ILLINOIS POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD
February 17,
1994
MARATHON OIL COMPANY,
)
)
Petitioner,
)
V.
)
PCB 94—69
)
(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)), Marathon Oil Company has requested
that the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (Agency)
recommend that the Board grant
a provisional variance to allow
several of Marathon Oil Company’s gasoline dispensing operations
(service stations) to continue operating even though they 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 Marathon
Oil Company a forty—five
(45)—day provisional variance for seven
(7)
of its facilities located in four
(4) counties 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 January 30,
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 forty-five
(45)-day provisional variance that
expired January 29,
1994.
The docket number of the previous
provisional variance was PCB 94—5, granted on January
6,
1994.
That prior provisional variance was itself an extension of the
forty—five
(45)—day provisional variance granted on October 27,
1993 in PCB 93—200.’
Section 36(c)
of the Act imposes limitations on the
Board’s ability to extend a provisional variance:
Any provisional variance granted by the Board pursuant
to subsection
(b) of Section 35 shall be for a period
of time not to exceed 45 days.
Upon receipt of a
recommendation from the Agency to extend this time
2
The Agency’s provisional variance recommendation states that
Marathon Oil Company 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
4
Kane
1
McHenry
1
Will
1
The addresses of those stations are listed as follows:
CountY
City or Village
Street Address
Cook
Des Plaines
10 W. Golf Road
Cook
Rolling Meadows
4200 Kirchoff Road
Cook
Northbrook
1795 Schermer Road
Cook
Hanover Park
1260 Lake Street
Kane
Aurora
1795 N. Farnsworth
McHenry
McHenry
4608 W. Crystal Lake Road
Will
Joliet
Glenwood
& Republic
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 Marathon Oil Company facilities is not
possible by the November 1,
1993 deadline for compliance because
Tokheim is in the last stages of
CARB
approval for vacuum assist
vapor recovery equipment for its gasoline dispensers,
and that
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
period, the Board shall grant up to an additional 45
days.
The provisional variances granted to any one
person shall not exceed a total of 90 days during any
calendar year.
Since the variance granted in PCB 94-5 expired January 29,
1994,
and fewer than ninety
(90) days elapsed in this calendar year,
the Board interprets Section 36(c)
as allowing Marathon Oil
Company the Agency-recommended forty-five (45)-day extension.
3
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
January 30,
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
IT IS SO ORDERED.
I, Dorothy M. Gunn,
Clerk of the Illinois Pollution Control
Boar
do hereby certi
that the above order was adopted on the
______
day of
‘-Li
,
1994,
by a vote of
~
-~
.
~
///
Dorothy M. c~hn,Clerk
Illinois PoUution Control Board