ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
    February 17, 1994
    SMITH OIL COMPANY,
    Petitioner,
    v.
    PCB 94—62
    )
    (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)), Smith Oil Company has requested
    that the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Agency)
    recommend that the Board grant a provisional variance to allow
    Smith Oil Company’s gasoline dispensing operations (service
    station) to continue operating even though it did not install
    operational vapor recovery equipment by November 1, 1993. Such
    request for a provisional variance and the Notification of
    Recommendation was filed with the Board by the Agency on Tuesday,
    February 15, 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 Smith Oil
    Company a forty-five (45)-day provisional variance for its
    facilities located in Will County 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 February 6, 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 February 4,
    1994. The docket nuiaber of the previous provisional variance was
    PCB 94-30, granted on January 20, 1993.
    The Agency’s provisional variance recommendation states that
    Smith Oil Company has requested a provisional variance on behalf
    of its service station in the Chicago area, located as follows:
    County
    City or Village Street Address
    Will
    Wilmington
    705 West Baltimore Street
    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
    2
    Agency recommendation states that installation of Stage II vapor
    recovery equipment at the Smith Oil Company facilities is not
    possible by the November 1, 1993 deadline for compliance because
    frost and ground conditions and adverse weather has prevented it
    from installing vapor recovery equipment for its gasoline
    dispensers 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
    February 6, 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, do hereby certif hat the above order was adopted on the
    /7’~’
    day of
    _.
    ,
    1994, by a vote of
    _____.
    L-’~orothyM. 9~nn,
    A.
    Clerk
    L~
    Illinois P~1LutionControl Board

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