New law changes NC clean-up rules
In North Carolina, Gov. Easley recently signed Bill 1362 into law, enacting
significant changes to the state
’s Dry-Cleaning Solvent Cleanup Act (DSCA), including a restructuring of how the
program will collect money from participating cleaners.
The idea fueling the changes is the hope that they will encourage more
drycleaning plant and property owners to add their contaminated sites to the
ranks of the DSCA Program.
Bill 1362, which went into effect on Sept. 1 of this year, throws out the old
deductible system, and in its stead calls for a fixed, co-pay percentage from
petitioners for the DSCA Program.
The percentage, which depends on the number of employees working at an active
petitioning plant, is based on assessment and remediation costs between $0 and
$1 million.
For active facilities with less than five full-time employees, petitioners would
be required to pay 1 percent of the cleanup costs.
For petitioners with active facilities that include five to nine employees, the
fixed co-pay percentage is bumped up to 1.5 percent.
Finally, facilities with more than ten employees who petition the DSCA Program
will have a co-pay of 2 percent.
The new fee structure should save most cleaners considerable money. Previously,
the up-front deductible could cost cleaners anywhere from $5,000 to $25,000.
Under the new system, a $300,000 cleanup would cost petitioners between $3,000
and $6,000, depending on how many people are employed at the plant. The highest
fees would fall in the range of $10,000 to $20,000 for a $1 million
remediation.
While the new system should save most cleaners money overall, Bill 1362 requires
plant or property owners who petition for a site cleanup in the program to pay
an application fee of $1,000.
It is also noteworthy that cleaners who entered the DSCA Program prior to Sept.
1 will have their financial obligations converted to the new fee structure.
Payments already made will be credited toward new financial obligations.
So, a cleaner who paid a $5,000 deductible for a small site will not be liable
for any additional fees unless the total costs exceed $500,000.
However, the new bill does not allow for the reimbursement of previously paid
fees that are in excess of the new fees under the restructure.
In addition to the modification of financial aspects of the program, the new
bill instigated other important changes.
Under the old law, plant owners or operators would have been outright denied
access to the cleanup program if the applicant facility was not in compliance
with the Minimum Management Practices (MMPs) at the time the contamination was
discovered.
That may no longer be the case in all instances. SB 1362 allows for the DSCA
Program to use its own discretion in determining if the site
’s non-compliance was significant enough to classify it as ineligible.
Another change coming in the new legislation is the definition of “drycleaning solvent.” With alternative solvents becoming more prominent in recent years, SB 1362
attempted to clarify which solvents qualify under the DSCA Program.
The new bill’s definition applies strictly to “any hydrocarbon or halogenated hydrocarbon used as a solvent in a dry-cleaning
operation or the degradation products of these solvents.
”
The tax on such solvents will continue as follows: $10 per gallon for cleaners
halogenated hydrocarbon-based solvents and $1.35 per gallon for
hydrocarbon-based solvents.
According to Dr. John Powers, Head of the Special Remediation Branch of the
Superfund Section of the North Carolina Department of Environmental and Natural
Resource
’s Waste Management Division, solvents subject to DSCA regulation and the $10 per
gallon tax include
“perchloroethylene, F-1, 1,3, or 1,1,1 trichloroethane, and n-propyl bromide.”
Solvents considered for the $1.35 per gallon tax include “the various petroleum solvents such as Stoddard and Quick Dry 105F as well as
the high-flash hydrocarbons including DF-2000 and EcoSolv.
”
Dr. Powers also noted that liquid CO2, propylene glyco ether and menthyl
siloxane are not subject to solvent taxes under the Program.
Among other changes to the cleanup law, Bill 1362 expanded the annual limit for
expenditures a site. The old cap was $200,000; the new limit is $500,000. The
yearly limit for sites classified as
“imminent hazards” also went up from $400,000 to $1 million.
For more information on the DSCA Program and its recent changes, visit its
official site at www.ncdsca.org.
