. LEHMAN: How much detail will be required
to know about the waste for the purposes of notifi-
cation? Is that the question?
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Here again, for the purposes of
notification, we are thinking that the requirements
would be very simple.
In other words, Just a very general
suspicion or knowledge that you have a hazardous
waste based on a list or general criteria.
There really — If I could get into
this a little bit, there are really three stages:
One is the notification that you think that you have
a hazardous waste. Second is an actual determination
that, "Yes, I do," or, "No, I don't," based on the
criteria. And there may be a priority ranging system
there — that is another thing we are thinking about
doing.
For example, there may be a simple
Ph test is one possibility. And if you flunk the
Ph test, regardless of what other properties the
waste has, then for the purposes of this law, it
is hazardous.
Then there is a third aspect involved,
and that is when the manufacturer is working with
a facility for the disposal or treatment.
There is still another layer or level
of knowledge that is required so that you can determine
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-51-
what Is the appropriate treatment or disposal method
for that waste. And that is a common practice now.
In other words, the people that are
in the business of treating these wastes will require
some type of analysis, or they will do an analysis
in their own laboratory for at least two reasons:
One is to set the price. There is going to be a
contract back and forth; they have to know how much
they are doing and how much it is going to cost them.
And secondly, to protect their own equipment and
their own people so that they know what it is they
are doing, they won't burn out the inside of an
incinerator, or blow out the inside of a reactor
vessel or whatever.
So there are all those three layers,
if you will, of detail that would be required.
But as far as determining for the
purposes of notification, I think our feeling would
be that either you just assume that it is hazardous
if you think it might be, or if you want to take
the trouble of running some tests against some of
the criteria, well, then do that.
But that -- that is about all that
we are talking about.
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Yes, sir?
MR. BAYR: Just a continuation.
How about applying the same situation
to a permit? Will you have to know every chemical
that is in your waste, or will you just be able to
generalize it?
MR. LEHMAN: The question is -- Is this coming
through? The question concerned how much detail you
need to get a permit.
And again, that is yet to be determined.
We are still working on those parameters.
I mentioned, there is a great tie
between section 3004 and 3005. The actual standards
for performance in terms of record keeping and so
on for facilities is 3004, and then this would be
applied to permitting conditions under section 3005.
MR. LEHMAN: I think we are running a little
overtime here, so perhaps we ought to cut it off
at this point, and if you have any further questions,
we can pick it up later.
Karl, do you want to take over?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Thank you, Jack.
It does look like this is pooped out.
We have gone into what was a lot of
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-56-
time for a break.
At this time, because of the fact
we are running over, I would like to just keep the
meeting moving straight through, and if you would
want to take a respite or a short walk, do it at
the risk of maybe missing a short portion of the
presentations.
I would like to move into the dis-
cussion now on the matters of land disposal. And
to treat that issue and these issues, we have George
Garland from our Office of Solid Waste in the Systems
Management Division in Washington.
I would like to request that the
input from the floor, to the best of your ability,
be phrased in a positive fashion more in terms of
your input to us in terms of what you would prefer
to see us do with respect to regulatory options that
the Agency has -- as opposed to —
A VOICE: A little louder please.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: All right, with
respect to regulatory options that the Agency has,
I would like to see the floor phrase its comments
into more positive guidelines or instruction rather
than questions which require lengthy elaboration
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-57-
by the speaker.
The general intent of this meeting
is to try to get from you some direction in terms
of the initial decision-making process that the
Agency is undertaking now, such that you will have
had an opportunity to make an input before a formal
promulgation of a proposal in the Federal Register.
So with this in mind, to the extent
that you may have concerns, if you could possibly
phrase them in something other than a question, it
would be more helpful than to ask questions which
require lengthy elaboration by people here.
Should you have to do that, I would
encourage you, if additional information has been
given sufficient to allow you to come to a position,
to write into our office to express yourself to any
issue which you may have and you wish to discuss,
but which you have not had an opportunity to discuss
or to hand in your writing here today.
Without further delay, George, will
you please take over on the matter of land disposal.
MR. GARLAND: The Resource Conservation and
Recovery Act closes the loop.
Now we have an act which deals with
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land protection or land disposal in a very broad
sense.
We have had a Clean Air Act and a
Clean Water Act, and now we have in essence a land-
disposal act.
The land-disposal provisions are based
on some new definitions of disposal, open dump,
sanitary landfill, and solid waste that call for
a rethinking of what we mean when we say, "solid-
waste disposal."
"Disposal" now means the 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 waste or any
constituent thereof may enter the environment or
be admitted into the air or discharged into any
waters, including ground waters.
Now, in a minute I will get into
section 400*1 of the act.
The definitions of "open dump" and
"sanitary landfill" refer to that section for
clarification. So basically Congress has deferred
the definition of "open dump" and "sanitary landfill"
and made that a part of the public-participation
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-59-
process -- The Agency is going through and develop-
ing these definitions.
The term "solid waste" means any garbage,
refuse, sludge from waste treatment plants, water-
supply treatment plant, or air-pollution-control
facility, and other discarded material, including
solid, liquid, semisolid, or contained gaseous
material resulting from industrial, commercial, and
agricultural operations and from community activities.
Well, the term "solid-waste disposal"
then is now very, very broad.
Section 4004 calls for the Agency
to issue within one year criteria for distinguishing
sanitary landfills from open dumps.
The criteria asked us to define a
"sanitary landfill" as that which will have no reason-
able probability of adverse effects on the environment.
We need to define "reasonable probability,"
and we need to define "adverse effects."
Now, for example, in dealing with the
protection of ground water, we would like to come
up with numbers which will say what in fact con-
stitutes an adverse effect on ground water.
Now, all around the country, various
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states have different kinds of ideas about ground
water.
It is not clear in fact who even owns
the ground water. And to come up with a federal
standard that was able to be worked in with all of
the various interpretations of ground water, owner-
ship, and ground-water protection in the various
states is a mammoth undertaking.
Nevertheless, we hope to come up with
specific numbers that can be worked into the various
frameworks of ground-water philosophy in the various
states.
Now, the act call-" for the state
to require disposal in sanitary landfills. And
these regulations will be developed under the state
plans.
The state planning process and pro-
visions will be discussed later in the discussion
of state programs, but I want to point out that the
criteria for sanitary landfills will determine the
kind of coverage that these state regulatory programs
will need to have.
Once the criteria have been promul-
gated, the act calls for inventory of open dumps.
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This inventory Is to be accomplished
in twelve months.
We hope that it will be undertaken
by the states.
After twelve months, the Agency will
publish a list of open dumps, and that will then
provide the menu for the states in its planning
process to come up with compliance schedules for
closing or upgrading the open dumps that have been
listed.
Now, when I say, "open dump," I could
very well be talking about an industrial impoundment
which contains materials that were leaking into the
ground water. And in fact the state might list this
as an open dump and then have a compliance schedule
for closing it over five years.
And this would apply to facilities
that were located on the private property, of course.
The state plan will then contain a
compliance schedule for each of the open dumps listed
in the inventory -- It will have a schedule for
closing or upgrading those dumps that will take
a maximum of five years.
If states have already committed
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themselves to closing open dumps in a period less
than five years, it is EPA's policy that the shorter
schedule should apply.
It is possible and, in fact, likely
that states will not be able to tackle all of the
various disposal practices that are now included
as land disposal.
They may be in pretty good shape to
deal with landfills and dumps. They may be a good
handle on waste-water sludge disposal. They may not
know so much about pits, ponds, or lagoons — Some
states know a great deal about pits, ponds, and
lagoons and be prepared to deal with them immediately,
In our regional identification guide-
lines in section 4002-A of the Act, and again this
will be discussed later, we are asking that the
Governor prioritize the various waste-disposal
practices and waste types and say how he intends
to deal with them over a period of time.
The act does not call for phasing
of the inventory, but in fact it may be the only
practical approach, and we are so listing comments
on that issue.
Now, the criteria are meant to be
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performance criteria. They are not meant to specify
exactly how people must operate disposal facilities.
However, section 1008 of the act
calls for guidelines which in fact are descriptive
and now prescriptive — and are suggestions for ways
to meet the criteria that have been promulgated
under section ^00^.
In the guidelines, then, there will
be a variety of ways that we feel the criteria will
be met. It will not be necessary to adopt these
various techniques that will be described with
respect to their technical performance and their
economics, and in fact if better ways can be found,
you are welcome to use them.
Nevertheless, we are required to give
suggestions on how criteria can be met.
Now, to give you an idea of what is
included in the criteria, or I shoul'd say with the
kinds of issues that will be dealt with in the guide-
lines, and in fact the criteria and the guidelines
are related, the guidelines are to describe levels
of performance, including appropriate methods and
degrees of control that provided a minimum for pro-
tection of public health and welfare, protection of
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the quality of ground water and surface waters from
leachates, protection of the qualities of surface
waters from runoff through compliance with effluent
limitations under the Federal Water Pollution Control
Act, protection of ambient air quality through com-
pliance with New Source Performance Standards or
requirements of air quality implementation plans
under the Clean Air Act; disease and vector control,
safety, and aesthetics.
Okay, that concludes my remarks on
the land-protection provisions of RCRA.
Are there any comments or questions?
Will you use the microphones, please,
for the benefit of everybody, including the court
reporter?
MR. CONNER: My name is Robert Conner.
With section 1008-A — there appears
to be a distinction between the guidelines under
section 1008-A-l and -- inasmuch as the guidelines
under A-l are only those which provide for the pro-
tection of public health and environment.
With those under 2 are much more
detailed than what they have to accomplish -- that
is -- I offer the suggestion that in your guidelines
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make it clear whether there is a difference between
the guidelines and try to embrace what the Congress
has apparently done.
MR. GARLAND: Thank you.
I can add that we have decided on
two areas tentatively in which we want to publish
guidelines.
That includes the updating of our
sanitary-landfill guidelines and sludge-land-disposal
guidelines.
MS. ROME: May I?
MR. GARLAND: Yes.
MS. ROME: My name is Louise Rome. I am with
the League of Women Voters, and I would like to
comment on section -- I'm not sure the section,
but on the definition of 26-A,"sludge" defined, and
then you proceed to section 1008, and I assume that
you are required to adopt guidelines for possession
and/or otherwise disposal of municipal sludges.
You want a recommendation? I give
you a strong recommendation to give priority to
this issue since so many of us in the major metro-
politan areas have difficulties on how to propose
sludge.
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We never cleared guidelines, and we
need regulations, which you can give in municipalities,
You can't exactly eat the stuff and -- I address
myself immediately to that. Thank you.
MR. GARLAND: Thank you.
That supports our direction, then.
We do intend to publish guidelines on sludge, and
that would include -- Oh, when we talk about land,
that includes such issues as crop uptake of heavy
metals and some guidelines on that issue.
Yes, sir?
MR. KANOPSON: My name -- My name is Bruce
Kanopson. I am with Schlitz Brewing Company, and
I was wondering if you had looked into trying to
define the wastes and by-products. Industries now
have by-products.
The whole spectrum between traditional
things and the waste market --
MR. GARLAND: We have thought about this.
And let me give you some of our thoughts, and maybe
you would like to add to them.
A VOICE: Repeat the question.
MR. GARLAND: Yes, the question was: Have we
thought about the difference between wastes and
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by-products -- sort of abbreviated, but if you
consider that spreading sludge on a crop is using
a by-product, and you say that is not a waste, we
don't need to worry about the criteria, then you
could end up putting some things on crops that were
going to be added to the food chain, and we -- you
might not want them in the food chain.
We, therefore, have not tried to
make a distinction between utilization of by-products
and disposal. Rather we intend to put out criteria
which will apply to all waste-disposal practices.
And if it turns out that somebody
says, "Gentlemen, this doesn't need to be subjected
to close criteria because this is Just utilization
of a by-product," we won't buy it.
As a case in point, in some of the
worst hazardous-waste-damage cases, we have people
who wanted to reclaim the drums, so they took the
contents of the drums to a farmer's field and dumped
them in the farmer's field and used the drums as a
by-product.
And it resulted in a contamination
of the Cohansie Aquifier, and the contamination of
a major part of it for public use.
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So basically we are not buying that,
I think.
MR. KANOPSON: I guess my concern is partly
according to the hazardous waste and partly because
states increasingly require permitting of solid-waste-
disposal facility, and you are going out saying,
selling, trying to get rid of spent grains or some-
thing of that sort and go to a farmer, and it turns
out that he Just had a -- needs a disposal permit
and uses it — The marketing is going to be much
more difficult.
MR. GARLAND: Okay, I should distinguish between
the hazardous-waste provision of the act, which
require, as Jack covered, a variety of kinds of
permits and manifest system and so forth, and the
general land-disposal provisions of the act, which
will be implemented by the state and will be dealt
with as the state sees fit.
It is clear that farmers are going
to -- Well, if we have criteria that affected land,
and we are concerned about what happens to crops,
if you put something that is a waste on the crop,
it is clear that the farmers will have to go to a
bit more trouble.
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It is our Judgment that It is probably
worth it to do this to protect people who are going
to be using the crops.
The question of just how much trouble
the farmers will have to go to depends on the process
we are going through now and what kinds of inputs we
get and suggestions.
Gould you come up to the near micro-
phone, please? I think it works better.
MR. RONDEAU: My name is Guy Rondeau,R-o-n-d-e-a-u,
I would like to know if you are going
to classify or define what a "sanitary landfill" is?
According to the type of waste that it accepts.
MR. GARLAND: We are going to classify sanitary
landfill, as in open dumps, according to the way they
affect the environment.
Now if you have a certain class of
land-disposal site, which only accepts certain kinds
of waste, and you can assure to the state's satisfac-
tion that that is the only kind of waste that is going
to go there, and I am not sure how you can do that,
that in fact you may have a different kind of require-
ment, then you would for a site that would accept
hazardous waste.
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What I am saying is -- We are concerned
with putting out the performance criteria.
The way these are implemented by the
state and whether the state has various classes of
landfills is pretty much up to the state.
MR. RONDEAU: Okay, so if you have a paper-mill
sludge site as compared to a municipal solid-waste
site, it may not require the same design and opera-
tion features if it is determined by performance-
monitoring data as meeting your requirements as far
as performance standards?
MR. GARLAND: Right.
MR. RONDEAU: Thank you.
MR. ROEThIG: Yes, my name is Don Roethig. I
am with tne city of Milwaukee. I would raise a
question.
1 presume that the Department of
Agriculture will play a significant role in publishing
Of the suggestions as to guidelines as far as sludge
is concerned?
MR. GARLAND: Absolutely.
We practically live over there. The
Food and Drug Administration as well.
The question was: Will the Department
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-71-
of Agriculture play a role in determining guidelines
for sludge utilization -- in case you didn't hear.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Thank you, George.
I would like to remind the people
or offer the people who have indicated a desire to
make a formal, written statement available to the
record to take the opportunity to do so -- that
all you have to do is step up and give it to the
reporter here, and she will enter it into the record
for you.
I have a fair number of people who
have indicated they would like to do that.
I also have a significant number of
people who have indicated the desire to make an oral
statement. Please don't miss the opportunity to do
so as the day progresses.
(Off the record.)
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Let's see, I will
take the opportunity now to offer for the record a
statement from the Northern Indiana Regional Coordinating
Council; a written statement from the city of Canton,
Ohio; and a written statement from a Mrs. Herman
Myrtle from Broadview Heights, Ohio.
Okay, we are relatively close to
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-72-
schedule again.
I would like to at this time bring
forward Mr. Bob Lowe, who is a representative of
our Resource Recovery Division in headquarters,
Office of Solid Waste, and he will discuss with
you the aspects of our RCRA regarding resource
recovery and technical assistance.
Bob?
MR. LOWE: Good morning, Karl, good morning.
My name is Bob Lowe. I am substi-
tuting for — Thomas Canfield -- who is no longer
with our Agency and, therefore, does not send his
regrets.
I would like to make one comment
first. Can you hear me? If you canthear me in
the back, raise your hand.
I didn't get any hands, it's okay
like this, okay.
I would like to make one comment on
how the record is going to be used.
We have hired a contractor who will
\«
summarize the transcripts from all 1HSL, public meetings
that we are holding around the country and present
that summary in a form that our management can read
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with some ease, so the fact that certain statements
are being submitted for the record and not read here
does not indicate that they won't be used or that the
contents will not be seen. They certai-nly will be
seen.
I am going to speak about the provi-
sions in the new act that cover resource conservation
and recovery.
The coverage that this act provides
for resource conservation and recovery is very broad.
It gives us the ability to do a lot of things. It
also authorizes a lot of money to do those things.
However, it is not likely that we
are going to have very much money to do those things ,
so as I go through -- as I go through this section --
sections of the law that apply to these areas, I will
try to give you an indication of what things we might
do and what things we probably will not do because
of the low level of resources.
May I have the slides now, please?
Resource conservation and resource
recovery is addressed in a number of areas of the
law.
First of all, the definition of "solid-
-------
waste management" includes resource conservation
and recovery so that wherever that definition is
mentioned, wherever "solid waste" is mentioned,
"solid-waste management," resource conservation
and recovery are included by definition.
But they are specifically addressed
on the section of guidelines, section 1008, and I
will continue to refer these sections by number
for those of you who are bureaucratically inclined
in not dealing with concepts and ideas.
I will also use abbreviations if it
will make you more comfortable.
In the resource-recovery area, we
have written some guidelines already under the exis-
ting previous legislation, and I believe our experience,
at least in resource-recovery conservation, is merely
to reissue these guidelines rather than develop any
new ones -- at least for the immediate future.
Section 2003 requires creation of
resource-recovery and conservation panels to provide
technical assistance to state and local governments.
I will get into this in a little more
detail in a moment.
Subtitle D, which lays out the state
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and local planning process, requires that resource
recovery and resource conservation will -- be addressed
throughout the process.
And I believe that Bob Duprey is going
to get into that when I am finished.
One item that is not on this slide
is federal procurement section 6002.
The law requires that the agencies
of the federal government that write procurement
specifications review those specifications to remove
any prohibitions to the use of secondary materials,
and that they require the use of secondary materials
wherever it is practical to do so.
We are supposed to write guidelines
to define what "practical" means.
Section 8003 is a very broad — spells
out a very broad program of information development
and dissemination.
This is something that we have con-
centrated on a lot in the past and will continue to
do so.
Another item which is not on this
slide, which I will get to in a minute, is section
8002, which calls for studies in s number of -- in
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a number of areas related to resource conservation
and recovery, and I will explain on that -- explain
them in a minute.
Section 8004 authorizes us to enter
into grants and contracts to demonstrate and evaluate
new technologies.
One important aspect of this, I think,
Is that we now have the authority to enter into con-
tracts for demonstration, which means that we can
enter into a direct relationship with a private
company who is developing a — developing a technology.
That is different from the authorization
that we had in the past, which was limited to giving
grants to public agencies, like cities and states.
We learned a lot about institutional
problems — in that exercise, but the process of
demonstrating the technology and producing informa-
tion from it was made more difficult as a result.
And we hope that if we -- if money does become avail-
able for this, that we will be able to do a better
job of advancing the state of the art in technology —
through the contract mechanism.
We also have the authority to evaluate
facilities that are built without federal money.
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This — We will probably put more
emphasis on this than in the past as a result of
having less money because we get more information
for a smaller amount of money than if we had to
build their facilities ourselves.
Section 8002 Indicates for studies
in a number of different areas — I am putting this
up merely so I will get an idea of the kinds of
topics that are covered.
I make one comment, and that is:
Studies are called for in the area of small-scale
and low-technology and front-end separation.
Openings for recycling, what this
means is -- another term for this is "source separation"
where materials, base materials that are recyclable
are segregated from other waste by the generator of
those wastes, either the household or the business
establishment, and collected separately and shipped
back to a manufacturing company for recycling.
This reflects — The fact that these
items are specifically mentioned reflects Increasing
emphasis in these areas.
Section 8002-J creates a resource-
conservation committee, which is a cabinet-level
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committee that Is supposed to Investigate and study
and report on a variety of incentives and disincen-
tives and existing and possible measures and policies
that have some effect on the way we use our materials
and what happens to those materials after they are
no longer useful.
I think it is worth mentioning that
it is very significant that there is a cabinet-level
committee.
There have been a number of studies,
high-level studies, conducted. I think this is
about the fifth or sixth one that has been authorized
since the '50s — the 1950s, but it is the first;
one that is going to be done within the administration.
Prior to this time, these kind of
studies have been — this kind of studies has been
done by special study commissions. And I think that
because it is being done inside the administration,
the chances for Implementing the regulations are
higher, and that Is good.
I say, "the cabinet-level committee,"
this committee is chaired by the Administrator of
EPA, and the membership is composed of the secretaries
of the number of departments — the Secretary of Labor
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and the Secretary of Commerce -- Secretary of
Treasury and so on, and the committee also includes
a representative of the Office of Management and
Budget in the White House.
And for those of you who are familiar
with the power structure in Washington, I think it
is significant to note that a mere representative
of the Office of Management and Budget has the status
of a cabinet secretary.
We think it is good — very good that
there is high-level attention to these issues.
For those people who wanted Congress
to take action and to implement incentives for re-
cycling and resource conservation and to do away
with disincentives that now exj.st, then this is —
this study provision is bad because it makes it
impossible, essentially impossible for any action
to take place until the studies are completed.
Section 2003 calls for creation of
resource-conservation and recovery panels, to provide
technical assistance, to meet a variety of purposes
in the law.
I would like to say, just in explaining
this, that I think the title of this is misleading
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in two ways: First of all, although it says,
"resource-recovery and conservation panels," the
panels are not limited to resource recovery and
conservation alone.
They are required by law to address
all areas of solid-waste management, including hazar-
dous-waste management.
Also, the term "panels" has an impli-
cation, I think is not quite -- right — at least we
who probably Interpret it differently.
The word "panels" conjures up an idea
of fix-ups — say for individuals who will meet as
a unit and travel as a unit. We don't see it happening
this way. We see it rather and as a pool of resources,
people with whom our relationship, contractual or
otherwise relationship, has been developed so that
we in EPA can call on people who have certain expertise
that is needed in a city or state and produce those
people -- either individually or in groups.
Those people are to have expertise
in the following areas -- technical, marketing,
financial, and institutional, and test people will
be the teams will be composed of EPA staff, consultants
under contract to EPA, and state and local officials
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who have some experience to share and who will be
provided through a program we call "peer matching."
Okay, could I have the lights back
on, please?
Just to give you an idea of some of
the issues we are trying to deal with or how some
of the basic provisions of our program that is still
in the formative stages, we would like to pose a
couple of questions; hopefully we'll stimulate some
discussion.
First of all, what criteria should
be used in selecting the materials and products for
study for the resource-conservation committee to
study?
For example, should we study those
products and materials that cause the greatest total
overall pollution -- that is, from the time they are
pulled out of the ground until the time they are
disposed of? Or should we Just look at the waste-
disposal impacts? Or should we just — Or should
we look at those resources that are most scarce, in
which case we wouldn't pay any attention at all to
glass or products containing glass.
Should we be concerned about the
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balance of papers? Should we look only at the
products that are imported? Should we look at
those products that are vulnerable to cartelization?
I think I am saying that -- using
that term properly, but I am talking about a product
such as I believe it is chromium.
Our entire supply to chromium comes
from Rhodesia and the Soviet Union, and our foreign
policy -- There is very serious foreign-policy impli-
cations associated with our source, continued source
of chromium from those places.
The second item: What type of infor-
mation is needed to help state and local officials
plan and implement resource-conservation and recovery
programs and projects, and what type of information
should we be provided to help state and local officials
implement hazardous and other regulatory programs?
In our technical-assistance program,
should we attempt to serve everybody, and should we
do that on a first-come, first-served basis, or
should we be more selective?
And if we are to be selective, what
criteria should we use to select technical-assistance
recipients?
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Should we select those that generate
the most tonnage, in which case we might never get
to the small communities?
We would be helping Chicago and Detroit
and Minneapolis, St. Paul. We probably would never
get to the smaller communities.
Should we work only with those who
have serious environmental problems? Should we work
with those communities that are most likely to succeed
in implementing whatever it is they are working on?
Should we work with those communities
that have — those projects have the most — the
greatest demonstration value?
Or this is one — Here is a suggestion
that was made at an earlier public-participation
meeting of this type -- Maybe we should work with
communities that have the greatest level of ignorance.
My reaction to that was: I could Just
see EPA making its monthly announcement of those
communities that were awarded technical assistance,
Jia^
and I don't think -- I don't think we would -lo^e"
long doing that.
Well, I will stop at this point and
open the floor to suggestions on how we should design
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our program or things we should look for.
State your name, spell your last
name, please.
MR. MITCHELL: My name is Bill Mitchell,
M-1-t-c-h-e-l-l. I represent Southern Illinois
University, Pollution Control Division.
I have a short statement I would like
to make.
Some of the work that we have been
doing in southern Illinois is to develop a system
which both monitors and encourages feedback from
the university solid-waste-collection and disposal
system.
Our objectives are quantifiable in
terms of dollars — okay?
Some of the work that we have been
doing at pollution control is developing a system
which both monitors and encourages feedback from
the university solid-waste-collection and disposal
system.
Our objectives are quantifiable in
terms of dollars, and evaluation of the overall
project, we hope, will be simply in that all we
have to do is check the bottom line.
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I am not saying that a cheap system
is most economical, nor am I saying that the methods
that we are using are the best for every other
institution or community.
But I am saying that the solid-waste
management is a local problem, and the solutions
should fit the location.
The Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act does not provide for methods of assessing the
real cost of present-day waste patterns. However,
it does acknowledge them.
Resource depletions, aesthetics,
economics, and practicality inherent with the existing
waste-disposal methods have not been fully assessed.
Should these costs be added to current
estimates of waste-disposal systems, and should the
cost be reflected in the price of goods, then the
solution would be apparent.
When all the costs are added, they
seem to point to one solution, and that is recycling.
Recycling is a preventive measure
which can end the solid-waste problem.
I have studied the solid-waste stream
for five years. I have read with interest about
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numerous methods and technologies devised to provide
a solution to the waste problem.
I am convinced that the technology
is available and waiting. In fact, an entire branch
of the pollution control Industry is poised and
waiting. So what is the hang-up?
Decision makers on every level of
government and industry are not fully utilizing
available technology.
A very important element in the planning
process has been overlooked. One element is totally
devoid of development in comprehension of solid-waste
problems.
This element is demand for these
solutions from the public. Solid waste simply is
not a priority issue in most communities.
The role of the individual in carrying
out solutions to the solid-waste problem has not
really been assessed. I feel that the generators
of waste are the key to the solution. Wasteful
behavior is a social phenomenon, which is encouraged
when people are not considered a functional part of
the solution to waste.
We need to involve the public in the
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solution to municipal solid-waste products. When
we deal with people, we are dealing with the cause
rather than the symptom of the problem.
S.I.U. pollution control has taken
the social science approach in seeking solutions
to the solid-waste problem.
We believe that a cooperative effort
is needed.
Surveys conducted in southern Illinois
indicate that up to 97 percent of the population
would participate in a source-separation program.
Our difficulties in implementing this
solution indicate that the credibility of public
opinion is lacking on the part of the decision
makers. No one believes that the people want to
solve the solid-waste problem and are willing to
do so.
We have found that if you ask the
average person whether or not they believe that
solid waste is a problem, they will say "Yes."
If you ask them if they would parti-
cipate in a source-separation program, they will
also say "Yes."
But if you ask them if they feel
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that others will participate in such a problem,
they will say "No."
EPA has funded two very interesting
experiments in Summerville and Marblehead, Massachusetts
The success of these programs indicates a willingness
of the public to change that behavior towards wastes.
I think that the results of these
studies are very significant, and I would like to
see similar programs in other parts of the country.
Perhaps people everywhere are willing
to separate their own wastes.
Perhaps the solid-waste problem should
be dealt with by offering the public the recycling
alternative.
We do not know where every resource-
recovery path will lead. We do know where our present
waste patterns and methods for dealing with them are
leading us.
The Resource Conservation Recovery
Act should emphasize solving the problem of waste.
When this is done, the problem of
disposal of residue will become a manageable one.
I have a few comments on selected
issues — Can I take the time? It's okay?
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One is public participation.
I feel that source separation is one
method which allows for public participation and
involvement in a very fundamental way.
I feel that this is the only way to
generate mass interest in solid-waste issues.
On manpower development, I feel that
EPA activities in this area should be directed towards
colleges, universities, and high schools.
This is where solid-waste problems
and solutions can grab imaginations. When solid
waste is no longer labeled as garbage, trash, or
refuse, it will become an attractive course of study,
which requires creative applications of scientific
and technological knowledge.
On conservation and recovery issues,
I feel that conservation is an essential aspect of
comprehensive solid-waste management.
However, radical upheavals in the
present manufacturing and distribution systems should
be provided.
I feel the conservation committee
should direct its attention to the plastic and food-
waste streams while promoting and encouraging less
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wasteful lifestyles.
Long-range goals should focus on
maximum utilization of all materials found in solid
wastes.
Resource-conservation panels should
play an important role in hazardous-waste-awareness
programs, and emphasis should be placed on reuse
rather than disposal.
I feel that incentive is the key to
the recycling solution in solid-waste management.
Money is a strong incentive.
If programs were encouraged which
provide monetary incentives to individuals, industry,
and government, then the success of and intent of
the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act could
be realized.
Utilization of waste materials in
the manufacture of new products should be encouraged
and supported. Freight rates and questions which
arise in reference to them should be examined.
Recycling should be strongly encouraged.
With reference to state programs, I
feel that levels of involvement with an individual
state should be flexible, allowing the unique
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situation within each state to dictate the systems
designed.
I feel that the key to state and local
investment in carrying out involvement, in carrying
out the Resource Conservation Recovery Act, depends
primarily on two things: First, it should involve
people, and second, it must be economically wise for
state and local governments to become involved.
The real cost of solid waste should
be made known, and cost-effective solutions should
be made available.
Solutions must be geared towards
developing and/or improving the economic structure
of local communities.
At pollution control, we have been
involved in several diverse programs -- in solid-
waste management.
Many of these have been outlined in
Resource Recovery Conservation Acts.
We are training people in resource
recovery. Our program consists of systematic data,
acquisition, and disincentive application of pro-
gressive steps to achieve the goal of solving the
solid-waste problem at the university.
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We have established a research method
known as "garbology analysis," which provides us
with daily monitoring of the waste stream, its com-
position, and the amount.
We are also conducting detailed cost
analysis of the university's waste-disposal system.
These studies are being -- These
studies are being complemented with source-separation
program for materials found in the waste stream.
We are also conducting motivational
research to determine optimum source-separation
methods.
Another aspect of our solid-waste
program is concerned with hazardous-waste evaluation
and collection and disposal methods.
We have had little encouragement or
support, but we have tapped into a very valuable
resource which has been overlooked by most solid-
waste programs.
We have people -- people that are
interested and involved in the solid-waste problem.
Waste is a social problem. Collection,
recycling, and proper disposal of residue is a
technical problem.
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We believe that if people can be
motivated not to waste, that the technology available
today can be used to provide a cost-effective solu-
tion to solid-waste problems.
Once people become interested in
and motivated to use less wasteful alternatives,
the solid-waste problem will be solved.
I am going to submit this also.
MR. SILVAGHI: Thank you, Bob.
For the record, I am Bob Silvagni.
I am with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency,
and I just have a few points I would like to make
to you, Bob .
First of all, we at the agency are
quite concerned that not enough emphasis at this
time is being placed in the area of resource con-
servation by the EPA and the development of RCRA.
We would like to see EPA stress the
issues of what we call "source reduction." Simply
reduce the source into the solid-waste streams.
Can we and how can government through
economic incentives, through regulatory methods,
reduce the amounts and types of packaging?
Through also source reduction can be
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made, objectives can be made through effective
public-education programs.
Also, developing legislation for
economic incentives either to reduce the availability
of industry to get tax breaks for the depletion of
natural resources — that is, tax credits for taking
ore out of the ground, etc., and giving the same
types of tax incentives or economic incentives for
the use of nonregistered materials.
We also would like to see the Agency
address some of the thoughts that are being presented
by various groups — in regard to the solid-waste
problem through saying the answer of the problem
is through source reduction, not source reduction,
through recycling and/or through litter control.
The various organizations that have
been -- Industry has spent millions of dollars saying
the answer to solid-waste problems is through litter
or through resource recovery, and we believe that in
Minnesota some of these answers should be addressed
to the source-reduction area.
And lastly, during the development
of the legislation, we believe it is important that
resource recovery be considered an alternative, but
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not as — not at the expense of source reduction.
What I mean by that is: If we encourage
communities to build thousands-of-tons-per-day resource-
recovery facilities, we want to make sure we don't
also cause these same communities to deny source
reduction, deny legislation or incentives.
If it takes 3,000 tons of waste paper
and packaging materials to provide the necessary
energy source for resource-recovery facility, that
same community with its investment will surely deny
any type of source-reduction issue in the packaging
area.
That is all I have, thank you.
MR. LOWE: Thank you.
You want to come up next?
Can I Just have an indication on hands
how many more people want to speak? One here? Okay.
MR. REILLY: My name is Peter Reilly, R-e-i-1-l-y,
from the Sinnissippi Audubon Chapter in Rockford,
Illinois.
I would like to reinforce the gentle-
man from Minnesota's points on source reduction;
specifically I wanted to recommend to the EPA that
in their focus of implementation of the act, that
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they not just study the small-scale and low-technology
area for handling solid waste, but rather make this
a major focus of their implementation and work with
the state plans.
I think that EPA made the mistake
in water pollution of considering the high technology,
the high cost, and very centralized plants as the
major solution to the problem.
They are now recognizing in their
amendments to the Water Pollution Act that they need
to look at less high technology and smaller scale
size — in rural areas or less dense areas of the
country.
I think in this case, resource recovery,
that they should start off with this as a major goal
rather than tacking it on at the end after the commit-
ment of a large amount of federal funds.
Specifically, then, I would like to
encourage them to utilize a large portion of their
demonstration funds to support low technology or
small-scale efforts, source-reduction efforts,
throughout the country.
I think this is one way to show that
source separation and source reduction would be
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feasible alternatives by having demonstrations
scattered in many parts of the country so that
people wouldn't have to say, "Well, it worked ir
Massachusetts so it should work here."
Secondly, I think there might be a
bias in here by saying, "small scale."
Certainly source reduction may well
prove feasible in cities larger than a quarter of
a million people, but this is where the demonstra-
tion projects should show to what extent this would
be feasible.
So again, I would just like to empha-
size that they take a strong effort in implementing
and encouraging source separation, low technology,
and in response to the gentleman who spoke previously
on source reduction, I think if we can encourage
people to separate their own wastes, that is a good
incentive for them to waste less.
MR. LOWE: Thank you very much.
Do you want to come up?
MR. RONDEAU: Guy Rondeau. I have a couple
questions on research recovery that I think are of
interest to people.
First of all, when will the resource-
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recovery panels be available? And financial
assistance now available for —
A VOICE: Can't hear you.
MR. RONDEAU: Okay.
I am asking when will the resource-
recovery panels be available? Is financial assistance
now available for such studies as feasible studies,
documents, and requests for proposals, and finally,
could you tell us a little bit more about the grants
for full-scale demonstration on pilot plants?
MR. LOWE: Are there any other — before I
answer that question, are there any other comments
that people want to make?
You want to make a statement as opposed
to a question?
MR. ROETHIG: I want to make a statement.
MR. LOWE: Why don't we — take a statement. I
can always answer you in private.
MR. ROETHIG: My name is Don Roethig, and I am
with the City of Milwaukee, and I appear here this
morning to make a humble plea to EPA in their pro-
mulgation of rules and regulations relative to this
act — Please, please, by all means, give consideration
to the highly industrialized urban community. And
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particularly -- in particular, with its people mix --
Do not use as a Judgment those bases and those demon-
strations that are representative of the bedroom
communities of our nation and apply those willy-
nilly to the total urban environment.
The Chicagoes, the Milwaukees, the
Bostons, the Detroits.
I beg you to please give consideration
to those. We have a mix of people and a mix of
industry.
All of the people don't even speak
the same language. We are not all of the same color,
and we have a different hierarchy of needs in terms
of their attitudes in addressing the solid-waste
problem.
So please give us some consideration --
thank you.
(Applause.)
MR. LOWE: Thank you.
How am I doing on time, Karl?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: You are going fine --
You got plenty of time.
MR. LOWE: Let me respond to Mr. Rondeau's
comments.
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The availability of panels, the
technical-assistance teams.
We have technical-assistance teams
in place and ready to go right now -- that are
operating under program plans designed under the
previous legislation.
We are right now developing program
plans on how to design and use these teams under
the provisions called for in the new law.
The design of our technical-assistamce
teams now may or may not be repeated depending upon
what we learn from the public and what we see our--
selves from the results of the use of these panels.
Anyway, so I guess what I can say
is we are — we have the capability to respond to
requests now, and we will continue to have that
capability although the form and extent of that --
of our assistance may change when we implement the
new law, and the personnel may change also.
I have got mixed feelings about how
much to promote our services. I want to promote it
very much because I think we have something to offer,
and I would like to be able to help everybody.
However, we have a small staff, and
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we have a small amount of money in our contracts
through which we hire consultants to work with us
in helping state and local governments.
So we will not be able to respond
to everybody.
We have to set a criteria that we use
now, and we will do the best we can to help as many
people as we can.
Regarding financial assistance, the
question was: Is financial assistance now available?
The answer is "No."
There is no money in the fiscal '77
budget, which carries us through September of this
year.
I think there is money requested in
the fiscal '78 budget, but when we — I don't know
when we are going to get the figures on that, or
when we will be able to spend it.
Regarding grants for demonstrations,
the likelihood of money for demonstrations projects
so low at this point that we don't -- I don't know
of any specific plans.
We have been meeting with -- industry
representatives and consultants and public-sector
-------
-102-
people to ask them what they think — research and
development needs ought to be for the future.
To that extent we are planning, but
I don't know the content of that.
uoV\o
I can tell -Jww to call, though, in
Washington.
Any other comments, questions? Okay,
Karl-
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Thank you, Boh.
We have one more formal presentation
to be offered this morning. It's by the Director
of the Air and Hazardous Materials Division of
Region Vj Mr. Bob Duprey, and he will talk to the
issue of the state role and perhaps offer some obser-
vations on funding with various excerpts of the act.
MR. DUPREY: Thank you, Karl.
I think it is rather ironic that the
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act is the last
major piece of environmental legislation that was
adopted by the Congress.
We have had in effect now for many,
many years the Clean Air Act and the Water Pollution
Control Act and the Pesticides Act of FIFRA.
Under these statutes, basically what
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we have been doing is trying to remove from the
air and remove from the water the pollutants that
have been able — put into them.
And these in part have helped contribute
to the present solid-waste problem.
I might say, just before the RCRA
was enacted, the Toxic Substances Control Act was
enacted, which deals with the front-end problem of
having chemicals enter the environment.
But the last piece of legislation,
which really closes the circle on environmental
legislation, was the Resource Conservation and
Recovery Act.
And basically I think this piece of
legislation offers us new opportunity in this area
of federal, state, local cooperation on implementing
a piece of legislation.
In fact, it's fairly unique in this
area.
I think some of the previous statements
that have just been made Just before me here actually
bring that out best of all. And that is, we are
really dealing with an area where it is impossible
for the federal government to lay down strict numerical
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-104-
limits or numerical criteria on Just how we deal
with the solid-waste problem.
What we are really talking about here
is an opportunity to set up the framework in which
the local government and state government and private
sector work together to develop a solid-waste-management
plan in each state and a hazardous-waste-management
plan which will deal with these problems in a most
effective way for that particular area -- because
there is no one single solution.
So it is our intent, anyway in Region V,
to attempt to implement this legislation as much as
possible at the state and local level.
Okay, the first slide deals with the
section of the Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act, which is on solid-waste management.
Essentially under this section of
the act, the Administrator has had six months to
publish guidelines to identify areas which have
comments in our appropriate units for planning
regional solid-waste services.
This is essentially by April of this
year, and it is our intent — T got my sections mixed
up here.
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-105-
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: I think you are
a slide out of sync.
MR. DUPREY: Let me advance -- wrong slide --
okay?
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: There you go.
MR. DUPREY: Essentially, I am talking about
the third item there, by April of this year, to
have these guidelines out -- Essentially it is
expected that -- Well, the headquarters' staff will
meet this and will be publishing what is known as
interim final regulations for initiating this part
of the act.
Within six months after publication
of these guidelines, the Governor of each state,
after consultation with the local elected officials,
also required to promulgate regulations identifying
the boundaries of each area within the state which,
as a result of urban concentrations, geographic
conditions, markets, and other factors, is appropriate
for carrying out regional solid-waste management.
The state then has another six months
under the act to Jointly with appropriate elected
officials of local government, to develop the state
plan and identify one or more agencies to implement
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-106-
such plan and Identify which solid-waste functions
will function under the state plan and be carried
out by the state, by the regional or local authority,
or combination of regional, local, and state
authorities.
There is a specific mention in the
act that the section 208 agencies be considered for
designation — if this is feasible.
The minimum requirements for approval
of the state solid-waste-management plan, which is
then developed, are as follows: Essentially there
must be an Identification of the appropriate respon-
sibilities of the various agencies that would imple-
ment the plan and the means that is provided for
coordinating regional planning and implementation.
There must be a prohibition of the
establishment of new open dumps within the state
and the requirement that all solid waste be utilized
either for resource recovery or disposed of in a
sanitary landfill.
There must be provision for closing
or upgrading of all existing open dumps within the
state.
There must be provision for establishment
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-107-
of state regulatory powers as necessary.
There must be provision that no local
government is prohibited from entering into long-term
contracts for the supply of solid-waste or resource-
recovery facilities.
And there must be provision for resource
conservation recovery and disposal of solid waste and
sanitary landfills or combination of practices as
appropriate to dispose of in a manner that is envi-
ronmentally sound.
In effect, though, there is considerable
freedom under the state plan, with the exception of
some of the minimum provisions outlined, for Just
what is included and what is done.
And in fact, particularly with respect
to hazardous waste, the question came up earlier, is
a need for the state to consider how hazardous wastes
are to be disposed of and really to develop appropriate
disposal mechanisms.
And it is not something that the
federal government can dictate or decide.
It is something that really has to
be done at the local and state level.
In terms of financial assistance, the
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-108-
two agencies, the state hazardous-waste section
of the act authorizes $25 million to be appropriated
to correct this problem.
The other sections of the act authorize
funds for implementation under section 4000-A-l,
which is $30 million for fiscal year '78 and $i)0
million for fiscal year '79, and this is for the
purpose of developing the state solid-waste plan.
Section 4008-A-2 authorizes $15 million
for each year, '78 and '79.
This is for the purpose of implementing
the state solid-waste-management plan.
This particular section, there is no
particular formula provided, but it is to provide
for the ease -- It's really to be decided on the
basis of the necessary funds for implementing the
particular state plan.
Now, that is it for the slides.
Now, actually this is the authorizations
in the act that really doesn't mean anything.
In terms of actual dollars, what
means something is appropriations, and appropriations
is a major fight each year in terms of what the
Congress actually gives the Agency.
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-109-
And in this particular area of
development, the state programs — We have in the
budget that has been submitted by President Carter
$12 million authorized to be appropriated to EPA
for grants to state and local agencies.
That represents something — a con-
siderable increase over the present grant program,
which is roughly $3 million annual-grants program.
But you can see the $12 million here
as far below the authorizations in the act, which
totally come up to something like $70 million, which
could have been it.
But it's normal practice by the Congress
to authorize considerably more funds than are actually
appropriated for implementation.
In terms of positions, essentially
the agency has been -- has approximately ^5 new
positions authorized to implement the statute, and
it's been decided that approximately 25 of these
will be distributed to the regional offices of EPA
for implementation.
Just how many we will get in Region V
is yet to be determined.
However, we were doing our best to
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-110-
put through our own internal resources as much as
we can into it right now.
We see the regional role in this,
and it, at the present time, to really be focusing
on how we best develop the state programs and how
we can to get the state programs in a position to
implement these regulatory authorities in the act
that will be coming down the road in a year and 18
months from now.
That is pretty much my formal comments.
1 am ready for questions or any
statements.
MR. PRIEDLANDER: James R. Friedlander, F-r-
i-e-d-1-a-n-d-e-r, Champaign County, Regional Planning
Commission, Urbana, Illinois.
I would merely like to express a
concern that your emphasis on 208, designated 208
agencies, to be the agencies to carry out local
solid-waste management be reconsidered, that there
are many agencies who are quite capable because of
their area of jurisdiction of undertaking solid-
waste management and planning that are not capable
of undertaking 208 and elected not to do so.
MR. DUPREY: The question deals with the point
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-111-
I mentioned on 208 planning agencies, and the gen-
tleman stated that there are other agencies that
are very capable in the solid-waste area that pro-
bably should be given more consideration.
I only brought out the point to mention
that Congress specifically mentioned in the act
something to be considered; however, it is not man-
datory that the 208 situation be used for this purpose,
It is really a decision that is to
be made by the state, particular state, and it is
a decision that is certainly not mandatory or wants
to be dictated by us in the federal government.
Any other questions or any other
statements on this particular area?
Also, if there is still some time
left, if anyone wants to make a statement on any
matter, or question on any of the talks that were
made this morning, the other people are still here,
we would be glad to take those now.
Yes?
MR. NIGRO: Yes, Emil Nigro, N-i-g-r-o. I
am with the City of Chicago, Department of Streets
and Sanitation.
And my peer, I thought, brought some
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-112-
relevant situation into this conversation when he
spoke from Milwaukee.
I heartily concur and agree with the
gentleman from the -- I think it was Southern Illinois
University and some of the others who said that it
would be important to, as part of the total program,
to reduce our waste inasmuch as possible.
And obviously that will --
A VOICE: Louder.
MR. NIGRO: But then the conversation got to
source separation -- that is to say from the point
of view from having the citizen separate his waste.
That certainly is not a new idea. It is also cer-
tainly a very worthwhile idea.
However, in a great many instances,
in the major urban areas anyway, this has simply not
worked. Chicago has tried it; Milwaukee has tried
it, if I recall correctly, as well as other major
urban areas.
So my suggestion to EPA in this regard
is that one of these panels perhaps should be set
up with a cross section of interdisciplinary people —
particularly taking into account the behavioral
psychologist who may develop an approach that could
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-113-
be used by the -- not only the major urban areas,
but itself that would create the incentive and
motivate the citizens to take a more active interest
and participate in the separation of the solid waste.
/
And I think that would be an approach ,\
A
to it. .
v> ;
As far as the technical assistance / /\
r V
is concerned, I think it is fairly safe to say, I ' •
/ '
don't remember the statistics, that the vast majority
17 ,"
of the people of our country live in the major urban
areas.
In these areas, it behooves us out
of necessity to get into higher technology means of
collection and disposal, and I think we have to keep
in mind that those two parts are one thing -- that
we do need to address ourselves moreso to bring you
up possible technologies for practical use, and I
think the EPA then, in the grants and research,
should give some more concentration in working with
the larger metropolitan areas where there is a certain
amount of management and technical expertise that
has been developed over time, and work with these
groups and -- to demonstrate some of the newer
technologies on an ongoing basis for a production-
-------
-Hit-
sized plant.
We have had, for example, I am not
going to name any names — I don't want to bruise
anybody or any city.
But we have had instances where soire
of the new technologies have been tried -- tried to
be brought up to a production-size operation where
it would be useful to a community, say a thousand
or two-thousand-type capacity, and it has not been
successful, I think, to put it kindly.
I think that at the national or federal
level, it would behoove a partnership based on this
premise that the major urban areas would provide the
inputs, the expertise, the technical expertise, and
management of the systems that the federal government
would sponsor financially these projects to get them
into a prudent state.
I am not talking about a type --
only on a first-type basis, because that technology
is transferable to -- all across the country to
other areas.
And I don't feel it is a proper share
of load for any one municipality to use their tax
dollars from a local area in an experimental procedure,
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-115-
This, I think, rightfully belongs
with the federal government level, and I still advo-
cate that position.
MR. DUPREY: Thank you.
I would like to add a brief remark
to that statement in that I think the act of the
RCRA is really part regulatory and part technical
assistance, and unfortunately the regulatory section
is perhaps going to be the better funded half -- in
that there are tight deadlines in there and so on,
and unfortunately, I think the Congress did not
give the kind of same emphasis on the resource
conservation recovery in terms of the funding.
And there is funding there, but I
don't -- I am not sure to what extent we are going
to be able to maintain the intent of the legislation,
which is, that is, to balance the resource-conservation-
recovery and technical-assistance panels on that with
the regulatory side, which is on the hazardous wastes,
of course.
I think it is something we need to
attempt to do and still try to do under the legislation,
I might say on the resource-conservation-
recovery panels that are mentioned, we would like to
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-116-
very much, within our Region V office, set up a
particular panels to the extent we can so that these
panels are implemented as much as possible at the
regional level and with the state and local involvement,
And I think perhaps if we can initiate
some panels to deal with some of the problems in
this region and use the suggestions that have been
made of involving; the cities and the units here,
in that, then we might be able to make a start in
that way.
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Okay, it looks as
though there are no specific desires to make addi-
tional comments.
With that, I would close this morning's
session with a mention that this afternoon we are
going to be having a series of consecutive panels
on the issues relating to hazardous wastes, state
planning, and resource recovery.
We will have removed the screen.
People will be up here, and I am hopeful that we
will be able to develop an active dialogue as indi-
vidual members of the panel and between panelists,
and by all means feel free from the floor to inter-
ject yourself if you feel so moved.
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-117-
At this point, then, we will adjourn
this morning's session and return here at -- let's
say quarter after 1:00. Then we can be ready to
start in at 1:30 on time.
(Whereupon a lunch recess
was had.)
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-118-
STATE OF ILLINOIS )
) SS
COUNTY OF C 0 0 K )
DIANE HROMEK, being first duly sworn, says
that she is a court reporter doing business in
the City of Chicago and State of Illinois, and
that she reported in shorthand the proceedings had
at the hearing of said cause, and the foregoing is
a true and correct transcript of her shorthand notes,
so taken as aforesaid, and contains all the
proceedings of said hearing.
SUBSCRIBED AND SWORN TO
before me this 18th day
of April, A.D., 1977.
Notary Public
-------
PUBLIC HEARING
on the
NEW RESOURCE CONSERVATION
AND RECOVERY ACT PL 94 -
before
THE UNITED STATES
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
March 22, 1977
1:30 P.M.
Holiday Inn O'Hare Kennedy
5440 North River Road
Rosemont, Illinois 60018
Susan Rivers
Court Reporter
-------
-2-
PRESENT:
PANEL MANAGEMENT OF HAZARDOUS WASTES; DEFINITIONS
AND GUIDELINE DEVELOPMENT
WILLIAM PETRICH, President, Environmental Clearing
House Organization, Hazelcrest, IL
MALCOLM CHESTER, Director of Environmental Control,
Illinois Manufacturers Ass'n, Chicago, IL
DENNIS JOHNSON, Manager, Liquid and Special Wastes Div.,
John Sexton Contractors Company, Chicago, IL
ROBERT SILVAGNI, Director, Division of Solid Wastes,
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
DONALD DAY, Chief, Office of Land Pollution Control,
Ohio Environmental Protection Agency
PANEL STATE PLANNING; SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT REGIONS
AND GUIDELINE DEVELOPMENT
DAVID LAMM, Acting Chief, Solid Waste Section, Division
of Sanitary Engineering, Indiana State Board of Health
JOHN F. MOORE, Manager, Land Pollution Control Division,
Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
JOHN REINHARDT, Chief, Solid Waste Management Section,
Wisconsion Department of Natural Resources
ROGER CONNER, Executive Director, West Michigan
Environmental Action Council
PANEL RESOURCE RECOVERY; PUBLIC AND PRIVATE RESPON-
SIBILITIES IN TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE AND TECHNOLOGY
DEVELOPMENT
STEVEN G. LEWIS, Director of Resource Recovery Programs,
The MITRE Corporation, Bedford, Massachusetts.
LEWIS OTT WARD, Manager, Marketing Solid Waste Systems,
UOP, Inc., Des Plaines, IL
LOUIS P. FARINA, Deputy commissioner, Bureau of Sanitation,
City of Chicago, IL
FRED KELLOW, Chief, Resource Recovery Division, Environmental
Protection Branch, Michigan Department of Natural Resources
-------
-3-
INDEX
PANEL MANAGEMENT OF HAZARDOUS WASTES:
Definitions and Guideline Development
Moderated by: mr. John Lehman __ page 5
PANEL STATE PLANNING:
Solid Waste Management Regions and Guideline Development
Moderated by: Mr. George Garland -- page 56
PANEL RESOURCE RECOVERY:
Public and Private Responsibilities in Technical
Assistance and Technology Development
Moderated by: Mr. Bob Lowe -- page 104
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-4-
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: Will you take
your seats, please?
Could we please have the panelists
for the first come forward?
Mr. Lehman, come forward and
moderate this session.
(WHEREUPON, Mr. Lehman takes
the podium.)
MR. LEHMAN: Ladies and gentlemen, could I
ask you to take your seats, please, and we will
get started.
We are going to have a panel on
Management of Hazardous Wastes: Definitions and
Guideline Development.
A number of gentlemen have kindly
agreed to take part in this panel. On your left
is Mr. William Fetrich, President of the Environmental
Clearing House Organization, Hazelcrest, Illinois.
Next is Mr. Malcolm Chester, Director
of Environmental Control, Illinois Manufacturers
Association, Chicago, Illinois.
Next to him is Mr. Dennis Johnson,
Manager of the Liquid and Special Wastes Division,
-------
-5-
John Sexton Contractors Company, in Chicago.
Next to him is Mr. Robert Silvagni,
Director of the Division of Solid Wastes of the
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency; and, next to
him, Donald Day, Chief of the Office of Land
Pollution Control, Ohio Environmental Protection
Agency.
I would like to just start the
panel session by — as I understand it, each gentle-
roan is prepared to make a brief set of remarks.
I will ask that they do be brief, so that we can
get some comments and reactions from the audience.
Mr. Petrich, will you please start
the panel?
MR. PETRICH: Is this loud enough for the
people in the back?
My name is Bill Petrich. I am the
President of the Environmental Clearing organization.
We started our work some four or
five years ago, working with local governments and
with the state government., and more recently, with
the Federal government.
We are trying to answer three
problems which are in very specialized areas, that
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-6-
of local waste and sludges in the Northern Illinois
and Northwest Indiana area. Our work surrounds
three essential points. We want to determine, one,
how many gallons are generated in this industrial
area; secondly, what is the chemical composition of
the material; and finally, what should be done with
it relative not only to the environment, but with
an eye toward conserving and utilizing some of
the processes.
So, we have been systematically
testing over the last three and a half, four years,
streams that are hauled by a variety of independent
hauling contractors who had previously taken all
of their material to sanitary landfills.
We found some very interesting
things. We found that roughly 28 percent of that
material is being hauled has an energy value. These were
predominately wastes that came from wastes and, we
have been successful in the last year in redirecting
those wastes and have further processed them into a
program with a secondary fill.
In fact, we were fortunate during
this last winter to keep a medium-sized company
in Indiana open when all of its neighbors were
-------
-7-
shut off in October.
Our efforts are predominately
directed at two things. One, to isolate what the
chemical composition is and fit it into the classi-
fication of waste; and secondly, if this material
is not obviously redeemable to us, to make others
aware of its presence so that other technology
might come to apply. And, the material may be
somebody else's raw material at another location
in the country.
Failing all of that, we determine
what is the correct environmental method for the
disposal of that material.
Some material lends itself to land
disposal. Some of it, of course, has to be incin-
erated. Of the eight specific classifications of
waste which we have developed, the one that seems
to make the greatest threat to the environment, at
this point, is that which we call Class Seven coming
from the plating industry and from the basic elec-
tronics industry, this is where we find concentrations
at. So, we share our information with the Federal
government. The local people we work very closely
with and the state agencies, in an attempt to get
-------
-8-
an answer to these three basic questions.
In addition to this, we have been
able to isolate, in addition to our secondary fill
program, quantities of noble metal-bearing wastes,
which we are now requiring for reentry back into
the industrial community.
We worked for about three and a
half years on a regulation in Illinois, which pre-
empts, in a sense, 76-10 and there is a third
public hearing on that proposed regulation in
Peoria, Illinois, and the parameters of that regu-
lation, which we were fortunate to have input into
are quite similar to what's being requested of 94580.
So, by brief summation, our
primary goal is to establish what this material is,
how much is there, and where should it properly go.
MR. CHESTER: Once again, my name is Malcolm
Chester. I am with the Illinois Manufacturers Associ-
ation, and we are in Chicago.
I'm going to talk about the Hazardous
Wastes Program from the general operator's viewpoint.
There are several problems. I can't
cover all of them. I'd like to cover one or two
here, briefly.
-------
Under the new Act, the Resource
Conservation Act, one of the most important problems,
we consider, is the legal difficulties associated
with the disposal of waste, which has no value as
a commodity as opposed to the normal shipment of
commodities, which do have value. This makes a
tremendous amount of difference, and should be
separated from commodities.
The Bill of Lading system, which
we are using in the shipping industry, ownership
of any commodity passes from the shipper to the
carrier, and finally to the purchaser of the
commodity.
The Bill of Lading serves as a
kind of proof of ownership in the shipping process.
Such a technical transfer of
ownership does not shield any of the parties in-
volved from any liability.
In the event something goes wrong,
it does provide a rough delineation of responsibilty
among the parties involved.
It also provides some defense to
a liability suit where negligence lies with another
party to the transaction.
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-10-
In other words, if someone
else is creating a problem, it doesn't come back
to you — that there is at least some defense.
Ownership, however, is different.
It can't be just transferred by the Bill of Lading
in the manner we have just described, because
hazardous waste has no value to transfer. We are
paying to have it disposed of. Therefore, absent
contractual obligations to the contrary, they
serve as agents for the generator in the disposal
of the waste. This means that the generator
retains primary liability for the wast e material
throughout its disposal and its potential -- and
this is the problem — forever thereafter it's
like a buried time-bomb. In some cases it's been
sitting there for 20 or 30 years. There's really
no end to the liability for the manufacturer as
long as that material can be traced back.
The manufacturer has sought to
protect himself against this open-ended liability
by contractually indemnifying themselves against
irresponsible actions of public disposals. Un-
fortunately, the manufacturer is not always in a
position to buy adequate protection for himself.
-------
-11-
Waste disposal sites are scarce,
particularly ones that can properly handle a lot
of this waste, and is going to represent haulers.
In many areas, both the hauler and disposer are
in a position to dictate contractual terms to the
generator, who has nowhere else to turn.
Hopefully, the generator can pro-
tect himself from such potential liability with
insurance, but in these days of million dollar
damages, such protection can be expensive and
difficult to obtain.
So far, the insurance rates for
waste disposal have not soared the heights of
Workmen's Compensation, but the potential is great
for toxic wastes to enter a water supply or stream.
The U.S. EPA does not protect
manufacturers from civil suits, this being really
the responsibility of legislators and the Congress.
It can do, through regulations,sharp lines of res-
ponsibility between the generators, the disposer,
and the hauler, and provide a registration-type
system which will help generators identify legitimate
and responsible haulers. Incidently, our 76-10
attempts to do so.
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-12-
Also, the U.S. EPA can make it
clear through its prosecutorial function, that is,
the state can utilize where liabilities for certain
actions lie — where do the liabilities lie in
terms of their ability to prosecute.
In this way, each of the three
component parts of the disposal process can con-
centrate on fulfilling his obligations without
trying to monitor one or both of the other com-
ponents involved. As it is now, we have a situation
where generators tail the haulers for hours. They
follow them along behind them to make sure they
are disposing of the wastes, and in some cases,
also inspect them to see that their wastes are
being taken care of properly.
On the generator's part -- he
must be willing to do some things too. He must
be willing to provide haulers and disposers with
adequate information on the materials being dis-
posed of. He must also be willing to provide
proper containment of waste where it is needed
and required.
Another problem that we discussed
this morning at some length, is the idea of the
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-13-
definition of a hazardous waste and the idea of
a hazardous waste list. We heard several comments
this morning on the fact that — what we're going
to do is have a list and then have an open-ended
responsibility on the generator in deciding if
another material might be a hazardous waste.
This is somewhat problematic,
in our opinion, because it's awfully difficult to
decide, as a manufacturer or generator, what is
hazardous.
I don't really think it can be
defined, and you have a situation too where the
U.S. DOT, where you have a thing labeled "hazardous"
when it is not, because they feel it's dangerous
to have materials going around when it, in fact,
is not hazardous waste or material.
I think this is another important
point. I think there is a limit to what a manufacturer
can do in terms of determining what, in fact, is a
hazardous waste and whether it should be on the list
or not. There has to be some reasonable parameters
used too, so we don't have this kind of situation
where a lawyer will come down to a manufacturer and
say -- well, just taking everything you send out
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-14-
as a hazardous waste that's on the list, because
this is the kind of thing you can't get involved in.
X think there has to be some very easy method that
the manufacturer should use, and I don't really
think that this system where some loose-ended
words are going to be adequate. There has to
be sharper lines drawn here, particularly when
we're talking about legal fees sometimes running
$75 an hour for a manufacturer.
I think the last point is the idea
of paperwork. He have done some work in R76-10
and we think there are two types of documents —
hazardous waste shipment records is what it's called,
which would accompany the waste. It would be signed
and retained by all three parties should their pri-
mary — we think this would be the primary document,
somewhat like a Bill of Lading.
There have been draft copies made.
It should contain things like necessary ratification
material for all parties classifying the toxic
characteristics of the waste. It should also have
a hazardous waste 24-hour resource number preferably
the 800 series, to provide emergency assistance. I
understand that the waste haulers here are having
-------
-15-
trouble getting the number.
The only other document, we
think that there should be a law,to be submitted
to the EPA annually or semiannully to meet the
Resource Act requirements, which do provide for
some submittals.
We think that all these records
should be available for constitutional valid
inspection by the EPA.
There is a lot more I want to
say on this subject, but I will pause.
MR. JOHNSON: My name is Dennis Johnson.
I am the Liquid and Special Wastes Manager for the
John Sexton Contracting Company. If my voice
holds out, I will be done in five minutes. I
just want to share a few thoughts with you on
industrial waste disposal. This is an overview,
primarily.
Perspective; The John Sexton
Contractors Company has taken a conservative ap-
proach to the direct sanitary landfill disposal of
industrial wastes in that Sexton is not only concerned
with potentially dangerous handling and toxological
-------
-16-
properties, but also with the co-disposal industrial
waste biodegradability and attenuative compatibility
with refuse and soil containment systems.
We do feel, based upon multitudinous
past R and D studies, that it is apparent that
soil science physical-chemical mechanisms are ex-
tremely effective in achieving the objective of min-
imal leachate generation within a puetresible waste
sanitary landfill.
We suggest for the implementation
of RCRA that a workable definition of hazardous
waste should specifically recognize dermal, oral
and inhalation toxicity. For the record, that's
(Sax, 2nd Edition) along with a compatible index
describing the degree in "Characteristics Excess"
of the normal biodegradable landfill environment.
A "Workable" Hazardous Waste
Definition! It would be by arbitrary definition
that puetresible solid waste (garbage) degradation
into liquified leachate, via the solid waste sanitary
landfill environment, represents a noxious (rather
than hazardous) set of chemical characteristics.
If this arbitrary definition has any credence, it
could only be valid with mutual recognitions that
-------
-17-
generated domestic waste leachate must be contained
within the landfill site and represents no appreciable
dermal, oral, or inhalation toxicities.
A possible definition of the
"Environmental Hazardous Waste" could be then derived
in the following manner:
1. By factor analysis, evaluate
the average "noxious" chemical characteristics of
domestic solid waste puetresible leachate. This
is recognized to be no small task -- the I.E.P.A/
DLNPC has provided R and D leadership in this area
with their previous publication of leachate charac-
teristic descriptives. Additional, industry-wide
R and D is needed.
2. These average characteristics
could represent an environmental standard for
compatibility comparison of "other" liquid or leach
extracted industrial wastes. Wastes for sanitary
landfill disposal could be referenced- by comparison
to the following five specific domestic puetresible
waste parameters:
(a) Non-biodegradable organic
carbon concentrations.
(b) Commonly occurring heavy metal
levels.
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-18-
(c) Volatility (flash point)
description.
(d) Oxidation -- reduction chemical
corrosibility (O-R potential).
(e) pH — taken as a constant
function of allowable percent Acidity or percent
Alkalinity.
3, It then would be a matter of
co-operative effort between regulatory agencies,
public communication, and the solid waste industry
to promulgate acceptable multiple factors, keeping
in mind toxicological health hazards, that can be
applied as "excessive" hazardous indicators -- that
is, hazardous defined as something for disposal in
excess of the normal land disposal refuse environment
and representing a potential health hazard.
Note: This "excessive factor"
approach could be realistically applied and sub-
sequently meet the environmental criteria for public
accountability.
Current Sexton Disposal Policy
(Internal Decision); "Specific disposal of noxious
industrial (water based) waste streams, having
chemical characteristics not exceeding the near
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-19-
compatibility with chemical parameters inherent
to domestic solid waste, should present no real
additional environmental impact to sanitary landfill
operations, providing chemical characteristic, waste
type classifications for landfill and process disposal
are defined".
Sexton feels, as a positive corollary
to the landfill site containment soils ability to
attenuate domestic puetresible waste leachate, it
is a plausible reality that the solid waste sanitary
landfill can also serve as an environmentally safe
absorptive/attenuative vehicle for compatible indus-
trial liquid waste disposal.
Sexton's corollary keys are:
1) Do the inherent characteristics
of the industrial liquid waste disposal streams
analytically agree, in near approximation, with
the chemical characteristics of puetresible solid
waste parameters?
2) Which broad industrial liquid
waste and/or sludge special wastes manufacturing
areas greatly exceed this domestic solid waste
chemical compatibility including toxicity and
therefore may possibly be considered for alternative
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-20-
land disposal methodology?
3) Can an industrial waste TYPE
(chemical characteristic) categorization system be
identified that affords qualitative evaluation of
what is compatible with the sanitary landfill en-
vironment; also definitions promulgated for specific
industrial wastes that should be considered for
isolated process center, stabilization-fixation
disposal, or incineration?
We at Sexton are committing much
of our internal research energies to the answering
of the above questions; we would suggest that a
RCRA R and D priority area be the consideration
of equivalent questions.
Based on our current interpretation
of sanitary landfill environment compatibility and
toxicity considerations for industrial waste disposal
— we have internally defined four TYPE disposal
classifications of wastes, based on analytical
chemical characteristics, for example, TYPE I --
Industrial Dishwater; TYPE II — Noxious; TYPE III
— Limited Toxic or Potentially Hazardous; TYPE IV
— Hazardous. Our efforts (and definitions) rep-
resent the private sector and, based on our continual
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-21-
up-graded R and D, are somewhat arbitrary; however,
the schematic of "waste compatibility and type
classification" is logically feasible (assuming
equitable standards), and could be implemented
accordingly.
Cooperative Effort; It is of
much encouragement to witness the fine cooperative
spirit and objective communications that can be
effective between government and industry. This
was never more apparent as has been evidenced in
the I.E.P.A/DLNPC sponsored "Illinois Plater's
Task Force" and "Waste Hauler's Rules and Regs."
Task Force.
Sexton applauds this effort and
would hope for continued Regulatory Agency willing-
ness to promulgate cooperative, industry-wide
and problem solving, joint industry-government
"task force" working groups, representative of
concerned and objective (critical) input from the
Solid Waste industry and industrial waste generators,
Environmental Protection can
be interpreted to be:
(a) Mutual recognitions that the
survival of our system requires profitability
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-22-
and public accountability go hand in hand.
(b) That what happens to
business and industry eventually happens to all
of society.
(c) That what happens to
all of society is directly related to our
previous wisdom, imagination and cooperative
effort.
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MR. SILVAGNI: My name is Bob Silvagni,
of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency.
To our panelists, ladies and
gentlemen.
The Agency — why I'm here,
is to address the subject, how the Minnesota
Pollution Control Agency would like the EPA
to implement the Hazardous Wastes Portion of
RCRA.
For you to appreciate some of
what I'm talking about, I'd like to give you some
background of what the State of Minnesota has
been doing in this area of hazardous wastes.
First of all, spurred by local
government back in 1970, "71, '72, '73, the
Minnesota Legislature passed the Minnesota Hazardous
Waste Act. Again, it began at the local level.
The Control Agenpy,specifically the office I work
in, has been working for two years to promulgate
comprehensive hazardous and toxic waste regulations
that would manage waste from the cradle to the grave.
About five years have gone by since the initial efforts,
and all our efforts have been supported by the EPA.
From the Environmental Protection
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-24-
Agency, they are trying to get us in the business f
of the regulations.
Simultaneously with developing
the regulations, we are initiating another grant
demonstration, chemical and hazardous disposal
facility. With this demonstration, we are trying
to locate, decide, construct, then operate a
facility with costs that will meet the total capital
outlay for the facility, will meet long-term monitoring,
long-term maintenance costs associated with that
facility.
With that background, I have the
following comments to the Environmental Protection
Agency.
First, state programs will need
financial assistance to develop programs in
hazardous and toxic wastes. These programs should
address the following:
Number one. The public awareness
of the problem.
This is a necessary first step
which leads to number two, a strategy to develop
a step-by-step process by which necessary legislation
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-25-
to grant that a state authority have hazardous
and toxic waste power.
Lastly, to develop long-term
training programs to meet manpower needs for the
generators of hazardous waste, for the transporters
and for the facility operators that need to dispose
of the material, along with the governmental regula-
tory people who are going to be needed to implement
the regulations.
In the regulatory area, and the
definition of hazardous waste, I have to make the
following suggestion.
First, much assistance is needed
in the development of clean toxicological tests.
Research is also needed to --
what levels of waste concentrations make a waste
hazardous?
Next, the EPA should establish a
strong national program -- a regulatory program of
equal standards between all states to insure that
no state becomes the dumping ground of all the
hazardous wastes in the region.
Four. Transport -- manifests
should be uniform throughout the country.
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This will facilitate exchange of
data and information for the use of waste exchange
operations and facilities on a regional basis.
We also encourage the use of a
national reporting system which will allow standard
interchange of information and materials.
Again, this would be especially
valuable for waste exchange potential throughout
the country.
Five. Encourage reserve and
demonstration for industry which will (a) develop
terminals systems which will keep wastes
separated. Encourage reuse and minimize the
toxicity of materials in volumes. That is, if you
could separate the waste of different compounds,
you might prohibit the potential of having a large
volume of any waste mixed in.
Six. Encourage the development
of a strong private service industry by hazardous
waste management and disposal.
Seven. Provide assistance to
state governments to develop legislative programs
to provide necessary authority for addressing
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-27-
hazardous waste management responsibility; (b) address
framework to locate hazardous and toxic waste treatment
and disposal facilities; and (c) address long-term
maintenance and monitoring liability of land disposal
sites.
Lastly, the new Administrator of
the Environmental Protection Agency needs to re-
align his organization. He needs to designate
the Office of Solid Waste Management to be in charge
of all land disposal of solid wastes and hazardous
waste material.
This includes the planning, the
land treatment and the final disposal of these
materials.
He needs to put an end in his
organization of in-fighting and duplication of
efforts.
I have one more.
Lastly, the EPA should beef up
the regional programs of the solid waste management
area in order to meet the present needs of solid
wastes, and the states needs in solid wastes.
I see that states will need a
strong regional program to be able to receive
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-28-
necessary support.
That is all X have prepared. I'll
be happy to answer questions later on.
MR. DAY: I am Donald Day, Chief of the Office
of Land Pollution Control for the Ohio Environmental
Protection Agency.
Just a bit on Ohio's background
in the hazardous waste area.
About a year ago, we did a mail-out
survey of industrial wastes. We did not use the
term "hazardous" at that time. We broke them into
18 categories, which we felt were general enough to
cover everything, and specific enough to help us.
We had about a 33 percent return.
We feel as though the raw data which we now have
indicates about 80 percent of what the real figures
are.
By totaling 18 categories from —
13 surveys were sent out to 15,000 manufacturers,
this was a survey of 13,000 manufacturers in Ohio,
we found that two and a half billion gallons per
year were going into our rivers and ponds.
16 million cubic yards of these
industrial wastes are being land-filled.
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-29-
39 billion pounds per year are
being incinerated.
151 billion pounds per year are
being spread on the land.
I think those figures are large
enough to indicate that we have a problem. All this
is not taking place in Ohio.
These are going to as maty as 14
different states. Those 14 states probably ship to
Ohio also.
As Minnesota feels, we feel that
one of our most important requirements to carry out
the part of the program is money.
A concrete indication that the Feds
attach some importance to this program, we did not
wish to set up the program wholly dependent on
Federal dollars, but without some Federal money,
it would be very difficult to sell a new, expensive
oriented program to the Ohio Legislature.
We are going through budget hearings
now. We are not talking expansion budget, we are
talking survival budgets.
We feel that common sense is very
important. The criteria for determining hazardous
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-30-
waste and what it is, should encompass some element
of common sense, and not be totally reliant on numbers.
As we found out in preparing Ohio's
rates about six months to twelve months ago, the choice
of the wrong numbers can result in the exclusion of
many hazardous wastes.
Conversely, without some non-
technical common sense, almost anything could be
called hazardous.
Errors will be made, but let's
hope that they will be made on the side of the
protection of the environment and public health.
If testing procedures must be
developed — and I think some will have to be,
certainly — they must be simple. We cannot afford
to get into the tremendously expensive testing game.
I'm speaking both for industry and government when
I say that.
A manifest system is probably the
key to the problem of hazardous wastes disposal.
A trip ticket, similar to California,
would appear to be a very effective one. Monthly
or quarterly reports could be used, especially for
waste that is uniform, day after day and it is much more
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-31-
burdensome, but it's a very effective monitoring
tool, because it comes in only once a month or
once every three months.
It might adjust, but manifests
still must be used.
I think, also, that a uniform
manifest format should be done for nation-wide
use, with allowances for some variations as the
individual states deem necessary.
A trip ticket system could be
computerized or could be monitored completely,
on a sample population basis, with periodic reports
to supplement.
As far as a state program itself
is concerned, guidelines for the state Hazardous
waste program that is developed by the Feds must
allow reasonable flexibility on procedures, penalties,
et cetera.
A key concept is that state programs
should be equivalent to the Federal program in
terms of accomplishing the intend of the Act, not
necessarily a mirror image. Guidelines that might
work in Ohio but would not work in California, and
those that would work in California would not work
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-32-
in Arizona or Minnesota. So, they can't be the rang
same everywhere.
Undue delays in approval,
unreasonable demands for detail would only result
in many of the states leaving the Hazardous Waste
Program to the Federal government.
We don't want to leave it to
the Federal government. We want to do it ourselves,
but we have to have financial support and we have
to have some reasonable approach, which I believe
they are attempting to get into now.
Lastly, I would concur with
Bob, that the Regional Office, speaking only for
Region V, must be reinforced with a staff so
that we in the state can get some help from the
Federal government.
MR. LEHMAN: The reporter would like copies
of those remarks if you have them available.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, you
have heard the comments of representatives of
state governments, the generators, transporters,
landfill operators.
I am sure that their remarks
have keyed some comments or questions on your own
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-33-
part, so let's throw the meeting open.
You can make comments or address
your comments to the panel, or whatever.
Anyone who would like to start it
off? I don't see any rush to the mike.
I guess my first question
concerns some remarks that Mr. Johnson made, and as
I understand it, Mr. Johnson, your company has
developed an internal classification system for
industrial waste.
That is, it — I got the sense
that you were feeling that the definition of a
hazardous waste ought to be tied somehow, to the
performance of these wastes landfill environment.
That is, tihe capability of the cells for attentuation
and so on.
I guess my remark or question to
you is, we have demonstrated that ourselves, and it
strikes us that the reason a waste could be considered
hazardous, is that it does not arrive at a sanitary
landfill.
In other words, that it is dumped,
if you will, along roadsides or in a farm or whatever,
as has been the case, and that the only provision for
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-34-
transportation tracking in the new law, is for
wastes that are deemed to be hazardous.
So, I'd be interested in your
comments in that respect.
In other words, I don't — it's
not clear to me how you could take the definition
of hazardous waste to landfill practice, in the
sense that -- our feeling is that the definition
really evolved around a hazard, if it does not
reach a landfill.
Could you comment on that?
MR. JOHNSON: I understand what you are
asking.
I can, perhaps, give clarification
based on toxicity — waste and toxicity.
We have looked at our internal
responsibilities for operations and also consider
have you have conducted, which tie in to what doesn't
go to a landfill.
Specifically, on the question of
toxicity. And, correlating them, if you were to
go and use that standard comparison of the Second
Edition, based on that are TYPE I, ana this is
going back now to the terminal inhalation, are
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-35-
TYPE I landfill or, rather, our TYPE II category
description of a waste would be "dishwater" by
definition, based on Sax, it would have a zero
reading.
Our TYPE II rating, which we
call by classification "noxious", based on
toxiclty would be low rating one all the way through
those three levels.
Our TYPE III, which we call
"potentially hazardous" again tying into Sax,
would be his moderate reading of II across the
board, and our last category, which we define as
"hazardous" were taken to Sax's definition of
•terminal inhalation.
MR. PETRICH: Just so anybody doesn't
get confused over this concept of hazardous waste,
I think it is important to mention we are talking
about two things. We are talking about a hazardous
waste in terms of its ultimate deposition, whether
that be a landfill, incinerator or whatever, remember
this. We are also concerned with recovery of what
was a redeemable material within that waste, even
if it is hazardous. That may be indeed hazardous
in that it can burn and explode, but that also has
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-36-
some redeemable value.
I think part of our consideration
here is not only the ultimate deposition of the
material, whether it be a landfill or incinerator,
whether it be redeemed for further use.
Consequently, in understanding
what a hazardous waste is, I think it is important
you keep this in mind.
In our analytical work we have
found rather substantial quantities of metals,
for instance, within the plating concentration,
which that manufacturer calls a waste, which we
call a raw material, because the concentrations
of chrome and magnesium and manganese and nickel
that we find in there are becoming of course more
significant when we think of the fact that there
is no more chrome in the United States.
We're going to have a problem
as to where to get these raw materials, so don't
get the idea that we are talking about "hazardous
waste" as if there were no value at all to it,
and that it all must be put somewhere so it doesn't
hurt anybody. We're also interested in that material,
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-37-
a material of whatever is redeemable.
I think this ie the major thrust,
certainly in my company, and among those people
who do the hauling of industrial wastes in this
area.
MR. LEHMAN: Any questions or comments from
the audience?
MR. WILD: My name is Paul Wild. Dennis,
what do you call a hazardous waste?
MR. JOHNSONi The gentleman asked rae what
my personal or Sexton's definition of what hazardous
waste would be.
I would certainly say that it
would be a TYPE III, which would be toxicity
considerations.
Some of the chemical characteristics
would be relatively arbitrary at this point.
I can give you a name, if you
want a name. I would consider athylene, which is
an organic waste used in -- as a chemical solvent
in commercial cleaners. It generates chloric acidity.
That's an extreme.
MR. LEHMAN: Any other questions?
MR. ROBERTS: Karl Roberts is my name, from
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-38-
the University —
What do you use as a standard for
toxicity?
MR. JOHNSON: Dangerous properties, industrial
metals.
MR. ROBERTS: I understand that but what
do you base it on? What levels are you talking
about?
MR. JOHNSON: Well, I'd like to share this
with you on a one-on-one communication. Not that
I don't want to answer publicly, but it gets into
interpretation of chemical characteristics.
I want to emphasize that this is
a private corporation, arbitrary, and for other
experimental approaches. We are suggesting that
there should be some efforts in this area.
Additionally, to what has been
at this point.
MR. LEHMAN: Do any of the other panelists
have questions or comments on any other remarks
made by the other panelists?
MR. SILVAGNIs One of the largest problems
that we are facing is the problem of — one of the
problems in Minnesota is overall development of the
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-39-
Hazardoua Wastes Program — is to get governmental
institutions on the site of the facility for
disposal of hazardous and toxic waste materials.
You people who are here from
industry have to realize that one of these days
us governmental people are going to promulgate
regulations which will require you who manufacture
these wastes to dispose of these wastes properly.
The question which I would like
to ask you, work in government, through FIFRA --
state government do to develop that framework
by which such types of facilities can be located
and operated in an environmentally safe manner?
MR. PETRICH: I'd like to comment on that!.
Thank you very much for answering
that question.
One of the things we have found,
because we work with so many agencies, if you started
the list either at the top or bottom, you are con-
fronted with the local Township and Board of Health
in small communities that we service. We are then
confronted with the County, we are confronted with
a major city, like Chicago. You have to deal with
the State of Indiana and the State of Illinois and
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-40-
aurrounding states that we service/ and then, you
have the Federal government.
And, under the Federal government,
within that we have the Department of Transportation
and the U.S. Coast Guard. We now have coastals
which will come into effect in July, which in some
areas, in our judgment, collide with what happens
here.
We have 95-580 in the Resource
Conservation & Racovery Act and then, the OOD and
the local and Federal government.
So, in response to the gentleman's
question as a state agency, doesn't it seem time
that we all stop reinventing the wheel and that
each state left to their own designs, will pro-
mulgate regulations?
How much have we heard "promulgate
regulations"?
So that the people in Minnesota
and Ohio are doing what was done already in Iowa
and Nebraska and that maybe has already been done
in Illinois and Indiana.
And, the Federal government in
Region V, who is really in the best position to
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coordinate the work that has to be done, has not
done that. And what I, as a private citizen and
as a private company, are trying to do, in terms
of giving this input, is to stop this flow of
information that^ia repetitive.
We should reach a point where
what we know could collectively be cleared through
some clearing agency, in terms of the structure of
the EPA, Region V, Central Office, ought to be
that place.
We keep reinventing the wheel and
rehashing the same regulations over and over again
and, somehow, that has to be brought to some focus.
I can recognize and appreciate the need, but I
think we know what that is now.
We know what's out there, we
classify it as best we know how.
Now, it's time to crystallize
it and make some sense to the manufacturing com-
munity and other service groups.
MR. JOHNSON: Well, X know how you feel, Mr.
Petrich. I do have to say --
MR. CHESTER: I think it goes back to the
idea that we keep on hearing words from the Federal
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-42-
government like "substantial", "the same", "more
stringent than", and all this other verbiage.
What we need is a standard that
we can reference and comply with so that we know
what we have to do in order to comply. This is
why I was asking this morning on the preemption issue,
We constantly place the Legislature
— everybody wants to do something. We never seem
to have any kind of guidelines as to what we should
do and have one kind of result. We tend to have
everybody going off on a tangent.
MR. WYDETTE: The list that we published
under Subtitle C, under Hazardous Wastes, I expect
it will be very comprehensive, will the state feel
really duty-bound to follow that list essentially?
What kind of priorities from that
list are going to allowable in the states?
MR. LEHMAN: ?he question was, "Given a
Federal list of Hazardous Wastes to what degree
are the states duty-bound to use this same list
or what degree of variation is allowable"?
I don't know; to be quite honest
with you.
That is still under development.
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The reason we are holding these meetings is to
bring out the issues like that.
The intent, I believe, of the
Legislature is to get a minimum national program
so that everyone is playing by the same rules
across the country. At least to minimally protect
the public health and the environment.
If the states choose, and we
are getting back to this issue raised this morning
of preemption, and I am not sure that we are using
that word in the right way, if a state chooses to
add materials to that class, I think that is their
right.
I don't want to make policy on
the spur of the moment, but it would strike me
that we would probably look unfavorably on the
state trying to have less of a coverage than is
given at the Federal level.
If I could address the preemption
term for a moment, this Act, as I read and interpret
it, does not in any way preempt the states from
doing what they want to do.
There are Federal regulations
that are required that we will promulgate and those
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standards and those regulations are capable of
being enforced at the Federal level, if the states
choose not to seek authorization.
However, if the state does have
a program which does satisfy the requirements
for being an authorized program, I think the
Federal presence would be very minimal.
And so, we certainly will not
be preempting the states in those states that
have that right.
In the other case, let's say the
state does not choose to take on this program,
then, I think the Congress made it very clear that
it is up to the Federal government to enforce the
standards.
So, if you want to call that
"preemption," you may do so, but I don't think that's
really the correct word here. It's not a question
of going in and taking over from the state. That
is not the intent.
MR. CHESTER! How much further down does that
go?
Bill was just referring to that.
We go to the state, then we go to the city, then
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we go to the county, then we go to the city, then
we go to the local government. How far does that
go?
We're getting back- to the same
problems we were just mentioning.
What we really need is a "Rules
of the Road".
We don't really care who is making
the rules so much as we have uniform rules.
MR. LEHMAN: Well that's fair enough.
Yes sir.
MR. MALCOLM: My name is Gabe Malcolm.
I am addressing my question to
Mr. Lehman.
Approximately a year or year and
a half ago, I attended a meeting that you were
involved in —
MR. LEHMAN: Excuse me. Would you like to
use this?
MR. MALCOLM: Approximately a year or year
and a half ago, I attended a meeting in Washington,
and Z believe you were one of the presiding officers,
and in the course of that meeting we spoke of these
very same problems, and we were going through the
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-46-
very same circles we are going through at this
meeting. And, at that time, the Federal EPA stated
that there are going to be task forces set up where
the EPA will be working with industrial groups
from various industries, because these problems
relate to particular industries.
But, nothing has been done in
that area that I am aware of.
These gentlemen were talking about
spinning wheels. It sounds to me like we have been
spinning wheels for a year and a half.
My question is just what is the
Hazardous Wastes Management Division of the EPA
doing insofar as these industrial task forces are
concerned?
MR. LEHMAN: The implication was that there
was going to be a task force for each industry.
Was that your understanding?
MR. MALCOLM: Yes, sir.
MR. LEHMAN: I'm sorry, because that was not
our intent.
We -- as I mentioned in the
meeting last evening, we did studies in 15 different
industries.
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The Industrial Wastes Management
Practices in 15 different industries over the
last two or three years, and those reports are
just now starting to be published in the National
Technical Information Service.
It has always been our intent
not to write regulations in this area — the
hazardous wastes area -- that would be industry
specific.
We're trying to avoid that in this
case.
Again, the law does not refer
to that, it's not our intent to do that.
That was the policy in the Water
Pollution Control Law when the Legislature directed
EPA to put out individual regulations for dis-
tribution.
This law does not, and we don't
intend to do that.
Now, as to how we are going to
get industrial input into the decision-making
regulatory process, this meeting is one way to
do it} we also have advisory committees which have
representatives from as wide a cross-section of
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industry as we can find. If your organization
is not represented on that, I'd be glad to talk
to you about how to get onto it.
We have a number of different
meetings that were described in some departments
last evening, with industrial, environmental,
state and local government groups trying to get
everybody's viewpoint into these regulations as
we develop them.
But, as far as having a task
force for each industry, that was never the
intention, and I'm sorry you got that impression.
Yes. We have several questions.
MR. THOMPSON: Bruce Thompson, from Sludge
Drug Company.
On this list of hazardous wastes
that is going to be published in about a year and
a half, will there be minimal quantities listed?
I'm concerned particularly with
chemicals used in laboratories; whether they will be
MR. LEHMAN: Tne question relates to whether
or not there will be a minimal amount cut-off.
I presume, in other words, an
exemption on the basis of quantity.
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You phrased that in the form
of a. question. Perhaps, if I could paraphrase
what you said in a positive way, I presume you're
commenting for such an exclusion to be made.
That's under consideration. It's
one of the options that we are considering.
However, it is very difficult, I
hope you would recognize, to make that distinction
because there are some chemicals where an extremely
small amount is extremely hazardous, so you almost
have to make an exception on a chemical by chemical
basis, which is very difficult to do.
MR. PETRICH? I just want to tell the gentleman,
if they don't get on that 94580, tne DOT will get
you. You are going to have to conform.
MR. LEHMANr Could you come to the mike,
please?
MR. WARD: I am Bill Hard.
I'd like to just comment on
Mr. Johnson's discussion of leaching.
In my opinion, dealing with the
national sludges on industrial wastes, I think that
the characteristics are probably one of the major
criteria for establishing the hazard of industrial
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-50-
wastes.
Certainly, the leaching charac-
teristic of any industrial wastes are going to be
controlled, to a large extent, by the climate of
the area, the mineralogical problems, and so on.
But, I think these things should be taken into
account and should be weighed veryheavily.
What we are talking about is
a definition of hazardous wastes or the criteria
for establishing what is a hazardous waste.
I think this should be weighed
very heavily.
MR. JOHNSON: I agree with you in fact.
I know a drug regulation — as
far as internal description is concerned, let me
read you, right, off our waste disposal application,
how we evaluate wastes:
"Liquid Waste Analysis. The waste
analysis is to be performed on a homo-
geneous sample which represents solidsand
liquids, leaching water included. The
analytical descriptions are to be deter-
mined on a liquid filtrate removed from
that homogeneous sample."
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I don't know if that helps you.
I'm not talking about acid descriptions of your
entire waste. I'm talking about only that of a
fill. Okay?
MR. WARD: Okay. You're talking about filtering,
What about that?
MR. WEISS: Ed Weiss, Task Force.
We're talking about this right
now as a possible standard for waste analysis.
I think it's too early to make
an intelligent comment on that.
I could comment as far as my
company is concerned. Let's ask the EPA man.
MR. PETRICH: I didn't mean to put them on
the spot.
MR. WARD: How about setting up some type
of a testing program to call and consider such
an entity — leachirig test — from various agents
for waste stability, primarily.
MR. LEHMAN: Glad you brought that up.
We recognize the importance of
leaching. We're doing what we are calling a standard
leaching test.
In other words, a standardized
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protocol for leach testing of wastes.
This is being done under contract
with the University of Wisconsin. The work is
on-going, right now, and we are hopeful to in-
corporate that test, or some leaching test at
least, into these regulations. So, the work is
going on right now.
I can give you the details later
on, if you would like.
MR. WARD: Thank you.
A VOICE: One of the things that concerns
me here is that there is a lot of discussion about
toxic, in the development of the Hazardous Wastes
Program. Research chemicals are strictly defined
to be used as a guideline, and I was wondering, in
your development under the Resource Recovery Act
that institutions such as universities are going to
be taken into consideration also?
MR. LEHMAN: in other words -- could you
amplify that a little bit?
I want to be sure — would you just
rephrase it?
A VOICE: It seems like hazardous toxicity
is geared mostly toward the industry and there is
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a lot of chemicals that are used in institutions
such as universities that aren't defined under
those classification systems, and I was wondering
if the classification systems that were being
developed were considered for institutions also.
MR. LEHMAN: Yes.
The question is, in the sense
that is the way we view it, and apparently, we
discussed it a little bit before, we are attempting
to define at least at the Federal level, these
definitions without regard to the source.
That is, we are not concerned
whether the waste comes from a laboratory, from
a university, from an electric shop, from a
manufacturing facility, whatever.
In other words, we want to make
these definitions as far as possible, uniform
across the board.
So, in that sense, we are
considering it. We're not explicitly calling out
a particular definition that would apply only to
a university lab, for example; if that is what you
are asking.
MR. PETRICH: I just thought it might be
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helpful if you were familiar with the current
practice of how we handle small amounts of chemicals
coming from universities or reserve areas.
The present program calls for
as clear an identification of that research
project as possible.
If it were mineral in nature,
that kind of thing, it gives us a fix on some of
the kinds of materials that would be intrinsic
within. If they are merely — only out-dated —
out of the laboratory, we start our classification
into two basic categories — organic and inorganic
chemicals, isolating things that would be highly
reactive and those that would be subject to
harmful exclusions, et cetera.
This is a private industry method
of handling small amounts of chemicals of the
laboratory and university wastes currently, and
what we do is just project them as if they had
ultimately become an industrial waste.
What we do on this is very critical
when we talk about industrial hazardous wastes.
You must remember when we identify
the industry we then go to the chemical industry,
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because that industry is significant to us as a
lead as to what those wastes may be, but once we
get the waste, it's -- we treat it as a chemical.
We are interested in the chemical
composition representative of what source.
We use the industry as a guideline.
MR. LEHMAN: We have time for one more comment.
MR. PRY: My name is Don Pry. Z work for
the Division of Wastes Management.
In response to a question up front,
and also in defense of the EPA, our company is a
member of the State Solid Wastes Management Association,
and X have had the pleasure of being in Dallas, some-
time in July, and we had a meeting sometime in
February, and some of the comments made were in
tracking this thing.
As the Federal people have asked
for some input from private associations, we're
getting a lot of input from industry and from the
private sector.
I'd like to compliment the EPA
on their program. They have come along so far.
MR. LEHMAN: I think we should close on
that positive note.
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I want to thank the panelists
very much for joining us today, and with that,
I'll turn the mike over.
(WHEREUPON, the panelists
were excused.)
HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: The second
session we wish to devote to State Planning: Solid
Waste Management Regions and Guideline Development,
and we have panelists from the state — several states,
and the representative from Michigan as well.
To moderate this panel, I have
asked George Garland to act and to help the session
move along.
with that, I'd like to turn it
over to George. Mr. Garland?
MR. GARLAND: Thank you, Carl.
I'd like to introduce the panelissts
for this session.
First, David Lamm, Acting Chie.
of the Solid Waste Section, Division of Sanitary
Engineering, for the Indiana State Board of Health
Jack Moore, Manager of the Land
Pollution Control Division, Illinois Environmental
Protection Agency.
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John Reinhardt, Chief of the
Solid Haste Management Section, Wisconsin Department
of Natural Resources; and, Roger Conner, Executive
Director of the West Michigan Environmental Action
Council.
I'd like to point out that I
am the Chairman of the working group for the Regional
Identification Guidelines, and I am the Chairman of
the working group for the State Planning Guidelines,
so if I get defensive and personal about that, you
will understand.
David.
MR. LAMM: Throughout this morning, and I
think, this afternoon, we have heard a fair amount
of discussion concerning both the Hazardous Wastes
Portion of the Act and the Solid Waste in general.
Several of the comments that we have heard stimulate
me, at any rate.
With regard to the comments on
the tight Federal guidelines that were mandated in the
Act, I think that to some degree, they are a gross
oversimplification of what we are experiencing and
the problems we are looking to.
The draft guidelines that George
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has provided for us to comment on, for guidelines
for establishing solid waste management in the
State of Indiana, for example, can lead us to go
in two directions, and I will explain that in a
minute.
The State of Indiana is divied
into a number of planning regions.
They are comprised of some
200 agencies, they work under Air programs, HUD
programs, Health Service Agencies; so from a
standpoint of our Office, quite frankly, if you do
not have enough time to comment thoroughly on
guidelines or proposals, or to carry out the public
participation, if you will, then a simple cop-out
is to recommend that the Governor designate
already existing agencies which in effect, cuts
off the intent of the Congress and what they want
the EPA to develop with regard to the Public
Law of 94-580.
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Specifically, we are looking
for guidelines of what has opened up. What is a
sanitary landfill? What is the legal amount of
detail that will be required on these land plans
that we can, in an intelligent manner, provide
to the locals so they can make a designation
as to how they would like to get involved in the
program, and we can make some recommendation to
the Governor.
It is sort of short, but that's
the comment that we have. We believe that a
good route to go would be to speed up the
development of the definition so that it would
put us in a more comfortable position to be
able to identify the region and the task that
they are going to be required to do in a more
intelligent manner.
MR. MOORE: I am Jack Moore-, with the
Illinois EPA.
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It's kind of amazing when
I hear other people talking from the various
states. We all seem to be pretty amenable in
this whole area of the problems with timing on
the regional identification guidelines, on some
of the difficult parameters that the states find
themselves dealing with.
Let me sort of look at this
center from a slightly different perspective.
Illinois, for instance, I think
has made quite a lot of progress since 1970. At
that time, we had approximately 1400 refuse sites
in the state.
As of right now, we have around
400 permitted landfill operations in the state.
That's a big decrease in the number of sites.
During the process of cleaning up
these [next page]
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open dumps throughout Illinois — almost all of
the local units of government went out of the
landfill or refuse business.
Illinois is kind of unique
in that about 85 percent of the disposal in the
state is handled by the private sector.
Strong enforcement of existing
state laws has caused these sites to be upgraded
into good operating sanitary landfills.
We have some changed sites.
I think, we have got, maybe, one site that could
probably handle Rhode Island's refuse. That's
just one site.
I think it would be contrary to
the best interest of the state if we were to embark
on any program which would replace the large amount
of private capital presently in view in the industry
with public funds.
From my reading of the Act, it
would seem probable that the guidelines would be
developed which would not destroy the existing system
in Illinois and still fulfill the requirements of
the Act.
As you are well-aware, Illinois has
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advanced, I think, pretty far into the areas of
PIPRA mandates. We have virtually no dumps. A
landfill fire is a remarkable occurrence.
I think we had five last year.
They were usually put out within a short period of
time, with the exception of one just south of
Chicago, which was a bugger.
We have done a lot of those things.
We have inventoried all of the sites, and previously
the panelists were talking about reinventing the
wheel.
We don't want to do that. We have
moved ahead and we want to go on to bigger and
better things.
So, as I view it, the Regional
Identification and Planning Section is probably
the most difficult of all the sections.
This, of course, can be viewed
quite differently, depending on the state's vantage
point, as I am trying to point out.
In Illinois, we have got a strong
state program. Other states have no programs at
all. There are states that have a history of local
control.
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In Illinois, there isn't much
local control, and the actual number of local
units of government that deal is almost mind-
boggling in this state, where it might not be
a particular problem in some places like Montana
or Nevada.
Illinois, again, is a peculiar
state in that, as I said, it has a strong in-place
program that, I think, is successful.
This is run through a strong
central government. We have got a disposal system
which, I mentioned earlier, that is almost 85 per-
cent operated by the public sector.
We have a myriad of local govern-
ments in the state.
We have a mental problem in terms
of the amounts of domestic waste and industrial
waste to be disposed of, but we are one of the few
states in the country to dispose all of our waste
within the state.
Now, don't get me wrong. There
should be involvement and must be involvement by
appropriate local officials.
I am going to say this: Our records
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show that almost all of the involvement, up to
this date,has been in the form of trying to block
a landfill in their jurisdiction, and all we are
saying is, "Why don't you let it go to the next
township?" That's been the problem we have had
up to this point.
I am sure there will be a lot
of questions about that.
I do believe that government has got
to be responsible. We simply can't walk away
from the problem when we are dealing with 8 million
tons of refuse -- domestic refuse in the state each
year and a like amount or greater amount of indus-
trial refuse.
The planning is not going to
be easy. But, to be effective, it's got to
interface the institutional with the regulatory
and facilitate planning.
And while I view much of this
planning as an effort to be shared by local planning
agencies, a lot of it must be done by the local
planning people.
RCRA calls for new ideas and new
technology. I am all for that, but we can't turn
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our backs on existing successful programs at 8 million
tons per year and our industry generating wastes
in that quantity or area with no place to go.
Waste disposal seems to be one
of those subjects that everyone is an expert
in. Very few of the experts have ever been out
to the landfill or processing plant, but it's
remarkable that there is such an interest in this
area.
We frequently get people calling
on designing of landfills over the phone. When
they find there is one going to be located near
their home, we get suggestions for things like
shooting it to the moon or floating it down the
Mississippi River or injecting it down to China.
It's a little bit beyond the
technology we have today.
Illinois is peculiar in another
standpoint too, in that our State Supreme Court
decided, approximately a year and a half ago, that
a state agency was the sole siting authority as far
as where a landfill goes.
That's been kind of a mixed blessing,
and it's turned our rather gray hair into a big
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blank one because tnere is no way in the world
that you can site a landfill and not find someone*
who is upset about it.
I don't know what we are going
to do about this. There is legislation proposed,.
there are also legislative initiatives to return
this to local government authority.
They say, "Let the local govern-
ment set aside a piece of ground for future landfill.'
That sounds fine, but that future
landfill may be sitting on top of a gravel pit, sand
lands or in flood plains.
To set aside a piece of land for
a landfill, you have to go through a very complicated
process just as you would if you were seeking a
permit for that site to operate it.
And, now, with the new Supreme
Court decision, we have to look at things like
historical, archaelogical considerations, the
beautification of the land, the value of the land,
transportation; things that usually weren't looked
at by the local zoning boards.
We have counties in Illinois which
have not sited landfills in over 30 years. Landfills
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have gone into their area, but at the direction
of the courts.
We just see the possibility of
domination starting when we look at the difficulty
of getting local representatives, local governments
to agree on a suggestion as controversial as the
disposal of waste.
With that, I'll turn the mike over.
MR. REINHARDT: John Reinhardt, Wisconsin
Department of Natural Resources.
I'm going to present a third
viewpoint and, I think, this viewpoint will tend
to show the difficult job of the staff members of
EPA in attempting to carry out the regulations
drafted under FIFRA, and, I think I would like to
take this opportunity to pay some recognition to
those members of the EPA who I feel have whole-
heartedly undertaken a very difficult job, and
are attempting, on a staff level both in Region V
and in Washington, to carry that out. And, I think,
I expect with some authority, because I became
involved in this business back in '65. The City
of Madison had a demonstration grant and I would have
to say I went to battle with various people.
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I have to say that Mr. Alexander
[phonetic] in Region V has just wholeheartedly gone
out for this Act and Mr. Duprey and Karl Klepitsch
and his staff have entered into the spirit of it,
and if I had an award to give out, I'd give Region
V one of the biggest and, I certainly have to
compliment the home office.
I am on the National Governor's
Conference that has been dealing with George Garland
and some of the other staff members in EPA in
Washington, and they have sat down with us and they
have listened very closely to what we have to say
along with many other people, and I'd have to say
for Jack Lehman, we are in the process of working
on legislation in Wisconsin, and they have been
very, very busy and have been many places, but they
have always had time to come to Wisconsin and give
us comments on our legislation.
And, I would have to say that this
is a great change in attitude over the last number
of years, and with that, I would say we all have an
obligation to give them positive input because, I
think in the end, they are going to make these
decisions.
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In Wisconsin, we have a
different form of government and there is no way
you will get implementation of this Act without
local government being involved in some manner
or way.
In Wisconsin, the Solid Haste
Regulation was passed in 1967. We have a long
history of attempting landfills and hazardous
wastes problems.
The home rule aspect in Wisconsin
counties does not have a Department of Public Works.
In 1971, there was special legislation giving the
counties the right to carry out the solid waste
management planning function.
Along with the solid waste management,
there is the provision for an authority on the county
level to overcome some of the local political pro-
blems that the county probably faces when they
attempt to get into the solid waste business.
There are also regional planning
commissions. One example would be Dane County
Regional Planning Commission, which is also the 208
agency in Dane County. There is a County Board Com-
mission to start a landfill operation.
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There is also the Wisconsin
Solid Waste Recycling Authority that was passed
in about '73 or '74, and got an overwhelming vote
for its creation.
It was created because it was
realized that to carry out the management
functions of solid waste, to carry garbage from
one place to another, that local government would
have to give up some of its veto rights.
There's also 208 planning agencies
in Wisconsin on sewage cleaning.
I have given you this background
because I am going to play the devil's advocate and
throw out a few of the practical problems we see
in Wisconsin that this Act thereby holds.
First of all, we have a problem
in that agencies and other units of government are
a long way from doing the planning and developing
of the operation and starting the landfills. They
made some enemies along the way.
This raises the question; should
nation-wide units of government, a county in
Wisconsin recycling authority, you name it, have
to go back and get a 51 percent vote of the
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local general purpose, units of government, and
did Congress really mean that when they set up the
public input provision?
Another interesting question;
after talking to a number of people both in the
business, at the county level, or at the Regional
Planning Commission level, that is, why should the
State of Wisconsin take on this planning aspect;
what is it in there for a local government to
do this?
Seeing the funding of FIFRA,
even if the maximum allocations were rationally
appropriated, they are completely insufficient
to do a planning effort in Wisconsin. You take
an average of about 75 counties and multiply that
by -- it's over 3 million dollars of planning efforts,
to really do the comprehensive coverage that one
envisions of the FIFRA plan, is not possible.
Why should the citizens of Wisconsin choose to take
on planning aspects under FIFRA?
Is that a serious enough threat
of something that will happen in the future to
convince a county board member he should ante up
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30 to 100,000 dollars on the county level or
appropriate to the Regional Planning Commission
to undertake the plan so that we can have systems
planned throughout the state in keeping with PIFRA?
I think I'll leave those two
questions to try to stir a little interest in
debate.
MR. CONNER: I have got to admit that I
would feel just a bit out of place sitting up
on this panel.
I was speaking to a class of
impetuous students recently and they were playing
a little word game, and the teacher asked one
of the students to define "a devil's advocate".
One of the Jdds, who I am con-
vinced was the son of the Chairman of the Detroit
Edison said, "Oh, is that a lawyer for the
environmental control?"
That's what I am. And, I aiji
Executive Director of a Citizen's Action Group.
One of those groups, that by
the modestly cynical comments of just about every
speaker so far, is out to outrage and stop land
disposal of waste products in the country. And,
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I have three suggestions and observations to
make in line with what we have to do.
The Section of the Act that we
are talking about is Subtitle D. For those who
have got a copy of the Act, I am going to try
to make my suggestions to go in the sequence that
the Act does.
The first Act, "The actual step
the EPA will take to implement this action will be
the issuance of guidelines for the identification
of Regions under Section 4002."
That's what the previous speakers
have been talking about, what kind of guidelines
is the EPA going to issue?
My suggestion is that there be one
primary area that is paramount, and that is the
designated agencies which are going to be conducting
or carrying out state planning responsibilities --
anr" what that really means, when you translate it is,
that they are going to get some of the limited amount
of Federal money. By being a designated regional
agency, you're going to get some of that Federal
money, and I say that any designated agency should
be required to have management capability.
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It can be an agency that has
already regulated solid waste activity at the
state level, or there ought to be an agency that
has the ability to carry out the plan on a local
level.
That may seem odd, but I have
seen too many plans developed by well-meaning,
well-qualified, well-intended folks that were
placed on the shelf because there was no com-
mitment to those plans by the people who were
going to dig up the dirt and put the stuff in
the ground. So, the money ought to go to an
agency with management capability.
The only exception I would see
would be in a large metropolitan area like Detroit,
where there are many management agencies. They
are all fighting about who, in this instance, ought
to make the agency.
The reason I have for saying that,
is that Congress is not going to give very much
money for this program. That's my first text.
My second suggestion has to do
with requirements -- the minimum requirements for
approval of state plans.
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Under Section 403 and 5, my
general observation-suggestion I'm going to
detail is that the guidelines
should not require the state to spend money on
developing elaborate plans for shining resource
recovery facilities, and elaborate discussions
of marketing. The guidelines -- the money that
should be spent in the guidelines should require
this to be spent in monitoring and regulating
the land disposal of wastes. It may seem odd,
again, coming from a committee in environmental
legislation, but the great majority of wastes
are going into the ground today and I will predict
that in 1990, and probably 2000, the same will be
true.
I am further convinced that one
of the greatest threats to the quality of our
onvironment today is coming about as a result of
that land disposal.
Although the Act seems to require
the EPA to do everything it wants; inasmuch as
Congress is only giving a limited amount of money,
the money should be spent in monitoring.
Now, the Act itself supports this
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emphasis. If you will look at Section 4003,
it has six requirements for what has to be done
in a plan in order to be approved.
The sixth requirement talks
about resource conservation and resource re-
covery, but if you look at Section 4007, "Plan
Approval", and look at the minimum conditions
for plan approval, you will note that the state
only has to submit a plan that meets Requirements
One, Two, Three and Five. Six is not included.
So, legislative history clearly
supports that the emphasis of these first state
plans should be in identifying and getting them
to the business of regulation.
Some of you will no doubt ob-
serve that the money under the Act is supposed to
be for the development of plans.
Now, when we think of plans, we
think of 208 plans. We have got pollution projections
that say how many tons per pound of waste are to
come out and so on.
Unfortunately, Congress has a
habit of using words like "almost" as a rule not
in their ordinary sense. So that if you thought
that the money that the EPA is going to give out
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was for monitoring, you are wrong. If you go
back and look at Section 4003 and the minimum
requirements, the first minimum requirement
is that there be a road map.
There is a description of how
the state program is going to operate. We can
use that in Michigan.
Then, the second thing that is
supposed to happen is the detail that the state
will prohibit the establishment of new open
dumps.
Right away that ought to alert
you. That doesn't sound much like a plan.
The states are supposed to have
a means of prohibiting.
Three. This is the crutial one.
"The plan shall provide for the closing or up-
grading of all existing old dumps within the
state, pursuant to the requirement of Section 4005."
Now, we're getting to the reason
why you have Federal money being used for monitoring
and enforcement, because look at Section 4005.
The critical language is the last long phrase in
Section 4005, which ends on the following page.
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This is what is supposed to
be in the plan. It's a timetable or a schedule
for compliance. This phrase talks about open
dumps, what's going to be in the state plan
with regard to all the open dumps basically.
"A timetable or schedule for
compliance for such practice or disposal of
solid wastes which specifies a scheduled or
remedial measure including an enforceable sequence
of action or operations leading to compliance
of the prohibiting of solid waste within a
reasonable time not to exceed..."
The critical language there
is "The state plan is going to have to include
the following".
These are the most important
things. Number one, the state plan has got to
include an inventory of all the open dumps. You
will note that there is not in Section 4003, One
through Six, but it was in George's speech a
little earlier. You remember then he threw in
a little twist in that states are going to supply
us with the inventory.
The first part of your plan is
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going to have to be an inventory of all the open
dumps.
You take the EPA, landfills,
and God forbid that you should be in the first
category. If you are in the first category,
which is good, they're going to get money from
the EPA to do it. Figure out who is in non-
complied landfills and then, Section 4005, they're
going to develop a "Timetable of remedial measure
including an enforceable sequence of actions or
operations."
You know what that is? That's
an order from the DNR that says you must
do the following ten steps on this landfill or
you are going to close down.
What this so-called plan is, is
just a -- in Congress' words, it's not a plan.
The EPA can follow my suggestion,
namely their guidelines as to what the plan should
be, the state puts most of the money into the
inventory, that's monitoring and developing these
enforceable sequences of action. That's the
regulation.
My third suggestion. The guidelines
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should clarify when the state is going to have
to develop the element on resource conservation
and resource recovery.
You remember I said a second ago,
that, under Section 4003, that it is not re-
quired to be in the first plan, but I have to
add the exception, too.
If you look at Section 4007, it
says that the Administrator shall review approved
plans from time to time and determine whether
provisions of correction are necessary to meet
all of the minimum requirements under Section 4003.
What happens, you submit your
first plan, then the Administrator reviews your
plan and says your plan doesn't have an element
under 4003 (6) .
Now, you'd have to do that. The
original guideline, it seems to me, ought to
identify when the EPA and under what circumstances
the EPA has got to go back to the state and re-
quire a modification to or addition for the plan
to deal with resource recovery and resource
conservation.
Maybe they should only require
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it when they get enough money to do it. They
ought to.
These are my three suggestions,
and now, for an observation.
When I first started reading
this Act, first I thought the real heart of
this action is Section 4004 (B), which says
that all state plans must require that all wastes
must be disposed of in landfills. And, then/ I
said the state can't get money without having a
plan, and since the plan has to require disposal,
the money is the carrot, and the state is going
to make you have proper landfills.
Hell, I was wrong. Section 4008 (1)
talks about appropriation of money and does not
require the state to have an approved plan before
it gets money. So, the carrot is there, but that
carrot does not make the state clean the act up.
There is a banner and it's a better
one than that. Look at 4007 (c) again -- wrong.
4005 (c) and look at the first part of 4005 (c).
It says, "Any solid waste management program or
disposal of sewage waste or hazardous waste which
constitutes the open dumping of solid waste is
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prohibited."
Think about that. There is a duty
you shall not open dump.
Those guidelines are going to
say what open dumping is. Now, how can I use that?
Look over at 4007. Wrong.
7002 (A) (1), titled "Citizen's
Suits"; and what it says, any person can bring
a lawsuit against anybody who is in violation
of any permit, action, standard, regulation,
condition, requirement, or order; and somewhere
in there I'm going to find that section which
says "no open dumping."
What that means is that the
environmentalist can take anybody into court
that is not disposing of waste in a way that
suits open dumping under the EPA guidelines.
Of course, remember I said there
was a comma and that comma is going too. You may
ask the question, why didn't the states just tell
the EPA to back out?
The answer is that the only way
they can avoid me being able to sue them, under
these citizen's suits provision, is that if they
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have an enforceable timetable, pursuant to
an approved state plan.
All you have to do Is come to
them and say, "Get on the stick."
I think it's an interesting act,
and one that's going to provide a lot of fun for
all of us in the coming time.
I just — I hope that I have
stimulated a comment, if not a question.
MR. GARLAND: Questions, gentlemen?
MR. WHITE: Martin White.
It is your opinion that the
state plan is further in the future?
MR. CONNER: Absolutely.
The state plan — it is my
goal that the states get going as soon as possible
in beefing up the regulations. I would encourage
the EPA to make that clear in their regulation.
MR. WHITE: Does John Lehman agree with you?
MR. CONNER: I don't know.
MR. SCOTT: Jack Scott, Boiling Corporation.
One of the things I think that
constitutes open dumping, the way you described
it, might be agricultural uses. Some solid waste
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does have nutrient value. I wonder if the
regulation is taking this into account, as a means
of disposal?
MR. CONNER: We intend to. The gentlemen
said earlier are we going to be talking to the
Department of Agriculture?
It's those kinds of thing you
can look for.
I'd like to make a remark about
something David Lamm said. He said you haven't
told us what an open dump is.
That definition doesn't come
for 12 months. The Governor, after the Regional
Identification Guidelines come out, has only
six months to identify his planning regions.
That means he is going to have to identify these
planning regions before sanitary landfills or
open dumping has been defined.
He has got six months after that
to say who is going to do what, basically.
All these things are in Section 4006,
if you want to took at what Congress said, and he
has to say who is going to do what before the
state planning guides come out.
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They come out on the same day
that the Governor says who is going to do what.
So, in fact, we have a kind of chicken and the
egg problem, and I am not sure that I have any
good solutions.
However, in the regional identification
guidelines, we are going to request, in the latest
draft, which came out yesterday, we are going to
request that the Governor say how he is going to
deal with the variety of waste disposal practices
that are now covered by the Act.
The Act, as I said before, doesn't
make allowances for phasing -- for saying we are
going to deal with this today, and then tomorrow,
and three years from the same. It's the only
practical approach, however.
So, in fact, although we don't
say what a sanitary landfill is, we say what kind
of things we are talking about and, hopefully, that
provides enough of a clue that intelligent regions
can be defined — or that regions can be defined
intelligently.
MR. MOORE: You pointed out, George, a point
we have been arguing before — talking to you about
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for a long time. The definitions.
We don't know how you are going
to come down on the position of landfill. That
could put all of the sites — suddenly open dumps.
So, in Illinois, we have felt kind of like some-
one who is thinking about ordering a mail-order
bride out of a catalog, just on the description.
We don't know how it's going to end up,
I think that one of the reasonable
problems that we see right now, we just don't
feel confident enough to move ahead as we would
like to, not knowing what those definitions are
going to be. That, and the definition of hazardous
wastes.
I'd like to say it's a pleasure
to be in league with the devil, and if Michigan
doesn't treat you well, come on over.
MR. LEWIS: I am Steve Lewis, with the MITRE
Corporation.
One of the concerns that I have
is setting up the regional boundaries, and David
mentioned, and Mr. Reinhardt mentioned, it seems
to me that if we are going to set up regional
boundaries for the purposes of planning for the
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control of landfill operations, we may very well
have one set of regional planning set-ups for
that.
If, however, we are going to
set up regional boundaries for the purpose of
planning for resource recovery, we might have a
completely different set of regional boundaries.
For resource recovery, you might
want a very large region, because for economics
of operation of the technology we are talking
about, we need a lot more wastes than we did
if we are just considering setting up an economic
landfill.
The primary criteria in both
cases is an economic criteria, and I was wondering
if any of you — how any of you feel about this?
MR. REINHARDT: The general question is
resource recovery.
In Wisconsin, we have an authority
which is an entity, which is in the recycling
business and the boundaries of the recycling authority
are formed along county lines, and the regions
are multi-county units.
Within these units, we don't see
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any problem with this boundary formation business,
if, for planning purposes, the Governor could
designate the recycling boundaries and then let
the recycling authority in the counties work among
themselves at what level of planning is going to
be done and who will do it.
I think our problems would be
greater if one had to start over and reaffirm
with all the local governments — the counties
that are already operating and then reaffirm to
recycling authorities all the way to the State
Legislature.
In our case, we have the institutional
requirements already there, if we can follow through
on the state level on how we go about doing the
proceedure.
ME. MOORE: Also, in Illinois, we permit
special wastes to be disposed of in approximately
20 of our landfill sites. You may or may not find
one of those sites in an area that might formally
be designated as a traditional solid waste-type
of planning. You have that situation compounding
the selection of regions, also.
We have two hazardous wastes sites
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in the state. Those are questions that are going
to be difficult to address when you are trying to
draw viable boundary lines for a comprehensive
waste land program.
MR. CONNER: The question I have, is whether
the EPA is committed to a regional program?
I just have a notion that — especially
knowing a little bit about the legislative history,
that it has pieces of the Clean Air Act in the
Federal — and then stuck in here almost either
arbitrarily and I am not sure that — obviously
we have to look at watersheds. You have to look
at airsheds. That was the rationalization for
having regions in Air and Water, but that regional
approach didn't all work in Air, and I am wondering
whether you are committed to forcing the state into
a large-scale regional approach for solid waste
management, when in Michigan what's going to
work is a state regulatory program and local ini-
tiatives, that will sometimes be private industry,
sometimes be accounting bureaus of public works,
and sometimes be a regional planning agency, depending
on the circumstances.
It ought to allow a state
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to develop a state plan delegating it to local
areas where there is a well-developed entity
that is in the management business. Let them
do the planning for that area. Don't try to
create an abundance of staffs, because what will
happen is a lucrative business for consultants.
But, these local units of government are not
going to be staffed by qualified people able to
do regional planning except in a large, metropolitan
area.
I would hope that the EPA is
not committed to a true regional approach to
management of solid wastes, because I am not
sure it is a good idea, and if it were, there is
not nearly enough money available.
MR. GARLAND: We have a trade-off between
institution building and getting the job done.
That is to say, we're going to focus on protecting
the ground water, for example, by passage of
legislation. This protects the ground water,
getting state-wide policies for ground water
standards and then implementing them across the
board or we are going to focus on getting Detroit
to cooperate with the surrounding counties, and
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so forth and so on.
My priorities, and I believe the
priorities intended by the Congress, are for us
to protect the environment first, and to create
new institutional arrangements second.
That's not to say that new
institution requirements might not be necessary,
because I am not thinking when I say that of
getting traditional enemies at the local level
to work together. Rather, I am thinking about
traditional enemies at the state level to work
together.
I shouldn't say necessarily that
they are enemies, but they are bureaucrats and
whether — if there is a state program that deals
sewage cleaning and another with industrial
improvements, and another that deals with septage
and solid wastes and so forth, it seems to me
that in order to have a comprehensive approach
and to have people who are trying to do something
right, and many industrial people are, to be able
to go to one place and get comprehensive answers
on what people are asking for, makes a lot of sense,
So, I would think that institution
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building at the state level might be appropriate
and might be necessary, given the broader definition
of solid waste and disposal.
MR. REILY: Peter Reily.
I'd like to direct a question
to the gentleman from the EPA on Mr. Conner's
point, in terms of the initial approval of
state plans, whether in fact you do read the
legislation the way he did, which indicated that
resource conservation plans do not need to be
included.
MR. GARLAND: The required criteria omits
the requirement for resource conservation and
resource recovery.
MR. REILY: Do you have a follow-up plan
in mind as to when the state plans would have to
incorporate resource conservation into their
plan?
MR. GARLAND: When I said in the Regional
Identification Guidelines we are going to ask
the Governor this question, I should add we're
also asking him to talk about his priorities in
dealing with the various functions.
One of those is resource conservation
and resource recovery so that he will have to
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specify at the outset when he intends to get around
to that. It's not something that is going to
slip between the cracks.
MR. RElLY: in other words, EPA has no time-
table. It's whenever the Governor feels interested
in doing it?
MR. GARLAND: You heard Jack Moore talk about
a central state government.
You heard John Reinhardt talk about
a state where things must be done at the local
level.
We have 50 states. You can look
upon this as a kind of devil-created thing, and
it's a really bad thing. But, I'm not sure it is.
It seems to me we have to allow
for plausibility. We have to have a certain amount
of faith in the process. If the people of the state
elected the governor, if people don't have faith
in state government, I guess people are in big
trouble.
This Act clearly puts a lot of
faith in state government, and if you are asking
the Federal government to say — you had better
focus -- forget about environmental stuff. We don't
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do that.
Nor can we go the other way.
Clearly this Act gives the Impetus to the state
level and cooperation with local elected officials.
MR. REILY: That's the longest rationalization
I have heard this afternoon to say "no".
What you are really stating is
that much of the Act — you really aren't trusting
the states. You are clearly telling the states
what they need to do and you are saying "no" in
this case.
I think, under Section 4007,
where Mr. Conner indicated that the Administrator
shall review approved plans from time to time,
is quite open-ended.
Do you have, at this point, a
timetable established as to how even you would
review the state plans on a regular basis?
Of course, there would be
instances where you might want to look at it on
a frequent basis.
MR. GARLAND: In fact, there is a state
planning process going on right now in Solid
Waste Management. The management responsibility
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11*0 at the level of the regional administrator.
MR. GARLAND: Each regional office visits
at least quarterly. There is a formal review
of state plans by headquarters at least annually.
I guess he — but, responding
to your remark, "The EPA doesn't trust the states
and it's really telling them what to do."
There is a difference between
making a guessing-game and saying to people, "Do
something in solid waste", and telling them what
you mean by that. Telling them to do something
about disposal or telling them what you mean
by disposal. And, saying "Do good things," and
specifying what you mean by goals specifying —
consider how it's done and laying out what you
think the functions are.
So, when I said we are going to
ask the Governor to address all these things, we
are trying to be specific in what it is we want
achieved. Where we are trusting the Governor is
in coming up with satisfactory approaches.
MR. CONNER: That section, to which I refer,
says that he shall review the approved plan from
time to time. Also, if he determines that revisions
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are necessary, to bring such plan into compliance
with the minimum requirements, "He shall, after
notice and public hearing withdraw his approval."
So that, part of the reason I
suggested that in your guidelines you ought to
set a deadline for this part of the Act, because
if you don't, it seems to me you won't be able
to get around reviewing a state's plan at the
time they apply for their second grant from you.
When they apply for a grant from
you, to tell some Federal judge you don't have
to go to the plan, you probably won't get away
with that. And, therefore, at the time a state
applies a second time and if they don't have a
resource conservation facility by then in their
plan, and somebody watching this who is knowledgeable
about it, then they will sue you and probably succeed,
If you include in this set of
guidelines some sort of reasonable timetable, even
if it's got elastic in it, take something. Then
you are going to have a defense at the time that
person sues you. But, if your response to the judge
is, "Judge, at some point in the future we are
going to get tough on that mandatory provision" —
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that's all for example.
MR. GARLAND: You are suggesting then
on the state guidelines, that, in fact, we tie
deadlines to the various elements of the plan
and that, in fact, will put us in a better position
when we get sued?
MR. CONNER: It says when one's plan is
approved, it will be reviewed; and once you say
that then you have triggered this provision,
because once you review it the second time you
are stuck, because it says, "shall."
So, not just to defend yourself
in lawsuits, but tell the people what they are
getting into.
If you say in your guidelines
the state must, in ten years, come up with a
resource conservation element, you will get
sued again.
MR. GARLAND: You are saying specify a date
when you will review, and specify what you will
be looking for when you do that review.
In fact there may be a series
of reviews. That makes a lot of sense.
A VOICE: There is a suggestion for the
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EPA. It is ironic that the Resource Conservation
Act does not specify when resource conservation
should be part of the plan. I think that they
should establish a date at which they would have
that incorporated in the state planning system,
because, to my point of view, resource conservation
should be the prime objective of the Act and not
something that's tacked on later on in the process.
So, as soon as possible this should be incorporated
in the statute under the EPA guidelines.
MR. GARLAND: I believe that gentleman is
asking the EPA for law instead of asking Congress
to write law.
I think he is asking the wrong
branch. I think he should direct his remarks
to Congress.
MR. KRAFTER [PHONETIC]: I am Richard Krafter,
from Michigan.
I'd like to know how many counties
in Michigan have met that master solid waste plan
as per our Act?
A VOICE: Less than half.
MR. KRAFTER: Less than half of 38 counties,
then?
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A VOICE: I think — one thing,
for Illiniois, Michigan, those states must have
some type of guidelines already as far as open
dumps and sanitary landfills are concerned,
because Illinois has gone from 1400 down to
400.
The State of Michigan has gone
done also. We must have some interim guidelines
we could go by.
One other comment for EPA and
the Department of Natural Resources. For instance,
in Michigan, there is an awful lot of land owned
by the Federal government in the State of Michigan,
that the Department of Natural Resources could
use for the land disposal sites.
That's the best land we have in
some of those states. It's extremely difficult for
consulting engineers to get these sites approved.
One of the reasons is isolation.
I think the other thing that Mr. Conner remarked
about, and also in the State of Illinois, during
this interim period, life must go en. So, I think,
the committee thing is only a master plan, but
one you can implement.
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It's nice to have a master
plan that's developed by these regional planning
agencies, but if they don't have the power to
enforce those plans, they aren't much better
than those of units.
The most important factor is
the inventory and then the enforcement, but how
do you enforce, and the word is dollars.
In the State of Michigan, if
we don't have the dollars to enforce these master
plans, then nothing much is going to happen.
You're going to have a lot of
kinds of laws. If we don't have the dollars to
build the sites, that Act isn't going to go much
further.
I think the other thing, too —
I think EPA has done an excellent job in Water
Pollution Control through the processes of Steps
One, Two and Three. We need this in the Act.
For instance, in Michigan, most
of the counties are less than 30,000 in population.
I wonder if resource recovery could be cost-effective
in the State of Michigan for most of those counties.
I doubt that it would be. It would be nice to
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implement our waste act to include some type of
study on resource recovery. I think it ought
to be cost-effective even before it's made
mandatory.
Also, I think these guidelines
-- for consulting engineers to have an input
in — that these guidelines are awfully stiff.
It's hard to design something and to meet all
these different agencies that might review,
from the very local level, all the way to the
top, to the State EPA. It's going to be hard
to get it approved — to get one of those
designed properly is difficult.
The guidelines are well done
in Michigan, but it's still difficult. Without
the guidelines, it would be difficult to design
something to meet all your approvals.
The last thing, again, it's nice
to have the 208 agencies, maybe with the people
that are going to cause these master plans to be
done. But, most 208 agencies do not have the
power to enforce anything. They do have the power
to review, but in Michigan, the law says that
except for those states over 10,000 population,
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the counties are the ones that have been charged
to develop the master solid wastes plans.
In most counties, maybe 50 percent
have those plans, but most counties right now don't
have the money to implement those plans, and Michigan
doesn't have the money to enforce those plans.
MR. GARLAND: I don't mean to be very negative
about resource recovery, the Act calls for open
dumps to be upgraded or replaced by resource
recovery facilities or sanitary landfills, so in
the process of closing the open dumps we would
assume that many communities might take advantage
of resource recovery opportunities.
The issue of whether resource
recovery is suitable for cities of 30,000, we
hope to emphasize resource recovery low-technology
approaches that are suitable.
I don't think it's unreasonable
that it could be feasible, but in a different
way than in massive plants that convert garbage
into energy, oil or sludge.
MR. MICHAELS: Otis Michaels, Dilly and Associates
[phonetic]. We are consultants in Illinois, and
having gone through the hearing process in Illinois
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since 1970 I wish to enforce some of the comments
that Jack Moore made, that in the U.S. EPA some
of the criteria that they can give serious con-
sideration to those states that have come into
the program. It is workable even with all its
faults and people identify it as an enforceable
program, and we hope it is given very serious
consideration and not sent back to point zero.
MR. MOORE: George, there almost seems to
be an impression here that we are looking in on
landfills, but that isn't true. We have committed
the Illinois EPA 4.8 million dollars for one
supplemental fuel control project for the City
for Springfield. We have got other grants with
the Pollution Control Bond Authority for some
smaller ones, such as Edwardsville. The states
have done those things.
We have a problem. We have got to
have safe disposal of materials. We are also
considering high technology, too.
MR. GARLAND: I'd like to thank the panel
and the audience for a spirited discussion.
(WHEREUPON, the panelists were
excused.)
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HEARING OFFICER KLEPITSCH: One again, I'll
have to do a little housekeeping to set up for
the next panel, and I would suggest that we would
be able to reconvene in about six minutes.
My watch says six minutes to
a quarter after four.
If you could take the seats in
the front, it would make better use of the space
in the room.
The last panel today that we are
going to convene is going to speak to the issue
of Resource Recovery, particularly private and
public responsibilities in technical assistance
and technology development.
To lead that panel, I have asked
Bob Lowe from our Washington office to take care
of it.
Bob, please?
MR. LOWE: I'd like to introduce our first
speaker, a man who has had many years of experience
in solid waste management, especially in resource
recovery. His knowledge of resource recovery
technology and marketing and legal and financial
issues is not surpassed. He is thoroughly familiar
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with the roles of the state and local governments
and the role of the Federal government in technical
assistance, and is generally regarded as the leader
in this field as a result of his expertise and his
ability and his integrity, and it gives me great
pleasure to introduce him to youv.
Which one of you wants to speak
first?
The people up here are seated
according to the listing in your programs.
Prom your left to right is
Steve Lewis, who is Director of the Resource Recovery
Programs for the MITRE Corporation, which is a non-
profit consulting firm in Bedford, Massachusetts.
Next to him is Lew Ward, who is
Manager for Marketing Solid Waste Systems of UOP,
Incorporated, which is located near here, in Des
Plaines, Illinois.
To his left and your right, is
Mr. Louis Parina, Deputy Commissioner of the Bureau
of Sanitation in Chicago, and on your far right,
Mr. Fred Kellow, Chief of the Solid Waste Management
Division of the Environmental Protection Branch of
the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
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So, each one of these gentlemen
has prepared some remarks, and I will let them
speak in turn.
Steve?
MR. LEWIS: Thank you very much, Bob.
As Bob indicated, I am with the
MITRE Corporation and in our work, we have worked
extensively with the state and local governments
in planning and implementing resource recovery
systems, preparing requests from proposal packets,
evaluating industry proposals, and in places like
Detroit, South State Michigan, Massachusetts and
some others.
I have been asked to comment
on the public and private responsibilities in tech-
nical assistance and technology development.
The first point I really want to
make is that in resource recovery, it seems to me
that there is quite a new and unique relationship
that exists between government and private industry
in this business, and that the Resource Recovery
Conservation Act, at least in my opinion, is an
excellent act in that it permits the natural relation-
ship, I think, which is necessary between government
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and industry to keep going to survive and to mature.
This includes a relationship
between government, industry and system planning,
in implementing as well as in research and development.
My second comment is that it is
my opinion that resource recovery systems should be not
only operated by private industry, but it is my
opinion that something I call "ownership control"
should also be exercised in the private sector as
well.
I put heavy emphasis personally
on the role of private industry in resource recovery,
and I think this is for a number of reasons.
The first is that resource recovery
is really a manufacturing operation, and has — for
the benefit of the public, it should be planned to
operate as a business, a financially self-sufficient
business and should not just be paid for with deficit
financing.
Secondly, its complex technology
requires skills, it requires marketing skills,
technicians, licensed operators, and so forth; and
really are not available and are very difficult to
get.
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Third, it requires marketing
skills that are not traditional in the kind of
development that state and local government people
know how to do well.
The government financial systems,
the government personnel systems, the government
management systems, are not really geared for this
kind of operation.
Finally, there is high capital
cost involved in them, and we know some of the systems
being planned today are in the 10s of millions —
to over 100 million dollars.
In most cities, certainly towns,
and most states cannot afford to put this kind of
capital investment in their total indebtedness.
I call for a very heavy role of private industry.
The problem in this, as in any
other kind of private business in that sense, but
the real problem is that the government, state and
local governments have responsibility for the planning
process. Now, what we have are state and local
government people who have little or no experience
in setting up this kind of business, with no responsibility
for the kinds of systems we need, what the market is,
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how to competitively select the systems from
private industry & how to set up all of the contracts
that are necessary.
I think that the Resource Recovery
Conservation Act that we are dealing with recognizes
this kind of potential relationship between government
and industry. So, I think we can make it work, and
I think we can perform if we have to win it.
I had a chart here which I can't
show because we don't have an overhead projector.
What this chart shows is the process of planning
and implementing a resource recovery system.
It has a number of tasks that are necessary, like
marketing analysis, technical assessments, legal
analyses, changes in the state and local legislation,
in making some of the key decisions about where
we are going to put the facility, how it is going to
be financed and owned and operated and so forth.
Now, this is a heavy responsibility
and it can take two or three years to go through
this process to come up with an operational facility,
and may very well cost in the neighborhood of $200,000
to $500,000 for the government agency to go through
that kind of planning process.
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Now, it also must be done within
the competitive laws, binding laws that the govern-
ment must live within, as well as the state laws,,
I think it's important that each
state and each local government not have to learn
this process anew and learn the language all over
again so, I am personally very much in favor of
the Technical Assistance Program.
I think that as we go through the
Act that the Technical Assistance Program is going
to be the single most visible evidence of the
working relationship that must exist between Federal,
state and local levels in moving towards resource
recovery.
The EPA is always in the proceiss
of setting out guidelines, and I have some guidelines
from the EPA in technical assistance.
The first guidelines, and these
may be guidelines to look out for, and the first,
look out that you don't convince or make local govern-
ments believe that you have more money or more ability
than you actually have, so that they sit back and wait
for you to come up with something for them. Try to
minimize the delay, look out for the inadequacy of
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funding, which you have. It is possible that you
get locked in to a particular location, to start
helping them and then you can't bail out. If
they bail out, they are going to lose everything
they have invested. If they don't, they are going
to stay in for a very long period of time.
It's important that the Technical
Assistance Program not become a replacement for the
normal consulting or engineering, or financial
types that are needed to make the system go.
Another point is local perception
of EPA.
There may very well be local
governments who really don't want EPA in there.
Another one is that local govern-
ment officials need to be in charge and if they feel
that by having technical assistance they are going to
lose being in charge, then that's going to worry them
quite a bit, and the relationship that exists there
might not be the kind that we all want it to be.
Finally, as sort of an adage,
and that adage is, "You get what you pay for," and
since they are not paying anything for it, they
might not think it's worth anything. So, look out for that,
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Finally, one is biased. Regardless
of whom EPA chooses to provide technical assistance,
whether they do it with their own staff or consultants,
it's going to be biased.
All of us are biased. Some of
us are biased against other people or biased in
other directions against certain kinds of technologies
or against source reduction, or what have you. So,
it is important to try to minimize the bias that
goes along with the Technical Assistance Program.
Finally, I think that EPA has
very good materials available to help its Technical
Assistance Program. It has in the past few years
prepared guidelines, manuals and instructions that
are available to all of us. I think that one of
its key roles in technical assistance should be
to go out and represent these, help people understand
and to put them in place.
I think it would be wrong for a
technical assistance team, in looking at the kinds
of tasks that are necessary to implement the syste;m,
I think it's wrong to throw a technical assistance
team into the complex and lengthy job of evaluating
industry proposals because — and then bail out of
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that technical program, because in the evaluation
of proposals the learning process that takes place
there and the people who actually do it translates
into the contracts and other kinds of relationships
that must take place.
Thank you.
Lew, do you want this?
MR. WARD: I have a few slides I'd like to
show you.
I am Lew Ward of UOP, in Des Plaines,
Illinois.
If we can have the lights off
to show this slide.
(WHEREUPON, the lights were
dimmed for presentation of the
slide, and the following comments
made.)
MR. WARD: I'd like to tell you a little bit
about what we do and what we have done.
This is the corporate headquarters
of OOP, which is within five miles of this location,
in Des Plaines, as I said.
UOP had acquired some time ago,
the business of my former company, which was under the
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name of International Boiler Works for Environmental
Systems, and we designed, built, directed, furnished,
and placed in operation the refuse combustion systems
of the Chicago Northwest Incinerator PIart shown here.
This is a plantowned and operated
by the City of Chicago, Commissioner Farina's depart-
ment operates it today, has operated it since 1970.
This plant is operated at 1600 tons per day of
municipal solid waste, it converts that municipal
solid waste to steam, some of which is used
beneficially in the plant. It also recovers ferrous
metal from the residue.
In Harrisburg, Minnesota, there
is a similar plant which is really a small regional
plant which consists of two units, roughly half the
size. It handles not only municipal solid waste,
but also industrial and commercial waste except
for problem or hazardous material. Both of these
plants incorporates systems called the Martin system,
which receives solid waste in unprepared form, u:n-
segregated and combusted in specially designed stokers,
boilers, electrostatic precipitators.
Now, basically, what we have all
been talking about in resource recovery is what to do
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with the solid wastes and what we can get from
it. And this slide shows 100 pounds of solid waste
coming in and you can forget the units — it gives
you the composition. It shows at the top, the most
important benefit, which is the heat. Usable heat
in tiie form of steam, which can then later be con-
verted to electric power or refrigeration for air
conditioning. Furthermore, the quantities aren't so
important here, but it is important that these mat-
erials are available. Ferrous scrap metal is avail-
able in a form that is immediately usable by the
secondary metals or the scrap metal industry.
Aluminum is available, and heavy non-ferrous metals,
largely coppers, brasses and zinc, and also an
aggregate, a material which is being used experimentally
in Pennsylvania, in Massachusetts, and in Maryland
in asphalt and rubber construction, and finally,
and separately, can be recovered.
What all this means in money is
that the energy component shown as steam is over
$10 per ton at the very low price of $5 a thousand
pounds for steam. The materials, reading them al-
together, come out to be just under $5 per ton of
solid waste for a total credit available of more
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than $15 per ton.
All of these number* are typical
and are, if you will, average because we have received
quotations from people who have looked at them from
Chicago Northwest, from Harrisburg, and have quoted
even higher prices than shown here. This is not by
any means a new technology. He have used it in —
before. We have used it in Europe. And finally
in our own work, we have come to the point of
design for the Northeast Massachusetts Plant, which
would be located in the area roughly, the Northeast
of Boston, and encompassing some 53 towns in
Massachusetts and in Southern New Hampshire.
This particular plant uses the
same technology as I described, taking unprepared
solid waste, converting it to steam, and then further
converting that steam to electrical energy, electricity,
which is sold under final contract to the local
investor-owned utility. The utility will take any
amount, all the amount generated by the plant on a
final 20-year contract at an escalating price. The
price is essentially tied to the increase in price
for oil. The material will be recovered as to
provide a credit against the cost of the facility
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for the user immunities.
I'll quickly show a couple of
other plants around the world.
This one is in Coventry, England,
a steam generating plant which is designed to
serve a district heating system, and therefore,
to heat the homes and the apartment buildings and
factories nearby.
And, another plant in Yokahama,
Japan, which is one of the most recent plants to
go on stream with the latest of pollution control
technology -- builder technology and so on.
If we may have the lights again.
In the Northeast Massachusetts
project and in others we have dealt with, we have
been the private contractors or one of the many
participating with the EPA technical assistance role.
He have found the EPA technical assistance to be very
helpful. We find there is a growing factor in the
project.
I think, perhaps the most important
factor of EPA technical assistance is that the know-
ledge came from one project which may be the only
project in the lifetime of the community,
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it is transported to the next community, and the
knowledge gained from the successes and the failures
of one project are applied to the next project.
I am sure EPA's financial help
to the local communities is also important because
that financial help hires consultants who then
assist the community in carrying out the project.
As a final note, I picked up this
publication here last night and today and it notes
the following: "The Congress intended RCRA to
address the following problem", among others, I'll
read only two.
"The wasteful burial of recoverable
resources with intended decreases in dependency
on foreign energy and material sources, and in
balance of payment deficits."
The second is: "The need to
continue the development of solid waste as an
energy source to conserve and protect resources
such as petroleum, natural gas, nuclear, and hydroelectric
generation."
We, as a representative of
private industry here today, stand ready to do our
part in meeting these goals, in answering these
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probleras, and we look to the combined efforts of
the EPA Technical Assistance Program, the consultants,
most importantly the states and local communities,
in carrying out these ends.
Thank you.
MR. LOWE: So far it sounds not only like
we stacked the deck, but we wrote the speeches.
I hope you will feel free to
say something against our program if you feel like it.
Of course, not many people want
to say something against something that is free.
At this point 1 will turn the
floor over to Commissioner Farina.
MR. FARINA: Thank you, Bob.
I would like first of all to
commend the members of the EPA for conducting these
regional meetings. I think it's in its infancy,
but we are on the right track.
Secondly, I wish to emphasize the
importance of the private sector in waste management,
w^ste control and the city and their joint effort,
for without the cooperation of both, the end result
could never be accomplished.
I would also like to mention the
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fact that I have attending this meeting with me
one of the finest waste management Commissioners
and I am very proud to have him with me, from
my home office. If you have any technical questions
regarding a supplementary fuel plant, Northwest or
any of the plants in the City of Chicago, we will
be at your disposal.
Third, I want to commend you for
staying at this late hour. What we lack in quantity,
we have in quality, so you are to be commended for
staying as long as you have.
I have ptepared a few notes
because I feel that the essence of this meeting
is to suggest, to make recommendations, to the EPA
for future meetings or for new legislation, whatever
it may be, so if you bear with me, I think we could
get along in this project.
Chicago has embarked on a program
of recycling & resource recovery. We have built a
supplementary fuel plant. We are going through the
stages of correcting any minor difficulty. We hope
to be on-line by July of this year, no later than
August. It looks very promising.
We also have the Northwest
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Incinerator, which not only supplies steam for
ourselves, but we are in the process of contracting
with the Brach Candy Company to sell them steam.
So, we are on the right track.
I think, as each and every one
of you knows, we are in its infancy. So, we must
cooperate, we must put our heads together. We
must have that old American ingenuity, in progress.
We have to utilize it to the best of our ability.
We can't sleep, we can't relax, because time is
of the essence. Problems have to be solved.
Let me get along with my talk,
if I may. in certain areas, the term "resource
recovery" has become the focal point of discussion
in solid waste management circles. Both public
and private agencies are now attempting to develop
new technologies which can effectively recover
resources from our nation's disposal waste.
The passage of the 1976 Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act legislates a new
responsibility for public and private solid waste
agency administrators. This new public law mandates
our equal attention to two primary issues.
One, the identification and
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development of new technical systems which can
dispose of increasing levels of generated waste
in an environmentally sound manner.
Two, the reclamation of recoverable
resources which have a type of second life utility.
It is generally recognized that the accomplishment
of these two objectives is no easy task, especially
in research work and solid waste technology which
involves tremendous expense & thousands of dollars
in manpower.
Unfortunately, most public
agencies are confronted with severe constraints
in both areas. Therefore, it is incumbent upon
representatives in local, state and Federal govern-
ment to design an outline for technological co-
operation and financial support, which can maximize
our resource recovery effectiveness.
The Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act gives us a general guide to the development of
such an outline. However, I would like to offer two
specific suggestions for your consideration.
One, in the area of technical
assistance, Section 2003 of the Act specifies the
development of resource recovery and conservation
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panels to provide state and local governments with
technical assistance upon request at no cost. As
indicated in the Act, each panel will include
technical, marketing, financial and institutional
specialists.
With respect to the disposition
of such panels, I feel it is of the utmost importance
that they be regionalized, with each panel's member-
ship representing a particular section of the nation.
Solid waste disposal needs in
different areas vary significantly in terms of
particular problems and concerns. Ideally, each
panel could direct their assistance to the municipalities
and/or states in one specific area.
In this way, the panel would be
familiar with the dictates of state governments.
Current estimates suggest that
20 to 25 of these panels will be formed for ad-
ministering technical assistance. If regionalized,
each panel would be responsible for two or three
or four state areas to which they would direct
their assistance.
Two. In the area of financial
support for technical development, Section 8006 of
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the Act authorizes the disbursement of Federal funds
for the development and implementation of new and
improved resource recovery systems and solid waste
disposal facilities. The Act limits the amount of
grant funding to 50 percent for projects serving
a single municipality and 5 percent in any other
case.
The balance of the cost-
in either instance would have to be borne
by the municipality or regional area which is being
served by the grant project.
In the case of new experimental
projects, which will potentially benefit the waste
disposal industry and states on a national scale,
I would take exception to the proposed grant funding
procedures.
The Federal share for such a
national impact should encompass 100 percent of
the project cost, excluding only administrative
and operational personnel salaries.
If we are serious about the ad-
vancement of waste technology, new experimental
projects must be initiated.
However, it is unreasonable for
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the Federal government to expect local financial
funding for such projects other than an investment
in salary for administrative and operational
personnel. The merit of 100 percent Federally
funded projects would be determined on the basis
of its potential national impact.
I would also suggest that the
recommendations for total funding of such projects
would have to be secured from a resource and
conservation panel before being forwarded to the
EPA Administrator. In this manner, the implementation
of noteworthy, innovative experimental projects
would not be subject to the financial status of
a local municipality or region.
Technology and technology develop-
ment are two serious concerns of all public agency
administrators.
However, we must be ever-mindful
of the fact that local municipalities and regional
areas are the testing grounds for any and all
resource recovery advances.
If the 1976 Resource Conservation
Recovery Act is to prove effective, it must provide
the necessary support to local level agencies.
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Without proper technical assistance and technology
funding of local projects, we will experience minimal
progress in waste disposal & resource recovery industries.
One other thing that I would like
to stress, is the fact that public relations is of
the utmost importance in any meeting such as this
or in the implementation of the funding of any project.
Without the joint efforts of private industry and
municipal and state and Federal governments, this
cannot be accomplished, because without the interest
and the knowledge of the people, who have control and a
direct link to the Congress, we could never receive the
assistance that we need. So, I strongly urge that
each and every one of us become familiar with public
relations and have that vehicle used so that we can
attain our end results.
Thank you.
MR. LOWE: Thank you, Commissioner.
Mr. Kellow?
MR. KELLOWs Thank you, Bob.
It's been a long day and you hav«
heard a lot of people discussing the subjects. I'll
try to keep my comments down and not be too repetitious,
although Z think there are some points that have been
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made that are worthy of repeating.
I kind of feel like we are back
a number of years ago when we talked about the
position where, in this country, based on a previous
program -- Federal program of Baird and Warner, and
some related to Federal activities of solid waste
management.
I think it's unfortunate that
we are in this position, because a lot of the
people I talk to in local government are saying,
"Well, we expect that this Act is going to carry
on just like it has in waste water, and the Federal
government is going to come in and bail us out."
I think one thing has changed
very dramatically, and I feel that is the participation
by public interest groups.
Roger Conner, who you heard today,
and his group are examples. We have had enthusiatic
support from people like the League of Women Voters,
which I don't think was the case in the initiation
of the Waste Water Program, and in some respects,
to the Air Program. I know there are times when we
in the regulatory agencies feel that groups like
this are going to slow us down, be responsible for
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a lot of delays, and it may well be, and it has
been to us in Michigan, in some respects. But,
in the long run, I think it will give us a better
overall program, and, therefore, increase wholesome
participation.
We have talked a little bit about
the time problem. I think everyone agrees that we
wish EPA had more time to develop the guidelines to
move into these projects. In discussing the problems
we have in Michigan on legislation, just this past
week, one of our legislators said, I think, when we
talk about environmental laws, we ought to delay
their effective date for two years for you people
to all get together and, maybe, give us a little
more time to develop the regulation. In some res-
pects, I think that is probably true.
I would like to mention, briefly,
Michigan does have a Resource Recovery Commission
that has responsibility to review our Department
programs, policies and legislation. They look at
the method in which the Department is operating
the Solid Waste Management Program. Our Commission
has a pretty good format, I think, to be of help to
us as well as the local government,
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and private interest operations.
One representative is from the
city, one from the township and one from the county
government. We have a state treasurer to help us
in financial activities.
There are two members of the
environmental recycling industry on the Commission,
and one landfill operator.
We have three citizens, two
representing the environmental organizations, and
then, of course, the director of DNR.
The Commission also has res-
ponsibility to promote resource recovery and to
be involved in the financial assistance programs
that are presently available under the statute.
It does have the authority to conduct show cause
hearings and reviews the Commission in lieu of
court action on both private and public refuse
disposal facilities which, I think, is significantly
a subject where as a result of these hearings, we
developed a time schedule signed by the operator
for elimination of the problem.
One point I think that is going
to be significant in the Commission activities in
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the next few years is their authority to issue
orders to local governmental units to implement
their solid waste planning. If they aren't pro-
ceeding in eliminating environmental hazards or
they are not proceeding in a development of resource
recovery, then it is an economically feasible solution
that the Commission can then issue orders, and as
a result of such orders, the operator would be subject
to a considerable fine on a daily basis.
We in Michigan are very desirous
to initiate the prelects in the next few years.
One of ray fondest hopes of
Federal legislation is that we would provide some
needed assistance.
They say we're now ready to
move. I am truly sorry that the statute didn't
provide the capability to not only make financial
assistance available to those in need of planning,.
but also to those local units that have had the
foresight, some on their own initiative and some
due to our initiating tighter controls on their
disposal facilities, that helped build some facilities
and get resource recovery moving.
In one sense, I think, the Federal
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Act penalizes those local units that have developed
plans. In other words, again it has been the
role of just, "Don't solve your environmental
problems. Somebody will come in with financial
assistance and help you do it at a later date."
Hopefully, those agencies who
have done some planning are going to be ahead
of the game and will be ready to move when
financial assistance does become available,
either from the state or local level.
I mention this in the hope
that if it is possible or if financial assistance
or construction is going to be generated in a
matter of a few years, we ought to begin pro-
moting it and trying to get it implemented right
now.
I am not aware that there is,
as yet, significant incentive in our programs
to encourage or force local units to work to-
gether to solve their problems.
In Michigan, we have a pretty
strong home rule for cities, township governments
and county government.
We do expect a good deal of
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animosity in certain areas.
Michigan does have legislation
which will permit local units to combine into
an authority and such has been used for solid
waste management and can provide reasons for
a regional approach.
For example, I am not aware of
any operating authority that totally encompasses
any of our present regional planning areas to provide
service. In most of our metropolitan agencies
I am aware of some real conflicts because the
various parties within the planning districts
there is not much help.
In the fill — I would like to
comment a little about open dumps.
I think I am concerned that we
develop a program that talks about closing open
dumps and don't address the real issue of sanitary
landfills.
I hope we don't get into a
square tactic program to eliminate many of the
projects that are underway in developing qualified
landfills. It may be a comment such, to the
effect, that while the environmental concerns
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are justified, in sanitary landfills, I hope
resource recovery can be sold primarily on its
value to society and not sold solely on its
comparison to the landfills.
In the field of resource
recovery, I would like to reemphasize the point
made this morning, that point to the part of
the role of state and local government. That
relates to the need to develop adequate, stable
and feasible markets for recycled materials
insofar, if necessary, to help in the creation of
industry that will use these materials.
We should further investigate,
eliminate where possible, and prevent any further
development of state or Federal legislation that
places obstacles in the path of resource recovery.
Freight differentials, for instance.
These are some of the keys to developing resource
recovery rather than some of the programs I have
heard discussed today.
As you know, PL94-580 will be
developing a program for hazardous w. ste management.
Here I feel some emphasis should be placed on the
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need to recover any valuable materials that
can be recycled from that particular waste stream.
I would like to see the hazardous waste program
not only for enforcement and control, but be
directed at developing, processing, decontamination,
stablization, recycling and reuse facilities for
this waste stream.
We do have processes in this
country that are a part of our society that are
generating problem wastes, and while they do pro-
vide a challenge, we should gear up to meet them
in a manner that will face the environmental needii
and consider the conservation of natural resourcest
through resource recovery along with various con-
trol programs for both.
Thank you.
MR. LOWE: Thank you.
I'd like to welcome comments,
questions.
MR. WARD: You pointed out a project of $15
from 100 tons of refuse as recoverable value.
At what cost was this $15 worth
of recovered material obtained?
And, secondly, what quantities --
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total of waste do you have to deal with in
order to obtain that kind of recovery at that
cost?
MR. WARD; All right.
Let me take that question one
by one.
I think probably the best answer
to give you on the idea of costs is to refer to
our Northeast Massachusetts project, and that
plant is operated for 3450 tons per day -- it
will operate at an average of 3000 tons per day.
The proposal that we have allows
for the recovery of heat energy as electricity
and for ferrous metal only, and we intend to
implement the rest of the system, but the cost
as bid based on those two recoveries only, and
the total recovery, therefore, was something over
$10 a ton for energy, which the number has risen
now because of the increase in the value of energy
to over a $1 a ton from the ferrous metal recovery,
That gave a tipping fee, there is
still a cost, and the 3000 ton per day level was
right at $5 per ton. So, the total cost of pro-
cessing the waste at the time of the proposal was
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approximately $16 per ton.
I should note that that cost
includes $1 per ton to the whole community in
lieu of taxes. That is for a large regional plant.
In a smaller plant, some of these
costs can not be obtained. I think that the
economies of scale are commercially demonstrated
in such a large plant; they are not available
in a plant of, let us say, a 100 tons per day.
Just where the economic breakpoint is depends
largely on the local situation, the ordinance
available for solid waste disposal, the ordinance
available for energy production, and so on.
MR. LOWE: Could I interrupt here?
What is the sense of your question;
the purpose?
Is it to make the point that
refuse by itself doesn't tell the whole story or
did you want specifically to know how much the
system costs?
MR. WARD: I was trying to get at the economics
of such an operation and at what size, what the
smallest threshold may be for getting into that
kind of operation?
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MR. LOWE: If I could exercise ray perogative
as moderator, given the late hour, I think asking
the cost of a resource recovery facility is like
asking what it's going to cost to buy a car. It
depends on what kind of car and what kind of
performance you expect to get out of it.
The system that UOP markets is
one of several that are available, some of which
are better at large-scale, some better at smaller
scales. I think this is really not the place to
get an answer that could be useful to you.
Sir? State your name.
MR. COX: Al Cox.
The net, minus $5 would be to
balance that against the cost of burying it. I
think his question is valid; isn't it?
MR. LOWE: It depends on the sense.
I think from your-experience,
and this maybe what you are getting at, at the
present time, the refuse from the sale of pro-
ducts are less than the total cost of building
and operating a facility and therefore, there will
be a disposal charge, at least in the early years.
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Some companies predict that once the plant is
built and the construction costs are therefore
determined and fixed, that the increase, the
expected increase in refuse as a result of
inflation will be higher than the increase in
operating cost and therefore, eventually maybe
the product refuse will offset the cost. But,
at the same time, there is no free ride based
upon the sale of products alone.
If you want to disagree, go ahead.
MR. WARD: I agree with that.
MR. LOWE: Sir?
MR. WALTON: John Walton from St. Paul.
I'd like to ask Mr. Ward if
the other recycleable things that you pass over
in your process are passed over because of lack
of technology or because of inadequate pay-out?
MR. WARD: You mean glass, for instance?
Well, let's answer glass and
paper.
Glass technology is available.
The problem at the moment is the economics of
the situation. That material, however is recovered
as an aggregate for asphalt or road building purposes,
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If the economics were different, it could be
recovered and sold if there was a net gain in
doing so.
For paper, paper is a large part
of the combustible, for instance, which is turned
into energy, and that is, of course, definitely
recovered as energy. It's a renewable source
of energy for this type of process. If paper
were recovered by some other means and sold for
a higher value per ton of solid waste, it would,
of course, be a net gain to you.
MR. SINOPOLI: Jim Sinopoli.
I would like to know how the
Resource Conservation Recovery Act is tied into
the Energy Policy and Conservation Act in two
respects. One, regarding waste recycling and
the other regarding waste by fuel supplements-
MR. LOWE: It's been a long time since I
did any thinking about the Energy Conservation
Act.
I am not quite sure how to
answer that. It's not part of our daily menu
of things to think about. I must admit that.
We have kind of put waste oil
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aside for the time being because we have a
project underway and we are waiting for the
results from it. That project is designed to
determine whether or not rerefined waste oil
can be an acceptible substitute for virgin base
for lubricating oil.
The project is being sponsored
by the U.S. EPA and being conducted by the agency
of the government that purchases all lubricating
oils. That's the Department of Defense, if you
can imagine that, is subsidizing the Department,
but we are doing that anyway. They are conducting
it on a series of tests using rerefined lubricating
oil in automobile engines, and, hopefully they
are going to find it's not a good substitute.
If you want to be more specific.
MR. SINOPOLI: is there any financial assistance
for planning demonstrations or implementation of
waste oil recycling programs?
MR. LOWE: At the moment, there is authorization
for a thing such as that because waste oil is
included as a solid waste in the definition of
"wastes" in this Act. And, therefore, it's included.
We don't have any money right now.
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If we had money on a good proposal, we'd fund it.
MR. RONDEAU: Guy Rondeau.
I'd have to agree with EPA
in that the number one priority is the establish-
ment of proper land disposal sites, but I'd also
like to comment that it clearly — the intention
of this legislation is to promote resource
recovery and yet, there seems to be little
attention given to it as compared to earlier
programs within the EPA.
If resource recovery is going
to become substantial in the United States,
I think we are going to have to give more
attention to this in that regard. I would like to
see the EPA direct more attention to both the
planning and financial aspects, in both planning
and in the establishment of full-scale plants,
and I would also like to address the audience
here to carry out the intent of this legislation,
they should contact their legislators to provide
you with adequate funding so that resource re-
covery can be implemented through proper funding.
I also have a question -- you
advocate private ownership to be used. I want
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you to expand on that, and also, you talked about
capital financing through the private sector.
Are companies out there ready
and willing to go in and finance a system on their
own?
MR. LEWIS: The definition of "ownership
control", the reason why I call it that and
put quotes around it, is that it's somewhat
illegal.
Let me use an example. In
my case, I have ownership control of my house,
but the bank owns it. Z have ownership control
legally in that I insure it and I am responsible
for maintaining it and keeping it up to snuff.
The same thing I think can be
true in resource recovery. It can be funded
through a variety of ways, it could even be
funded using government GO bonds, but my opinion
was that even in that case, I would want to see
ownership control preside with the operator of
the facility. I would prefer that be a private
industry rather than using government people.
It's not true in all cases.
Some cities do it perfectly well,
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but not very many.
The second question was
whether or not private companies are out there
ready to invest in this technology?
The answer is "yes." We have
more than one case in which major private companies
have in writing committed themselves to using
their own equity in capitalizing the facility
up to 20 or more percent of the total capital
cost of the facility.
The remainder in many cases
can be funded through a variety of means.
One means is the use of industrial
revenue bonds which is -- let's call it nonpublic
funds, even though it may be funded through a
publicly-sponsored mechanism.
MR. MITCHELL: My name is Bill Mitchell,
and I have a question for Mr. Kellow.
What role, if any, do technology
community single programs play in the overall
state plan?
MR. KELLOW: You mean individual household
recycling programs?
MR. MITCHELL: Community recycling centers.
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MR. KELLOW: We are discussing that
aspect of source of volume production right
now.
We have not made a decision
in that area yet.
Certainly there is reason for
protection in certain areas of the state, we
feel. It's going to depend a little bit on
the overall county plan for that particular
area. We have some recycling operations con-
ducted by a few, as was mentioned this morning,
bedroom communities, but no overall program
in the metropolitan area.
MR. LOWE: Any others?
MS. SOLDBERG [PHONETIC]: Elizabeth
Soldberg, Westmont Environmental Pollution and
also, League of Women Voters.
I just want to follow-up a
little bit -- this is, maybe, too
specific a question, but know in the law
you do have as one of the special studies,
front end source separation study, to talk about
the effect that this type of effort may be on
how recovery centers would operate and* in
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lieu with what I ask Mr. Ward, how sensitive
is a system like yours to the fluctuations in
the waste stream composition?
Do you have a lot of leeway?
If you pulled out a lot of
paper, say by source reduction, would it affect
your operation?
MR. LOWE: Did you hear that question?
The Question is: What is the
effect on the operation of a plant similar to
the system marketed by UOP?
What is the effect on the economics
of that plant of measures such as source separation
of paper or waste reduction?
MR. WARD: All right.
Let me answer it in two parts.
First of all, the combustible
portion of the refuse is composed largely of
paper, Z would say, but not by any means entirely
of paper. It's all sorts of things, plastics,
rags, and so on.
If you removed all of the paper,
you would remove a substantial part of the com-
bustible, but not all. The amount of combustible
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matter you remove is directly proportional
to the amount of energy that won't be recovered
even if you are going to remove 10 percent of
the paper, then the number will go down by 10
percent.
You might ask yourself what
is the value of wastepaper, particularly waste-
paper that might be recovered from the garbage
can? Is it more than $10 per ton by itself,
and the market price varies all over the map,
but in recent history, it's been worth $5 a ton
or less as wastepaper of a higher grade than
paper recovered from the garbage can.
Now, the second part of your
question, I can answer this way.
In our Northeast Massachusetts
project, as part of our original proposal in
developing — in contract language, we have agreed
to cooperate with our source representation program,
meaning that if those programs are in existence
now in say, Marblehead unit community, or if
they are established in the future, we will
cooperate with them in a number of ways, including'
making such a determination if paper was source
separated and delivered to the facility, if
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the market for paper as source-separated paper
was higher than the energy value/ it would be
sold as paper, and the community would benefit
accordingly.
If the market price was lower
than the energy value, the opposite would result
and the communities get 90 percent of the energy
recovered from the Northeast Massachusetts project.
We also would serve as a broker
for cans, glass, other source-separated material
and provide assistance in handling and public
relations, and so on. That's part of our
proposal.
MR. LEWIS: One other way of looking at
this, if you go to source-separate paper, it's
going to be newspaper print and newsprint com-
prises about 7 percent of the waste stream.
Paper comprises about — the combustible comprises
80 percent, which would be high.
So that could be essentially
80 percent or 7 percent or 5.6 percent of the
combustible, for example. If you had a newsprint
recovery source separation program, and if you
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had half the people participating, that would
be half of 67 or 3 percent of the combustible.
They would use 3 percent of their refuse from
which would be — if it was $10, that's 30*.
If you had a good participation
separation program of newsprint, they would lose
30$ a ton. It doesn't seem that important to
me.
MR. LOWE: It is EPA policy that in and of
themselves, an even more beneficial, if it's
done simultaneously, provided that markets exist.
And, we think that it can be done. That has been
balanced against the need for guaranteed waste
streams to industrial processing facilities, which
have a large fixed capital investment.
What this says, I think to planners
— they should try to take into account the source1.
separation and plan for it in advance of initiating
a processing plant.
In other words, before you
invite someone in to design a large plant, you
define which way the stream is going to be and
how much, hopefully, the total waste stream,
which you can recover through source separation.
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MR. KELLOW: The Detroit discussions of
what we do about this — once we design a plant,
you have got your financing set up. I know
that one way they will try to bite into that
system is that the municipality would then be
responsible.
They are going to pay a certain
amount of money into that system, whether some-
body removes that paper, cardboard, or aluminum.
Then, private enterprise has got to protect their
needs.
If you don't have that ability,
you can expect that somebody is going to say,
"You are passing some legislation." So, you are
not going to take anything out of that waste
stream.
MR. LOWE: That raises a point that was
touched upon earlier, what rights the private
sector assumes?
There is a tendency to over-
estimate or underestimate. There are some risks
that the private sector, that are not assumed
under any conditions, and the public sector, and
local government have to assume the risk for
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-150-
certain things. In general, the way these
risks generally are allocated is who has con-
trol of particular aspects of the project.
Since the private sector does
not control the source of waste, that is generally
the responsibility of the local government to
provide a certain type of waste in a certain
quantity.
That's what Mr. Kellow was
getting at.
In general, what I am trying to
say, is that municipalities should expect to assume
some risk and should attempt to get the private
sector to assume others.
MR. WARD: We look at source separation as
one means, by the way, of offsetting increases
in waste generation so that we take issue to a
slight degree to the fact that source separation
should always be in place and operating before
a resource facility is planned to be built, because
we think it can be put in later as ones means of
offsetting your annual growth.
For another thing, we'd like to
submit this for your consideration. Separating
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-151-
aluminum, either — say by combustion method,
gives us a chance to see all the aluminum in
the stream, which we believe the overall recovery
efficiently will be higher at that point.
MR. LOWE: Thank you.
Any other questions?
MR. UNDERWOOD: Warren Underwood.
I'd like to address an earlier
question that Mr. Ward touched on concerning
glass recovery.
I believe you mentioned that
the technology was available now for recovery
of glass in large reviews, that UOP had not
seen, I believe, there are about five resource
recovery facilities that will be recovering
glass, I believe by 1978.
MR. LOWE: That comment was made by the
gentlemen from Owens-Illinois that are about
five resource recovery facilities in some stage
of planning, design or construction that will
be recovering glass by 1978.
Any other questions or comments?
Karl, should I manage here or
do you want to?
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-152-
Thank you for sticking it out
with us, for attending our meeting.
(WHEREUPON, the meeting was
adjourned at 5:10 o'clock p.m.)
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STATE OP ILLINOIS )
) SS
COUNTY OP C O 0 K )
SUSAN RIVERS, being first duly sworn, says
that she is a court reporter doing business in
the City of Chicago and State of Illinois, and
that she reported in shorthand the proceedings
had at the hearing of said cause, and the fore-
going is a true and correct transcript of her
shorthand notes, so taken as aforesaid, and
contains all the proceedings of said hearing.
~ I ( i. -i. 'I /c.. ' yC
Susan Rivers
SUBSCRIBED AND SWORN TO
before me this 18th day of
April, A.D., 1977.
Notary Public
My fomission Expir&s August 4,1980
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JOHN SEXTON CONTRACTORS Co.
9OO JORIE BOULEVARD
OAK BROOK, ILLINOIS 6O521
March 29, 1977
TEL 3J2/6S4.J2BO
Mr. Carl J. Klepitch, Jr.
Chief, Waste Management Branch
U. S. Environmental Protection Agency
Region 5
230 So. Dearborn St.
Chicago, 111. 60604
Dear Mr. Klepitch:
Since I was unable to attend the hearing on Public Law 94-580, I would
like to express my opinion to you.
We at Sexton are expressly concerned because of the apparent negative
attitude of the Act with respect to private industry. Indeed, much of
the Act may include without compromise those whose interests encompass
collection. It is apparent, however, that those who have served their
communities by obtaining and operating landfills will be sorely used
considering the planning aspects as proposed and drafted to date. We
know of no plan which offers the private contractor the freedom of choice,
the economics of which are readily evident in areas where such practices
are commonly employed.
As you know, Sexton has been actively supporting federal solid waste control,
development and planning since the early stages. We are persuaded that
strong federal leadership is an absolute must, but Public Law #94-580 does
not appear to be the type of legislation that will provide the proper incen-
tives.
Much of the preliminary publication of data by the EPA has stressed congres-
sional intentions, the Act's objectives and the establishment of a "partner-
ship between the Office of Solid Waste Management Planning of the U.S.E.P.A.
and local levels of government".
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Mr. Carl J. Klepitch, Jr. March 29, 1977
- 2 -
We wish to recognize the appropriateness of the "intentions" and "objectives"
but feel obligated to point out that according to the Waste Age Survey of
Disposal Practices-*, 36% of the nation's licensed or permitted sanitary
landfills are owned and/or operated by private industry; collection services
in some states are performed almost exclusively by private industry - if any
service is known to exist ; and the so-called "hazardous" waste industry,
except for a few notable exceptions, is exclusively the domain of private
industry. Additionally, since resource recovery or resource conservation
must be economically justified to survive, and has survived for that portion
of the waste for which a demand exists, we find it highly unlikely that the
government's "partnership" will mature without the recognition of the working
partners.
We have reviewed the Act and its provisions and commend the congress for
providing some of the tools we require, but must admist we found the instruc-
tions for their use to be less than satisfactory.
The implementation of Public Law #94-580, the Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act of 1976, has been the focal point of many meetings in Chicago and throughout
the nation. We have reviewed some of the transcripts of these meetings and
have been disappointed with the contents. While the meetings are billed as
"information exchanges" and the "inter-change of ideas, views and attitudes with
the EPA", most of the EPA comments have been in reiteration of the Act itself
with the hard questions eliciting "We haven't decided yet" or "I don't know" and
"That's not within my purview" or "That's what we are going to find out". There
are no positive statements made for us to evaluate.
In essence, the meetings have drawn questions from those in attendance which
could, for the most part, have been anticipated by knowledgeable staff personnel
in advance of these meetings. As experience was gained through this series of
meetings, more of the answers might have been formulated for basic questions
such as:
1. What are the limits or definitions of hazardous waste?
2. How do you propose to divide the nation into planning areas with
implementation responsibilities when these responsibilities have been
traditionally separate and distinct?
3. How will public planning of private enterprise operations be accom-
plished without sacrificing the competitive edge that keeps it going?
(1) Waste Age, January, 1977 - Exclusive Waste Age Survey of the Nation's
Disposal Sites.
(2) Waste Age, February, 1977 - Exclusive Waste Age Survey of the Nation's
Collection Practices
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Mr. Carl J. Klepitch, Jr. March 29, 1977
- 3 -
t. Who is going to tell the county officials that the new plan makes
them responsible for solid waste and "hazardous" solid waste, but
there is no money for the purchase of land in advance of need?
5. What does one do for operating income from government owned lands
which are to be removed from the tax rolls for X number of years?
While many improvements are in order, it must be recognized that the present
system does work and the proposed plan, as we evaluate it, may reduce the
participation on the part of private enterprise making it solely a government
responsibility from origin to disposal.
It is our hope that the accelerated time schedule mandated will be sacrificed
for good, constructive program planning and those who prepare the plan imple-
mentation will correct the omissions and commissions contained within the Act
as it is now written.
Very truly yours,
JOHN SEXTON CONTRACTORS CO.
^zn-fZ&CZ^
Arthur A. Daniels
Executive Vice President
AAD:ms
ends.
Shelf No. 598
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