Document YrEkbyJnG94xwe1Onggwo29oy

October 7,1978 MONS 011354 r MarcLeepson Marc Ltcpson lives on a farm in Woodbridge, Va. his it a story about a midnight mover. Not Burns $75,000 to dispose of 31,000 gaions of T a guy who skips out on his rent m the mid PCB oil. dle of the night. Not a late night disco The nearest legal PCB chemical waste landfiB dancer. Our midnight mover is a clandestineis located in Livingston. Ala., about 650 males waste hauling operator who empties toxic chemi from Raleigh. According to police investigators. cal cargoes illegally, under the cover of darkness. Transformer Sales didn't take the PCB oil to the Midnight movers operate m every state of the Alabama landfilL Instead, inmriimr during the union.They've dumped toxics in scwas, streams, night of July 2$, it was dumpedalonga network lakes, rivers, oceans, old quarries and m forests, of secondary roads in IS North Carolus coun fields and trenches. Some even dump their poi ties located between Raleigh and the Virginia sons along roads. state line. On Aug. II, Robert Bums, the owner ofTrans The PCB oil looked like ordinary road oil, and forma Sales Co. of Allegany, N.Y,, and Burns' it would have gone unnoticed if a chemist who two sons Randall and Timothy were arrested happened to be vacationing in North Carolina snd held without bail in New York on fugitive hadn't become suspicious about its peculsr odor. from justice warrants filed by the state of North He scooped up a sample, analysed it and notified Carolina. Bums and sons were charged with North Carolina authorities when he discovered dumping 11,000 gallons of transformer oil con what it contained. Witnesses recalled seeing an taining the industrial pollutant PCBa (polychlo unmarked truck with New York iccnsc plates rinated biphycnyls),Jong known as one of the spreading the oil along the highway. most toxic substances ever syntnemeq. tSc Nearly a month lata New York Suit poire three aiso lice federal charges stemming from impounded a 24 foot track cootsmmg an oil the incident. tank. The truck, painted white with no identify Bums' Transformer Sales Co. is in the busi ing marks, is equipped with t switch near the ness of salvaging PCB o9 from transformers, and driver's seat enabling someone inside the cab to it has been identified as the largest KB transpor release the contents of the tank. Bumsadmittcd tation, storage and resale firm in the country. Sometime this summer, Bums was contacted by that he owns the truck but insists that his com pany was not involved in the dumping. He can ac an old business associate, R.E. "Buck" Ward Jr., count for every drop of Ward's PCB oil, he said. who owns Ward Transforma Co. in Raleigh, North Carolina authorities are now debating N.C. According to newspaper reports, Ward paid what to do about the spill--and who is going to 4/kAviriNWiMul Action HONS 011355 piy for the cleanup. State Highway Division workers, protected by rubber suits and masks, sprayed the oil with activated charcoal, soapy water and emulsified asphalt soon after the spill was discovered. The idea was to deactivate the PCBs before the state removed the soil so the PCBs "won't be absorbed into the soil or wash swaysaid Or. Martin Hines, an epidemiologist with the North Carolina Department of Human lons of PCB oil stored in 500 steel drums were discovered fa a YoungsvUlc, Penn, warehouse also leased to Bums. According to Youngsvifie Borough Manager George Probst, some of the drums were leaking, and scientists from the Penn sylvania Environmental Resources Department were called to check the community water sup* ply for possible PCB contamination. The PCB oil will be removed, he said. Bums has admitted Resources. The state estimates that the con of possessing even more PCB oil. He told police in removing some 40,000 cubic yards of PCB con* vestigators that some 4,000 gallons are sitting in laminated soil could reach $2.5 million. a tank truck parked inalot near Jamestown, N.Y. After collecting dirt samples. North Carolina Bums, however, claims that the press hss ex Agriculture CammMoncrJame* Grahamwarned aggerated the dangers of PCfts. There's a general igiMt "any disoct human consumption" of misunderstanding about PCBs and what they do, csnpswithia 100 yards of the sptt. **This would he says. TWuw doubt, based on government Mao apply to pasture and hay for feed," he said. information, PCB ta a had o3. If you drank a "In com for silage, we recommend that the first glass of it, it wouldn't do you any good." But five or six rows be left and plowed under." Ares residents reported attacks of nausea, PCB is not "something like chlorine gas, where you get one whiff and you're dead," Bums said. diasincts and cramps soon after the oil was "I have worked around PCB for 15 years.... dumped. Sute officials say there is no serious I have breathed it, I have had it on my hands, I health problem, but signs have been posted warn have had it dumped on me" without ill effect. ing pedestrians to keep off the sites. And local Bums offered to demonstrate his conviction that schaal officials arc considering re-routing school PCBs aren't particularly harmful. "I would be buses around the tpBIs. "In general, we want to keep kids out of these sites, not because there's willing to go before television cameras or what* ever and stand in a barrel of it," he said on an immediate risk of picking up a great amount." Aug. 29. mid Dr. John MacCormack, head of the Com* Bums may be willing to immerse himself in a muniraNr Disease Department of the N.C Divi sion of Health Services, "but because it's better barreiful of PCBs, but others who have been un* wittingly exposed to the chemical haven't been to be more conservative chan not conservative quite so fortunate. In SMS, for example, 1,000 enough*' , Japanese suffered severe reactions to PCB con taminated riee oil. And in other instances, PCB. eanwhile, back in western New York, a suspected carcinogen, has caused severe skin Mi Rums and his Transformer Sales Co. are and eye trritatioas and has been linked to repro in more legal hot water over other.inci- ductive disorders, kidney damage and liver ail denss of afieged mishandling of PCB*. On Aumge.nts in humans. 24, a 24 hour police guard waa posted on a dbed in Aftsgany owned by Transformer Sales. Inside hitc Bums plant his public PCB bath, were 5,000 gaBons of PCB transformer oil stored the Environmental Protection Agency in $5 galan drums. After au emergency meet (EPA) is in the process of setting up ing. the Cattaraugus County Health Department two separate regulations governing the disposal told Bums to remove the oil. The oil was trucked of hazardous wastes--one specifically for PCBs to an approved disposal site in Porter, N Y. near and the other-for all other hazardous wastes. But Niagara Rafts, and county officials say they'll PA is far behind schedule. Why? Primarily be MB Bums for the coat of the move. The health department was concerned with cause Congress has been reluctant to fund EPA't cosdy program to police the nation's toxic chem reports that some of the PCB oft was leaking into ical supply. Furthermore, the job has been infi a weft located about 400 feet from the shed. The well is major source of drinking water for Al legany's 2,700 residents, tod Mayor Nicholas Amato ordered the well closed pending tests of nitely more complex than originally anticipated. There are approximately 70,000 chemicals manufactured or processed right now m over ISS^KHl chemical plants across the country. the water supply. EPA's job under the Toxic Substances Control The day after the police guard was potted Act of 1974 is to test and prevent dangerous around the Allegany shed, 27,500 additional gal chemicals from entering the market, as well as HQHS 011356 Environment*! Actton/S to oversee the removal of existing hazardous chemicals. The law also ordered EPA to end U.S. produc tion and marketing of PCBs and to set up meth ods of disposing of the chemical. PCBs are no longer being made in this country; Monsanto, the Alflfcican Kfc manufacturer, voluntarily stopped producing them last year. Bur that doesn't mean thcrcaren't any PCBs around. Millions of tons of PCBs can be found inside many electrical products, and companies stuck with PCBs are now trying to figure out what to do with them. Many are taking the easy way out and selling their PCBs to midnight mov ers who ean dispose of them legally at only fow sites--Grand View, Idaho, Arlington, Ore., Uv ingston. Ala., and Porter, N.Y. All are privately run chemical waste landfills that have met EPA requirements for PCS disposal which went into effect last April. Although high temperature in cinerators could be used to safely dispose of the chemicals, as yet none has met EPA standards. Regulations for disposal of all other hazard ous wastes come under the 1976 Resource Con servation and Recovery Act (RCRA). When set in motion, the law will establish a comprehensive system to track hazardous chemical wastes from the time they leave the factory through their burial or incineration. But EPA has yet to implement any of the waste disposal regulations under RCRA. The law called for the regulations to be established by April 21,1971, but four of the seven regulations have not yet been proposed, and EPA officials say they won't be until early next year. This means that the RCRA tracking system and waste disposal regulations won't take effect until mad- 1980 at the earliest. Convinced that EPA was mired down need lessly in regulatory reviews of the situation. En vironmental Action and the Environmenu) De fense Fund recently brought suit against the agency to force it back on schedule. The law suit. if successful, will lead to EPA regulations both defining what a hazardous waste is, forcing companies to identify wastes, package them properly and reveal the details of their produc tion to disposal cycles (see bon, page 7). Are the long delays contributing dircttly to the growing me of midnight movers? Clnurd Wttk magazine reported earlier this year that "there are indications that iRegri traffic in haz ardous wastes is big businea." Since the chemical industry generates some 35 million metric tons of wet hazardous wastes a year, another question is: will chemical companies and other waste gen erators try to unload great quantities of the haz ardous wastes on midnight movers in anticipa tion of costlier EPA regulated sites? Since there is plenty of time between now and 1980 for more Robert Bumaes to tuna up around the country, the answer will undoubted- !y be yes. 6/linvironmentAl Anion MONS 011357