Environmental Rules in the United States

1. Environmental Rules in the United States

2. National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) • Enacted January 1, 1970 • Set a national environmental policy • Required all federal agencies to consider environmental impacts before undertaking major actions • It was a procedural statute

3. National Environmental Goals 1. Fulfill each generation's responsibilities as a trustee of the environment for each succeeding generation. 2. Assure for all Americans safe, healthful, productive and aesthetically and culturally pleasing surrounding.

4. National Environmental Goals 3. Attain widest range of beneficial uses of the environment without degradation, risk to health or safety, or other undesirable and unintended consequences. 4. preserve important historic, cultural and natural aspects of our national heritage

5. National Environmental Goals • 5. Achieve a balance between population and resource use which will permit high standards of living and a wide sharing of life's amenities. • 6. Enhance the quality of renewable resources and approach the maximum attainable recycling of depletable resources

6. Federal Rule Making • Statute • Rule and Orders • Formal and Informal Rulemaking • Pre-Enforcement Review

7. EPA Annual Rule Creation • About 130 substantive regulations that apply nation wide • 5-to-10 impose cumulative costs of more than $100 million per year • 900 proposed regulations, technical corrections to existing regulations, State Implementation Plans and enforcement rules

8. Clean Air Act (CAA) • Clean Air Act Amendments of 1970 • Authorized National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) • Authorized new source performance standards • authorized national hazardous air pollutant standards • authorized federal civil and criminal enforcement authority

9. NAAQS • Primary standards protect against adverse health affects • short term for acute, long term for chronic • sensitive populations (asthmatics, children and elderly • Secondary standards protect against welfare affects • damage to animals, crops, vegetation and buildings

12. Pollutant Emissions have Decreased as a Result of Regulation

14. CAA 1977 Amendments • Provision to prevent deterioration of air quality in areas that the air is better than the NAAQS (PSD)

15. CAA 1990 Amendments • 187 air toxics • annual fee an any regulated pollutant • phase-out of O3-depleting compounds • expands federal authority • creates two new federal crimes • knowingly or negligently releasing hazardous pollutant and putting another person in imminent danger

16. Title V Permit to Operate • All Major Sources of air pollution must have a permit • Permit requirements must be followed • emission limits • emission monitoring • operations and maintenance plans • record requirements • reporting requirements • training

17. Rules to Reduce Air Toxics from Industrial Boilers • Air toxic-known or suspected to cause cancer or other serious health affects in humans • Mercury adversely affects developing brains • Cadmium, dioxins, furans, formaldehyde and HCl • Many can build in environment • Cause harm to environment • Can build in food chain

18. Rules to Reduce Air Toxics from Industrial Boilers • Promulgated 2/21/2011 • A major source • emits or has the potential to emit 10 tpy or more of any single HAP or 25 tpy or more of any combination of HAP. • An area source • a HAP-emitting stationary source that is not an major source

19. Rules to Reduce Air Toxics from Industrial Boilers • Major source numerical limits • Mercury (MACT) • Particulate matter (surrogate for non-mercury metals) (MACT) • Dioxin (MACT) • Carbon monoxide (for non-dioxin organic toxics) (MACT) • Hydrogen Chloride (for acid gases) (MACT) • Area Source Limits • Mercury (MACT) • Particulate matter (new boilers only) (GACT) • Carbon monoxide (MACT)

20. Clean Water Acts • Original Goals (1972) 1. Restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the national waters 2. Provide for the protection and propagation of fish, shellfish and wildlife and recreation in and on the waters. 3. Eliminate the discharge of pollutants by 1985

21. 1977 Amendments CWA • Established the basic structure for regulating pollutants discharges into the waters of the United States. • Gave EPA the authority to implement pollution control programs such as setting wastewater standards for industry. • Maintained existing requirements to set water quality standards for all contaminants in surface waters. • Made it unlawful for any person to discharge any pollutant from a point source into navigable waters, unless a permit was obtained under its provisions. • Funded the construction of sewage treatment plants under the construction grants program. • Recognized the need for planning to address the critical problems posed by nonpoint source pollution.

22. Evolution of the CWA • more holistic watershed-based strategies. • equal emphasis on protecting healthy waters and restoring impaired ones. • Involvement of stakeholder groups

23. Three Elements of Water Quality Standards • Designated Use of the Water (drinking swimming and fishing) • Criteria to protect those uses (such as chemical-specific threshold) • Anti-degradation policy to keep waters that currently meet the standards from deteriorating

24. Water Quality of Rivers in the United States

25. Water Uses • Aquatic Life Support • Drinking Water • Fish Consumption • Shell Fish Harvesting • Swimming • Recreation • Agriculture • Ground Water Recharge • Wildlife Habitat • Culture

28. Solid and Hazardous Wastes • Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) 1976 • Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) 1980 • Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments (HSWA) 1984 • Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA) 1986

29. Purpose of RCRA • Regulation of solid and hazardous waste management • Focuses on the prevention of releases of hazardous wastes • CERCLA and SARA focused on cleaning up sites created by past waste disposal practices and spills of hazardous substances

30. Exclusions • residues in containers • domestic sewage, industrial wastewater regulated under CWA • household wastes • residue from fossil fuel combustion • mining wastes • oil and gas refining wastes • used oil (if it is unmixed)

31. All Hazardous Waste Generators are Regulated • Any person or site whose act or process produces hazardous waste • generators may accumulate only 90 days of hazardous waste • if longer they need to get a hazardous waste storage site permit.

32. Others Regulated by RCRA • Transporting • treating • storing • disposing

33. Toxic Substance Control Act TSCA • Identify and control toxic chemicals • state a U.S. policy on toxic chemicals • applies to manufactures and processors of chemical substances • regulates radon, asbestos and lead-based paint (ammonia?)

34. Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act • Encourages and supports emergency planning at state and local levels • informs communities of the nature and amounts of hazardous substances in their area

35. EPCRA-Emergency Planning • Requires state and local emergency response committees (SERC’s and LERC’s) • facilities having hazardous substances must coordinate emergency response plans • emergency notification of chemical releases • extremely hazardous substances or CERCLA hazardous substances must be reported immediately

36. EPCRA-Community Right-to-Know • Have MSDS for all hazardous materials • inventories of hazardous materials must be reported to LERC SERC and local fire departments

37. Toxic Release Reporting • annual report of toxic chemical release • ammonia, HCl, nitrate, lead, dioxin, acetaldehyde, H2S

38. Questions?