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Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Opposes UN Listing of Potential EDCs
Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) will oppose any resolution at next week’s UN summit that seeks to list potential endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs).
(ACC Mentioned) PE Makers Take Unusual Step to Stop Pricing Slide
Sep 25, 2015 | Plastics News
By Frank Esposito

One of the many wonderful things about the resin market is its never-ending ability to surprise.
ICCM4 President Urges Countries to Consider Extending Saicm
Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The president of next week's key UN chemicals summit has said discussions on the sound management of chemicals beyond 2020 have “not been straightforward”, but will be considered at the meeting.

Chemical Management News

California Agency Issues Draft Alternatives Analysis Guidance
Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

California's Department of Toxic Substances (DTSC) has issued draft alternatives analysis guidance for consultation. This aims to help companies adopt safer alternatives to chemicals of concern in products designated under the state's Safer Consumer Products (SCP) programme.
A Chemistry Test for Public Safety
Sep 25, 2015 | UCLA Newsroom
By Dan Gordon

An estimated 80,000 chemical substances currently find their way into our environment through industrial and agricultural waste, as well as through food additives, pesticides, pharmaceuticals and personal care products.
Senators Eye TSCA Reform Bill Revisions To Boost Democratic Support
Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo

Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM), sponsor of legislation to overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), is weighing requests from other Democratic senators including Ed Markey (D-MA) on possible amendments to the bill that could help boost its backing from the Senate minority and potentially secure a filibuster-proof level of support.

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Energy and Environment News

Hatch, McCaskill Float Bill to Ease Ozone Compliance
Sep 25, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen

Sens. Orrin Hatch and Claire McCaskill Thursday introduced legislation that would allow cities to enter “early action compacts” with EPA over ozone emissions.
Groups Urge Court to Keep EPA Air Rule in Place
Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Regulation
By Lydia Wheeler

Groups are urging the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to leave the Obama administration’s landmark air quality rule in place.
The Connection Between Cleaner Air and Longer Lives
Sep 25, 2015 | The New York Times
By Michael Greenstone

Back in 1970, Los Angeles was known as the smog capital of the world — a notorious example of industrialization largely unfettered by regard for health or the environment. Heavy pollution drove up respiratory and heart problems and shortened lives.
Industry, States Ask Court to Scrap MATS Rule
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Reilly and Robin Bravender

Several states and industry groups yesterday asked a federal court to toss out the Obama administration's landmark standards for reducing mercury pollution at coal-fired power plants.
Public Health Groups Make Late Push for Tighter Ozone Limit
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Reilly

Public health advocates this week made a last-minute plea for a more stringent national ozone standard as U.S. EPA nears an Oct. 1 court-ordered deadline to choose a final new limit for the air pollutant.
State Air Officials Seek Prompt Implementation Guide For EPA Ozone Rule
Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker

A group representing air regulators from 18 states is urging EPA to promptly issue guidance on how states should implement the agency's pending revision to its ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS), highlighting concerns among the states about a potential stricter standard and new regulatory burdens it could trigger.
House Passes NEPA Fast-Track Review Bill
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus

The House today passed legislation that would speed up environmental reviews.
Ozone Lobbying Ramps Up As EPA Prepares To Issue Stricter Air Standard
Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker

Public health advocates, industry groups and others are ramping up lobbying trying to sway EPA on the outcome of its imminent decision on whether to make its ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) stricter, with the agency widely expected to tighten the existing 75 parts per billion (ppb) limit down to at least 70 ppb. Ahead of an Oct. 1 judicial deadline for issuing a final revised standard, various groups have been holding 11th-hour meetings with EPA and White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB) officials on the rule. The final updated ozone NAAQS has been undergoing mandatory White House pre-publication review since Aug. 28. President Obama recently acknowledged concerns raised by Republicans and industry organizations that a stricter standard could cause major costs by placing many areas out of attainment with the limit. Those areas would have to then impose potentially costly pollution controls on industrial sources of ozone-forming air pollution. But Obama in his Sept. 16 remarks to the Business Roundtable in Washington, D.C., also noted the situation is "complicated" because EPA by law cannot consider costs when deciding the level of a NAAQS. And the agency appears all but guaranteed to issue a final revised air standard that is more stringent than the 75 ppb limit established in 2008. EPA's Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) said a standard in the range between 60 ppb and 70 ppb is necessary to meet a Clean Air Act mandate that the NAAQS be requisite to protect public health with an adequate margin of safety, though the agency proposed a limit in the 65 ppb-70 ppb range. In Sept. 22 remarks to a Wall Street Journal event in Washington, D.C., EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy acknowledged that CASAC advised her on "what they thought the levels ought to be." When the agency releases the final standard, she said, "I think people will see we did the job we were supposed to do." Industry sources have said the final NAAQS EPA sent for OMB review leans toward a 70 ppb limit, while the White House Council on Environmental Quality is said to favor a stricter 68 ppb standard. Either value would be toward the top of the 65 ppb-70 ppb EPA proposed in November, and at the high end of CASAC's recommended 60 ppb-70 ppb range. Environmentalists are arguing that only a standard as low as 60 ppb would satisfy the air law mandate of protecting public health with an adequate margin of safety -- though it is unclear whether they would sue over a 70 ppb limit, and federal courts often defer to EPA on setting the level of the NAAQS. EPA must set the standard based solely on its review of science on a criteria pollutant's adverse impacts on public health and the environment, though it can consider costs when writing rules to implement a NAAQS. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chair of the Science, Space & Technology Committee, sent Sept. 24 letters to EPA and the White House seeking more details on the alleged disagreement on where to set the NAAQS. Environmentalists' Push Environmentalists in their last-minute meetings with EPA and OMB officials, and in recent public remarks, argue that these legal restrictions mean the agency must set a standard as strict as 60 ppb. Natural Resources Defense Council attorney John Walke told a Sept. 16 event in Washington, D.C., hosted by think tank OurEnergyPolicy.Org that "setting the standard at 70 [ppb] would be an utter failure of responsibility and leadership. It would leave thousands more Americans losing their lives, and hundreds of thousands more suffering asthma attacks than setting a safe health standard based upon the medical science that goes beyond that business-as-usual status quo." A 70 ppb limit would require little additional regulatory effort to meet, he said. Walke also noted that Obama in 2011 forced EPA to drop a discretionary tightening of the standard down to 70 ppb, which the president at the time justified as necessary for regulatory certainty given that the Clean Air Act mandates a NAAQS review every five years and the ozone review was at the time due in 2013. Environmentalists criticized Obama's decision then, and Walke at the event asked, "Will the White House decide that that is the controversy they want to remind the public of and court a second controversy, leaving a legacy of unsafe air when it leaves office at the end of its second term?" Groups in favor of an ozone standard as strict as 60 ppb have met with OMB or at press time planned to meet with administration officials to renew their calls for a stringent limit. For example, the Sierra Club and Environmental Defense Fund met with EPA and OMB officials Sept. 24 and the American Academy of Pediatrics has a meeting set for Sept. 28. Organizations that have already held meetings include several different regional branches of the American Lung Association on various dates, the American Thoracic Society on Sept. 15, and the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management, representing air regulators in the Northeast, on Sept. 22. Industry's Opposition Industry groups remain vehemently opposed to any tightening of the NAAQS, saying the science does not support a tougher limit and warning of catastrophic consequences resulting from more onerous emissions limits that would stifle economic growth. Areas in nonattainment must impose costly pollution controls on industry, or limit industrial expansion, or face the ultimate sanction of losing federal highway funds. The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) continues an advertising campaign in several states, warning of the adverse impact of a tougher ozone limit. And the American Petroleum Institute (API) has produced new estimates of the number of areas that would for the first time find themselves in nonattainment, showing that the impact of a NAAQS at 70 ppb appears far less severe than one set at 65 ppb. Nonetheless, API continues to insist that no tightening of the standard is warranted. On a conference call with reporters Sept. 18, API official Howard Feldman said that at 75 ppb there will be some 217 counties in nonattainment. With a 70 ppb standard, that number would swell to 958, and at 65 ppb increase to 1433 counties. Tightening the standard would "significantly chill economic activity," Feldman claimed. Asked about impact on the oil and gas production sector, Feldman said API does not have quantitative estimates, but can state qualitatively that the tougher the standard, the greater the adverse impact on drilling. Some areas of the country that have seen a boom in drilling would be facing nonattainment for the first time, especially in the mountainous West, where high altitude combines with ozone-forming air pollution and emissions from outside the country to form ozone. Feldman noted that peak "background" ozone levels in this area can reach or exceed ozone levels within EPA's proposed range for the new NAAQS. State air regulators and industry cannot control background and hence cannot meet the standards where background exceeds the NAAQS level. Industry sources argue that EPA's rule allowing regulatory exemptions for areas experiencing "exceptional" events such as wildfires will not be sufficient to compensate for high background ozone. API's Feldman said he would meet with OMB and EPA on Sept. 25, while other industry groups opposed to a stricter standard have already met, or will meet, with administration officials. Those organizations include the Independent Petroleum Association of America at a Sept. 22 meeting, NAM at a Sept. 16 meeting, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce at a Sept. 15 meeting, energy company Phillips 66 at a Sept. 11 meeting, the American Forest and Paper Association at a Sept. 10 meeting and the industry NAAQS Implementation Coalition at a Sept. 8 meeting. Upcoming Meetings More meetings are scheduled, including for the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), which at press time was slated to meet with OMB Sept. 25. AFPM, representing the refining sector, was one group that participated in the Sept. 16 OurEnergyPolicy.Org event. Sarah Magruder Lyle, representing AFPM, warned at the event that, "At the proposed [NAAQS] level, I can tell you what will happen. Manufacturing will leave this country once again, as it did previously. There will be no refining expansions. There will be no additional petrochemical facilities." Magruder Lyle warned that tougher ozone standards would increase energy costs to consumers, in part through restrictions on refining and manufacturing industry, and in part through reduced oil and gas production. "Six out of seven of the most productive shale plays in the country that have accounted [for] close to 100% of domestic natural gas production over the last three years will be unable to meet the proposed more stringent ozone rule. In many of those places, energy is their largest industry. And in some places, it's their only industry," she said. Obama in his recent remarks to the Business Roundtable stressed the legal constraints EPA is working under in developing a NAAQS rule. Obama described the "fairly stringent statutory guidelines by which the EPA is supposed to evaluate the standards," adding that "EPA is following the science and the statutes as best as it can." Obama said that he had recognized "some of the concerns" of states and municipalities faced with potentially tougher rules over "legitimate economic issues that have to be considered." But he also said that, "Even with the costs associated with implementing the ozone rule, when you do a cost-benefit, the amount of lives saved, asthma averted and do forth is still substantially higher than the costs." The costs of the rule are fiercely contested, with a much-publicized analysis by economic consulting firm NERA, commissioned by NAM, putting the figure as high as $140 billion in lost economic output. A Sept. 15 report by consultants Synapse Energy Economics, sponsored by public health advocates, says the NERA study is flawed. "Synapse reviewed NERA's report on behalf of Earthjustice and found that it grossly overstates compliance costs due to major flaws, math errors, and unfounded assumptions in NERA's analyses," the firm says.
Senate Dems Tell Obama to End Arctic Drilling
Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

Some Senate Democrats are once again asking President Obama to end oil and natural gas drilling in the Arctic Ocean.
House Expected to Pass 'Clean' Spending Bill, Avoid Shutdown
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Daniel Bush

House Speaker John Boehner's decision to retire next month should pave the way for Congress to pass a short-term funding bill next week and avoid a government shutdown, House lawmakers said today.
14 More Jurisdictions Join International Alliance Pledging Lower Emissions
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Anne C. Mulkern

Fourteen more governments, including cities, subnational governments and one nation, yesterday joined a pact agreeing to take steps striving to keep global warming's temperature rise to below 2 degrees Celsius.
U.S. and China Strike Climate Deal
Sep 25, 2015 | PoliticoPro (Morning Energy)
By Eric Wolff

President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping will issue a joint announcement today laying out the details of a landmark climate deal between the world's two largest carbon polluters.
US, China to Expand on Climate Pact
Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Briefing Room
By Timothy Cama

The United States and China will announce new commitments Friday to expand on last year’s major joint agreement on climate change, including through a cap-and-trade system for China.
China to Launch a Nationwide Cap-and-Trade System and to Work with the U.S. on Forging a Paris Deal
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Lisa Friedman

China will put in place a nationwide carbon emissions trading program in 2017 and agree to stringent transparency rules in a new global climate change accord as part of a sweeping announcement President Obama and President Xi Jinping will make today, White House officials said.
Pope Asserts 'Right of the Environment' in U.N. Address
Sep 25, 2015 | Politico
By Nahal Toosi

Pope Francis took his call to protect the environment to the United Nations on Friday, where he also urged world leaders to help the poor, remember people’s spiritual rights and rid the world of nuclear weapons.
Climate Change: What’s Next
Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By former Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska)

As Washington, D.C. greets Pope Francis this week, there is much anticipation about what he will say about a number of issues – specifically climate change.
Greenwire's Chemnick Talks Climate Momentum Following Papal Address
Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - TV

As Pope Francis continues his U.S. tour, will his remarks on climate affect the tone of discussions in Congress and the momentum heading into this year's Paris talks? On today's The Cutting Edge, Greenwire reporter Jean Chemnick discusses the power of the pope following his historic address.

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Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Opposes UN Listing of Potential EDCs

Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) will oppose any resolution at next week’s UN summit that seeks to list potential endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs).
Speaking to the press ahead of the fourth International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM4), industry consultant and former Dow Chemical executive Greg Bond said any such a proposal would not have the trade body’s backing. It has been mooted by NGOs (CW 24 September 2015) and some developing countries.
But the ICCA does support the EDCs workplan said Mr Bond. This was devised by:the UN Environment Programme (Unep);the World Health Organization; andthe OECD.
The conference is being held to assess the progress of the UN's Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (Saicm). The programme's goal is to ensure the sound management of chemicals across the globe by 2020.
Speaking on the same call, Greg Skelton, senior director for international affairs at the American Chemistry Council, said that the biggest contribution to improving global chemicals management would come from action by national governments. “Helping countries put capacity in place to manage chemicals will have the biggest impact,” he said.
Mr Skelton, who is also the industry representative on Saicm's advisory body, said ICCA members are contributing to those efforts through:industry capacity building – notably through its voluntary Responsible Care programme and associated workshops; andcontributing capacity building and best practice to its partnership with Unep. Examples, he said, include integrating the ICCA's regulatory toolbox with Unep’s guidance on developing legislation and administrative structures (GBB September 2012) to help governments establish approaches to chemicals management, and cooperation between the two bodies on port and transportation chemicals safety projects in Kenya and Ghana. The ICCA and Unep will renew their memorandum of understanding, which expired in 2014, at ICCM4.
He said sound chemicals management is necessary to support sustainable growth in manufacturing, which is being sought by developing nations. He also voiced support for the continuation of Saicm beyond 2020.
ICCM4 will also discuss a proposal to set up a voluntary programme on chemicals in products (CW 24 August 2015). If adopted, the ICCA wants this to be governed by Saicm, rather than having a separate secretariat.

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(ACC Mentioned) PE Makers Take Unusual Step to Stop Pricing Slide

Sep 25, 2015 | Plastics News

By Frank Esposito

One of the many wonderful things about the resin market is its never-ending ability to surprise.
That’s happening again right now, as North American polyethylene makers began telling customers in late August that prices could fall 4 cents in September. That’s like a poker player not only showing his cards to the other players, but magnifying those cards and displaying them on a screen right behind his head.
PE market watchers are saying that producers have taken this almost unprecedented step in order to stop prices from falling even further in the midst of global economic volatility. Regional PE prices already had fallen an average of 5 cents per pound in August as oil prices fell.
That’s the kind of month August was — the kind that could make even hardened PE sellers do things they never thought they’d do. Per-share stock prices of plastic materials firms got hammered in August as well. And PE wasn’t alone in taking a price plunge — regional prices for polypropylene, polystyrene, PVC and PET bottle resin fell as well.
“Whenever oil prices move down sharply, most commodity resins prices are bound to soon start moving downward, as well,” said Phil Karig, managing director with the Mathelin Bay Associates consulting firm in St. Louis. “In the case of ethylene-affected resins [like PE and PVC], the recent easing of ethylene supply issues is also contributing to downward pricing pressures.”
West Texas Intermediate oil prices were above $45 per barrel on Aug. 1, but were near $39 per barrel by the end of the month, for a drop of about 13 percent. Prices since then have rebounded to $47 in late trading Sept. 15. Abundant supplies of PE also played a role in the 5-cent price drop, according to Mike Burns, a PE market analyst with Resin Technology Inc. in Fort Worth, Texas.
How did PE buyers in the region take the news?
“The U.S. PE price has to be lower to continue competitive exports,” a Texas-based buyer told Plastics News. “Of course, if exports are down because U.S. PE prices are too high that leads to oversupply [in the U.S.], so it’s kind of a vicious circle.
“But U.S. [PE profit] margins are still high. They may have room to come down some more.”
PE demand growth in the U.S. and Canada remained solid through July, according to the American Chemistry Council. High density PE sales in the region were up almost 6 percent in that seven-month period, with low density PE up almost 2 percent and linear low density PE sales up almost 6 percent in that time frame.
The August PP decline averaged 2 cents per pound, although that amount could vary, depending on how much of a decrease buyers saw in July. The two-month July-August dip totaled 3 cents per pound. Some saw that move in 1.5-cent increments, others saw 1 cent in July and 2 in August, or vice versa.
The August PP drop was the second straight month prices for the material have fallen and the third decline in four months. Regional PP prices now are down a net of 17 cents per pound so far in 2015.
North American PP growth was solid in the first seven months of 2015, growing 5.3 percent. A 5.9 percent domestic growth rate was dampened by a 10 percent slide in export sales.
Regional PS prices tumbled an average of 2 cents per pound in August. Some buyers reported 3 cent drops, but 2 seemed to be the market average. That drop came only a month after prices rose 6 cents, prompted by higher prices for benzene feedstock.
Benzene prices for August, however, fell about 8 percent to $2.80 per gallon, sending PS resin prices down as well. Regional PS prices now are down a net of 4 cents per pound in 2015.
North American PS sales through July essentially were flat vs. the year-ago period. Sales into the market’s leading food packaging/food service sector grew 2 percent in those seven months.
For PVC, prices ticked down an average of 1 cent per pound as seasonal construction activity began to slow. Prior to that decline, prices for the material had been flat for four consecutive months.
U.S./Canadian PVC sales essentially were flat through July, as a gain of almost 3 percent in export sales was canceled out by a decline of almost 2 percent for sales into the domestic market. Sales into PVC’s flagship rigid pipe and tubing market also were essentially flat for the seven-month period.
PET bottle resin’s 4-cent August drop wiped out a 3-cent hike that some buyers saw in June and others saw in July. In August, some buyers reported a 5-cent price drop, but 4 cents seemed to the number seen by most buyers.
For the year, North American PET prices now are up a net of 2 cents per pound. The market continues to struggle with lower consumption of carbonated soft drinks and with increased use of thinner water bottles that use less PET per unit.

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ICCM4 President Urges Countries to Consider Extending Saicm

Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The president of next week's key UN chemicals summit has said discussions on the sound management of chemicals beyond 2020 have “not been straightforward”, but will be considered at the meeting.
The fourth international Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM4) will assess progress to date on the UN's voluntary chemicals initiative: the strategic approach to international chemicals management (Saicm).
In a guest column for this month’s Global Business Briefing, Dr Richard Lesiyampe, who is also principal secretary of Kenya's environment ministry, says a proposal on chemicals management beyond the current end of Saicm's remit in 2020, will be put to the conference.
The proposal says ICCM4 "may also wish to consider the need for a decision addressing chemicals and waste beyond 2020, including the Strategic Approach", at the fifth session of the conference in 2020.
“I encourage the conference to consider this, and the linkages with the post-2015 development agenda, to formulate a resolution setting out recommendations and actions for the longer term”, says DrLesiyampe.
“I urge all of Saicm’s many stakeholders to commit, to cooperate, to be aware and to take ownership of the work that needs to be done. If we can engender this spirit, I expect we shall be able to reach consensus on the matters that are critical to Saicm and bring us closer to the 2020 goal.”
He adds that the proposed UN sustainable development goals (SDGs) are a "major opportunity" to promote the chemicals agenda, and that a stronger connection between them and Saicm will strengthen the understanding of governments, industry, the private sector and civil society.
The UN summit for the adoption of the proposed post-2015 SDGs will be held from 25-27 September in New York. A target of one of the goals is to achieve the environmentally sound management of chemicals and all wastes throughout their lifecycle by 2020.
Earlier this week, global NGO the International POPs Environment Network (Ipen) warned that if ICCM4 fails to address the issue of what happens after 2020, and Saicm is allowed to expire, “there will be a gap; and critical momentum will be lost” (CW 24 September 2015).

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Chemical Management News

California Agency Issues Draft Alternatives Analysis Guidance

Sep 25, 2015 | Chemical Watch

California's Department of Toxic Substances (DTSC) has issued draft alternatives analysis guidance for consultation. This aims to help companies adopt safer alternatives to chemicals of concern in products designated under the state's Safer Consumer Products (SCP) programme.
Manufacturers of products designated by the agency as "priority products" must develop an alternatives analysis (AA). These will then inform the DTSC's regulatory response to the specified chemicals of concern (CW 15 December 2014).
The agency says that because a “hastily substituted alternative” can lead to unintended consequences it plans to develop an AA process to avoid such “regrettable substitutions”.
Set out in the draft guidance is the need for “a comprehensive alternatives analysis with a broad scope [that] will consider a wide variety of effects and avoid shifting the problem from one phase of the lifecycle to another, from one region to another, or from one environmental impact to another” (GBB November 2014).
Included in the guidance are:steps and approaches for conducting an AA;tools and methods for completing these steps;approaches for collecting relevant data; anddetails on reporting requirements under the SCP programme.
According to the agency, the SCP programme employs a lifecycle perspective, and therefore encompasses a broad range of considerations that manufacturers should factor into their evaluation of alternatives.
These factors go “beyond traditional product performance and price considerations toward a more comprehensive cost and effectiveness evaluation that includes health, safety and environmental considerations throughout a product’s lifecycle,” it says.
Listed in the guidance document are dozens of considerations for AAs. These include:adverse environmental impacts (for example effects on air or water quality, ecological impacts);adverse human health effects (such as carcinogenicity, developmental toxicity);environmental fate (for example bioaccumulation, biodegradability, persistence); andphysical chemical hazards (for example flammability, combustion).
The draft also calls for consideration of exposure pathways, economic effects, and the product's performance and functionality.
Initial priority products proposed by the agency are:paint strippers with methylene chloride;spray polyurethane foam with unreacted MDI; andchildren's foam-padded sleeping products with flame retardants TDCPP or TCEP.
Once the proposed priority products are finalised through a formal rulemaking – expected next year – manufacturers or trade groups will have 180 days to submit a draft AA, and must have a finalised analysis within a year. Final AAs will be subject to public comment.
The draft guidance covers the first stage of an AA's development. A draft document for the second stage is expected in December.
Comments on the proposed guide are due by 23 October. The DTSC asks respondents “to provide the names of tools, methods, approaches, and data sources not already mentioned, as well as examples for steps and approaches to complete an AA.”

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A Chemistry Test for Public Safety

Sep 25, 2015 | UCLA Newsroom

By Dan Gordon

An estimated 80,000 chemical substances currently find their way into our environment through industrial and agricultural waste, as well as through food additives, pesticides, pharmaceuticals and personal care products. But even as companies continue to produce new chemical compounds at a rapid clip, toxicologists and state and federal regulators agree that conventional approaches to testing chemical safety have significant limitations.
“When we say chemicals in the environment are safe, that’s only within the context of what has been studied,” said Patrick Allard, assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences in the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health. "But what has been studied is only the tip of the iceberg — there is still a great deal of uncertainty.”
For one thing, he explained, in the United States approximately 60,000 chemicals were grandfathered in, exempting them from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) testing by the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976. Moreover, Allard noted, while chemical companies are now required to test new compounds before introducing them into the environment, the limits of the old toxicology testing tools leave many unanswered questions about their safety.
“The tests that currently exist can accurately determine whether chemical compounds have the potential to cause genetic damage or cancer,” Allard said. “But when it comes to determining the effects on more complex concerns like reproduction and aging, this is where the technology lags. The current tests are time-consuming, expensive, and involve the use of many rodents and other vertebrate animals at a time when some are rethinking the current approach to animal testing. What we need are tests that do not require such animals, are inexpensive, and will give us quick and accurate answers about the safety of what we are about to release into the environment.”
By applying state-of-the-art automated technologies from genetics and other biological fields to issues of toxicity, particularly pertaining to reproduction, Allard and his Fielding school laboratory colleagues have developed an approach to chemical toxicology testing that addresses the key shortcomings of the conventional methods. Allard’s approach uses C. elegans — tiny worms that have been used as model organisms for research in genetics and developmental biology, both because they share many reproductive processes with humans and because they reproduce rapidly. In a 2013 study with researchers at the EPA, Allard applied his method to the screening of pesticides and showed that using C. elegans for toxicity screens resulted in high rates of accuracy for predicting the reproductive toxicity of chemical compounds in mammals.
“With this approach we can now simultaneously screen hundreds of compounds for their toxicity to the reproductive process, which can help to prioritize the chemicals that need further analysis,” Allard said. “Beyond that, once we find compounds that are repro-toxic, we can look further into the stages of reproduction that are affected, and how they are affected.”
Allard has applied the new approach to the study of bisphenol A (BPA), a compound found in items such as polycarbonate bottles, soda cans and cash register receipts, and bisphenol S (BPS), a very similar compound that is increasingly used as a replacement in “BPA-free” products because of concerns about BPA’s toxicity. Allard and others have previously shown that BPA alters processes important for reproduction, but little is known about the toxicity of BPS.
With one of his Ph.D. students, Yichang Chen, Allard has found BPS to be as repro-toxic as BPA in C. elegans — although the toxic effect occurs through different genetic mechanisms.
Allard explained that the tools he has developed are not intended for his lab alone. “Our goal is to create technologies that will assist government and the chemical industry and improve the public’s health,” he said. “With these types of studies, we hope to show that an alternative model such as ours is worth the investment.”
For the work that he and his team have done on preventing adverse health effects from environmental exposure, Allard recently received a 2015 Innovation in Regulatory Science Award from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, an independent private foundation dedicated to advancing the biomedical sciences by supporting research and other scientific and educational activities. Allard also received the 2015 International ToxScholar Grant from the Society of Toxicology.

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Senators Eye TSCA Reform Bill Revisions To Boost Democratic Support

Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Bridget DiCosmo

Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM), sponsor of legislation to overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), is weighing requests from other Democratic senators including Ed Markey (D-MA) on possible amendments to the bill that could help boost its backing from the Senate minority and potentially secure a filibuster-proof level of support.
"Sen. Markey has approached Sen. Udall on the issue and Sen. Udall is open to accommodating any changes that can help grow support for the bill, while retaining the bipartisan support it has," a Udall spokeswoman says. At press time the bill, S. 697, had the backing of 31 Republicans and 23 Democrats, including Udall.
One chemical industry source says there have been talks with the bill's leaders, including Republican Sen. David Vitter (LA), on a possible manager's amendment. The hope of those talks is that "some additional discussion could get some additional Democrats -- not only votes, but sponsors," the source says.
The most recent Democrat to sign on as a co-sponsor of the bill was Sen. Tammy Baldwin (WI) on July 16, while the most recent GOP co-sponsors were Sens. Lamar Alexander (TN) and Deb Fischer (NE) on Sept. 22. The legislation would reform the 1976 TSCA, which many stakeholders say needs to be overhauled to give EPA new authority to address risks from existing chemicals in the marketplace, among other changes.
Proponents of the pending reform bill, S. 697, are weighing a floor vote for the measure in October that they believe could secure more than 70 votes, easily enough to overcome a potential filibuster threat from some Democrats, such as Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), who continue to have significant concerns about the legislation. Given that there are 54 Republican senators, securing more support from Democrats will be vital to hit that target.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), a sponsor of the S. 697 bill, told a keynote address to the Environmental Council of the States' fall meeting Sept. 2 in Newport, R.I. that the bill should get "north of 70 votes."
Earlier this year, Democratic Sens. Whitehouse, Jeff Merkley (OR) and Cory Booker (NJ) worked with the bill's lead sponsors Vitter and Udall on legislative revisions that included allowing states to be co-enforcers of chemical regulations and modifying the factors for when EPA designates a chemical as a "high priority."
The changes have not been enough to win over Boxer, ranking member of the Environment & Public Works Committee (EPW). The senator has said she opposes the bill because of its sweeping preemption of state chemical programs and other provisions, and has vowed a filibuster to try and block it clearing the Senate.
But the bill's supporters believe they have enough votes to overcome a filibuster should Boxer follow through on her threat. "I suspect [the final support] will be well north of 60 votes," the industry source says.
To help reach that level of backing, Udall appears willing to consider further changes to the bill. A second industry source says that Sens. Markey and Dick Durbin (D-IL) -- who has long advocated TSCA reform but is not a sponsor of S. 697 -- have a "few amendments" crafted in discussions with Udall and environmentalists. "I have not seen the language but have been told that they are 'technical corrections," the source says.
Spokespeople for Markey and Durbin did not respond to requests for comment by press time.
Pending Legislation
S. 697 cleared EPW in a 15-5 vote following an April 28 markup, with Sens. Boxer, Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Markey, Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Benjamin Cardin (D-MD) voting against the legislation.
None of those senators have subsequently co-sponsored the bill, though Markey's staff have outlined potential changes that, if adopted, could lead the senator to support it. Those revisions include increasing industry funding for EPA chemical assessments and speeding agency reviews of certain substances.
Markey's environmental policy advisor Michael Freedhoff told a July 27 forum at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., that the senator wants the legislation revised to set an $18 million cap on industry funding of EPA chemical reviews, and to tighten a seven-year window for EPA reviews of persistent, bio-accumulative and toxic chemicals (PBTs) for which risks are already well understood.
Freedhoff also said concerns remain with S. 697 and a competing House measure about the scope of federal preemption of state laws and how compromises on that issue will be implemented. For Markey, a remaining concern on preemption is ensuring states are not preempted by federal chemical restrictions that may not take effect for years.
Vitter and Udall have indicated that while they will allow some amendments when the bill goes to a floor vote in the coming weeks, they oppose major changes that could cost the bill its broad bipartisan support.
Sources have said that October may be the target for a floor vote, and Udall said in a statement to Inside EPA, "I'm in regular communication with Senate leadership, and there absolutely is time in the calendar to take up TSCA reform." Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has been "very encouraging," and the bill's leaders are "continuing to work with any senators who want to have a constructive contribution on improvements to our bill," Udall says.
McConnell's office did not respond to a request for comment by press time.
Conference Committee
Even if the Senate holds a successful floor vote on S. 697 in October, lawmakers will still have to hold a conference committee to resolve differences between the bill and the narrower House bill, H.R. 2576. That measure cleared the House in a 398-1 vote in late June.
Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL), who authored the House legislation, previously said that the two chambers will eventually hold "staff to staff meetings" to discuss the bills and options, including "informal conference, negotiating on the same bill, [or] formal conference."
The eventual conference talks could include discussion of some of the lingering concerns advocates have about TSCA reform, including criticisms of various provisions in S. 697.
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) -- which has not endorsed the Senate bill -- is highlighting language in the legislation that it says would weaken EPA's authority to identify uses of chemicals of concern in everyday products. NRDC also warns the language could weaken the agency's power to prevent such substances' importation from overseas, saying President Obama should veto the bill if the language is not removed.
"The current provision creates additional legal hurdles before EPA can require notification about products that contain toxic chemicals the agency believes could harm public health or the environment," under its significant new use rule (SNUR) authority, writes Daniel Rosenberg, NRDC senior attorney, in a Sept. 16 blog post.
Under current TSCA authority, EPA issues SNURs to require notice at least 90 days before a new use of a chemical is adopted, which gives EPA an opportunity to obtain more information if necessary and make a decision whether limitations should be imposed on the production or use of the chemical.
"The new provision goes well beyond these general factors for consideration, and imposes a new limitation on EPA -- that it cannot impose a significant new use reporting requirement on an article being imported or processed in the U.S. unless the Administrator makes 'an affirmative finding' that 'the reasonable potential for exposure to the chemical substance through the article or category of articles subject to the rule warrants notification,'" Rosenberg wrote.

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Energy and Environment News

Hatch, McCaskill Float Bill to Ease Ozone Compliance

Sep 25, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard

By Alex Guillen

Sens. Orrin Hatch and Claire McCaskill Thursday introduced legislation that would allow cities to enter “early action compacts” with EPA over ozone emissions.
Such compacts would keep those areas from being categorized as out of attainment with a national ozone standard, a designation that could threaten major industrial and transportation expansion in those areas.
The areas would have to meet certain standards under the early action compacts, which would allow cities to use "locally crafted solutions to improve air quality so that they can comply with federal standards," Hatch said in a statement.
EPA previously used EACs from 2002 to 2007, but stopped after a federal court said the agency had gone beyond its authority under the Clean Air Act. Thirteen of the 14 areas that drew up compacts improved their air quality and avoided a non-attainment designation, according to Hatch’s office.
EPA is expected to set a new ozone standard by Oct. 1. Last year it proposed lowering the standard from 75 parts per billion to 65-70 ppb.

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Groups Urge Court to Keep EPA Air Rule in Place

Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Regulation

By Lydia Wheeler

Groups are urging the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to leave the Obama administration’s landmark air quality rule in place.
The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) filed a joint motion with the state of Massachusetts on Thursday asking the court to let the Environment Protection Agency’s (EPA) first-ever limits on mercury, arsenic and acid gases emitted by coal-fired power plants stand while it rehears a case challenging the rule.
In June, a sharply divided Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the agency should have taken into account the costs to utilities and others in the power sector before even deciding whether to set limits for the toxic air pollutants it regulated in 2011 and remanded the case back to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Now the nation’s second-most powerful court must decide whether to keep the standards in place while the EPA responds to the Supreme Court's ruling.
“Vacating the rule would be profoundly disruptive, creating and exacerbating significant hazards to public health and the environment and disrupting the administration of other vital air and water pollution control programs,” the motion from the EDF said.
Power companies, including Calpine Corporation, Exelon Corporation, National Grid Generation LLC and Public Service Enterprise Group Inc., also filed a joint motion Thursday in support of leaving the standards in place. The companies said their compliance costs are actually lower than what the EPA had predicted.
The EDF said the pollutants the EPA is trying to regulate are dangerous to human health even in small doses. The group said mercury can cause brain damage in children, metal toxics like chromium and nickel can cause cancer and acid gases can lead to respiratory problems.
“EPA has ample information to swiftly address the court’s ruling while ensuring that these vital clean air safeguards are carried out without delay,” Graham McCahan, EDF’s senior attorney, said in a news release.

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The Connection Between Cleaner Air and Longer Lives

Sep 25, 2015 | The New York Times

By Michael Greenstone

Back in 1970, Los Angeles was known as the smog capital of the world — a notorious example of industrialization largely unfettered by regard for health or the environment. Heavy pollution drove up respiratory and heart problems and shortened lives.
But 1970 was also the year the environmental movement held the first Earth Day and when, 45 years ago this month, Congress passed a powerful update of the Clean Air Act. (Soon after, it was signed by President Richard Nixon, and it was followed by the formation of the Environmental Protection Agency and passage of the Clean Water Act, making him one of the most important, though underappreciated, environmentalists in American history.)
Since that time, the Clean Air Act has repeatedly been challenged as costly and unnecessary. As a fightbrews over President Obama’snew use of the law to addressglobal warming, it’s worth re-examining the vast difference the law has already made in the quality of the air we breathe, and in the length of our lives.
Numerous studies have found that the Clean Air Act has substantially improved air quality and averted tens of thousands of premature deathsfrom heart and respiratory disease. Here, I offer new estimates of the gains in life expectancy due to the improvement in air quality since 1970 — based on observations from the current “smog capital” of the world, China. (To learn more about how this was calculated, click here.)
For several decades starting in the 1950s, China’s government gave residents in the northern half of the country free coal for winter heating, effectively creating a natural experiment in the health impact of pollution. My colleagues and I recently compared pollution and mortality rates between the north and south of China and calculated the toll of airborne particulate matter, widely believed to be the most harmful form of air pollution, on life expectancy.
Applying that formula to E.P.A. particulate data from 1970 to 2012 yields striking results for American cities.Continue reading the main storyBiggest Winners of Clean Air Act
By reducing particulate pollution, the Clean Air Act added years to the lives of Americans.Calculated gain in life expectancy, metro areasWeirton, W. Va.Wichita, Kan.PhoenixNew Castle, Pa.Mobile, Ala.Youngstown, Pa.Chattanooga, Tenn.Pueblo, Colo.Kingsport, Tenn.Birmingham, Ala.5.24.33.93.93.93.43.02.92.92.8Estimates of three life-years saved per 100 microgram decrease of total suspended particles per cubic meter. Michael Greenstone; E.P.A.
In Los Angeles, particulate pollution has declined by more than half since 1970. The average Angeleno lives about a year and eight months longer. Residents of New York and Chicago have gained about two years on average. With more than 42 million people currently living in these three metropolitan areas, the total gains in life expectancy add up quickly.
But some of the greatest improvements occurred in smaller towns and cities where heavy industries appeared to operate with few restrictions on pollution.
In 1970, the Weirton, W.Va.–Steubenville, Ohio, metropolitan area had particulate concentrations similar to current-day Beijing. A child born there today can expect to live about five years longer than one born in 1970.
More than 200 million people currently live in places monitored for particulates in 1970 and today. (The E.P.A. focuses on the most heavily populated or polluted areas of the country, which is why these calculations exclude approximately 115 million people.) On average, these people can expect to live an additional 1.6 years, for a total gain of more than 336 million life-years.
Not all of these benefits came from Clean Air Act regulations. Other factors include local regulations and the shifting of relatively dirty industries abroad. But the Clean Air Act was a primary cause.
The history and impact of the Clean Air Act can serve as a valuable case study for countries that are struggling today with the extraordinary pollution that we once faced. In Northern China, where pollution is curtailing lives by an average of five years, the government has at last declared a “war on pollution.” While enforcement is not perfect, the government has improved transparency and amended environmental protection laws to impose stricter punishments against polluters.
In India, pollution is abridging the average person’s life by about three years. But the growing outrage has not yet coalesced into forceful action, although it’s possible that pressure to take steps against climate changewill also have an effect on improving air quality.
The hundreds of millions of life-years saved from improved air quality in our country didn’t happen by accident or overnight. This happened because a collective voice for change brought about one of the most influential laws of the land.
As the United States and other nations continue to debate the costs of environmental regulation, they can do so with the knowledge that the benefits can be substantial. As proof, we need look no further than the five extra years residents of Weirton-Steubenville are living and the hundreds of millions of years gained by Americans throughout the nation.
Michael Greenstone, the Milton Friedman professor of economics at the University of Chicago, runs the Energy Policy Institute there.

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Industry, States Ask Court to Scrap MATS Rule

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Amanda Reilly and Robin Bravender

Several states and industry groups yesterday asked a federal court to toss out the Obama administration's landmark standards for reducing mercury pollution at coal-fired power plants.
Led by White Stallion Energy Center LLC and the state of Michigan, the parties argued that a Supreme Court decision earlier this year rendered the standards illegal.
In a 5-4 ruling in June, the high court sent the standards back to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, finding that EPA should have considered costs when it found that it was "appropriate and necessary" to regulate hazardous emissions from power plants.
"An agency's rule cannot continue to have the force of law, imposing binding obligations on private citizens, when it has been declared unlawful," the industry parties wrote in a motion filed yesterday.
The Obama administration and its allies from states and green groups, meanwhile, urged the appeals court yesterday to keep the rule in place while allowing EPA to address the problems flagged in the Supreme Court's ruling.
EPA issued the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or MATS, in December 2011 to require coal-burning power plants to reduce emissions of mercury, lead, arsenic and other hazardous air pollutants. Coal plants are the country's largest emitters of mercury, and EPA said that MATS would prevent 11,000 premature deaths a year and yield up to $90 billion in health benefits.
Although EPA considered costs later in the regulatory process, the agency relied only on a public health analysis when determining that power plants emissions should be regulated in the first place.
In their brief asking the court to completely scrap MATS, industry and the states argued that the Supreme Court had unequivocally ruled that EPA exceeded its authority under the Clean Air Act when it issued the mercury standards.
EPA, they said, "failed to answer the threshold question Congress directed it to consider before regulating the emission of hazardous air pollutants from power plants: Is such regulation worth it -- that is, are the benefits of regulation worth the costs?"
Nearly 20 states -- Texas, Utah, Oklahoma, South Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Nebraska, Missouri, Mississippi, Kentucky, Kansas, Indiana, Idaho, Arkansas, Arizona, Alaska and Alabama -- joined Michigan and White Stallion in the request. Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad (R), Oak Grove Management Company LLC, the Gulf Coast Lignite Coalition and the National Mining Association also joined the motion.
To support their request, states and industry noted that EPA mostly relied on co-benefits -- health benefits not directly attributable to reductions in mercury -- to come up with its estimate that the rule would yield billions of dollars in benefits.
The groups argued that removing those co-benefits resulted in a "gross imbalance" between the benefits of the rule and its expected cost of $9.6 billion a year.
"Despite this gross imbalance of costs and benefits, EPA refused to consider costs when making the initial decision whether to regulate," their motion says. "Instead, the agency found regulation was 'appropriate' because power plants' remaining emissions of hazardous air pollutants pose hazards to public health and the environment and because controls are available to address those hazards."
Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association Inc., a small generation company that operates a coal-fired power plant in Colorado, filed a separate motion yesterday asking the court to throw out the rule. Tri-State also asked the court to suspend requirements for power plants that had asked for a one-year extension from the original compliance deadline of April 2015 in the event that MATS is left in place.
A separate group of industry intervenors in the case that includes geothermal power producer Calpine Corp. and Exelon Corp. instead urged the court to leave the rule in place. EPA, the companies said, had already collected "considerable information" about costs and benefits of the rule.
Eliminating the rule, the firms said, would have "disruptive consequences" for the electric power industry given the "substantial" investments companies have made to comply with the rule.EPA warns vacatur would be dangerous, disruptive
EPA yesterday asked the appeals court to keep the rule in place while it tweaks its rule on an "expedited basis" to address the Supreme Court's "limited holding."
Keeping the mercury rule in place, the administration argued, would "preserve the important public health and environmental benefits achieved by the rule, and avoid regulatory uncertainty and significant complications for other important EPA programs, without significant disruptive consequences for regulated sources."
Although the Supreme Court found that EPA failed to consider costs when the agency determined that it was "appropriate and necessary" to regulate hazardous air emissions from power plants, EPA argued that the existing record for the rule contains extensive documentation about the costs of compliance. Based on the cost data that's already available, the agency believes there is a "serious possibility" that EPA will reaffirm its finding.
EPA also said it intends to wrap up its consideration of costs as close to April 15, 2016, as possible.
The agency also argued that the health and environmental consequences of gutting the rule would be dire, including "extremely dangerous" threats posed by mercury to children and developing fetuses. Vacating the rule would additionally have "significant disruptive consequences" for regulated industries, the administration said.
EPA's state and environmental backers also pressed the court to keep the rule in place while sending it back to the agency for a quick fix.
"Vacating the rule would be profoundly disruptive, creating and exacerbating significant hazards to public health and the environment and disrupting the administration of other vital air and water pollution control programs," EPA's supporters told the appeals court.
That brief was filed by a coalition including Massachusetts, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Baltimore, Chicago and the District of Columbia. Among the other groups that submitted the brief were the American Lung Association, Environment America, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club.

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Public Health Groups Make Late Push for Tighter Ozone Limit

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Amanda Reilly

Public health advocates this week made a last-minute plea for a more stringent national ozone standard as U.S. EPA nears an Oct. 1 court-ordered deadline to choose a final new limit for the air pollutant.
In a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, the American Thoracic Society and New York University's Marron Institute of Urban Management urged the administration to lower the national standard from its current level of 75 parts per billion to 60 ppb -- the low end of the range recommended by EPA's scientific advisers.
According to the groups, a 60 ppb standard would prevent 6,408 premature deaths annually compared with current ground-level ozone concentrations.
"Administrator McCarthy, the fate of thousands of lives annually rests on your decision," ATS and the NYU institute wrote in the letter dated Wednesday and circulated late yesterday.
Ground-level ozone is a key component of smoggy air that's formed when nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds react in the presence of sunlight.
EPA last November proposed to tighten the standard to between 65 and 70 ppb based on a review of public health data but said it would take comment on a level as low as 60 ppb. The agency's final rule is at the White House Office of Management and Budget for interagency review.
According to the letter from the public health advocates, a 70 ppb standard would result in 3,752 more premature deaths a year than a 60 ppb limit.
"The lives of 3,700 Americans are too important for EPA to ignore," ATS and the NYU institute wrote.
The Los Angeles area stands to gain the most from a 60 ppb standard when considering avoided premature deaths, according to the groups. A 60 ppb limit would prevent 619 deaths in the area compared with current ozone concentrations, the groups said.
ATS and the institute told McCarthy they planned to soon release a more detailed report on potential lives saved by a tighter ozone standard. The report is unique from EPA's estimates of the benefits of a tighter standard, they said, because it does not taken into account reductions in ozone caused by other air regulations.
Business and industry groups have waged an aggressive campaign against a tighter standard, warning of potential high compliance costs.

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State Air Officials Seek Prompt Implementation Guide For EPA Ozone Rule

Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Stuart Parker

A group representing air regulators from 18 states is urging EPA to promptly issue guidance on how states should implement the agency's pending revision to its ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS), highlighting concerns among the states about a potential stricter standard and new regulatory burdens it could trigger.
In a September survey, the Association of Air Pollution Control Agencies (AAPCA) shows that at least 19 states in their individual comments to EPA on the proposed tougher ozone standard want EPA to propose implementing measures at the same time it issues its final NAAQS rule -- though the agency's NAAQS guidance often lags long behind a NAAQS update.
EPA must decide by an Oct. 1 judicial deadline whether to tighten the existing 2008 ozone standard of 75 parts per billion (ppb) down to a proposed limit within the range of 65 to 70 ppb. Industry and GOP lawmakers oppose a stricter limit, while environmentalists are pushing for an even stricter standard of 60 ppb.
Once EPA finalizes the standard it will then move to designating areas as either in attainment or nonattainment with the NAAQS. Areas exceeding the standard must then craft state implementation plans (SIPs) outlining the pollution controls they will impose on industrial sources of ozone-forming pollutants in order to cut emissions and attain the NAAQS. Industry warns these controls are costly and hurt the economy in nonattainment areas.
An important part of the process of SIP development and implementing the NAAQS is EPA's formal guidance detailing technical requirements, allowable SIP measures, and other aspects of the standard.
State regulators have often complained previously of long delays in EPA's issuance of implementation measures for its six NAAQS. For example, the National Association of Clean Air Agencies (NACAA) -- a larger group representing state and local air regulators, many not part of AAPCA -- in its March 23 comments on EPA's then-draft National Program Manager budget guidance called for faster issuance of implementation rules.
"NACAA has commented to EPA, in comments on the proposed ozone NAAQS, that any final ozone NAAQS revision be accompanied by the proposed implementation rule . . . and that the final implementation rule be promulgated no later than one year after that," the group said.
For the ozone standard, the states surveyed by AAPCA differed on how quickly EPA should finalize an implementation rule, with their responses ranging from within one year of proposal, to issuance with final nonattainment area designations that are due within three years of a new standard being adopted.
If states do not have implementation rules from EPA, they cannot design their SIPs or be confident that EPA will approve those plans, state regulators have said.
However, EPA air officials have indicated that the agency will again not contemporaneously issue implementation rules for any revised NAAQS, including the ozone rule.
At an April 22 meeting of the Clean Air Act Advisory Committee in Arlington, VA, EPA's Anna Marie Wood said it would be "nearly impossible" to issue implementation guidance at the same time as the ozone NAAQS, and EPA instead aims to issue the rule within two years of the new standard.
In part, this is because EPA needs to know what the standard is in order to craft appropriate implementation guidance, Wood said. EPA has already indicated that the implementation guidance for the current 2008 ozone NAAQS of 75 ppb will to a large degree serve as a template for future ozone guidance, however, which should speed drafting of new a implementation rule.

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House Passes NEPA Fast-Track Review Bill

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Kevin Bogardus

The House today passed legislation that would speed up environmental reviews.
H.R. 348, or the "Responsibly and Professionally Invigorating Development (RAPID) Act of 2015," would establish hard deadlines for proposed energy and infrastructure projects that undergo National Environmental Policy Act reviews.
The bill passed 233-170 on a largely partisan vote in the lower chamber. Only seven Democrats ended up voting for the legislation.
The RAPID Act, sponsored by Rep. Tom Marino (R-Pa.), has been part of a package of bills pushed by Republicans that take aim at the Obama administration's regulatory authority. Democrats as well as environmental and public interest groups have blasted the bills as weakening key protections for public health and safety.
Republicans touted the legislation on the House floor today before the House approved it. Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said the RAPID Act would help get construction workers in need of work back on the job.
"It is exactly what our private- and public-sector leaders have called for. It is what millions of American workers yearning for new work and higher wages need," Goodlatte said.
GOP lawmakers also toughened up the legislation's anti-regulatory stance.
Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) offered an amendment that would ban agencies from using draft NEPA guidance issued by the White House Council on Environmental Quality. The document has angered Republicans because it calls on agencies to consider climate change as part of their NEPA reviews.
The Arizona lawmaker said his "common-sense" measure would protect jobs by stopping agencies from "being forced to follow job-killing and unlawful draft guidances" that lead to cap-and-trade mandates.
In response, Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) read an excerpt from Pope Francis' address to Congress yesterday in which he discussed lawmakers' responsibility to stop the destruction of the environment.
"I take that call by our pope very seriously," Dingell said. "By considering this bill and this amendment, Congress is not playing a constructive role."
Democrats' opposition to Gosar's amendment, however, was not enough to stop it; the provision passed the House on a 223-186 vote.
Several amendments offered by Democrats to change the bill fell flat on the House floor.
One measure, offered by Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.), would have struck the bill's language that stops agencies from using the social cost of carbon in their environmental reviews.
"My amendment rejects the false choice between a prosperous economy and a healthy climate. We can and we must have both," Peters said.
Marino opposed the amendment, calling the social cost of carbon rule "junk science."
"Its political function being to make renewable energy look like a bargain at any price and fossil energy look unaffordable no matter how cheap," Marino said.
Peters' amendment failed in a 179-229 vote.
Marino's bill also found success last year. The House passed the legislation in March 2014 (E&ENews PM, March 6, 2014).
The RAPID Act, however, will likely not go much further than the House this Congress. Last week, the White House issued a veto threat against the legislation (E&E Daily, Sept. 17).

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Ozone Lobbying Ramps Up As EPA Prepares To Issue Stricter Air Standard

Sep 25, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Stuart Parker

Public health advocates, industry groups and others are ramping up lobbying trying to sway EPA on the outcome of its imminent decision on whether to make its ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) stricter, with the agency widely expected to tighten the existing 75 parts per billion (ppb) limit down to at least 70 ppb.
Ahead of an Oct. 1 judicial deadline for issuing a final revised standard, various groups have been holding 11th-hour meetings with EPA and White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB) officials on the rule.
The final updated ozone NAAQS has been undergoing mandatory White House pre-publication review since Aug. 28. President Obama recently acknowledged concerns raised by Republicans and industry organizations that a stricter standard could cause major costs by placing many areas out of attainment with the limit. Those areas would have to then impose potentially costly pollution controls on industrial sources of ozone-forming air pollution.
But Obama in his Sept. 16 remarks to the Business Roundtable in Washington, D.C., also noted the situation is "complicated" because EPA by law cannot consider costs when deciding the level of a NAAQS.
And the agency appears all but guaranteed to issue a final revised air standard that is more stringent than the 75 ppb limit established in 2008. EPA's Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) said a standard in the range between 60 ppb and 70 ppb is necessary to meet a Clean Air Act mandate that the NAAQS be requisite to protect public health with an adequate margin of safety, though the agency proposed a limit in the 65 ppb-70 ppb range.
In Sept. 22 remarks to a Wall Street Journal event in Washington, D.C., EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy acknowledged that CASAC advised her on "what they thought the levels ought to be." When the agency releases the final standard, she said, "I think people will see we did the job we were supposed to do."
Industry sources have said the final NAAQS EPA sent for OMB review leans toward a 70 ppb limit, while the White House Council on Environmental Quality is said to favor a stricter 68 ppb standard.
Either value would be toward the top of the 65 ppb-70 ppb EPA proposed in November, and at the high end of CASAC's recommended 60 ppb-70 ppb range. Environmentalists are arguing that only a standard as low as 60 ppb would satisfy the air law mandate of protecting public health with an adequate margin of safety -- though it is unclear whether they would sue over a 70 ppb limit, and federal courts often defer to EPA on setting the level of the NAAQS.
EPA must set the standard based solely on its review of science on a criteria pollutant's adverse impacts on public health and the environment, though it can consider costs when writing rules to implement a NAAQS.
Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chair of the Science, Space & Technology Committee, sent Sept. 24 letters to EPA and the White House seeking more details on the alleged disagreement on where to set the NAAQS.
Environmentalists' Push
Environmentalists in their last-minute meetings with EPA and OMB officials, and in recent public remarks, argue that these legal restrictions mean the agency must set a standard as strict as 60 ppb.
Natural Resources Defense Council attorney John Walke told a Sept. 16 event in Washington, D.C., hosted by think tank OurEnergyPolicy.Org that "setting the standard at 70 [ppb] would be an utter failure of responsibility and leadership. It would leave thousands more Americans losing their lives, and hundreds of thousands more suffering asthma attacks than setting a safe health standard based upon the medical science that goes beyond that business-as-usual status quo." A 70 ppb limit would require little additional regulatory effort to meet, he said.
Walke also noted that Obama in 2011 forced EPA to drop a discretionary tightening of the standard down to 70 ppb, which the president at the time justified as necessary for regulatory certainty given that the Clean Air Act mandates a NAAQS review every five years and the ozone review was at the time due in 2013.
Environmentalists criticized Obama's decision then, and Walke at the event asked, "Will the White House decide that that is the controversy they want to remind the public of and court a second controversy, leaving a legacy of unsafe air when it leaves office at the end of its second term?"
Groups in favor of an ozone standard as strict as 60 ppb have met with OMB or at press time planned to meet with administration officials to renew their calls for a stringent limit.
For example, the Sierra Club and Environmental Defense Fund met with EPA and OMB officials Sept. 24 and the American Academy of Pediatrics has a meeting set for Sept. 28.
Organizations that have already held meetings include several different regional branches of the American Lung Association on various dates, the American Thoracic Society on Sept. 15, and the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management, representing air regulators in the Northeast, on Sept. 22.
Industry's Opposition
Industry groups remain vehemently opposed to any tightening of the NAAQS, saying the science does not support a tougher limit and warning of catastrophic consequences resulting from more onerous emissions limits that would stifle economic growth. Areas in nonattainment must impose costly pollution controls on industry, or limit industrial expansion, or face the ultimate sanction of losing federal highway funds.
The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) continues an advertising campaign in several states, warning of the adverse impact of a tougher ozone limit.
And the American Petroleum Institute (API) has produced new estimates of the number of areas that would for the first time find themselves in nonattainment, showing that the impact of a NAAQS at 70 ppb appears far less severe than one set at 65 ppb. Nonetheless, API continues to insist that no tightening of the standard is warranted.
On a conference call with reporters Sept. 18, API official Howard Feldman said that at 75 ppb there will be some 217 counties in nonattainment. With a 70 ppb standard, that number would swell to 958, and at 65 ppb increase to 1433 counties. Tightening the standard would "significantly chill economic activity," Feldman claimed.
Asked about impact on the oil and gas production sector, Feldman said API does not have quantitative estimates, but can state qualitatively that the tougher the standard, the greater the adverse impact on drilling. Some areas of the country that have seen a boom in drilling would be facing nonattainment for the first time, especially in the mountainous West, where high altitude combines with ozone-forming air pollution and emissions from outside the country to form ozone.
Feldman noted that peak "background" ozone levels in this area can reach or exceed ozone levels within EPA's proposed range for the new NAAQS. State air regulators and industry cannot control background and hence cannot meet the standards where background exceeds the NAAQS level.
Industry sources argue that EPA's rule allowing regulatory exemptions for areas experiencing "exceptional" events such as wildfires will not be sufficient to compensate for high background ozone.
API's Feldman said he would meet with OMB and EPA on Sept. 25, while other industry groups opposed to a stricter standard have already met, or will meet, with administration officials. Those organizations include the Independent Petroleum Association of America at a Sept. 22 meeting, NAM at a Sept. 16 meeting, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce at a Sept. 15 meeting, energy company Phillips 66 at a Sept. 11 meeting, the American Forest and Paper Association at a Sept. 10 meeting and the industry NAAQS Implementation Coalition at a Sept. 8 meeting.
Upcoming Meetings
More meetings are scheduled, including for the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), which at press time was slated to meet with OMB Sept. 25. AFPM, representing the refining sector, was one group that participated in the Sept. 16 OurEnergyPolicy.Org event. Sarah Magruder Lyle, representing AFPM, warned at the event that, "At the proposed [NAAQS] level, I can tell you what will happen. Manufacturing will leave this country once again, as it did previously. There will be no refining expansions. There will be no additional petrochemical facilities."
Magruder Lyle warned that tougher ozone standards would increase energy costs to consumers, in part through restrictions on refining and manufacturing industry, and in part through reduced oil and gas production. "Six out of seven of the most productive shale plays in the country that have accounted [for] close to 100% of domestic natural gas production over the last three years will be unable to meet the proposed more stringent ozone rule. In many of those places, energy is their largest industry. And in some places, it's their only industry," she said.
Obama in his recent remarks to the Business Roundtable stressed the legal constraints EPA is working under in developing a NAAQS rule. Obama described the "fairly stringent statutory guidelines by which the EPA is supposed to evaluate the standards," adding that "EPA is following the science and the statutes as best as it can."
Obama said that he had recognized "some of the concerns" of states and municipalities faced with potentially tougher rules over "legitimate economic issues that have to be considered."
But he also said that, "Even with the costs associated with implementing the ozone rule, when you do a cost-benefit, the amount of lives saved, asthma averted and do forth is still substantially higher than the costs." The costs of the rule are fiercely contested, with a much-publicized analysis by economic consulting firm NERA, commissioned by NAM, putting the figure as high as $140 billion in lost economic output.
A Sept. 15 report by consultants Synapse Energy Economics, sponsored by public health advocates, says the NERA study is flawed. "Synapse reviewed NERA's report on behalf of Earthjustice and found that it grossly overstates compliance costs due to major flaws, math errors, and unfounded assumptions in NERA's analyses," the firm says.

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Senate Dems Tell Obama to End Arctic Drilling

Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

Some Senate Democrats are once again asking President Obama to end oil and natural gas drilling in the Arctic Ocean.
In a letter Friday, 12 senators asked Obama to block any additional drilling after Royal Dutch Shell wraps up its exploratory drilling in the Chukchi Sea, northwest of Alaska, this fall.
They also press Obama to explain how Arctic drilling fits within his climate policies, a question they said he has failed to answer thus far.
“You have stated many times that America must reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and build our capacity for clean, renewable energy,” the Dems wrote.
“Allowing Shell to expand fossil fuel drilling in the Arctic is incompatible with this imperative and with your commitment that the United States will lead the global effort to address climate change.”
They also cited the risks of an oil spill to the wildlife, natural resources and nearby native communities as further reasons to stop drilling.
“We urge you to change course, and ask for your critical leadership on international Arctic Ocean protection,” they said.
Democrats had pressed Obama multiple times to reject Shell’s drilling application, for which it received approval in May.
Since then, they have repeatedly pushed Obama to change course.
“We continue to hope the administration will reverse its policy to promote drilling in the Arctic,” they said in their Friday letter. “In the meantime, we are concerned that no one has responded to the concerns we raised in our previous letters.”
The letter was signed by Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), Jeff Merkley (Ore.), Patrick Leahy (Vt.), Ben Cardin (Md.), Bernie Sanders (Vt.), Al Franken (Minn.), Richard Blumenthal (Conn.), Brian Schatz (Hawaii), Martin Heinrich (N.M.), Ed Markey (Mass.), Cory Booker (N.J.) and Gary Peters (Mich.).

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House Expected to Pass 'Clean' Spending Bill, Avoid Shutdown

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Daniel Bush

House Speaker John Boehner's decision to retire next month should pave the way for Congress to pass a short-term funding bill next week and avoid a government shutdown, House lawmakers said today.
Lawmakers said the Ohio Republican's surprise announcement today clears a path for GOP House leaders to push through a "clean" stopgap spending bill, known as a continuing resolution, or CR, that doesn't include a provision to defund Planned Parenthood.
"I expect we'll pass a clean CR" next week, House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) told reporters.
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) echoed Rogers, saying he expects the spending measure to reach the House floor next week. "I expect that Tuesday [the Senate] will send us a bill, and I expect that bill to be clean," Hoyer said. "I would hope that we can pass that."
The House will likely pass a Senate-backed bill that would keep the government open through mid-December, instead of voting on new legislation, Rogers said.
"The likelihood is it'll be [the Senate's bill]," Rogers said.
Boehner was facing a revolt from the House GOP's conservative flank, which wants to pass a spending bill that would strip Planned Parenthood's federal funding.
But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle said they were optimistic Boehner would bring a clean CR to the floor now that he no longer has to worry about angering his GOP critics.
Averting a government shutdown would allow the country to "move beyond where we are right now, which is incredible uncertainty," New York Rep. Joseph Crowley, a member of the House Democratic leadership team, said in a brief interview.
Still, Crowley said a short-term funding bill wouldn't address a Democratic demand that Congress lift sequester-level spending caps.
"We still have to deal with the issue of sequester," Crowley said.
The Senate is scheduled to vote on its spending bill next week. The House timeline is less clear. Congress must act by Sept. 30 to stop the government from running out of funding.
Reporters Geof Koss and Hannah Northey contributed.

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14 More Jurisdictions Join International Alliance Pledging Lower Emissions

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire

By Anne C. Mulkern

Fourteen more governments, including cities, subnational governments and one nation, yesterday joined a pact agreeing to take steps striving to keep global warming's temperature rise to below 2 degrees Celsius.
The new partners included San Francisco, New York City and Italy. At a ceremony in New York City, representatives from those places and the others signed the agreement called the Under 2 MOU. California in May launched the effort with the goal of influencing U.N. negotiations in Paris.
There are now 38 jurisdictions in the alliance, representing 17 countries and five continents with a collective $8.7 trillion in gross domestic products and more than 313 million residents, California Gov. Jerry Brown's (D) office said in a statement. If the Under 2 MOU signatories represented a single country, Brown's office said, it would be the third-largest economy in the world behind China and the United States.
"This is a very significant moment," Brown said at the event in New York. "It's modest. We're mere subnational units. That's not a very glorious title. Nevertheless, there is a certain flexibility in being a state or a region." He noted that "we do have some nations" in the pact.
"This is all about the grass roots," Brown added, "or, as Pope Francis said, the periphery coming together from the far-flung regions to change the direction of the modern world."
Brown noted that the world today has been built in part with fossil fuels, which run transportation, electricity and more.
"So when we say we're going to reduce the effects and the use of fossil fuels, we're saying something radical and profound, but necessary," Brown said. Fossil fuels have helped create "new technology and communications and modern medicine."
"On the one hand, there's a shiny luster of prosperity and innovation," he said. "On the other hand, there's a dark underside. So we have to be clear about where we are as well as where we're going."
The accord commits the members to cut greenhouse gas emissions 80 to 95 percent below 1990 emissions levels by 2050, or to achieve a per-capita annual emissions target of less than 2 metric tons by 2050.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (D) said that "business as usual simply won't do when our very survival is at stake, and as local leaders, we must use all tools at hand to address climate change head-on."
"That's exactly what New York City is doing with our ambitious and necessary OneNYC, a comprehensive blueprint for a strong, sustainable, resilient, and equitable city -- including our sweeping plan to reduce emissions 80 percent by 2050," he said in a statement.
Those signing the agreement in New York were: Italy; New York City; the Azores, Portugal; Madeira, Portugal; Guédiawaye-Dakar, Senegal; the city of Nampula, Mozambique; and the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal.
Seven others signed the agreement remotely: Gifu prefecture, Japan; Mexico City; Northwest Territories, Canada; San Francisco; Ucayali, Peru; Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada; and Greater Manchester, United Kingdom.
In addition to California, founding signatories of the Under 2 MOU include: Baden-Württemberg, Germany; Baja California, Mexico; the Brazilian state of Acre; British Columbia, Canada; Catalonia, Spain; Jalisco, Mexico; Ontario, Canada; and Wales, United Kingdom. In the United States, the other founding signatories are Oregon, Vermont and Washington state.

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U.S. and China Strike Climate Deal

Sep 25, 2015 | PoliticoPro (Morning Energy)

By Eric Wolff

U.S. AND CHINA TO ANNOUNCE DETAILS OF CLIMATE DEAL: President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping will issue a joint announcement today laying out the details of a landmark climate deal between the world's two largest carbon polluters. As Pro's Andrew Restuccia reports, U.S. officials released a few details of the deal last night, including a promise by China to develop a national cap-and-trade program and to prioritize low-carbon-emitting sources in its electric dispatch. In return, the U.S. will complete new rules for heavy duty vehicles and phase down hydrofluorocarbons, a greenhouse gas that traps a lot of heat but spends less time in the atmosphere than carbon.
Paris, allons-y vite! The deal between a developed nation and a developing nation creates new momentum for an international accord in Paris. Andrew reports, "The countries have made progress in defining the different responsibilities countries will have in cutting emissions, long one of the biggest sticking points in the negotiations.... [T]he U.S. and China have come closer to agreeing broadly to a 'form of differentiation which depends on countries' actual real circumstances.' That could amount to a big breakthrough if China can convince other developing countries to follow suit."
"The announcement could help to counter criticism from conservative opponents of the Obama administration's efforts to fight climate change, who have contended that the United States shouldn't act because Beijing has done little to reduce its emissions. 'By the way, China's doing nothing,' GOP presidential contender Donald Trump said Thursday morning on CNN."
POPE FRANCIS HEADS TO NEW YORK: The U.S.-China agreement could buoy the spirits of Pope Francis, who will address the General Assembly of the United Nations today at 10:20 a.m. The pontiff finished his stay in Washington with a speech to a Joint Session of Congress in which he pressured lawmakers to act on several issues close to his heart, not least the need to battle climate change. The U.N. speech will be streaming here.
The Pope's climate message resonates with younger and less religious Americans, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. As POLITICO's Nick Gass reports, "About six in 10 Americans agree with the pope's recent call for the world to redouble its efforts in fighting climate change.... Along denominational lines, 51 percent of Protestants agree, compared to 36 percent who do not, while 67 percent of Catholics agree with the Holy Father's message and 23 percent do not. But among those who described themselves as not religiously affiliated, 74 percent agreed with the Argentinian pope's global message.... Adults aged 18 to 34 backed the pope on climate change to the tune of 69 percent to 18 percent." http://politico.pro/1VcYxFz
IT'S FRIDAY FRIDAY, GETTIN' DOWN ON FRIDAY: I'm your host Eric Wolff, and I've made some jokes about wall-to-wall coverage Pope Francis this week that inadvertently offended some people. My apologies. In the meantime, I still need your energy tips, quips, and comments atewolff@politico.com, or follow us on Twitter: @ericwolff, @Morning_Energy, and@POLITICOPro.
** A message from the American Lung Association: Kids want to play outside. But high ozone days can lead to asthma attacks and premature death. That’s why 73 percent of Americans support stricter limits on smog pollution. Stronger limits mean less smog and healthier lungs for our kids: www.fightingforair.org **
RAPID ACT TO BRAVE LEGISLATIVE RAPIDS: The House of Representatives will vote today on the RAPID Act, a bill to accelerate the approvals of infrastructure projects. The process of gaining necessary permits for long infrastructure projects like pipelines and transmission lines typically requires years to complete environmental reviews and applications for state, federal, and local permits. The Obama administration has made its own attempts to speed the approval process through the creation of interdepartmental teams, but to little avail. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress have offered legislation to solve the problem. The RAPID act tries to the environmental review process by forcing federal agencies to coordinate better and creating new deadlines, among other measures.
But the bill also contains at least one provision sure to inspire Democratic opposition: It would forbid agencies from including a social cost of carbon in its cost-benefit calculations. Republicans have long railed at inclusion of carbon benefits on the benefit side of various regulations, but Democrats have defended it. In a scheduling email to his caucus, Minority Whip Steny Hoyer called the bill, "Regrettably Another Partisan Ideological Distraction."
CRUDE OIL EXPORT BAN READY FOR ITS SENATE CLOSE-UP: Pro's Elana Schor reports, the Senate Banking Committee will hold a markup meeting on Thursday for a bill to lift a crude oil ban. A similar bill was to have received a vote in the House next week, but it has been postponed to the first week in October.
SHUTDOWN-O-METER: ME's slightly janky, steam-driven, basic-model government-shutdown-o-meter reads 3 out of 10 (with 10 a certain shutdown and 1 no chance). As ME's colleagues at POLITICO have been reporting, GOP leaders in both houses are poring through Robert's Rules of order to avoid sending federal workers home on Thursday. After a continuing resolution that would have defunded Planned Parenthood failed to make the grade yesterday, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell plans a vote on a clean continuing resolution for Monday that will keep government's wheels turning through Dec. 11. Speaker John Boehner is hoping to use something called an "enrollment correction" to satisfy his base while still getting the Senate's bill approved by a majority.
MATS ENJOYS SECOND ACT IN AMERICAN LIFE: The Supreme Court remanded EPA's mercury rule back to the D.C. Circuit in June, saying the agency must consider the costs of the rule. But the high court left it to the lower court to decide whether the rule needed to be suspended or vacated or left in place while the EPA worked out its calculation. In briefs filed yesterday, the EPA asked the court to leave the rule in place, because it did not expect any major changes after it produces a new "appropriate and necessary" finding. “EPA anticipates that the robust data set amassed during the rulemaking will prevent the need to generate a new analysis out of whole cloth, and that there should be little doubt that the agency chose correctly from the outset,” the agency wrote. The states that sued the agency in the first place asked the court to toss the whole thing out.
Also getting in on the action: A coalition of friendly states, environmental groups and public health advocates joined EPA in arguing that the legal issues "is one EPA can readily correct on remand without altering the substance of the Rule, and the Agency has committed to act promptly." http://politico.pro/1R3QncW. Calpine, Exelon, National Grid and PSEG, who supported the agency in its court case, also defended the agency's positon in a brief:http://politico.pro/1KCNzy2
IF AT FIRST YOU DON'T SUCCEED, TRY, TRI-STATE AGAIN: Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association, the co-op that previously tried to get the court to exempt one of its Colorado plants from part of the mercury rule, filed its own brief agreeing with the other critics that the rule should be tossed out. But if it's not, the company asks the judge to please give them their exemption. Tri-State’s plant has until April 2016 to comply, but it wants even more time given the legal uncertainty around the rule. “It would be manifestly unfair to require Tri-State and any other similarly situated companies to make such decisions unless and until EPA takes the action necessary to provide a legal basis for the MATS Rule,” the company wrote:http://politico.pro/1NPGb7P
ME MAILBAG: The American Thoracic Society sent a letter to the EPA calling on the agency to set its ozone standard at the lowest level it is considering, 60 parts per billion, a 15 ppb reduction from the present standard. The society says in its letter it will soon be releasing a report that says the lower standard would prevent 6,408 more deaths than 75 ppb, and 3,752 more premature deaths than 70 ppb. The letter says, "The lives of 3,700 Americans are too important for EPA to ignore."
ME-A CULPA: EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy went to U. Mass-Boston, which does not play football, and therefore would be confused about exactly what to do when if they showed up at Notre Dame Stadium only to be faced with beating the Fighting Irish in full pads. Go Beacons!
FORGIVE ME: We got a little too excited yesterday with wanting to see how Exelon Corp. and Pepco Holdings re-up their merger efforts before D.C. regulators and jumped the gun a bit. Although we dutifully marked out the 30-day deadline on our calendar given the day and language of this statement from the D.C. Public Service Commission, the countdown clock didn’t start until the commission’s order was officially docketed two days later. The utilities have through Monday to file their request for reconsideration.

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US, China to Expand on Climate Pact

Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Briefing Room

By Timothy Cama

The United States and China will announce new commitments Friday to expand on last year’s major joint agreement on climate change, including through a cap-and-trade system for China. The new bilateral agreement will add details to how the countries will implement the pledge announced in November. In that pact, the United States agreed to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 26 to 28 percent by 2025 and China agreed to peak its greenhouse gases by 2030, the first such promise from the world’s largest carbon dioxide emitter. The Friday announcement will include a number of new declarations regarding domestic policies within the two countries and how the countries will provide financing to developing nations to help them cope with climate change, senior Obama administration officials said Thursday. “This is a statement that has been worked closely on and negotiated closely by our respective teams over the course of many months, and it has three basic components,” an official said. The China agreement was instantly controversial among Republican lawmakers who highly doubt China will live up to its commitments. They also argue it holds the United States to unreasonable standards that will dramatically harm the economy. The new commitment on Friday comes as Chinese President Xi Jinping is in the United States for an official state visit, with climate on the agenda for discussion with President Obama. Significantly, China is pledging to implement a national cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases by 2017, applying to sectors including power generation, steel and building materials. “These sectors together produce a substantial percentage of China’s climate pollution, and this reflects a significant policy move that the Chinese are announcing they will take,” an Obama administration official told reporters. China will also use a “green dispatch” system for its power generation, in which it will prioritize generation from low- and zero-carbon sources like renewable energy over highly polluting sources like coal. The agreement will include heavy-duty vehicle emissions rules and new efficiency and appliances standards. The other pieces of the new pact focus on international climate financing and how the two countries want to negotiate in the run-up to December’s international climate-pact talks in Paris. While Obama has pledged $3 billion for the international Green Climate Fund, China will announce other climate financing outside of that system, said the administration officials. Republicans in Congress have called the $3 billion promise dead on arrival and promised to make sure it is never funded.

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China to Launch a Nationwide Cap-and-Trade System and to Work with the U.S. on Forging a Paris Deal

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire

By Lisa Friedman

China will put in place a nationwide carbon emissions trading program in 2017 and agree to stringent transparency rules in a new global climate change accord as part of a sweeping announcement President Obama and President Xi Jinping will make today, White House officials said.
The joint call to action on global warming will be the second time in less than a year that Obama and Xi have stood side by side to pledge joint cooperation between the world's two largest economies and emitters of greenhouse gas pollution.
Leaders said they hope the announcement, which also includes a Chinese pledge of money for poor countries that one official described as "commensurate" with a U.S. promise to deliver $3 billion in climate aid over four years, will shift the international negotiations into high gear before landmark talks in Paris in December.
"President Obama and President Xi have put a high priority on addressing climate change, and also on the role that our two nations can play in addressing this pressing issue," a senior Obama administration official said in a call with reporters.
"Last year's joint announcement was about setting targets. This year is about showing the world our countries' conviction ... to lead the world toward a durable global climate agreement," he said. In November, the United States vowed to cut emissions 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025 while China pledged to peak its emissions rise by 2030.
Details of the deal are expected to be announced this afternoon. But officials said the highlights include a pledge from China that it will launch a nationwide emissions trading scheme in 2017 covering specific sectors, including power generation, iron and steel, chemicals, and building materials like cement.
Other elements of the announcement, according to the White House and ClimateWire sources, include:A "very substantial" Chinese pledge of climate finance to help poor countries cope with the impacts of climate change. The money (a dollar figure was not unveiled) will not go through the United Nations' Green Climate Fund but will be "reinforcing" it, according to the White House.New joint U.S. and Chinese targets for heavy-duty vehicles, building efficiency and appliance standards.A commitment from China to "strictly control public investment flowing into projects of high pollution and high carbon emissions, both domestically and internationally."Agreements or "landing zones" on eight wedge issues in the Paris deal, including commitments by both countries to see carbon cuts build in ambition over time. China and the United States will also agree to reporting and review of both mitigation efforts and financial commitments.The deal also includes what another administration official described as "new progress" in breaking down a 20-year-old climate change architecture that divided the world into rich countries that take obligatory action and poor countries that cut carbon voluntarily. Countries should act "in light of different national circumstances," on everything from mitigation to finance, the United States and China have agreed.
That issue of determining how much responsibility countries of different levels of wealth and emissions should take in addressing climate change has plagued the U.N. talks for years. A senior Obama administration official noted that many countries still don't agree with the U.S.-China approach -- which in practice essentially allows countries to simply do as much as they believe they can -- but said the fissures are starting to close.
"What the U.S. and China are able to do together has a powerful and positive impact on many countries," the administration official said. "Absolutely there are still countries that are not fully convinced, and the discussions go on. I think we are making progress, but I wouldn't say this is the end of the road."'A very big deal' takes shape
U.N. climate chief Christiana Figueres, speaking to ClimateWire in New York, said she was "very excited" about the U.S. and China announcement, adding that it is critical that the countries set an example to others and show how they will make good on their November joint targets.
"The world doesn't stop in Paris. In fact, that's when the rubber hits the road," Figueres said.
Harvard University economist Robert Stavins, one of the original architects of the cap-and-trade system, called the new agreements -- particularly the carbon market -- "a very big deal" and said China is making exactly the type of synchronized environmental commitments that the U.S. Congress has been calling for.
A climate change playmaker? China's President Xi Jinping poses with a Tacoma, Wash., high school football team Wednesday before flying to Washington, D.C., to discuss strategies with President Obama. Photo by Elaine Thompson, courtesy of the Associated Press.
"The fact that we are now seeing it between the United States and China on climate change is very important, and would have been a shock a year ago," he said. "This goes to the heart of what has been the conservative critique of the international negotiations on climate change."
But Republicans and other critics of U.S. climate change policy were not offering up any praise.
"An undefined financial commitment and vague statements about a carbon market are no substitute for actual commitments to reduce carbon emissions. To date, we haven't seen that kind of commitment," Scott Segal, a partner with the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani, said in a statement to ClimateWire.
He argued that China's peaking pledge "amounts to no more than 'business as usual'" and said China is not doing its "fair share."
"Almost all of the actions China has proposed are already being implemented, and the political will for future action appears almost non-existent," he wrote.
Environmental activists in China, who include some of the fiercest critics of the government's climate policies, said painting China as not acting or unwilling to be held to Western accountability standards no longer holds water. The United States, they argued, will be the country in the hot seat.
"China has said we are going to put a price on carbon," said Li Shou, senior climate officer with Greenpeace East Asia. "Can the U.S. go toward the same direction?"

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Pope Asserts 'Right of the Environment' in U.N. Address

Sep 25, 2015 | Politico

By Nahal Toosi

Pope Francis took his call to protect the environment to the United Nations on Friday, where he also urged world leaders to help the poor, remember people’s spiritual rights and rid the world of nuclear weapons.
The lengthy speech before the General Assembly in New York came ahead of a major international conference later this year on how to deal with climate change, and the 78-year-old Francis, who is visiting the U.S. for the first time in his life and addressed Congress on Thursday, said he was confident that the gathering in Paris would lead to effective agreements.
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The Roman Catholic leader, who also is a head of state (the Vatican), insisted that a “‘right of the environment’ does exist” and cannot be ignored. The human individual, Francis said, “possesses a body shaped by physical, chemical and biological elements, and can only survive and develop if the ecological environment is favourable. Any harm done to the environment, therefore, is harm done to humanity.”
He also linked the destruction of the environment to greed and economic inequality, arguing: “The poorest are those who suffer most from such offenses, for three serious reasons: they are cast off by society, forced to live off what is discarded and suffer unjustly from the abuse of the environment. They are part of today’s widespread and quietly growing ‘culture of waste’.”
Francis’ environmental appeals are controversial in U.S. political circles, where many Republicans resist the mainstream scientific consensus that human activity contributes to climate change. Some Republicans took comfort in the fact that Francis, who spoke in English before Congress, didn’t specifically use the phrase “climate change,” even though it was clear he was referring to it. According to his prepared remarks, he also avoided the phrase Friday, but his reference to the Paris gathering again signaled that the climate shifts worry him.
While urging world leaders to press forth with solutions to end poverty, Francis also told them that while worrying about people’s material circumstances is important, it’s key to also remember their spiritual rights.
“In practical terms, this absolute minimum has three names: lodging, labour, and land; and one spiritual name: spiritual freedom, which includes religious freedom, the right to education and other civil rights,” the pope said.
As part of his call for the prohibition of nuclear weapons, the pontiff praised the recent nuclear deal with Iran, though he didn’t single out that country by name, calling the agreement “proof of the potential of political good will and of law, exercised with sincerity, patience and constancy.”
Later in his speech, the Argentine-born Francis, the first pope to hail from Latin America, also urged action against a scourge he said was “silently killing millions of people”: the drug trade.
“Drug trafficking is by its very nature accompanied by trafficking in persons, money laundering, the arms trade, child exploitation and other forms of corruption,” he said. “A corruption which has penetrated to different levels of social, political, military, artistic and religious life, and, in many cases, has given rise to a parallel structure which threatens the credibility of our institutions.”
In pressing for an end to the turmoil in the Middle East, Francis seemed especially frustrated, saying he regretted having to bring the topic up once more, and decrying the “painful” situation “where Christians, together with other cultural or ethnic groups, and even members of the majority religion who have no desire to be caught up in hatred and folly, have been forced to witness the destruction of their places of worship, their cultural and religious heritage, their houses and property, and have faced the alternative either of fleeing or of paying for their adhesion to good and to peace by their own lives, or by enslavement.”
Francis will spend the rest of the day in New York, where his schedule includes a multi-religious service at the 9/11 memorial, a motorcade through Central Park, a visit to a school in East Harlem and leading a Mass at Madison Square Garden. He’ll head to Philadelphia on Saturday for the last leg of his U.S. trip. There he will attend the World Meeting of Families, a major Catholic conference, as well as visit a prison.
He leaves the U.S. on Sunday evening, and will be seen off by Vice President Joe Biden.

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Climate Change: What’s Next

Sep 25, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog

By former Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska)

As Washington, D.C. greets Pope Francis this week, there is much anticipation about what he will say about a number of issues – specifically climate change. While some members of Congress have already announced they will boycott the Pope’s speech because of his comments on climate change, I hope that folks will reflect on the president’s recent trip to Alaska and understand the urgency of this issue.
All you had to do was turn on your television or check Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter recently to see that President Obama made an historic visit to Alaska earlier this month. The late summer weather along with our breathtaking landscapes provided the perfect backdrop for the president’s trip around my unique state.
While I knew there would be no shortage of photo opportunities while the president was here, I admit I was skeptical about what exactly this trip would really mean for Alaska. The chatter in the days leading up to his arrival was enough to give you a serious case of whiplash.
If you listened to conservative talk radio then you might be convinced the president was going to end resource development forever. If you listened to extremist protesters, then you might be convinced the president was going to drill any and everywhere in Alaska with no regard for any living thing. You know the conspiracy theories are really flying when even Sarah Palin decides to throw in her two cents.
I was proud, however, to see the majority of Alaskans greet the president with the respect and excitement that a visiting Commander in Chief deserves. Whether or not you agree with his politics, the president’s visit was a rare opportunity to put Alaska and our issues front and center on the world’s stage.
And while many in the Lower 48 may still struggle to grasp just how large Alaska is or where it is on a map (not in a box below California and next to Hawaii by the way), the truth is that Alaskawill be a critical component of this country’s all-of-the-above energy plan not only for today, but as we transition to alternative energy sources.
I commend the president for prioritizing the need to deal with climate change. As an Alaskan, I was especially pleased to see the administration take the time to travel and see what the impacts of climate change truly mean here at home.
But what happens now?
While D.C. doesn’t always listen to what Alaskans think our state needs, this trip seems to be an exception. After seeing the incredible damage caused by climate change to villages all over the state, Obama has reinvigorated the Denali Commission to lead the state’s climate resilience and adaptation efforts. While it’s still a federal agency, the Denali Commission was designed specifically to help Alaskans face their unique challenges. And how we address climate change in this state will be no different.
Alaskans also know that if we wait for every skeptic of climate change to get on board before taking action, it will be too late. We must be proactive and take charge of our energy needs.
Access to clean energy means allowing communities to take ownership of their futures. If villages aren’t sending half of their wages out on the diesel barge, just imagine the financial opportunities this might appear: opening up a small business, saving for education, and increasing access to better infrastructure are just a few.
Upon his return to D.C., Obama announced a new initiative called Clean Energy Solutions for Remote Communities bringing Alaskans together with people all over the country to come up with new ways to pay for clean energy projects. He also announced a new $4 million Department of Energy-led competition for rural communities to help improve energy efficiency.
The president and Secretary of State Kerry are also taking this message to the international community. Alaskans are not the only Arctic residents suffering from high energy costs. Our neighbors in Russia, Canada, and even Greenland share similar challenges. This presents an opportunity for collaboration, but also a huge business market for clean energy practitioners in Alaska who lead the world in understanding the technical challenges associated with putting renewable energy on a small grid. The State Department is using our Arctic Council Chairmanship to shine a light on what could be a great business opportunity for Alaskans.
All of this will build on the important progress we have already made towards increasing the balance between responsible resource development and investing in alternative energy. That is why I worked closely with the administration during my time in the Senate to move along the permitting process in the Arctic. Today, we are the closest we have ever been to developing the billions of barrels of oil and trillion cubic feet of natural gas located there.
In addition, the administration provided an exemption to Alaska’s five coal plants due to our high energy costs, providing balance between the need for clean energy and affordable energy. Stimulus funds also helped develop the Fire Island Wind Energy Project that now provides 5 percent of Southcentral Alaska’s energy needs. These are just some of the projects across Alaska bringing wind, tidal, hydro and new technologies together.
It is no secret that the president and I have disagreed on a number of issues – and I haven’t been shy about saying so. But you don’t need to agree with all of the president’s policies to recognize that we must act now on climate change or it will continue to pose a serious threat to our environment, economy, and overall national security. It is time to come together, focus on what is possible, and make sure our children and the generations after them can continue to enjoy this planet just as we have.
Begich represented Alaska in the Senate from 2009-2015. He is now the president and CEO of Northern Compass Group located in Anchorage, Alaska. He also serves as a strategic adviser to Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck.

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Greenwire's Chemnick Talks Climate Momentum Following Papal Address

Sep 25, 2015 | E&E - TV

As Pope Francis continues his U.S. tour, will his remarks on climate affect the tone of discussions in Congress and the momentum heading into this year's Paris talks? On today's The Cutting Edge, Greenwire reporter Jean Chemnick discusses the power of the pope following his historic address. She also talks about the growing momentum surrounding this year's international climate talks in Paris.Transcript
Monica Trauzzi: Welcome to The Cutting Edge. As Pope Francis continues his U.S. tour, will his remarks on climate affect the tone of discussions in Congress and the momentum heading towards this year's Paris negotiations? Greenwire's Jean Chemnick is here to talk about the power of the pope following his historic address.
Jean, the pope endorsed the Clean Power Plan. How does this stand in contrast to the other issues that the pope addressed before Congress yesterday?
Jean Chemnick: Well, it's very rare for the pope to get into the nitty-gritty of policy, I mean, not -- it was a fairly general statement, but to even signal out a policy of any kind is rare and he really didn't do that very much at all in either his address at the White House or to Congress. And what it shows is his devotion to the issue of climate change because the Clean Power Plan is the cornerstone of Obama's work on climate change, his -- it's very integral to his ability to deliver on emissions pledges and it's a very important part of what the U.S. will take to Paris at the end of this year. And so if you get rid of that -- which many Republicans in Congress are determined to do -- then that makes a Paris deal very impossible, and the pope is -- that's an important priority for him.
Monica Trauzzi: And the pontiff, of course, called on Congress to act on climate. Was there any sense, following the pope's remarks on the Hill, that he may have advanced the ball in some way towards some level of action? And how do you think his remarks will impact the legislative agenda this fall?
Jean Chemnick: Yeah, it probably won't. I mean, lawmakers after the speech were very respectful; they said they appreciated that the pope had come, but they sort of immediately started to spin his remarks -- Mitch McConnell said on the floor that the media had taken the remarks out of context; James Inhofe, who's the head of the Environment and Public Works Committee, put out a press release saying, "Oh, well, by saying that Congress should have a role in setting policy, the pope -- this really reinforces the idea that Obama shouldn't be going it alone."
So, immediately, people were messaging, and really, we'll still looking at the same fall, which includes at least some votes to knock down key climate change rules.
Monica Trauzzi: The speech was pretty untypical to what we're used to hearing from Congress. What stood out to you on tone and substance, specifically?
Jean Chemnick: Well, it was a very different tone than what is usually heard in that chamber. It was very -- the wording was very gentle. It was obvious that the goal was not to score political points or to shame anyone in there, but really, to just raise questions and talk about ideas instead of politics. And even the choice of wording, you know, the words "climate change" or "global warming" or "abortion" didn't really appear in his remarks, but it was still very clear what he was talking about. He was referencing directly his encyclical, which is all about climate change, and that was a very effective -- it was very thought-provoking, I think, for people on both sides of various issues.
Monica Trauzzi: And the focus today is at the United Nations. How does his U.S. visit overall impact the momentum heading into December's Paris talks?
Jean Chemnick: Well, it's clear that this is -- that is part of what he hopes to affect, and I was listening a little bit to the translation of the U.N. speech this morning. He is talking about climate change, and that's him addressing the members of the U.N., 193 countries that later this year will possibly broker a deal on climate change, and that has been a real priority for him. And he was talking about the need to deal with climate change to protect the poor and the effect of climate change on the most vulnerable countries, so that is the goal, I think, yeah.
Monica Trauzzi: Thanks, Jean, a very impactful visit. It's been very interesting to watch him as he travels throughout the East Coast. Thanks for coming on the show.
Jean Chemnick: Thanks.
Monica Trauzzi: More Cutting Edge coming next Friday. We'll see you then.
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