DEQ Seeks Comment on Proposed Odor Nuisance Strategy

by Susan Watkins

6/11/2013 2:07:53 AM

The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) is soliciting input on a proposed new odor nuisance management strategy.  The effort grew out of years of complaints from frustrated victims of nasty odors in North Plains (Recology outdoor food compost facility) and Portland (Daimler paint plant, ESCO foundry).  DEQ has long "regulated" odors from facilities like these, and like Riverbend Landfill, by putting language that prohibits nuisance odors in their permits.  However, DEQ never enforces these requirements.

The draft strategy proposes to develop a path to enforcement that includes the following steps:  The agency will:

- monitor, track, and respond to odor complaints;

- determine appropriate abatement measures ("best work practices");

- refer offenders to the state Office of Compliance and Enforcement which will order the offender to institute the abatement.

We find a lot of problems with this approach.  For example, DEQ currently believes the landfill engages in "best work practices" to control odors -- yet no matter how successfully those practices are implemented, the odors never decrease!  In other words, the strategy cannot succeed unless the abatement measures chosen actually work. 

Moreover, the strategy contains no standards for determining the sufficiency of the evidence required before the agency will declare a site to be a "suspected nuisance" subject to a requirement to implement abatement measures.  Finally,  although they will be "consulted," the people most impacted by the odor are not made parties to any proposed Best Work Practices Agreement that DEQ may sign with the offender.

Please read the proposed odor nuisance strategy and let DEQ know you want it strengthened!  Find the strategy at:

http://www.oregon.gov/deq/Pages/Nuisance-Strategy.aspx

Opponents Seek Contested Case

by Susan Watkins

6/11/2013 1:35:47 AM

The Stop the Dump Coalition has asked the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to hold an administrative hearing on the approval it recently issued for an MSE berm at Riverbend Landfill.  The hearing, called a contested case, is normally granted to applicants whose permit requests have been denied by DEQ.  However, nothing in Oregon's administrative rules prevents the agency from holding a contested case at the request of a permit opponent.

Stop the Dump President Ilsa Perse cited three general grounds for the request:

- No evidence of any need for additional landfill capacity was shown, triggering DEQ's power to deny the permit on the grounds that Waste Management, the landfill's owner, failed to "clearly demonstrate" the need for additional capacity;

- The County has never approved additional landfill cells as contemplated by its 2004 Solid Waste Management Plan; and

- Other grounds argued before DEQ by landfill opponents during the comment period on the berm, including seismic stability of the proposed wall and the legal effect of EPA rules that control the scope of a seismic safety assessment.

Perse says the group does not expect DEQ to grant the request, but felt it was important to give the agency the opportunity to resolve the dispute administratively.  Contested cases are much cheaper for the agency and for taxpayers than the alternative of a court battle.  Assuming the request for a contested case is denied, the Coalition will formally ask DEQ to reconsider its decision.