Industries That Pollute Are Facing Lots of Dirty Work

George J. Smith may be one of the few corporate environmental managers in Orange County who can look ahead to next year with equanimity. His company, an Anaheim-based computer circuit board manufacturer called Aeroscientific, has a state-of-the-art waste treatment system, and top management made a strong commitment to environmental protection several years ago.

The wave of new rules on air and water pollution, hazardous waste disposal, garbage recycling and other environmental issues that will be implemented during the year ahead therefore shouldn’t cause any severe disruptions for Smith and his firm. But the same cannot be said for many other Orange County businesses.

1990, in fact, could go down as the year that Southland companies really changed the way they think about environmental protection. The regulations that come into effect in 1990, combined with the establishment of specific targets for even more stringent pollution-reduction measures that will kick in later in the decade, will make it painfully clear that Band-Aid solutions are no longer a practical option.

“Band-Aids have heavy operations and maintenance costs,” noted Douglas K. Garfield, an associate in the Orange County office of Dames & Moore, a large construction and engineering company that is experiencing huge growth in its environmental consulting business. “You can say, ‘What do I need to do to respond to these specific requirements?’ Or you can step back and start to look at everything, all your processes, in light of what is likely to occur.”

Regulatory Vise

Clearly, what is likely to occur over the course of the next decade is a steady tightening of the regulatory vise which will severely limit the use of many common industrial chemicals and require substantial new capital investments in pollution control for companies ranging from large aerospace concerns to the neighborhood auto body shop.

And what is a certain to occur in 1990 is a series of local, state, and federal regulations which will:

* Bar the disposal of untreated hazardous wastes on land.

* Require companies to catalogue emissions into the air of even small amounts of toxic chemicals, and then, in conjunction with regulatory agencies, assess the risk they pose.

* Limit the ability of companies to install facilities which contribute to air pollution without first reducing pollution at existing facilities.

* Further restrict the use of certain so-called “volatile organic chemicals”--commonly used in paints and solvents--and of the notorious ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).

* Establish new rules for the proper handling of medical wastes.

* Mandate that much of the regular trash produced by businesses and residences be recycled.

The impact of these measures on business is far from uniform, hitting some small manufacturing firms in businesses such as metal plating and painting very hard while leaving some larger, cleaner industries relatively unscathed. But few will escape entirely.

“I don’t know that next year will be a turning point, but there will be more regulations, more restrictions, and costs are going to escalate,” said Duane Jordan, an active member of the Industrial Environmental Coalition of Orange County and an environmental manager at a large local manufacturing company.

One of the most important measures to take effect in 1990 is the final phase of a state and federal prohibition on the land disposal of certain untreated hazardous substances. Known as the “land ban,” the rule will require that all hazardous materials be treated even if they are being dumped in regulated hazardous waste landfills.

Many dangerous substances are already subject to the land ban, but the third phase of the rule, set for implementation on May 8, will affect a number of materials--such as heavy metal sludges--that are not acutely toxic but are produced in great volume by industries such as electronics and metal finishing.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the California Department of Health Services are now scrambling to develop treatment standards for the various affected substances. If no standards have been established by May, or if adequate treatment capacity is not available, some wastes could be exempted from the ban.

Forms of Treatment

Treatment often involves a process called “fixation,” in which the waste is solidified so that it will not leak into ground water, and some of the wastes affected by the land ban can be treated relatively easily. The cost burden on some smaller firms could nonetheless be significant enough to cause serious disruptions, or even desperate and illegal solutions.

“I fear (the land ban) will lead to an increase in illegal dumping,” said Robert Merryman, chief of the Environmental Health Division of the Orange County Health Care Agency.

To help small companies cope with the land ban, the Orange County Fire Department is developing an education campaign to help disseminate information on alternatives, said Karen Peters, head of the department’s hazardous materials program.

“The little guys get crunched, because they don’t have a staff to analyze the waste streams,” Peters noted. “We want to get as much information out there as possible.”

Larger companies, meanwhile, are already taking a number of steps in response to the land ban. A McDonnell Douglas spokeswoman said the company is spending “millions” to revamp its hazardous waste disposal systems. The company is using fixation for some wastes, incinerating others, and increasing its efforts to recycle some hazardous materials and find substitutes for others, she said.

The land ban may also force companies to begin planning for a September, 1991, deadline for evaluating all sources of hazardous waste and identifying specific waste reduction measures. Already, any company disposing of hazardous waste must certify that they have a waste minimization program in effect, but that rule is considered a mere formality.

“People are going to start getting ready for the source evaluation,” predicted Gail Brice, vice president in the Orange County office of McLaren, an environmental consulting firm. “There will have to be a huge commitment to waste minimization programs.”

At Hughes Aircraft, a program called the “zero disposal initiative” has been in place since last year, according to environmental health manager Renzo Venturo, who added that the company is working to “change processes, change materials and change what we buy” to limit the amount of waste that needs disposal.

A similar commitment is now being forced upon companies in regard to the emission of toxic materials into the air. A new state law requires all firms to conduct an audit of “air toxics,” and next year regulators will begin to conduct “risk assessments” based on the results of those audits.

Companies judged to be posing too great a risk to the surrounding communities--the exact levels of acceptable risk for different substances will be established next year--will be required to cut their emissions.

Brice said that “enlightened” companies would begin preliminary risk assessment now, so they might be able to eliminate trouble spots before the state comes in and mandates what could be more dramatic and expensive action. “Now is the time to implement the plan,” said Brice, who added that the aerospace, petroleum and electronics industries would be especially affected by the air toxics law.

“To wait will be a lot more costly than doing it up front,” added Garfield.

It might be more difficult for companies to prepare for some of the 19 measures likely to be adopted next year by the South Coast Air Quality Management District as part of the comprehensive--and controversial--Air Quality Management Plan approved last March. The proposals are now in draft form and are likely to be approved by the AQMD board in 1990 as part of the first phase of the broad, three-phase effort to bring the Los Angeles basin into compliance with federal air quality standards.

One of the more arcane, but potentially most influential, of the AQMD measures has to do with changes in the “new source review” requirements for emissions from factories and other stationary sources of pollution.

Currently, any new or existing company that wants to bring a polluting facility on-line has to “offset” any new pollution by reducing pollution from an existing source, if emissions from the new plant exceed a certain threshold. If the company cannot reduce pollution elsewhere, it can purchase offsets on the open market from a company that has reduced pollution without opening new facilities.

Fuel Conversion

Under the proposed new rules, which the AQMD board is expected to decide on in March, the minimum threshold for offsetting would be eliminated, meaning any new source would require offsetting reductions, explained an AQMD spokesman. Moreover, all outstanding offset credits would be discounted by 80%. And that’s in addition to the general requirement to use the best available technology to control emissions from any new source.

The AQMD will also be considering a number of initiatives for future implementation, including measures to require operators of vehicle fleets to convert to cleaner fuels, rules to further controls on emissions and wastes from bakeries and dry cleaners, new restrictions on release of gases from small boilers, and a complete phase-out of fuel-oil use by local utilities and other power generators.

Several other AQMD proposals could impose further rules governing the use of volatile organic chemicals (used in paints, solvents, and many other applications) and chlorofluorocarbons. CFCs have been banned in aerosol sprays for more than a decade, but they are still widely used in air-conditioning coolants and as a solvent for cleaning electronic components.

The city of Irvine, in a widely publicized move last July, imposed its own total ban on CFC use within the city, and that measure is scheduled to take effect July 1. Local electronics companies, however, say they are in good shape to comply with the rule. “We are getting rid of some of our CFC-based products, replacing them with an aqueous cleaning product that’s like soap and water,” said John Olson, vice president of manufacturing at the personal computer maker AST Research.

Olson added that the company supported the CFC ban, and that it didn’t anticipate problems with other new environmental rules. A Western Digital spokesman said his company was committed to working with the city on the CFC issue, and that it is currently seeking an exemption to use a CFC substitute that has a less severe impact on the ozone layer.

Also on the local level, the county and cities will be working to develop recycling programs for regular residential and business trash in accordance with a state law requiring a 25% reduction in the amount of garbage shipped to landfills by 1995, and a 50% reduction by 2000.

And though there are no specific new rules this year, a major concern for many local companies will be cleaning up ground water and soil polluted by recently removed underground storage tanks. In the real estate industry, even greater vigilance is expected regarding possible contamination problems and liability on any property that changes hands.

The state government will not be idle either, as it moves to pass new legislation governing the handling and disposal of infectious medical wastes.

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Clean Air Act

And on the federal level, Congress is expected to pass next year the long-delayed reauthorization of the Clean Air Act. The impact of the legislation in California will be limited, because a key part of the legislation deals with the Eastern and Midwestern problem of acid rain, and because air pollution standards in California generally exceed federal requirements.

But the exact shape of the legislation could have a major impact on the type of regulatory policies adopted throughout the country over the next decade, because state and local policy makers often follow the lead of Congress.

“Congress will have to decide whether to micro-manage the controls on every smokestack, or whether to go with an enforceable market incentive plan,” said Fred Krupp, executive director of the Environmental Defense Fund. “How that debate goes will effect not only how the acid rain rules are written, but also the type of environmental laws that get passed in the future.”

ENVIRONMENTAL REGULATION

Numerous government bodies are involved in implementing environmental protection policies. Many pollution problems involve more than one agency, and in those cases a “lead agency” will usually be designated.

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency:

Federal agency that enforces such federal environmental laws as the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Resource Recovery and Conservation Act.

California Department of Health Services:

State agency with overall responsibility for many state environmental laws. Key divisions include the Toxic Substances Control Division and the Environmental Health Division.

California Air Resources Board:

Responsible for regulating automobile emissions and overseeing implementation of state clean air laws and the policies of the regional air quality districts.

California Water Resources Control Board:

Responsible for regulating the use and quality of surface and ground water, and overseeing the activities of the regional water quality control districts’ boards.

South Coast Air Quality Management District:

State-chartered agency covering Orange County and four others, the AQMD has authority to set and enforce rules for all stationary sources of air pollution.

Water Quality Control Districts::

Two state-chartered agencies have the authority to set and enforce rules protecting water quality in the county. The Santa Ana district covers North County; the San Diego district, South County.

Orange County Water District:

Responsible for supplying water.

Orange County Health Care Agency:

The agency’s Environmental Health Division enforces regulations regarding handling and disposal of hazardous waste, storage of hazardous materials in underground tanks, ground water cleanup projects, and oversees clean-up of hazardous waste spills.

Orange County Sanitation District:

Permits and regulates discharge of waste water to the sewage system, and operates sewage treatment plants, in most of the county. Local sanitation districts have responsibility elsewhere.

Orange County General Services Administration:

Operates landfills for regular trash and has general responsibility for solid waste disposal.

Orange County Fire Department:

With 16 local fire departments, the county department regulates the storage and handling of hazardous materials, and performs emergency response.