Wisconsin Statutes & Annotations
Chapter 291 - Hazardous waste management.
291.01 - Definitions.

291.01 Definitions. In this chapter:
(1) “Closing" has the meaning designated under s. 289.01 (5).
(2) “Department" means the department of natural resources.
(3) “Disposal" means the discharge, deposit, injection, dumping, spilling, leaking or placing of any hazardous waste into or on any land or water in a manner which may permit the hazardous waste or any hazardous constituent to be emitted into the air, to be discharged into any waters of the state or otherwise to enter the environment. “Disposal" does not include the generation, transportation, storage or treatment of hazardous waste.
(4) “Environmental pollution" means the contaminating or rendering unclean or impure the air, land or waters of the state, or making the same injurious to public health, harmful for commercial or recreational use, or deleterious to fish, bird, animal or plant life.
(5) “Generation" means the act or process of producing hazardous waste but does not include any manufacturing process.
(7) “Hazardous waste" or “waste" means any solid waste identified by the department as hazardous under s. 291.05 (1), (2) or (4).
(8) “Hazardous waste facility" means a site or structure for the treatment, storage or disposal of hazardous waste and includes all of the contiguous property under common ownership or control surrounding the site or structure.
(9) “Hazardous waste management" means the systematic source reduction, collection, source separation, storage, transportation, exchange, processing, treatment, recovery and disposal of hazardous wastes.
(10) “Long-term care" has the meaning designated under s. 289.01 (21).
(11) “Manifest" means a form used for identifying the quantity, composition and the origin, routing and destination of hazardous waste during its transport.
(12) “Municipality" means any city, town, village, county, county utility district, town sanitary district, public inland lake protection and rehabilitation district or metropolitan sewage district.
(14) “Person" means an individual, owner, operator, corporation, limited liability company, partnership, association, municipality, interstate agency, state agency or federal agency, department or instrumentality.
(16) “Solid waste" has the meaning given under s. 289.01 (33).
(17) “Resource conservation and recovery act" means the federal resource conservation and recovery act, 42 USC 6901 to 6991i, as amended on November 8, 1984.
(18) “Storage" means the containment of hazardous waste for a temporary period in a manner that does not constitute disposal.
(19) “Termination" has the meaning designated under s. 289.01 (40).
(20) “Transport" means the movement of hazardous wastes by air, rail, highway, water or other means, except for the movement of hazardous waste within the site at which the hazardous waste is generated or within a facility that is licensed under this subchapter.
(21) “Treatment" means any method, technique or process, including neutralization, which follows generation and which is designed to change the physical, chemical or biological character or composition of any hazardous waste so as to neutralize the hazardous waste or so as to render the waste nonhazardous, safer for transport, amenable for recovery, amenable for storage or reduced in volume. “Treatment" includes incineration.
(22) “Treatment facility" means a facility at which hazardous waste is subjected to treatment and may include a facility where hazardous waste is generated. This term does not include a waste water treatment facility whose discharges are regulated under ch. 283 unless the facility is required to be permitted as a hazardous waste treatment facility under the resource conservation and recovery act.
(23) “Wastewater" means all sewage.
History: 1995 a. 227 ss. 649, 992.
The deterioration of useful materials into waste is a process that results in the generation of waste under s. 144.61 (4) [now s. 291.01 (5)]; the yard at which waste is stored and a hole dug to bury waste are facilities under s. 144.61 (5m) [now s. 291.01 (8)]. State v. Edward Kraemer & Sons. Inc. 170 Wis. 2d 646, 489 N.W.2d 708 (Ct. App. 1992).
The language of s. 144.61 (5m) [now s. 291.01 (8)] suggests that the coverage of s. 144.62 [now ss. 291.05 to 291.11, 291.91 and 291.93] is restricted to facilities intended to be used for disposal, treatment, or storage of waste. Acme Printing Ink Co. v. Menard, Inc. 870 F. Supp. 1477 (1994).