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1999 SESSION

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HB 1748 Solid waste management

Introduced by: R. Creigh Deeds | all patrons    ...    notes | add to my profiles

SUMMARY AS PASSED: (all summaries)

Solid waste. Makes numerous changes to Virginia’s laws regulating solid waste. The bill expands the required review and determinations that must be made by the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) when it considers permit applications related to solid waste management facilities and the siting of new landfills, including prohibiting new landfills in seven types of environmentally or geologically sensitive areas. The Virginia Solid Waste Environmental Stewardship Fund is created and will be funded through a tonage based assessment. The assessment has a $1 per ton base which may increase up to $2 per ton based on daily volume of municipal solid waste disposed of in a landfill. The Fund may be used for grants to local governments and certain types of political subdivisions for proper closure of landfills without proper liner and leachate control systems, whether owned by the local government or political subdivisions or abandoned in their jurisdiction. Localities and public service authorities may opt out of having their wastes included in the assessment if they dedicate an equivalent amount to the same purposes as the Fund or for recycling efforts. The bill also requires the development of regulations governing truck transport of municipal solid waste; provides for the incorporation into permits of guarantees for municipal solid waste disposal capacity for Virginia localities, in accordance with solid waste management plans; requires agreements between host localities and applicants for new or expanded landfill operations; requires certification by waste transporters that waste is suitable for disposal at a facility before the facility may accept it; requires DEQ to extend post-closure monitoring and maintenance and financial assurance requirements when necessary to protect human health and the environment; and imposes a one-year moratorium on permit issuance for new landfills except for those permits for which a notice of intent was filed before January 1, 1999. DEQ is also directed to conduct a comprehensive study of waste management practices and needs. The bill contains technical amendments. This bill is identical to SB 865.

This bill is also identical to HB 2557 and SB 1309 except with regard to the Solid Waste Environmental Stewardship Fund. The purpose for which the funds may be used are identical in all four bills except that HB 1748 and SB 865 also allow use of the Fund for Fund-related administrative costs and for solid waste inspection, monitoring and enforcement programs of DEQ (Item 424 #2c of the budget allocates $650,000 and 10 positions, contingent on creation of the HB 1748 and SB 865 Fund, for these later purposes.). Other differences lie in the fund name and the creation of a tonnage based assessment to capitalize the Fund in HB 1748 and SB 865. In addition, SB 1309 and HB 2557, in subsection C of § 10.1-1413.2, grant the DEQ Director access to the Fund for up to $100,000 per "occurrence" without the Governor's approval. HB 1748 and SB 865 use the term "grant" instead of "occurrence" to parallel the terminology used in the section.


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