ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
January
8,
1976
REPUBLIC STEEL CORPORATION,
)
)
Petitioner,
v.
)
PCB 74—481
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY,
)
Respondent.
CONCURRING OPINION
(by Mr.
Duinelle):
One of my reasons for concurring in this action is that the
time of compliance is already past.
Under the Settlement in the
Circuit Court cases cited
(p.
2 of Opinion)
compliance was to be
achieved by December 31,
1975.
All this action does now is to
protect Republic Steel from retrospective Agency prosecution.
The
company should have been in compliance on December 31,
1973.
The record is not adequate on the question of cyanide
discharges and their effects upon Lake Michigan as far as the
Chicago drinking water intakes or beaches are concerned.
Dis-
charges
as high as 0.8 mg/i of cyanide have occurred
(Petition,
p.
5) which is
400
times the drinking water standard of 0.2 mg/i.
But these values are based upon “weekly 24—hour composite samples”
(Petition,
p.
5) and thus shorter period “slug” discharges could
have been much higher in strength.
The
Calumet
River
at times drains to Lake Michigan.
If
no dilution water
is being drawn through the O’Brien Locks,
the inflow to the River of effluents such as Republic’s must
necessarily result in a lakeward flow.
Or precipitation
might cause storm flows from nearby drained areas to contribute
to flow reversals of the Calumet River perhaps even with simultaneous
O’Brien Locks water demand.
A recent study,
“Water Pollution Investigation:
Calumet Area
of
Lake
Michigan”,
October
1974,
was
done
by
Dr.
Richard
H.
Snow of the lIT Research Institute under U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency funding.
The~following statement appears in
the report.
19
—
552 A
—2—
The Caluinet River is also polluted, but its
flow is reversed so that it does not normally
drain to Lake Michigan.
Flow in the Calumet
River is controlled by the O’Brien Lock and
is directed to the Cal-Sag Channel except
during periods of heavy flooding or very low
lake levels.
Outward flow can also occur if
effluent from Lever Bros.
through Wolf Lake
exceeds the flow through O’Brien Locks.
Just
at the mouth of the Caluinet River the flow is
usually outward, because U.S. Steel Company
discharges water from the Lake into the south
slip just inside the River mouth (Technical
Committee 1970).
(p.6).
(emphasis added)
Thus, the record
in this case is not adequate to determine
if Chicago drinking water cyanide levels were excessive because of
Republic.
It would have been a simple matter to include Chicago
water system data
in this record but it was not done.
And no
data are presented on cyanide levels at the beaches near the mouth
of the Calumet River.
The reasons for the 2—year delay in Republic’s compliance,
from December 31,
1973 to the present December
31, 1975,
are not
clear.
And the various Circuit Court cases are not binding upon
this Board since
it was not a party.
All things considered
I concur in this decision reluctantly
and only to prevent a grant of the variance by operation of law.
Submitted by
I, Christan L. Moffett, Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control
Board, hereby certify the above Concurring Opinion was submitted on
the
jg4~
day of April,
1976.
Illinois Pollution
i Board
19
—
552
B