25244.23
. (a) (1) The department shall adopt regulations to ensure
that trade secrets designated by a generator in all or a portion of
the review and plan or the report required by this article are
utilized by the director, the department, the unified program agency,
or the appropriate local agency only in connection with the
responsibilities of the department pursuant to this article, and that
those trade secrets are not otherwise disseminated by the director,
the department, the unified program agency, or any authorized
representative of the department, or the appropriate local agency,
without the consent of the generator.
(2) Any information subject to this section shall be made
available to governmental agencies for use in making studies and for
use in judicial review or enforcement proceedings involving the
person furnishing the information.
(3) As provided by Section 25159.5, the regulations adopted
pursuant to this subdivision shall conform with the corresponding
trade secret regulations adopted by the Environmental Protection
Agency pursuant to the federal act, except that the regulations
adopted by the department may be more stringent or more extensive
than the federal trade secret regulations.
(4) "Trade secrets," as used in this section, may include, but are
not limited to, any formula, plan, pattern, process, tool,
mechanism, compound, procedure, production data, or compilation of
information that is not patented, that is known only to certain
individuals within a commercial concern who are using it to
fabricate, produce, or compound an article of trade or a service
having commercial value, and that gives its user an opportunity to
obtain a business advantage over competitors who do not know or use
it.
(b) The department, the unified program agency, and the
appropriate local agency shall protect from disclosure any trade
secret designated by the generator pursuant to this section. The
department shall make available information concerning pollution
prevention approaches that have proved successful, and that do not
constitute a trade secret, when carrying out subdivision (c) of
Section 25244.17.
(c) This section does not permit a generator to refuse to disclose
the information required pursuant to this article to the department,
the unified program agency, or the appropriate local agency, an
officer or employee of the department, the unified program agency, or
the appropriate local agency, in connection with the official duties
of that officer or employee under this article.
(d) Any officer or employee of the department, the unified program
agency, or the appropriate local agency, or any other person, who,
because of his or her employment or official position, has possession
of, or has access to, confidential information, and who, knowing
that disclosure of the information to the general public is
prohibited by this section, knowingly and willfully discloses the
information in any manner to any person not entitled to receive it,
is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction thereof, shall be
punished by imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding six months,
by a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars ($1,000), or by both
the fine and imprisonment.