=======================Electronic Edition========================
RACHEL’S HAZARDOUS WASTE NEWS #150
—October 10, 1989—
News and resources for environmental justice.
——
Environmental Research Foundation
P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403
Fax (410) 263-8944; Internet: erf@igc.apc.org
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HOW TO FIND OUT ABOUT PERMANENT
HAZARDOUS WASTE CLEANUP TECHNOLOGIES.
What can be done to clean up superfund sites permanently? A
recent publication from the New York Environmental Institute
addresses that question: PERMANENT CLEANUPS, A CITIZEN’S GUIDE TO
HAZARDOUS WASTE TECHNOLOGIES & RESOURCES.
Selecting a permanent cleanup technology is not a simple matter.
Different kinds of wastes require different technologies. Metals
will require one kind of cleanup, organic chemicals will require
something different. Often, a single site may require several
different approaches.
It is not easy to find out which technologies are best for your
site because much of the information you will get is filtered
through the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) before it
gets into your hands. EPA has a definite bias toward low-cost
cleanup. The U.S. Congress required EPA to “prefer permanent
cleanups” over non-permanent cleanups, but permanent cleanups are
often more expensive than temporary “fixes,” so EPA has continued
to go its own way, ignoring Congress, ignoring science and
ignoring common sense. As we reported earlier (RHWN #86 and #87),
the Congress’s Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) studied 100
Superfund cleanups and reported (in a study called ARE WE
CLEANING UP) that it is “not uncommon to have a multi-million
dollar cleanup decision made without any technical data to
support it, either from the technical literature or from tests
done on site material.”
The key here is “treatability studies” of the actual wastes at
your own site. Treatability studies should reveal which
technologies have any hope of success with your particular wastes
in your particular geology. Unfortunately, in the past, EPA has
frequently not done treatability studies and has rushed ahead
with a “cleanup” that had no hope of permanence.
Superfund cleanups are not supposed to be experiments, with the
public serving as guinea pigs. Cleanups are supposed to be
restricted to cleanup technologies that have been demonstrated.
To allow new technologies to be tested, EPA operates the SITE
program (Superfund Innovative Technology Evaluation). Companies
that think they have invented a better mousetrap can request that
the SITE program evaluate their technology; if it looks
promising, presumably that technology becomes one of the ones EPA
can consider at your site.
To learn more about the SITE program, get yourself put on the
free SITE publications mailing list by writing to the EPA Office
of Research and Development (ORD) Publications, 26 W. Martin
Luther King Drive (G72), Cincinnati, Ohio 45268, or phone them at
(513) 569-7562.
The following SITE publications are currently available free from
the same phone number:
TECHNOLOGY PROFILES (EPA/540/5-88/003); SECOND REPORT TO CONGRESS
(EPA/540/5-89/009); TECHNOLOGY SCREENING GUIDE FOR TREATMENT OF
CERCLA [SUPERFUND] SOILS AND SLUDGES (EPA/540/2-88/004).
Actual results from tests of five new technologies are available
in a series of SITE reports: HAZCON-SOLIDIFICATION APPLICATIONS
ANALYSIS (EPA/540/A5-89/001); SHIRCO-INFRARED INCINERATION
APPLICATIONS ANALYSIS (EPA/540/A5-89/010); AMERICAN
COMBUSTION-OXYGEN ENHANCED INCINERATION APPLICATIONS ANALYSIS
(EPA/540/A5-89/005); TERRA VAC-VACUUM EXTRACTION APPLICATIONS
ANALYSIS (EPA/540/A5-89/003); IWT-IN SITU STABILIZATION
APPLICATIONS ANALYSIS (EPA/540/A589/004). Each of these documents
summarizes test results and will lead you to other, more detailed
EPA documents if you want them.
To learn more about the status of particular technologies in the
SITE program, you can dial into a free computer bulletin board
system (BBS) operated for EPA by a contractor in Maryland; set
your communications software for 1200 or 2400 baud, no parity, 8
data bits, phone (301) 589-8366 and sign on. There are currently
49 short SITE documents available on the system. The EPA contact
in DC for this system is Jim Cummings at (202) 382-4686. This
same bulletin board has a section devoted to waste minimization,
which we have not looked into.
EPA also operates a program called Alternative Treatment
Technology Information Center (ATTIC), to help people find and
evaluate innovative cleanup technologies. ATTIC is only available
to EPA employees, EPA contractors, and employees of state
governments. However, a friendly federal or state official can
legally extract information from the system and give it to you.
The system is computerized but is not available on-line; you
phone a human and request information, which is then mailed to
you. The EPA man in charge is Michael Mastracci at (202)
382-5747; he is notorious for not returning phone calls, but his
office will mail you publications describing ATTIC. The ATTIC
system is run for EPA by Technical Resources, Inc., in Rockville,
Md; phone Sheryl Williams at (301) 816-9153.
At many Superfund sites no one knows for sure how to achieve
permanent cleanup. But the goal of the Superfund program is a
valid one–to protect people and wildlife from leaking dumps, so
it is important not to allow uncertainty to cause paralysis.
One solution at many sites would be to excavate the wastes and
store them for a few decades in multi-story concrete buildings
built up on concrete posts so the underside of the entire
building could be inspected for leaks. The safe excavation of
wastes, and the storage of wastes in concrete buildings, have
both been studied and they appear to be feasible and affordable.
(See bibliography, below.) So far, EPA has resisted these
solutions, perhaps because the resulting buildings would be
large, visible symbols of technical failure by American
industry–evidence of decades of negligent slovenliness by the
nation’s corporate leaders. EPA would rather cap the evidence
with clay and hide it underground. But excavation and
above-ground storage often make sense and should definitely be
evaluated thoroughly.
To learn about Superfund in general, get:
Anne Rabe, TOOLS FOR ACTION; A CITIZEN’S HANDBOOK ON NEW YORK
STATE’S SUPERFUND PROGRAM for $7.00 from: NY Environmental
Institute, 33 Central Ave., Albany, NY 12210; phone (518)
4625527. Much of this publication applies to sites outside New
York. Deals with the whole superfund process.
And: U.S. CONGRESS, OFFICE OF TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT, SUPERFUND
STRATEGY [OTA-ITE-252]. Dated April, 1985. Available for $10
from: U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402-9325;
phone (202) 783-3238. Everyone who cares about Superfund should
read this.
And: ARE WE CLEANING UP? Available for $3.75 from U.S. Government
Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402-9325; phone (202) 783-3238;
request GPO stock number 052-003-01122-1. Also available (free)
from Joel Hirschhorn, Congress of the United States, Office of
Technology Assessment, Washington, DC 205108025; or phone (202)
224-8713. OTA’s look at 100 Superfund cleanups, showing that EPA
has missed the boat much more often than not.
A brand new publication, which we haven’t seen, is the Superfund
Implementation Plan–the Bush administration’s plan for cleaning
up old dumps; it’s available by phoning the “Superfund Docket
Office” in DC: (202) 382-3046, though it may be several weeks
before they’re ready to mail you a copy.
To learn about permanent cleanup technologies, get:
Jamie Risedorph, Leslie Dame and Anne Rabe, PERMANENT CLEANUPS
[28 pgs.] for $3.00 from: NY Environmental Institute, 33 Central
Ave., Albany, NY 12210; phone (518) 462-5527. An overview of
cleanup technologies and a resource guide for citizens.
And: Steven Lester and others, INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGIES FOR
DISPOSAL OF HAZARDOUS WASTES $8.95 from: Citizen’s Clearinghouse
for Hazardous Wastes, P.O. Box 926, Arlington, VA 22216; phone
(703) 276-7070. An overview of cleanup technologies and a lot of
good advice about how to approach the problem of evaluating
technologies for cleaning up a site.
And: PRE-FEASIBILITY STUDY: THE SAFE EXCAVATION OF HYDE PARK
DUMP. 15 pages. Technical appendices are also available. The main
Study is available to citizen groups for “cost of photocopying,”
from Pollution Probe Foundation, 12 Madison Avenue, Toronto,
Ontario M5R 2S1, Canada; phone Pam Millar at (416) 926-1907. A
pioneering study of safe ways to excavate wastes, then store them
above-ground while new technologies for detoxifying them can
develop.
And: James V. Walters and others, “Elevated Concrete Buildings
for Long-Term Management of Hazardous Wastes.” Environmental
Progress (Vol. 7, No. 4) [Nov., 1988], pgs. 224-229. Argues from
an engineer’s perspective that huge concrete buildings can store
hazardous wastes more safely and at less cost than a landfill for
several decades while permanent detoxification technologies are
developed.
Rachel search terms: superfund; remedial action; alternative
treatment technologies; landfilling; above-ground storage; ota;
epa; site.
–Peter Montague, Ph.D.
Descriptor terms: hazardous materials; superfund; epa; remedial
action; site; waste disposal technology; studies; alternative
treatment technologies;