BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 102
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Date of Hearing: April 28, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENTAL SAFETY AND TOXIC MATERIALS
Luis Alejo, Chair
AB 102
(Rodriguez) - As Amended March 26, 2015
SUBJECT: Railroad and surface transportation safety and
emergency planning and response: hazardous materials
SUMMARY: Creates the Regional Railroad and Surface
Transportation Accident Preparedness and Immediate Response
Force (Response Force) in the Office of Emergency Services
(OES). Requires the Response Force to be responsible for
providing regional and onsite response capabilities in the event
of a release of hazardous materials from a railroad tank car, a
railroad accident involving a tank car, or a hazardous material
release from a truck. Establishes a fee (Fee) paid by each
person owning hazardous materials that are transported by rail
or truck in California to fund OES activities. Specifically,
this bill:
1)Requires the Response Force to be responsible for providing
regional and onsite response capabilities in the event of a
release of hazardous materials from a railroad tank car, a
railroad accident involving a tank car, or a hazardous
material release from a truck, and for implementing the state
regional railroad accident preparedness and immediate response
plan for releases of hazardous materials from a railroad or
other surface transportation.
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2)Requires the Response Force to consist of representatives of
all of the following: Department of Fish and Wildlife;
California Environmental Protection Agency; State Air
Resources Board; Department of Resources Recycling and
Recovery; California Regional Water Quality Control Boards;
Department of Toxic Substances Control; Department of
Pesticide Regulation; Office of Environmental Health Hazard
Assessment; State Department of Public Health; Department of
the California Highway Patrol; Department of Food and
Agriculture; Department of Forestry and Fire Protection;
Department of Parks and Recreation; Public Utilities
Commission; State Fire Marshal; Emergency Medical Services
Authority; California National Guard; and, any other
potentially affected state, local, or federal agency, as
determined by OES.
3)Requires OES to develop a Railroad and Surface Transportation
Accident Plan in cooperation with the Response Force members
and requires the plan to become an annex to the state
emergency plan.
4)Creates the Regional Railroad and Surface Transportation
Accident Preparedness and Immediate Response Fund (Fund).
Requires moneys in the Fund, upon appropriation by the
Legislature, to be used by OES to pay for the following
purposes related to the transportation of hazardous materials:
a) Reimbursement of California High-Cost Fund-B
Administrative Committee fund for moneys previously loaned
to OES;
b) Planning, developing, and maintaining a capability for
emergency response to accidents including the risks of
explosions and fires involving tank cars or trucks carrying
hazardous materials;
c) Planning, developing, and maintaining a capability for
emergency response to releases of hazardous materials from
tank cars and trucks including reducing the harmful effects
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of exposure of those materials to humans and the
environment;
d) Creation, support, maintenance, and implementation of
the Response Force;
e) Acquisition and maintenance of specialized equipment and
supplies used to respond to a hazardous materials release
from accidents involving trucks and railroad accidents
involving a tank car;
f) Support of specialized training facilities to prepare
for and respond to a hazardous materials release from a
railroad tank car or a railroad accident involving a tank
car;
g) Creation and support of a regional, state level, and
local emergency response team to provide immediate onsite
response capabilities in the event of large scale releases
of hazardous materials from a railroad tank car or a
railroad accident involving a tank car;
h) Support for specialized training for state and local
emergency response officials in techniques for prevention
of, and response to, release of hazardous materials from a
railroad tank car or trucks; and,
i) Provides that fees paid into this Fund by the owner of
hazardous materials, which is also subject to the oil spill
prevention and administration fee, may reduce their
payments to the oil spill prevention and administration fee
by an amount equal to the Fund payments.
5)Requires that the amount available for appropriation from the
Fund does not exceed $10 million in any calendar year.
6)Requires OES to establish a schedule of fees to determine the
amount of the Fee that shall be paid by each person owning
hazardous materials that are transported by rail in California
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in an amount sufficient to fund the appropriation from the
Fund, to reimburse the Fund for any moneys loaned, and to
maintain a prudent reserve of two months' operating costs.
Requires the Fee to be based on each loaded tank car and
collected in a manner specified. Requires the Fee to be fair,
as specified by federal law, and reflect the proportionate
risks to the public safety and environment resulting from a
release of different hazardous materials and the expense of
preparing to respond to those varying risks. Prohibits the
Fee to exceed the reasonable regulatory costs to the state.
Requires OES to set the Fee consistent with Proposition 26 of
2010.
7)Allows OES to authorize payment of the Fee through
contributions of in kind of equipment, materials, or services.
8)Defines "hazardous materials" as a material that the United
States Department of Transportation has designated as a
hazardous material for purposes of transportation in Part 172
of Title 49 of the Code of Federal Regulations.
EXISTING STATE LAW:
1)Establishes, under the Lempert-Keene Seastrand Oil Prevention
and Response Act, the Office of Oil Spill Prevention and
Response (OSPR) as the primary authority to direct prevention,
removal, abatement, response, containment, and cleanup efforts
with regard to any oil spill in the marine and inland waters
of the state.
2)Provides that OES is the central point in state government for
the emergency reporting of spills, unauthorized releases, or
other accidental releases of hazardous materials and shall
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coordinate the notification of other state and local
administering agencies that may be required to respond to the
accidental releases.
EXISTING FEDERAL LAW:
1)Requires each state to have a State Emergency Response
Commission (SERC) to coordinate and supervise federal programs
related to hazardous material emergencies and ensure public
availability of appropriate chemical information. (OES is the
chair of the California SERC.)
2)Requires that laws related to railroad safety be nationally
uniform "to the extent practicable" and allow the state to
adopt an additional or more stringent law under certain
conditions when not preempted by the federal act.
3)Requires, pursuant to a United States (U.S.) Department of
Transportation order, each railroad carrier to provide the
SERC for each state in which it operates trains transporting
one million gallons or more of Bakken crude oil, notification
regarding the expected movement of such trains through the
counties in the state.
FISCAL EFFECT: Not known.
COMMENTS:
Need for the bill: According to the author, "AB 102 was
introduced to respond to the need to address gaps in
California's first responders' ability to respond to spills of
hazardous materials.
While the focus has been on recent spills of crude oil by rail
in the U.S. and Canada, there are other extremely toxic and
dangerous materials that are being transported by both truck and
rail. Last year's funding of the Oil Spill Prevention Response
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Program in the Department of Fish and Wildlife recognized the
danger of petroleum spills from rail, truck and pipeline.
Placing a fee on hazardous materials to fund the ability to
respond to spills needs to be carefully considered prior to be
adopted".
Accidents involving hazardous materials travelling by rail: In
recent years, there have been a number of serious accidents
across North America involving hazardous materials travelling by
rail. For example, in July 2013, a train carrying crude oil
through Lac-Megantic, Quebec derailed and exploded in a downtown
area. In addition, there have been incidents across the United
States involving crude and ethanol that have caused significant
environmental damages and posed a risk to human health and
safety. While California has not had a large-scale rail accident
involving hazardous materials in recent years, a train accident
in Dunsmuir in 1991 spilled 19,000 gallons of pesticide into the
Sacramento River. The effects of the spill were substantial and
impacted a significant area.
State funding for railroad hazardous material accident response:
Following the Dunsmuir accident in 1991, the state assessed a
fee on hazardous materials transported in the state. This fee,
on trucking companies and the railroads, was assessed from 1991
until it expired in 1995. In 1994, each trucking company paid a
$205 fee. In addition, major railroads paid differing fees, all
of which generated over $1.2 million in revenue. Information on
how the fee rate was determined is unavailable. Funds collected
from the fee were deposited in the Rail Accident Prevention and
Response Fund and used to support grants to local communities
for hazardous materials response equipment and training.
As part of the 2014-15 budget, the Legislature authorized a $10
million loan from the High-Cost Fund-B Administrative Committee
Fund, which provides subsidies to telephone carriers that
provide basic local telephone service in high-cost areas, to a
new Regional Railroad Accident Prevention and Immediate Response
Fund. The funds are intended to support six new hazardous
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materials response teams with the purchase of hazardous material
response vehicles and training. The loan is scheduled to be
repaid with interest by July 1, 2017, although, at the time the
loan was made, no funding source was designated to provide
repayment.
The FY 2014-2015 budget trailer bill, SB 861, Chapter 35,
Statutes of 2014, expanded the OSPR marine oil spill program to
inland oil spills that affect waters of the state. This bill
requires railroads to have oil spill contingency plans and
demonstrate the financial ability to pay for any damages
resulting from a spill. Additionally, SB 861 established a 6.5
cent per barrel fee on oil transported by pipeline or railroads
to refineries to fund OSPR regulations and oversight programs.
Governor's budget proposal FY 2015-2016: Included in the
Governor's proposed budget for FY 2015-2016 was a "trailer bill"
proposal to create the Regional Railroad Accident Preparedness
and Immediate Response Force in the Office of Emergency Service,
and to designate this force as being responsible for providing
regional and onsite response capabilities in the event of a
release of hazardous materials from a rail car or a railroad
accident involving a rail car. AB 102 is similar to the
Governors' proposal with the addition of surface transportation
and truck transportation of hazardous materials.
Office of Emergency Services - gap analysis: In March of 2015
OES completed an analysis of outstanding gaps in the State's
ability to respond to hazardous material spills from rail
accidents. Among the major findings from this Gap Analysis were
the following shortcomings, specifically, the analysis
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identified gaps in hazardous materials response capacities:<1>
1)High-hazard areas for derailments are primarily located in the
mountains with some high-hazard areas in urban areas such as
in the San Bernardino-Riverside and San Luis Obispo regions;
2)There are limited or no hazmat teams located near the
high-hazard areas in rural Northern California and other
populated areas near rail routes, such as Stockton, San Luis
Obispo, Santa Maria and Barstow have only "non-certified"
hazmat teams;
3)There is currently no reliability for, or system-wide access
to industry-based resources that are controlled by industry;
4)Because Central Coast refineries do not have the same level of
hazmat response capability with Type 2 State certified hazmat
teams, without specialized or enhanced hazmat capabilities
along and adjunct to Central Coast refineries, there remains a
significant risk to public safety and the environment in the
event of a hazardous materials incident; and
5)The $1.7 million provided by Pipeline and Hazardous Materials
Safety Administration is inadequate to support emergency
hazmat response needs.
Arguments in opposition: A coalition of business, agricultural
and chemical manufactures, including the American Chemistry
Council, voiced their concerns with AB 102 as well as the
Governor's budget proposal. Specifically they stated,
"Collectively, we are committed to the safe transport of
materials that are vital to a broad range of industries,
including water treatment, farming, construction, medicine,
technology, and transportation. Many facilities and businesses
in California depend on receiving these essential materials.
However, as drafted, the bill leaves unanswered too many
questions about the level of necessary funding, its duration,
how the program will be implemented and the potential impact on
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<1> Cal-OES, "Hazardous Material Team and Response Resources
Capabilities: Updated Gap Analysis for Transport and Response of
Hazardous Materials by Rail and Refineries in California", March
2015.
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California businesses."
Prior legislation:
SB 861(Budget Committee), Chapter 35, Statutes of 2014. Expands
the State's marine oil spill program to inland oil spills that
affect waters of the state. Requires railroads to have oil
spill contingency plans and demonstrate the financial ability to
pay for any damages resulting from a spill and established a 6.5
cent per barrel fee on oil transported by pipeline or railroads
to refineries to fund regulations and oversight programs.
AB 380 (Dickinson), Chapter 533, Statutes of 2014. Requires rail
carriers to submit specified information regarding the transport
of hazardous materials and Bakken oil to the OES for the
purposes of emergency response planning.
SB 1319 (Pavley), Chapter 348, Statutes of 2014. Provided the
expansion of OSPR's duties to require training and equipment
grants for local first responders and ensures OSPR has access to
confidential information collected by OES and the Energy
Commission. Requires comprehensive rail inspections and inland
oil risk assessments. This bill was amended to instead include
groundwater language and was subsequently enacted into law.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION:
Support
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None on file.
Opposition
Agricultural Council of California
American Coatings Association
Automotive Specialty Products Alliance
California Chamber of Commerce
California Cotton Ginners and Growers Association
California Farm Bureau Federation
California Manufacturers & Technology Association
California Paint Council
California Railroad Industry
Cal-Tax
Chemical Industry Council of California
Consumer Specialty Products Association
Styrene Information Research Center
Western Agricultural Processors Association
Western Plant Health Association
Analysis Prepared by:Bob Fredenburg / E.S. & T.M. / (916)
319-3965
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