STATEMENT OF DON R. CLAY, ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR, OFFICE OF SOLID WASTE AND EMERGENCY RESPONSE, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, With your permission, I will put the full statement in the record and briefly summarize. With me today is Sylvia Lowrance, who is the Director of the Office of Solid Waste, on my right here. Again, thank you for the opportunity. What I wanted to do today is briefly cover two topics, first in the reauthorization for RCRA, some of the principles that we generally apply, and then a few general comments on your bill. I believe that a reauthorized RCRA should include a waste management system that has a series of principles. These include-and you've heard them all from me before, I think—a hierarchy of handling waste, of source reduction, recycling, and then waste treatment disposal. I believe that we ought to be sure that we tailor new standards to the magnitude of risk posed by the waste, something that Dr. Ritter continually brings up. We should consider costs as well as the degree of human health and environmental risk mitigation. Clearly, we like to foster a market-based approach, where we can, to encourage sound management of solid waste, and we want to make sure, particularly in the solid waste area, that we strengthen the Federal, State and local partnerships because it's not an exclusive Federal role. And finally, I'm always cautious of having EPA get into areas where they do not have environmental protection as the key. These principles, in general, have guided our review of H.R. 3865 and result in the identification of many of the issues which are covered in my detailed testimony. On the other hand, I do think we share mutual goals of fostering resource conservation recovery and ensuring protection of human health and the environment, so we only sometimes differ on how we get there. We clearly need to be sure that the Federal laws are a help and not a hindrance, and that clearly invalidating current successful approaches with inflexible Federal laws may not serve that goal. We got to be aware that much is being accomplished now. A lot of changes, in fact, are occurring with the system we have, and we should be very cautious about changing that, particularly to a command-and-control Federal approach. I think, in general, it might be better to wait until it is shown that today's progress isn't serving our goals, and I believe the indicators are otherwise. With respect to municipal solid waste, EPA is leveraging its resources to help encourage economically efficient solid waste markets. The type of role that we see for EPA includes leadership, technology transfer, and consumer education. We believe in true cost accounting, where EPA will help, in fact, people make better decisions, and we are supporting this by such things as our decisionmaker's guides and other educational materials. We have also promoted the use of variable rate pricing for municipal solid waste, as well as being a leader in some of the Federal procurement, where we have five Federal procurement standards out, which are sometimes now being adopted by the industrial sector. 57-148 O 92. 7 In labeling, we are working with the Federal Trade Commission to eliminate fraudulent claims that distort the market for environmentally responsible products, again, a part of our education to the consumer in this area. The kind of progress we have received for municipal solid waste includes that we have 125 recycling laws passed in 38 States in 1989 alone, and something like 27 curbside collection programs now operating in 1990, which has doubled from the previous 2 years. We believe the national recycling rate will be in the range of 20 to 28 percent by 1995. Others have reported that capital expenditures for recycling equipment is up maybe 250 percent in the period 1987 to 1989, and we have something like over 1,400 local composting programs. The kind of concerns we see for general RCRA reauthorization seem to be moving away from letting the market work in what the States are doing and what individuals are doing to the command and control fixes to them. The kind of examples we have are the mandatory recycling content standards. We prefer to harness the marketplace to create a demand for recycled products, and I think labeling, for example, will make that easier. For industrial wastes, there are a number of issues we need to answer regarding the risks posed by these wastes today. A lot of this waste is going to sea facilities anyway because of the liability concerns. Many States have programs underway and there is a lot of information there that we need to understand before we delve deeply into that. Finally, in brief summary, we agree with your goals of pollution prevention and safe waste management as expressed in the bill. We are concerned sometimes with the means we have of getting there. We will be happy to work with you and we appreciate your willingness to hear all sides of the issue. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. [Testimony resumes on p. 211.] STATEMENT OF DON R. CLAY ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR OFFICE OF SOLID WASTE AND EMERGENCY RESPONSE BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND HAZARDOUS MATERIALS OF THE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES March 10, 1992 Good morning Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee. I am Don R. Clay, Assistant Administrator for Solid Waste and Emergency Response. With me this morning is Sylvia K. Lowrance, Director of the Office of Solid Waste. I want to thank you for the opportunity to comment on H.R. 3865, your proposed legislation for reauthorizing the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA). The issues discussed in the draft proposed legislation are ones that are of critical importance to our nation's citizens, industry, and all levels of government. OVERVIEW The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act is far-reaching legislation, which is pivotal to EPA's overall goal of protecting human health and the environment. In the past decade, EPA and the nation as a whole, have achieved tremendous gains in improving waste management. The reauthorization debate is a unique chance to recognize our many successes and to learn from that experience to improve future waste management. The RCRA statute is designed to prevent environmental contamination by ensuring safe management of solid and hazardous Because of RCRA's broad jurisdiction, its present and waste. potential impact upon government (federal, state, and local) and upon the national economy is enormous. RCRA already embodies a vast regulatory program. Today's program avoids tomorrow's Superfund sites by assuring "cradle-to-grave" management of hazardous wastes. As we turn our attention to Subtitle D, the program addressing all other solid waste, we must recognize that the universe is potentially many times the size of the Subtitle C program, and far more diverse. Because of the potential scope of these programs, it is essential that we carefully define our national goals in addressing these issues. We must ensure that we target the most significant risks to human health and the environment and explore the full array of regulatory and non-regulatory options for addressing these problems. Moreover, we must recognize that in many cases we are not beginning this debate with a blank slate. States and localities have for years addressed many aspects of solid waste management. Their interests in this debate should be given great consideration. GUIDING PRINCIPLES FOR WASTE MANAGEMENT Against this backdrop I'd like to share with you six major principles which influence my vision of a comprehensive and workable waste management program for this country. These are principles that we are applying today as we implement the hazardous waste program and which I believe should shape this legislative debate. It is against these six principles that H.R. 3865 has been assessed. First, we need to target our scarce governmental and societal resources to the most serious environmental problems. RCRA addresses many low risk wastes, causing unnecessary regulatory burdens on segments of the American economy. At the same time, the more important environmental priorities do not receive the attention they merit. Given the widespread fiscal problems facing all levels of government today, setting sound priorities will concentrate strained resources to our greatest advantage. The Second, when seeking to reduce risks, we must employ the most efficient, cost-effective means to achieve our goals. best means of solving our nation's waste problems are not necessarily the most expensive, nor the most intrusive, and are not always located at the federal level. We should develop and fully explore creative solutions to waste problems market-based solutions. - especially Third, environmental protection, especially in the waste management area, is a partnership between the federal government and state and local governments. States and localities traditionally have the lead role in solid waste management and are actively implementing new and innovative programs without extensive federal government involvement, and I believe that this should continue to be the case. Most states are authorized to administer part of the RCRA hazardous waste program; by the very |