ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
January 11, 1995
GO-TANE,
)
Petitioner,
)
v.
)
PCB 95—25
)
(Provisional Variance)
ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL
)
PROTECTION AGENCY,
)
)
Respondent.
ORDER OF THE BOARD (by C. A. Manning):
Pursuant to Section 35(b) of the Environmental Protection
Act (Act) (415 ILCS 5/35(b)), Go-tane has requested that the
Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Agency) recommend that
the Board grant a provisional variance to allow several of Go—
tane’s gasoline dispensing operations to continue operating even
though they did not install operational vapor recovery equipment
by November 1, 1994. Such request for a provisional variance and
the Notification of Recommendation was filed with the Board by
the Agency on Tuesday, January 10, 1995. 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 Go-tane a
forty-five (45)-day provisional variance for three of its
facilities located in two (2) counties in the Chicago
metropolitan statistical area from the Stage II vapor recovery
requirements, as set forth in 35 Ill. Adm. Code 218.586, for the
period beginning December 16, 1994, and continuing for forty-five
(45)—days or until the required vapor recovery equipment is
installed, whichever comes first.
This recommendation is essentially that the Board extend a
previously—granted provisional variance that expired December 15,
1994. The docket number of the previous provisional variance was
PCB 94-348, granted on December 1, 1994.
The Agency’s provisional variance recommendation states that
Go—tane has requested a provisional variance on behalf of
numerous of its service stations in the Chicago area, located as
follows:
County
Number of Stations
Cook
2
Will
1
The addresses of those stations are listed as follows:
2
County
City or Village Street Address
Cook
Bellwood
600 Eastern Ave.
Cook
Chicago
2001 North Harlem
Will
Plainfield
306 Joliet Road
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. The
Agency recommendation states that installation of Stage II vapor
recovery equipment at the Go—tane facilities was not possible by
the November 1, 1994 deadline for compliance because Go—tane has
contracted for the purchase and installation of vacuum assist
vapor recovery equipment, but that the equipment was not
available before the compliance deadline.
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 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
December 16, 1994 and it shall expire on the date the
petitioner completes the required installation of vacuum
assist Stage II vapor recovery equipment, or after forty—
five (45)—days have elapsed, whichever comes first;
2. The petitioner shall notify the Agency of the
installation of the vapor recovery equipment, 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
3
IT IS SO ORDERED.
I, Dorothy M. Gunn, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control
Board~dohereby certi that the above order was adopted on the
//~—
day of __________________________, 1995, by a vote of
_______
7’
~
~
Dorothy N. 5~1nn, Clerk
Illinois Póflution Control Board