CYPRESS, Calif. — California shouldn’t weaken hazardous waste rules to allow local landfills to accept toxic dirt that currently goes to two specialized disposal sites in the Central Valley and hazardous facilities in other states, the state Board of Environmental Safety voted Thursday.
The vote went against a proposal by the Department of Toxic Substances Control that had prompted fierce opposition from environmental groups.
“I think they have been really listening to the community,” said Melissa Bumstead with the advocacy group Parents Against the Santa Susana Field Lab.
California’s hazardous waste laws are stricter than the federal government’s, and the state has long transported much of the waste it considers hazardous to other states with more lenient rules.
The Department of Toxic Substances Control said disposing more waste in state would likely reduce costs and truck emissions. But environmental advocates worried the plan could have exposed already vulnerable communities to contaminated waste and set the precedent for more rules to be weakened.
“I don’t think that municipal waste landfills were ever designed to accept this kind of waste, and to deregulate it … puts those landfill communities” at risk, said Jane Williams, executive director of California Communities Against Toxics.
California only has two hazardous waste landfills — Buttonwillow and Kettleman Hills in the San Joaquin Valley — which are expected to reach capacity by 2039, according to a report by the department. An estimated 47% of California’s hazardous waste is trucked across state borders. Contaminated soil, waste oil and mixed oil are the state’s three largest annual sources of hazardous waste. On average, more than 567,000 tons (514,373 metric tons) of toxic soil are produced every year.
The hearing comes months after wildfires in Los Angeles incinerated cars, homes and everything in them, turning ordinary objects into hundreds of tons of hazardous waste requiring specialized cleanup. It was the largest wildfire hazardous materials cleanup in the EPA’s history.
The infernos have also raised concerns about toxic ash and soil. Just this week, the Pasadena Unified School District published soil testing results showing high levels of arsenic or brain-damaging lead in nearly half its schools.
After the fires, hazardous waste was sent to temporary sites to be separated and packaged before most of it was trucked to Utah, Arizona, Nebraska and Arkansas. Two…
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