Opinion ID: 490091
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Plain Language of Section 3004(u)

Text: 27 The Industry Petitioners first urge that the EPA's definition of facility is inconsistent with the directive in section 3004(u) to take corrective action at a treatment, storage or disposal facility. They argue that the word at clearly shows an intent to limit the duty to take corrective action only to contiguous land ... used for treating, storing, or disposing of hazardous waste. 40 C.F.R. Sec. 260.10 (1986). However, this would virtually nullify the requirement, to take corrective action for releases from any solid waste management unit. Under the Industry Petitioners' view, the only way a duty would attach to take corrective action for releases from a solid waste unit would be if that solid waste unit happened to be on the contiguous land ... used for ... hazardous waste. 28 We fail to see how the use of the word at in section 3004(u) clarifies, in any way, the meaning to be placed on the word facility. It certainly does not require the use of the Industry Petitioners' definition. Moreover, looking at section 3004(u) as a whole, it appears that employing the Industry Petitioners' definition would render the duty to take corrective action for releases from solid waste management units virtually meaningless. Absent some affirmative showing that Congress intended to achieve such an anomalous result, we are not persuaded that the EPA misconstrued the statutory language.