AQMD Gears for War Emergencies : Pollution: Agency sets up procedure to allow waivers from clean-air regulations.

It was a matter of wartime national security, Arco Products Co. said.

The conflict in the Persian Gulf made extra gasoline deliveries critical, an Arco attorney wrote in a Jan. 18 petition to the South Coast Air Quality Management District. If Arco stations run out of gas, he wrote, “for whatever reason, the public will perceive shortages areawide and will associate them with the Iraqi war . . . (leading to) a heightening of public anxiety.”

Even before the war, the firm had long wanted to load 1.1 million gallons more fuel each day than is allowed under its air quality permits for two truck terminals in Carson and South Gate that supply local service stations. But in loading the extra fuel, more gasoline vapors would escape, just as they do when a car’s tank is filled. The hydrocarbons added to the atmosphere would be roughly equivalent to another 2,000 autos traveling daily on local roads.

Arco estimated that getting AQMD permission for the extra loading could take more than two years. So when war broke out, the company asked for an emergency waiver of its pollution limits without the extensive public notice usually required.

Although the company withdrew its emergency request, it still is negotiating for a higher loading limit and a hearing is set for March 12. But the district did decide to make representatives available on a 24-hour basis to grant other on-the-spot war-related waivers, over the telephone if need be. So far, no one else has asked for special consideration.

Still, the oil company’s request to the AQMD was not the first in the nation to cite Operation Desert Storm as a reason for bypassing the public in decisions affecting the environment at home.

Twice since Iraq invaded Kuwait in August, the U.S. Department of Defense obtained a waiver from the federal Council on Environmental Quality, allowing the Pentagon to conduct war-related activities without the regular public review process.

New methods to destroy land mines have been tested on federal property in the West--”not in California,” said the council’s top lawyer, Dinah Bear, who would not disclose the location. Flights from an Air Force base in Massachusetts were increased above permitted levels.

Environmentalists are alarmed by what they fear is the beginning of a trend. “We have no problem with the streamlining of the process. We do not accept . . . secrecy,” said Lenny Siegel, chief researcher for the National Toxic Campaign Fund, a group studying military pollution. The organization was responsible for the first public disclosure of the Pentagon waivers.

Each time a military service or company asks for the right to pollute more for the sake of the war effort, “it should be identified so that people would recognize it’s a cost of the war and can judge if it’s truly an emergency,” Siegel said.

Jan Chatten-Brown, president of the Coalition for Clean Air, said: “Nobody’s going to quarrel with doing something if it’s truly necessary for the conduct of the war, but it seems to be extraordinarily unlikely that there would be a legitimate case.”

If war-related emergencies are claimed, Chatten-Brown said, “I think the district would have to be very, very careful that they weren’t misled.”

In the Arco case, she said, “it’s very ironic that while Arco is touting their contribution to controlling air pollution (with a new, cleaner gasoline) that they should quietly seek a variance on grounds” she believes are not justified.

The company’s general counsel, Richard C. Morse, said Arco withdrew its emergency petition Jan. 23 after coming to believe there was no war-related urgency.

“Within the week or so after the war started, it was apparent that consumers were not panicking,” he said. The firm began negotiating with the district for higher loading limits anyway--”for efficiency’s sake,” Morse said. In the absence of an agreement, the March public hearing will proceed.

In the meantime, Morse is happy that Arco’s request led the district to institute its variance-by-phone process for war emergencies. “That’s a very useful new procedure,” he said. “It’s nice to know that they are being that responsive.”

Diana A. Love, AQMD chief prosecutor, said the district has yet to receive requests for variances under the new process, which went into effect Jan. 30. She said the district’s hearing board, which considers variances, soon will issue a public notice about the process.

Emergency variances last up to 30 days, Love said, which give the recipient an opportunity to conduct business while going through the regular public hearing process.

“You never give notice in advance on emergency variances. By law, you don’t have to,” Love said.