3.25.060 Definitions

This section shall govern the definitions of words and phrases used within this Chapter. All words not defined herein shall be used in their ordinary and everyday sense.

(a) "All Appropriate Inquiries" means the process of evaluating a property's environmental conditions and assessing the likelihood of any contamination in compliance with the All Appropriate Inquiries Final Rule at 40 CFR 312.

(b) "Brownfield" means real property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a Hazardous Substance, pollutant, or contaminant.

(c) "Cleanup standards" means (a) the level of hazardous substance concentrations that protect human health, reservation natural resources, and tribal subsistence uses ("cleanup levels"); (b) the location on the site where those cleanup levels must be attained ("points of compliance"); and (c) additional regulatory requirements that apply to a cleanup action because of the type of action and/or the location of the site. These requirements are specified in applicable Tribal and federal laws and are generally established in conjunction with the selection of a specific cleanup action. Cleanup levels that have been adopted by the Tribe as a matter of Tribal law for Surface Water, Groundwater, Sediment, and Soil are at Appendices A-1 through A-4, as amended.

(d) "Contamination" or "contaminated" means the environment has been affected by a hazardous substance to the point that remedial action is necessary to restore the environment.

(e) "Department" means the Natural Resources Department of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians.

(f) "Discharge" means, but is not limited to, spilling, leaking, pumping, pouring, emitting, emptying, releasing or dumping.

(g) "Dispose" or "disposal" means the discharge, deposit, injection, dumping, spilling, leaking or placing of any solid or hazardous waste into or on any land or water in a manner which may permit the waste to be emitted into the air, to be discharged into any waters of or otherwise to enter the environment.

(h) "Emergency" means a situation which requires an immediate response to address an imminent threat to public health, safety or welfare, or the environment.

(i) "Environmental standards" mean those cleanup standards, performance standards, standards of control and other substantive and procedural requirements, criteria or limitations promulgated under Tribal, federal or state environmental or facility sitting laws that specifically address a hazardous substance, pollutant, remedial action, location or other circumstances found at a site or facility.

(j) "Facility" means:

(1) Any building, structure, installation, equipment, pipe or pipeline (including any pipe into a sewer or publicly owned treatment works), landfill, storage container, motor vehicle, rolling stock, aircraft, natural or man-made well, pit, pond, lagoon, impoundment, ditch, or

(2) Any site or area where a hazardous substance has been deposited, stored, disposed of, or placed, or otherwise come to be located; but does not include any consumer product in consumer use or any vessel.

(k) "Free product" means a hazardous substance that is present in the environment as a floating or sinking non-aqueous phase liquid.

(l) "Groundwater" means subsurface water in a zone of saturation.

(m) "Hazardous sites list" means a list of sites where remedial action has been determined by the department to be necessary.

(n) "Hazardous substance" means any substance or combination of substances, including any waste of a solid, semi-solid, liquid or gaseous form, which may cause or significantly contribute to an increase in mortality or serious irreversible or incapacitating reversible illness, or which may pose a substantial present or potential hazard to human health or the environment because of its quantity, concentration or physical, chemical or infectious characteristics. This term includes, but is not limited to:

(1) A substance defined in the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980, 42 USC §9601 as amended, as a hazardous substance.

(2) Those substances which are toxic, corrosive, flammable, irritants, strong sensitizers or explosives.

(3) Petroleum, including crude oil or any fraction thereof that is liquid at standard conditions of temperature and pressure.

(4) Waste generated during the extraction, beneficiation, and processing of minerals, identified in Appendix A-1.

(o) "Immediate Action" means a remedial action that is taken within a short period of time after the discharge of a hazardous substance or contamination occurs, or after the discovery of the discharge or contamination.

(p) "Institutional controls" mean non-engineered instruments, such as administrative and legal controls, that help minimize the potential for human exposure to contamination and/or protect the integrity of the remedial action.

(q) "Natural resources" land, fish, wildlife, biota, air, water, ground water, drinking water supplies, and other such resources belonging to, managed by, held in trust by, appertaining to, or otherwise controlled by the Tribe, or, if such resources are subject to a trust restriction on alienation, any member of the Tribe.

(r) "Operator" means any person who operates a site or a facility.

(s) "Owner" means any person who owns or who receives direct or indirect consideration from the operation of a site or a facility regardless of whether the site or facility remains in operation and regardless of whether the person owns or receives consideration at the time contamination occurs.

(t) "Person" means any natural or legal person, including corporations, and Tribal, federal, and state entities, governmental units, or agencies thereof.

(u) "Practicable" means remedial action is capable of being implemented, taking into account:

(1) The technical feasibility of the remedial action option, considering its long-term effectiveness, short-term effectiveness, implementability and the time it will take until restoration is achieved; and

(2) The economic feasibility of the remedial action, considering the cost of the remedial action compared to its technical feasibility.

(v) "Registered pesticide" means a pesticide registered or exempted by the federal Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Pesticide Programs.

(w) "Release" means any spilling, leaking, pumping, pouring, emitting, emptying, discharging, injecting, escaping, advecting, dispersing, diffusing, leaching, dumping, or disposing into the environment (including the abandonment or discarding of barrels, containers, and other closed receptacles containing any hazardous substance or pollutant or contaminant).

(x) "Remedial action" or "remedy" means those response actions, other than immediate or interim actions, taken to control, minimize, restore, or eliminate the discharge of hazardous substances or environmental pollution so that the hazardous substances or environmental pollution do not present an actual or potential threat to public health, safety, or welfare or the environment. The term includes actions designed to prevent, minimize, stabilize, or eliminate the threat of discharged hazardous substances, and actions to restore the environment to the extent practicable and meet all applicable environmental standards. Examples include storage, disposal, containment, treatment, recycling, or reuse, and any monitoring required to assure that such actions protect public health, safety, and welfare and the environment.

(y) "Reservation" means all areas within the exterior boundaries of the Bad River Indian Reservation.

(z) "Responsible party" or "liable party" means any person who, under this law, is required to:

(1) Take action to prevent or abate contamination, a threat of contamination, the discharge of a hazardous substance or threat of a discharge; or

(2) Reimburse a Tribal entity for the costs incurred by the entity to take action to prevent or abate contamination or threat of contamination or the discharge of a hazardous substance or threat of a discharge.

(aa) "Restore" or "restoration" means to return the environment to the biological, chemical, and physical conditions that existed prior to the discharge of a hazardous substance or contamination.

(bb) "Site" means any area where contamination has occurred or is suspected of occurring, including a place of business that handles, transports or stores hazardous substances and is required to track such materials, and anywhere that a hazardous substance has come to be located.

(cc) "Surface water" means all water above the surface of the ground within the exterior boundaries of the Bad River Reservation including but not limited to lakes, ponds, reservoirs, artificial impoundments, streams, rivers, springs, seeps and wetlands.

(dd) "Tribal entity" means a board, committee, commission, department, division, or agency of the Bad River Band of the Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians.