Clean Harbors’ Kimball facility operates under a permit issued by the State of Nebraska that allows it to process and incinerate up to 505,344 pounds of hazardous wastes per day.
Inspections of the facility by EPA in September 2007 and by the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality in April 2008 found a series of alleged violations of the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), which regulates the storage, treatment and handling of hazardous wastes.
The inspections found presence of several open, unlabeled and leaking hazardous waste containers; storage of different hazardous wastes in proximity that could cause chemical reactions.
Failure to minimize the release of hazardous waste to the environment, to make determinations on two containers of waste, to insure the integrity of a secondary containment structure, to properly manage a container of received waste; and improper emissions control of hazardous waste tanks on the part of the facility also surfaced as a result of EPA inspections.
Under terms of an administrative consent agreement filed in Kansas City, Clean Harbors has agreed to submit to EPA written plans for minimizing the possibility of release of hazardous wastes from a building within the facility, and for addressing cracks and gaps in secondary containment for tank and container storage.
The company will also submit quarterly reports to EPA detailing inspections of its hazardous waste container storage areas and secondary containment, and will document steps taken to correct any issues of concern. The company has already installed an emissions control device on its hazardous waste tanks, at an estimated cost of $152,000.
