Underground storage tanks: corrective action.

Under existing law, Barry Keene Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Trust Fund Act of 1989, every owner of an underground storage tank is required to pay a storage fee for each gallon of petroleum placed in the tank. The fees are required to be deposited in the Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Fund. The money in the fund may be expended by the State Water Resources Control Board, upon appropriation by the Legislature, for various purposes, including the payment of claims of up to $1,500,000 per occurrence, as defined, to aid owners and operators of petroleum underground storage tanks who take corrective action to clean up unauthorized releases from those tanks and the payment of claims for certain 3rd-party injuries and damages. Existing law requires the board to pay a claim for the costs of corrective action to a person who owns property on which is located a release from a petroleum underground storage tank that has been the subject of a corrective action, and for which additional corrective action is required because of additionally discovered contamination from the previous release, if the person who carried out the earlier and completed corrective action was eligible for, and applied for, reimbursement pursuant to specified provisions, only to the extent that the amount of reimbursement for the earlier corrective action did not exceed the amount of $1,500,000. This bill would additionally impose as a requirement for that reimbursement that the subject tank has been removed. The bill would also require the board to pay a claim for the costs of corrective action to a person who owns property on which is located a release from a petroleum underground storage tank that has been removed if the site has been the subject of a corrective action, additional corrective action is required because of additionally discovered contamination from the previous release, the person who owns the property meets specified requirements and is required to perform corrective action pursuant to those provisions because of additionally discovered contamination, and the person who carried out the earlier and completed corrective action did not apply for reimbursement, as prescribed. This bill would become operative only if legislation is enacted in the 2013–14 Regular Session and becomes operative that extends the January 1, 2014, reversion date in a specified provision of the Health and Safety Code to a date that is after January 1, 2014, relative to petroleum underground storage tank fees.