Directs the Director of the Department of Environmental Quality to suspend, delay, or defer the issuance of any permit to provide for the closure of any coal combustion residuals (CCRs) surface impoundment or other CCRs unit that no longer receives CCRs, located within the Chesapeake Bay watershed, until July 1, 2019. These limits do not apply to a permit required for an impoundment where CCRs have already been removed and placed in another impoundment on site, are being removed from an impoundment, or are being processed in connection with a recycling or beneficial use project. The measure also requires the owner or operator of such a CCRs surface impoundment or unit to issue a request for proposals (RFP) for entities to conduct recycling or beneficial use projects for the CCRs at such impoundment or unit. The RFP shall require responding entities to provide information from which the owner or operator is able to determine certain, among other things, the cost of the recycling or beneficial use of the CCRs. The owner or operator is required by November 15, 2018, to transmit to the Governor and certain committees and agencies a business plan that that compiles the information collected through the RFP process.
Sponsored bills
Authorizes the Department of Environmental Quality (the Department) to conduct inspections of the land-disturbing activities of interstate and intrastate natural gas pipeline companies that have approved annual standards and specifications as such land-disturbing activities relate to construction of any natural gas transmission pipeline greater than 36 inches inside diameter to determine (i) compliance with such annual standards and specifications, (ii) compliance with any site-specific plans, and (iii) if there have been or are likely to be adverse impacts to water quality as a result of such land-disturbing activities. The bill authorizes the Department to issue a stop work instruction on the relevant part of the site when the Department determines that there has been a substantial adverse impact to water quality or that a substantial and imminent adverse impact to water quality is likely to occur as a result of such land-disturbing activities. The bill requires that upon written documentation of completion by the company and approval by the Department in writing of the corrective measures specified in the stop work instruction, the instruction shall be immediately lifted. Such stop work instruction may be appealed to the circuit court of the jurisdiction where the violation was alleged to have occurred or other appropriate court.