| TO: | Honorable Troy Fraser, Chair, Senate Committee On Natural Resources |
| FROM: | Ursula Parks, Director, Legislative Budget Board |
| IN RE: | SB1156 by Hinojosa (Relating to land reclamation projects using tires.), As Introduced |
This bill would make changes to the application procedure for Land Reclamation Projects Using Tires (LRPUT) made with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). The bill would require that a person could not begin a LRPUT without a permit from the agency and would allow the agency to grant an exception to allow for the burial of whole tires in a LRPUT.
The bill would require applicants to mail a copy of the application to the commissioners’ court of each county in which the proposed project is located in addition to existing notice requirements. The TCEQ would not be allowed to grant a permit for a LRPUT before receiving comments or suggestions from specific local entities or after a certain time period as defined in the bill.
Applications for a LRPUT would be required to include an analysis and evaluation of the environmental impacts on the soil and groundwater in the area of the proposed project. The analysis would require a comparison of the impact of using scrap tires for the proposed reclamation project to the impact of at least one reasonable alternative method of land reclamation for the proposed project.
On or after the effective date of this Act, any ongoing or pending LRPUT that had not yet placed tires below ground would be prohibited from placing tires until they had obtained a permit under the new requirements required by the bill.
Passage of the bill is not expected to have a significant impact on the TCEQ's current application process for LRPUTs.
| Source Agencies: | 582 Commission on Environmental Quality
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| LBB Staff: | UP, SZ, TL
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