National Clothesline

No perc drycleaning machines could be sold in California after December next year and all perc drycleaning would be phased out by 2022 under a new proposal being formulated by the California Air Resources Board staff.

Earlier this year the staff had proposed less sweeping amendments to the Air Toxics Control measure that would have allowed perc use to continue indefinitely in many locations, but the Air Board rejected that plan at a hearing in May and directed the staff to come up with a plan that would totally phase out perc in California drycleaning plants.

Thus the staff is working on a new proposal which is likely to go before the board early next year. Mei Fong of the air board staff brought drycleaners up to date on the status of the plan during a session at the California Cleaners Association’s Fabricare 2006 program.

Fong, who is leading staff work on the new plan, said that as it now stands staff will propose no new installations of perc machines beginning Jan. 1, 2008. Perc machines would have to be removed from co-residential facilities by July 1, 2010; all converted perc machines would have to be removed by the same date.

Also beginning July 1, 2010, all other perc machines would need to be removed when they become 15 years old. By the end of 2022, al perc machines would be gone from California.

In addition, drycleaners using perc would have record-keeping and reporting requirements and would have to follow operating practices that include having a spare set of gaskets and spare lint filter on hand, an annual enhanced leak check, regenerating secondary control systems and other leak check repair requirements.

Perc distributors would have to keep records of perc sales and purchases and report annual amounts of perc and recycled perc sold to California cleaners.

Fong said the board is aware of the financial impact the rules will have on cleaners who have to replace their perc machines. She noted that there are grants available to help cleaners with the cost of replacing perc equipment, but these are limited. A statewide program provides grants to replace perc machines with either wetcleaning or CO2 but it is not available for other perc alternatives. Fong said the California legislature would probably have to amend the law in order to make these grants more widely available.

The South Coast Air Quality Management District also has grants available for converting from perc to other cleaning technologies. These are available for hydrocarbon equipment.

Fong said the staff report and proposed amendments to the Air Toxics Control Measure would be available to a 45-day formal public review before the Air Board takes it up again, probably at its January 2007 meeting. There will also be a public workshop on the proposal this fall.

Up-to-date information on the proposal and any hearings or workshops should be available on the CARB web site www.arb.ca.gov/toxics/dryclean/dryclean.htm.

Speaking after Fong was Mike Belote who represents CCA in the California legislature. He said there has been “a big change in environmental issues” in the state to the extent that there is little chance any current regulations would be rolled back and that new, tougher regulations are likely to pass.

“The handwriting is on the wall,” he said. “All of the cleaners in California could show up at the hearing and the decision would not change.”

Further, he said, the chance of changing the state grant program to hydrocarbon solvents is unlikely. Environmentalists would oppose any such move.

Belote said there has been a sea-change in California and that the consensus now is that global warming is real and that the state must take the lead in addressing it. Polls have shown that Republicans as well as Democrats want something done about global warming.

To that end, he said, a bill before the legislature would make CARB “the greenhouse gas czar’ in California, charged with reducing greenhouse gases in the state back to 1990 levels by 2020. That makes it unlikely that wider use of hydrocarbon solvents would be welcomed in the state.

Belote also noted that the state minimum wage has become a contentious issue in the gubernatorial election. One proposal would increase it from $6.75 to $7.75 an hour and include indexing which would bump up the wage annual based on the consumer price index. Californians support a higher minimum wage generally but the business community is especially opposed to indexing. Belote said it is likely a compromise will be struck that will have a stepped increase of $1.25 or $1.50 an hour but with no indexing.