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Chemical spill
hearing told new
agency would
be costly
Putting tanks regulation in
By Lori Tighe
Health Department hands
requires new law
Star-BulletinState agencies acknowledged passing the buck -- primarily because of the cost -- on who should inspect chemical tanks to prevent spills such as the one on Thanksgiving Day at Campbell Industrial Park.
But legislators want the "buck' to stop with the Brewer Environmental Industries' spill that dumped 35 tons of sulfuric acid.
Senators Colleen Hanabusa and Brian Kanno led a special session last night at Kapolei Middle School to reexamine the Brewer spill and to investigate what needs to be done to protect neighboring communities from a chemical disaster.
"Everybody wants to pass the buck, and we have to show up to make sure it doesn't get blamed on us," said Gideon Awa, the Honolulu Fire Department's captain of fire prevention and acting administrator for the state Fire Council. "Yes, they like us, but they can hate us at the same time."
The Fire Department and the Health Department, both under public scrutiny, told legislators it would require a change of law and several million dollars to regulate chemical tank inspections.
The permitting of chemical tanks used to be in the state fire code, but the counties chose not to adopt it because of cost, Awa said. The city is reconsidering regulating future chemical tanks, he said.
"It takes an incident like this for everyone to sit up and take notice," Awa said. "Lay people have to understand it costs money."
Residents say public agencies haven't done enough to protect them from chemical accidents.
"One spill could kill me," said Maeda Timson, a Makakilo resident and chairwoman of the Makakilo/Kapolei/Hanokai Hale Neighborhood Board.
"We have a community trying to take care of itself, when these agencies should be accountable to the people they're serving,"Timson said.
"I don't want to glow in the dark."
The cleanup at Brewer still continues in emergency response phase and will cost the company several hundreds of thousands of dollars, said Gary Gill, state deputy director for environmental health.
"We have a long way to go with Brewer. The cleanup is not complete," he said.
No state program exists to inspect chemical tanks, he said. The Health Department only has authority to respond to a spill.
"If the Legislature wanted us to inspect and regulate tanks, a new law would be required," Gill said. It would cost several million dollars to establish a new branch to conduct the inspections, he said.
As a compromise, the Health Department recommended tighter rules requiring more information from companies, such as when tanks were last inspected, whether employees were trained in emergency response, and do they have a spill-containment system.
While the Legislature ponders what to do, a third Honolulu Fire Department HAZMAT team is moving to Kapolei when the new truck arrives, Awa said. The team will have at least five people and will be able to respond quicker to spills at Campbell Industrial.
To prevent spills, Hanabusa said a law regulating chemical tanks may need to be passed.
"Since everyone is saying we don't have the authority to inspect chemical tanks, we have to give them the authority," she said. "It's long overdue."
