The Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) on Friday issued a suspension order against hazardous waste management firm SOLCHEM Philippines Inc. (SPI) for illegal dumping of toxic waste in a private lot in Dasmariñas, Cavite.
Following a technical conference with officials of SOLCHEM and EMB-Region 4A director Allan Leuterio on Tuesday, EMB director Juan Miguel Cuna said the recommendation of the regional office is to suspend the company's transporter and treatment, storage and Disposal (TSD) registration certificates.
In the conference, SOLCHEM president and general manager Edwin Afzelius admitted to contracting a person identified only as "Boyong" to transport and store their partially treated hazardous wastes.
The company reportedly did not verify whether the individual actually operates a storage facility accredited by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources.
The company said they did not also know the location of the facility.
Last week, a total of 63 drums of hazardous waste were recovered in Barangay Langkaan I in Dasmariñas.
Upon investigation, truck driver Ramon Olager said the drums came from the treatment facility of SOLCHEM Philippines in Las Piñas City.
With this action, Cuna said the company violated Republic Act No. 6969 or the Toxic Substances and Hazardous and Nuclear Wastes Control Act.
He added, however, that the penalty for the company has yet to be determined.
?The temporary suspension of SOLCHEM?s TSD permits would mean that the firm is not allowed to transport and treat hazardous wastes until such time that the disposition that came up during the technical conference conducted between the EMB and SOLCHEM has been complied with," Cuna said. ? JMT/VS, GMA News
Bhopal, July 22: The process of disposal of 346 tonnes of toxic waste lying at the defunct Union Carbide plant here has once again hit a road block with several groups protesting the dumping of this poisonous material at Nagpur in Maharashtra.
The decision to dispose of the toxic waste at a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) facility near Nagpur was taken after the unit evinced interest in it, as stated by former Union Environment Minister, Mr Jairam Ramesh, here on May 26.
Following this, the Madhya Pradesh High Court had also issued directives to the State Government as well as the DRDO to make arrangements for the transport and disposal of the toxic waste lying in the defunct factory for almost 27 years. But opposition towards disposing of such a huge quantity of hazardous waste has irked some NGOs and activists here. According to Ms Rachna Dhingra from ‘Bhopal Group for Information and Action’, an NGO, though the matter is sub-judice and will come up for hearing on July 28, the facility near Nagpur does not have mandatory clearances from Maharashtra Pollution Control Board for operating it. Speaking to PTI, Ms Dhingra claimed that no facility in India is capable of disposing of such a toxic waste safely and demanded that it should be disposed of in any of the OECD (Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development) countries as they have a capacity to deal with such hazardous waste. She also suggested that the cost of shipment of toxic material should be charged to Dow Chemicals, the current owner of the defunct plant at Bhopal.
Keywords: Bhopal, Union Carbide, toxic waste disposal, DRDO, NGO
Cedar Mountain Environmental president Charles Judd talks about plans he has to build a low-level radioactive waste disposal facility near Clive in February. On Tuesday the Tooele County Commission voted to continue its five-year-old ban on creating new hazardous waste storage zones. - file photo / Maegan Burr- file photo / Maegan Burr" href="C:\Program Files\ABS\Auto Blog Samurai\data\Hazardous Waste Disposal News\Haz Waste Disposal Google\H4GQ_Nuke_Waste_12_9_10.jpg" rel=lightbox[10608586]>slideshow Move keeps proposed competitor to EnergySolutions out — for now
The Tooele County Commission voted Tuesday not to lift a five-year-old ban on the creation of new hazardous waste storage zones.
The removal of the ban was considered at the request of Charles Judd, president of Cedar Mountain Environmental, a Salt Lake City-based transportation and waste management company. Judd wants to open a low-level radioactive waste disposal facility that would compete with EnergySolutions. He plans to build the facility on 320 acres of school trust land about 4 miles north of EnergySolutions’ Clive site.
“I had just come on the commission in 2005 when we passed an ordinance to shrink the hazardous waste zones and to not allow any additional new hazardous waste zones to be created,” said Colleen Johnson, chairwoman of the county commission, during the discussion of Judd’s proposal. “It was the overwhelming public opinion at the time that they did not want any new — or expansion of — hazardous and radioactive waste facilities in the county. I don’t see that much has changed since that time.”
Judd countered by saying his proposal has several elements that make it attractive to the county. He proposes to pay fees based upon the volume of waste received by the facility instead of a percentage of revenue, as is the current agreement with EnergySolutions. He also would give 50 cents per cubic foot of waste received directly to the Tooele County School District.
“Under my proposal, the county would receive $10 million a year for 30 years,” Judd told commissioners. “All I want you to do is seriously look at my proposal and what I am offering to the county and schools.”
The state School Land Trust program would also receive a payment per cubic foot of waste.
“The payments from Judd’s proposal would go directly into the pool of money distributed statewide for community councils to spend on their local schools,” said Margaret Bird, an administrator with the School Children’s Trust, the beneficiary of the School Land Trust program.
Judd also touted job creation as a benefit of the proposal.
“I would employ 200 to 300 people directly with another 300 related jobs that would be created because I will be contracting with local Tooele County companies,” Judd said.
Steve Bunn, owner of Lake Point-based general contracting firm Broken Arrow, one of those potential contractors favors Judd’s proposal.
“I worked with EnviroCare when it first started. We helped develop the technology they currently use out there,” Bunn said. “I have had conversations with Charles and together we can do things much more efficiently with the knowledge that we gained from doing this before. There also are people out there in the waste industry that are unhappy with EnergySolutions and would like a competitor to do business with.”
Judd added that opening his new facility will not bring any more waste to Tooele County.
“About 98 percent of the commercial low-level waste produced in this country comes to Clive right now,” Judd said. “There isn’t that much additional waste that I can bring to the county, but I will compete directly with EnergySolutions for waste.”
The capacity of the EnergySolutions site at Clive has been a source of disagreement. Judd said he can show they have only a five-year capacity remaining, while EnergySolutions officials have testified they have 25 to 30 years capacity remaining.
While the county commission voted unanimously to not lift the hazardous waste zone ban, the door was left open for Judd to return at a future time and make the request again.
“I am not necessarily opposed to the idea,” said Commissioner Jerry Hurst. “I would like to see you go a little further with your planning without us taking this action right now. You have a lot of steps to take yet, you need a state license as well as the approval of the governor and the legislature. Let’s see how far you can get in the process first.”
Judd said he has submitted an application for site review with the state Division of Radiation Control and that could possibly go forward without the ordinance change.
Judd is no stranger to rejection. Having served as the president of EnviroCare, the precursor to EnergySolutions, from 1988 to 2002, he has been trying to get back into the radioactive waste business since he left EnviroCare. In 2003, he was turned down for a conditional use permit to build a radioactive waste site on property he owned adjacent to EnergySolutions. The county claimed Judd had not proved the need for an additional radioactive waste site. He sold the property to EnergySolutions, which then received permission from the county to store radioactive waste on the site.
In 2005 Judd sued the county for denying his permit and the 3rd District Court dismissed the case because he no longer owned the property. He appealed to the Utah Supreme Court, which overruled the district court and ordered a trial held. Judd lost the district court trial and was in the process of appealing that loss to the state Supreme Court in 2009. Judd dropped the appeal in Feb. 2010.
“I decided to try and work out an agreement with the county outside of the court system,” Judd said. “It is difficult to believe they won’t even look at a plan that will create hundreds of jobs and give them millions more in mitigation fees than they are receiving now.” Judd said he doesn’t believe commissioners are trying to deliberately give EnergySolutions a monopoly.
“The current ordinance does favor EnergySolutions,” Judd said. “ But I think the commissioners have just worked with one company for so long they are having trouble understanding how it would work with two companies.”
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is fining the West's largest hazardous waste dump more than $300,000 for alleged improper disposal of cancer-causing chemicals.
Residents near the Kettleman Hills dump in Central California previously expressed concerns that it was linked to a high rate of birth defects among children in the area, but state health officials say they have not identified a common cause of the problems.
EPA officials said Tuesday that Chemical Waste Management was being fined because the dump failed to clean up soil tainted with PCBs. The facility is one of just 10 dumps nationwide that handles polychlorinated biphenyls, a now-banned transformer fluid.
The landfill is near Kettleman City, an impoverished San Joaquin Valley farm town where 11 cases of cleft palates and other birth defects have been reported since 2007.
PLAINWELL, Mich. (NEWSCHANNEL 3) - A hazardous waste disposal company in Plainwell is looking to expand and the DNRE wants you to weigh in.
Drug and Laboratory Disposal is located on Broad Street. News reports say it wants to increase the size of its operation nearly tenfold.
Environmental officials are considering the company's application and they're holding the first of a series of public hearings tonight to discuss the proposal and get input.
That meeting starts at 7:00 tonight at Plainwell City Hall.
Nearly 1.837m tonnes of hazardous waste were generated in Switzerland in 2009. The figure, released earlier this week by the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN), represented an increase of almost 4 per cent or 71,000 tonnes compared with the year before.
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The amount of hazardous waste treated domestically rose by around 3.2 per cent to 1.586m tonnes. Around 251,000 tonnes of hazardous waste were exported, after 229,000 tonnes were transported abroad in 2008. Mineral wastes, sludge and treatment residues again made up the largest fractions of hazardous waste. Accounting for 630,000 tonnes, landfilling was the most commonly employed means of disposal. Around a third of the waste was incinerated and 17 percent was recycled or treated.
The Horseheads Central School District athletic fields are no longer listed with the Department of Environmental Conservation as a hazardous waste disposal site.
But environmentalists question the testing, and the DEC's research. They say just because one investigation didn't unearth anything, it doesn't mean there's no potential danger.
Testing by a private company, Barton and Loguidice, came back negative for hazardous chemicals. Superintendent Ralph Marino, Jr. is relieved, but the president of Toxics Targeting, Walter Hang, has doubts.
There is clear documentation that pollution is here, Hang said.
That's according to a 1986 investigation by NUS Corporation.And these are cancer causing agents found in cigarette smoke that cause lung cancer, Hang said.
Hang said the concern is pollutants dumped near the fields decades ago in an adjacent nature area could have migrated over years.
Bart Putzig, the DEC engineer who worked with the school district, said there's no cause for concern.
We did not find that there was a consequential amount of waste so there's really nothing to clean up. It just didn't rise to a level where the state needed to take action on it, Putzig said in a phone interview.
We did comprehensive testing, we went well beyond just the satellite section,? Superintendent Marino said.
But Hang is convinced the work was not comprehensive enough and wants more testing, and ultimately, a complete clean-up of the area. But that might take some time. the matter is closed, Marino said.
