[Congressional Bills 105th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1711 Introduced in House (IH)]







105th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 1711

To establish a maximum level of remediation for dry cleaning solvents, 
                        and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                              May 22, 1997

Mr. Barton of Texas (for himself, Mr. Green, Mrs. Chenoweth, Mr. Frost, 
Mr. Crapo, Mr. Shadegg, Mr. Christensen, Mr. Radanovich, and Mr. Smith 
  of Texas) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
      Committee on Commerce, and in addition to the Committees on 
Transportation and Infrastructure, and Education and the Workforce, for 
a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for 
consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the 
                          committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To establish a maximum level of remediation for dry cleaning solvents, 
                        and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Small Business Remediation Act of 
1997''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND INTENT OF CONGRESS.

    (a) The Congress declares that the public should be protected from 
the risk of waste or spilled solvents and other chemicals in the soil, 
surface water, groundwater, and other environmental media.
    (b) The Congress finds that the remediation requirements for 
spilled or waste chemical substances are often inconsistent, 
conflicting, and may impose a burden that bears little relationship to 
the potential harm to the environment and that these requirements pose 
a special burden on small businesses and landowners.
    (c) Congress intends that standards shall be set for remediation 
that, with an adequate margin of safety, will protect public health 
from significant risk from these chemicals and below which level 
remediation will be permitted but not required.
    (d) Congress resolves that to implement these conclusions a maximum 
level of remediation in soil, surface water, groundwater, and other 
environmental media shall be set, initially, for solvents for the dry 
cleaning industry.

SEC. 3. STANDARD FOR CLEAN-UP.

    The maximum level of remediation of dry cleaning solvents in soil, 
surface water, groundwater, and other environmental media that a 
Federal, State, local agency, or court may require of a person engaged 
in dry cleaning or the owner of land or a facility in which such a 
person is conducting dry cleaning shall be one-tenth the equivalent 
exposure of the workplace standard for such solvents established by the 
Secretary of Labor under the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 
1970.

SEC. 4. CALCULATION OF EQUIVALENT EXPOSURE.

    (a) In consultation with the Administrators of the Occupational 
Safety and Health Administration and the Environmental Protection 
Agency, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences shall, 
within 6 months of the date of the enactment of this Act, publish in 
the Federal Register its computation, based on realistic scientific 
assumptions, of equivalent exposure by ingestion, inhalation, and 
absorption indices for the general public, for soil, surface water, 
groundwater, and other environmental media in nonoccupational 
circumstances.
    (b) The equivalent exposure shall be calculated from the workplace 
standard for dry cleaning solvents which assures on the basis of the 
best available evidence that no employee will suffer material 
impairment of health or functional capacity even if such employee has 
regular exposure for the employee's entire working lifetime.

SEC. 5. AUTHORIZATION TO REMEDIATE AT A LOWER LEVEL THAN THE MAXIMUM 
              LEVEL OF REMEDIATION.

    Nothing in this Act--
            (1) shall preempt or otherwise prevent a Federal, State, or 
        local government or private party from remediating soil, 
        surface water, groundwater, or other environmental media to a 
        lower level than the maximum level of remeditation at its own 
        cost and expense, or
            (2) shall alter or affect the Federal drinking water 
        standards under title XIV of the Public Health Service Act.

SEC. 6. DEFINITIONS.

    For purposes of this Act:
            (1) The term ``other environmental media'' means air and 
        organic and inorganic material.
            (2) The term ``equivalent exposure'' means the amount of a 
        chemical substance found in air, surface water, groundwater, 
        and other environmental media which is equivalent, under 
        general and realistic conditions of human exposure, absorption, 
        and toxicity, to that of the workplace standard for that 
        substance.
            (3) The term ``maximum level of remeditation'' means one-
        tenth the equivalent exposure and is deemed fully protective of 
        human health.
            (4) The term ``workplace standard for dry cleaning 
        solvents'' means the standard established by the Secretary of 
        Labor under section 6(b)(5) of the Occupational Safety and 
        Health Act of 1970 as the time-weighted average and set forth 
        in section 1810.1000 Z-2 of title 29 of the Code of Federal 
        Regulations.
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