Hazardous Waste Management System; Definition of Solid Waste; Toxicity Characteristic

This action responds to two court vacaturs of regulations under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), first, by deleting regulatory language that classified mineral processing characteristic sludges and by-products being reclaimed as solid wastes under RCRA's hazardous waste management regulations, and secondly, by codifying the decision that the Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) may not be used for determining whether manufactured gas plant (MGP) waste is hazardous under RCRA. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) initially took action on these matters as part of the Phase IV Land Disposal Restrictions (LDR) on May 26, 1998. Today's revisions carry out vacaturs ordered by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in Association of Battery Recyclers v. EPA (ABR). In addition, we are announcing that we plan to propose a separate rule to revise the definition of solid waste.