EAB Review Could Spur Calls For EPA To Tighten Waste Combustor MACT

摘要

An EPA Environmental Appeals Board (EAB) judge is raising questions in a hazardous waste combustor permit suit over whether the agency's maximum achievable control technology (MACT) standard for the combus-tors is sufficiently strict as applied in certain areas, which could prompt fresh calls for EPA to significantly tighten the air rule. But any revision to the air rule might be years away, because the agency in its fiscal year 2015 budget justification says that it is realigning funds in its waste program, which will cause a delay in updating the MACT. Environmentalists argue the combustor MACT is too weak, and EPA must update the standards to meet a judicial remand. One industry source says that the EAB fight, In re: ESSROC Cement Corporation, highlights a potential conflict between EPA's MACT and a decision by EPA Region V - covering several Midwest states - to impose stricter controls on mercury-containing waste used in ESSROC's combustor at a Logansport, IN, facility. The region conducted a site-specific risk assessment (SSRA) of the combustion facility to determine that its permit needed to include stricter controls on the waste being combusted in order to reduce mercury levels emitted during combustion.