ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
October 20, 1994
AMOCO OIL COMPANY,
)
O’HARE
TERMINAL,
)
)
Petitioner,
)
V.
)
PCB 94—298
)
(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)), Amoco Oil Company (Amoco) has
requested that the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
(Agency) recommend that the Board grant a provisional variance to
allow Amoco to hydrostatically test a new aboveground storage
tank. Such request for a provisional variance and the
Notification of Recommendation was filed with the Board by the
Agency on Wednesday, October 19, 1994. Pursuant to Section 35(b)
of the Act, the Board must issue the variance within two (2) days
of this filing.
Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Environmental Protection
Act (Act) (415 ILCS 5/35(b)), the Illinois Environmental
Protection Agency (Agency), by and through its Director, Mary A.
Gade, seeks a provisional variance for Amoco in order to allow
Amoco to hydrostatically test a new aboveground storage tank.
Specifically, the Agency recommends that we grant Amoco a
forty-five (45)-day provisional variance for its Cook County
facility from the effluent requirements, as set forth in 35 Ill.
Adm. Code 304.141(b), for the period from when the petitioner
begins discharging the water used for the hydrostatical test, and
continuing until the petitioner completes the discharge
procedures, but not for longer than 45 days.
The Agency recommends that the Board grant the requested
provisional variance with specified conditions. The Agency
agrees that the repairs are necessary. The Agency anticipates
that the requested provisional variance would have minimal
environmental impact on the receiving stream. The Agency is
unaware of any public water supplies that the requested
provisional variance would adversely impact. The Agency
maintains that a grant of a provisional variance would violate no
federal laws. The Agency finds that a denial of the requested
provisional variance would create an arbitrary or unreasonable
hardship on the petitioner.
2
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.
~
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.
Having received the Agency recommendation finding 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 304.141(b), on the
following conditions:
1. The term of this provisional variance shall commence
when the petitioner, Amoco, begins discharging the water
used for the hydrostatical test, and continue until the
petitioner completes the discharge procedures, but not for
longer than 45 days, whichever comes first;
2. The petitioner shall notify Robert Sulski of the
Agency’s Maywood Regional office by telephone, at (708)531—
5900, when the water used to hydro test the new storage tank
begins to be discharged and again when the process is
complete. The petitioner shall confirm this notice in
writing within five (5) days, addressed as follows:
Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
Division of Water Pollution Control
Compliance Assurance Section
2200 Churchill Road
P.O. Box 19276
Springfield, Illinois 62794—9276
Attention: Mark T. Books
3. During the term of this provisional variance,
Petitioner shall be in compliance with its NPDES permit
limits (1L0034347).
The petitioner shall execute a copy of a Certificate of
Acceptance of this provisional variance and forward that copy to
the Agency addressed as is the written notice required in the
above condition; the petitioner shall forward that copy within
ten (10) days of the date of this order of the Board, and the
Certificate of Acceptance shall take the following form:
3
CERTIFICATION
I (We),
hereby accept and agree to be bound by all terms
and conditions of the order of the Pollution
Control Board in PCB 94-298, October 20, 1994.
Petitioner
Authorized Agent
Title
Date
IT IS SO ORDERED.
I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control
Board, do hereby certify ~j,hat,the above order was adopted on the
~‘~CZ~ day of ____________________________, 1994, by a vote of
~
Dorothy M.4~unn,
)?‘~
Clerk
/S~~~J
Illinois ~jlution Control Board