ILLINOIS

POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

April

27,

1982

IN THE MATTER OF:

R81—22

t?ROPOSED REGULATIONS FOR RCRA

ORDER OF THE BOARD

(by

D. Anderson):

On April

14,

1982 five

steel

companies

(Granite City Steel

Division of National Steel Corporation,

Interlake,

Inc., North-

western Steel

and Wire Company, Republic Steel Corporation and

United States Steel Corporation)

filed an emergency motion for

stay of the rules adopted February

4,

1982.

The Board considered

this

motion on April

15,

at which time it granted an Illinois

Environmental Protection Agency (Agency) motion to withhold ruling

and

scheduled a special meeting.

On April

15,

1982,

the steel companies moved to amend their

motion instanter,

which motion is hereby granted.

On April

26,

1982 the Agency filed its Objection to the motion,

and on April 27

the steel companies

filed a response to the objection.

SB 875,

P.A.

82—380,

codified as Section 22.4(a) of the Act

states that:

“The Board shall

adopt within 180 days regulations which

are identica

in substance to federal regulations or

amendments thereto promulgated by the Administrator of

the United States Environmental Protection Agency to

implement Sections 3001,

3002,

3003,

3004,

and 3005,

of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976

(P.L.

94-580),

as amended.

The provisions and

requirements of Title VII of this Act shall not apply

to rules adopted under

this subsection.

Section

5 of

the Illinois Administrative Procedure Act relating to

procedures

for rulemaking shall

not apply to rules

adopted under

this section.”

This legislative enactment reflects a legislative determination

that speedy adoption of the proposed RCRA regulations

is

in the

public interest, and specified that their adoption should not be

subject to the usual,

lengthy rulemaking procedures of the Act or

the

APA.

(It

is to be noted that existing Chapters

7 and

9 were

not repealed by SB 875.)

The

Board on its own initiative opened this proceeding to

public comment, and has timely enacted regulations which in its

opinion are “identical in substance” to the federal regulations.

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2

The Board accordingly believes that since it has done no more

or less than to fulfill its legislative mandate, that petitioner is

unlikely to succeed in its appeal.

The legislature has determined

that enactment of the RCRA regulations

is in the public interest,

and the Board

finds that issuance of a stay would improperly over~-

ride this determination, as well as perpetuating undesireable

regulatory uncertainty for persons subject to the rule.

The steel companies have not persuasively argued that they

would suffer irreparable

injury, having presented vague and

unsupported allegations,

More importantly, procedural avenues

for relief from real problems exist short of imposition of a stay.

Procedural Rule 411 provides for an automatic stay of a rule if a

variance petition is filed with the Board within 20 days after the

effective date.

This is

the proper

route for handling transitional

problems which arise with adoption of new regulations.

Accordingly, the motion for stay is denied.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

I, Christan

L. Moffett,

Clerk of the Illinois Pollution

Control Board, hereby certify that the above Order was adopted on

the

~j’

day of

________-,

1982 by a vote ~

Christan L, Moff~9 Clerk

—

Illinois Pollutiotr~ ontrol Board

46—166