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IBM Environmental Management System (EMS) Permit

Background

In fall 2000, MPCA began work on an "Experimental Agreement" with IBM Rochester under the Joint EPA/State Agreement to Pursue Regulatory Innovation, working through the MPCA Commissioner's Office, in consultation with the agency's senior managers team, and with direction and participation from MPCA's air quality program.

IBM Rochester was selected as a project participant because of its "low-risk" status. The facility has minor actual environmental impacts, arrived at through historic and recent improvement. In addition, MPCA believes IBM Rochester to be worthy of trust. Their good performer status has been achieved in large part by a proactive environmental management culture both at the corporate and local level. This culture is expressed in an Environmental Management System (EMS) designed, maintained, and independently overseen to a widely-accepted international standard (ISO 14001). IBM Rochester's EMS has been in place and subject to third-party audit for over three years.

In times of declining budgets and shifting environmental priorities, MPCA believes it makes sense to experiment with disinvestment in oversight of good performers. If successful, this experiment can be expanded to larger numbers of companies, freeing up MPCA's resources for new priorities while simultaneously creating a real regulatory incentive for companies to position themselves as good performers.

While MPCA seeks significant redirection of resources in the next ten years, clearly this program is not now intended for high-risk or low-trust companies. The status of such companies may change in ten years, but until it does the conventional regulatory tools and relationships will remain in place for them.

Updates

Following is a summary of the results of project development:

• The "Agreement" is now an air permit - elements from other media (hazardous waste or wastewater for instance) may be added;
  
  
• The design of the permit and oversight experiment ensures compliance, performance, enforceability, fee payments, decision points for continuation, and exits;
  
  
• A manufacturing operation releasing volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) load from process alcohols was sold by IBM in November 2001 - what remains is a large campus (boilers, emergency generators, etc.) now supporting assembly operations and software development. No new manufacturing is foreseen, although research and pilot scale manufacturing must be planned for;
  
  
• The Rochester area's return to attainment for SO2 was Federal Register noticed and finalized in spring 2001 - State Implementation Plan (SIP) conditions for SO2 in IBM's previous air permit have been carried forward into the new permit;
  
  
• The air permit is a variation on Minnesota's existing state air Option D registration permit - individualized to IBM, still a synthetic minor and public noticed. The permit contains facility-wide caps between synthetic minor and registration permit limits; through a variance of state rule, offers operational flexibility under those caps so that minor and moderate permit amendments would not be required; retains current SIP requirements for SO2; offers reduced recordkeeping (instead of monthly, annual emissions calculations) for all other air pollutants (except NOx) as long as actual emissions remain below specified limits (typically 25-30% of the permit limits);
  
  
• A combination of annual air emissions data, third-party EMS auditing enhanced with random sample verification of IBM's air emissions data-generation process, and a public web site for impacts and EMS audit findings substitutes for routine MPCA inspections.
  
  
• MPCA will inspect on cause - potential imminent and substantial danger to human health or the environment; an emergency spill or accident mitigation circumstances; complaint situations not otherwise resolvable; or continuing noncompliance with permit emission limits or record keeping requirements.
  
  
• The United States Environmental Protection Agency approved the permit framework April 8, 2002; that framework was circulated for public comment in May 2002 (with no formal public comment); discussion among MPCA staff and the company led IBM to apply for a variance to support the flexibility from minor and moderate amendments; as the variance was developed, MPCA made technical revisions to the permit to integrate variance procedures and related issues into the permit without disturbing the framework or emissions limits.
  

To implement the permit, IBM and MPCA developed an experimental project approach that began in June 2002.

• IBM and MPCA agreed to a 3-year experimental period for the variance. The 3-year period would begin with permit issuance.
  
  
• IBM agreed to integrate project benchmarking elements and MPCA participation into the June 2002 audit, allowing MPCA to establish a well-defined experiment. The next-scheduled third-party EMS audit would follow in 18 months (end of 2003); audits would occur at 2-year intervals after.
  
  
• Following the 2005 audit, MPCA would produce findings and discuss them with EPA and other stakeholders. Depending on the findings, MPCA could discontinue or continue nonexpiring IBM's permit amendment variance.
  
  

  UPDATE: This review was completed and public noticed in November 2005, and the variance was made conditionally nonexpiring in December 2005. This document summarizes MPCA’s findings: IBM Rochester Experimental EMS Air Permit 11/30/05 DRAFT Final Project Report

• MPCA could move to extend the permit and oversight options to wider groups of regulated facilities through policy and rule.
  
  UPDATE: A new EMS air permit option was finalized in Minnesota rule in December 2004. More information on this permit option is available on the EMS Web page.

Facility Air Emissions

The pollutants regulated for this permit include:

• carbon monoxide (CO)
• nitrogen oxides (NOx)
• lead (Pb)
• particulate matter less than 10 microns in diameter (PM10)
• total particulate matter (PM)
• sulfur dioxides (SO2)
• Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)
• hazardous air pollutants (HAPs)

Note that most HAPs are either VOCs or particulates; grouping them as HAPs allows analysis of overall toxicity.

Below is a summary of facility-wide, annual, actual air emissions for regulated pollutants for IBM Rochester. The second and third columns list each pollutant's permit limit and reduced recordkeeping threshold, respectively.

Summary of Air Pollutant Emissions (tons/year), 1997-2005

NOTES for the table above:

1. The list of HAPs numbers 188; the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) list contains 582 chemicals. Only the HAPs-listed chemicals are regulated by this permit and are presented here or elsewhere on the web page.
2. HAPs may include VOCs and particulate matter (such as metals).
3. Combined HAPs are the sum of the next three lines:
   • "Combustion" - is calculated using combustion factors for recorded amounts of fuels burned in boilers and generators
   • "Manufacturing" - are releases related to chemical usage in manufacturing processes (and submitted to the Toxics Release Inventory, or TRI)
   • "Ancillary operations" - are those associated with process support, maintenance, laboratory, or pilot processes. Materials used are assumed to be 100% losses.
4. "NR" means that TRI chemicals that are also HAPs were not reported for that year because their use had fallen below the threshold above which TRI reporting is required.
5. The single largest HAP is usually ammonia generated during fuel combustion.

EMS Audit Summaries

• IBM Rochester June 2004 EMS audit summary
• IBM Rochester November 2003 EMS audit summary
• IBM Rochester June 2002 EMS audit summary
• IBM Rochester for the year 2000 - summary of the third-party Environmental Management System (EMS) auditor's examination of how well the Rochester facility's EMS conforms to the ISO 14001 international EMS standard.

Permit

• Beginning in 2004, any subsequent amendments to the IBM permit can be viewed on the Air Permits Issued page.
• Permit as amended May 19, 2003 - IBM Rochester's experimental air emissions permit was amended to add a Title I condition at the bottom of page 6/top of page 7. The 2-page Technical Support Document for the May 2003 amendment appears at end of the linked document.
• Permit - IBM Rochester's air emissions permit, issued November 6, 2002, after two public comment periods and approval of the necessary variance by the MPCA Citizens' Board on October 22, 2002.
• Technical support document - document providing background information for the November 2002 permit.
• EPA approval letter - the April 8, 2002 letter from EPA Region 5 Administrator to MPCA approving the draft permit.

Notification/Responses

During the course of this project, this space will be used to summarize:

• any IBM Rochester notifications to MPCA of deviations or noncompliance with a term or condition of the permit, and resulting corrective actions by the company;
  
  
• a summary of MPCA's investigation and monitoring of IBM Rochester's response to any identified deviations, noncompliance, deficiencies, or potential problems with the terms and conditions of this permit. MPCA shall post its summary as soon as possible, but normally within 90 days of being informed of the situation, unless a longer investigation is required;
  
  
• notification of significant facility operation changes.

More Information

For more information about this project, contact Al Innes at 651-757-2457. More information is also available on the Environmental Management System Web page.