Way Cleared to Use Disputed Incinerator

In a potentially costly rebuke of the San Diego City Council, a federal court judge Monday cleared the way for a private firm to start burning hazardous waste in an experimental incinerator atop La Jolla’s Torrey Pines Mesa.

Officials from Ogden Environmental Services promised immediately after Monday’s court hearing to begin long-delayed test burns of waste within the next few months. If Ogden can win approval from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, some of that waste will come from Glen Avon’s notorious Stringfellow Acid Pits and Fullerton’s McColl waste dump, which are high on the federal government’s Superfund cleanup list.

Ogden received the go-ahead nearly three years after its predecessor, GA Technologies, first asked the EPA for permission to fire up the incinerator. On Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Judith Keep permanently barred the City Council from using its regulatory authority to reject the project.

The council first rejected the project Dec. 8. Ogden sued and won a May 11 decision from Keep that the council had no right to deny the firm a permit on generalized health and environmental grounds. The council again turned down the firm June 13, this time saying it never intended to allow such an operation in its high-technology “scientific research zone.”

Oral Ruling

But Keep, agreeing with Ogden attorneys’ arguments, ruled that the city had shown through its actions that it had no intention of merely regulating the project but had banned it outright. That posture runs counter to strongly worded congressional legislation encouraging development of innovative hazardous waste disposal technology and state and federal agencies’ conclusions that the project is safe, Keep said in an oral ruling from the bench.

“This is a national priority,” Keep said. “This is basically almost a national emergency.”

Later, she added, “Without delving into the council’s intent, I find the city’s conduct over the past few years has resulted in a de facto ban.”

City council members and attorneys were scheduled to discuss whether to appeal the ruling at a closed session today. Unless the city can reverse the decision, Ogden will soon start operating the state’s first demonstration project under the 1984 federal legislation and its first “circulating bed combustor” for use in disposing of hazardous chemicals, acids and sludges.

Ogden’s EPA permit limits it to burning 438,000 gallons of waste during a maximum of 365 days over the next 3 1/2 years. The state Department of Health Services has also approved the project’s safety.

Research Park

The incinerator’s locale, in a research park amid the eucalyptus groves of San Diego’s poshest enclave, was frequently mentioned by its opponents as one of the most important reasons for denying the permit. The incinerator will operate near the UC San Diego campus, three hospitals, the Torrey Pines State Reserve, some residential tracts, a day-care center and the Torrey Pines Inn.