BILL ANALYSIS Ó
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 1249|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: SB 1249
Author: Hill (D)
Amended: 5/27/14
Vote: 21
SENATE ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY COMMITTEE : 5-1, 4/30/14
AYES: Hill, Hancock, Jackson, Leno, Pavley
NOES: Fuller
NO VOTE RECORDED: Gaines
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 4-2, 5/23/14
AYES: De León, Hill, Padilla, Steinberg
NOES: Walters, Gaines
NO VOTE RECORDED: Lara
SUBJECT : Hazardous waste: shredder waste
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : This bill authorizes the Department of Toxic
Substances Control (DTSC), in consultation with the Department
of Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle) and the State
Water Resources Control Board (Board), to adopt regulations on
management standards for metal shredding facilities, metal
shredder residue, or treated metal shredder residue. Authorizes
DTSC to establish a fee that is sufficient to reimburse
specified costs.
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ANALYSIS :
Existing law:
1.Under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act
(RCRA) of 1976, governs the disposal of hazardous waste:
A. Through regulation, sets standards for the treatment,
storage, transport, tracking and disposal of hazardous
waste in the United States.
B. Authorizes states to carry out many of the functions of
the federal law through their own hazardous waste laws if
such programs have been approved by the United States
Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA).
1.Under the California Hazardous Waste Control Act (HWCA) of
1972:
A. Establishes the Hazardous Waste Control program.
B. Regulates the appropriate handling, processing and
disposal of hazardous and extremely hazardous waste to
protect the public, livestock, and wildlife from hazards to
health and safety.
C. Implements federal tracking requirements for the
handling and transportation of hazardous waste from the
point of waste generation to the point of ultimate
disposition.
D. Establishes a system of fees to cover the costs of
operating the hazardous waste management program.
E. Authorizes the DTSC to enforce federal law and
regulations under the RCRA.
F. Requires the DTSC to grant and review permits and
enforce the HWCA requirements for hazardous waste
treatment, storage and disposal facilities.
1.Under the Integrated Waste Management Act, requires materials
that require special handling, as defined, to be removed from
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major appliances and vehicles in which they are contained
before crushing for transport or transferring to a baler or
shredder for recycling.
This bill:
1.Requires the DTSC to conduct a preliminary analysis and a
final analysis evaluating the hazardous waste management
activities of metal shredding facilities.
2.Authorizes the DTSC, in consultation with CalRecycle and the
Board, to adopt regulations establishing alternative
management standards for a metal shredding facility, including
activities conducted within the boundaries of a metal
shredding facility, and for the generation, storage,
transportation, and disposal of metal shredder residue and
treated metal shredder residue, as defined, that will apply in
lieu of the hazardous waste management standards if the DTSC
performs specified actions.
3.Provides that if the management standards adopted by the DTSC
result in metal shredder residue or treated metal shredder
residue being classified as nonhazardous waste, the material
may be used as alternative daily cover or for beneficial
reuse.
4.Requires the DTSC to provide notice that it proposes to adopt
alternative management standards.
5.Prohibits the DTSC from adopting management standards that are
less stringent than applicable standards under federal law and
will require metal shredder residue and treated metal shredder
residue to be disposed of in a specified manner.
6.Requires the DTSC to complete the analysis of the hazardous
waste management activities and the subsequent regulatory
action before January 1, 2017, and makes all hazardous waste
determinations and policies, procedures, or guidance issued by
the DTSC before January 1, 2014, relating to metal shredder
residue or treated metal shredder residue inoperative once the
DTSC has taken regulatory action.
7.Authorizes the DTSC to collect an annual fee from metal
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shredding facilities at a rate sufficient to cover the costs
of the DTSC to implement these provisions.
Background
Auto/metal shredding and recycling . The shredding of
automobiles and major household appliances is a process where a
hammer mill grinds the materials fed into it to fist-size
pieces. The shredding of automobiles results in a mixture of
ferrous metal, non-ferrous metal (e.g. alloys of copper and
aluminum) and shredder waste, referred to as automobile shredder
waste (ASW).
This waste is composed of the plastics, rubber, foam, residual
metal pieces, paper, fabric, glass, wire, hoses, rubber gaskets,
sand, dirt and other non-metallic waste that remains from
recycled automobiles, trucks, buses, and household appliances.
ASW contains heavy metals (lead, copper, zinc and cadmium),
chlorine and PCBs, as well as other hazardous chemicals.
After shredding, some ASW is treated using metals fixation
treatment technologies, coating the waste in cement to "fix" the
hazardous constituents in the waste. It is referred to as
"fluff" and distributed to landfills across the state to be used
as alternative daily cover.
Roughly 700,000 tons of this waste -- also called fluff -- is
disposed of in the state's landfills each year. According to
the CalRecycle records, 6,056,026 tons of ASW has been disposed
in California landfills between 1998 and 2007.
ASW as hazardous waste . Prior to 1984, all ASW was considered
not to be hazardous waste and was disposed of or used as
alternative daily cover in municipal solid waste landfills.
In 1984, California deemed ASW as a non-RCRA hazardous waste (or
California hazardous waste) due to the presence of lead,
cadmium, copper and zinc at levels above the state's regulatory
thresholds, as well as PCBs at concentrations which on some
occasions exceeded either/both the federal and California
regulatory thresholds.
Between 1986 and 1992, California's Department of Health
Services (DHS) Toxic Substances Control Division (predecessor to
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DTSC) issued conditional nonhazardous waste classifications
(also referred to as "f letters") to seven shredder facilities
in California who treated their ASW to fix the hazardous
components into the waste. Once facility operators received a
nonhazardous waste classification, treated ASW was no longer
regulated as a hazardous waste.
In 1988, California's regulation of ASW was formalized in the
DHS Policy and Procedure 88-6.
In early 2001, the DTSC began an initiative to evaluate the
adequacy of the ASW policy, which included new sampling and
analysis. The report from that initiative recommended
rescinding the conditional nonhazardous waste classifications.
However, the DTSC took no further action.
Environmental and public health incidents caused by shredder
facilities . In 2002, the DTSC issued an "imminent and
substantial endangerment" order against Pacific Steel, because
dust blowing from contaminated piles of waste stored out in the
open, which contained PCBs and toxic metals such as lead, zinc
and copper, polluted and threatened to pollute the air and water
near the facility. In 2011, the DTSC issued a remedial action
order against Pacific Steel to clean up the site.
In 2011, the DTSC settled an enforcement action against the Sims
Metal West and S.A. Recycling facility in Anaheim for $2.9
million. The action alleged that S.A. Recycling violated air
pollution laws when an explosion at its San Pedro facility at
Terminal Island destroyed its air pollution control system in
May 2007 and the company continued operating for weeks without
proper equipment. As a result, approximately 4.4 tons of toxic
particulates were released to the air, and migrated to bay
waters and the community of Wilmington, putting local residents
and the environment at risk.
At a 13-acre bay front site in Redwood City, Sims Metal
Management shreds about 300,000 automobiles a year, along with
appliances and other metal products, and loads the materials via
huge conveyor belts onto ships bound for China, Korea and other
countries, where they are made into new products.
In January 2012, Sims Metal Management in Redwood City was cited
by the US EPA for polluting the San Francisco Bay. Inspectors
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found the company had unlawfully discharged PCBs, lead, copper,
mercury and zinc into Redwood Creek, a tributary of San
Francisco Bay. The US EPA found PCB levels of 195 times
accepted levels and more than 10 times accepted levels of lead
in sediment near where the shredding yard meets the Redwood
Creek. This enforcement action was resolved in 2013.
Additionally, there have been several fires in the last several
years at the Sims Redwood City facility that have caused the Bay
Area Air Quality Management District to ask residents to stay
inside. Two fires occurred in November and December of 2013,
raising concerns about the proximity of this facility to
residents.
In the fire in December 2013, no one was reported injured by the
smoke or fire, which was limited to a debris pile about 900
square feet in area and 30 feet tall, but the noxious odor
produced by the blaze was detected as far south as South San
Jose and across the bay in Oakland and Berkeley.
The company's recycling facilities in Hayward and San Francisco
experienced fires in 2009 and 2010 respectively, according to
records from the District.
ASW regulatory review . In 2002, the DTSC conducted an auto
shredder initiative that found both treated and untreated
shredder waste exceeded state regulatory thresholds for lead,
zinc and cadmium. The report recommended that the DTSC policy
and procedure that allowed the exemption for this waste be
rescinded and the waste stream be regulated as hazardous waste.
No action was taken at that time.
In 2008, the DTSC sent letters to shredders expressing the
department's intention to rescind Policy and Procedure 88-6 and
repeal the conditional authorization that allows ASW to be
classified as non-hazardous waste. However, the DTSC has not to
date rescinded the conditional waste classifications.
The DTSC is currently reviewing technical data about current and
potential chemical treatments of metal shredder residue in order
to reevaluate its prior waste classification decisions. In
addition, the DTSC is inviting input from the public. The DTSC
will develop a course of action based on the findings of this
process.
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FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: Yes
According to the Senate Appropriations Committee:
Likely initial annual costs of at least $300,000 from the
Hazardous Waste Control Account (special) for two years to the
DTSC to conduct the required analysis, prepare the required
finding, and potentially develop regulations.
Likely ongoing annual costs of up to $200,000 from the
Hazardous Waste Control Account (special) to the DTSC for
regulation of metal shredding facilities.
Unknown fee revenue to the Hazardous Waste Control Account
(special) either from fees under existing hazardous waste law
or under new regulations for metal shredding facilities.
Unknown costs and revenues, possibly in the hundreds of
thousands of dollars, from the Waste Discharge Permit Fund
(special) to the Board related to the permitting of landfills
that accept designated waste or metal shredding residue.
SUPPORT : (Verified 5/27/14)
California League of Conservation Voters
Coalition for Clean Air
Environmental Working Group
Natural Resources Defense Council
OPPOSITION : (Verified 5/27/14)
Republic Services
Waste Management
West Coast Chapter of the Institute of Scrap Recycling
Industries
ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office, metal
and recycling facilities operating in California pose a distinct
risk to public health and the environment and the hazards
associated with these operations are not adequately regulated.
Many of these facilities are located in highly populated areas
and have been found to have contaminated air and water
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surrounding their facilities.
The author states that six fires have broken out at metal
shredding and recycling facilities in the Bay Area since 2007,
five of them at facilities owned by Sims Metal Management LTD.
Three occurred at the company's facility in Redwood City,
causing plumes of smoke to billow over the city impacting the
health of the residents of Redwood City. The Counties of San
Mateo, Alameda and Santa Clara had to issue health advisories
because of the smoke and school districts were forced to keep
students inside because of the poor air quality.
The author asserts that after the last two fires in November and
December of 2013, Redwood City leaders called on regulators to
do more to help protect residents from future incidents.
ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION : The West Coast Chapter of the
Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries strongly opposes this
bill, as currently drafted, stating that "the bill in its
current form would threaten the economic viability of large,
well-established metal shredding facilities in California.
These facilities have provided safe and environmentally
responsible recycling services to the citizens of the State of
California for over four decades and are responsible for
thousands of good jobs across the state. Without the ability to
safely and effectively recycle the huge quantities of scrap
metal that are produced by our society on a daily basis, our
landfills, roadsides, back yards, alley ways and open space
would be littered with discarded automobiles, household
appliances and the endless variety of other discarded metal
products that are recycled by metal shredding facilities. The
Legislature must consider the impact of proposed legislation on
this vital industry."
RM:e 5/27/14 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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