Score One for the Drycleaners in BAAQMD……at least for a little while.
Score One for the Drycleaners in BAAQMD……at least for a little while.
By Marti Russell, REA, Western Sales Manager
EnviroForensics, Inc.
A Steering Committee Meeting was held on Friday, March 5, 2010 in San Francisco. As if the economy isn’t bad enough for small businesses and depending on the outcome of this meeting, the cleaners in the Bay Area Air Quality Management District in Northern California may have another hurdle in trying to stay open and meet the mandated regulations bestowed upon them.
The BAAQMD staff was directed by the Board of Supervisors last year to come up with a plan to shorten the time frame on phasing out perc in their District. All perc cleaners in the BAAQMD know the District wants to accelerate the banning of perc faster than the California Air Recourses Board mandated timeframe of 2023.Good Housekeeping Includes Good Record Keeping
Written by Steve Henshaw, President and CEO of EnviroForensics and PolicyFindLau
As seen in the December 2009 issue of Western Cleaner & Laundererndere
You can tell a lot about a drycleaner’s operation by the way that he conducts housekeeping. That is to say that if a drycleaner keeps a clean store, he probably handles chemicals in a manner that minimizes environmental releases. However, good housekeeping alone may not keep you out of hot water with the regulatory agencies.
There are some simple, effective and inexpensive ways to protect your business and your assets from liability by keeping good records. If you’ve ever watched one of the procedural crime dramas, the plot usually turns around “the evidence.” Creating, organizing and maintaining records can be the evidence that keeps you out of trouble. Hazardous waste manifests, perc purchase/disposal records, transporter license numbers and treatment facility identification numbers are all examples of things you should (or, in some cases, must) keep records of. However, those records aren’t just in case of a major problem. They can help you identify a minor problem before it gets serious.It’s a Good Idea to be Proactive!
Steve Henshaw Collaboration with Justin Gifford.
Opening up Google, a newspaper, turning on the radio or catching the evening news is sure to expose you to the national debate over health care and insurance. Through that exposure, most of us have gained at least a passing familiarity with the issue of “pre-existing conditions.” Insurers either refuse outright to cover a person with a pre-existing condition or exclude that condition from the coverage, leaving the insured to pay for it out of his pocket. Environmental liabilities and using historical insurance to offset those liabilities are not the focus of a lively national debate, yet the costs incurred by drycleaners each year due to a similar problem are staggering.
We receive calls on a regular basis from drycleaners or property owners already engaged in defining the size of a spill or actively remediating it at the “request” of regulatory agencies asking for our help locating historical insurance to pay for the investigation and cleanup. Often times, we are able to locate that insurance to fund the clean up…but just as often, the twenty, thirty or hundred and fifty thousand dollars already spent by our client cannot be recovered from the insurer even though the spending was necessary to comply with the regulator’s orders.
News for Drycleaners Concerning BAAQMD
As it stands now, Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD) in Northern California may be changing their regulations…again. AND, things do not look so good for dry cleaners in that District.
BAAQMD staff will go in front of the Stationary Steering Committee on Monday, November 16, 2009 to discuss the social economic impact the current State’s Air Toxic Control Measure (ATCM) regulation is having on the Dry Cleaning Industry. Everyone should be aware by now, that it is extremely tough out there for businesses to survive. Some businesses are down by 30%, banks are not lending money for equipment upgrades and credit scores need to be over 680 to qualify for loans or leases.
However, more important than the Steering Committee meeting, is the one that will be held on December 16, 2009. BAAQMD staffers go in front of their boss, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors (BOS), to address the directive that the Board gave them last year. This meeting will be open for public comments.The Geochemistry of Chinese Dry Wall
Written By Konrad Banaszak, Chief Scientist at EnviroForensics
In what might seem to be a tenuous connection, the recent troubles with “Chinese Dry Wall” are actually geochemical. From the basic production of dry wall itself, to the deleterious reactions noted in the press, geochemical reactions are the essence of good and “bad” dry wall.
Simplifying dry wall manufacture, the basics are somewhat familiar to all whoever made a “plaster of Paris” mold while a grade schooler. The manufacture of plaster of Paris or the rock in sheetrock begins with the mineral gypsum which is mined from the earth. Gypsum occurs in beds in sedimentary rock layers that form the geological column and is the result of the evaporation of sea water. Some modern dry wall uses gypsum produced by scrubbers at power plants, but most is still made from mined gypsum.
Gypsum is a crystalline substance made up of one unit of calcium sulfate and two units of water. It may be hard to believe, but a “rock” does contain that much water. Gypsum is ground into a powder and then three quarters of the water is driven off by simple heating. The resulting fine white powder is plaster of Paris. As grade schoolers know, merely adding the correct amount of water back to the white powder yields a slurry that can be molded. The correct amount of water is that which restores the gypsum. Letting the mold dry out will yield a fine white solid knick knack.
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