8.7 Water Pollution, Hazardous Waste, and Community Right-to-Know
Key Takeaways
- RCRA regulates hazardous waste cradle to grave; generator status is large (1,000 kg/month or more), small (100 to less than 1,000 kg/month), or very small (100 kg/month or less).
- A waste is hazardous either because it is listed (F, K, P, or U lists) or because it exhibits ignitability, corrosivity, reactivity, or toxicity by the TCLP.
- CERCLA liability for contaminated sites is strict, joint and several, and retroactive, so a contributor of a small fraction can be liable for the entire cleanup.
- EPCRA sections 302, 304, 311/312, and 313 govern emergency planning, release notification, chemical inventory reporting, and the Toxics Release Inventory respectively.
- The Clean Water Act regulates point-source discharges through NPDES permits and indirect discharges to publicly owned treatment works through pretreatment standards.
Water Pollution, Hazardous Waste, and Community Right-to-Know
The BGC Community Exposure subject area covers "other IH-related environmental subjects such as emergency planning and response, water pollution, hazardous waste, and environmental fate and transport." The industrial hygienist is frequently the person who determines whether a waste stream is hazardous, whether a release is reportable, and what the community is told.
1. RCRA: Hazardous Waste Cradle to Grave
The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (1976) governs the generation, transport, treatment, storage, and disposal of hazardous waste under Subtitle C. Its architecture is a chain of custody for waste.
Is it a hazardous waste?
A solid waste is hazardous if it is listed or if it exhibits a characteristic.
Listed wastes (four lists):
| List | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| F | Non-specific source wastes | F001–F005 spent halogenated and non-halogenated solvents |
| K | Specific source wastes from named industries | Wastewater treatment sludge from a named process |
| P | Acutely hazardous discarded commercial chemical products | Sodium cyanide, many pesticides |
| U | Toxic discarded commercial chemical products | Many laboratory solvents |
Characteristic wastes (four characteristics):
| Characteristic | Code | Criterion |
|---|---|---|
| Ignitability | D001 | Liquid with flash point below 60 °C (140 °F); also ignitable compressed gases, oxidisers, and certain solids |
| Corrosivity | D002 | Aqueous with pH ≤ 2.0 or ≥ 12.5, or corrodes steel faster than 6.35 mm/year at 55 °C |
| Reactivity | D003 | Unstable, reacts violently with water, generates toxic gas, or is a cyanide or sulphide bearing waste |
| Toxicity | D004–D043 | Leachate from the Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) exceeds a listed limit |
The TCLP simulates landfill leaching conditions. A solid that is safe to handle can still be a toxicity-characteristic waste if it leaches lead, cadmium, chromium, or an organic above the regulatory level — which is exactly how blast media, paint chips, and treated wood become hazardous waste.
Generator status
| Category | Monthly generation | On-site accumulation limit | Accumulation time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Very small quantity generator (VSQG) | 100 kg or less | 1,000 kg | No time limit |
| Small quantity generator (SQG) | more than 100 to less than 1,000 kg | 6,000 kg | 180 days (270 if transporting more than 200 miles) |
| Large quantity generator (LQG) | 1,000 kg or more, or more than 1 kg of acute hazardous waste | No limit | 90 days |
Generator status is determined monthly, so a single large clean-out can move a facility into a higher category for that month.
The manifest
Hazardous waste shipped off site travels under a Uniform Hazardous Waste Manifest, signed by the generator, each transporter, and the designated facility, with a copy returned to the generator. If the signed copy does not come back within 35 days, the generator must investigate; if it has not arrived within 45 days, an exception report goes to EPA. Generators must also meet satellite accumulation, container labelling and dating, weekly inspection, contingency planning, and personnel training requirements.
2. CERCLA: Superfund
The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (1980) addresses abandoned and uncontrolled contaminated sites, rather than ongoing waste management.
Its defining feature is the liability scheme:
- Strict — liability without proof of negligence or fault.
- Joint and several — any one potentially responsible party can be held liable for the entire cleanup.
- Retroactive — applies to disposal that was entirely lawful when it occurred.
Four classes of potentially responsible party: current owners and operators, owners and operators at the time of disposal, generators who arranged for disposal, and transporters who selected the disposal site.
Sites are scored using the Hazard Ranking System, and those scoring above the threshold are placed on the National Priorities List. Cleanup proceeds through remedial investigation and feasibility study, a record of decision, remedial design and action.
Release reporting: a release of a hazardous substance at or above its reportable quantity in a 24-hour period must be reported immediately to the National Response Center.
3. EPCRA: Community Right-to-Know
The Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act, enacted as SARA Title III in 1986 after the Bhopal disaster, has four reporting programmes that the exam expects you to distinguish by section number.
| Section | Programme | Trigger | Goes to |
|---|---|---|---|
| 302 | Emergency planning | Extremely hazardous substance present above its threshold planning quantity | State emergency response commission, local emergency planning committee |
| 304 | Emergency release notification | Release of an extremely hazardous substance or CERCLA hazardous substance above its reportable quantity | LEPC, SERC, and National Response Center |
| 311/312 | Chemical inventory reporting | Chemicals requiring an SDS above threshold quantities | Safety data sheets or a list (311) and annual Tier I/Tier II inventory (312) to LEPC, SERC, and fire department |
| 313 | Toxics Release Inventory | Manufacture, process, or otherwise use a listed toxic chemical above threshold at a covered facility with 10 or more full-time employees | Annual Form R to EPA and the state |
Two memory hooks: 304 is the phone call made at the time of a release; 313 is the annual report of routine releases and transfers, due July 1 for the previous calendar year.
4. Clean Water Act and Drinking Water
Clean Water Act (1972). Its central prohibition is that no one may discharge a pollutant from a point source to waters of the United States without a permit.
- NPDES permits authorise direct point-source discharges, imposing technology-based effluent limitations and, where necessary, water-quality-based limits derived from total maximum daily loads.
- Pretreatment standards apply to indirect dischargers sending wastewater to a publicly owned treatment works, preventing pass-through of pollutants the plant cannot treat and interference with its biological processes. This is the programme most industrial facilities actually live under.
- Stormwater discharges from industrial activity and construction sites require permit coverage and a stormwater pollution prevention plan.
- Spill Prevention, Control, and Countermeasure (SPCC) plans under 40 CFR 112 are required for facilities storing oil above threshold quantities with a reasonable expectation of discharge to navigable waters.
Safe Drinking Water Act. Sets enforceable maximum contaminant levels (MCLs) for public water systems, set as close as feasible to the health-based, non-enforceable maximum contaminant level goals (MCLGs). The Lead and Copper Rule uses an action level structure rather than an MCL — currently 15 µg/L for lead and 1.3 mg/L for copper at the 90th percentile of tap samples — because the source is distribution-system corrosion rather than the treatment plant. The 2024 Lead and Copper Rule Improvements lower the lead action level to 10 µg/L, but systems generally do not transition to that regime until November 1, 2027, so 15 µg/L remains the operative action level in the meantime.
5. Why the Industrial Hygienist Owns This
- The person who characterises a waste stream is usually the person who understands what is in it — a materials and process question before it is a regulatory one.
- Reportable-quantity determinations happen under time pressure during an incident, and the immediate-notification clock is short.
- Tier II inventories and TRI reports draw on the same chemical inventory that drives the hazard communication programme, so the data should be maintained once and used for both.
- Community exposure questions on the exam frequently combine a release scenario with dispersion, reportable quantities, and notification obligations in a single item.
A facility generates 850 kg of hazardous waste in one month and no acute hazardous waste. What is its generator status and maximum on-site accumulation time?
Spent abrasive blast media from removing lead-based paint appears as an inert sand-like solid and is not on any RCRA listing. Under what circumstance would it nonetheless be a hazardous waste?
A chlorine release occurs at a manufacturing plant at 2 a.m., exceeding the reportable quantity. Which EPCRA provision governs the immediate notification the facility must make, and to whom?
A company purchased a facility in 2015 and later discovered that a prior owner had legally landfilled solvents on the property in 1968. Under CERCLA, what is the company’s exposure?