Substance Release Regulation
(AR 124/93)
January 1997
The Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act (EPEA) gives Alberta
Environment powers to regulate the release of substances into the
environment, including release to air, water and land.
The Substance Release Regulation came into force on September 1, 1996
and represents a consolidation and amendment of the previous EPEA Air
Emissions Regulation and Industrial Plants Regulation.
Overview
Part 4, Division 1 of EPEA deals with the release of substances into
the environment and encompasses the releases of substances to air, land
and water. The Act regulations releases, principally through a framework
of approvals and Codes of Practice and also creates general prohibitions
with respect to substance releases.
The Substance Release Regulation covers various types of substance
releases into air. These include:
- visible emissions (opacity) from stationary activities;
- particulate emissions from a wide variety of industrial and
combustion activities;
- secondary lead smelter particulate emissions; and
- vinyl chloride releases from vinyl chloride and polyvinyl chloride
plants.
The Regulation also defines "burnable debris" and
"prohibited debris" in relation to acceptability for open
burning and maximum opacity emissions. In addition, the Regulations give
the Director the following authorities related to both air and liquid
emissions to the environment to:
- request any substance release returns or reports;
- specify monitoring requirements related to substance release
control;
- specify ambient monitoring related to a substance release; and
- to specify analytical methods for measuring substance releases.
The Regulation also outlines activities whose substance releases are
now governed by Codes instead of approvals.
Regulatory Details
The Substance Release Regulation along with the Activities
Designation Regulation and Approval Procedures Regulation provide
details on the legislative requirements and procedures that apply to
substance releases from a wide range of activities. There is a separate
regulation that deals specifically with Ozone-Depleting Substance.
The Substance Release Regulation establishes general substance
release restrictions for certain activities that are not subject to
approvals. It also established minimum substance release requirements
for many activities which must also obtain an approval pursuant to the
Activities Designation Regulation. In these cases, the Director, in an
approval, may specify more stringent limits than are in the Substance
Release Regulation, but may not relax the limits.
It is expected that substance releases to the environment will be
minimized by applying pollution prevention practices and the use of best
available demonstrated pollution control technologies. The Alberta
Ambient Air Quality Guidelines, the Alberta Ambient Surface Water
Quality Interim Guidelines and the Alberta Tier I Criteria for
Contaminated Soil Assessment and Remediation are used to evaluate the
acceptability of substance releases that cannot practically be further
minimized.
A major change in the regulatory framework for controlling substance
releases occurred in September 1996 when the requirement for approvals
for certain activities was replaced with a requirement to comply with a
Code. The activities affected by this change and the name of the Code
applying to that activity are listed in Table 1. Codes also require
certain monitoring to ensure the ongoing effective control of emissions.
Industry sectors selected for regulation by Code were those that used
standardized environmental protection practices, were not complex and
had little potential to create a significant adverse effect. Copies of
Codes can be obtained from the Queen's Printer Bookstores in Edmonton
and Calgary.
The release of emissions exceeding or contrary to the limits in the
Substance Release Regulations or an approval must be reported in
accordance with the substance release provisions of the Environmental
Protection and Enhancement Act (EPEA) and the requirements of the
Release Reporting Regulation (AR 117/93) and a related Release Reporting
Guideline.
Table 1. Substance Release Codes
ACTIVITY |
CODE |
Asphalt paving plant |
Code of Practice for Asphalt Paving Plants | < tr>
Concrete producing plant |
Code of Practice for Concrete Producing Plants |
Compressor and pumping stations
Sweet gas processing plants |
Code of Practice for Compressors, Pumping Stations and Sweet
Gas Processing Plants |
Foundry |
Code of Practice for Foundries |
Fish farm
Fish processing plant |
Code of Practice for Small Fish Farms and Fish Processing
Plants |
Hydrostatic testing |
Code of Practice for Discharge of Hydrostatic Test Water from
Hydrostatic Testing of Petroleum Liquid and Natural Gas
Pipelines |
Hydrologic tracing analysis |
Code of Practice for Hydrologic Tracing Analysis Studies |
Red meat processing plant
Poultry processing plant |
Code of Practice for Small Meat Processing Plants |
Tanker truck washing facility |
Code of Practice for Tanker Truck Washing Facilities |
Vegetable processing plants |
Code of Practice for Small Vegetable Processing Plants |
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