Document jgQYpRjp1B126Kyy2NbZGpd5R

jL San Francisco <it|roiucle Sat., Nov. 29, 1980 , -By '4nh Bancroft- i - Twenty-one electrical trans pital, said that, while it has been a ! formers, containing tip to 200 gal hospital practice for the past 15 lons of highly toxic PCBs, are being years to dump the transformers in illegally stored on the grounds of the woodsy area, he did not become Sonoma State Hospital in a wooded aware of the problem until yester area used by patients for hiking . day. and picnicking,, state and federal j investigators discovered yesterday. , "Our guidelines did not focus on storage (of PCBs), but on trans | The illegal storage area, where j the leaky transformers are placed portation," said Martin, appearing slightly chagrined. ; on wooden pallets over the soil, i$ ' on an oak-covered knoll-adjacent to According to Martin, the Sono lithe hospital's water treatment plant ma hospital officials had not been ! and about 100 feet uphill from an advised of the ; hazards of PCBs ; enclosed reservoir. . . 1 until February 1979 when they ' V \ The problem came to light received a short memorandum from the health department's Haz eariy 'this week after a hospital ardous Materials Management Sec j teacher's aide saw the transformers tion. .... '. while she was leading a group of patients on a hike behind the While the memorandum stated hospital. Located near Glen Ellen, that "the department considers . Sonoma State Hospital serves more PCB to be an extremely hazardous than: 1500 mentally retarded pa waste," it did not advise the hospi tients. ; , tal- bf the stringent regulations . governing storage of PCBs. ! All but four, of the transform ers were marked with bright yellow . Since the receipt of the memo, i PCB warning stickers advising of Martin said, the hospital's electrical !;. the chemical's hazards. department supervisor has made i ?;.J,. The aide called the Sonoma-. monthly inspections of the storage site. I iI ' based PCB Project,' a non-profit Organization devoted to exposure I and cleanup of PCB spills, and. ' "He gives it an eyeball inspec tion, and if he sees any change in | project workers notified the feder- . them (the transformers) he makes IV; al Environmental Protection Agen- sure they're battened down," he "i; cy. ,. said. I | ! According to an EPA source, the agency had been advised of the t storage area nearly three months ! ,ago, but no inspector was sent to He said electrical workers at the hospital are not provided with protective clothing for work around PCBs, as is required by the ^the;site.H"-.7 California Occupational Safety and ! j; Health Administration. Yesterday, inspectors from the EPA and the state Department of PCBs, long considered by phys- Health Services scoured the site ' icians' and scientists' to be a health with hospital officials, taking soil hazard, were banned in 1978. The i. samples and asking why it was that chemicals remain in legal use in officials had not been informed of' "closed systems" by utility com the strict regulations : regarding panies and in large installations storage of PCBs. that run electrical plants, such as the one at Sonoma State Hospital. Dr. Patrick L. Martin, execu tive director of Sonoma State Hos The EPA requires that PCBs must be stored in enclosed, marked barrels, within a concrete structure surrounded by a moat, to prevent any possibility of their leaking into the environment. State and federal inspectors were cautious yesterday about dis cussing the potential dangers of the hospital's illegal storage site. "They should be stored in a more secure location," allowed Paul Williams, waste management spe cialist for the health department. "But we won't know what the i hazards are until we get the sam1 pies back." EPA inspector Daniel Horgan j was more candid. "It's pretty appar1 ent," he said, "that those are PCBs ' and this is an unauthorized storage | site." If, after the samples are ana lyzed for PCB levels, the hospital is found to be in violation of EPA regulations, the institution could be fined as much as $25,000 for each i day the violation continues. The federal and state inspec tors estimated it would take up to two weeks to receive results of the samples taken at the site. The transformers at the site, i some as large as four feet tall and two feet in diameter, were covered with a black, oily substance that I had apparently dripped from the I tops of the transformers onto the ground. Although the state Depart ment of Health Services is charged with enforcement and regulation of hazardous substances in California, Williams said the department "hasn't made any investigations of institutions" to determine whether they're in compliance with toxic substances laws. PCB-ARCH-EXT0376249