12 Southeast Sites Targeted in Plan for Waste Treatment Plants

City leaders from Santa Fe Springs and Long Beach reacted with mixed emotions this week as Los Angeles County waste planners unveiled a list of potential sites they say are suitable for building a proposed countywide system of hazardous waste treatment plants.

The county’s proposal, patterned after similar treatment systems used in Germany and Denmark for several years but never attempted on a large scale in the United States, mentions 20 possible sites for half a dozen hazardous waste treatment plants to be constructed in heavy industrial sectors scattered across the county.

According to engineers for the county Sanitation Districts, the proposed plants would use chemical processes and intense heat to turn liquid hazardous wastes into less hazardous dry cakes and ash. The plan is to haul dry residues to a remote desert site for encapsulation in a clay-lined “residuals repository,” which scientists say will not leak like a conventional moist landfill.

Twelve potential sites, most of them available for sale, were named Tuesday in Santa Fe Springs, Vernon, Commerce, Bell and Long Beach. Eight others are in Carson, Irwindale, Azusa and the San Fernando Valley.

Federal Agency Backs Plan

Although the county’s plan is strongly backed by officials of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, city leaders this week expressed reactions ranging from caution to heated opposition.

Don Powell, Santa Fe Springs city manager, said the City Council last week voted unanimously to oppose construction of any hazardous waste treatment plant there and has sent a letter to the county expressing its opposition to the proposal.

“The City Council will fight it all the way,” Powell said. “Our feeling in Santa Fe Springs is that we have all the hazards we want here.”

Powell said the city is moving away from its past reliance upon heavy industry. Last week, he said, city officials tentatively approved limiting the number of above-ground storage tanks permitted in Santa Fe Springs to the present 313 tanks.

“There is a transformation taking place in this city in terms of kinds of businesses, and we have more light industry and mid-tech companies and less and less heavy industry,” Powell said.

“We don’t want to expand the risk level any further in this city. We’re definitely going in the opposite direction from this county report.”

The five sites identified in Santa Fe Springs, most of which Powell said are in escrow for other uses, are at 9601 John Street, Los Nietos Road at Dice Road, 9101 Sorensen Avenue, Springdale Avenue at Florence Avenue and Bell Ranch Drive north of Santa Fe Springs Road.

4 Sites in Vernon

Four sites were identified in Vernon. They are at 3333 Downey Road, 3691 Bandini Blvd., 4408 Bandini Blvd. and 3113 E. 26th St.

One site was identified in Bell, a parcel between Bandini Boulevard and Lindbergh Lane just east of Atlantic Boulevard. Another site was identified in Commerce at 3416 Garfield Ave.

John Dever, Long Beach city manager, said he had not been informed about the county’s list of potential sites, but noted that Long Beach has strict zoning ordinances concerning hazardous wastes.

“It couldn’t be done without a hell of a lot of work on its environmental impact, traffic impacts and many other concerns,” Dever said.

The single potential site named in Long Beach, on California 47 at the Cerritos Channel, also takes in a large portion of Los Angeles city territory.

But Dever said he would “have to see the piece of land they are proposing, because we might oppose it just on its face if we don’t agree with the location.”

He expressed concern that the county had not asked the city to help identify potential sites in Long Beach’s industrial area, saying, “We could have saved them a lot of trouble if they had just called us and let us know what they were doing.”

The county Department of Public Works and the county Sanitation Districts hired a Coldwell Banker industrial real estate specialist to conduct a search of the county’s industrial zones. According to their joint report, the sites selected had to include 5 to 15 acres of land near a freeway or major access road and near an adequate sewer system.

Nathan Manske, director of public safety in Carson, said he is reviewing the county’s proposal and preparing to report his recommendations to the City Council at their Oct. 21 meeting.

Four potential sites were identified in Carson, in addition to a fifth site proposed in an unincorporated area just north of the city.

Manske declined comment on the merits of the county’s plan, saying he wants to “find out exactly what’s been proposed and how it would work.”

“It is our understanding from the county that there is no intent to force any site on a city, and that local land use practices and policies as established by city councils will prevail,” Manske added. “We are operating under that assumption.”

Officials of the county Department of Public Works and the Sanitation Districts said in their report to the Board of Supervisors Tuesday that “it will take a concerted effort to convince the public and elected decision makers that modern hazardous waste treatment centers . . . are in no way like Superfund sites of the past.”

County officials are seeking a safe way to dispose of more than 550,000 tons of hazardous wastes that require disposal in Los Angeles County each year because the few remaining legal disposal sites have closed or are coming under EPA scrutiny for contamination problems.

Last winter the last hazardous waste dump in the county, the BKK landfill in West Covina, closed, forcing waste generators to hire trucking companies to haul the wastes to two dump sites about 200 miles north of Los Angeles.

New Federal Laws

However, strict new federal laws, to be phased in over the next five years, will prohibit dumping of untreated hazardous wastes and liquids, forcing the county to find an alternative.

Several city leaders said they fear that the county’s treatment plant proposal could bring new hazards into their communities.

“This worry is very much on our minds,” said Irwindale Mayor Pat Miranda. “We have gone on record supporting a trash-to-energy plant if it can be proved to meet all federal and state standards, but a hazardous waste treatment plant is another question.”

Los Angeles City Councilman Howard Finn, whose district in the San Fernando Valley contains one of the proposed sites, vowed to fight the county’s proposal for a regional treatment plant system and residuals repository.

On-Site Treatment

Finn has argued that Southern California industry should embrace on-site treatment of hazardous wastes to “take care of the problem where it is generated.” He said such an approach would eliminate the need for trucking wastes over city streets and freeways.

In its report to the Board of Supervisors, county engineers said that the search for potential treatment sites is not over.

“Time and budget did not allow a comprehensive block-by-block search of the entire county,” the report said. “Some locations, equaldy as suitable as those presented herein, may be proposed as treatment or disposal facilities in the future.”