In this month's issue of Restoration & Remediation Magazine, Mr. John Banta wrote an excellant article regarding the
Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Lead Paint regulation - Renovation, Remodeling, & Painting Rule. The article covers the history of the rule and discusses enforcement issues.
As the article discusses the roll-out period for firms to become certified by filing their paperwork and paying their fees to the EPA, as well as for the Certified
Renovators supervising these jobs to be trained, was extended to the end of 2010, but the effective date for using lead safe work practices remained April 22, 2010. As Mr. Banta indicates in his article "this means...that any firm performing work for hire in target housing or child-occupied facilities built prior to 1978 is required to follow the regulations, even if their paperwork hasn’t been processed or even filed." However, this grace period is over.
The EPA may audit the records of any firm in violation of the regulation for up to three years after the job is complete and be fined up to $37,500 per occurrence per day. If the violation of the law is willful, the fine can be doubled and jail time may be assigned by the courts. This law applies in all federal jurisdictions; except states, tribes, and territories that EPA has approved to administer their own RRP programs. According to the article those states are, Wisconsin, Iowa, North Carolina, Mississippi, Kansas, Rhode Island, Utah, Oregon, Massachusetts, and Alabama have had their programs approved in lieu of the
Federal program. Approved State programs must be at least as strict as the EPA regulations.
Don't forget tomorrow is the EPA Information Session at Hofstra and if you have any questions please post them here or at Future Environment Designs Forum, and I will try to get an answer to your questions.
Image via WikipediaLate last week we received a FAQ from New York State Department of Health. The FAQ is focused on analyzing asbestos samples and the environmental laboratory accreditation program. The FAQ has several interesting piece of information. Those of you who attend my classes, have heard me discuss the problems with analyzing vermiculite and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) statement that asbestos inspectors should not sample the material but should assume the material is asbestos. Well Question 10 in this document states "Since there is currently no approved analytical methodology to reliably confirm vermiculite as non-asbestos containing it is best to assume vermiculite is contaminated with asbestos and proceed accordingly." We will add this document to all our course manuals, and/or you can access the document at: http://futureenvironmentdesigns.com/Media/NYS%20Asbestos%20FAQ%20%20April%208-2011%20(2).pdf.
