The Legislature finds and declares that a number and variety of industrial facilities and related operations generate, store, handle, and transport extremely hazardous substances; that some of those operations may represent a catastrophic threat to public health and safety, especially in a densely populated state; that, in recent months, the catastrophically tragic event in Bhopal, India, as well as a score of accidental chemical releases into the atmosphere of the State demonstrate that modern technology, operations systems, and safeguards can fail in protecting against such threats to the public; that while a strengthened capacity to minimize and abate discharges once they occur and efficient plans to evacuate populations if those discharges cannot be contained are vital components of a comprehensive public protection program, the single most effective effort to be made is toward prevention of those environmental accidents by anticipating the circumstances that could result in their occurrence and taking those precautionary and preemptive actions required.

L. 1985, c. 403, s. 2, eff. Jan. 8, 1986.