California Water News Daily Your Source For Water News in California
According to the State Water Resources Control Board, LAWA was in violation of a number of ordinances:· Violated leak prevention requirements for hazardous substances in underground storage tanks at the three airports.
· Failed to monitor tanks and product piping.
· Late testing of monitoring equipment.
· Failed to install secondary containment measures.
The Water Board’s main concern arises from the discovery of three unpermitted and unmonitored underground storage tanks. The tanks were located on grounds near a burn site used to simulate airplane crashes and fires. To simulate the destruction, aviation fuel was dispersed on an airplane fuselage. Due to the lack of containment, it is possible that hazardous runoff was produced.
“What made this case so concerning is that, during our investigation, State Water Board investigators unexpectedly found three large unpermitted and unmonitored tanks that were used to store hazardous runoff produced from the fire training exercises,” David Boyers, State Water Board assistant chief counsel, said in a statement. “Both LAWA and the local agency responsible for permitting the tanks, in this case the Los Angeles City Fire Department, should have known the tanks were storing hazardous substances that posed a risk to the environment and should have been permitted. We required that LAWA test the soil beneath the tanks in order to ensure that no releases had occurred. Thankfully, there was no containment that resulted from the violations.”
LAWA will pay the following:
· $1.2 million in civil penalties to the State Water Board.
· $100,000 for reimbursement of enforcement costs.
· 1.1 million will be suspended with $650,000 being suspended based on LAWA completing several environmental improvements.
· $450,000 suspended as long as LAWA maintains compliance with the underground storage tank requirements for five years.
