The Legislature finds and declares as follows:

(a)  Discharges of liquid hazardous wastes or hazardous wastes containing free liquids into lined or unlined ponds, pits, and lagoons pose a serious threat to the quality of the waters of the state.

(b)  Recent reports indicate that hazardous waste contamination from surface impoundments is migrating to domestic drinking water supplies and threatening the continued beneficial uses of the state’s ground and surface waters, air, and environment.

(c)  Under the federal Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (42 U.S.C. § 6901 et seq.), and under state regulations, the storage of hazardous wastes in existing ponds has not been required to meet the same requirements as new impoundments, such as double liners, leachate collection, and leak detection.

(d)  Recent studies have found that synthetic liners, clay liners, and combinations, including clay and synthetic liners, impede, but do not eliminate, leachate from surface impoundments migrating into the surrounding environment.

(e)  It is in the public interest to establish a continuing program for the purpose of preventing contamination from, and improper storage, treatment, and disposal of, liquid hazardous wastes or hazardous wastes containing free liquids in surface impoundments. It is the intent of the Legislature, in enacting this article, to establish a program that will ensure that existing surface impoundments are either made safe or are closed, so that they do not contaminate the air or waters of the state, and so that the health, property, and resources of the people of the state are protected.

(Added by Stats. 1984, Ch. 1543, Sec. 2.)