§ 761.120 Scope.

(a) General. This policy establishes criteria EPA will use to determine the adequacy of the cleanup of spills resulting from the release of materials containing PCBs at concentrations of 50 ppm or greater. The policy applies to spills which occur after May 4, 1987.

(1) Existing spills (spills which occurred prior to May 4, 1987, are excluded from the scope of this policy for two reasons:

(i) For old spills which have already been discovered, this policy is not intended to require additional cleanup where a party has already cleaned a spill in accordance with requirements imposed by EPA through its regional offices, nor is this policy intended to interfere with ongoing litigation of enforcement actions which bring into issue PCB spills cleanup.

(ii) EPA recognizes that old spills which are discovered after the effective date of this policy will require site-by-site evaluation because of the likelihood that the site involves more pervasive PCB contamination than fresh spills and because old spills are generally more difficult to clean up than fresh spills (particularly on porous surfaces such as concrete). Therefore, spills which occurred before the effective date of this policy are to be decontaminated to requirements established at the discretion of EPA, usually through its regional offices.

(2) EPA expects most PCB spills subject to the TSCA PCB regulations to conform to the typical spill situations considered in developing this policy. This policy does, however, exclude from application of the final numerical cleanup standards certain spill situations from its scope: Spills directly into surface waters, drinking water, sewers, grazing lands, and vegetable gardens. These types of spills are subject to final cleanup standards to be established at the discretion of the regional office. These spills are, however, subject to the immediate notification requirements and measures to minimize further environmental contamination.

(3) For all other spills, EPA generally expects the decontamination standards of this policy to apply. Occasionally, some small percentage of spills covered by this policy may warrant more stringent cleanup requirements because of additional routes of exposure or significantly greater exposures than those assumed in developing the final cleanup standards of this policy. While the EPA regional offices have the authority to require additional cleanup in these circumstances, the Regional Administrator must first make a finding based on the specific facts of a spill that additional cleanup must occur to prevent unreasonable risk. In addition, before a final decision is made to require additional cleanup, the Regional Administrator must notify the Director, Office of Resource Conservation and Recovery of his/her finding and the basis for the finding.