2 County Firms Cited for Failure to Report ’87 Toxic Emissions
Two high-tech manufacturers in Orange County were cited Monday by the Environmental Protection Agency for failing to comply with a federal law that requires them to report the nature and amount of toxic chemicals that they release into the air, water or ground.
Irvine-based Diceon Electronics Inc., a major manufacturer of computer circuit boards, is scheduled to be fined $262,000, the largest penalty proposed for any of the 42 U.S. companies named Monday by the EPA.
Diceon was accused of failing to report by the deadline of July 1, 1988, its 1987 estimated release of eight toxic chemicals--including sulfuric acid, ammonia and hydrochloric acid--from two plants in Irvine and one in Chatsworth, in the northwestern San Fernando Valley.
The EPA did not make an independent estimate of the amount of toxic chemicals discharged by non-complying companies.
“We haven’t seen the fines, and we haven’t heard anything about it,” said Peter S. Jonas, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Diceon, which employs about 600 people at its two Irvine plants, and which most recently reported annual sales of $141 million.
“I’m not even aware that we failed to report,” Jonas said.
Newport Corp.’s Fine
The federal agency has also proposed a fine of $34,000 for Newport Corp. of Fountain Valley, which makes laser-related equipment for industrial and scientific research facilities. Newport Corp. is said to have failed to report its estimated release of two toxic chemicals. The corporation employs about 390 people and had sales of $53 million in its most recent fiscal year.
Robert C. Hewitt, the corporation’s senior vice president for finance, said company officials were surprised that the EPA proposed a fine.
“We filed the reports as soon as we were aware that we needed to file the reports,” Hewitt said.
Diceon and Newport Corp. are alleged to have violated provisions of the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act of 1986. The law requires manufacturers that employ 10 or more people and that make use, or process more than threshold quantities of 300 toxic chemicals to file reports annually with the EPA. The manufacturer is to identify the toxic chemicals the company uses and estimate the amount of chemicals it releases into the environment.
The reports are available to the public and used by local and state governments to develop plans to deal with emergencies, a process that is also required by federal law. The first reports required under the new law, covering the year 1987, were due July 1, 1988.
The reports that were filed revealed that 169 companies in the county released among them more than 7 million pounds of toxic chemical fumes into the atmosphere in 1987--about three pounds of airborne pollutants for each of the county’s 3.1 million residents.
“These companies have a legal responsibility to provide the data,” EPA Administrator William K. Reilly said in a statement. “We have an obligation to enforce the law and to assure that this national inventory of discharged toxic chemicals is publicly available. . . . This information is a requisite in any constructive, community-based strategy to reduce pollution.”
The fine proposed for Diceon is high, regional EPA spokeswoman Kathleen Goforth said, because the company allegedly released a large number of chemicals.
The penalty assessment, she said, “depends on the size of the company, the number of chemicals we believe they should have reported and the amount of individual chemicals that they manufacture, process or use. If you have a lot of chemicals, (the penalty) can come out pretty high.”
The EPA said Diceon failed to report and estimate its release of sodium hydroxide and nitric acid at its facility at 16832 Hale Ave., Irvine; sodium hydroxide, hydrochloric acid, glycol ethers, nitric acid and copper at its plant at 18552 Von Karman Ave., Irvine, and sulfuric acid, ammonia, copper, copper compounds, glycol ethers and sodium hydroxide at its Chatsworth facility.
Newport Corp. failed to report its use of chromium, a component of stainless steel, and 1,1,1-trichloroethane, which is used in cleaning metals, the EPA said. The company’s plant is at 18235 Mt. Baldy Circle in Fountain Valley.
Besides Diceon and Newport Corp., the EPA cited six other California companies, proposing individual fines ranging from $17,000 to $76,000. The other companies and their proposed fines are:
Beringer Vineyard, St. Helena, $17,000; Perkin Elmer Corp., Los Angeles, $17,000; Hemet Casting, Hemet, $17,000; Matchmaster Dyeing & Finishing, Los Angeles, $42,000; Integrated Device Technology, Santa Clara, $67,000, and Elpower Corp, San Diego, $76,000.
Companies may appeal the EPA’s proposed fine and plead their case before a federal administrative law judge, Goforth said.
