Agency: Environmental Quality

Line Item: Environmental Response and Remediation

Function

The mission of the Division of Environmental Response and Remediation is to protect the health and the environment of the citizens of Utah from exposure to hazardous substances. This is accomplished by the following means:

• coordinating notifications and responses to incidents posing imminent hazards;
• implementing corrective actions (clean-up);
• providing educational services to the public;
• ensuring compliance with regulations; and
• managing risks and hazards.

The major functions of the division include the following:

• conduct site investigations;
• negotiate and coordinate clean-up activities;
• encourage voluntary cleanup of contaminated sites;
• perform risk assessments;
• coordinate enforcement activities;
• provide compliance activities;
• conduct certification training;
• establish design and operation standards;
• coordinate emergency response and planning;
• coordinate division safety program;
• collect and analyze chemical inventory and usage data;
• coordinate cost recovery actions;
• release prevention inspections and education; and,
• provide the public with chemical inventory of usage data.

The Division of Environmental Response and Remediation (DERR) was created from the Bureau of Solid and Hazardous Waste (BSHW) on July 1, 1990 to more effectively administer the rapidly expanding role of three federal environmental laws: The Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act, the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA), and the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), Subtitle I, Regulation of Underground Storage Tanks.

The division is organized into two major branches, the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) Branch (commonly known as Superfund) and the Underground Storage Tank Branch.

Through cooperative agreements with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) or Federal Facility Agreements with federal agencies, the division is involved in all hazardous waste sites in Utah that are included or are being investigated for the National Priorities List (NPL). The NPL is established by the federal, non-delegated CERCLA program. Utah has approximately 520 sites on the active or archived CERCLA list. Of these, 25 sites have been proposed with 20 of these finalized and on the NPL. Cleanup has been completed at 14 NPL sites.

The division administers the Voluntary Cleanup Release program since it was enacted by the Utah Legislature in 1997. This program allows for cleanup of contaminated properties not otherwise addressed by other regulatory program by owners, purchasers, or others voluntarily with state oversight.

The division administers the Underground Storage Tank (UST) program which is charged with enforcing state and federal underground storage tank regulations in Utah. The UST section conducts inspections at underground storage tank facilities to ensure compliance with leak prevention and leak detection requirements. The UST section administers various certification programs for underground storage tank installers and removers, inspectors, precision tank testers, groundwater, soil samplers, consultants, and registration of UST operators. Additionally, the section reviews and approves plans for closure of tanks, helps owners receive coverage under the State's Petroleum Storage Tank (PST) Fund, presents public information outreaches, and pursues tank compliance actions. The UST program has established standards for the design, installation, closure, operation and monitoring of regulated underground storage tanks. Local health departments are utilized to assist in conducting inspections and providing complaint response at a local level.

The Leaking Underground Storage Tank Remedial Assistance section has the responsibility for overseeing clean-up activities at leaking underground storage tank sites. This section monitors compliance with schedules and public information, approves corrective action technology, directs site investigations and remediation work. Additionally, this section takes compliance actions against responsible parties at leaking underground storage tank sites and responds to tank emergencies.

The PST Remediation section is responsible for administering the Petroleum Storage Tank Fund, which is a state trust fund established to provide financial assurance for underground storage tank owners to clean up releases from their tanks. Claims against the fund are processed, clean-up work reviewed and approved, and assistance given to underground storage tank owners to complete the clean-up process. An independent accounting firm conducts and actuarial analysis of the PST Fund annually. The draft actuarial report for FY 2012 projects a positive cash balance for the next 10 years. According to the report, the cash balance will increase from $12 million in 2013 to $16.3 million by 2022.

Final authorization from the EPA to administer the federal rules for the Underground Storage Tank program in Utah has been received.

The division received $1,929,000 in federal stimulus funding to apply towards abandoned leaking underground storage sites. With this funding, the division completed two site assessments and initiated nine site cleanups at the end of September 2011. Groundwater is currently being monitored at the nine cleanup sites to evaluate them for closure.

Performance

This measure evaluates underground storage tank (UST) facility compliance with key regulatory provisions that likely prevent or minimize human environmental impacts from UST releases (petroleum). Metrics for "significant operational compliance" fall into two categories: release prevention and release detection. The primary mechanism for successful results is outreach and education of facility owners/operators. Verification is done by inspections and compliance is by follow-up and enforcement. The graph below shows the percentage of UST facilities that meet the requirements for release prevention and release detection within 60 days of the compliance inspection done by the division.

Closing leaking underground storage tank (LUST) sites is an important performance measure to the state and EPA. "Closing" a LUST site means the site has been cleaned up to standards protective of human health and the environment. Cleanup to closure also facilitates redevelopment. On a national level, Utah ranks in the top 10% of states that have closed out most of their LUST sites. Utah has had 4,971 LUST release sites and has closed 4,511 of them.

This measure benchmarks productivity of moving sites through the voluntary cleanup program (VCP) to completion. Evaluating completion numbers on an annual basis allows the division to benchmark sites against a period of time (one year). There are many factors that weigh in on the time to completion, such as size and complexity of the site and associated contamination, timeframe of the applicant, economic conditions, etc. The downward trend reflects the challenging economic climate. VCP participation is 100% voluntary; the speed of cleanup slows when applicant money is less.

In addition to the key performance measures listed above, the division reported the following performances measures for FY 2012:

• inspected 958 underground storage tank facilities for compliance;
• closed 44 petroleum storage tank (PST) fund covered releases and 46 non-PST leaking underground storage tank (LUST) releases for a total of 4,511 cumulative releases closed to date;
• received and coordinated 336 incident notifications; and,
• issued one Certificate of Completion (COC) for a Voluntary Cleanup Program site and one No Further Action (NFA) for a total of 39 COC and No Further Action decisions in the program to date.

Funding Detail

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