(1) "Department" means the Department of Health and Environmental Control.
(2) "Discharge" means leakage, seepage, or other release.
(3) "Drycleaning facility" means a professional commercial establishment located in this State for the purpose of cleaning clothing and other fabrics utilizing a process which involves the use of drycleaning solvents. In the case of a retail establishment, the establishment is one that operates or has at some time in the past operated in whole or in part for the purpose of cleaning clothing and other fabrics for members of the public, other drycleaning facilities, and dry drop-off facilities. In the case of a wholesale establishment, the establishment is one that operates or has at some time in the past operated in whole or in part for the purpose of cleaning clothing and other fabrics for other drycleaning facilities or dry drop-off facilities. "Drycleaning facility" includes laundry facilities that are using or have used drycleaning solvents as part of their cleaning process but does not include textile mills or uniform rental and linen supply facilities.
(4) "Drycleaning solvents" means nonaqueous solvents used in the cleaning of clothing and other fabrics and includes halogenated drycleaning fluids and nonhalogenated cleaners, and their breakdown products. "Drycleaning solvents" includes only solvents originating from use at a drycleaning facility or by a wholesale supply facility.
(5) "Dry drop-off facility" means a commercial retail store that receives from customers clothing and other fabrics for drycleaning at an off-site drycleaning facility and does not clean the clothing or fabrics at the store utilizing drycleaning solvents.
(6) "Employee" means a natural person employed and paid by the owner of a drycleaning facility for thirty-five or more hours a week for forty-five or more weeks a year and on whose behalf the owner contributes payments to the South Carolina Employment Security Commission or Department of Revenue as required by law. Excluded from the meaning of the term "employee" are owners of drycleaning facilities and family members of owners, regardless of the level of consanguinity, if the family members are not employed and not compensated pursuant to the definition of the term "employee" contained in this item. Part-time employees who are employed and paid for fewer than thirty-five hours a week for fewer than forty-five weeks a year must not be deemed to be employees unless their hours and weeks of employment, when combined with the hours and weeks of employment of another or other part-time employee or employees, total thirty-five or more hours a week for forty-five or more weeks a year.
(7) "Person" includes an individual, partnership, corporation, association, trust, estate, receiver, company, limited liability company, or another entity or group.
(8) "Wholesale supply facility" means a commercial establishment that supplies drycleaning solvents to drycleaning facilities.
(9) "Insolvent" means the approved expenses of the Department of Health and Environmental Control and the Department of Revenue as well as the estimated cleanup costs are projected to exceed the fund balance and projected revenues for a five-year period commencing on January fifteenth of each year.
(10) "Halogenated drycleaning fluid" means any nonaqueous solvent formulated, in whole or in part, with ten percent or more by volume any of the halogenated compounds chlorine, bromine, fluorine, or iodine. Halogenated drycleaning fluids include perchloroethylene (also known as tetrachloroethylene), trichlorethylene, and any breakdown components of them.
(11) "Nonhalogenated cleaner" means any nonaqueous solvent used in a drycleaning facility that contains less than ten percent by volume of any halogenated compound. Nonhalogenated cleaners include petroleum based drycleaning solvents and any breakdown components of them.
(12) "Nonaqueous solvent" means any cleaning formulation designed to minimize swelling of fabric fibers and containing less than fifty-one percent of water by volume.
(13) "Former drycleaning facility" means a drycleaning facility or wholesale supply facility that ceases to be operated as a drycleaning facility or wholesale supply facility before July 1, 1995.
(14) "Property owner" means a person who is vested with ownership, dominion, or legal or rightful title to the real property or who has a ground lease interest in the real property on which a drycleaning or wholesale supply facility is or has ever been located.