ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

October 20, 1994

RUNNFELDT & BELMONT,

Petitioner,

v.

)

PCB 94—293

)

(Provisional Variance)

ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL

)

PROTECTION AGENCY,

)

Respondent.

ORDER OF THE BOARD (by M. McFawn):

Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Environmental Protection Act

(Act) (415 ILCS 5/35(b)), Runnfeldt & Belmont has requested that

the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Agency) recommend

that the Board grant a provisional variance to allow Runnfeldt &

Belmont’s gasoline dispensing operation (service station) to

continue operating even though they will not install operational

vapor recovery equipment by November 1, 1994. This provisional

variance is being requested because the property is being sold for

uses other than gasoline dispensing. Such request for a

provisional variance and the Notification of Recommendation was

filed with the Board by the Agency on Tuesday, October 18, 1994.

Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Act, the Board must issue the

variance within two (2) days of this filing.

Specifically, the Agency recommends that we grant Runnfeldt &

Belmont a forty-five (45)-day provisional variance for its facility

located at 475 Chestnut Street, Winnetka, Cook County, Illinois in

the Chicago metropolitan statistical area from the Stage II vapor

recovery requirements, as set forth in 35 Ill. Adin. Code 218.586,

for the period beginning November 1, 1994, and continuing for

forty-five (45)-days or until the sale of the property is final,

whichever comes first.

Upon receipt of the request, the Agency issued its

recommendation, notifying the Board that the failure to grant the

requested forty—five (45)—day provisional variance would impose an

arbitrary or unreasonable hardship on the petitioner.

Provisional variances are by their very nature temporary. The

responsibilities of the Agency and the Board in these short-term

provisional variances are different from the responsibilities in

standard variances. (See 415 ILCS 5/35(b) & 36(c)). In

provisional variances it is the responsibility of the Agency to

make the technical determinations and finding of arbitrary or

unreasonable hardship. The Board’s responsibility is to adopt a

formal order, to assure the formal maintenance of the record, to

assure the enforceability of the variance, and to provide

notification of the action by a press release.

---

2

Having received the Agency recommendation notifying the Board

that a denial of the requested relief would impose an arbitrary or

unreasonable hardship, the Board hereby grants the petitioner a

provisional variance from 35 Ill. Adm. Code 218.586, subject to the

following conditions:

1. The term of this provisional variance shall commence on

November 1, 1994, and continue for forty—five (45)—days or

until the sale of the property is final, whichever comes

first.

2. The petitioner shall notify the Agency of the sale of the

property, by sending notification addressed as follows:

Mr. Terry Sweitzer, P.E.

Manager, Air Monitoring Section

Illinois Environmental Protection Agency

Division of Air Pollution Control

P.O. Box 19276

Springfield, Illinois 62794—9276

IT IS SO ORDERED.

I, Dorothy N. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control

Board, do hereby certify th~tthe above order was adopted on the

~

day of

_____________________________, 1994, by a vote of

________.

//

‘T~’

Dorothy

~

M./”Gunn,

)~

Clerk

Illinois ‘P~llution Control Board