
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 9, 1990                   TAG: 9005090627
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A/3   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

EPA'S NEW RULES ON TOXIC WASTE DRAW CRITICISM

Industry soon will have to comply with new federal requirements when disposing of toxic industrial wastes on land, but environmentalists contend the rules don't go far enough to curb pollution.

"It gives the green light to continue dumping billions of gallons of untreated hazardous waste down deep wells," said Jane Bloom, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Other critics of the new regulations announced Tuesday by the Environmental Protection Agency said the requirements will only lead to new Superfund toxic waste sites in the years to come.

The EPA's long-awaited regulations, in development for six years, call on industry by 1992 to comply fully with new treatment requirements for more than 40 million tons of toxic waste that are dumped onto the ground surface or injected into deep wells.

"These rules will keep significant quantities of hazardous waste off the land, preventing the future ground-water contamination and assuring safe management of these wastes," said Donald Clay, the EPA's assistant administrator in charge of hazardous waste regulation and the Superfund cleanup program.

But several environmental groups and an industry group representing waste-treatment companies strongly criticized the agency action, saying it was too weak to assure the environment will be protected.

Richard Fortuna, executive director of the Hazardous Waste Treatment Council, said the EPA action, designed to curb the land disposal of untreated toxic chemicals, instead "ensures that the waste management practices of today will become the Superfund sites of tomorrow."

The critics said that while the regulations impose new treatment requirements for some toxic wastes, they also will allow industry to dispose of acidic and solvent wastes through dilution rather than special treatment to reduce the toxicity.

The environmentalists and other critics also said the EPA action:

Exempts toxic chemicals that go to wastewater treatment facilities or are injected into deep wells from special treatment requirements, requiring instead that the wastes be diluted.

Fails to establish technology-based treatment standards for eight toxic metals including lead, cadmium, chromium and mercury.

Allows toxic wastewater to continue to be placed in unlined and leaking lagoons and some residues from the treatment process to be placed in unlined landfills.

by CNB