About the Department of Law's Environmental Section
The Environmental Section provides advice and representation to several agencies, including primarily the Department of Environmental Conservation, to assist them in the performance of their duties related to environmental matters.
Oil spill prevention and response: The department advises and defends DEC regarding oil spill contingency plan approvals. When spills occur, the department provides investigative, enforcement, and litigation services to ensure that the response is prompt and complete, that state costs and damages are reimbursed, and that violations of law are assigned fair consequences. Advice is provided with respect to the prevention and amelioration of fuel oil spills from above and under ground storage tanks.
Contaminated sites: In consultation with DEC, department attorneys pursue appropriate enforcement actions to ensure cleanup at contaminated sites or recommend to DEC that the state initiate a state led cleanup. In either case, the department pursues appropriate reimbursement of any state cleanup expenditures. The department consults with DEC in decisions to release a potentially responsible party from liability when available evidence indicates that the party is not, in fact, liable. Department attorneys work with DEC to negotiate prospective purchaser agreements for contaminated sites when appropriate. The section’s representation includes instances where the state is seeking to enforce cleanup or secure cost recovery as well as in those cases where the state is sued with respect to its role in a contaminated site or in carrying out its regulatory function.
Air and water quality: The Department provides legal advice to DEC regarding air permits and provides legal representation for enforcement of clean air laws and regulations. The Department also provides advice on water quality issues including permitting for large mines, NPDES primacy, marine vessel wastewater discharges, domestic wastewater, and drinking water. Advice is provided to the Village Safe Water program on a variety of issues related to that program.
Coastal Management Program: The Department provides legal advice to DNR’s Division of Coastal and Ocean Management. The Department advises DNR before, during, and after consistency reviews, during the various revisions that the coastal program undergoes, and during the legislative session when bills affecting the program are introduced.
Public health: The Department provides legal advice to DEC’s Division of Environmental Health on public health issues, such as food safety, animal health, and pesticides.
Homeland security: Legal advice is provided to various state officials regarding efforts to improve security of critical facilities, such as the Trans Alaska Pipeline and drinking water supplies.
Legal defense of state actions: The environmental law component defends state agencies and officials when they are sued for the performance of their duties. These include cleanup decisions, issuance of permits, approval of contingency plans, consistency determinations and other matters.
Significant Environmental Matters
Forest Service Road 3030
The U.S. Forest Service and the Western Federal Land Highway Division of Federal Highway Administration (WFLHD) has been improving approximately 20 miles of road on Prince of Wales Island. In 2006, for 3.5 miles of this road, WFLHD utilized rock from a specific borrow area as the fill for the road (sometimes filling up to 20 feet). This rock has now proven to have acidic properties and has resulted in areas of very high acidity. The acidic runoff and groundwater has affected at least 3 anadromous streams in the area. DEC, WFLHD, USFS and EPA are currently working together to address the contamination both in the short and long term.
Cruise Ship Program Revisions
DEC and Law continue to work diligently in developing significant revisions to DEC's cruise ship program in order to implement new requirements relating to Ocean Rangers and cruise ship wastewater discharges established under Ballot Measure 2 (the Cruise Ship Initiative), which voters approved in August of 2006. Ocean Rangers are now conducting on-board monitoring of large cruise ship operations, including observations of air emissions and wastewater discharges. In the spring of 2008, DEC also finalized a general permit for large cruise ship wastewater discharges. Regulations necessary to implement the ballot initiative are also being developed.
For more information on the cruise ship program, please visit the following link: http://www.dec.state.ak.us/water/cruise_ships/index.htm
Water and Wetlands Permitting Issues
Given that there are more than 174 million acres of wetlands found within Alaska, the exercise of federal jurisdiction over waters and wetlands in Alaska is of keen interest to the State of Alaska. Law, DEC and DNR continue to review new or evolving policies and guidance (including June 2007 joint guidance) generated by EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to assess the potential impact they will have for projects and activities within the Alaska.
Exxon Valdez Oil Spill
The 1991 agreement settling the state and federal governments' civil claims against Exxon as a result of the Exxon Valdez oil spill includes a provision which allows the governments to reopen the settlement and require Exxon to make additional payments totaling as much as $100 million to fund specific restoration projects identified by the governments to address injuries that meet the Reopener criteria. On June 1, 2006, the State of Alaska Department of Law and the U.S. Department of Justice announced that they have taken the first step in asserting a claim under the Reopener provision by providing ExxonMobil Corporation with a detailed project plan for the cleanup of lingering oil at an estimated cost of $92 million. On August 31, 2006, the Department of Law and the U.S. Department of Justice submitted a demand letter to ExxonMobil for $92 million pursuant to the EVOS settlement Reopener provision. The governments continue to pursue this matter.
For more information on the governments' settlement with Exxon and the Reopener provision, please visit the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council web site at http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/.
Seabulk Pride Tanker Grounding
The Department of Law is assisting the Department of Environmental Conservation's investigation of the February 2, 2006 grounding of the oil tanker Seabulk Pride near the Nikiski Kenai Pipeline dock in Cook Inlet. DEC Administrative subpoenas were issued to Tesoro, the vessel's contingency plan holder, and Seabulk Tankers, Inc., the vessel owner. Both companies have provided documents in response to the subpoenas and the investigation is continuing.
DEC's web site on the incident can be accessed at: http://www.dec.state.ak.us/spar/
perp/response/sum_fy06/060202201/060202201_index.htm
Selendang Ayu Grounding and Oil Spill
On December 8, 2004, the 738-foot cargo vessel M/V Selendang Ayu, ran aground and broke in half off Unalaska Island in the Aleutian Islands. The cargo vessel, which was bound to Asia with a 60,000-ton soybean load, was carrying approximately 425,000 gallons of Intermediate Fuel Oil 380 and 21,000 gallons of marine diesel oil; an estimated 354,218 gallons of those oils were released into the environment. Six of the vessel’s crew members were lost in the rescue effort. Representatives of natural resources trustee agencies, which for the state include the Departments of Law, Natural Resources, Environmental Conservation, and Fish and Game, have undertaken pre assessment activities associated with the natural resource damage assessment and restoration process. On March 30, 2007, the trustee agencies published a notice of intent to conduct restoration planning in the federal register.
The United States Fish & Wildlife Service is the federal lead administrative trustee agency and maintains a web site at http://alaska.fws.gov/fisheries/contaminants
/spill/sa_index.htm with information on the natural resource damage assessment process.
The Department of Law is also pursuing on behalf of the Departments of Environmental Conservation, Natural Resources and others civil claims against the owner and operator of the M/V Selendang Ayu arising out of the grounding and oil spill. These claims involve oil spill penalties, wreck removal, trespass and other non-natural resource damages. Included in these civil claims is recovery of the State's costs responding to and overseeing the response to oil spill from the Selendang Ayu and the company's wreck removal efforts. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation maintains a web site concerning the oil spill response and wreck removal at http://www.dec.state.ak.us/spar/perp/response/sum_fy05/041207201/041207201_
index.htm
Kensington Appeal
This case involves an appeal of the Army Corps of Engineers' permit allowing for disposal of mine tailings at the Kensington Mine outside Juneau. The Ninth Circuit ruled that the COE permit was invalid because such tailings require a different federal permit, from EPA. Petitions for certiorari, filed by both the state and Coeur Alaska, Inc., are pending in the U.S. Supreme Court.
APDES Project
The state has submitted its application to USEPA to take over the program for permitting disposal of pollutants in surface waters. Alaska is one of five states not to have assumed that permit program from EPA. To get EPA approval of a state program, ADEC must demonstrate that it has the authority to run a program no less stringent than EPA’s under the federal Clean Water Act. For more information on this project, see the web site: http://www.dec.state.ak.us/water/npdes/index.htm.
Appeal of Red Dog Mine Discharge Permit
A few residents of Kivalina, along with some environmental advocacy groups, appealed the discharge permit EPA issued for the mine, as well as the state's certification that the federal permit also satisfies state law. EPA eventually withdrew its permit, but certain aspects of the state’s certification remained in effect, and so the appeal of the state decision was not made entirely moot. The case is now before the state Office of Administrative Hearings, has been fully briefed, and is awaiting decision.
2006 BP Pipeline Spills and Shutdowns Investigation
DEC and the Environmental and Oil, Gas & Mining sections of the Department of Law are investigating the March 2006 Prudhoe Bay pipeline spills at Gather Station 2 and Flow Station 2, as well as corrosion and integrity problems with BP operated pipelines discovered in 2006. For more information visit the web sites:
http://www.dec.state.ak.us/spar/perp/response/sum_fy06/060302301/060302301_
index.htm
and
http://www.law.state.ak.us/department/civil/bp-pb-closure.html
Adak Island Cleanup
Cleanup of Adak Island, a former Naval base, is currently ongoing. The Island is contaminated with both petroleum and munitions, including unexploded ordinance. Petroleum contaminated areas of the Island are currently being remediated by the Navy. Currently, the Department of Law, DEC and the Navy are working through issues related to remediation of munitions, including issues such as institutional controls for the safety of residents and visitors to the Island. Additional information can be found at: http://www.adakupdate.com/
Alaska Coastal Management Program
DNR and Law continue to work on changes to the Alaska Coastal Management Program (ACMP). Currently, coastal districts are in the process of amending their coastal management plans to comply with legislative mandates. And the ABC Lists, which list categorically consistent determinations (A List), generally consistent determinations (B List), and state permits subject to consistency review (C List), are being reviewed and updated by DNR. Additional information pertaining to the ACMP can be found at http://www.alaskacoast.state.ak.us/.
For further information on Environmental Law contact:
Steve Mulder
Chief Assistant Attorney General, Section Supervisor
907-269-5274
