Plan to Ease Toxic Waste Rules Opposed : Regulations: Bill backed by industry would free thousands of smaller firms from new enforcement set for January. Environmentalists are fighting the measure.
A move by a California business and industry coalition to weaken or eliminate the state’s regulations covering the treatment of toxic wastes at smaller industrial sites is encountering stiff opposition from environmentalists.
The coalition, whose members range from small dry cleaners to giant aerospace companies, supports legislation by Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) that could free thousands of firms from state regulations scheduled to take effect in January.
The rules are “extreme, burdensome, costly” and “will not prevent pollution,” Polanco told the state Senate Toxic and Public Safety Management Committee at a recent hearing.
Furthermore, the East Los Angeles legislator argued, the regulations would cost the state thousands of jobs and make California less competitive economically.
Polanco’s bill is seen by some as part of a larger attack on the state’s environmental laws and regulations.
“We’ve had a whole raft of bills attacking environmental permitting and regulation,” Sierra Club lobbyist Bonnie Holmes said. “They’re all based on the premise that environmental regulations are the key reason for business flight from California. We don’t think that case can be made.”
Holmes said high taxes and labor costs, a flawed workers’ compensation system and the national recession, especially in the aerospace industry, contribute far more to the problems of California business than do environmental laws.
The Polanco bill would continue state regulation and inspection of industries that treat large volumes of toxic substances at their facilities but would exempt thousands of smaller businesses--creating threats not only to the environment but also to public health and safety, environmentalists say.
The Polanco bill is sponsored by the Western States Petroleum Assn., which represents the state’s largest oil companies. Other major sponsors are chemical companies, drug manufacturers and aerospace firms.
Polanco said in an interview that he introduced the legislation because “many of the people in my district are victims of the loss of jobs due to over-regulation.”
Polanco has received substantial campaign contributions from companies in these industries: at least $20,000 in 1991 and 1992.
Since 1980, state law has required any business that treats hazardous waste to obtain a permit. Generation and transportation of toxic substances are covered by separate regulations, both state and federal.
To obtain a treatment permit, a company must demonstrate that containers and tanks used in the process are safe and that there is “secondary containment” to prevent leaks and spills.
The company also must prove that it is financially strong enough to pay damage claims to third parties and to close the treatment facility properly when it is no longer needed.
In addition, if contamination is found anywhere on the premises, “corrective action” must be taken not only to fix the problem but also to clean up other toxic problems at the plant, regardless of whether the present owners are responsible. This is the portion of the rules that the large corporations also oppose.
Until now, the state Department of Toxic Substances Control has concentrated on companies that treat large quantities of high-risk materials--”persistent metals” such as cadmium, lead and zinc, or “volatile solvents,” oils and pesticides.
Many of these wastes, which have seeped into ground water supplies at some industrial sites from leaking containers or through inept handling, have been found to be serious health hazards. Some cause cancer.
For instance, cadmium found in waste water generated by metal plating and aluminum soldering operations has been linked to emphysema, cirrhosis of the liver and severe bone and skeletal deformities, among other health problems, said Norman Riley, a hazardous waste specialist with the toxic substances department.
Oil refineries, electronics manufacturers, aerospace firms and other large companies were unhappy about the regulations but, by and large, have complied with this “full permitting process,” state officials said.
However, some of the most serious contamination problems are not caused by industrial giants but by smaller companies, such as metal finishers, circuit board manufacturers, dry cleaners and graphics shops.
When the toxic substances department turned its attention to smaller companies in 1989, officials tried to come up with a permitting approach that would be less burdensome for small businesses that were treating limited amounts of toxic substances.
They came up with a new “permit by rule” approach, a sort of honor system that enables smaller companies to continue to treat hazardous wastes on-site as long as certain conditions are met.
These include informing the department as to what materials are being treated and how the work is performed, and an annual $1,100 fee.
It is an honor system because the toxic substances department lacks the resources to inspect these facilities more than once every three or four years.
The “permit by rule” plan was supposed to take effect last January but, buffeted by industry criticism, the Wilson Administration has postponed implementation twice. Now the plan is scheduled to be put in place next January.
In the meantime, the coalition of more than 50 companies and industry associations has put its muscle behind the Polanco bill, which, according to Gordon Hart, consultant to the Senate Toxic and Public Safety Management Committee, would “all but eliminate ‘permit by rule.’ ”
Small businesses argue that they cannot afford the new toxic treatment regulations.
Jennifer Cullen, one of the owners of a plating company in Polanco’s district, told the committee that four of the firm’s 10 executives spend all of their time on regulatory matters, which she said cost $200,000 in 1991.
“There’s just too much paperwork,” Cullen said.
Bill Wiggins, president of Automation Plating Corp., a Glendale company that employs 65 people, said, “We’re being asked to do a lot of things that will force a lot of small businesses out of California.”
Environmental organizations reply that there have been many serious recent instances of improper treatment, or inadequate handling, of toxic wastes at both large and small industrial operations.
A recent federal Environmental Protection Agency report states that 54% of large industrial users are not in compliance with federal standards for waste discharges into sewer systems.
While industry characterizes some on-site treatments as “low-risk” activities, such as dilution of acids, Peter Weiner, an environmental attorney, cited a recent accident in the Bay Area in which an attempt to neutralize acids went awry, melting the chemical containers and the “secondary containment,” which forced closure of U.S. 101.
On another occasion, hundreds of people had to be evacuated from a downtown Los Angeles building after a jeweler accidentally mixed cyanide with peroxide, creating the kind of lethal gas that some state prisons use to execute prisoners.
A third episode involved a company that heated resin as part of a fiberglass manufacturing process. The resin became overheated, creating a toxic cloud that injured eight people and caused the evacuation of 700 others from a four-square-mile area of West Covina.
Industry representatives argue that several other agencies, including local sanitation districts, air and water quality boards, county health departments and others, already supervise hazardous waste treatment, rendering the new rules unnecessary.
Toxic substances experts and environmentalists disagree.
“Sewer agencies make sure discharges comply with regulations,” Weiner said. “What they almost never do is inspect above ground to make sure that companies have tanks that don’t leak and treatment processes that are truly effective.”
The argument will resume Monday afternoon, when the Senate Toxic and Public Safety Management Committee concludes its hearing and is expected to vote on the Polanco bill.
