BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 804
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY
Senator Jerry Hill, Chair
2013-2014 Regular Session
BILL NO: SB 804
AUTHOR: Lara
AMENDED: September 11, 2013
FISCAL: Yes HEARING DATE: September 12, 2013
URGENCY: No CONSULTANT: Rebecca Newhouse
SUBJECT : BIOMASS: CONVERSION TECHNOLOGY
SUMMARY :
Existing law , under the California Integrated Waste Management
Act (Act):
1) Requires each city or county source reduction and recycling
element to include an implementation schedule that shows a
city or county must divert 50% of solid waste from landfill
disposal or transformation by January 1, 2000, through
source reduction, recycling, and composting activities
(Public Resources Code §41780).
2) Establishes a state policy goal that 75% of solid waste
generated be diverted from landfill disposal through source
reduction, recycling or composting by 2020 (PRC §41780.01).
3) Defines "transformation" to mean incineration, pyrolysis,
distillation, or biological conversion other than
composting and specifies that "transformation" does not
include composting, gasification, or biomass conversion
(PRC §40201).
4) Defines "biomass conversion" to mean the controlled
combustion, when separated from other solid waste and used
for producing electricity or heat of specified biomass,
including, agricultural crop residues, bark, lawn, yard,
garden clippings, leaves, silvicultural residue, tree and
brush pruning, wood, wood chips, and wood waste and
nonrecyclable pulp or nonrecyclable paper materials (PRC
§40106).
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5) Specifies that "biomass conversion" does not include the
controlled combustion of recyclable pulp or recyclable
paper materials, or materials that contain sewage sludge,
industrial sludge, medical waste, hazardous waste, or
either high-level or low-level radioactive waste (PRC
§40106).
6) Defines "composting" to mean the controlled or uncontrolled
biological decomposition of organic wastes (PRC §40116.1).
This bill as approved by the Senate Environmental Quality
Committee (April 22, 2013 version of the bill):
1) Includes conversion technologies in the definition of
"biomass conversion."
2) Clarifies that for the purposes of complying with specified
provisions of the integrated waste management act,
composting includes aerobic and anaerobic decomposition of
organic wastes.
Amendments taken in the Assembly (September 5, 2013 version of
the bill):
1)Remove the provision of the bill relating to composting
including anaerobic decomposition.
2)Define "biomass conversion technology facility" to mean a
facility that uses a conversion technology capable of
converting nonrecyclable biomass, as specified, into
marketable products and fuels through noncombustion thermal,
chemical, or biological processes, and specify that a
biomass conversion technology facility does not include
composting or biomass controlled combustion.
3)Clarify that conversion technology refers to the technology
used by a "biomass conversion technology facility" defined
above.
4)Require biomass conversion technology facilities to:
a) Certify to the air district that a local agency
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sending biomass to the facility is in compliance with
the Act; and,
b) Allow Department of Resources Recycling and
Recovery (CalRecycle), consistent with their existing
authority to inspect legal and illegal solid waste
facilities, to inspect the facility to ensure that the
facility is only processing biomass that meets the
local certification requirement and is limited to
eligible biomass, as specified.
5)Require CalRecycle to notify the air district (e.g., air
quality management districts and air pollution control
districts) within 48 hours if there is a violation of the
state's solid waste laws, and require the air district to
investigate and begin necessary enforcement actions.
6)Require an air district, prior to issuing a permit for a
biomass conversion technology facility, to determine whether
or not the facility meets the requirements for best
available control technology for criteria air pollutants,
toxic air contaminants, and greenhouse gases.
7)Require a biomass conversion technology facility to submit
to the city, county, or city and county with land use
permitting authority over the facility, documents that
demonstrate that the facility is:
a) Designed to cause no net increase in toxic air
contaminants and criteria air pollutants as compared to
existing and comparable biomass controlled combustion
technology;
b) Not designed to produce hazardous waste as an end
byproduct of the technology unless the hazardous waste
is treated at the facility to render it nonhazardous;
and
c) Comply with Health and Safety Code Section
25143.5, relating to biomass conversion ash.
COMMENTS :
1) Referral to the Committee pursuant to Senate Rule 29.10 . As
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seen previously by this Committee, SB 804 included other
conversion technologies in the definition of biomass
conversion and included anaerobic decomposition in the
definition of composting.
The current version of the bill, as amended in the
Assembly, removes the provision concerning composting and
adds a new chapter containing various requirements for
noncombustion biomass conversion technology facilities.
2) Purpose of Bill . According to the author, "Existing
California law defines 'biomass conversion' as the direct
combustion of certain listed types of biomass materials.
This definition excludes conversion technologies that can
more efficiently generate electricity from biomass with
lower air emissions. This hampers the State's goals of
diverting additional organic materials from disposal."
3)Conversion technologies . According to CalRecycle, conversion
technologies are processes that can convert organic
materials into usable forms of energy including heat, steam,
electricity, natural gas, and liquid fuels.
Thermochemical conversion processes are characterized by
higher temperatures and faster conversion rates and include
combustion, gasification, and pyrolysis. Pyrolysis is the
thermal decomposition of feedstock at high temperatures
(greater than 400?F) in the absence of air, whereas
gasification is a process that uses air or oxygen and high
heat, (typically above 1300?F) to convert feedstock into a
synthetic gas or fuel gas. Gasification uses less air or
oxygen than incineration processes. Thermochemical
conversion is best suited for lower moisture feedstocks.
Biochemical conversion processes include aerobic conversion
(i.e., composting), anaerobic digestion (which occurs in
landfills and controlled reactors or digesters), and
anaerobic fermentation (for example, the conversion of
sugars from cellulose to ethanol). Biochemical conversion
proceeds at lower temperatures and lower reaction rates.
Higher moisture feedstocks are generally good candidates for
biochemical processes.
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The definition of transformation in current law captures
many thermochemical and biochemical conversion technologies,
but some processes that would technically qualify as
conversion are specifically excluded by statute, namely
composting, gasification and biomass conversion (i.e.,
combustion of greenwaste).
4) Solid waste diversion credit for biomass at conversion
facilities . Current law requires jurisdictions to divert
50% of solid waste from landfill disposal or transformation
through source reduction, recycling, and composting
activities. Prior to 2008, diversion estimates to determine
compliance with the 50% diversion mandate were performed by
calculating the quantity of solid waste generation and
estimating the amount of diversion. SB 1016 (Wiggins)
Chapter 343, Statutes of 2008, changed the diversion
calculation by only considering the quantity of disposal,
as reported by disposal facilities (transformation
facilities and landfills) and the jurisdiction's
population, and comparing that value to a baseline rate of
disposal.
Biomass conversion, currently defined as the controlled
combustion of specified biomass feedstocks when separated
from municipal solid waste, is excluded from the definition
of transformation, and therefore, biomass that is combusted
at a biomass conversion facility is not counted as
disposal. SB 804, by adding conversion technologies in the
definition of biomass conversion, would exclude those same
feedstocks when processed by conversion technologies, from
being counted as disposal .
5) Biomass in California . According to data from the
California Biomass Collective, there are 28 operational
facilities in the state using wood or agriculture biomass
with a net generation of 565 megawatts (MW). In addition
to these larger scale, biomass combustion facilities, there
are a handful of small scale, demonstration and/or research
projects in the state that use a noncombustion conversion
technology, which generate or plan to generate anywhere
from a fraction of an MW to several MWs using biomass. Of
these facilities, the Dixon Ridge Farms in Dixon, CA uses a
gasification technology to generate 0.1 MW of electricity
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from woody and agricultural biomass, and the Cabin Creek
Biomass Facility Project in Placer County is proposing to
construct a two-megawatt wood-to-energy biomass facility
that would also use gasification technology. These
facilities may be affected by the provisions in SB 804
concerning noncombustion conversion technologies that
process eligible biomass.
6) Biomass and RPS . Current law identifies electrical
generation facilities that use biomass as renewable
electrical generation facilities and can be certified, if
they meet fuel specific requirements, by the CEC as
RPS-eligible, and therefore may be used by retail sellers
of electricity, and POUs to satisfy their RPS procurement
goals.
The California Energy Commission defines biomass as any
organic material not derived from fossil fuels, including
the feedstocks eligible under biomass conversion.
Because, for facilities using biomass to generate
electricity, the CEC looks at the biomass used, and not the
type of technology used to process that biomass, SB 804
does not alter current law regarding RPS credit and biomass
conversion technology facilities, since it does not change
which feedstock are eligible under biomass conversion.
7) Theory vs. Reality . Amendments taken in the Assembly
Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials Committee to add
requirements for noncombustion biomass conversion
technology facilities were intended to ensure that these
new, ostensibly more advanced and cleaner noncombustion
technologies are more protective of the environment as
their proponents claim.
However, the current language of the bill requires that
documents be submitted to the city or county with local
land use permitting authority that show the facility is
"designed" to cause no net increase in air pollutants as
compared to existing and comparable biomass combustion, and
that the facility is not "designed" to produce hazardous
waste as a byproduct.
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Being designed to do something, and actually meeting that
goal are two very different things. It is unclear whether a
facility would be able to continue to operate if it was in
fact "designed" to meet those requirements, but was shown,
at some later date, to not lower air pollutant emissions
compared to controlled combustion, or that it produced a
hazardous byproduct as a result of operations.
8) Nonrecyclable biomass . Current law specifies certain
biomass feedstocks, namely agricultural waste, bark, lawn,
yard, garden clippings, leaves, silvicultural residue, tree
and brush pruning, wood waste and nonrecyclable pulp or
nonrecyclable paper, as eligible feedstocks for biomasss
conversion facilities.
SB 804 specifies that all of the aforementioned biomass
feedstocks must be "nonrecyclable" for noncombustion
biomass conversion technology facilities. This requirement
is unclear in its intent, since most of those biomass
feedstocks can be processed into mulch, potentially
qualifying as recyclable.
9) Two standards for biomass conversion . SB 804, as amended in
the Assembly, contains additional requirements for
facilities processing biomass using noncombustion
conversion technologies compared to facilities processing
biomass with controlled combustion, although both would be
defined as "biomass conversion" under SB 804.
Those additional provisions require facilities to certify
to air districts that a local agency sending biomass to the
facility is in compliance with the state's solid waste
laws, require facilities to allow CalRecycle to inspect
noncombustion biomass conversion technology facilities, and
require CalRecyle to notify air districts within 48 hours
if illegal feedstocks are being utilized for further air
district investigation. Biomass conversion technology
facilities must also submit documents to local land use
agencies that show that the facility is designed to reduce
toxic and criteria air emissions compared to biomass
combustion facilities and is not designed to produce
hazardous waste as an end byproduct.
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SB 804 is not technology neutral, and instead sets a higher
standard for noncombustion conversion technologies
processing biomass compared to controlled combustion of
those same feedstocks . It is unclear why the use of
noncombustion conversion technology requires additional
requirements outside of the existing regulatory framework
designed to protect environmental quality (including CEQA
and air district permitting process) that are not required
for traditional combustion of eligible biomass.
If these additional requirements are necessary to protect
the environment in the case of noncombustion conversion
technologies processing biomass, should they not also be
applied to biomass combustion facilities, as well?
10)Related legislation . AB 1126 (Gordon) of 2013 makes changes
related to permitting for solid waste conversion meeting
specified requirements. AB 1126 passed out of the Assembly
on concurrence.
SOURCE : California State Association of Counties
County of Los Angeles
SUPPORT : Los Angeles County Solid Waste Management
Committee/
Integrated Waste Management Task Force
Waste Management
OPPOSITION : California Refuse Recycling Council
Center for Biological Diversity