If you are a hazardous waste generator, it is your responsibility to make sure your waste transporter is licensed by EPA and/or state agency to transport hazardous wastes. In other words, you need to make sure it has an EPA ID number. Federal regulation 40 CFR 262.12(c) states that a ”generator must not offer his hazardous waste to transporters or to treatment, storage or disposal facilities that have not received an EPA identification number.”
California’s Title 22 hazardous wastes regulation 22 CCR 66262.12(c) has similar language.
It is that simple.
Here is what happened to Home Depot in California. On May 13, 2004, a waste transporter hired by Home Depot collected hazardous waste at the Player del Rey Home Depot and started mixing different types of wastes in a 55-gallon container. The container exploded and caused a fire that resulted in the store being evacuated. The following day, California Highway Patrol found a truck operated by the same transporter hauling hazardous wastes from Home Depot.
It turned out that this waste hauler was not licensed by DTSC as a hazardous waste transporter and did not have an EPA ID number. The unlicensed waste hauler was a subcontractor to Home Depot’s contractor.
This finding initiated a series of subsequent inspections at Home Depot’s 200+ facilities in California which resulted in the State of California filing a law suit against Home Depot. The company was held liable for numerous violations and fined a total of $9.9 million by the Superior Court .
It all started with an unlicensed waste transporter.
At a refinery near Dumas, Texas, in February 2007, a water-containing pipe froze and cracked, releasing high-pressure liquid propane; the resulting fire burned three workers and caused more than $50 million in property damage. In January 2001, two workers burned to death at a large Indiana steel mill after they were sprayed with flammable gas condensate, which ignited. The accident occurred after ice had cracked and damaged a valve in the mill’s coke oven gas distribution system.
The US Chemical Safety Board just issued a video on the need to properly winterize pipes and connections to prevent major chemical accidents.
Here is a short video from the U.S. Chemical Safety Board on how unsafe work practices and the lack of training led to fatalities at an oil production field in Mississippi.
It is important to learn from other people’s mistakes. This video is very instructive.
It goes without saying that the first thing you need to do when you have a spill is to stop the spill and ensure the safety of your employees and the community. After you have done that, there are three things you should keep in mind:
The first thing is to determine your Federal Reportable Quantities. Determine the amount of chemical you have spilled and check to see if it has exceeded EPA’s federal reportable quantity (RQ). You can do that easily by looking up the RQ in EPA’s List of Lists. Remember that the RQ of a chemical always refers to its pure form in a mixture or compound. For example, if you spill a mixture that contains 50% of X and the RQ for X is 400 lbs, you will have to have spilled more than 800 lbs of the mixture for you to exceed the RQ.You must report any spilled amount over the RQ to the National Response Center at 1-800-424-8802.
The second thing to remember is to check your state’s own reporting requirements. Many states have their own spill reporting requirements in addition to the Federal reporting requirement. States such as New Jersey, California, New York and Iowa(just to name a few) require reporting of all spills regardless of quantities. For example, in Californiayou must report any amount of chemical spill to the California Office of Emergency Response unless you can show that “there is a reasonable belief that there is no significant present or potential hazard to human health, the environment or property.” The onus is on you to determine if the spill was “significant” or not.
We have prepared a summary chart showing the various spill reporting requirements in all 50 states. Use it as a guide. Check out the state’s website for more details.
The third thing to remember is this. If you are not sure if you should report a spill, report it.
On June 24, 2005, fire and explosions swept through the Praxair Distribution, Inc., gas cylinder filling and distribution center in St. Louis, Missouri. The accident occurred when gas released by a pressure relief valve on a propylene cylinder ignited.
The U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) investigators noted the accident occurred on a hot summer day with a high temperature of 97 degrees F in St. Louis. At Praxair, cylinders were stored in the open on asphalt, which radiated heat from the direct sunlight, raising the temperatures and pressure of the gas inside the cylinders. At approximately 3:20 p.m., a propylene cylinder pressure relief valve began venting. CSB investigators believe static electricity, created by escaping vapor and liquid, most likely ignited the leaking propylene.
The CSB issued Safety Bulletin listing several best practices for cylinder storage at gas repackaging facilities, including fire protection systems to cool cylinders and limit the spreading of fires, adding barriers to contain exploding propylene cylinders within the facility, and gas detection systems that can sound alarms and activate fire mitigation systems.
The following video shows the initial fire spreading quickly to other cylinders. Exploding cylinders – mostly acetylene – flew up to 800 feet away, damaged property, and started fires in the community. The fire could not be extinguished until most of the flammable gas cylinders were expended. An estimated 8,000 cylinders were destroyed in the fire, which took five hours to control.
We can all learn from other people’s mistakes. The following paragraphs are taken from a press release on its investigation of a major chemical accident by the U.S. Chemical Safety Board:
The Point Comfort complex, on the Texas Gulf Coast, is the largest Formosa facility in the U.S., employing 1,400 full-time workers and 400 contactors. The accident occurred in the plant’s Olefins II Unit, which converts either natural gas liquids or naphtha into products such as propylene and ethylene. The accident began when a vehicle – a forklift towing a trailer loaded with cylinders of breathing air used in maintenance – snagged a valve, pulling it out of the system. This caused the release of a large volume of propylene which then ignited, creating a large fire. The initial explosion knocked several operators to the ground and burned two men, one seriously. Fourteen workers sustained minor injuries evacuating the complex.
The CSB Case Study concludes that had the Olefins II unit been equipped with automated shutdown valves it may have been possible to stop the propylene flow, limiting the size of the fire. Operators were unable to reach manual valves to stop the release due to the presence of the growing vapor cloud.
The investigation noted that the valve hit by the trailer was unguarded, and vulnerable to being hit by vehicles. The Case Study also noted that some steel supports were not fireproofed, and collapsed. This caused the failure of pipes designed to carry flammable hydrocarbons to the unit’s flare system, where they could be safely burned in the atmosphere. Without this safety system in place, pressurized flammable gases continued to feed the fire, which burned for five days. In addition, the CSB found that flame resistant clothing was not required for all employee activities within the Olefins II unit where there were large quantities of flammable liquids and gases.
CSB Board Member John Bresland said, “This began with a seemingly minor event, in which a trailer bumped into a drain valve. But the incident had disastrous consequences because the facility was not better prepared for a large chemical release. The fires and explosions at Formosa’s Point Comfort plant provide compelling reasons to analyze vulnerabilities that could lead to a major chemical accident.”
What follows is a short video from the CSB on its investigation and findings:
If you are a hazardous waste generator, it is your responsibility to make sure your waste transporter is licensed by EPA and/or state agency to transport hazardous wastes. In other words, you need to make sure it has an EPA ID number. Federal regulation 40 CFR 262.12(c) states that a ”generator must not offer his hazardous waste to transporters or to treatment, storage or disposal facilities that have not received an EPA identification number.” 
