Summary of EPA Meeting with Duratherm 

August 7, 2007

On Tuesday, August 7, OSW staff met with Duratherm and its
representative to discuss their concerns with the DSW proposal and other
EPA rules. Barry Hogan of Duratherm explained his company’s principal
operations (recovery of materials from petroleum refinery wastes using
indirect thermal desorption).  Duratherm tests the wastes extensively
and Barry stated that it is usually more familiar with the wastes than
most petroleum refineries.  They have a RCRA Part B permit.  Barry H.
stated that recycling is actually a form of waste management.  Although
it should be encouraged and is environmentally preferable to landfilling
or incineration, recyling often needs regulatory oversight to protect
human health and the environment, he averred.  He then discussed the
regulatory exclusion for wastes inserted as feedstocks into the
petroleum refining process.  He stated that the exclusion would probably
be ultimately beneficial, but that a gradual loosening of the criteria
(such as when materials are inserted into the refining process) may have
sometimes led to materials of low value being recycled, so that the
recycling  process was actually of dubious legitimacy.   He also stated
that residuals would end up in petroleum coke, which would be shipped to
other countries for burning because such burning would be infeasible
here due to CAA controls.  Mark Eads said that we were beginning to
address such issues in our life-cycle analyses, but that such analyses
are currently difficult to do.    

He said that generators may send materials to an excluded recycler not
because it is cheaper but because they don’t have to do TRI reporting.
 He said that making TRI requirements more dependent on what most people
think of as actual releases would help address that problem.  OSW stated
that we would not be able to address TRI issues in this rulemaking.  

Barry then said that any exclusions should provide “visibility”
(preferably through conditions) so that the facilities would not slip
off the radar screen of regulators and the public.  Leigh Ing mentioned
the fertilizer rule as an example of useful conditions, especially the
constituent limits. OSW agreed, but said that such limits would be much
more difficult to establish in a rule covering many different types of
wastestreams.  Barry mentioned that financial assurance was particularly
important for excluded recyclers, because lack of regulation could lead
to overextension and possible financial problems, so that cash in the
bank for closure should be available in case markets change.  He stated
that economics should play a large part in deciding whether recycling
was legitimate, but acknowledged that developing an economic “test”
would be difficult or impossible.  He said that the ideal situation
would be a sort of “RCRA lite” for recycling facilities, and that
uniform conditions would be preferable for all facilities doing waste
management involving UTS standards, so that a level playing field could
be created.  

In response to a question from Leigh Ing, OSW said that the purpose of
the rule was to increase cost-effective recycling while maintaining
protection of human health and the environment, and also to respond to
various court cases.  Leigh expressed concern that over time, the rule
could lead to problems caused by inexperienced operators entering the
recycling arena and hence reduced environmental protection.  Barry said
that we may not have examined fully the potential impacts of the rule on
currently permitted facilities.  Mark Eads said that this issue was
addressed to a certain extent in the RIA, and also that it might be
possible for permitted facilities to accept excluded waste by changing
capacity or by some other measures. 

Barry and Leigh both asked about the possibility that the final DSW rule
could cover burning for energy recovery and use constituting disposal.  
if OSW said that we would need to get input from OGC on whether we could
finalize those provisions.  We also said that there would be a push to
get the rule finalized before any administration change, so that might
make it harder to address technically difficult issues.  We said that if
Duratherm continued to be concerned about the impact of this rule on
permitted facilities and the potential for environmental harm, they
could consider setting up a meeting at the political level. Leigh said
she would let us know if Duratherm decided to take that approach.  She
also stated that OSW should call her if we had any questions about
“real world” issues regarding Duratherm’s operations.  

Attendees were:

OSW:  Marilyn Goode, Dave Fagan, MaryBeth Sheridan, Ross Elliott, Amy
Lile, Amanda Geldard, Mark Eads

Duratherm:  Barry Hogan

Leigh Ing Consulting:  Leigh Ing, representing Duratherm 

