United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Office of
Public Affairs1
Washington DC 20
Dee'Smber
EPA
The Future: 1984 and beyond.
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Chesapeake Bay Program: Jacques Cousteau, noted French oceanographer, and EPA Ad-
ministrator William D. Ruckelshaus discuss marine pollution problems, including the pro-
posed Chesapeake Bay cleanup program, at a meeting at EPA headquarters. Ruckelshaus
has announced that an agreement has been signed creating an executive council to carry
out cleanup of the Bay. The council will include representatives of Virginia, Maryland,
Pennsylvania, the District of Columbia and EPA. An article on the role of EPA and the
States in carrying out this agreement will appear in the next issue of EPA Journal.
1984 and Beyond
In the 1970's the American
public was educated about the
environment as a national
concern and we learned to
control many of the conventional
pollutants. This month, EPA
Journal considers what will be
the focus of environmental
issues in the future.
The Journal asked a diverse
group of national leaders what
they see as the major environ-
mental concerns emerging in the
remainder of the decade. EPA's
regional administrators discuss
their environmental priorities for
1984.
Symbolic of the tough envi-
ronmental issues of this decade
is the stubborn fire in a
mountain of old tires in
Winchester, Va. The discarded
tire problem in Winchester and
nationally is reviewed by Susan
Tejada, EPA Journal contribu-
ting editor.
Helping illuminate another
major environmental concern
present and future, EPA Ad-
ministrator William D. Ruckel-
shaus discusses the challenge
of controlling toxic pollutants.
Deputy Administrator Alvin L.
Aim reports on EPA's steps to
deal with these substances
and General Counsel A.
James Barnes analyzes one of
the key toxics issues—victim
compensation.
The Administrator also
comments on the cleanup of the
Great Lakes, a great environ-
mental asset shared by the U.S.
and Canada, and gives a brief
status report on another inter-
national concern, acid rain.
Other progress is noted by the
Environmental Industry Awards
granted to recipients, including a
gold mine and a brewery.
Nature's own progress from
season to season is described in
an essay looking forward to the
New Year.
The appointment of more new
key officials at EPA headquarters
and regionally is reported and
recent developments in EPA
activities are described in a
regular feature—Update.
Meanwhile, EPA took time to
celebrate a milestone—its 13th
birthday—an occasion noted by
the Agency's first and current
Administrator. L
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United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Office of
Public Affairs (A-107)
Washington DC 20460
Volume 9
Number 4
December 1983
?/EPA JOURNAL
William D. Ruckelshaus, Administrator
Josephine S. Cooper, Assistant Administrator for External Affairs
Jean Statler, Director, Office of Public Affairs
Charles D. Pierce, Editor
John M. Heritage, Managing Editor
Susan Tejada, Contributing Editor
Articles
EPA is charged by Congress to
protect the Nation's land, air and
water systems. Under a mandate of
national environmental laws, the
Agency strives to formulate and
implement actions which lead to a
compatible balance between human
activities and the ability of natural
systems to support and nurture life.
The EPA Journal is published
by the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency. The Administrator
of EPA has determined that the
publication of this periodical is
necessary in the transaction of the
public business required by law of
this Agency. Use of funds for print-
ing this periodical has been approved
by the Director of the Office of
Management and Budget through
4/1/84. Views expressed by authors
do not necessarily reflect EPA policy.
Contributions and inquiries should be
addressed to the Editor (A-107),
Waterside Mall, 401 M St., S.W.,
Washington, D.C. 20460. No permis-
sion necessary to reproduce contents
except copyrighted photos and other
materials.
National Leaders
Speak on
Environmental Future 2
A New Year
in Nature 7
1984 in EPA's
Regions 8
Dealing with Toxic
Substances:
Present and Future 13
Progress on the
Great Lakes 18
Ruckelshaus Talks
About Acid Rain 19
Tire Fire Lights Up
National Problem 20
Industry Environmental
Award Winners 24
More Appointments at
EPA 26
Update 28
Toxic Chemicals and
Health 30
Minority Students
Working as
EPA Apprentices 32
Front Cover: Sunlight glistens on
an icy road leading past a Ver-
mont farm wrapped in a mantle
of snow. Photri photo by Everett
Johnson.
Photo Credits: Steve Delaney,
B. A. King, Everett Johnson of
Photri, AP.
Design Credits: Robert Flanagan,
Ron Farrah
EPA Journal Resumes
Publishing 10 Times a
Year
EPA Journal, now a quar-
terly, will resume publish-
ing 10 times a year in 1984.
The additional issues will
help compensate for the re-
cent discontinuance by the
Agency of EPA Update, an
external biweekly publica-
tion. The present Journal
subscription rate of $7.50 a
year will continue until the
U.S. Government Printing
Office determines the
appropriate charge for
printing 10 issues a year.
Current subscribers will
continue to receive the
magazine at no extra
charge until their sub-
scriptions expire. The Jour-
nal was started in 1975 and
printed 10 times a year un-
til September, 1981, when
the number of issues was
reduced to six and then to
four in 1982.
EPA JOURNAL Subscriptions
The annual rate for subscribers in the
U.S. for the EPA Journal is
$7.50. The charge to subscribers in
foreign countries is $9.40 a year. The
price of a single copy of the Journal
is $2.50 in this country and $3.15 if
sent to a foreign country. Prices
include mailing costs. Subscriptions
to EPA Journal as well as to other
Federal Government magazines are
handled only by the U.S. Government
Printing Office. Anyone wishing to
subscribe to the Journal should fill in
the form at right and enclose a
check or money order payable to the
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National
Leaders
Speak on
Environmental
Future
Russell E. Train
President
World Wildlife Fund~U.S.
Former EPA Administrator
Owen Bieber
President
United Auto Workers
What should we expect as the
major, national environmental
problems for the remainder of
the 1980's and what can we do
to prepare for them?
EPA Journal asked a diverse
group of leaders around the
country their views on this
question. They included elected
officials, en vironmen talis ts,
business groups, labor, and
public interest organizations.
Here are their answers:
It is my belief that the most crucial long-
term environmental problem we face is
how to balance the world's natural re-
source needs with its human needs. The
policies we pursue in the coming decade
toward managing these needs will have
unprecedented implications on the quali-
ty of life for generations to come.
Nowhere is sound resource man-
agement more urgently needed than in
the non-industrialized, or Third World na-
tions. In my judgement, the central focus
of both development and conservation
efforts in these countries must center up-
on encouraging at the local level the
kinds of industry and enterprise that en-
able people to support themselves and
reap ongoing economic benefits from the
use of their natural resources. Until the
people of these nations find sustainable
ways of using these resources, they will
have no choice but to continue to dam-
age and deplete them.
The non-industrialized world has
tended to regard development and the
safeguarding of natural resources as
mutually exclusive. That perception, how-
ever, is changing. Increasingiy, leaders of
developing nations are recognizing that
sustainable growth and economic de-
velopment can only occur on an ecologi-
cally sound base. They are coming to
understand that the kind of development
they need is that which allows people to
make their living without destroying or
impairing their cropland, pasture, forests
and water supplies which are necessary
both to meeting human needs and to
supporting the diversity of other life on
the planet.
In short, conservation and de-
velopment efforts in the Third World can
only succeed to the extent that they com-
bine to offer the poor a genuine alterna-
tive to the continued consumption of
their natural capital.
The development of a harmonious rela-
\A/hile broad public awareness of the toxic
waste disposal problem assures that
remedial steps will be taken, the dangers
posed by workplace chemicals are far less
widely understood. The rapid proliferation of
potentially harmful chemicals and the
resulting difficulty of tracing ill effects back
to their workplace source define this problem
as a hidden time bomb in public health
terms. The solution, in our view, is rigorous
application of stringent "right to know"
standards whereby all potentially hazardous
substances are clearly labeled and workers
are continually updated on the nature of the
substances they are working with, the proper
handling of such substances and the identifi-
cation of symptoms which might indicate a
harmful exposure level.
As the decade unfolds, we will be racing
the clock in the face of impending disaster
unless we get a handle on accumulating
workplace toxins. Industry, and in particular
the chemical industry, will very likely argue
that government regulation in this area will
impede American productivity and cost us
jobs vis-a-vis our worldwide competitors. I
think the experience of some of the
European countries will show to the contrary
that prudent regulation is fully consonant
with a competitive situation.
tionship between human populations and
their natural resource base will be a de-
cisive factor in bringing about the politi-
cal, economic, and social stability in the
Third World necessary to ensure a more
harmonious future for all of mankind.
EPA JOURNAL
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Dorothy S. Ridings
President
League of Women Voters
Russell W. Peterson
President
National Audubon Society
Dr. Jay D. Hair
Executive Vice President
National Wildlife Federation
In the last 10 years, the nation has worked
intensively to improve water quality.
Although much has been accomplished in
controlling water pollution from industrial
and municipal sources, clearly much remains
to be done. One major unresolved problem is
the growing threat posed by toxic contami-
nation of drinking water supplies—particu-
larly groundwater resources.
Another problem is controlling the sub-
stantial water pollution problems linked to
non-point or diffuse sources, such as runoff
from farmland and construction sites.
But in the next decade, in addition to
tackling these unresolved water pollution
control issues, the nation must grapple with
some fundamental water management ques-
tions. How should water resources be
allocated among competing uses? What uses
should be given priority? Who should pay?
And at what price?
League members across the country are
increasingly concerned about the ramifica-
tions of inter-basin transfer of water; the
depletion of precious groundwater supplies;
and, finally, the steps that can be taken now
to ensure that adequate supplies of clean
water are available to meet our future needs.
One thing is certain —in the next decade we
must make sure that water conservation
becomes a part of the nation's environmental
ethic, just as energy conservation did in the
last decade.
Although nuclear war and human popula-
tion growth stand out as the greatest
threats to the environment, the way we
procure, transport and use energy must rate
in third place.
Consider the ramifications of past and
present energy practices. The mining of coal
and uranium, and the drilling for oil,
continue to degrade and disfigure the land.
Sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and particu-
lates released from electric power plants—
and carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and
hydrocarbons from auto exhausts—pollute
the air and cause acid rain. The burning of
fossil fuels releases CO2 which may seriously
alter the world's climate. Deforestation for
wood fuel causes soil erosion and depletes
watersheds. Oil spills befoul the coasts.
Nuclear plants stockpile huge quantities of
long-lived radioactive waste, adding to the
earth's burden of life-threatening materials
and facilitating the spread of nuclear
weapons.
A most promising development of the past
few years is the more efficient use of energy
stimulated by the increased price of oil.
Doubling auto mileage per gallon of gasoline,
for example, permits cutting the production
and burning of gasoline in half, thus
reducing the impact on the environment.
Continuing increases in the efficiency with
which energy is used should permit substan-
tial growth in the world's production of
goods and services with less energy con-
sumption in the year 2000 than today. And
of course the sun offers the potential to
eventually satisfy all our energy needs. While
we prepare for an energy future based on
greater efficiency and the substitution of
renewable solar energy—in its many forms-
tor conventional fossil fuels, our government
must in the interim insist that industry use
the best technology for burning fossil fuels
so as to minimize environmental damage.
Crom an environmental point of view,
nothing will be more important in the next
decade than cleaning up the toxic nightmare
we have created and properly disposing of
the hazardous wastes we generate daily to
prevent a recurring nightmare in the future.
For example, more than a ton of hazardous
waste for every person in this country is
added to our environment every year. The
sheer magnitude of the problem cannot be
ignored. Of the 16,000 inactive hazardous
waste sites identified by EPA, 5,000 will
require some degree of cleanup. Of the 539
most dangerous sites identified so far, 75
percent have groundwater contamination
problems. In 954 cities studied by EPA this
year, 29 percent have contaminated drinking
water supplies—most likely due to the
leaching of toxic wastes.
We must come to grips with the toxics
dilemma not just during this decade, but
with an eye on long-term natural resource
trends.
Because this country needs both a healthy
environment and economic growth, we must
make the maintenance of that sound
environment compatible with the cost of
doing business. We must create economic
incentives for industry not only to clean up
its wastes, but to find new ways for proper
future disposal as well.
Bernard Baruch once observed that "the
highest and best form of efficiency is the
spontaneous cooperation of a free people."
The cooperation of all parties concerned with
our toxics problems will hopefully lead to a
solution that produces the clean environment
all Americans want.
DECEMBER 1983
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Mike Lindberg
City Commissioner of
Portland, Ore., and Chairman of the
Energy, Environment and
Natural Resources Committee,
National League of Cities
Although considerable progress has been
^^ made in the environmental area, due in
large part to federal legislation, significant
environmental problems will need to be
addressed over the next decade. Two in
particular come to mind.
One problem concerns the difficulty of
making environmental decisions in the face
of scientific and technological uncertainty.
Over the past year, Congress has grappled
with the decision to develop a national acid
rain control program, despite questionable
data linking S02 and NOX emissions from a
particular source to a particular "receptor"
area. Yet, untess a control program is
enacted, irreversible environmental damage
may be done. Similarly, data which would
support the creation of a federal compensa-
tion program for victims of hazardous
substances is seriously deficient. However,
there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of
persons who have been damaged by such
substances and who have not been
adequately remedied by the judicial process.
Further, Congress has tried to develop
various means of disposing of hazardous
wastes, yet it is known that all of the landfill
disposal methods are technologically
unsound and will eventually fail, and the
technological adequacy of other disposal
methods is highly uncertain. Given these
seemingly overwhelming uncertainties, how
can our national decision-makers make
informed decisions? Clearly, there are no
easy answers to this problem. At a mini-
mum, there must be continued federal
emphasis on environmental research and
development efforts.
The second problem concerns the diffi-
culty of relating one environmental program
to another. Over the past year, it has
become evident that federal environmental
decisions in one area have repercussions for
a second or third area. Proposed federal
policy to lessen the use of land disposal
methods of hazardous wastes may cause an
increase in incineration, which in turn may
cause an increase in incinerator-related air
pollution. Federal requirements to clean
wastewater to secondary treatment
Dr. Jack D. Early
President
National Agricultural
Chemicals Association
Cor the agricultural chemicals industry, as
well as for industry in general, the poten-
tial of groundwater contamination will
continue to be an issue. I am confident that
our scientists can develop solutions for
preventing or correcting groundwater
contamination, although those solutions
could be technically difficult to achieve.
Dealing with the issue of groundwater
contamination is more difficult. Issues evolve
out of public perceptions which may or may
not be directly related to the facts. Success
in dealing with this and other issues depends
upon several factors.
First, good, solid science must support
both formal actions and public discussion by
the Environmental Protection Agency.
Second, both EPA and industry must work
to establish public confidence in the quality
of the science supporting their activities.
Finally, the public itself must come to
understand that the mere presence of a
chemical in groundwater at a relatively low
level is not necessarily a risk to public health
or the environment. Also, it must be recog-
nized that all groundwater is not of drinking
quality due to both natural and man-induced
causes. This situation necessitates normal
groundwater management programs balanc-
ing use and quality criteria.
standards causes toxic sludge creation and
disposal problems. Over the next decade,
EPA may need to take a more holistic
approach to environmental problems which
may necessitate a restructuring of the
agency's internal organization. Similarly, the
organization of the various Congressional
committees concerned with environmental
issues may need revision.
Ted Wilson
Mayor of Sa/t Lake City, Utah
and Chairman of the
Energy and Environment Committee,
U.S. Conference of Mayors
\A/hen it comes to environmental matters,
where you stand depends a great deal
on where you sit. As the Mayor of a major
American city for the last eight years, and
Chairman of the U.S. Conference of Mayors'
Energy and Environment Committee since
1981, I believe the greatest challenge we face
as a nation in the next decade in the environ-
mental area is to develop and sustain a
national environmental consensus, not only
on the problems we face in restoring the
quality of our land, air and water—but on
the solutions as well.
Looking back over recent history, it's clear
that the greatest environmental achievement
of the 1970"s was the broad-based education
of the American people on the existence of
significant threats to our environment. That
understanding is now a permanent part of
the national political culture we all share. But
we sorely lack environmental consensus on
the solutions we will have to implement to
achieve the results we desire.
This consensus must be built on several
fronts simultaneously. There must be
consensus between the Administration and
Congress; there must be consensus among
regions; and there must be consensus within
our own communities.
Mayors have neither the luxury nor the
time to view environmental matters as
separate problems or occasional concerns.
We know too well that they are part of an
overall system which at once threatens the
health and quality of life for all Americans.
Consensus and action at all government
levels must be our top priority for the next
decade so that a clean environment can be
not a battle we are fighting, but one which
we have won.
4
EPA JOURNAL
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Henry A. Waxman
U.S. Congressman (D.-Calif, t
Chairman, Subcommittee on
Health and the Environment,
House Committee on
Energy and Commerce
Derhaps the most crucial issue of the 1980's
will be whether we continue to resolve
uncertainty in favor of protecting public
health or we adopt crude mathematical
formulas such as cost/benefit analysis and
risk assessment as tools for making decisions.
Today, the protection of public health is the
keystone of our environmental laws including
the Clean Air Act and the Safe Drinking
Water Act, the environmental statutes under
my subcommittee's jurisdiction. For over a
decade, we have sought to protect particu-
larly sensitive citizens such as children, the
aged, and pregnant women from polluted air
and water. We have yet to eliminate
unhealthy air in our cities, to regulate
effectively cancer-causing air pollutants, or
to begin to deal with the threats to our
ecology—and possibly our health —posed by
acid rain. Nor have we ensured the safety of
our nation's drinking water supplies.
We can continue the progress already made
or we can rationalize away the hazards that
still exist by the misguided use of risk assess-
ment and cost/benefit analysis. Even though
industry and many within the current
Administration want greater and greater
reliance on these mathematical tools, I don't
think the American people will stand for
abandoning many of our citizens who are
most sensitive to pollution. For in the final
analysis, when we get through all the maze
of numbers and scientific hypotheses, we are
talking about people's lives and the judgment
of who will live and who will die.
Robert Stafford
U.S. Senator fft-VtJ, and
Chairman, Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee
Our modern life has become dependent to
^ an astonishing degree on chemicals that
are synthesized or isolated from natural
products.
But it has only been in recent years that
we have been made acutely aware of the
fact that many of these chemicals—perhaps
thousands of them —are poisonous.
A series of frightening events has
awakened us to the fact that not only are we
making poisonous substances, but that we
are releasing them into our environment in
staggering amounts.
We still don't know very much about all
this, but we do know that our nation has
another environmental health crisis on its
hands.
The care and handling of toxic chemicals
has become the issue that will dominate our
environmental agenda for the remainder of
the twentieth century.
At the turn of this decade, the American
Chemical Society had listed more than four
million distinct chemical compounds that had
been reported in the literature in the previous
15 years—and that list was growing at the
rate of 6,000 each week.
The Environmental Protection Agency has
told us that there may be as many as 70,000
chemicals in commercial production in the
United States. Perhaps as many as 10,000 of
that total are dangerous.
The list is growing daily. And hardly a
week goes by without another report of a
newly discovered hazard in the marketplace
or in the workplace, in air or in water, or in
some other part of the environment.
We should not restrict our inquiry into the
universe of problems caused by the release
of toxics into our environment to only those
situations that have made headlines, because
the problem is all about—in every part of our
nation.
What we must do is to explore every
aspect of how and why these poisons are
entering our environment and how much
injury they are causing. We must decide how
to help those who have been injured, and
also how to stop such injury in the future.
We are beginning an inquiry that may lead
Christopher S. Bond
Governor of Missouri and
Chairman of the Committee on
Energy and Environment,
National Governors' Association
In my view, the challenges we face in
managing hazardous and toxic substances
are the most difficult we have encountered in
the history of environmental protection.
Specifically, hazardous air pollutants,
groundwater contamination, and toxic water
pollution present us with very difficult
problems and choices, for a number of
reasons. Perhaps foremost, there is a very
limited body of scientific knowledge concern-
ing which substances are hazardous, and at
what doses. Without a sense of what may
be the safe level, if any, for a hazardous sub-
stance, regulation will be based on guess-
work. Second, we have not developed
adequate, affordable technologies to reduce
or eliminate many hazardous substances
from our air or water. The alternative of
shutting down plants is not an acceptable
solution. Third, we have not made sufficient
effort to integrate Into our industrial
processes means to reduce the total
generation of toxic wastes.
While the problems we face are tough,
they are not insurmountable. With a greater
emphasis on research into the health effects
of suspected hazardous or toxic materials, on
the development of more effective control
technologies, and on the restructuring of our
industrial processes, we can do a better job
of cleaning up past mistakes as well as
ensuring that we don't create new problems
in the future.
us to dramatic changes in the way we
conduct our lives. Such changes may be
required if we are to avoid unacceptable risks
to ourselves and to our environment.
DECEMBER 1983
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Alexander B. Trowbridge
President
National Association of Manufacturers
Cor two decades, the American political
agenda has included a prominent place for
environmental discussion. During the
eighties, that agenda will focus in large part
on solutions to the disposal of hazardous
wastes, a problem we have only recently
come to understand.
Hazardous waste management will
continue to play a major part in America's
environmental debate for two reasons. The
first is the legacy of years of casual disposal
of hazardous wastes. The second is the large
volume of this inevitable byproduct of a
technologically-advanced society. It will take
a major effort to store and dispose of wastes
in an ecologically sound manner, but it can
be done.
One possible solution is incineration —the
burning of hazardous wastes, either on land
or at sea. Though the emissions of such a
process would still be toxic, the amount of
waste could be reduced considerably. The
technology now available makes this process
very expensive. But technology advances
rapidly, and if we will commit ourselves to
researching and developing the process, we
may end up with a good solution to a diffi-
cult problem.
Producers and consumers atike share the
responsibility for shaping waste policies that
are cost-efficient as well as consistent with
public health objectives. The federal govern-
ment should encourage the states to
designate disposal sites —without facility
requirements that are so stringent that they
preclude an actual site location. Adequate,
safe disposal facilities are the primary goal of
everyone concerned.
Today's hazardous waste management
programs should be highly selective, concen-
trating on those areas and sites where the
most wastes are being generated. Addi-
tionally, not all sites are equally toxic, though
current regulations often treat them as
though they were. Those that pose the
greatest health threat naturally should be the
first to be cleaned up.
The ultimate solution to the problem of
hazardous wastes still lies in the future—
hopefully, the near future. Whatever that
solution turns out to be, it will require the
serious efforts and cooperation of industry,
government and the public.
John Quarles
Attorney and
Former EPA Deputy Administrator
"To me the next big problem that EPA will
confront over the coming decade is
obvious. It is to deal more effectively with all
the old problems already stacked high on its
platter.
The expression "overworked, underpaid,
and unappreciated" comes closer to the
truth, when applied to EPA, with each
passing year. This Agency is one where
budget cuts conflicted with wise national
policy. As EPA's jurisdictions have been
expanded, its responsibilities have multiplied.
Its manpower needs have grown.
Even more serious than the manpower gap
is the need to reassess EPA's role in
addressing the universe of vexing environ-
mental issues. Public expectations are now
almost hopelessly unrealistic. The prevailing
assumption is that Congress and EPA,
through federal regulation, can control the
unlimited diversity of sources and individual
practices which in the aggregate create
environmental problems. It cannot be done.
Whether one is talking about users of
municipal sewage treatment plants, or small
generators of hazardous waste, or dry
cleaning establishments and other diffuse
sources of air emissions, or ranchers, farmers
and other non-point sources of surface water
runoff, the sheer numbers of affected
persons place limits on what the federal
government can do. So it is with many other
environmental problems.
Often EPA has aggravated the inherent
difficulty of its task by reaching out for more
jurisdiction and by establishing intricate
regulatory requirements. The inherent
complexity of the problems is thus com-
pounded by the complexity of EPA's
response.
To the extent that EPA may operate
efficiently off the top of the pile—concen-
trating on the most serious needs and simply
allowing others to slide—the excesses of
regulatory over-reach may be innocuous. But
it does not seem to work that way. Instead,
one detects a rising preoccupation with the
paperwork, a greater sense of spinning
wheels. Harried by pressures from without
and within, the program managers may be
distracted from those efforts that would be
truly productive. In comparing regulatory
controls against environmental results, it
indeed may be true that less is more.
With public pressures intense, especially in
the extremely complex fields of toxic sub-
stances and hazardous wastes, it is hard to
see any easy ways to achieve actual simplifi-
cation in EPA's vast undertakings. But the
first need is just to see the problem clearly.
To see and to resolve it is the biggest
challenge EPA faces today.
EPA JOURNAL
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Environmental Almanac
A New Year
in Nature
Glossy Ibis
"The curtain is lifting now on a magnificent
free show —the arrival of the new year in
nature. It offers splendor, savagery, peace,
and a whiff of eternity.
While paper calendars mean nothing in the
natural world, January is a good time to
begin listening again to the ageless rhythms
of the forest, fields and streams.
The outdoor season begins softly like the
opening of a symphony with muted violin
strings. Then gradually the tempo picks up
with the approach of spring. As the pulse
quickens we hear the mounting frenzy of
sawing violin bows, the boom of kettle
drums, the groaning of bass fiddles and
blaring of trumpets.
Gradually the music flows into the flower-
ing of summer, then glides into quieter
reflective passages for fall and subsides with
flute calls announcing the death of another
year.
One of the charms of the outdoor world is
that it is completely unpredictable. On one
January day you can explore the countryside
after a snow storm and hear only the wind
blustering through some hemlock trees and
the cracking of ice from a nearby lake or
river.
Yet the next day the hush of a snow-
covered land can be suddenly broken by the
frantic crashing of a deer racing down a
glazed hillside. Behind it echoes the baying
of hounds gaining on their quarry.
The deer lurches by, its sharp hooves
breaking through the snow crust with every
step. The pursuing dogs running swiftly on
their padded feet on top of the snow appear
over the brow of the hill just as the deer
reaches the plowed road and races away
with a burst of speed on the firmer surface.
Soon the dogs will see only the blood-
stained tracks left by the deer's legs scraped
raw by the jagged snow crust.
While these pursuit dramas are rarely seen,
fields and woods offer many gentler sights —
a white-breasted nuthatch walking down a
tree trunk head first, a red bellied wood-
pecker undulating through the air from one
tree to another; or a flying squirrel peeking
through a crevice in its tree-trunk home at a
stranger wandering by.
Although nature offers its rewards every-
where to anyone who will take the time to
look, the Washington, D. C. area is excep-
tionally rich in natural beauty and variety of
life.
Located approximately three hours away
from both 4,000-foot mountains and ocean
beaches, this region provides an exceptional
number of habitats for birds and mammals.
A particularly keen observer of the Wash-
ington natural scene was Louis J. Halle, a
former State Department official who found
the first evidence of approaching spring in
the faint dawn singing of a cardinal in
January.
Halle, author of the noted Spring in
Washington published in 1945, lamented that
"the government has no department that
takes cognizance of life itself; it posts no
watchers out of doors to sniff the wind and
inform those within of eternity."
One of the loveliest developments in
Washington each spring is the flowering of
forsythia in great overflowing golden clusters
which brighten many lawns and parks.
Outside the city, wood ducks nest high in
sycamore trees up and down the Potomac
River and from pond and lakes the little frogs
called spring peepers are clamoring for
mates, as they have for thousands of years.
The arrival of summer will find many
animals in the area searching feverishly for
food to support their new young. Among
these will be the resurgent beavers.
These animals are sometimes viewed with
mixed emotions because they can gnaw
through prized trees on private land and kill
others by flooding woodfots behind their
newly constructed dams.
While these elusive creatures are rareiy
seen during daylight they can occasionally be
seen by moonlight if you follow the sound of
their splashing or their chewing on a tree
trunk.
One of the more exotic creatures active in
the region during the summer is the glossy
ibis, a wading bird with irridescent copper
plumage. Flocks of ibis, once sacred to the
ancient Egyptians, can often be seen at the
Chincoteague Island wildlife refuge with their
long curved beaks racing up and down like
sewing machine needles as they feed in a
frenzy on small insects, fish and frogs in the
marshes.
As fall approaches, ruby-throated
hummingbirds in the area begin to train for
their long migration flights which will take
many of them over the Gulf of Mexico. They
engage in mock aerial duels while visiting
flowers or artificial feeders to drink nectar or
sugar water.
As one bird hovers on furiously beating
wings beneath a feeder, another humming-
bird will dive bomb it from above and force
the first bird away. The deposed bird will
then retaliate by zipping around a tree to
ambush its rival just as it gets ready to sip
from the feeder. Sometimes five or more
hummingbirds will engage in this aerial war-
fare, darting back and forth in a dazzling
display.
Even with these warm-up exercises, many
hummingbirds, as well as other small birds,
fail to complete the perilous journey across
the Gulf of Mexico. Buffeted by storms, the
exhausted creatures drown in the choppy
water, although some find temporary refuge
on passing ships.
Walk the countryside in winter and note
the constellations blazing in the brilliant star-
studded skies —Orion, the hunter; the Great
Bear, Cassiopeia, the Queen; and Cygnus,
the Swan, flying across the heavens.
This is also the time when the hooting of
owls has a special meaning. It's courting
season and the owls will soon be mating and
nesting, despite snow and cold. Their young
will be ready to leave the nest by the end of
winter.
While we talk of the end of one season
and the beginning of another, we know that
all time is seamless.
For those interested in spending more time
with nature, there are several excellent
regional books in addition to Halle's Spring
in Washington. These include Claudia Wilde's
Finding Birds in the National Capital Area, a
Smithsonian publication; Natural Washing-
ton, a nature lover's guide to Washington,
by Bill and Phyliss Thomas; and, for those
interested in the major mountain range near
Washington, Maurice Brooks' The Appalach-
ians, a landmark in natural history writing.
Armed with these books, you will be ready
to explore the outdoors world and heed
Milton's counsel: "Tomorrow to fresh woods
and pastures new." —C. D. P.
DECEMBER 1983
-------
1984
in EPA's
Regions
Michael R. Deland
Region 1
Jacqueline E. Schafer
Region 2
For a look ahead in EPA's 10 regional offices,
the EPA Journal asked the Regional
Administrators to comment on their environ-
mental priorities in 1984. Their views follow:
Mew England prides itself on its vital and
valuable coastline. Our coastal waters
are major resources for boaters, swimmers,
clammers, fishers, and nature lovers.
One of my top Regional priorities in 1984
will be to accelerate water pollution cleanup
efforts in coastal areas, particularly Boston
Harbor.
The recreational potential of Boston
Harbor is great, but use of this resource is
curtailed by poorly functioning primary treat-
ment plants at Deer and Nut Islands in the
Harbor. These facilities handle some 500
million gallons of wastewater every day. The
plants are antiquated and overloaded.
I intend to work closely with a special
commission appointed by Massachusetts
Governor Michael Dukakis which is develop-
ing a long-range master plan for the Harbor,
as well as with our Congressional delegation,
local officials and concerned citizens.
We are pressing ahead with the develop-
ment of a draft environmental impact state-
ment designed to develop treatment alterna-
tives. Improvements to Nut Island are
underway and a facilities upgrading plan for
Deer Island will be prepared.
We will not resolve all of the problems in
Boston Harbor in 1984. It will take time-
probably more than a decade—and it will be
expensive—well in excess of a billion dollars.
But, we will be putting in motion in 1984
many initiatives that will pay dividends in the
years ahead.
In addition to Boston Harbor, there are
other troubling coastal problems I will be
addressing. We will seek a solution to the
major PCB problem in New Bedford Harbor
and an end to the dumping of sludge into
the ocean by the South Essex Sewerage
District, north of Boston. Toward the end of
1983, we initiated a major enforcement
action against the District requiring an
immediate end to the dumping of sludge.
Other 1984 alternatives will be the develop-
ment of regional strategies dealing with the
problem of failing underground gasoline
storage tanks and the air toxics problem,
both high priorities with our New England
states.
I n Region 2, which includes New York,
New Jersey, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin
Islands, the problems of hazardous and toxic
chemicals have mushroomed into our top
environmental priorities. We are addressing
them through our Superfund and Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act programs in
close conjunction with the states.
Region 2 has nearly one quarter of the 546
Superfund sites on the National Priority List;
there are 85 in New Jersey alone, 29
in New York, and 8 in Puerto Rico. New
Jersey ranks first among all the states, and
in FY 1984, we expect New York to
nominate several more sites for the list.
Our goal this year ijsto get out and clean
up as many sites as we can. We want to
move as many sites as possible from the
remedial investigation and study phases, into
the design and engineering phase, to final
cleanup. We also intend to initiate investiga-
tions and studies at as many new priority
sites as possible. Here are a few highlights:
• The number one site on the National
Priorities List is Lipari landfill in Gloucester
County, New Jersey. We are nearly finished
installing a cutoff wall and cap; after that,
we will develop a final site closure plan.
• At Love Carjal in Niagara Falls, New York
State continues to operate a leachate
collection system and to oversee the comple-
tion of an expanded cap over the canal and:-
its drainage area. The State is studying the
need, if any, to include additional cost effec-
tive and environmentally sound remedies to
contain leachate from the canal.
• In Atlantic City, N.J., chemicals from
Price's Pit landfill are migrating toward the
City's public water supply well field. The
State is about to start drilling wells in a new
location so that some capacity will be on line
in time for the 1984 tourist season. EPA is
looking at what future steps are necessary to
control the plume of contamination that has
already entered the area's groundwater. To
date, EPA and the State have obligated
approximately $8.2 million.
• We expect to decide on the best remedies
to deal with contamination in area creeks
and storm sewers before the end of 1983 and
get them into construction next fall. Nearly
$8 million has been obligated from the
Superfund to date.
EPA JOURNAL
-------
Thomas P. Eichler
Region 3
Charles R. Jeter
Region 4
Valdas Adamkus
Region 5
The majority of the problems facing the
Mid-Atlantic Region are similar to those
faced by the nation as a whole. Conse-
quently, the Regional Office is placing
emphasis on helping the Agency to deal with
those priorities established by Administrator
Ruckelshaus in the Management Account-
ability System. However, Region 3 has some
unique problems which demand unique solu-
tions. To insure these solutions are found, I
have also established eight Regional priorities
for my staff.
As might be expected, dealing with
hazardous waste is a major priority. Region 3
is near the top in terms of the number of
dumpsites which must be addressed under
Superfund and the number of active hazard-
ous waste facilities regulated under the
Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.
Since the credibility of the entire Agency
hinges on how we deal with hazardous
waste, my staff and I are doing everything
we can to move forward with this very
complex new program.
Enforcement is another important program
for the Agency. In Region 3, we will concen-
trate our efforts on making enforcement a
tool to increase compliance and provide
actual environmental improvement. Key focal
areas are hazardous waste, federal facilities
and Chesapeake Bay water quality.
Region 3 recently completed a seven-year,
$27-million water quality management study
of the Chesapeake Bay. A major priority in
the coming year will be to assist the states in
implementing the recommendations made in
the study to protect and improve the water
quality and natural resources of (the Chesapeake.
Issues of ocean dumping and ocean
incineration of waste off the mid-Atlantic
coast are of great concern to our municipali-
ties and resort areas. We are working to
ensure that Agency policies in these areas
are integrated with concerns about near-
shore and land-based facilities.
Most of Region 3's states have or are
assuming delegation of the major national
environmental programs. We will work with
these states to provide more helpful over-
views and to improve our technical
assistance, particularly our laboratory
support, so that we can provide ourselves,
the states, and the public with a quick and
accurate assessment of local or regional
environmental conditions whenever needed.
Finally, we are using a variety of manage-
ment tools to help Regional managers grade
their performance on actual environmental
results. Since environmental improvement is
really the bottom line for the EPA, this goal,
in all programs, will be our major priority.
\A/hile Superfund activities currently
v v continue as part of a nationwide priority,
Region 4's diverse environmental concerns
require focusing our energies and efforts in
many of the same areas of environmental
protection as in the past.
Because of the large number of Federal
facilities located in this Region, one of our
top priorities will be to work with those
Federal agencies to improve compliance with
environmental regulations.
Emphasis on water programs will also be
evident in the Region, In the area of ground-
water protection, we are reviewing our
administrative procedures and ensuring
coordination among all program areas to
protect this valuable resource. One such
effort involves the Biscayne Aquifer, which is
the sole source of drinking water for the
three million residents of southeastern
Florida.
There are eight Superfund sites
located in the aquifer recharge area which
may be contributing to contamination. We
are currently conducting a three-phase study
to determine the remedial actions needed for
Superfund site cleanup and for any other
actions required for the continuing protection
of the aquifer. Wastewater treatment
continues to be one of our greatest environ-
mental concerns in this Region. We will use
funds to assist with municipal compliance in
particular. Wetlands protection takes on
increasing importance in the Southeast as
pressures for development continue.
With our high levels of delegation we will
work to ensure good quality state programs.
We pay close attention to our pesticides
program because of the heavy use of chemi-
cals such as EDB and Temik for agricultural
activities in this area. Superfund cleanups
will continue. Emphasis will be placed on
emergency response capabilities and the
need for adequately trained personnel.
Qecause the six states in the Midwest have
D traditionally drawn their economic and
physical strength from heavy industry, the
tension between protecting the environment
and encouraging economic development is
particularly acute.
Among my highest priorities for 1984 is the
investigation and cleanup of uncontrolled
hazardous waste sites. One-quarter of the
sites on the National Priorities List are
located in this Region. At 16 of these sites,
remedial investigation and feasibility studies
were begun in FY '83, and 24 new sites are
slated for action this year. During FY '83,
immediate removal actions were conducted
at 29 sites, 13 of which were on the National
Priorities List. We project that 20 enforce-
ment actions wil! be taken in 1984.
We have already negotiated tough settle-
ments with firms associated with some of
the most significant sites, such as Chem-
Dyne, Enviro-Chem, and Seymour Recycling.
We expect to participate in negotiations on
20 to 30 sites in 1984. As we start work at
sites, an ambitious community relations
program will continue to address concerns of
local residents.
We will also be inspecting most hazardous
waste disposal sites to make sure they are
complying with Federal regulations for safe
disposal. We will continue strict enforcement
of groundwater protection regulations. We
have been making significant progress in
turning the|Resource Conservation and Re-
covery Act programs over to the states and
wil! continue to work toward this goal in
1984.
We will continue actively to enforce
asbestos and PCB regulations and to place
special emphasis on our role in the
implementation of the national dioxin
strategy, including the conduct of intensive
field studies. As U.S. Chairman of the Great
Lakes Water Quality Board, t am concerned
particularly about the effect that many
toxicants have on the lakes. We will be
looking for new ways to approach toxicant
problems in various environmental media
throughout the Region.
The ongoing search for a workable solu-
tion to acid rain is one of my primary
concerns. Our efforts have been aimed at
ensuring that both the environmental quality
of the sensitive wilderness of northern
Minnesota and the economic viability of the
mining towns of the Ohio River Valley have
been protected. We are looking for environ-
mentally sound and economically feasible
solutions to this most difficult problem.
DECEMBER 1983
-------
Dick Whittington
Region 6
Morris Kay
Region 7
John G. Weiies
Region 8
The five states of Region 6 ... Arkansas,
Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and
Texas ... lie at the very heart of the
"Sunbelt."
Growth of population and industrial
activity throughout the Region have been
tremendous, increasing the pressures on the
environment in virtually every area.
Keeping up with growth in the Region will
be of the highest priority in 1984 and the
years beyond.
More than 25 million people now live in
the Region, and population is expected to
increase by 50 percent by the year 2000.
Already, three of the ten largest cities in the
country are in this Region, and San Antonio
and Austin are among the fastest growing
cities nationwide.
While manufacturing growth has been
slowing in many parts of the United States,
manufacturing in Region 6 is on the
upswing. The largest growth industry is
chemical and allied products, although other
industries such as non-electrical machinery,
fabricated metals, electrical machinery,
primary metals and electronics are also
strong. As the economy recovers, industrial
output will be even greater, further
increasing environmental pressures.
The EPA Region 6 staff has made, and
continues to make, great efforts to attain
and maintain environmental quality in the
area under its jurisdiction. We have made
considerable progress in many areas, but we
still have our work cut out to maintain
quality and to make improvements in areas
where meaningful environmental gains are
possible.
A large part of our challenge is that our
attractive position in the heart of the Sunbelt
makes us vulnerable to the environmental
problems that are so often associated with
growth and development.
We must strive to use our resources
where they will be most effective to protect
the environment and human health.
Qegion 7 is faced with a number of com-
plex and intriguing environmental
challenges. It is our goal to meet these
challenges by operating in an open, fair,
even-handed manner. We are taking strong
enforcement action to assure environmental
compliance as we evaluate each specific
problem and determine the most effective,
safe, and intelligent solution.
Local, national and international media
attention has focused on dioxin contamina-
tion in this Region. However, it is our belief
that all environmental problems in our Region
are important and should be addressed. We
work to resolve each environmental problem
with the same serious and dedicated
approach.
The priorities in Region 7 are to achieve
environmental results by reaching out with
innovative action where applicable to solve
each and every environmental problem that
we face in our day-to-day activity. We
believe this approach will ensure a safe and
healthy environment.
We are firm and fair in applying the
strength of the Agency in order to improve
environmental compliance, and we achieve
positive results by working closely with State
and local environmental officials as well as
concerned citizens. Perhaps most impor-
tantly, we are sensitive to the concerns of
those individuals who have experienced a
dramatic change in their lives because of
environmental issues.
We will continue to pursue this dynamic
effort to produce sound environmental
solutions.
Degion 8's most important environmental
priority for 1984 is a people priority.
Guided by Mr. Ruckelshaus' operating
principles and national goals, we have begun
an exciting rebuilding in the Regional office.
We have established simple Regional goals
to complement the Administrator's and to
refocus our attention after a period of
turmoil. They are:
• We care! We expect excellence.
• We strive for compliance and firm, fair
enforcement.
• We protect the environment.
We have added goals aimed at improving our
professionalism, our internal and external
communications, and our sense of service to
EPA's constituents.
The goals, backed up by detailed objec-
tives and action items, were drafted during
intensive work sessions by key Regional
managers and offered to employees for their
comments and participation in November.
In coming months, we visualize a work-
force with a renewed belief in itself working
aggressively on the full range of environ-
mental challenges facing us. Management
development has also been targeted for
particular attention.
We especially want to show significant
progress in 1984 in dealing with acid deposi-
tion, mining wastes, and groundwater,
problems that are present in other Regions
but especially important here.
We have relatively few sources of sulfur
and nitrogen oxides but many of our water
bodies are especially sensitive to acidifica-
tion. Mining is an economic mainstay in the
Region but its wastes pose substantial
environmental threats in some cases. In this
arid part of the country, groundwater is
immensely important for people, livestock
and natural purposes, and is threatened by
many of our mining, energy and waste
handling activities.
Some of these problems have been with
us for years, of course, and new ones are
emerging. But also emerging is a new, or at
least revitalized, "Can Do" spirit in the
Regional office. We will meet the challenges
of 1984.
10
EPA JOURNAL
-------
Judith E. Ayres
Region 9
Ernesta B. Barnes
Region 10
In 1984, Region 9 will be moving beyond
V traditional, single-purpose approaches to
environmental management.
Over the next year, the Region's federal,
state and local officials will be working
together to develop an integrated process for
identifying environmental problems and for
arriving at improved ways to correct them.
The state's regional air and water boards, and
city and county governments, will be
active participants with EPA in tailoring
programs to fit local needs and involve the
individual communities in decision-making.
For example, EPA's new, multi-purpose
pilot project in California's Silicon Valley is
designed to change traditional approaches to
pollution control programs by looking simul-
taneously at existing environmental regula-
tions and pollution linkages between air, land
and .water. Our goal is to assemble a picture
of the environment as a whole and develop a
consensus for decision-ma king and action.
This approach will be the keystone for
other projects expected to go forward in
1984. Among them are:
• the siting of new hazardous waste facilities
in California to correct the acute problem of
site closure;
• the contemplated development of the
Outer Continental Shelf, with its potential for
gas and oil exploration and recovery in the
coastal waters of California, recognizing
problems of air quality as well as wetlands
protection;
• pretreatment of industrial waste;
• preservation of high quality waters, attain-
ment of purer air and better management of
toxic wastes in Region 9 states, particularly
in California, which holds approximately 80%
of the Region's population;
• continuation of our efforts to resolve the
border sanitation problems at Tijuana-San
Diego and Mexicali-Calexico in California,
and Mogales-Nogales in Arizona.
We are optimistic that this new direction
will improve our environmental oversight in
all environmental media and enhance Region
9's stewardship in 1984.
protecting the quality of groundwater—
EPA's top priority in Region 10—is a job
that is becoming both easier and more diffi-
cult in the Pacific Northwest because the
people of the Northwest have made ground-
water protection their top priority too.
The job is easier because, with popular
support behind EPA and State agencies
implementing environmental law, there is less
resistance to governmental action to clean
up polluted groundwater or to take the steps
to head off the contamination. When EPA or
a state or local agency sees a problem, the
response is immediate. There is no inertia.
People are demanding and, what's more,
receiving prompt attention whenever they
perceive a threat to their groundwater.
The people of the Northwest fully under-
stand the link between the improper or
unwise disposal of hazardous wastes and
contaminated groundwater. They've seen
municipal drinking water wells closed in
Tacoma, Wash., and private wells closed in
Spokane, and they've read reports of EPA
having uncovered toxic materials and
hazardous wastes in the soil and water table
at dozens of locations throughout Idaho,
Oregon, and Washington.
The public's concern is high and so are its
expectations. Those expectations may be
unrealistically high, and that's what makes
our job more difficult.
Potential risks to groundwater are, all too
often, seen as real dangers. Suspicions are
regarded as fact. Problems with a hazardous
waste disposal facility are thought to be
unsolvable.
EPA in Region 10 is committed to keeping
potential risks from becoming real. We are
committed to checking out suspicions to see
if they have foundation in fact. And, where
we see problems with hazardous materials or
toxic substances, we are committed to over-
coming those problems by demanding proper
management from the operator of a disposal
facility.
Our challenge in Region 10—as it is
throughout the Agency— is to make the best
"environmental buy" for the EPA buck. If
we act early by spending thousands of
dollars to prevent groundwater contamina-
tions, we can avoid spending millions later
on. We must assess risks and, where those
risks are real, manage them so that our
resources can be devoted to all the tasks
needed to protect the environment and
human health.
DECEMBER 1983
-------
EPA Toxics Responsibilities
under Eight Laws:
• Clean Air Act, Sect. 112: Lists and
controls hazardous air pollutants.
• Toxic Substances Control Act, Sect. 6:
Regulates the manufacture, use and
disposal of toxic pollutants.
• Clean Water Act, Sect. 307a: Sets
criteria for the cleanup of toxic water
pollutants.
• Safe Drinking Water Act, Sect. 1412b:
Sets maximum contaminant levels for
drinking water pollutants.
• FIFRA (pesticide law), Sect. 6: Sets
standards to control toxics in pesticide
use.
• CERCLA (Superfund), Sect. 102, 104:
Controls toxics in spills; cleans up toxics
found in waste disposal sites.
• Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act, Sect. 3001: Sets criteria for defining
toxic wastes.
• Marine Sanctuaries Act, Sect. 102:
Controls ocean dumping of wastes.
12 EPA JOURNAL
-------
Dealing with
Toxic Substances:
Present and Future
(The following two articles are excerpted
from remarks by EPA Deputy Administrator
Alvin L. Aim and General Counsel A. James
Barnes to a mid-November conference on
toxics. The conference was sponsored by
Inside E.P.A. and The Center for Energy and
Environmental Management.)
The
National Attack
on Toxics
in the
Environment
Alvin L. Aim
EPA Deputy Administrator
A while ago the New Yorker ran a cartoon
that eventually appeared someplace in
nearly every office at EPA. It showed a post
office lobby with three mail chutes: one
marked "local," one marked "out of town,"
and one marked "toxic wastes." I want to
speak about what's going on behind that last
mail chute, about the various ways that EPA
is dealing with the control of toxic sub-
stances in the environment.
For a number of reasons, this has been a
difficult business. For one thing, in the past
decade EPA has been given eight separate
statutes to administer, all of which touch on
the control of toxics to a greater or lesser
extent. Each of these has its champions,
who have been active in pressing their
priorities upon the Agency. For another, the
scientific base on which regulatory actions
must be based barely existed in the recent
past, and is still incomplete in many
respects. On top of that, we have had to
create toxic control programs amidst a series
of crises which, by diverting resources and
attention, has made the development of
consistent and effective policies extraordi-
narily difficult. For these reasons, it is fair to
call the control of toxic and hazardous
substances the most complex regulatory
mission ever devised.
It has therefore taken some time to sort
out, but I now believe that we are beginning
to marshal all our authorities in a concen-
trated and coordinated attack on toxic
wastes. One may ask why a coordinated
approach is so important, and why we single
out a class of pollutants as "toxic" or
"hazardous." Clearly, all pollutants are in
some sense toxic and hazardous? Yes, but
we already do a reasonable job of controlling
those pollutants—the so-called conventional
pollutants—that typically damage health or
the environment through acute effects at
relatively high concentrations: things like
smog, like oxygen depletion from sewage,
like gross industrial pollution.
When we use the term "toxics," in
contrast, we mean substances that may have
chronic, and perhaps irreversible, effects on
human health or the environment at relatively
low concentrations. We're concerned about
cancer, about birth defects, and chronic
kidney ailments. We are also concerned
about long-term damage to wildlife or
aquatic ecosystems through the concentra-
tion of poisons in the food chain.
The statutes, in fact, give us some guid-
ance on what sort of substances we are to
control, either generically or specifically. For
example, the Clean Air Act mandates the
control of any substance that "causes or
contributes to mortality or irreversible or
serious reversible disease." The Resource
Conservation and Recovery Act (or RCRA)
and the Superfund legislation tell us to act
when there is "imminent danger to public
health." Congress may also go beyond a
generic description to "define" a list of
chemicals as toxic. Examples of this are the
list of water toxics in Section 307 of the
Clean Water Act and the inclusion of a
mandate to control PCBs in the Toxic Sub-
stances Control Act (or TSCA).
I he law thus tells us to limit the amount
of substances discharged to the environment,
but it does not tell us what substances to
limit first, how much, and, of course, it
doesn't tell us where to put the stuff. These
are not small matters. The number of poten-
tially toxic chemicals is so large that we will
never be able to fully investigate more than a
small fraction of them; we therefore must
choose our objects of interest very carefully.
Although control measures are what capture
the public's attention, efficient screening and
priority-setting are indispensable to a' suc-
cessful toxics control program. Also, many
DECEMBER 1983
-------
of these substances can appear in all the
environmental media—air, surface water, and
groundwater—and can move between them.
They can through either natural processes
or, what is more disturbing, as a result of
pollution control itself.
We
f e generally have the authority nec-
essary to control significant risk wherever it
appears. What we need is a coordinated
approach to insure that these risks stay
controlled, now and in the future. Our policy
to accomplish this has three broad
conceptual elements.
First, we must cope with the toxic legacy
of the past. The Superfund program is
designed to clean up the most obvious
example of this, hazardous waste dumps.
This mammoth endeavor has become the
second most expensive program at EPA.
Second, we must restrict the present
release of hazardous chemicals into the
environment by completing or expanding our
efforts under such programs as TSCA, the
pesticides control legislation (FIFRA),
effluent guidelines, and Section 112 of the
Clean Air Act.
Finally, we must protect the future by
preventing the use of potentially dangerous
substances, as we do under certain sections
of TSCA and FIFRA, and by preventing
unsafe disposal of hazardous wastes through
the RCRA program. Insuring the future also
means paying special attention to uniquely
sensitive resources—groundwater for one—
and the potential for irreversible damage to
ecosystems.
I would like to turn now to how we are
carrying this policy out, first in the media
programs and then as it applies to problems
cutting across the traditional air, water, and
groundwater categories.
In the air program, as you may know, we
have for historical reasons divided harmful
airborne substances into criteria and
hazardous pollutants. Of course, criteria
pollutants are health hazards. Ozone and
other smog precursors, S02 and particulates,
are all associated with respiratory disease.
Lead has neurological and blood chemistry
effects and carbon monoxide at low levels
aggravates heart disease. But we know
enough about the effects of such substances
at typical atmospheric concentrations to set
criteria that will protect sensitive populations
from harm. This is not the case with the
substances we call hazardous air pollutants.
We don't know what they do to people at
ordinary levels of exposure. This makes the
scientific basis for controlling a hazardous air
pollutant much more difficult to assemble,
and the Agency has been criticized for
slowness in setting national emissions
standards for these substances.
Despite this, many hazardous air pollutants
are at least partially controlled through the
programs that control criteria pollutants,
because two of the criteria pollutants—
particulate matter and volatile organic com-
pounds—actually contain many substances
identified as hazardous air pollutants. We
estimate that for 25 substances on the
familiar list of 37 hazardous air pollutants, we
obtain levels of removal from the existing
program that range from 20 to 80 percent.
It is important therefore to insure that
ambient standards for these criteria pollu-
tants are being achieved throughout the
country. States that have not attained
ambient standards will be required to submit
revised plans to show how standards will be
met. We are also looking harder at places
where the state implementation plans have
not been put into effect, and we have
increased air enforcement staffing by ten
percent to do that more effectively.
Beyond this, we are developing a targeted
hazardous air pollutant strategy that will
concentrate our resources on the most signifi-
cant health risks. This strategy is based on
two elements. First, the use of risk assess-
ment would identify the most significant risks
and thereby establish a rational system of
priorities for this program. Second, a variety
of regulatory tools besides national emissions
standards should be considered to deal more
effectively with the many different types of
situations in which unreasonable risk may
occur. For example, it may be more appro-
priate to establish performance standards to
control asbestos, land use rules to reduce
risk from radionuclides at uranium mine sites,
or ambient standards for arsenic. We have
already presented the case for such
additional flexibility to the Congress.
In the meantime, we will proceed quickly
to make decisions on a number of long-
standing proposed actions, those on
benzene, arsenic, and coke oven emissions.
In addition, we will accelerate the regulatory
actions now in process by concentrating our
resources on those that promise significant
public health benefits. To support this
commitment to address the air toxics
problem comprehensively, we have increased
the budget of this program by 22 percent
over the 1983 level.
Tu,
I urning now to water, we can see substan-
tial progress in using the major tool we
possess to control the release of toxics from
industrial point sources, the effluent guide-
lines program. EPA is obliged by consent
decree to issue guidelines establishing Best
Available Technology for 21 major industries.
Eighteen guidelines have been promulgated
already, and we expect this huge effort to be
essentially complete in the very near future.
When these guidelines are put fully into
effect, we will have reduced the amount of
toxics reaching the waterways by 660 million
tons per year, which represents more than 90
percent of the tonnage that would otherwise
have been discharged.
We have also accelerated the issuance of
permits that establish limits for the discharge
of toxic materials. Until recently there was a
troubling backlog in permitting because of
the delay in developing the guidelines. We
have now given higher priority to industrial
source permitting, stepped up training and
technical support to permit writers, and
mobilized contract support to regional offices
and states. We also increased permitting
resources by 30 percent between Fiscal Year
'83 and '84. As a result, we expect to issue
virtually all major industrial permits within
EPA's permitting authority by the end of
fiscal '85. We expect similarly high levels of
permitting performance by the delegated
states.
Significantly, we are also attempting, for
the first time, to link our toxics removal
regulations directly to the value we are trying
to achieve, which is improved water quality.
Where state standards contain criteria for
specific toxic pollutants, such as heavy
metals and various pesticides, we will
enforce those criteria in the next round of
permits. But even where toxic criteria have
not been set, we plan to use biological
toxicity testing of actual industrial effluents
to set limits that meet the goal found in all
state standards: to "avoid toxic pollutants in
toxic amounts." This new approach, which
we call "biomonitoring," is now being
reviewed in draft form; we believe it to be a
fundamental step forward in water quality
regulation.
We are also moving more quickly to
protect groundwater, which is starting to look
like the major toxics control problem of the
1980's. Recognizing the magnitude of this
problem, the Agency is starting to develop a
comprehensive groundwater strategy. It will
focus primarily on insuring that our own
programs work smoothly together and that
the roles of Federal and state governments
are clearly defined. Through our operating
programs, responsibility for dealing with
specific groundwater problems is at the
regional level, but we are also considering
the establishment of a central office for
groundwater strategy, under the direction of
a senior official, to strengthen management
in this area and to deal rapidly with emerging
new threats to groundwater.
One of these, for example, arises from the
leakage of underground storage tanks, a
phenomenon known, predictably, as LUST.
We believe, in fact, that LUST may prove to
be a serious groundwater problem. More
than 100,000 underground tanks have been
identified in Michigan, New York, and the
San Francisco Bay area alone. It is estimated
that 16,000 of the 83,000 active tanks in New
York State are leaking. We are currently
developing a survey to understand the
magnitude of this problem. We are also
evaluating how our statutory authorities
could be harnessed to regulate these
sources.
At present, of course, the major programs
EPA uses to protect groundwater are RCRA
and Superfund. Superfund is expanding and
accelerating. We have identified 16,000 sites;
of these, we have completed site inspection
on 2,000, evaluated 900, and placed 546 on
a proposed National Priorities List. We
expect that there will eventually be about
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EPA JOURNAL
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1,400 sites eligible and scheduled for Super-
fund action on that list. Superfund enforce-
ment staffing will increase by one-third, to
over 300 positions. Our budget for the
Superfund program overall is up $100 million
to a total of $410 million.
To prevent a repetition of the practices
that make Superfund necessary, we are also
accelerating hazardous waste management
under the Resources Conservation and
Recovery Act. We have increased our RCRA
enforcement staff by 134 percent to 175
positions. We are vigorously pursuing the
permitting of disposal facilities and the
enforcement of Class I monitoring
regulations relating to groundwater.
As we improve our performance in con-
trolling toxics within the media programs, we
are also concentrating resources to attack an
important set of toxic substances across
media lines. The existing chemicals program
under the Toxic Substances Control Act is
starting to move. We have published pro-
posals aimed at controlling the carcinogens
MDA and MBOCA and have asked for public
comments on whether formaldehyde should
be similarly controlled. There is now, for the
first time, an effective existing chemical
screening program; we are now making
screening decisions on 50 chemicals a year.
In addition, we have just decided to develop
comprehensive management plans for several
significant chemcials, designed to link all
EPA authorities so as to efficiently minimize
risk from these contaminants. Finally, the
Agency is about ready to issue a dioxin
strategy which sets both a blueprint for
identifying the problem and taking actions to
reduce human exposure.
In addition to this new work, we are
evaluating our current asbestos control
program to see how effective it has been in
reducing public health risk, and are
conducting a survey of asbestos in public
buildings to assess the level of health danger
that represents. We will be evaluating more
extensive regulation of this dangerous
substance over the next year. Meanwhile, we
have added $500,000 to the asbestos inspec-
tion program and will add a like amount in
Fiscal '85. Inspections for compliance have
jumped from over 200 in FY '83 to a pro-
jected 800 in FY '84.
Beyond the management and improvement
of existing programs, we need to find some
general ways of improving our approach, as
an Agency, to the problems posed by toxic
chemicals in the environment. To this end,
we have established a Task Force on Toxics
Integration, which is scheduled to complete
its work soon. We expect to receive recom-
mendations on: how we can get the risk
assessments we need and how we can im-
prove them; how we can develop a consis-
tent policy for the management of risk within
the structure of present statutes; how we
can respond more effectively to the highly
visible crises that grow up around particular
chemicals; and how the Federal government
as a whole can do a more efficient and
consistent job of controlling dangerous
substances.
To sum up, we are serious about our
commitment to clean up the environmental
errors of the past, to restrict the production
and release of dangerous substances now,
and to safeguard against degradation in the
future. Our present budget and our stated
priorities stand as warrants of that intent. All
told, our programs devoted to toxics control
account for nearly $690 million, or 45 percent
of EPA's operating budget. The Administra-
tor's top four priorities are all concerned with
the control of toxics. In all, this constitutes a
dramatic shift in how EPA performs. We can
no longer look only at the ends of pipes and
stacks. We must better understand why a
myriad of toxic substances can affect us
across an extremely wide range of severity-
through the air, through the food chain, and
through the surface or ground waters.
Armed with that information, we will make
the hard choices that comprise real environ-
mental management. D
Toxic Victim
Compensation
A. James Barnes
EPA General Counsel
The first assignment that I received from
Administrator Ruckelshaus on my return
to the Agency in May was to coordinate
EPA's activities on toxic victim compensation
and to represent the Agency in discussions
within the Administration. It was readily
apparent that compensation of those
exposed to toxic substances is a difficult
issue which involves serious social
justice/social equity considerations—and that
how we resolve the issue can have far-
reaching consequences for our society. In
my remarks I will first briefly characterize the
issue and then indicate how the Administra-
tion is approaching it. Finally, I will identify
some of the major problems and areas of
inquiry that we are pursuing.
One of the most striking features on
returning to EPA is the deep and widespread
public concern—as well as the extensive
Agency efforts—concerning toxic or haz-
ardous substances. Thirteen years ago when
the Agency began, the symbols of environ-
mental concern were oil-soaked seagulls,
smog in L.A., and a river in Cleveland that
occasionally caught fire. Today, they have
been replaced by Love Canal and Times
Beach—symbols of the public concern about
toxic and hazardous substances. They illus-
trate the deep public apprehension about
exposure to toxics. Some is fear of the
unknown—such as dioxins—while other
substances such as asbestos are feared
because they are so pervasive in our
industrial/consumer society.
We have moved fairly aggressively to deal
with the problems posed by toxic or hazard-
ous substances. Several major pieces of
legislation have been enacted including
RCRA (Resource Conservation and Recovery
Act) which seeks to improve our transporta-
tion, treatment, storage and disposal of
hazardous waste, CERCLA (Superfund}
which deals with past disposal problems that
pose significant risks, and TSCA (Toxic
Substances Control Act) which addresses
the safety of new chemical substances
before they are introduced into the environ-
ment. Now the related question of what we
are doing about persons who may have been
injured by exposure to hazardous materials
has been raised onto the public agenda.
DECEMBER 1983
15
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No one who is familiar with the anguish of
someone who has a brain-damaged child,
who has had a miscarriage, or who has
cancer can be oblivious to the very real
human concerns involved. Where the person
happens to have had some exposure to toxic
materials—be it at work or in the environ-
ment—it is not unexpected that some may
draw a connection between the exposure
and the injury or disease—irrespective of
whether science would support such a link.
Compensation of these individuals poses a
serious social justice/social equity issue and
involves the elemental question of which
risks of an industrial society are to be borne
by individuals, which by persons who are
considered responsible for the particular
activity, and which by the society as a
whole. But to recognize that this represents
a serious issue does not foreordain the
answer of a new federally directed compen-
sation scheme or a new federal right to
litigate.
I here are, as you know, a variety of
proposals now before Congress dealing with
a range of toxic compensation issues includ-
ing asbestos, radiation. Agent Orange and
toxic victim compensation in general. Behind
most of these proposals is the belief that the
present compensation schemes—primarily
state tort law—are not adequate. Certainly
there are a number of difficulties with the
way the tort system currently works.
These include:
• the long latency period associated with
some diseases and time that it may take to
discover that an individual has a particular
disease or injury may extend beyond the
statute of limitations that has been estab-
lished as an outside limit during which a
cause of action must be brought;
• there may be difficulties in establishing
which person or persons are responsible for
causing a particular injury and the related
question of whether the persons who are
liable are financially responsible;
.• in many cases it may be difficult to estab-
lish the requisite causal relationship between
the alleged exposure and the injury or
disease that ultimately resulted;
• the tort system commonly entails substan-
tial transaction costs (in terms of dollars and
time) that may reduce the recovery available
to the potential victim or indeed make it
uneconomical to seek a remedy to begin
with. Overall, the difficulties with the tort
system can be characterized as uncertainty
and unfairness in providing unequal results in
otherwise similar circumstances.
A concomitant problem with the current
tort system, of course, is uncertainty for
industry and insurers as to their potential
liability for actions that have taken place
largely in the past. The spectre of major
companies seeking the protection of the
bankruptcy law and fights between, and
among, insured and various insurers are only
some evidence of the unease that the situa-
tion poses.
With legislative consideration of some of
the victim compensation proposals likely, the
President recently established a Cabinet
Council Working Group to follow the issue
and to develop the Administration's position.
The Working Group is' composed of senior
officials under the leadership of Mike
Horowitz, the General Counsel of the Office
of Management and Budget, and Assistant
Attorney General Paul McGrath. Several
points concerning the structures and
approach of the Working Group should be
noted. First it is a broad-based effort
effectively to utilize the resources of the
Executive Branch; some twelve agencies are
participating. Various agencies have different
contributions and perspectives. Some of the
agencies, such as the departments of Labor
and Health and Human Services, have experi-
ence with existing compensation schemes;
some such as EPA and the Office of Science
and Technology Policy have experience with
the scientific questions involved; other
agencies such as OMB, Council of Economic
Advisors and Treasury can contribute the
economic analysis required; and the Depart-
ment of Justice can provide legal analysis.
Second, the Working Group is looking to
develop an overall policy in the toxic victim
compensation area. There are a number of
generic issues that are involved regardless of
whether we are talking about Agent Orange,
asbestos or toxic victim compensation gen-
erally. However, an approach used in dealing
with one problem may well become a prece-
dent for some of the related areas—and
might make it difficult to justify different
results. For example, EPA's decision to buy
out property in the Times Beach, Missouri
area because of the dioxin problem can
affect the discussions about compensation
for those exposed to Agent Orange. More-
over, we believe that these topics are closely
related politically and that it is important to
consider the degree to which we will allocate
relatively scarce societal resources to the
politically strong or the momentarily
notorious.
A third important element in the Adminis-
tration's approach is that we are determined
CAUTION CONTAINS PCB's ~
p (Polychiorinated Biphenyls) W
Z FOR PROPER DISPOSAL INFORMATION 4Z
K CONTACT U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL ^
PROTECTION AGENCY
jflTHIS
EQUIPMENT
CONTAINS
PCB
(Polychiorinated Biphenyls)
CAPACITOR(S)
EPA requires placement of labels like I
these on electrical transformers and
other equipment containing significant
amounts of PCBs, industrial chemicals
which can cause serious health and en-
vironmental problems. While Congress
has prohibited the manufacture of these
chemicals, substantial amounts of this
material are still present in older electri-
cal and other industrial equipment.
16
EPA JOURNAL
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to see public policy made in this area in a
responsible way because of its importance,
its complexity, and the significant cost
ramifications involved, as well as the long-
term implications for our tort system and
various support programs. The Administra-
tion will insist on a careful, thorough,
thoughtful analysis and a full airing of the
issues and the considerations of these
proposals before action is taken. For its part,
the Administration currently has an intensive
fact gathering and analytical effort under
way which is the most extensive that I have
seen at the Cabinet Council level.
What are the major issues and areas of
inquiry that we are focusing on as we seek
to establish an Administration position on
these issues? First, we are trying to define
the nature and the scope of the problem that
is to be addressed. Who are the "victims"
that we are concerned about compensating?
In allocating resources do we want to distin-
guish between individuals with cancer where
the cause is unknown and those where the
cancer can be linked—albeit tenuously in
some cases—to exposure to a certain sub-
stance? What about similar injuries? For
example should the brain-damaged child
living near a hazardous waste site be treated
differently than one whose damage was
caused in an accident with an uninsured
motorist? To what degree should the
proposed schemes be retroactive and to
what degree prospective only? All of these
questions involve underlying issues of
fundamental fairness in our society. Closely
related is the question of whether we should
expand access and redefine causation to
stretch our tort system in new and unaccus-
tomed ways, or whether we should turn to
an administrative scheme that is less of a
"lottery" and more predictable and universal
in scope of coverage.
Second, we are reviewing existing
compensation schemes. Here we are looking
to the extent to which victims are compen-
sated by existing public and private mecha-
nisms—such as the tort system, insurance and
generic health and income maintenance
programs like Social Security and medicare.
In the course of this exercise we are carefully
reviewing the CERCLA 301 (e) Study Report
that was completed in 19S2. We are also
looking at the federal government's experi-
ence with other administrative compensation
schemes such as the black lung program,
as well as state experience with workmen's
compensation.
Third, we are looking carefully at the
contribution science is now in & position to
make. In particular, from EPA's perspective,
we are examining the role that some of the
legislation proposes the Agency should play.
Certainly there is considerable frustration
with the current tort system and the diffi-
culties of establishing a legally sufficient
causal nexts in many cases. This frustration
may lead to the temptation to presume a
causal nexis where it is difficult to show
causation. At EPA we frequently operate on
the edge of science in setting standards as to
levels of exposure. There is a real question
as to whether the law can force science to
produce a degree of precision certainty
beyond that achievable with our present
knowledge and resources. In some of the
proposed legislation EPA would be asked to
produce criteria documents and to make
case-by-case determinations as to whether
there is a causal nexis between alleged
exposure to hazardous waste at a particular
site and a disease or injury to a person. An
initial look at these proposals raises serious
questions; first, as to whether EPA would be
able to do what the legislation asks, and
second, whether utilizing our limited scientific
resources and capacity to try to establish
these relationships or to disprove them is
really wise use of our resources—or alterna-
tively whether it suggests simply another
high transaction cost that would involve the
proposed compensation determinations.
Another matter of concern to EPA is the
potential conflict of interest that might be
created for it. EPA is currently required to
identify substances for the purpose of regu-
lating them and to set standards for safe
exposure in the society; some of the legisla-
tion would require EPA listing of substances
as prerequisite to liability and some legisla-
tion would require it to also act as a judge to
make determinations as to whether exposure
at a given level resulted in a particular injury
or disease to a person. Another conflict
could be produced between EPA's obliga-
tions under CERCLA (Superfund) to act to
remove imminent hazards to public health by
cleaning hazardous waste sites and the
responsibilities that it might have to make
compensation determinations. These two
responsibilities could be inherently in conflict
because cleaning up a site would likely
involve rapid action to remove wastes from
the site whereas concern about making com-
pensation decisions would suggest leaving
the material in place so that extensive testing
and analysis could be carried out.
A
, fourth area of inquiry has to do with the
economics of the various toxic compensation
proposals and their long-term fiscal implica-
tions for society, government and industry.
Here we are looking at what kinds of losses
are to be compensated, who pays, how,
what mechanism is to be used, what trans-
action costs are to be contemplated, how
solid are the cost projections, how is the
program integrated with other compensation
programs? We believe we need to be cogni-
zant of the experience with the black lung
program and with the kinds of cost estimates
that are already before us concerning the
asbestos litigation as well as the proposed
legislation.
All of these questions, and others we are
pursuing, involve initial definition of the
"problem" we face, followed by analysis of
the various proposed schemes, as well as
analysis of other alternatives that might
address any identified problems, including
changes in workmen's compensation, adjust-
ments in state tort laws, and adjustments to
other income maintenance or health protec-
tion schemes. We all have a major stake in
the intelligent analysis and resolution of the
various issues that are involved in this
process. Doubtless there will be differences
of opinion within the Administration and in
Congress—just as there are likely to be differ-
ences within society. But we are determined
that on this issue, as on others that involve
fundamental questions of social equity, that
we are careful and thoughtful in the way we
analyze the problem; and hopeful that with
that kind of approach we arrive at a policy
that is wise and consistent with the
philosophical underpinnings of our society. D
DECEMBER 1983
-------
Progress
on the Great Lakes
Ice breaker ship circles vessel caught in
ice in Lake Superior near Sault Ste. Marie
to help free it. This photo is one of a
series by B. A. King in the special exhibit
"Great Lakes, America," which EPA
helped sponsor.
EPA Administrator William D. Rucketshaus in
a recent talk to the International Joint Com-
mission, an agency set up to control border
pollution problems, reviewed the progress
made in cleaning up the Great Lakes in the
past 10 years,
Ruckelshaus noted that the limits on
phosphorous discharges into the Great Lakes
agreed to by Canada and the U.S. in 1972
are now being met by both countries, an
important step in preventing eutrophication,
particularly in Lake Erie.
"In 1972," Ruckelshaus said, "the U.S.
contribution to the phosphorous load in
these lakes was almost 19,000 tons annually.
Today, it's less than 3,000 tons. That's an
85 percent reduction."
This reduction was made possible partly
because Federal and State governments
in the U.S. invested about $6 billion in the
last 12 years to build or to improve existing
treatment at 798 facilities in the Great Lakes
region. He added that this program is
continuing and during the fiscal year ended
last September, EPA awarded $350 million
more in construction money in this region to
improve 55 more municipal treatment works.
In addition to the construction of
municipal treatment works, the Administrator
noted "we have also taken, sometimes alone,
sometimes together, a number of regulatory
actions which also aided in the cleanup:
"We imposed a national ban on the manu-
facture and use of DDT in 1972; Canada
followed suit shortly thereafter.
"We have a national ban on the manufac-
ture and we strictly limit the uses of PCB's.
Canada has done the same.
"Most uses of the chemical toxaphene
have been cancelled in the United States.
Canada also controls toxaphene very
rigorously."
{Copies of the full text of Ruckelshaus'
speech to the IJC and the Great Lakes
Governors meeting in Indianapolis, Ind., on
Nov. J7, 1983, can be obtained by writing to
EPA JournalJ
Ruckelshaus also noted that "levels of
DDT, PCB's and mercury in Lake Michigan in
recent years are down by about 70 percent
to 95 percent.
"We are still concerned about toxic
discharges but even there we've made a lot
of progress.
"When you've got an identifiable pipe or
outlet or a specific place where a discharge
to water occurs, in EPA parlance that's a
'point source.' We were required by the
Clean Water Act to devise and put into place
effluent guidelines—standards for the
content of discharges from point sources—in
various categories of industry, everything
from aluminum fabricating to nonferrous
metals to electroplating facilities. So far, out
of 28 industrial categories we have put out
final standards for 18 categories, proposed
rules for seven categories and we are still
working on the three remaining classes.
"This means almost all of the industrial
dischargers on the Great Lakes are covered
by very stringent guidelines which are
specifically designed to keep the toxics out
and protect the overall quality of the
receiving waters. That's the point source.
"The nonpoint sources are much more
difficult to control simply because they do
not represent a pipe or an outlet or a special
spot. Typically, nonpoint sources develop
when nitrogen chemical fertilizer or
phosphorus for instance is spread over a
farm. The nitrates or phosphates accumulate
in the rain water and wash out into nearby
streams in dozens, or even hundreds of
places.
"Last month in Halifax, Nova Scotia, I
joined Secretary of State Schultz, Minister
of External Affairs Alan MacEachen and
Minister Caccia in signing an annex to our
earlier agreements which emphasizes the
reduction of phosphorous from nonpoint
sources. We intend to get at these
discharges through what we hope will be
low cost programs such as modification of
agricultural practices and technical assistance
to States and local governments. We think
that this phase of our joint effort will work as
well as our cooperative efforts in the past.
"I don't want to give you the impression
that everything is peaches and cream. It's
not. There are still many serious problems
which confound us and stretch us to the
limits of our knowledge.
"We have a particularly difficult problem in
the chronic chemical contamination around
the Niagara River, on our side of the border.
We have found similar problems elsewhere in
lands adjacent to the lakes. We have decided
therefore to study the areas surrounding the
connecting channels of the Great Lakes. This
inquiry will cost some $500,000 this year. We
hope to complete the study by 1986. We are
counting on our Canadian colleagues from
Environment Canada and the Provinces to
join us in this significant project.
"Some Canadians have worried out loud
about the level of research funding for the
Great Lakes program. To them I am happy
to report today that EPA's FY 1984 appropri-
ation includes $2.5 million to maintain the
Great Lakes research program at our Grosse
He, Michigan facility. This is the same level
of funding as in previous years. Grosse lie
will still provide technical assistance to the
IJC in administering programs under the
Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement. It
goes without saying that we welcome the
participation by Canadian authorities in
research planning related to the Great Lakes.
"We have a great deal of work to do still,
of course, but much has been accomplished
to date. We should allow ourselves to enjoy
some modest sense of accomplishment for
what we have done so far. Rivers like the
Detroit and St. Clair are no longer sinks into
which Canadian and American steel, chemi-
cal and auto industries dump their wastes.
Walleye pike and trout have returned to
many rivers and oil-soaked ducks are
becoming a thing of the past." D
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EPA JOURNAL
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Ruckelshaus Talks About Acid Rain
In his talk on the Great Lakes, Administrator
Ruckelshaus a/so briefly discussed the acid
rain problem. Following are excerpts from his
remarks on this subject:
"\ have decided to talk for a few moments
only about acid rain. It is a serious problem
between our two nations, certainly as
difficult as any in living memory.
"When I came back home to EPA six
months ago, in fact at my swearing-in cere-
mony, President Reagan gave me an assign-
ment of coming to grips with the acid rain
problem. I assure you that it is an assignment
i do not take lightly. It is not an easy task as
everyone must surely know by this time.
What is at stake potentially is billions of
dollars and a clash of sectional interests in
our country which recalls some of the
toughest and thorniest sectional rivalries in
our nation's past. A practical policy has so
far eluded us, but we are working very
intently on it and we are determined to reach
a consensus and fashion a policy to deal
with acid rain as promptly and as effectively
as we can.
"I know that there are many on both sides
of the border who say that this problem will
never be solved. I don't think that's true. A
way must be found to deal with this prob-
lem, to resolve the admittedly numerous
scientific uncertainties and reach an
agreement that is satisfactory to both sides.
Getting there will not be easy. We'll need
patience, skill, and hard work, and some
luck would not hurt either.
"Frankly, I have always been suspicious of
the gloom and doom school of environ-
mental analysis, I remember, for instance, in
1971 when some 'experts' told us that Lake
Erie was dead, incapable of recovery.
Fortunately, neither Canada nor the United
States accepted that counsel of despair.
Instead, we did something about it. If you
come right down to it, the message of the
gloom and doom crowd is basically this:
'Why bother? No matter what you do,
disaster is waiting to engulf you, individually
and collectively.' That's something that I
refuse to accept.
"That kind of approach to public policy is
doubly destructive. It condemns as useless
any action we have to take to restore the
situation and worse stilt, it paralyzes needed
efforts to improve the situation.
"The 'experts' who thought the Great
Lakes couldn't be saved from dying were, to
put it charitably, dead wrong. We ought to
learn something from the exercise. If
someone teils you that the problem of acid
rain or hazardous waste is insoluble, I urge
you to remember the lesson of Lake Erie. It
was pronounced dead a dozen years ago.
Today it is alive and well.
"It seems to me that together we have the
power to solve problems like acid rain. I
don't mean 'power' in the sense of coercion
or forcing someone to do our will. I mean
'power' in the sense of our capacity to act,
our capacity to marshal our assets, use our
ingenuity, brains, and sweat to fashion
reasonable and effective solutions. That's
another good thing that we have taken for
granted: the ability we have in our two
countries to control our own future.
"I am confident that historians will give
the present acid rain controversy the status
of another great success in recounting the
long and happy story of Canadian-American
friendship." D
DECEMBER 1983
19
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Tire Fire Lights Up
A National Problem
by Susan Tejada
At 12:48 a.m. on October 31, 1983, a fire
was reported in Winchester, Virginia. The
next day, the State of Virginia requested
Superfund assistance from EPA, and the
agency dispatched to the site Tom Mas-
sey, senior on-scene coordinator for the
EPA region encompassing Virginia.
EPA is not normally in the business of
fighting fires but, as Massey discovered
when he arrived in Winchester on
November 1, this was no ordinary fire.
Some people in the Frederick County
town were already referring to the
volcano-like blaze as Mt. Saint Frederick.
Paul Rhinehart, an elderly Winchester
resident, had operated a tire disposal op-
eration for many years, collecting about
50 cents apiece for hauling discarded
tires from Maryland, Virginia, West Vir-
ginia, and Washington, D.C. Efforts of the
Frederick County government to slow
down accumulation of the tires were un-
successful, and Rhinehart's tire collection
eventually grew to mammoth pro-
portions.
Landfill dumping of tires is prohibited
in Frederick County, so Rhinehart tried to
develop a method to burn the tires in a
furnace and use the resulting oil for
heating. By October 31, when the tower
of tires was reportedly torched and
dreams of a systematic energy conver-
sion process went up in smoke,
Rhinehart had amassed somewhere be-
tween 5 and 7 million tires. The huge pile
was about 80 feet high in places, as tall
as an eight-story building. It spread out
over more than four acres, covering an
area about as big as three and a half
football fields. The number of tires was
so mind-boggling, The Washington Post
reported, that there were more tires in
Rhinehart's pile than bushels of apples
harvested in 1979 in Frederick County,
Virginia's leading apple-producing area.
When Massey arrived at the scene of
the blaze on November 1, he found that a
towering plume of smoke was spreading
as far as 50 miles away, creating a visible
air pollution problem. Combustion reac-
tions within the tire pile were also
generating a stream of pyrolitic oil (syn-
thetic crude oil). It was flowing from the
bottom of the pile at rates of up to 50
gallons a minute and creating the poten-
tial for serious water pollution of nearby
feeder creeks to the Potomac River.
Dr. Joe Lafornara also arrived on scene
November 1. Lafornara is Chief of the
Analytical Support Section of EPA's En-
vironmental Response Team, a group of
12 hazardous waste specialists based in
Cincinnati, Ohio, and Edison, New Jersey
who provide scientific expertise to
EPA regional response officials. The oil
flow, Lafornara said, "looked like a small
river, it was coming out of that pile so
fast." Preliminary investigations showed
the runoff contained about 1,000 different
organic compounds.
Lafornara likened the potential effect to
that of an oil spill. "The oil would have
floated on the surface of the creek, from
bank to bank, covering everything," he
explained. "When it reached the river, it
would have been brought into the water
column at the rapids. At calmer points,
some of it would have come back up to
the surface and floated on top. All the
water intakes on the Potomac would
have had to be closed. Believe me," said
Lafornara, who has had experience in
fighting oil spills, "it's cheaper to catch it
at the outset than to clean up 60 miles of
shoreline."
Fortunately, the local volunteer fire de-
partment had already begun to "catch it
at the outset." In fact, before 24 hours
had passed, the firefighters had con-
structed a water collection system and
two crude filter fences, fashioned out of
hay, to contain the flow of oil. And the
Virginia Office of Emergency and Energy
Services had already set up a command
post.
Mobilization
Begins
When a Superfund response was author-
ized on November 2, Massey began one
of the largest emergency mobilizations
under that law. "The mobilization of re-
sources was phenomenal," says Bob
Mason, a scientist under contract to EPA
who, along with many others during the
first two weeks, worked 20-hour days on
site doing air monitoring and technical
calculations. "Experts," says Mason, "ar-
rived almost immediately from the tire
industry, from the American Petroleum
Institute, and from trade associations.
And most of them offered their advice
and services free."
County government officials, "working
as long and hard as anyone," according
to Mason, handled community relations.
State government representatives, on
scene from the beginning, handled the
press and will continue to handle site
safety and water surveys. The local Sher-
iff's Department, in cooperation with the
Air National Guard, provided round-the-
clock site security, essential at this un-
fenced site where curious onlookers
could otherwise have come in direct con-
tact with toxic substances.
All 22 members of the U.S. Coast
Guard's Atlantic Strike Team assisted
with photo and cost documentation and
site safety. The Centers for Disease Con-
trol issued a health advisory on air pollu-
tion and provided information on poten-
tial health effects. The National Institute
for Occupational Safety and Health
advised on worker safety. The Federal
Aviation Administration and the U.S. Air
Force loaned fire fighting equipment
used in air disasters. Pumps developed
by the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration for use with the space
shuttle were used to recirculate con-
taminated water back onto the fire,
where it could be incinerated into harm-
less steam.
In all, more than two dozen agencies
participated in the early stages of the re-
sponse. The U.S. Geological Survey de-
scribed geological conditions. Since wea-
ther conditions affect the response —
wind can change the direction of the
smoke and rain can cause containment
ponds to overflow — the U.S. Forest Ser-
vice provided daily information on short
and long range weather predictions.
Since the blaze could have started a for-
est fire — the site was surrounded by for-
20
EPA JOURNAL
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Mushroom-shaped cloud of smoke rising
from enormous used tire fire near
Winchester, Va.
est and oil flowing through the area
would have been easily ignitable — both
state and federal forest services advised
on construction of firebreaks.
The cost ceiling on this Superfund
emergency response climbed from
$250,000 to $425,000 to $900,000. The
limit of $1 million for an emergency re-
sponse was waived, and the ceiling
climbed again to $1,350,000. In mid-
November, daily operating costs were
running between $25,000-$35,000. That
money was buying site security, fire con-
trol, runoff collection, air and water
monitoring, technical support, and con-
struction of a new containment pond
with impervious liners, a new siphon
dam, and access roads to handle the in-
flux of heavy equipment.
It is expected that some of this money
will be recovered because runoff oil is
being collected and sold to recycling
companies. Stili, the question remains: is
the expense justified?
EPA feels the expense to date is jus-
tified because of the threat to public
health and the environment. In addition
to pollutants like carbon monoxide and
sulfur dioxide normally produced in the
burning of fossil fuels, this particular fire,
because of the chemical constituents of
the tires, also produced arsenic and tel-
lurium. Fortunately, even in samples
taken three yards away from the fire,
these substances were present in small
quantities only. At a distance of 100
yards from the fire, they presented no
health threat. The real threat, as Lafor-
nara explained, came from the chance
that the ignitable oil would flow downhill,
setting off forest fires, polluting drinking
water, entering surface waters, and kil-
ling fish and waterfowl.
To date, because of response actions,
none of these threats has materialized.
The fire, the pyrolitic oil, and the con-
taminated water have all been contained.
On November 17, EPA's Environmental
Response Team began an environmental
assessment study to determine what
long-term remedial actions might be
necessary if groundwater contamination
has occurred.
DECEMBER 1983
21
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Other Tires,
Other Fires
The Winchester area blaze is 10 times
bigger than any previous tire fire, Lafor-
nara estimates. But it is not the biggest
pile of tires in the country. At a site in
Westley, California, about 12 million tires
are piled up on a 20-acre site. Nor is the
Winchester blaze an isolated incident.
According to Tony O'Brien of the Nation-
al Fire Protection Association (NFPA),
since 1971 there have been 176 fires at
centers that reclaim rubber from used
tires and, in the same period, 49 fires at
warehouses that store rubber products,
including tires. These fires together have
caused seven civilian deaths, 208 injuries
to civilians and firefighters, and a total
estimated economic loss of $90.5 million.
And these figures may be incomplete.
NFPA's statistics are based on incident
reports filed with the group by fire de-
partments and insurance companies.
Other incidents may go unreported.
Regulations for dumping of scrap tires
in landfills, if issued at all, are written by
local governments, not by the federal
government. According to an article in
the Akron Beacon Journal, the City of
Akron has tried to ease the threat of
dump fires by enforcing a city law
requiring that tires be stacked in rows no
higher than 20 feet and located within
300 feet of a hydrant.
Mired
in Tires
Tire fires are a serious problem because
tire disposal is a serious problem. Es-
timates of the number of tires discarded
each year in the United States vary from
a low of 135 million to a high of 230 mil-
lion. According to Ray Oviatt of the
Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, the
number has probably dropped somewhat
in recent years owing to greater con-
sumer use of long life tires. Still, the
number of annual discards today is prob-
ably somewhere in the range of 165-175
million.
The great majority of discards, about
73 percent, end up in landfills and
dumps, according to a 1979 study done
for the U.S. Department of Energy. An-
other18 percent are retreaded; 3 percent
are burned for fuel; and the remainder
are used in rubber reclamation or recy-
cled for uses like artificial reefs, road sur-
faces, and roofing shingles. These figures
probably don't include such other uses
as the tire strips that Wayne Newton re-
portedly nails to the wood posts of the
corral on his ranch to protect his thor-
oughbred horses.
Industry spends an estimated $80 mil-
lion a year to get rid of scrap tires. Once
the discards are dumped, they remain
virtually indestructible for years. Buried
in landfills, they tend to pop to the sur-
face as air collects in their hollow cavi-
ties. Water also seeps into these cavities
and forms a breeding ground for mos-
quitoes.
Looking
for a Solution
The amount of recycled rubber used in
this country has dropped from an es-
timated high of 60 percent during World
War II, to 20 percent in the early fifties, to
only about 3.5 percent in 1980. Unless
more tires are recycled, dumps may be-
come blanketed with this rubber refuse.
Industry is studying the problem and run-
ning experimental projects to find a solu-
tion. As long ago as 1969, the Firestone
Tire and Rubber Company, working
under a cooperative agreement with the
U.S. Department of the Interior, tested
methods for destructive distillation, or
carbonization, of scrap tires. The tests
demonstrated that it was technically feas-
ible to dispose of the discards, and
potentially to obtain valuable byproducts
as a result. However, while the study ex-
amined effects of different temperatures
of carbonization, it did not address the
economic feasibility of the methods.
In 1982, the Rubber Manufacturers
Association (RMA) and the National Tire
Dealers and Retreaders Association
(NTDRA) cosponsored an International
Symposium on Scrap Tires. Robert
McRee of Environmental Control Prod-
ucts, Inc., in Charlotte, North Carolina,
presented a paper on pollution-free in-
cineration of rubber tires coupled with
profitable energy recovery. With one in-
cinerated tire capable of yielding two and
a half gallons of oil, McRee called
landfilling of rubber tires "a shameful re-
moval of a valuable fuel potential from
our total energy chain" and concluded
that the equipment components for rub-
ber tire incineration "are now a practical
reality."
Cooling rather than heating tires was
also discussed as a recycling method.
Professor Norman Braton of the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin at Madison described
how cryogenics, or cooling, "can be an
important recycling application for such
systems as the automobile truck tire."
Timothy Baker of Baker Rubber Com-
pany in South Bend, Indiana discussed
the market hierarchy of recycled tires.
Baker categorized six areas of tire
recycling: retreads, tire splitting, ground
rubber, rubber reclaiming through size
reduction, energy recovery through in-
cineration, and fringe uses, including the
use of rubber in asphalt. Under Baker's
six categories come most possible uses
for recycled tire rubber: gaskets, seals,
flexible spacers, floor mats, high grade
filler, binding material, and crash barriers
along highways.
in a recent conversation Frank Ryan of
the Rubber Manufacturers Association
described a Uniroyal project for burning
EPA JOURNAL
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Plume of black smoke drifts north from a fire involving several million used tires stored at a farm site some five miles west of
Winchester, Va. This aerial photo was taken just east of Winchester. The smoke drifted at least 30 miles north into western Maryland.
five percent shredded tires with coal to
produce energy. Goodyear's Ray Oviatt
also discussed his company's recycling
efforts. Goodyear, says Oviatt, has de-
veloped systems for making floating
breakwaters and artificial reefs from dis-
carded tires. In pilot projects in Florida
and Texas, tires were bundled, weighted
with concrete, and dumped into the sea
at selected sites. Becoming encrusted
with marine growth, they attracted aqua-
tic life and promoted game fishing.
Goodyear also tried lashing old tires
together to form floating breakwaters
and shore protection devices. The
largest, says Oviatt, was a 6,000-tire-long
breakwater in Lorain, Ohio.
Goodyear also ran two experiments to
extract energy from controlled tire
burning. At the company's Jackson,
Michigan plant, now shut down, tires
were burned in a boiler to produce steam
that could be used in making new tires.
The system worked, but was discontin-
ued because it was not cost effective. In
another experiment conducted in
cooperation with The Oil Shale Corpora-
tion (TOSCO), Goodyear tried pyrolytic
heating of tires to recover oil and carbon
black, a substance used in the production
of new tires. Like the other experiment,
this too worked, but was not cost effec-
tive; the carbon black wasn't of high
enough quality for new tires. "This," says
Oviatt, "was a noble experiment that
didn't live up to our expectations."
Still Struggling
with the Scraps
Efforts have been made to solve the
problem of scrap tire disposal, but most
of the solutions either don't work, are not
economically feasible, or involve such a
miniscule number of tires as to make no
more than a dent in the overall problem.
NTDRA Dealer News, a publication of the
National Tire Dealers and Retreaders
Association, last year ran an informal
survey of its members to learn how they
handle scrap tire disposal. While Dealer
News found several instances of prog-
ress, it concluded that people "are still
struggling with the scrap tire problem,
and those who have found solutions are
in the minority." In terms of recycling
rubber tires, "a viable economic program
of a substantial nature is yet to come,"
said Norm Kramer at the RMA-NTDRA
symposium. Kramer, of MAC Corpora-
tion's Saturn Shredder Division in Grand
Prairie, Texas, declared that current
recycling efforts "represent a very small
percentage of the total quantity of avail-
able tire inventory."
Recycling tires is not cheap. But paying
for disposal of discards isn't cheap either.
And paying the consequences when a
disaster of major proportions such as the
Winchester fire occurs isn't cheap or
easy.
According to Lee Thomas, EPA's Assis-
tant Administrator for Solid Waste and
Emergency Response, the agency is con-
sidering three options in Winchester: put-
ting the fire out, letting it burn itself out,
or accelerating the blaze. Putting the fire
out by conventional fire-fighting tech-
niques would probably take over 100
days, require four sets of equipment, and
cost up to $15 million. Potentially worst of
all, says Tom Massey, the aftermath of
an extinguished fire would be "a great
big dump of half-burned tires, carbon
black, all kinds of residue, and continuing
leachate." Letting the fire burn out by it-
self could take as long as 10 months. The
result would be leftover steel rims and a
pile of ashes. Meanwhile, collection of
the runoff oil is proceeding and the con-
tinuing burn is being controlled in a way
that does not threaten public health. The
third option — accelerating the blaze by
blowing air into the center of the pile —
is being investigated.
Can any good come out of this dis-
aster? Possibly, says Bob Mason. Pre-
vious experiments in burning tires to ex-
tract oil have all taken place at controlled
temperatures. In Winchester, fire temper-
atures are uncontrolled. If the core
temperatures of the tire pile could be
monitored, optimum conditions for
pyrolysis of tires could be identified, and
information on the most effective rate of
burn would become available. Perhaps,
says Massey, the interest generated in
the scientific community by the
Winchester blaze will be a springboard to
a new technology that could aid in a
solution to the problem of scrap tire dis-
posal. D
DECEMBER 1983
23
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Industry
Environmental
Award Winners
Homestake gold mine and processing
buildings in Lead, South Dakota. The firm
won an industry environmental award for
pollution cleanup.
A gold mining company in Lead, S.D., has
won a national award for the
management of its solid wastes. The firm is
Homestake Mining Company.
Homestake's award was for establishment
of an ongoing program to dispose of tailings
— or ore residues—in an impoundment and
to remove solid wastes from process water
used at its gold mine. The firm's cleanup
system received the 1983 National Environ-
mental Industry Award for Excellence in
Solid Waste Management.
The Environmental Industry Awards are
sponsored jointly by the President's Council
on Environmental Quality (CEO) and the
Environmental Industry Council, whose
member companies make or install pollution
control systems and equipment.
Five other firms also won awards, which
were presented at ceremonies by Alan Hill,
chairman of the CEQ.
For years, Homestake recovered most of
its gold through a process that included the
use of mercury. After extraction, the tailings
were discharged into Whitewood Creek.
In 1971, residual mercury was found in the
creek and in Oahe Reservoir downstream.
Homestake then developed a new extraction
process that discontinued the use of
mercury.
But other measures had to be taken to dis-
pose of the tailings and remove heavy metals
and cyanide traces from process wastewater.
A 230-foot earth and rockfill starter dam
was built in the steep mountainous canyons
of Grizzly Gulch 2.9 miles from the mine.
The tailings now are pumped to the site,
where state-of-the-art technology is used to
impound them safely. Water used in the
process is recycled.
Other measures have been taken to
remove heavy metals and cyanide traces
from water discharged into Whitewood
Creek. One is a pressure sand filtration
treatment system in operation since August
1979.
Construction of another facility to remove
heavy metals and cyanide traces from the
water is under way. It is expected to be in
operation by next August.
Homestake's investment in environ-
mental improvement activities is expected to
total about $35 million.
Other award winners and their categories
are:
Steelcase inc., Grand Rapids, Michigan-
air pollution control; Miller Brewing Com-
pany, Albany, Georgia —water and waste-
water pollution control; Environmental
Systems Corporation, Muskegon, Michigan —
hazardous waste management; Allied Corpo-
ration, Metropolis, Illinois—toxic pollution
control; and —in a joint effort in Colorado for
excellence in environmental permitting —
AMAX Inc., and three government agencies.
Oteelcase's citation was for a successful
10-year research and development program
to reduce hydrocarbon emissions from its
painting operations.
The company operates 17 paint lines—in
its more than six million square feet of
production area —to spray desk, file, seating,
panel, and systems furniture.
A decade ago, according to Gary G.
Egleston, Steelcase's Manager for Environ-
mental Administration, the amount of solvent
in the company's paint was too high to meet
acceptable environmental standards.
Kent County, Michigan, had failed to meet
EPA's ozone air quality standard. The
excessive solvent emissions at Steelcase
were one of the contributing factors.
Steelcase embarked on a research program
aimed at increasing the amount of solids in
the paint and decreasing the solvents. The
company convinced both paintmakers and
application equipment manufacturers to help
in the program.
Early experiments were disappointing,
since paints with increased solids levels
brought decreases in quality and in
application speed.
But between 1978 and 1982, Steelcase
reduced its volatile organic compound (VOC)
emissions a weighted average of 41 percent.
The average VOC content of paint fell from
5.5 pounds per gallon to three pounds, and
sometimes lower.
I he Miller Brewing Company's Southeast
Brewery, Albany, Georgia, won an award for
a new approach to cleaning hard-to-process
brewery wastewater.
Brewery wastes are among those that can
be broken down by bacteria and subsequently
removed from wastewater by allowing them
to settle.
Miller officials say the wastes have always
been hard to process because they are diffi-
cult for bacteria to consume. The wastes are
full of hard-to-digest carbohydrates and are
lacking in such nutrients as phosphorus,
nitrogen and iron.
Traditionally the treatment theory has been
to add enormous numbers of bacteria to the
wastewater along with the nutrients to make
them consume a lot, but this makes them
produce copious amounts of sludge solids. It
runs up a big electric bill for the necessary
aeration of the water and can result in some
discharge of sludge into streams.
Miller technicians decided to experiment
with the possibility that fewer bacteria would
do a better job, under the right conditions.
Over a period of six to nine months, the
.'.-I
EPA JOURNAL
-------
company was able to provide conditions
which encouraged the proper strain of
bacteria to grow. These organisms were put
into an aerobic digestion tank and given no
food until they were turned loose on the beer
waste.
According to Miller executives, because the
bacteria consume more, there is less sludge
to remove and it is easier to control.
Annual wastewater treatment cost at
Albany has been reduced from about
$2.5 million to $1.3 million.
I he Environmental Systems Corporation of
Muskegon, Michigan won its award for a
massive cleanup project at a chemical com-
pany site in Muskegon. The site is owned by
Bofors Nobel Inc., a subsidiary of a Swedish
company, A. B. Bofors. Bofors bought the
former Lakeway Chemicals Company Inc. in
1977.
The Swedish company wanted to move
quickly to establish itself in the U.S. specialty
and fine chemicals market. But it first had to
deal with a huge waste problem the former
owners had left behind.
More than 370 million pounds of sludge
had been placed in lagoons at the site since
1961. Some of the material had seeped
through sandy soils to contaminate
groundwater.
When the State of Michigan ordered that
the site be cleaned up, Bofors set up
Environmental Systems Corporation, a joint
venture of Zimpro Inc., and Waste Manage-
ment, Inc., to do the job. That was in 1981.
Environmental Systems decided to dispose
of the wastes on-site rather than have them
removed. It used a systems approach involv-
ing several technologies—among them bio-
carbon treatment, wet air oxidation, waste
acid neutralization and detoxification, pyro-
lytic thermal processing, secure landfill and
forced soil-water flushing. This approach
permits ESC not only to clean up the site but
also to process wastes from continuing
manufacturing operations.
While these technologies have been used
elsewhere, Environmental Systems integrated
them to permit the lowest cost treatment or
detoxification method for each of a wide
variety of waste streams.
To date, nearly 200 million gallons of
polluted groundwater have been pumped and
treated, and a million gallons of manufactur-
ing wastes have been detoxified.
Dam in Grizzly Gulch will impound tailings
from Homestake mine
/Allied Corporation's Metropolis, III., plant
has been given an award for combining two
hazardous wastes to create a usable third
material.
Allied's Metropolis plant chemically treats
uranium to produce uranium hexafluoride for
use in nuclear reactors. The plant produces
numerous inorganic fluorides as well, includ-
ing sulfur hexafluoride, a widely used insula-
tor in high-voltage electrical applications.
The Metropolis site also houses Allied's
pilot plant for the development of specialty
products based on fluorinated carbon, a key
material in the manufacture of lithium
batteries and other products.
Members of Allied's Chemical Sector
process technology group at the Metropolis
plant overcame a large-scale waste problem
by developing a technology to treat one
waste stream produced at the plant with a
second hazardous waste.
The result is 8,000 tons of synthetic
fluorspar, a raw material suitable for the
manufacture of anhydrous hydroflouric acid
at another Allied location,
A $4.3 million plant to produce the new
material from toxic wastes began operations
in 1982. It saves Allied $1 million a year and
eliminates the need for storage or disposal of
large quantities of hazardous solid waste. It
also reclaims approximately 1,000 cubic yards
of time monthly for reuse in the plant's
wastewater treatment process.
I he Colorado Joint Review Process, a
group consisting of a private company and
three public agencies, won a national award
for cooperating to assure environmental
protection during the opening and operation
of a new molybdenum mine.
The private company is AMAX Inc. The
government agencies are the Gunnison
County Board of Commissioners, the
Colorado Department of Natural Resources,
and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's
Forest Service.
The Colorado project involves AMAX's
Mount Emmons molybdenum mine in Gunni-
son County. It was planned after discovery
of a primary molybdenum deposit there—one
of the world's largest—in 1977.
The group was formed to coordinate
action by a host of county, state and federal
agencies with environmental protection
responsibilities—and to assure input from
nearby communities and the public at large—
on decisions affecting quality of life in the
Mount Emrnons area.
The Department of Natural Resources
used the Mount Emmons case lessons to
draft a manual that will guide actions in
other projects to protect the environment.
Several states also have expressed interest in
the manual. D
DECEMBER 1983
25
-------
Joseph A. Cannon
Bernard D. Goldstein
John A. Moore
More
Appointments
at EPA
Cour EPA assistant administrators nomi-
'nated by President Reagan have been con-
firmed by the U.S. Senate, a new region-
al administrator for Region 9 in San Fran-
cisco has been named by Administrator
Ruckelshaus and a high ranking post in
the Superfund program has been filled.
The four headquarters EPA officials are
Joseph A. Cannon, Assistant Administra-
tor for Air and Radiation; Bernard D.
Goldstein, Assistant Administrator for Re-
search and Development; John A.
Moore, Assistant Administrator for Pesti-
cides and Toxic Substances; and Milton
Russell, Assistant Administrator for Poli-
cy Planning and Evaluation. The new Re-
gional Administrator is Judith E. Ayres,
and Cora Prifold Beebe will help oversee
the Superfund budget.
Cannon has been the Acting Assistant
Administrator for Air and Radiation at EPA
since July 1983. He previously served as
Associate Administrator for the Office of
Policy and Resource Management at EPA
from September 1981 to July 1983. Prior to
that, he served as a special assistant and
legal advisor for regulatory reform to the
Administrator from May to September 1981.
Prior to joining EPA, Cannon practiced law in
Washington, D.C.
He received his undergraduate and law
degrees from Brigham Young University,
where he was an editor of the school's law
review. Cannon is married and has four sons.
Dr. Goldstein has been chairman of the De-
partment of Environmental and Community
Medicine of the University of Medicine and
Dentistry of New Jersey-Rutgers Medical
School since 1980.
During the same period, he served as chief
of the Division of Environmental and
Community Medicine of Middlesex General
Hospital and as an associate professor of the
Department of Environmental Medicine at
the New York University Medical Center.
Goldstein has served as a scientific adviser
to EPA since 1978, and he has been
chairman of the Agency's Clean Air Scientific
Advisory Committee since 1982.
Between 1975 and 1980, Goldstein was an
associate professor of the Medicine and
Environmental Medicine Departments of New
York University's School of Medicine. He
was a National Institutes of Health Senior
International Fellow at the Department of
Biochemistry at Brunei University and at the
Department of Community Medicine at St.
Thomas' Hospital and Medical School in
London, England.
Goldstein received his B.S. from the
University of Wisconsin in 1958 and his M.D.
from New York University School of Medi-
cine in 1962. He is married and has two
children.
Dr. Moore previously served as Deputy
Director of the National Toxicology Program
(NTP) in the Department of Health and
Human Services (DHHS), a position he held
since that program began in 1978. During the
same time he served as Director of Toxicol-
ogy Research and Testing in the National
Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
EPA JOURNAL
-------
Milton Russell
Judith E. A yres
Cora Prifold Beebe
He is a board-certified toxicologist and
served on a variety of national and inter-
national scientific panels on dioxin.
Moore graduated from Michigan State
University in 1961 where he also received a
Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine (1963). He
and his wife will be moving to Washington,
D.C. from Raleigh, N.C., where he has been
located.
Russell came to EPA from Resources for
the Future, a public policy research institu-
tion specializing in natural resources and the
environment. He served as Director of its
Center for Energy Policy Research since
1979. He was with the institution since 1976.
From 1974-1976, Russell served as senior
staff economist at the Council of Economic
Advisers. He worked as a staff economist for
the Federal Power Commission during
1966-1967.
Russell has taught at several universities,
including Southern Illinois University at
Carbondate where he was chairman of the
Economics Department.
He received his doctorate in economics
from the University of Oklahoma in 1963,
after previously earning his masters in
economics there in 1957. He graduated from
the Texas College of Arts and Industries,
Kingsville, Texas, in 1955. He and his wife
reside in Washington, D.C.
Regional Administrator Ayres has operated
her own consulting organization in San
Francisco since 1978. It has been con-
cerned with environmental program planning.
natural resources economics, environmental
mediation, marine policy, and the analysis of
environmental legislation and regulations.
From 1971 to 1978, Ms. Ayres held various
positions with the Department of Interior.
They included serving on the personal staff
of former Secretary of the Interior Rogers
C.B. Morton in the capacity of speech
writer, an assignment with the Joint Federal
State Land Use Planning Commission in
Anchorage as Communications Director, and
head of the Public Affairs Office of the
National Park Service in Alaska. Ayres also
served in Washington, D.C. as legislative
liaison for the National Park Service.
She served on the North Pacific Fisheries
Management Council advisory committee
from 1976-77, and has lectured at national
and international conferences on natural
resources management.
She was awarded her bachelor of arts
degree in zoology and physiology and an
equivalent degree in English from Miami
University in Oxford, Ohio, in 1966. In 1967,
Ms. Ayres attended Leeds University in
Wakefield, England, where she did graduate
work in archeology. The following year, she
attended the International Christian
University in Tokyo, where she pursued
graduate studies in Japanese art, politics and
religion. In 1980, she earned her Master of
Public Administration degree at Harvard
University's John F. Kennedy School of
Government in Cambridge, Mass.
Ms. Ayres and her husband, John W.
Burke III, an attorney, and their daughter live
in the San Francisco Bay area.
Beebe has been named as
Director of the Office of Policy and
Program Management for the Office of
Solid Waste and Emergency Response.
A recognized expert in federal fiscal
policy, Beebe has served since 1981 as
Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for
Administration. In that post, she oversaw
management of the Department's 11
bureaus, 121,000 employees, and $4.7
billion operating budget. Prior to joining
Treasury, she was principal Deputy Assis-
tant Secretary of Education for
Elementary and Secondary Education.
From 1973 to 1981, she was Director of
the Division of Planning and Budgeting in
the U.S. Office of Education, where she
managed a budget of $12 billion.
In addition to her professional career,
Beebe has been widely published on a
range of subjects and has received
numerous professional and service
awards. She holds B.A. (1959) and M.A.
(1969) degrees from the University of
Michigan and has done post-graduate
work at the Johns Hopkins University
School of Advanced International studies.
She is active in various professional and
civic organizations.!!]
DECEMBER 1983
27
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Update
A review of recent major EPA activities and developments in the pollution control program areas.
AIR
EPA Ends Ban
EPA has announced an end to
its four-year ban on construction
of new and modified stationary
pollution sources in most of
California as a result of the
state's compliance with automo-
tive inspection and maintenance
requirements (tailpipe emission
tests) of the Clean Air Act.
Under the Act, six areas of
California were required to
include I/M programs in their
1979 clean air implementation
standards. They were the Los
Angeles basin, San Francisco
Bay area, Sacramento area, San
Diego, Ventura, and Fresno
Counties. Establishment of l/M
programs required state authori-
zation under California law.
Without state authorization for
the I/M program, the plans
could not be approved; and on
July 2, 1979, the construction
moratorium was automatically
imposed.
On September 10, 1982, the
Governor of California signed the
legislation which authorized the
state to implement I/M where
specifically requested by respon-
sible air pollution control dis-
tricts. The districts responsible
for five of the six areas have
requested implementation, and
EPA's action removes the
construction moratorium in these
areas.
Fresno County is the only
remaining California nonattain-
ment area failing to request
implementation of the auto
inspection program. Under the
Clean Air Act, EPA is required to
retain the construction
moratorium until the county
formally requests the program to
be adopted. EPA continues to
work with Fresno County offi-
cials in order to secure the auto
inspection program for that area.
ENFORCEMENT
Violation Notices
The City of Philadelphia has
been accused by EPA of viola-
tions of the Federal Clean Air
Act. The alleged violations
involve tampering with emission
control devices on 131 city police
vehicles, for which the agency is
asking penalties of $327,500.
The Agency has also issued a
notice to the County of Green-
ville, S.C., for alleged violations
of the Act. The agency is asking
penalties of $630,000.
The violation notice in Phila-
delphia resulted from an
investigation conducted by EPA
investigators, after the agency
received complaints from the
Philadelphia Clean Air Council
and the Philadelphia Police
Mechanics' Union.
EPA investigated the allega-
tions and documented the 131
tampering violations which
occurred between August 1982
and July 1983. The violations
included 52 catalytic converter
removals, 32 carbon canister
removals and 47 air pump
removals. EPA said tampering
had occurred on 60 percent of
the city's police vehicles, but it
cited only the most serious
violations.
The notice in South Carolina
alleges that Greenville County
used leaded gasoline in vehicles
requiring unleaded gasoline. The
agency is asking for penalties for
90 specific instances of automo-
tive misfueling.
EPA said the enforcement
action was taken as a result of
an investigation conducted by
agency investigators after
receiving information from
concerned citizens in Greenville.
Actual inspections of vehicles,
fueling facilities, and related
county records were performed,
with the permission of county
officials. The county's own
maintenance fueling records
revealed a regular practice of
allowing the cars to use leaded
gasoline.
Cleanup Agreement
EPA recently announced an
agreement between the agency
and Westinghouse Electric
Corporation requiring the com-
pany to clean up polychlorinated
biphenyl (PCB)-contaminated
wastes at Neal's Landfill and
Neal's Dump near Bloomington,
Ind.
The agreement satisfies only a
request for a preliminary injunc-
tion requiring immediate cleanup
measures at the two sites. The
preliminary injunction is part of a
larger suit filed on January 4,
1983, requesting cleanup of the
sites. Trial for the remaining
portion of the suit is scheduled
to begin early next year in
Indianapolis.
During the mid-1960's, West-
inghouse disposed of PCB-
contaminated waste products at
both sites from its electrical
equipment manufacturing facility
in Bloomington. The wastes
include electrical capacitors filled
with PCB fluid, and manufactur-
ing byproducts saturated with
PCBs and other organic
chemicals, including toluene.
Some of the PCB-contami-
nated equipment has rusted and
broken open, releasing PCBs
into the nearby environment,
posing a threat to populations
around both sites. PCBs have
been found in surrounding soils
at both sites and in streams near
Neal's Landfill.
HAZARDOUS WASTES
Superfund Progress
Emergency actions at more than
150 hazardous waste sites have
been completed in the first 33
months of the Superfund
program, according to EPA.
As of September 30, EPA had
obligated more than $47 million
to fund 206 removal actions. One
hundred fifty-three of the actions
had been completed.
The figures refer only to
actions taken under EPA's emer-
gency response program, which
deals with imminent threats to
public health and the environ-
ment. Superfund emergency
responses have been completed
in 36 states. Pennsylvania had
the most such responses—13,
followed by Ohio with 12;
California with 11; Texas with
10; Florida and New York with
eight each; and Illinois, Indiana,
Michigan, and New Jersey with
seven each.
Other EPA efforts provide for
longer-term solutions to prob-
lems at hazardous waste sites.
As of September 30, EPA had
also obligated $124.6 million for
long-term cleanup activities at
141 sites.
Administrator Ruckelshaus
pointed out that EPA is taking
several steps to accelerate
cleanup of hazardous waste
sites, the Agency has authorized
its Regional Administrators to
commit up to $250,000 in funds
to initiate removal actions
without prior headquarters
approval. "Furthermore,"
Ruckelshaus said, "we are acting
sooner to address situations
which pose a potential threat to
public health and the environ-
ment, rather than waiting for a
crisis to develop."
PESTICIDES
Predator Control
EPA recently announced its final
decison on the use of Com-
pound 1080 (sodium fluoro-
acetate) to control coyotes and
other feral or wild dogs.
The decision modifies the 1972
ban on the pesticide for predator
control and allows the registra-
tion of the chemical toxicant in
toxic collars and, subject to
stringent restrictions, in single
lethal dose baits. The application
for registration of Compound
1080 for large bait stations and
smear posts was denied.
The decison, made by Lee
Thomas, EPA's Assistant Admin-
istrator for Solid Waste and
Emergency Response, affirms,
with some modifications, the
October 22, 1982, initial decision
of Administrative Law Judge
Spencer T. Nissen. Thomas was
designated to rule on Compound
1080 on July 18, 1983, by EPA
Administrator William D.
Ruchelshaus who excused him-
self from consideration of the
issue. At that time, Mr. Thomas
was the Acting Deputy Adminis-
trator of EPA.
The final decision will now
allow parties to apply to EPA for
registration of Compound 1080
for the two uses allowed. In
addition to meeting the registra-
tion standards, registration of
Compound 1080 for predator use
must meet a number of addi-
tional restrictions established in
the final decision order.
Pesticide Review
EPA has asked for public com-
ment on its analysis of the risks
and benefits associated with the
seven pesticides used for sub-
terranean termite control.
After examining available data,
the agency has concluded in its
report that existing evidence is
not sufficient to determine that
the proper application of termite
control pesticides poses
unreasonable risks to public
health. The pesticides reviewed
were chlordane, heptachlor,
aldrin, dieldrin, pentachloro-
phenol, lindane and chlorpyrifos.
In assessing the risks and
benefits associated with the
seven major registered termite
products, the Agency found the
benefits to far exceed the risks at
this time. At the same time, the
agency recognized that in indi-
vidual cases where the termiti-
cides are improperly applied or
misused in treating residential
dwellings, the risks from
exposure may exceed the
benefits. The Agency is, there-
fore, considering restricting the
use of these pesticides to certi-
fied applicators who are trained
in application techniques which
reduce human exposure. The
report indicates that the risk
assessment on the seven chemi-
cals is incomplete because of the
lack of definitive data on the
extent and amount of human
exposure and on the health
effects which may be induced by
such exposure to these
pesticides.
The Agency has developed an
action plan to obtain the neces-
sary toxicology and exposure
28
EPA JOURNAL
-------
data to fully assess the health
risks and determine the need for
any further regulatory action.
The toxicology studies include
mutagenicity tests and sub-
chronic inhalation studies. The
pesticide producers will also be
required to provide indoor air
monitoring data for various types
of dwellings that have been
treated with these termiticides.
RESEARCH
Innovative Studies
EPA is awarding a total of
$250,000 in research and
development contracts to 10
small high-technology firms as
part of a federal program which
encourages smaller companies to
submit innovative research
proposals.
The proposals selected were
from Chemical Process Corpora-
tion of Brookfield, Wis., to study
ways to produce a useful prod-
uct from waste whey; Richard
Jablin and Associates of
-Durham, N.C., to study a
method of cooling molten slag
without producing polluting
emissions; Bend Research of
Bend, Ore., to develop an eco-
nomical way to recover metals
from sludges; and PEDCO Environ-
mental of Cincinnati, to investi-
gate the recycling of dust from
electric arc furnaces.
Also selected were Bollyky
Associates of Norwalk, Conn.,
to evaluate an ozone-hydrogen
peroxide system for dis-
infecting wastewater;
Matrecon of Oakland, Calif., to
develop ways to determine how
waste liquids with organic com-
pounds travel through clay
liners; and Water Engineering and
Technology of Fort Collins,
Colo., to study erosion from
slopes in hazardous waste sites
protected by rock mulch.
The remaining firms selected
were Kenterprise Research of
York, Pa., to develop a new
process to clean up dioxin;
Merix Corp. of
Wellesley, Mass., to investigate
four novel processes for con-
trolling volatile organic emis-
sions; and Photox International
of Houston to investigate a new
photochemical process for clean-
ing up contaminated ground-
water.
TOXICS
Formaldehyde Review
EPA has announced that it is
rescinding its 1982 decision that
formaldehyde did not meet the
statutory criteria for priority
review under the Toxic Sub-
stances Control Act (TSCA).
Accordingly, the Agency is
soliciting public comments to
assist it in determining whether
formaldehyde presents a signifi-
cant risk to humans.
EPA is under statutory obliga-
tion to decide within 180 days
whether to initiate regulatory
action if it makes a threshold
determination under Section 4(f)
of the Toxic Substances Control
Act that there may be a reason-
able basis to conclude that a
chemical presents a "significant
risk of serious or widespread
harm" to humans from cancer,
gene mutations, or birth defects.
Formaldehyde is a widely-used
chemical. In 1981, 5.86 billion
pounds were produced in the
U.S., making it the 25th chemi-
cal in a ranking by U.S. produc-
tion volume. Some major uses
are: ureaformaldehyde resins
used in plywood, particle board,
and paper and textile treatments;
formaldehyde resins used as
adhesives and for foundry
molds; tissue preservation; and
as a chemical intermediate.
Formaldehyde is also present in
the air due to natural processes
and incomplete combustion.
Laboratory Standards
Laboratory standards for testing
pesticides and toxic substances
under the Federal Insecticide,
Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act
(FIFRA) and the Toxic Sub-
stances Control Act (TSCA)
have been set by EPA.
These standards, called Good
Lab Practices, are designed to
assure that test data submitted
to the Agency for regulatory pur-
poses are reliable. Good Lab
Practices are those yardsticks by
which EPA can determine
whether laboratory studies are
being properly conducted and
will yield sound data. EPA's
Good Lab Practices are consis-
tent with testing procedures
developed by the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration.
EPA proposed the standards
after learning of allegations that
Industrial Biotest Labs, a large
laboratory headquartered in
Chicago, had provided falsified
data to the Agency. Some pesti-
cides were duly registered by
EPA based on that data; many of
these products subsequently
required a lengthy retesting
process.
Based on these allegations, on
October 21 of this year, a U.S.
District Court judge in Chicago
found three former IBT officials
guilty of mail fraud and making
false statements to the
government.
WATER
Revised Rules
EPA has issued revised rules
governing water quality stand-
ards that will strengthen the
protection of streams, rivers, and
lakes.
The standards, established by
the states and approved by EPA,
set water quality goals for
specific bodies of water. They
also serve as the regulatory basis
for treatment controls and
strategies beyond technology-
based levels of treatment.
The new rules incorporate new
changes in response to numer-
ous public comments. EPA
adopted several measures to
reassure the public that the
Agency is committed to achiev-
jng the goals of the Act. They
include, for example, regulatory
language explicitly affirming
EPA's commitment to use stand-
ards as a basis of restoring and
maintaining the integrity of the
nation's waters. EPA also added
a "Purpose" section declaring
that standards are to protect
public health and welfare, and to
enhance water quality.
The new rules also clarify that
when a state changes the desig-
nated uses of its waters, it will
have to demonstrate that those
uses are not attainable, based on
a number of well-defined factors.
There is a much stronger
emphasis on state adoption of
water quality criteria for toxic
pollutants. Under the previous
regulation only a few toxic
pollutants were included in a
limited number of state stand-
ards. EPA revised this section to
reflect the Agency's commitment
to control the discharge of toxic
pollutants and in response to
public concern over toxic
wastes.
The Agency retained the basic
provisions of the antidegradation
policy dealing with protection of
pristine, high quality waters,
existing instream uses, and
waters constituting outstanding
national resources.
EPA also set the "fishable/
swimmable" goal of the Clean
Water Act as the basis of all
standards' decisions and for the
first time provides a mandatory
policy for upgrading all water
bodies to that use classification,
where attainable.
EPA also expanded and clari-
fied acceptable procedures for
downgrading stream use classifi-
cations, specified appropriate
state and federal roles, deline-
ated several acceptable forms of
water quality criteria, and
described the dual function of
water quality standards as both
goals and regulatory tools.
Treatment Options
EPA recently announced it is
proposing new rules for
secondary treatment of waste-
water that will make it easier for
smaller communities to meet
Clean Water Act requirements
while assuring that water quality
will not be adversely affected.
The rules are in response to
1981 congressional amendments
to the Act that consider less
expensive methods of biologi-
cally treating wastewater, such
as trickling filters and waste
stabilization ponds, as equivalent
to conventional secondary treat-
ment systems.
Approximately 3,000 trickling
filters and pond facilities now in
operation would be potentially
eligible for permit adjustments.
About 85 percent of these facili-
ties serve communities with
populations of less than 10,000
persons.
Congress in 1981 amended the
Clean Water Act to allow the
less costly biological systems to
be considered as secondary treat-
ment, provided water quality .
would not be adversely affected
by designating these systems as
equivalent to secondary
treatment.
Drinking Water
EPA has begun the second
phase of revised regulations that
will become the permanent
drinking water standards for all
public water systems.
The Agency has issued an
Advance Notice of Proposed
Rulemaking (ANPRM) for
National Revised Primary
Drinking Water Regulations
which went into effect shortly
after Congress passed the Safe
Drinking Water Act in 1974.
The task of developing revised
regulations is such a major
undertaking that EPA has divided
the process into four phases.
The first of these dealt with
volatile synthetic organic
chemicals, and an ANPRM for
these substances was issued in
1982. Proposed regulations for
these chemicals, which include
carbon tetrachioride and tri-
chloroethylene, will be issued
next year and final regulations
should appear in 1985.
The latest action, the second
major step in revision of the
regulations, deals with most
substances addressed in the 1975
interim regulations—the micro-
biological contaminants,
inorganic chemicals, and
pesticides. D
DECEMBER 1983
29
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Toxic Chemicals
and Health
{Excerpts from a speech by EPA Adminis-
trator William D.Ruckelshaus to the
Chemical Manufacturers Association in
New York on Nov. 8, 1983)
"I think you have to accept the industry's
lack of credibility on health questions as
a fact of life deriving from complex his-
torical and institutional factors. I under-
stand how the many competent and
reputable scientists who work in the in-
dustry might resent it. Decrying public
ignorance of factors involving their
health may assuage resentment, but it
only fuels negative public perceptions
about the chemical industry's social con-
science.
"Of course, you must continue to put
forward the facts at your disposal; in-
deed, it is essential that you do so. The
chemical industry is our greatest and
most reliable source of information on
chemical species, on their behavior under
all conditions of physical state and mix-
ture, on controlling hazards and recycling
wastes. Despite this acknowledged ex-
pertise, I would caution you not to dis-
miss public fears because your calcula-
tions show them to be 'irrational.'
"We know, of course, some public
fears do not stand up well before statis-
tical tests. For example, a recent poll
published in the Scientific American
asked people from different groups to
place in rank order the risk of death from
various causes. It was clear from the re-
sults that many people have ideas about
relative risk that are at variance with any
strictly statistical evidence we have.
"The important point for our purposes
is that such ideas will cause people to
impose different standards of safety on
risks of different origins. If, as that poll
suggests, college students believe that
pesticides and nuclear power plants
present greater risks than boating or
motorcycle accidents (a supposition, I
might add, not strongly supported by
actuarial statistics) then they will seek to
impose stricter controls on the risks they
believe more important. There is nothing
inherently wrong with this; public safety
is a judgment, not a mathematical
calculation. As such, it is properly housed
in the political 'process. We can try to
change these judgments over time, with
evidence, with research, but we do our-
selves a disservice if we pretend that the
concerns the political judgments address
are not 'real.'
"We may ask, why is rational argument
less than convincing in discussions about
toxic chemicals? Why aren't the judg-
ments more in line with our calculations?
I believe it is because public concern is
centered on those dreaded diseases that
are plausibly connected with low con-
centrations of toxic substances, that is,
cancer and the genetic and reproductive
disorders, and because, at the heart of
our risk assessments there is, undeni-
ably, a hollow place. I think people sense
that we really don't know how and under
what circumstances chemicals cause
cancer; they're right, we don't.
| here are over 400,000 deaths from
cancer each year. About two percent of
children are born with some defect. How
much of this toll is associated with expo-
sure to toxic chemicals? Almost none? A
lot? There are credentialed scientists
supporting extreme points on this spec-
trum and many in between. This un-
certainty imposes upon those with a re-
sponsibility to the public, and I trust that
includes all of us here, a position of pru-
dent concern.
"I have no doubt some of this concern
may prove mistaken in years to come,
but in this we are very much in the posi-
tion of the early European sanitarians,
who fought for sewer systems and other
basic public health measures in the early
nineteeth century. These people did not
know about germs, and were roundly
mocked by people who believed there
was no provable connection between dirt
and disease. In fact, some of the jus-
tifications the sanitarians put forward to
defend their projects appear quaint and
ridiculous to us now, as our solemn pro-
nouncements about cancer will no doubt
appear to our posterity. But they built the
sewers anyway. There is a lesson for us
here about action in the face of ignor-
ance.
"Let me explain how EPA is
responding to this problem, which we
share, of acting in the face of ignorance.
First, we accept risk assessment as an
important tool; given the very great num-
bers of possible regulatory objects of
interest, it is indispensable for setting
priorities. It is also useful as a means of
demonstrating to a concerned public that
we are working on the most significant
risks. But note this: risk assessment can
seriously backfire if there is any suspi-
30
EPA JOURNAL
-------
cion that policy interests (other than con-
cern for public health) have intruded into
our calculations of risk. At EPA we have
tried to disentangle risk assessment, as a
process, from the policy considerations
that go into making a final decision about
regulating a substance, which we call risk
management. I realize there is not an
obvious bright line between the two; still,
I believe that good public policy obliges
us to make it as bright as we can.
"This is something that industry has
not always done, and the idea that eco-
nomic interests prevail over health con-
cerns in industry statements about risk
has stuck in the public mind. I should
"add that there are some hopeful signs
that this is changing. Much of the in-
dustry has embraced the principle that
risk assessments must emerge from dis-
interested establishments. I trust that this
trend—whose exemplar is the Chemical
Industry Institute of Toxicology—will con-
tinue.
Dut risk assessment is not a solution
to the problem of public fear and public
trust. It is my belief that the key to the
acceptance of any body of analysis is the
public perception of action. The public
must be convinced that when we have a
reasonable belief in an unreasonable risk
we will move to reduce it, swiftly and de-
cisively.
"Now we may not agree on whether
such actions are worthwhile. We all
know how many assumptions go into
risk assessments and how radically the
assessments change when you vary
them. If we often disagree on things that
appear eminently possible to pin down,
such as control costs, then of course
we're going to fight over numbers that
inhabit what one of our scientists ruefully
calls "a mathematical fairyland." But
although we are deeply committed to
finding the most cost-effective ways of
controlling public health risks, we cannot
wait for the last decimal point to be en-
tered. I have no doubt that we will in the
future require expenditures that your anal-
ysis shows control inconsiderable risks. I
think that society has told us to pay that
price as a sort of insurance. In a certain
sense, the actual, quantifiable risk reduc-
tion we obtain thereby is beside the
point. We are really buying freedom from
fear, and most Americans are willing to
pay a reasonable price to obtain it.
"Moreover, if we do not act decisively
under the conditions I have described,
the public trust in EPA will erode. Indeed,
in some quarters it already has. Our
friends in the environmental movement
would like us to be strictly bound by
statutory mandates so that we would
have little freedom to perform the bal-
ancing and priority-setting operations im-
plied by the term risk management. I
don't think this is a correct approach. In
terms of efficient public health protection
it is no substitute for Agency flexibility.
But this flexibility will be granted us only if
we are trusted, and in order to be trusted
we must act where the facts warrant. This
is an important point for the industry to
consider, because I believe the events of
the last few years have shown that in the
long run a strong and trusted EPA is the
best friend the industry has.
"The chemical industry can help itself
a great deal in this matter by adopting a
similar policy. You can take actions that
will capture the public imagination, and
make you appear, in the old phrase, part
of the solution instead of part of the prob-
lem. As to what actions would be suit-
able, I will quote no less an authority
than your past chairman, Bill Simeral:
To start, we can clean up the dump sites.
Abandoned dump sites are the single,
most obvious symbol of everything the
public believes to be wrong with the
chemical industry. Whatever their impact
on the environment, rusted drums are
poisoning the climate for the chemical in-
dustry in Washington and across the na-
tion. As long as we let the problem per-
sist, we don't stand a chance at winning
the confidence of the people.'
"I couldn't agree more, and the same
goes for us in government. We have to
stop playing 'who struck John' around
the issue of responsibility for hazardous
waste sites. We have to go beyond public
relations and the legal niceties. The pub-
lic is not going to stand still when repre-
sentatives of a multibillion-dollar industry
and governmental officials at all levels
dance a minuet around cleaning up a site
that has some little town scared half to
death.
"As I noted, the management of your
organization is aware of the need for
movement on this issue, as are we. As
you are probably aware, we have
changed our policy regarding cleanup
projects in that we now begin the actual
site work before nailing down the details
about who will ultimately bear the cost.
In addition, I have encouraged an in-
formal group made up of representatives
of industry, the Agency and the environ-
mental community to develop recom-
mendations about how we can all work
together to speed the cleanup. We expect
recommendations from them early next
year.
"I view this sort of effort as an initial
step in the widening of the industry's
assumption of responsibility concerning
toxic chemicals in the environment. I
think you will sooner or later have to
confront hazardous waste disposal in a
much more comprehensive way than you
have in the past. I can't believe that the
use of chemicals in general will increase
as much as you would like it to if people
who use them in commerce do not have
a safe place to put potentially hazardous
waste. It is in your ultimate interest to in-
sure that your customers can dispose of
their wastes safely even if this means, in
some cases, taking care of them
yourselves. The chemical industry must
begin to prepare itself for helping police
the whole cycle of use, disposal and
recovery for a variety of toxic chemicals.
V\/hy should you do this? Isn't it stick-
ing your neck out? Isn't your job simply
to make and sell chemicals and realize a
profit? In answer I would turn to Peter
Drucker's argument that profit is a neces-
sary condition of enterprise, but not its
ultimate end, which is to insure the sur-
vival and growth of the organization. I
hope that what I've said today, and what
you have heard from others both within
and outside the industry, convinces you
that the survival and growth of the in-
stitutions you represent is in some doubt
if you do not act quickly, boldly and con-
vincingly to rid the environment of toxic
substances where you can and stem the
public apprehension they engender.
"This is your challenge, our challenge.
I believe rising to meet it is a necessary
ingredient in the prosperity of your in-
dustry and the well being of our country.
We should get on with it."D
DECEMBER 1983
31
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Minority
Students
Working as
EPA Apprentices) f
Crystal Darvin, a 17-year old high school
senior, spent last summer working in
EPA's Health Effects Research Laboratory
in Cincinnati helping to conduct tests to
determine the effects of different chem-
icals on liver cells in rats.
It wasn't exactly a vacation, but she
said the experience will help if she de-
cides on a career in medicine. Darvin,
who is enrolled at Anderson High School
in Cincinnati, is working part-time in the
laboratory now. She is one of 52 stu-
dents in the Greater Cincinnati area who
participated last summer in the ten-week
minority apprenticeship program being
sponsored each year by the EPA and ad-
ministered by the University of Cincinna-
ti.
The program goal is to interest more
minority persons in science and engi-
neering. Darvin and the other students
are gaining direct experience in labor-
atories at EPA's Andrew W. Breidenbach
Environmental Research Center in Cincin-
nati. EPA engineers, scientists and
mathematicians work one-to-one with the
students to help them gain the most
from their apprenticeships.
Seventeen-year-old George Ellis of For-
est Park High School says his appren-
ticeship has "given me the foundation for
planning a college career in chemistry
and biology." He spent the summer in
EPA's Environmental Monitoring and
Support Laboratory summarizing reports
on the toxicity of pollutants.
Stephen Hill, a senior at Woodward
High School, spent his summer's appren-
ticeship in the Municipal Environmental
Research Lab entering data on water
pollution research into a computer. "It
shows me what engineers do and helps
me a lot with accuracy," Hill said. The 17-
year-old student says the work "most de-
finitely helps prepare me for my career."
He would like to major in aerospace engi-
neering in college.
Emile Coleman, a research chemist
who is one of the supervisors of the stu-
dents, said many are performing real ex-
periments that help in EPA research and
monitoring. "This isn't just a classroom
setting," Coleman said.
Darrin Morris, student at Forest Park High School in Cincinnati,
conducts pollution test on drinking water sample. Morris is in EPA
minority apprenticeship program.
One of those performing tests was
Kimberly Conliffe, 17, a student at Syca-
more High School. She has been working
for the past two summers in the Health
Effects Research Laboratory identifying
organic chemicals in drinking water.
Chemicals she identified are tested on
laboratory animals for ill effects.
The students get valuable experience
plus a stipend of up to $134 a week, said
Clarence demons, coordinator of the
program. He added that "we hope to
continue working with the students
through college and, hopefully, get many
of them jobs with EPA after graduation."
The program began in 1980 and about
135 students have been involved.
In addition to the experience provided
by the program, the income is an asset
for a young person saving for college,
points out Jewell Mimms, 16, a junior at
Walnut Hill School. Mimms, who would
like to pursue a computer engineering
career, spent the summer in the Center's
Office of Administration putting data into
a computer.
Another student, Zena Henson, 17,
says, "I almost feel I have a degree in
this field already," after spending two
summers in the program classifying
organic materials. She is aiming for a
career in biochemistry at the Ohio In-
stitute of Technology.
According to demons, the program be-
gins each year with brochures being sent
to area high schools explaining the
apprenticeships. Then school counselors
have their best minority students who
are interested in the EPA program take a
set of tests at the University of Cincinna-
ti. After the tests, the University refers to
EPA those who are qualified for the
training. Students involved in the pro-
gram are blacks, Hispanics and Pacific
Islanders.
Prospective apprentices, demons said,
must have completed at least the sopho-
more year of high school and a year of
study in the physcial or life sciences.
The summer program starts after com-
pletion of the school year. It is operating
under annual grants of about $2,000 per
student from EPA's Office of Research
and Development. The funds are for
salaries, transportation and an enrich-
ment program conducted by the Univer-
sity one day each week throughout the
apprenticeship.
demons added that the EPA laboratory
directors in Cincinnati "are in
wholehearted support of the program."Q
32
EPA JOURNAL
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Sun, ice and snow light up this wintry
scene at Old Woman Bay at Wawa,
Ontario, Canada, near Sault Ste. Marie.
This photo is one of a series by B. A.
King in the special exhibit "Great Lakes,
America" which EPA helped sponsor.
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Unned Slates
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Agency
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Postage and
Fees Paid
Environmental
Protection
Agency
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uTBST
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