Hazardous Waste Trust Fund

Learn how the Hazardous Waste Trust Fund (HWTF) is funded and how EPD uses the HWTF for hazardous site assessment, remediation, and monitoring, local government landfill reimbursements, and abandoned site cleanups. 

Site Assessment, Remediation and Monitoring

The HWTF is used to fund certain EPD operational costs, primarily within the Response & Remediation Program (RRP).  With the funding, EPD discovers and evaluates hazardous sites, publishes this information on the Hazardous Site Inventory (HSI), and works with entities who caused the contamination to clean the sites up.  This includes review of release notifications and providing regulatory oversight of sites listed on the HSI as well as those enrolled in the Voluntary Remediation Program. The HWTF funds approximately forty staff including managers, engineers, geologists and support personnel.

Local Government Landfill Reimbursements

By statute, EPD sets aside a portion of collected HWTF fees for local government reimbursement of eligible costs related to landfills listed on the HSI. Up to $2 million per site is available for both permitted and unpermitted landfills. As of 2024, the annual funding was approximately $5 million and is expected to remain at this amount through FY2033.  For information on the reimbursement process including eligibility, reimbursable costs and application process, please see our Local Government Landfill Cleanup Reimbursement page.

Abandoned Site Cleanups

Lastly, the bulk of the HWTF is used to fund the investigation and cleanup of abandoned sites throughout Georgia using state contractors.   These include HSI sites where there are no responsible parties (RPs) to perform the cleanup or sites where the RPs cannot or will not perform the necessary work. These cleanups also include emergency removal actions such as disposal of abandoned drums. Typically, a lien is filed on the property for cost recovery, and EPD will negotiate those liens with innocent purchasers.

Read about these activities and more in our HWTF Annual Reports linked below: