Preview Newsletter

ACC AM 9/30

Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Senate Floor Vote on TSCA Appears Imminent
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Reprot
By Anthony Adragna and Ari Natter

Legislation to overhaul how the U.S. regulates its chemicals for the first time since 1976 could hit the Senate floor in the “next day or so,” the office of Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and several Senate aides said Sept. 29, after negotiators closed in on an agreement with Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) that would allow consideration of the bill to proceed
(ACC Mentioned) Positions on Chemicals, Hormones Released
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

The International Council of Chemical Associations released on Sept. 28 a set of principles it said regulators and the public generally should use to identify endocrine-active and endocrine-disrupting chemicals.
(ACC Mentioned) Chemical Industry Wants U.N. Effort To Stay Focused On Original Goal
Sep 29, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Cheryl Hogue

The global chemical industry is lobbying to keep a U.N. agreement focused on the safe management of bulk chemicals. It does want to see it expanded to include acting on highly hazardous pesticides or pharmaceutical products that persist in the environment.
(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Says EDC Safe Exposure Levels Should Be Accepted
Sep 30, 2015 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer

The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) says there should be acceptance that “safe levels of exposure” can be set for endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs).
(ACC Mentioned) Revise that outdated TSCA! (Boxer, 2010). Wait: do NOT revise that outdated TSCA! (Boxer, 2015)
Sep 29, 2015 | Science 2.0
By Gil Ross

Almost as soon as the much-derided Toxic Substances Control Act was passed, in 1976, our friends in the "environmental" movement began to complain about its shortcomings.
(ACC Mentioned) ACC: Endocrine Society Statement ‘Disregards State of Science’
Sep 30, 2015 | FoodQualityNews.com
By Joe Whitworth

The American Chemistry Council (ACC) has said the Endocrine Society’s claims of evidence tying endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) to diabetes and obesity risks ‘disregards the state of science’.
(ACC Mentioned) Experts Link Chemicals to Obesity, Diabetes
Sep 30, 2015 | Mother Nature Network
By Mary Jo DiLonardo

New evidence ties hormone-disrupting chemicals to two of the biggest health threats we face today: obesity and diabetes.
States Urge Further Changes in TSCA-Reform Bill
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Reprot
By Pat Rizzuto

States' ability to manage chemical risks must be protected through further changes to Senate legislation to update the Toxic Substances Control Act, according to two state organizations.
Everyday Chemical Exposure Linked to Obesity, Diabetes Epidemic
Sep 30, 2015 | Yahoo! Health
By Amy Capetta

A Scientific Statement released by the Endocrine Society says that new evidence points to a link between endocrine-disrupting chemical exposure and both diabetes and obesity — two of the biggest heath threats in modern society.
Pilot Program Will Gauge Air Quality in New York Nail Salons
Sep 29, 2015 | The New York TImes
By Benjamin Mueller

Dozens of desk lamps fitted with air quality sensors will appear in nail salons across the city next year, providing information to health officials, customers, salon managers and the workers themselves about whether chemical levels in the air are unsafe.

Chemical Security News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Energy and Environment News

(ACC Mentioned) Energy-Saving Catalysts Goal of Academies Workshop
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

A committee convened by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine will hold a workshop next spring to spur research and development of new catalysts that can save energy, thereby reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Democrats File Amendments to Oil Export Bill
| BNA Daily Environment Report
By Ari Natter

Amendments related to new licensing requirements and climate change were among 18 amendments House Democrats filed to floor-bound legislation that would lift the ban on most crude oil exports.
Upton Restores Republican Measures in Energy Bill
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Ari Natter

Language that would expedite the Energy Department's consideration of natural gas exports is among the Republican-backed measures included in a new version of broad energy legislation to be marked up by a House committee Sept. 30.
No TSCA Rule to Cut Carbon Dioxide Emissions, EPA Says
Sep 30, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

The Environmental Protection Agency will not use regulatory authorities provided under the Toxic Substances Control Act to cut carbon dioxide emissions.
EPA Requires Fenceline Monitoring of Refinery Emissions
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Patrick Ambrosio

Petroleum refineries will be required to install monitors to measure fenceline concentrations of benzene, one of a series of new requirements established by the Environmental Protection Agency Sept. 29.
EPA Weakens Final Refinery Air Toxics Rule, Reducing Compliance Costs
Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker

EPA's final rule revising air toxics limits for petroleum refineries backs down from some strict emissions controls floated in the proposed version of the rule, greatly reducing compliance costs while retaining what EPA says are health benefits similar to the proposal -- prompting a cautious welcome from some industry officials and environmentalists.
EPA Defends Refinery Emission Rule from Industry Critics
Sep 29, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Elana Schor

EPA today defended its new refinery emissions rule from condemnation by industry groups that warn the updated pollution controls are too costly.
Rule Aims to Shield Communities from Refinery Emissions
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E PM
By Amanda Reilly

The new U.S. EPA rule cracking down on refinery emissions will allow continuous monitoring of benzene for 6.1 million Americans who live within 3 miles of oil and gas refiners, Administrator Gina McCarthy said today.
EPA Cracks Down on Oil Refinery Pollution
Sep 29, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has issued a new rule designed to slash toxic air pollution generated by petroleum refineries.
Bush Plan Targets 'Damaging Federal Energy Policies'
Sep 29, 2015 | E&E PM
By Jennifer Yachnin

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush today asserted that "damaging federal energy policies" must be repealed to improve the nation's economy but also called for ending tax benefits to all sectors of the energy industry as he unveiled his presidential campaign's energy platform.
Bush Energy Plan Would Boost Exports, Approve Keystone
Sep 29, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry

Republican contender Jeb Bush on Tuesday unveiled his energy plan, which would expand oil and gas exports and approve the Keystone XL pipeline to boost the American energy sector.
Bush Goes Heavy on Fossil Fuels
Sep 29, 2015 | PoliticoPro
By Darren Goode

Jeb Bush released an energy plan Tuesday that was filled with Republican standards: drill more oil, cut regulations and build the Keystone XL pipeline.
EPA Preps Revisions to Greenhouse Gas Reporting Rule
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Anthony Adragna

The Environmental Protection Agency is preparing changes to how power plants, refineries, chemical plants, underground coal mines and other large facilities report their greenhouse gas emissions, the agency told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 28.
Rep. Poe Reintroduces Bill to Kill Flagship Climate Rule
Sep 29, 2015 | E&E PM
By Jean Chemnick

Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) reintroduced a bill yesterday that would bar U.S. EPA from implementing its Clean Power Plan or from using the Clean Air Act to introduce cap and trade.
House's Chief Clean Power Plan Critic Heads for the Exits
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Jean Chemnick and Jennifer Yachnin

The architect of the House Republican strategy to kill U.S. EPA's carbon rules suggested yesterday that he is not seeking another term because his enthusiasm for fighting policies he opposes is waning.
Lawmakers Hit EPA Air Chief Over Climate, Ozone Plans
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Amanda Reilly

Senate Republicans yesterday questioned whether the benefits of two major U.S. EPA air regulations would outweigh their costs.
High Compliance Rate Seen for Clean Power Plan
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Anthony Adragna

Relatively few states—even the ones that dislike it—ultimately will elect not to submit their own compliance plans for the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan, the heads of groups representing state air and utility regulators said Sept. 29.
Caucus Addresses Justice Impacts of Power Plan
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rachel Leven

Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus are working to ensure that vulnerable communities are consulted and considered during states’ Clean Power Plan planning process, the caucus co-chairs told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29.
McCabe Downplays Publication Delay for Carbon Rule
| BNA Daily Environment Report
By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency's top air official disputed claims that the EPA is taking an unusually long time to formally publish the final Clean Power Plan, noting that the agency submitted the regulation for publication more quickly than it had other major environmental rules.
Court Won't Help EPA's Foes in Failed Carbon Rule Suit
Sep 30, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit today shot down the last ditch attempt by opponents of EPA’s Clean Power Plan to keep a panel of three Republican judges for upcoming lawsuits over the rule.
Feds Set to Impose Major Ozone Rule
Sep 30, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry and Tim Devaney

The Obama administration is poised this week to issue a final rule on ozone levels that business groups contend would be the single most expensive regulation ever imposed by the U.S. government.
Final Methane Rules Due by Early Summer 2016, EPA Says
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Anthony Adragna

Regulations meant to curb methane emissions from new and modified sources in the oil and natural gas sectors are expected to be finalized by “late spring or early summer” 2016, a senior official with the Environmental Protection Agency's air office said Sept. 29.
Ozone Rule Will Protect Health, EPA Official Says
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency's forthcoming final decision on where to set national ozone standards will be protective enough to meet Clean Air Act requirements, the agency's top air official said.
Smog Kills
Sep 29, 2015 | Politico Magazine
By David Baron

One of the biggest environmental fights right now involves the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal to strengthen protections against ozone pollution—a proposal that’s in the crosshairs of major polluters and their allies in Congress.
Do More on Methane Rules, Groups Urge EPA in Pittsburgh
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Leslie Pappas

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's proposed rules for methane emissions for the oil and gas industry do not go far enough and should be expanded, speakers from environmentalist groups, community and parent coalitions, religious orders and state environmental regulators told the agency during a public hearing Sept. 29 in Pittsburgh.
EPA Sends GHG Reporting Revisions For OMB Review
Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA

EPA has taken a step toward revising its greenhouse gas reporting program, sending a series of proposed revisions to the White House Office of Management & Budget for review on Sept. 25.
EPA Says NSPS, State Rules Will Inform Need To Regulate Existing Drilling
Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo

A top EPA air official says the agency's proposed rule to cut methane emissions from new and modified oil and gas operations combined with state air programs and a new EPA voluntary plan for reducing the sector's air pollution will ultimately determine whether the agency ever pursues a rule to cut methane from existing drilling sources.
Ex-Sen. Talent Launches Advocacy Group to Boost RFS
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Amanda Reilly

Former Sen. Jim Talent (R-Mo.) today will launch a new group to boost the nation's biofuel policy.

Transportation News

Bipartisanship Frays as Dems Protest House Package
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Geof Koss

After months of negotiations on a bipartisan energy bill, House Democrats say they won't support the measure during today's markup without further changes.
Inhofe Urges McCarthy to Move 'Now' on House Highway Bill
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Sean Reilly

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) can't wait for a promotion before tackling a long-term surface transportation bill, a key senator said yesterday.
Clean Reauthorization of Pipeline Programs Unlikely
Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rachel Leven

An unchanged reauthorization of pipeline safety programs isn't completely off the table, but the prospects for it dimmed in light of issues such as those raised in a Senate subcommittee hearing Sept. 29.
Blumenthal Weighs Legislation to Overhaul PHMSA
Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily
By Hannah Northey

Sen. Richard Blumenthal said yesterday he is considering legislation to reform the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, an agency that's been scrutinized recently for a series of pipeline explosions and leaks.
Oil Train Law Still in the Works
Sep 28, 2015 | Everett Herald
By Jerry Cornfield

A new state law requires cities, counties and fire departments be told ahead of time when an oil train is coming through their community.

Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Senate Floor Vote on TSCA Appears Imminent

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Reprot

By Anthony Adragna and Ari Natter

Legislation to overhaul how the U.S. regulates its chemicals for the first time since 1976 could hit the Senate floor in the “next day or so,” the office of Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and several Senate aides said Sept. 29, after negotiators closed in on an agreement with Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) that would allow consideration of the bill to proceed.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), the Senate's number-two Republican, told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29 he expects the Senate to “take that up in October,” referring to the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act (S. 697). The bill currently has 55 co-sponsors from across 36 states.
“Senator Udall is very optimistic that we could see the Lautenberg chemical reform bill on the floor in the next day or so thanks to collaborative input from other senators in recent days,” Jennifer Talhelm, Udall's spokeswoman, told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29. “We hope we are very close to passing the bill out of the Senate.”
The bill, sponsored by Udall and Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), would update the Toxic Substances Control Act, which governs industrial and other commercial uses of chemicals in the U.S. Supporters of the bill include Dupont, 3M, the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, American Chemistry Council, BASF Corp., Consumer Electronics Association, Dow Chemical Co. and the National Association of Manufacturers, among others.
No Official Agreement
Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), would not confirm the bill's timing: “We have not announced any timing on the bill. Still.” McConnell has previously named the TSCA reform legislation a good candidate for the chamber's consideration and multiple senators predicted it would garner 80 to 85 votes upon reaching the floor (176 DEN A-3, 9/11/15).
News of the bill's possible floor consideration comes as two state organizations urged Senate leadership to incorporate further changes to measure in order to better protect the ability of states to manage chemical risks (see related story).
A key obstacle to the bill advancing in the Senate has been Boxer, who views the bill as detrimental to chemical safety protections, but a Republican Senate aide with knowledge of the bill said the California Democrat was ready to drop her objections to the bill.
Boxer told Bloomberg BNA she and negotiators were “close” to an agreement that would allow consideration of the bill to proceed but declined to specify what it would look like.
“I'm not going to tell you what I'm negotiating, but it's going very well,” Boxer said of the negotiations.
New Wrinkle Emerges
Even amid that progress, the Republican aide said a new hang-up has emerged: Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) is seeking to attach an amendment to the bill that would reauthorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which would be a poison pill in the House.
The fund, which uses revenues from offshore oil and gas development to establish national parks and other public spaces, is set to expire at the end of September.
A Burr spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Benjamin Dunham, former chief counsel to the late New Jersey Democrat Lautenberg, told Bloomberg BNA talks were ongoing in the Senate and “nothing has been finalized.”
“A lot could change in the next few hours, but I think it's more likely than not that we'll see TSCA on the floor this week,” Dunham, now a senior managing director with Dentons, said.

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) Positions on Chemicals, Hormones Released

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

The International Council of Chemical Associations released on Sept. 28 a set of principles it said regulators and the public generally should use to identify endocrine-active and endocrine-disrupting chemicals.
The Endocrine Society released an overview of recent scientific studies on endocrine-disrupting chemicals. The weight of scientific evidence removes “any doubt that endocrine-disrupting chemicals are contributing to increased chronic disease burdens related to obesity, diabetes mellitus, reproduction, thyroid, cancers, and neuroendocrine and neurodevelopmental functions,” the statement said.
The chemical association's principles and Endocrine Society's statements were timed to the start of the International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM4), taking place in Geneva from Sept. 28 to Oct. 2. Endocrine-disrupting chemicals are one of many issues countries, intergovernmental organizations and nongovernmental organizations, which includes organizations representing the chemical industry, will discuss during the conference.
Principles Call for Distinctions
Among other points, the International Council of Chemical Association's 11 principles called for a clear distinction to be made between “endocrine-active” and “endocrine-disrupting” chemicals.
“Chemicals with no proven endocrine-related adverse effects have been mischaracterized and stigmatized” because such distinctions are not being made, the association said.
The association also called for credible test methods and high-quality data to be used in evaluating chemicals for their endocrine activity or disruption potential.
The principles “will help enhance the reliability, credibility and relevance of research intended to identify whether chemicals interact with the endocrine system and if that activity causes harm,” said Council Secretary Cal Dooley, in an announcement of the principles. Dooley also is the president of the American Chemistry Council.
The Endocrine Society's statement called for chemicals to be tested before being sold in commerce. These tests should include evaluating the chemicals for endocrine-like activities at low doses, the society said. The society consists of health practitioners, researchers and other individuals focused on understanding hormones and chemical or other factors that affect hormonal function. It advocates for health-protective policies.
The international conference is designed to help participating organizations contribute to the UN's Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM). That voluntary agreement is aimed at encouraging the sound management of chemicals throughout their life-cycle so that by 2020 chemicals are produced and used in ways that minimize significant adverse impacts on human health and the environment.

Richard Lesiyampe, president of the conference, already has acknowledged that governments have fallen behind in their obligations and will need to continue their efforts beyond 2020 (242 DEN A-16, 12/17/14).

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) Chemical Industry Wants U.N. Effort To Stay Focused On Original Goal

Sep 29, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News

By Cheryl Hogue

The global chemical industry is lobbying to keep a U.N. agreement focused on the safe management of bulk chemicals. It does want to see it expanded to include acting on highly hazardous pesticides or pharmaceutical products that persist in the environment.
That lobbying is in full swing at the fourth International Conference on Chemicals Management, which is being held this week in Geneva. At the conference, which has taken place every three years since 2006, governments, environmental and health activists, and the chemical industry discuss how to improve the manufacturing, transportation, use, and disposal of commercial substances worldwide. These U.N.-sponsored gatherings are particularly focused on helping developing countries build up the basic know-how and ability to manage chemicals in commerce safely. By 2020, developing countries are expected to produce 31% and use 33% of chemicals worldwide according to the U.N.
The chemical industry is making its push because pending at the conference are proposals to expand work under a U.N. agreement called the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM) to highly hazardous pesticides and environmentally persistent drugs.
Manufacturers of commercial chemicals, who have been involved with SAICM since its inception in 2002, aren’t enthusiastic about broadening global efforts under this agreement. Instead, they want SAICM to focus resources on its main goal—helping developing countries establish their own capacity to manage chemicals safety, says Greg Skelton, senior director for international affairs at the American Chemistry Council, a trade association of chemical manufacturers. Skelton is serving as the global chemical industry’s representative to the high-level talks at the Geneva meeting.
Safely managing commercial chemicals is an essential skill for economies to master as they continue to develop, Skelton continues. “You cannot have a sustainable manufacturing sector without sound chemicals management,” he explains.
Environmental activists are calling for the Geneva meeting to create a global alliance of governments, industry, and activists that would ratchet back the use of highly hazardous pesticides. These substances “continue to be widely used and there is no comprehensive, international approach to their phaseout,” say Olga Speranskaya, cochair of a coalition of environmental groups called IPEN. Safer alternatives to highly hazardous pesticides “are available and in use, especially agroecology and ecosystem approaches to pest and weed management,” says Sarojeni Rengam of the international Pesticide Action Network.
CropLife International, a global farm chemical industry association, is concerned that the proposal to expand work under SAICM could duplicate efforts on highly hazardous pesticides already underway by three U.N. agencies, says Keith Jones, CropLife’s director of stewardship and sustainable agriculture. The U.N’s World Health Organization, its Food & Agriculture Organization, and the U.N. Environment Programme are already working to curb health and environmental problems from exposure to these substances.
Although the conference will decide whether to expand SAICM’s work to include environmentally persistent drugs, some leading pharmaceutical industry groups do not appear to be active at the Geneva meeting. These include the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations and the Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America.

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Says EDC Safe Exposure Levels Should Be Accepted

Sep 30, 2015 | Chemical Watch

By Leigh Stringer

The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) says there should be acceptance that “safe levels of exposure” can be set for endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs).
Issuing a set of 11 principles for identifying EDCs on the first day of ICCM4 - a major UN chemicals conference in Geneva - it said that thorough examination can identify safe exposure levels.
EDCs is one of the "emerging issues" addressed by the UN's main chemcials initiative, the voluntary Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (Saicm). A Resolution on EDCs has been proposed for adoption at ICCM4, and the ICCA has already said it will oppose any Resolution that seeks to list potential EDCs (CW 25 September 2015).
The key ICCA principle says: “The suggestion that low levels of exposure can cause harmful effects that are not adequately captured by traditional toxicological studies is often discussed, but rigorous reviews by scientists at regulatory agencies have been unable to validate the hypothesis, so changes to current testing and safety assessment approaches are not warranted.”
The science does not back up the theories around low dose exposure and non monotonic dose response of EDCs, says the association. “The US EPA and the European Food and Safety Authority have thoroughly examined this and they have not been able to replicate the same health outcomes,” said spokeswoman Anne Womack Kolton.
Until the evidence shows the need to change the way risks and hazards are assessed, she said, “there should be acceptance that you can have a safe level of exposure and you can manage that risk just as you would any other chemicals.”

Low level effects
But some scientists at ICCM4 disagreed. Professor Leonardo Trasande of the New York University (NYU) school of medicine said the lowest levels of exposure appear to pose the greatest increment in health effects. Professor Trasande led studies for international scientific organisation, the Endocrine Society, which concluded, earlier this year, that exposure to EDCs in the EU has an annual price tag of at least €157bn (CW 9 March 2015).
To prove a safe level of exposure, he said, laboratory studies and ongoing monitoring of human exposure are required. “We need to take an evidence-based approach that proves innocence [of a chemical] in contrast to what currently occurs, which is a dangerous and unnatural experiment on human health”.
He said that this should be to “actively test chemicals for potential health hazards”, with a focus on lowest levels of exposure.
This “should take a rigorous and broad approach that includes developing organ systems and endocrine systems, in particular”. He added that the present regulatory framework does not require that level of testing “anywhere in the world” but said that the EU is moving in this direction.
Publishing a review of EDCs science on Monday, the Endocrine Society said the evidence that some chemicals disrupt hormones in a way that causes a range of serious health problems has become more compelling (CW 29 September 2015).
However, in response, the American Chemistry Council, a member of the ICCA, said the review “incorrectly characterises as settled, the still-unproven hypothesis regarding risks of low levels of exposure to particular chemicals”.
It also said the review failed to differentiate between chemicals that are “endocrine-active”, meaning they interact with the endocrine system, and those that are “endocrine disruptors” – those where the levels of exposure associated with an interaction cause scientifically proven adverse health effects.

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) Revise that outdated TSCA! (Boxer, 2010). Wait: do NOT revise that outdated TSCA! (Boxer, 2015)

Sep 29, 2015 | Science 2.0

By Gil Ross

Almost as soon as the much-derided Toxic Substances Control Act was passed, in 1976, our friends in the "environmental" movement began to complain about its shortcomings. Around the turn of the century, the cacophony grew ever louder: who needs an old chemical safety law, whose main accomplishment (it was said) was never having evaluated or banned anything. OK, that was perhaps an exaggeration: out of the "85,000" or however many chemicals on the market, only "200" had been tested by the EPA, and only 5 had been banned. The worst example: in 1989, the EPA took steps under TSCA to ban or severely restrict the known carcinogen, asbestos. However, before any final regulation was enacted, the 5th Circuit Court overturned the ban as too broad and not sufficiently supported by evidence (although a few paper products containing asbestos were banned).
The ongoing controversy over reforming or revising TSCA came to a boil a few years ago, when Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) decided that enough was enough, and took over the management of getting TSCA reform done. A coalition was formed to promote the passage of what was then called the "Safe Chemicals Act of 2011."
One of the most fervent co-sponsors at the time was Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), who chaired the key Environment and Public Works Committee. Her deeply-ingrained commitment to the cause of chemical safety and environmental protection at all costs was well-known to her colleagues, the press, and the many, many activist groups whose HQs (or major outposts) were in the Golden State. In fact, she solicited and received testimony on the urgent need for TSCA reform from the "senior scientist" at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Dr. Gina Solomon. Dr. Solomon testified about the sad state of our nation's chemical safety testing, and as proof, offered her organization's findings that there were forty-two chemical sites in 13 states which had provoked clusters of various illnesses among the nearby residents, including cancer. (Finding that hard to swallow, my organization, ACSH, undertook a project to look into those alleged clusters of chemical-induced disease. Our findings are contained here; in summary, there was precious little evidence to support forty of the 42 sites in question).
Paying no heed to our deconstruction of NRDC's thesis, Sen. Boxer and her liberal-Democratic colleagues went full speed ahead on crafting a new, new TSCA reform with regulatory strictures substantially more draconian than the Lautenberg bill. Needless to say, support from across the aisle was nonexistent and industry was similarly unimpressed — the New York Times was a big-time supporter.
At this key moment, Sen. Lautenberg became ill and was in semi-retirement for a while, and the reform effort languished. Then, like the phoenix, he resumed his Senatorial duties and solicited input from less-devoted environmentalist colleagues and even Republicans. Working mainly with Sen. David Vitter (R-LA), they crafted a more even-handed reform bill. Sadly, Sen. Lautenberg's illness (a cancer) recurred, and he had to retire, dying shortly thereafter in June of 2013, with the end in sight for his TSCA reform efforts.
Or so everyone thought. With 55 co-sponsors and support from the American Chemistry Council and Sen. James Imhofe (R-OK) on the one hand, and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) on the left, passage of the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act seemed a matter of time. (The House bill, The TSCA Modernization Act, passed in June this year by 398-1). But we still have no reform bill.
Why not? Because Sen. Boxer has decided that the new bill gives too much protection to industry and their hated chemicals and voids some of the consumer protections that California has amongst its thicket of green regulations, which cause marketers in the 49 non-California states to pull their respective hairs out. Tough on them, she and her staffers and deep green donors and constituents aver: our way or no highway for TSCA reform. And although she no longer controls the fate of such bills as she did when the Democrats ruled, she still packs a disproportionate punch with her colleagues on environmental issues, more's the pity.
She doesn't want compromise, bipartisan reform of chemical safety if she doesn't get to write it (undoubtedly with the help of her cronies in California's environmental camp and the state's "Green Chemistry Initiative," under which the EU's precautionary principle has been transplanted onto our shores). But her main issue seems to be Proposition 65, the "Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act" of 1986, also known as the predatory lawyer annuity act: any substance marketed in the state with any taint of "carcinogen" based on rodent tests ("at the drop of a rat") must be so labeled. Exposure and levels play no role, and any bounty hunter lawyer can enforce the act by suing the recalcitrant company and collecting the "damages," which has created a cottage industry of such Prop. 65 specialists, but no discernible benefit to the public health of California's residents.
Public records have revealed the lengths (or depths) Sen. Boxer will traverse to protect Prop. 65 from the meddling hands of TSCA reform. In an article entitled "Boxer, Californians fight parochial tag in reform battle," E&E News found her desperate solicitations to non-California officials to get them to testify against the Lautenberg bill, so as to appear that such opposition is not a private bailiwick of herself and her acolytes (which it is). One Californian (echoing many others in every state) had this perspective on that inane regulation: Anthony Caso, a law professor at Chapman University in Orange, Calif., and a critic of the program, said "We're talking about getting warnings anytime something might cause cancer. On the face of it, that sounds great, but if you see the label on absolutely everything everywhere, it's meaningless."
Here's the tally sheet: Democrats, Republicans, business and industry, and most environmental groups are all hoping for meaningful TSCA reform this year, in homage to the long career and hard work of Sen. Lautenberg, and to at long last modernize TSCA. Opposed: the senior senator from the empire of California, Barbara Boxer. If the status quo survives thanks to her, the present patchwork of state (and local) chemical regulations will remain, with some states having essentially no consumer protection. It's a shame to see one stubborn Senator standing in the way of progress, in the name of...what? Sen. Boxer: do not let the perfect be the enemy of the very good.

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) ACC: Endocrine Society Statement ‘Disregards State of Science’

Sep 30, 2015 | FoodQualityNews.com

By Joe Whitworth

The American Chemistry Council (ACC) has said the Endocrine Society’s claims of evidence tying endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) to diabetes and obesity risks ‘disregards the state of science’. EDCs mimic, block or interfere with the body’s natural hormones and can alter the way cells develop and grow, according to the Endocrine Society. The organisation said additional research from a 2009 report has found exposure is associated with increased risk of developing diabetes and obesity . Mounting evidence also indicates EDC exposure is connected to infertility, hormonerelated cancers, neurological issues and other disorders, it added. EDCs include bisphenol A (BPA) found in food can linings, phthalates in plastics and cosmetics, flame retardants and pesticides. ACC said the statement by a ‘limited group of Society members’, disregards the state of the science on the effects of chemicals on the endocrine system and makes ‘broad, unsupported claims’ about relationship between certain chemicals and disease. “The statement incorrectly characterizes as settled, the stillunproven hypothesis regarding risks of low levels of exposure to particular chemicals,” it said. “In doing so, the society discounts the extensive reviews by experts at the US Environmental Protection Agency and the European Food Safety Authority that were unable to substantiate the health significance of the so called lowdose effects, and questioned the validity of the nonmonotonic hypothesis. “Furthermore, the Endocrine Society’s report fails to differentiate between chemicals that are ‘endocrineactive,’ meaning they interact with the endocrine system, and those that are ‘endocrine disruptors,’ meaning that the levels of exposure associated with that interaction cause scientificallyproven adverse health effects.” Action to minimise exposure The Endocrine Society called for additional research to infer causeandeffect relationships between exposure and health conditions, regulation to ensure chemicals are tested for endocrine activity, including at low doses, prior to being permitted for use and “green chemists” and other industrial partners to create products that test for and eliminate potential EDCs. The statement comes as society experts are addressing the International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM4), in Switzerland, on using scientific approaches to limit health risks of EDC exposure. ACC said the chemicals industry is supporting research to boost scientific understanding of the way chemicals interact with the endocrine system using validated screening tools, tests and methods. “The industry’s Long Range Research Initiative has developed cutting edge screens and tests to support these efforts and has made substantial contributions to the development of high throughput tools that can be used to prioritize and screen chemicals at a much faster pace than traditional methods,” it said. “Industry has been an active participant in the US EPA program and has submitted data and analysis on testmethod development and chemicals for use by regulators to determine whether chemicals activate the endocrine system and if so, whether they cause adverse health effects due to that interaction.”

School lunch concerns Meanwhile, school meals may contain unsafe levels of BPA, according to a study in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology . "During school site visits, I was shocked to see that virtually everything in school meals came from a can or plastic packaging," said Jennifer Hartle, a postdoctoral researcher at the Stanford Prevention Research Center. "Meat came frozen, prepackaged, precooked and preseasoned. Salads were precut and prebagged. Corn, peaches and green beans came in cans. The only items not packaged in plastic were oranges, apples and bananas." Researchers interviewed school food service personnel, visited school kitchens and cafeterias in the San Francisco Bay Area and analyzed studies on BPA food concentration values finding exposure varied depending on what students eat. Elementary school students having pizza and milk with fresh fruits and vegetables would take in minimal levels. But a student consuming pizza and milk with canned fruits and vegetables could take in anywhere from minimal levels to 1.19 micrograms of BPA per kilogram of body weight per day. Students who consume the maximum amount would take in more than half of the dose shown to be toxic in animal studies (2 micrograms per kilogram of body weight per day) in one meal. However, the Center for Accountability in Science said the levels of BPA exposure estimated are nowhere near “toxic levels.” CAS cited EFSA’s opinion this year saying “BPA poses no health risk to consumers of any age group” and the agency’s tolerable daily intake level set at 4 micrograms per kilogram of body weight per day. “While the study’s lead researcher said she was “shocked to see that virtually everything in school meals came from a can or plastic packaging,” it’s shocking she would assume school meals were prepared any other way. “Cans and plastic packaging are among the best ways for schools to provide children with a variety of fruits and vegetables and avoid spoilage.”

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) Experts Link Chemicals to Obesity, Diabetes

Sep 30, 2015 | Mother Nature Network

By Mary Jo DiLonardo

New evidence ties hormone-disrupting chemicals to two of the biggest health threats we face today: obesity and diabetes.
A task force issued a statement this week on the harm that can come from hormone- or endocrine-disrupting chemicals, also known as EDCs. The statement, released by the Endocrine Society, is based on a review of more than 1,300 studies. The research found mounting evidence to support a connection between the chemicals and health problems including:DiabetesObesityHeart diseaseInfertilityHormone-related cancers in women (breast, ovarian, endometrial)Prostate cancerThyroid disordersNeurodevelopmental issues in children
PHOTOS TO INSPIRE: 10 animals found in the rain forest
The statement is significant, points out WebMD, because it comes from doctors who treat people for hormone problems rather than scientists who study the effects of chemicals in animals or on cells.
This new statement updates a similar one released in 2009. But six years ago, researchers couldn't make a strong case for the links between those chemical and diseases, said Andrea Gore, Ph.D., a pharmacologist at the University of Texas at Austin, and chair of the task force that developed the statement.
“The evidence is more definitive than ever before – EDCs disrupt hormones in a manner that harms human health,” said Gore. “Hundreds of studies are pointing to the same conclusion, whether they are long-term epidemiological studies in human, basic research in animals and cells, or research into groups of people with known occupational exposure to specific chemicals.”
Chemicals to avoid
Gore said that people should minimize exposure to these chemicals that block or mimic the action of hormones in the body and said that better safety testing is needed to identify new EDCs and make sure they are kept out of household products.
Known EDCs include:Bisphenol A (BPA), found in food can linings and cash register receiptsPhthalates, found in plastics and cosmetics and flame retardantsSome pesticidesTriclosan, a chemical used for antibacterial purposes
Gore points out that there are somewhere around 85,000 chemicals known to be used in the U.S. right now.
“Not all of them are EDCs, but if even 1 percent of them were EDCs, that would be 850 chemicals,” she said.
Heating plastic containers may allow chemicals to leach into food. (Photo: Monkey Business Images/Shutterstock)
How to avoid exposure
Gore offered several everyday suggestions for people who want to limit their exposure to EDCs.Don't use plastic water bottles. "I not only reduce my own exposure to chemicals by not using disposable water bottles but I'm also contributing to not contaminating the environment."Avoid heating and using plastic containers. "You may have a healthy meal, but if it's in a plastic container, it's leaching chemicals."Limit processed food. "Eat as much not-processed food as possible. During food processing, chemicals can be introduced inadvertently. Buy fresh fruits and vegetables and you're not getting any processed chemicals into your body."
Not everyone agrees
The report has elicited criticism from the chemical industry.
The summary of the new report "makes broad, unsupported claims about the relationship between certain chemicals and disease," the American Chemistry Council, the nation's largest chemical industry trade group, said in a statement. The group points out that regulatory agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have not substantiated the idea that minute doses of endocrine disrupters can cause health problems.
"Furthermore, the Endocrine Society’s report fails to differentiate between chemicals that are ‘endocrine-active,’ meaning they interact with the endocrine system, and those that are ‘endocrine disruptors,’ meaning that the levels of exposure associated with that interaction cause scientifically-proven adverse health effects."

Return to headline | Return to top
States Urge Further Changes in TSCA-Reform Bill

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Reprot

By Pat Rizzuto

States' ability to manage chemical risks must be protected through further changes to Senate legislation to update the Toxic Substances Control Act, according to two state organizations.
“Additional modifications are critical for a final comprehensive law that protects public health and the environment,” William Pound, executive director of the National Conference of State Legislatures, and Alexandra Dunn, executive director and general counsel for the Environmental Council of States, wrote in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), posted online Sept. 29.
The letter discussed S. 697, the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, which is co-sponsored by 56 Senators from 36 states, but has not been scheduled for floor action (see related story).
Senate Majority Whip Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29 that he anticipates the bill reaching the floor within weeks. “That's on the list of pending legislative action,” he said. “I'd expect we take that up in October.”
Pound and Dunn thanked senators for revising S. 697 to grandfather state chemical laws enacted before August 2015.
Years of Inaction Concern States
States are concerned, however, that the bill would pre-empt many state chemical regulations after August 2015 once the Environmental Protection Agency begins to assess the safety of a chemical.
“This language creates uncertainty for states and has the potential to delay or remove much-needed protections against toxic chemicals,” Pound and Dunn said.
At least five years could transpire between the EPA's launch of a risk assessment and its decision about whether to regulate it, they said.
“This means there could be several years where the federal government is not acting, states are pre-empted, and the public and environment are unprotected from dangerous chemicals,” Pound and Dunn said.
To address this concern, they urged two changes to S. 697.
First, states should be able to manage chemical risks in the absence of a final EPA determination.
Second, the section of S. 697 that would allow states to submit a waiver allowing them to manage chemical risks while the EPA's assessment continues should be revised to allow states to pursue needed regulations as their waiver requests are pending, they said.
State Grants Also Needed
Finally, the state organizations repeated a request for federal funding to support states that would work with the EPA to manage chemicals.
Section 28 of TSCA authorizes such grants. Dunn previously urged Congress to revitalize that grant program to enable states to offer technical assistance to businesses pursuing safer chemistries (30 DEN B-1, 2/13/15).
Lynn Bergeson, managing partner of Bergeson & Campbell PC, discussed state pre-emption during a Sept. 24 webinar her law firm held on TSCA-reform legislation before the House and Senate. Her firm specializes in laws and regulations addressing chemicals.
“State pre-emption remains the most difficult and contentious issue,” she said.
“If that difficult and complex issue can be resolved, it could open the door to TSCA reform happening—something like this new legislation,” Bergeson said.

Return to headline | Return to top
Everyday Chemical Exposure Linked to Obesity, Diabetes Epidemic

Sep 30, 2015 | Yahoo! Health

By Amy Capetta

A Scientific Statement released by the Endocrine Society says that new evidence points to a link between endocrine-disrupting chemical exposure and both diabetes and obesity — two of the biggest heath threats in modern society.
Approximately 35 percent of American adults are obese and more than 29 million Americans have diabetes.
Animal studies have found that endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) affected beta and alpha cells in the pancreas, fat cells, and liver cells, which can lead to two risk factors for type 2 diabetes and obesity — insulin resistance, as well as an abundance of insulin in the body.
Previous research has found endocrine disruptors to play a role in infertility, hormone-related cancers (such as breast and ovarian cancer), prostate conditions, thyroid disorders, neurological issues and other disorders, and the “number of corroborating studies continues to mount.”
What types of chemicals are endocrine disruptors?
DDT and other pesticides, plasticizers such as bisphenol A (BPA), phthalates, and flame retardants. They’re found in everyday products — including cash register receipts, plastic bottles, metal food cans, food, toys, cosmetics and pesticides, according to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
Related: Is It Safe to Reuse Plastic Containers?
“The evidence is more definitive than ever before — EDCs disrupt hormones in a manner that harms human health,” says Andrea C. Gore, PhD, Professor and Vacek Chair of Pharmacology at the University of Texas at Austin and chair of the task force that developed the statement. “Hundreds of studies are pointing to the same conclusion, whether they are long-term epidemiological studies in human, basic research in animals and cells, or research into groups of people with known occupational exposure to specific chemicals.”
This information is especially vital for adults looking to start a family.
“Couples planning to have a baby, and pregnant women, should be particularly vigilant about avoiding chemicals,” Gore tells Yahoo Health.
The statement — which was addressed at the International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM4), in Geneva, Switzerland — calls upon policymakers to keep EDCs out of our everyday items (for example, bisphenol A, or BPA, can be found in food can linings and cash register receipts) and to regulate further chemical testing.
Here are strategies to follow today to limit your exposure to EDCs.
1. Do not mix heat with plastic. “Plastics are more likely to leach out of containers when heated,” says Gore. Experts suggest avoiding putting plastic containers in the microwave or dishwashers with very hot water, for instance.”
2. Ditch the plastic water bottle. When you’re on-the-go, Gore advises to sip H2O from either a reusable metal or glass water bottle. “Not only will you decrease leaching of chemicals (that can be obtained in a plastic bottle), you’ll also reduce your contribution to environmental plastic waste that is filling landfills, and polluting our oceans.” However, if a plastic bottle of water is your only option, keep it out of the sun or a heated environment (like a hot yoga class) to avoid leaching.
3. Scrub your produce. “Many pesticides are known EDC’s,” she says. “Rinsing fruits and vegetables—tap water is fine—before eating can help to minimize exposure to these chemicals.”
4. Eat fresh over processed foods. “Processed foods may have additives, and the food may come into contact with containers or machinery that might result in some leaching. And if possible, avoid meats that come from animals treated with hormones or antibiotics.”
5. Store food in either glass or BPA-free stainless steel bowls and containers. “Although some manufacturers have removed BPA from food and beverage storage containers, we do not always know what has replaced the BPA or whether it has been tested as an EDC,” explains Gore.
5. Tidy up your home. “Keep your house clean. Also, plug holes under sinks and in the kitchen to minimize pests in order to avoid a need for chemical pesticides.”
6. Take action. “Chemicals can be added into food storage containers without any required testing for safety,” explains Gore. “Therefore, contact your elected representatives to ask for improved testing of chemicals that are used in the food industry, before they are introduced.”

Return to headline | Return to top
Pilot Program Will Gauge Air Quality in New York Nail Salons

Sep 29, 2015 | The New York TImes

By Benjamin Mueller

It is a question that has lurked in the minds of many manicurists: Are the chemicals they handle on a daily basis endangering their health?
A pilot program, introduced Tuesday by the New York City public advocate’s office and backed by the Clinton Global Initiative, is designed to ensure that they do not.
Dozens of desk lamps fitted with air quality sensors will appear in nail salons across the city next year, providing information to health officials, customers, salon managers and the workers themselves about whether chemical levels in the air are unsafe. Continue reading the main storyRELATED COVERAGESome Nail Salon Owners in New York Push Back Against Increased RegulationSEPT. 3, 2015Benefits, and Some Resistance, as New York Cracks Down on Nail Salon AbusesJULY 16, 2015
The program is the latest in a series of initiatives by the city and state to protect nail salon workers from dangerous work conditions and labor abuses in the wake of a two-part investigation of the industry by The New York Times. The series included an examination of the health problems, including miscarriages, cancers and respiratory issues, experienced by many manicurists who regularly bathe their hands in polishes and solvents and breathe their chemical fumes.
Medical research has tied chemicals used in nail products to serious health problems. But little is known with certainty about the extent to which manicurists are actually at risk. Efforts to limit chemical exposure in salons have also been hamstrung by outdated standards, health advocates and even federal regulators say.
The pilot program, which is being financed by a private equity firm, Pegasus Capital Advisors, is intended to make daily air quality information available for the first time in a range of city salons, and create an incentive for owners to improve ventilation.
“They’re going to use this prototype as a way to determine what nail salon they should patronize,” Letitia James, the public advocate, said in an interview. “It’s really an environmental justice issue because the vast majority of the workers are immigrants, and oftentimes they’re not empowered and not given the proper information.”
The public advocate’s office said sensor chips embedded in small lamps will measure certain organic compounds in the air, a measure that health advocates say would include a range of potentially harmful ingredients. Brandon Zaharoff, an investment professional at Pegasus, said the sensors would signal the presence of the “toxic trio” of chemicals associated with the most serious medical issues: toluene, dibutyl phthalate and formaldehyde.
A colored indicator light on the lamp will show how poor the air quality is. The information will also be made available remotely to health officials through an online dashboard, and to salon managers through an app on their smartphones.
The public advocate’s office, in partnership with Pegasus and the Lighting Science Group Corporation, which makes the devices, plans to distribute 50 of the lamps to a total of about 35 salons starting in January. Salons will have to volunteer to receive one or two of the devices, but the program’s backers hope it will evolve into a citywide norm as consumers gravitate to salons with the sensors.
Ms. James, a Democrat, announced the pilot program on Tuesday at a panel at the annual meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative, which made the program one of its Commitments to Action. That designation, which has gone to several thousand programs over the last decade, means that the group will work to spread the program’s goals and recruit additional partners.
“It will really allow users to have the information to make health choices about where they choose to get their nails done, and where to push for better air quality and ventilation systems,” said Mr. Zaharoff, of Pegasus, which focuses on resource sustainability and is investing about $23,000 in the pilot program.
But scientists and health advocates said transparency about air quality would go only so far in an industry where regulators have been struggling to eliminate the potentially toxic chemicals outright.
“If something is a toxic chemical, you don’t need to measure it — you need to get rid of it,” said Cora Roelofs, an assistant professor of public health and community medicine at Tufts University, who conducted a study in 2011 about assessing chemical exposure in salons. “I wouldn’t put effort in what are likely to be unreliable snapshots of the chemicals you pick. And then what are you going to compare it to?”
Another question hanging over the pilot program is whether its standards will be stringent enough. The devices will convert their measurements into equivalent levels of carbon dioxide, and then rely on indoor air quality standards set by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers to decide whether chemical levels are dangerous.
But the paucity of research on chemical exposure inside nail salons makes it difficult to determine what impact those standards would have. Measurements taken in nail salons have found exposure levels to be well below standards set for workplaces by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration, but health advocates and federal officials have said those standards are too high and needed revision.
Very few studies have focused on nail workers specifically, but one published in 2011 on chemical exposure among Vietnamese workers in California salons found that chemical levels were higher than the California Environmental Protection Agency’s recommended limits.
The research scientist who led that study, Thu Quach, of the Cancer Prevention Institute of California, said measurements are also highly dependent on where the sensors are placed. For her study, she put sensors on workers’ collars, for example, so they could capture the air near their breathing zones, and she pointed out that stationary lamps could end up farther from the nail products themselves.
“My concern is that it would really underestimate the exposures,” Dr. Quach said.

Return to headline | Return to top

Chemical Security News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Energy and Environment News

(ACC Mentioned) Energy-Saving Catalysts Goal of Academies Workshop

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

A committee convened by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine will hold a workshop next spring to spur research and development of new catalysts that can save energy, thereby reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
The workshop will seek to identify research opportunities in particular for catalysts that could work at lower temperatures to convert natural gas into feedstocks to make chemicals, Allison Eckhardt, a spokeswoman for the Basic Energy Sciences program within the Department of Energy's Office of Science, told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29.
DOE, the National Science Foundation, the American Chemistry Council , the Dow Chemical Co. and the Saudi Basic Industries Corp., more commonly known as SABIC, are sponsoring the committee's work, according to the National Academies' description of the project.
Catalysts can be natural or synthetic chemicals. Most biochemical processes that occur in living organisms are mediated by enzymes, which are catalysts made of proteins. Metals and chemicals also can serve as catalysts.
People and companies add catalysts to materials such as beer, cheese, laundry detergents and petroleum to spur or increase the rate of chemical reactions.
ACC: Enhancing Sustainability
“The chemical industry has been a pioneer in the development of catalytic technologies, which help reduce and optimize energy use in chemical processing and have the potential to further enhance sustainability in the industry going forward,” Mike Walls, ACC's vice president of regulatory and technical Affairs, told Bloomberg BNA in an e-mail.
“The workshop and report are a scoping exercise in which stakeholders can explore the ‘art of the possible’ when it comes to catalysis and start to identify the areas and processes that catalytic research and development efforts should focus on,” he said.
Changing chemical feedstocks, particularly shale gas, are prompting the need for new catalysts, the academies said.
Opportunities Offered by New Catalysts
New energy-saving catalysts also are needed for biomass used as a feedstock and traditional feedstocks such as naphtha, which is present in coal-tar, shale oil and petroleum, according to areport, “Technology Roadmap: Energy and GHG Reductions in the Chemical Industry Via Catalytic Processes.”
The International Energy Agency, International Council of Chemical Associations, and the German Society for Chemical Engineering & Biotechnology issued the roadmap in 2013.
Biomass has the potential to be a “game-changer” in reducing dependency on fossil fuels, absorbing carbon dioxide and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the report said.
Yet, greenhouse gas emissions resulting from land-use changes, agriculture, harvesting, transport and processing of the biomass can make biomass feedstocks more GHG-intensive than fossil fuel-based production, the report said.
Specific scenarios can vary, but “using biomass as a feedstock for chemical products can be 10 to 15 times more energy-intensive compared with the established fossil-based routes,” the report said.
New catalysts could help reduce the energy used to convert biomass into chemicals, it said.
DOE provided $100,000, or one-third of the total $300,000 cost of the workshop, according to Eckhardt.
The academies committee will prepare a final report drawing on the workshop and other information. That report is expected in fall 2016, Lauren Rugani, an academies spokeswoman told Bloomberg BNA.

Return to headline | Return to top
Democrats File Amendments to Oil Export Bill

| BNA Daily Environment Report

By Ari Natter

Amendments related to new licensing requirements and climate change were among 18 amendments House Democrats filed to floor-bound legislation that would lift the ban on most crude oil exports.
It remains to be seen which amendments, if any, will be made in order by the House Rules Committee, which set a Sept. 28 deadline for members to file amendments to the bill (H.R. 702).
Among these is a measure by Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) that would require a national interest determination by the Commerce Department before the agency would grant crude oil export authorization.
Other amendments include a measure by Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) that would not allow the bill to go into effect until President Barack Obama determines that repealing crude oil export restrictions will not increase greenhouse gas emissions.
Rules Committee to Meet
Also filed was a measure by Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) that would establish a program to help minority- and women-owned businesses in the energy supply chain and an amendment by Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) that would reinstate the ban if exports were determined to cause gasoline price increases.
The Rules Committee is expected to meet to consider the measure the week of Oct. 5, the same week the bill, by Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) is expected to be brought to the House floor.
In addition to repealing the section of the 1975 Energy Policy and Conservation Act that created the crude export ban, the legislation bars the federal government from imposing or enforcing any similar restrictions and requires an Energy Department report on the appropriate size and makeup of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
More than a dozen oil companies including ConocoPhillips Co., Marathon Oil Corp. and Hess Corp. are lobbying to have the trade restrictions lifted, arguing the rules put in place in the wake of the Arab oil embargo no longer make sense in the face of booming domestic oil production.
Opponents of changing the law include Consumers & Refiners United for Domestic Energy (CRUDE), a coalition of independent refiners comprising Alon USA, PBF Energy Inc., Philadelphia Energy Solutions and Delta Air Lines Inc.'s Monroe Energy LLC, which argue lifting the ban will increase domestic oil prices.

Return to headline | Return to top
Upton Restores Republican Measures in Energy Bill

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Ari Natter

Language that would expedite the Energy Department's consideration of natural gas exports is among the Republican-backed measures included in a new version of broad energy legislation to be marked up by a House committee Sept. 30.
Other measures included in an amendment in the nature of a substitute to H.R. 8 include provisions that would repeal a 2007 law requiring that federal buildings phase out the use of fossil fuels. Another of the measures, which was backed by natural gas utilities, would suspend an Energy Department rulemaking setting energy efficiency standards for furnaces, according to a summary.
The amendment, by Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, signals a move away from earlier attempts to keep the legislation bipartisan after negotiations with committee Democrats broke down (181 DEN A-3, 9/18/15).
Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), the top Democrat on the committee, issued a statement shortly after the substitute amendment was released, saying he would oppose the bill.
Democrat Opposition
“[A]fter nearly seven months of good-faith efforts on both sides of the aisle—efforts that yielded a consensus in our subcommittee markup—Republicans decided to abandon that process,” Pallone said. “With this manager's amendment, the majority has made significant and controversial changes, just hours before we are set to start marking up this bill.”
Included in the substitute amendment was language that would require the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to conduct a reliability analysis on any proposed or final rule affecting electric generating units estimated to cost $1 billion or more.
It also includes a measure by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and backed by groups such as the National Association of Home Builders and the American Gas Association that would limit the federal government's role in setting energy building codes.
“Our goal remains getting something to president's desk that can be signed,” Upton said Sept. 29 in remarks before the committee.
30-Day Deadline
Specifically, the provision to expedite the federal approval process for natural gas exports would set a a 30-day deadline for DOE to act on applications at the conclusion of the review required by the National Environmental Policy Act.
Similar legislation (H.R. 351), passed the House in January with support from organizations representing companies such as Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. and Range Resources Corp.(19 DEN A-9, 1/29/15).
The underlying bill, the North American Energy Security and Infrastructure Act (H.R. 8), would streamline the federal siting process for interstate natural gas pipelines and allow the Energy Department to take certain measures during “grid security emergencies.”

Return to headline | Return to top
No TSCA Rule to Cut Carbon Dioxide Emissions, EPA Says

Sep 30, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

The Environmental Protection Agency will not use regulatory authorities provided under the Toxic Substances Control Act to cut carbon dioxide emissions.
The EPA denied the Center for Biological Diversity's petition asking the agency to conclude carbon dioxide poses an unreasonable risk and therefore should be banned or restricted using authorities provided by Section 6 of TSCA, according to a letter and prepublication Federal Register notice the agency posted online Sept. 29.
The EPA also denied the petitioners' alternative request that the agency issue a Section 4 test rule instead of the Section 6 rule. The requested test rule would have required manufacturers and processors that generate the air pollutant to conduct tests to determine carbon dioxide's toxicity, persistence and other characteristics.
The center filed the petition June 30 (127 DEN A-9, 7/2/15).
“The petitioners provided neither adequate specifics on the relief sought under TSCA, nor sufficient information on the costs and benefits associated with a requested regulatory option to allow EPA to make the unreasonable risk finding,” the EPA said, regarding the Section 6 rulemaking request.
“The petitioners do not present EPA with information sufficient to establish that testing under TSCA section 4 is necessary to develop data that would allow EPA to determine whether anthropogenic CO2 emissions present an unreasonable risk of injury under TSCA,” the agency said.
Finally, the agency pointed to Section 9(a) of TSCA, which requires the agency to coordinate actions taken under TSCA with those taken under other statutes the EPA administers.
Domestic and international actions the EPA is taking under the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act and other authorities are more effective means of addressing the ocean acidification and other concerns raised by carbon dioxide, the agency said.

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Requires Fenceline Monitoring of Refinery Emissions

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Patrick Ambrosio

Petroleum refineries will be required to install monitors to measure fenceline concentrations of benzene, one of a series of new requirements established by the Environmental Protection Agency Sept. 29.
The fenceline monitoring requirements are included in a final rule that updates national hazardous air pollution standards that apply to refineries, which also will be required to improve the efficiency of flares and comply with new emissions standards for delayed cokers.
The EPA estimated the final rule (RIN 2060-AQ75), once fully implemented in 2018, will reduce emissions of benzene, xylene and other hazardous air pollutants by 5,200 tons per year. The agency also estimated the rule will cut emissions of volatile organic compounds, a precursor to the formation of ground-level ozone, by 50,000 tons per year.
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy told reporters during a conference call that the rule takes advantage of new technology to significantly reduce emissions while improving refinery operations.
“This rule is all about operating efficiently,” McCarthy said.
McCarthy said the fenceline monitoring requirements will “prevent, not just control” fugitive emissions of toxic air pollutants. Additionally, data from the monitors will be publicly accessible through a new database that the EPA will maintain, creating a “kind of neighborhood watch” for refinery air pollution, McCarthy said.
The updated standards apply to 142 petroleum refineries in the U.S. and will improve air quality for the 6.1 million people who live within three miles of a petroleum refinery, the EPA said. The agency estimated that refinery operators, including Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp., will need to make $283 million in capital investments to comply with the updated standards. The agency also projected that the industry would need to spend about $63 million annually to ensure compliance with the final revised standards.
The agency said in the rule that the overall economic effects of the rule should be minimal for both the refining industry and consumers.
Industry Welcomes Flaring Changes
The American Petroleum Institute, which previously raised concerns that the EPA had significantly underestimated the cost of the November 2014 proposed version of the refinery rule, said in a Sept. 29 statement that the agency made “substantial improvements” to the regulation.
The API said in comments that the proposed version of the refinery rule could have cost refineries more than $20 billion. The industry trade group now projects that the regulations could cost refiners as much as $1 billion.
Bob Greco, downstream group director for the API, told Bloomberg BNA in an e-mail that the proposal would have required the industry to conduct “hundreds” of new flares at refineries, which would have cost billions of dollars and significantly increased greenhouse gas emissions from the sector.
“EPA reviewed industry data, and in the final rule EPA instead is implementing work practices to improve existing flare operations, which minimizes huge added costs and GHG emissions increases,” Greco said.
The agency initially proposed to prevent the venting of pressure release devices to the atmosphere, but conducted an analysis that found at least one new flare per facility would need to be installed to handle releases from the devices. Instead the EPA established work practice standards that will reduce the magnitude and frequency of pressure release devices and emergency flaring events without the negative effects associated with the installation of more flares.
The agency's final rule requires flares to operate with “no visible emissions” and to comply with flare-tip velocity requirements when flare vent gas flow is below the smokeless capacity of the flare, rather than at all times, as was proposed. The EPA set work-practice standards related to visible emissions and velocity limits when the gas flow is above the smokeless capacity of the flare.
Greco said API is still reviewing the 745-page final rule and did not comment on provisions beyond flaring requirements.
Chet Thompson, president of the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, issued a Sept. 29 statement that criticized the EPA for requiring refinery operators to install “expensive new emissions controls that provide little incremental health benefits.”
Thompson noted that the EPA's residual risk review of the sector concluded that refinery emissions fall “well under the significance level” for chronic risk, a finding that he said demonstrates past improvements have been effective.
“AFPM will be reviewing this rule and our next move will be dictated by our findings,” Thompson said.
Shorter Implementation for Monitoring
The agency agreed to review its refinery standards and issue its final decision on whether revisions were warranted in order to settle a lawsuit filed by the Environmental Integrity Project and other advocacy groups that challenge the agency's failure to meet a statutory review deadline under the Clean Air Act (Air All. Houston v. McCarthy, D.D.C., No. 12-1607, motion filed, 1/13/14; 151 DEN A-1, 8/6/13).
Earthjustice issued a Sept. 29 statement on behalf of those advocacy groups that was generally supportive of the EPA's final rule.
Lisa Garcia, Earthjustice's vice president for healthy communities, said the rule contains several new health protections that will benefit communities that live near refineries.
“EPA's standards will give many communities a first look at how much cancer-causing benzene local refineries are releasing into the air, along with other important new health protections,” Garcia said. “This is a true legacy that this administration can be proud of.”
The EPA actually shortened the amount of time that refineries will have to meet the new fenceline monitoring provisions from three years in the proposal to two years in the final rule.
Sparsh Khandeshi, staff attorney with the Environmental Integrity Project, told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29 that the EPA should be applauded for shortening that implementation timeline given that communities have been asking for some sort of fenceline monitoring at refineries for about a decade. The monitors required by the EPA are “very simple” to set up and relatively inexpensive, Khandeshi said.
“We don't think it's a significant burden on industry,” he said.
No Real-Time Monitoring
The environmental groups, which also included the Louisiana Bucket Brigade and Air Alliance Houston, did criticize the EPA for not requiring refineries to install monitors that would provide real-time information on fenceline concentrations of benzene. Instead, refinery operators are required to collect data from the monitors once every two weeks, with refineries that consistently stay below the regulation's emissions limits allowed to conduct even less frequent monitoring.
Several organizations that commented on the refinery proposal, including the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, urged the EPA to require active, real-time monitoring for refineries (214 DEN A-1, 11/5/14).
Janet McCabe, EPA acting assistant administrator for air and radiation, told reporters Sept. 29 that the agency spent a lot of time considering different types of monitoring technology. The technology selected by the EPA is able to detect “very low levels” of benzene that cannot be recorded by other monitors, she said.
McCabe said the EPA acknowledges that technology is advancing, so the rule will accommodate “improvements and advancements” in air monitors.
Changes on Relief Devices
Khandeshi said the Environmental Integrity Project was pleased that the EPA had maintained proposed emissions limits for delayed cokers and requirements that refinery operators actively monitor flaring operations. Those provisions will help achieve significant reductions of refinery emissions, he said.
But Khandeshi said his group was “slightly dismayed” that the EPA did not follow through with its proposed prohibition on emissions releases from pressure release devices.
“We believe that it is cost-effective and feasible for facilities to comply with a blanket prohibition,” Khandeshi said.
The EPA did set a hard limit of no more than three events in three years per pressure release device or flare. McCabe said that after that hard limit of three events is reached, any subsequent event would qualify as a violation of the Clean Air Act.

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Weakens Final Refinery Air Toxics Rule, Reducing Compliance Costs

Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Stuart Parker

EPA's final rule revising air toxics limits for petroleum refineries backs down from some strict emissions controls floated in the proposed version of the rule, greatly reducing compliance costs while retaining what EPA says are health benefits similar to the proposal -- prompting a cautious welcome from some industry officials and environmentalists.
The main difference between the proposal and final rule released Sept. 29 appears to be that EPA dropped a plan to ban outright all toxics release from pressure relief devices (PRDs), which industry says are vital to ensure plant safety. As a result, the agency is not requiring the construction of many new flares to dispose of waste gases.
American Petroleum Institute (API) Downstream Group Director Bob Greco in a statement to Inside EPA says that under the proposed version of the rule industry “would have had to construct hundreds of new flares” to burn off the toxics otherwise released by the PRDs. The result of a prohibition on PRD releases would have been “not only a cost of billions of dollars, but with a significant increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.”
But “EPA reviewed industry data, and in the final rule EPA instead is implementing work practices to improve existing flare operations, which minimizes huge added costs and GHG emissions increases,” Greco says.
In an overview fact sheet for the final rule, EPA says that instead of a PRD ban the agency will “significantly reduce smoking flare emissions and releases by pressure release devices by requiring a comprehensive program of process changes and pollution prevention measures for these emission sources.
“This first of its kind national program will require: a minimum of three pollution prevention measures be installed; continuous monitoring of flares and pressure release devices; release events must be analyzed to determine the cause and remedied; and a hard limit of no more than three events in three years per device or flare.”
EPA says the projected emissions cuts will be only slightly lower than under the proposal, and that this difference results from EPA using a tougher “emissions factor” to estimate emissions cuts than in the proposal. Emission factors are used to estimate emissions from specific pieces of equipment commonly found in an industry sector -- and advocates have an appellate lawsuit pending claiming EPA's refinery factors are too weak.
The final rule does tighten some air pollution control requirements for the sector, setting stricter emissions limits for various hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) than those now in place for the refinery sector.
The rule imposes tougher conditions on flares, requiring greater destruction efficiency, and sets first-time limits on delayed cokers, used to process residual oil from refining into oil and petroleum coke. It limits emissions from some smaller storage tanks for the first time, and tightens requirements for some larger ones.
EPA is also imposing first-time fenceline monitoring requirements for refineries, and establishes continuous emissions monitoring of PRDs and sets a limit of three release episodes in three years from such devices. Fenceline monitoring will be required in 2017, a year earlier than proposed. Full compliance with the rule is required in 2018.
However, industry groups appear to have generally won significant concessions from EPA with respect to the rule's stringency and the consequent compliance costs. According to another Sept. 29 statement from API, the group now estimates compliance costs for the industry at $1 billion -- still far more than EPA's estimate of $283 million -- but far less than many billions API thought the May 15, 2014, proposed rule would cost.
“EPA analyses, supported by extensive industry monitoring data, show that air emissions from refineries are already at safe levels,” said API's Greco in the second statement. “The refinery industry has proven we can provide reliable American energy while protecting the environment and local communities, and collaborative efforts by API and the EPA led to final regulations that are more cost-effective than the proposal.”
Regulatory Benefits
In a Sept. 29 statement to announce the rule's release, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy stressed the rule's benefits to communities living near refineries, many of them low-income or communities of color, who have long complained of the health risks posed by refinery emissions.
“These updated Clean Air Act standards will lower the cancer risk from petroleum refineries for more than 1.4 million people and are a substantial step forward in EPA’s work to protect the health of vulnerable communities located near these facilities,” McCarthy said.
“The act requires a healthy environment for all communities, and this rule delivers on EPA’s commitment to environmental justice by reducing toxic air pollutants that impact families living near refineries by requiring, for the first time ever in an EPA air rule, monitoring of emissions at the fenceline and corrective action if standards are exceeded.”
Speaking to reporters on a Sept. 29 conference call, McCarthy said the rule will create a sort of “neighborhood watch” for refinery emissions by monitoring plants at the fenceline, which will monitor benzene as a surrogate for all HAPs on a continuous basis.
On the same call, acting EPA air chief Janet McCabe said that the rule requires that plants be encircled by 12 or 24 monitors, depending on the size of the facility.
In response to a question from Inside EPA on the call, McCabe confirmed that EPA believes its canister-based monitoring is superior to types of monitoring that provide results near instantaneously. “I certainly would say that this monitoring is real-time,” McCabe said, but it does not have an instantaneous readout. The rule would allow for adoption of new monitoring technologies in the future, she said.
McCabe further confirmed that the final rule does not find remaining, or “residual” risks from the refinery sector in excess of acceptable bounds. This issue is crucial because the final rule stems from a “risk and technology review,” under which EPA must under the air law review the remaining risks presented by an industry sector eight years after its initial regulation under air toxics standards.
If EPA finds such risks, and it finds technology is cost-effectively available to mitigate them, EPA must tighten maximum achievable control technology standards. Also, EPA can tighten standards, or introduce them for the first time on new equipment, based on new developments in industrial process and control technologies.
Industry groups including API and the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) say that the absence of residual risk undermines EPA's case for tougher regulation.
AFPM President Chet Thompson in a Sept. 29 statement says, “EPA issued a final rule concluding that refinery emissions fall well under the significance level for chronic risk and are not a source of harm to surrounding communities. This conclusion demonstrates that the refinery hazardous air pollutant reductions have proven effective. We therefore are disappointed by EPA’s decision to require additional expensive new emissions controls that provide little incremental health benefits.”
Environmentalists' Reaction
One environmentalist counters, however, that EPA has at least two distinct sources of legal authority for its rule under section 112 of the Clean Air Act, and can base its decision to toughen standards based on residual risk, new technology to curb emissions, or both.
Environmental groups who sued EPA to update its air toxics standards for the sector, resulting in the new rule, gave the rule a qualified welcome in a Sept. 29 statement.
“We applaud EPA for adopting new regulations that will reduce toxic emissions from refinery flares and better protect communities from unnecessary exposure,” said Sparsh Khandeshi, attorney for the Environmental Integrity Project (EIP), which filed the 2012 lawsuit along with Earthjustice that prompted EPA to tighten the regulations.
“The changes, requiring better monitoring and operation of refinery flares are common-sense requirements and are long-overdue. At the same time, we believe that EPA underestimated the full toxic burden from refineries and that the agency should have updated its risk analysis to account for its recent findings that flares and other refinery sources release significantly more pollution than previously reported,” Khandeshi said.
A second environmentalist says that EPA's risk assessment underestimates the true risks from refineries because it fails to use the latest emission factors developed by EPA for emissions from industrial flares. The new factors, at issue in the pending litigation, find that flare emissions can be up to four times higher than previously thought.
Environmental groups are therefore seeking stricter refinery air rules. In their statement, they say EPA should have: Required monitoring technology that would offer reports on air pollution in real time (instead of requiring just passive sampling that collects data on two-week averages; set a lower, more protective level of benzene at which corrective action will be required; prohibited all uncontrolled air pollution emissions from pressure relief valves and other similar devices; and prohibited the routine use of the burning of waste gas, through flaring, which environmentalists say releases hundreds of tons of pollution into the air.
EPA set the threshold level of benzene that triggers a root cause analysis and corrective response at nine micrograms per cubic meter, but environmental groups say this is too high and is not sufficiently health-protective.
The second environmentalist says it is unclear whether groups will take further legal action, but that they will continue to press EPA to tighten the refinery sector rules

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Defends Refinery Emission Rule from Industry Critics

Sep 29, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard

By Elana Schor

EPA today defended its new refinery emissions rule from condemnation by industry groups that warn the updated pollution controls are too costly.
The American Petroleum Institute and American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers fired off criticism minutes after the final rule's release with a projected price tag of $283 million, with API claiming that its total cost could reach $1 billion.
EPA air chief Janet McCabe described the new controls, which include up-to-date fence-line monitoring for benzene emissions from refineries, as "doable" for the industry and the product of long-running consultations.
Oil and gas producers were less sanguine. AFPM President Chet Thompson observed in a statement that EPA"s rule found refinery emissions "fall well under the significance level for chronic risk and are not a source of harm to surrounding communities," adding that his members "therefore are disappointed by EPA’s decision to require additional expensive new emissions controls that provide little incremental health benefits."
API's downstream director, Bob Greco, hailed changes EPA made to the final update from its proposed version but warned in a statement that “[d]espite these improvements, regulators need to be thoughtful about the additional impacts of new regulations and added costs to delivering affordable energy to U.S. consumers."

Return to headline | Return to top
Rule Aims to Shield Communities from Refinery Emissions

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E PM

By Amanda Reilly

The new U.S. EPA rule cracking down on refinery emissions will allow continuous monitoring of benzene for 6.1 million Americans who live within 3 miles of oil and gas refiners, Administrator Gina McCarthy said today.
"For the first time, a nationwide rule will require refineries to monitor emissions at their fence lines and publicly report the data using a new database that EPA is standing up and will manage," McCarthy said in a telephone conference to roll out the rule.
"So, in essence, this rule creates a kind of neighborhood watch for refinery pollution," she said.
Green groups praised EPA for tightening the monitoring provisions in the final rule compared to a proposal from May 2014 but said a lower benzene limit and real-time reporting of monitoring data were still needed. Oil groups also characterized the final rule as an improvement over the proposal but said it could still be too costly.
The rule requires refiners to surround their properties with up to two dozen canisterlike air monitors that spit out benzene readings every two weeks.
"This will give us and everyone else a more complete picture of what's going on at the facility," said EPA acting air chief Janet McCabe.
Refineries will face an annual limit for benzene of 9 micrograms per cubic meter; facilities will face corrective action if any of the monitors surrounding a refinery detect a problem.
According to EPA, the monitoring requirements stemmed from feedback from people who live in the shadow of refineries.
"We heard that communities wanted to know about the emissions that were coming," McCabe said. "The communities have been very clear that they're concerned about upset emissions and emergency emissions."
The final rule also seeks to nearly eliminate emissions from smoking flares and pressure release devices. Refineries will be required to install at least three pollution prevention measures addressing those emissions and put in place continuous monitoring technology (Greenwire, Sept. 29).
Hilton Kelley, founder and CEO of the Community In-power & Development Association Inc., praised the rule as a step in the right direction for environmental justice.
The rule "will help protect lives in our vulnerable communities," Kelley said.
EPA undertook the rulemaking as a results of a 2012 settlement with Environmental Integrity Project over the agency missing a Clean Air Act deadline to update refinery standards.
Environmentalists cheered the rule's fence-line monitoring provisions, flaring restrictions and emissions limits on other refinery operations.
"The changes, requiring better monitoring and operation of refinery flares, are common-sense requirements and are long overdue," said Sparsh Khandeshi, staff attorney at Environmental Integrity Project. "At the same time, we believe that EPA underestimated the full toxic burden from refineries."
EIP and other environmental groups say the agency should have required more advanced monitoring technology that offers information in real time, set a lower benzene limit, and completely prohibited all emissions from pressure relief valves and the routine use of flaring.
"We will keep fighting so that all refineries comply with the standards and ultimately are required to use the best available safeguards from hazardous pollution," said Lisa Garcia, Earthjustice vice president for healthy communities.
The oil industry maintained that refineries had already spent billions of dollars installing air pollution controls and that it was already operating refineries in a safe manner.
"EPA analyses, supported by extensive industry monitoring data, show that air emissions from refineries are already at safe levels," said Bob Greco, the American Petroleum Institue's downstream group director.
API estimated the new rule would cost as much as $1 billion -- far lower than the group's $20 billion cost estimate for EPA's proposal. EPA today said the final rule will cost refiners $283 million in capital costs and $63 million annually.
The industry group credited itself for collaborating with EPA to come up with final regulations that were more cost-effective than the proposal.
Among the changes, EPA said it simplified flare requirements and allowed additional flexibility in the final rule compared to the proposal.
EPA is also allowing refineries to conduct less fence-line monitoring than required if benzene levels are consistently below 10 percent of the yearly limit.

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Cracks Down on Oil Refinery Pollution

Sep 29, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Devin Henry

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has issued a new rule designed to slash toxic air pollution generated by petroleum refineries.
The rule, which will be implemented in 2018, requires refiners to reduce toxic air pollutants by 5,200 tons and cut 50,000 tons of volatile organic compounds from the air every year.
It also requires refiners, for the first time, to monitor concentrations of benzene, a chemical that has been linked to health problems, at their sites and inform the public about those levels. If the benzene levels exceed federal regulations, refiners will have to reduce them.
In a statement, the EPA pitched the new rule as a public health necessity.
“These updated Clean Air Act standards will lower the cancer risk from petroleum refineries for more than 1.4 million people and are a substantial step forward in EPA’s work to protect the health of vulnerable communities located near these facilities,” EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said in the statement.
There are 142 large refineries in the United States, and 6.1 million people within three miles of them.
The agency said the regulation will cost about $63 million to implement annually and that the final standards “will have a negligible impact on the cost of petroleum products.”
The oil industry pushed back against the rule last year during the comment period, saying the standard would be “infeasible” to comply with and warned they could increase emissions of greenhouse gases.
On Tuesday, the American Petroleum Institute (API) said regulators considered some of their concerns and tweaked the rule in some ways. But even so, API said the rule is still too expensive. It predicts it would cost $1 billion to implement and contends refiners were already working hard on reducing their emissions.
“Despite these improvements, regulators need to be thoughtful about the additional impacts of new regulations and added costs to delivering affordable energy to U.S. consumers,” API Downstream Group Director Bob Greco said in a statement.
“Companies have already spent billions of dollars to reduce emissions by installing flare gas recovery and flare minimization systems to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and air quality continues to improve as a result of these voluntary programs and existing regulations,” he added.

Return to headline | Return to top
Bush Plan Targets 'Damaging Federal Energy Policies'

Sep 29, 2015 | E&E PM

By Jennifer Yachnin

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush today asserted that "damaging federal energy policies" must be repealed to improve the nation's economy but also called for ending tax benefits to all sectors of the energy industry as he unveiled his presidential campaign's energy platform.
Bush, who is campaigning for the GOP presidential nod, announced his plans at an event at Canonsburg, Pa.-based Rice Energy Inc., as well as in a pair of memos published on his campaign website and on social media.
His energy platform focuses on four key areas, including repealing the 1970s-era oil export ban and easing restrictions for natural gas exports as well as terminating the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan, which aims to reduce carbon emissions from power plants.
Bush's proposal also names approval of the Keystone XL pipeline as a priority, along with giving states and Native American tribes greater control over energy production on public lands.
"Energy is not just a sector of our economy. It is also an input into every other economic sector," Bush wrote in a post to the website Medium.
He added: "That means cheaper, more reliable energy benefits American families in multiple ways. More domestic energy leads to more jobs, higher wages, lower gas prices and smaller electricity bills. In short, it means more money in people's pockets, allowing them more freedom to make more choices for themselves and their children."
Bush's new policy reiterates a series of regulatory reforms he similarly vowed to enact if elected, including killing a series of environmental regulations on water use, coal ash and carbon emissions (E&ENews PM, Sept. 22).
"Energy resources must be developed in a way that protects human health and the environment. Rules play an important role in making sure this is the case," Bush stated on his campaignwebsite. "But the Obama Administration's excessive rules too often usurp state and tribal authority and go beyond what is necessary."
But Bush also called for additional funding for "high-priority basic research and increasing the effectiveness of our national labs," and alluded to previous remarks he has made in which he said he would end tax benefits to the oil and gas industry, as well as end tax credits for renewable energy sources.
"In addition, we must create a level playing field for all energy sources including, but not limited to, nuclear, renewables, coal, natural gas, oil and alternative fuels. We unnecessarily drive up energy costs on Americans when we play favorites and suppress the dynamism of free markets," Bush said.
During a July campaign event in New Hampshire, Bush said he would like to see tax reform that would affect "wind, solar, all renewables, and oil and gas" by lowering the tax rate and eliminating subsidies.Reactions mixed
ConservAmerica Executive Director Rob Sisson, whose group includes Republican environmentalists, praised Bush's policy proposals as a "thoughtful, pragmatic and realistic road map."
"The Bush energy plan works simultaneously to boost the economic security of American families and clean our air of harmful emissions. It's win-win," Sisson said.
In particular, he praised Bush's call to ease natural gas exports, asserting that such sales could help to reduce emissions from other nations.
"By leveraging market forces rather than regulatory edicts out of Washington, Bush hitches a cleaner global environment to a growing American economy," Sisson said. He also said Bush's plan is distinct from other energy policies in the GOP primary race to date because it offers "a realistic way for America to help the rest of the world reduce emissions."
But environmentalists at the League of Conservation Voters criticized Bush for his call to dismantle regulation and said the proposals create "a carbon bomb."
"It ignores sound science and undoes any meaningful progress we have made combating climate change. To please Big Oil and the other polluters that fund his campaign, Bush is ignoring the majority of Republican voters who believe the climate is changing," said LCV Senior Vice President of Campaigns Daniel Weiss. "This plan threatens public health and economic growth by dumping millions of tons of carbon pollution into the atmosphere. Bush assumes that pollution is free, but that only applies to companies and not the public who will pay its costs."
Similarly, California billionaire environmental activist Tom Steyer, who heads NextGen Climate Action, criticized Bush for not doing more to promote renewable energy in his plan.
"Jeb Bush today sided with dirty energy interests and laid out a plan that would lock us into fossil fuels for decades," Steyer said in a statement. "Bush's plan is out of step with the American people on clean energy. The fact is voters in both parties want their next president to stand up and embrace the transition to a clean energy economy -- not hold it back."

Return to headline | Return to top
Bush Energy Plan Would Boost Exports, Approve Keystone

Sep 29, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Devin Henry

Republican contender Jeb Bush on Tuesday unveiled his energy plan, which would expand oil and gas exports and approve the Keystone XL pipeline to boost the American energy sector.
The former Florida governor also vowed to end President Obama’s climate rule for power plants if he wins the presidency next year.
Bush rolled out his energy platform during a speech in Pennsylvania and in a post on his website. In the post, he said his proposals would build on the growth already seen in the booming American oil and natural gas sectors and help keep energy prices low for consumers.
“Energy is not just a sector of our economy. It is also an input into every other economic sector,” Bush wrote.
“That means cheaper, more reliable energy benefits American families in multiple ways. More domestic energy leads to more jobs, higher wages, lower gas prices and smaller electricity bills. In short, it means more money in people’s pockets, allowing them more freedom to make more choices for themselves and their children.”
Bush said he supports ending federal rules blocking crude oil and liquefied natural gas exports, something he predicted would “create hundreds of thousands of additional jobs and significantly lower net energy costs within two years.”
On Keystone, Bush said President Obama and Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton have “baldly politicized the government permitting process,” and said he supports the project. Clinton opposes Keystone and the Obama administration continues to study the pipeline.
Bush also said he would “reduce overregulation,” and highlighted the climate rule for power plants as an “attempt to impose the president’s conception of how everyone should produce and consume energy.” He said the rule needs to be “stopped in its tracks,” and suggested giving more regulatory power back to state and tribal governments.
“Taken together, these policies will fully unleash the energy revolution, creating more jobs, higher wages, cheaper gas and cheaper electricity, while better protecting our interests abroad and our environment,” Bush wrote.
Bush is the second Republican presidential candidate to outline his energy plan, following Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who pitched his last month.
Environmental groups were not impressed by Bush’s proposals.
The League of Conservation Voters called the proposal “a carbon bomb.”
“It ignores sound science and undoes any meaningful progress we have made combating climate change,” LCV senior vice president of campaigns Daniel Weiss said.
“This plan threatens public health and economic growth by dumping millions of tons of carbon pollution into the atmosphere. Bush assumes that pollution is free, but that only applies to companies and not the public who will pay its costs.”
“This plan promises voters the world,” Sierra Club political director Khalid Pitts said in a statement.
“But the truth is that the world is exactly what it would sacrifice to fatten the wallets of dirty energy conglomerates like Koch Industries — all while failing to tackle the moral imperative of the climate crisis and just days after Pope Francis made clear that this is one of the greatest challenges facing humanity.”

Return to headline | Return to top
Bush Goes Heavy on Fossil Fuels

Sep 29, 2015 | PoliticoPro

By Darren Goode

Jeb Bush released an energy plan Tuesday that was filled with Republican standards: drill more oil, cut regulations and build the Keystone XL pipeline.
But it's more notable for what it dodges: Bush is one of the greenest candidates in the Republican presidential field.
He’s also battling accusations that he’s soft on the issues that are firing up the Republican base right now, and his big energy rollout didn’t mention the term “climate change.” And while he promises to stop President Barack Obama’s climate regulations “in their tracks,” he didn't repeat his previous concerns that the climate is changing "and humans are contributing to it,“ or that Republicans who deny global warming risk being viewed as “anti-science.”
“It’s pretty standard stuff that people want to hear from the horse’s mouth,” said Andrew Sabin, a longtime major GOP donor and environmentalist who has given Bush’s campaign advice on developing his energy and environmental agenda. “Jeb is playing it very conservative and very smart.”
Climate change is an important issue to Republicans like Sabin, and it appeals to independents and other swing voters that Bush would need to court if he wins the GOP primary. And his pro-drilling positions put a wider gulf between him and Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, who has come out against Arctic drillingand Keystone XL.
Bush’s plan “reads like a Big Oil wish list, while apparently omitting clean energy and renewables entirely,” Clinton campaign director John Podesta said in a statement to POLITICO. “Given Bush's long record of climate defeatism and his history of taking campaign contributions from oil interests, I guess we shouldn't be surprised.”
Bush also threw his support to lifting the 1970s crude oil export ban, a GOP cause célèbre that may replace even Keystone XL as the top energy fight in the political arena.
“There’s no reason why this can’t be an effective tool for us to re-engage in the world,” Bush told the crowd Tuesday at a Pittsburgh-area facility run by natural gas company Rice Energy. “I can’t think of a better deal than what we’re going through right now, we’re just not exploiting it to the fullest extent possible.”
But while Bush’s plan says Washington should “defer” to states that are pressing to allow oil and gas drilling off their coasts — specifically mentioning Alaska and Virginia — it’s silent on whether he continues to oppose oil rigs in federal waters off Florida, a stance he championed fiercely as governor of the historically anti-drilling Sunshine State.
His fuzziness on climate science and his states-rights position on drilling serves two purposes for Bush, allowing him to run with the GOP pack during the primaries while leaving him room to embrace a more environmentally friendlyposition during the general election. And the initial reaction from greens might only help with that strategy.
“This plan is meet the new driller, same as the old driller,” said Daniel J. Weiss, senior vice president for campaigns at the League of Conservation Voters. “Jeb Bush’s plan is a giant carbon bomb that will accelerate climate change, sea-level rise, smog and health impacts.”
Bush has long separated his support for expanding oil production, including opening up federal lands “in a thoughtful way,” from his opposition to offshore drilling near Florida, a position that created a rift with George W. Bush’s administration in 2001. He touted his fight to keep oil rigs far away from the state’s coast in a March 2000 email, where he listed “maintaining Florida’s position against offshore drilling” as No. 2 on his roster of environmental accomplishments, ahead of even his multibillion-dollar efforts to restore the Everglades.
And some Bush-backers are hoping he may outline an energy platform in the coming months that could distinguish him from others in the GOP field and give green-minded Republicans something to rally behind.
“I think that’s going to come down the road,” Sabin said. “This is where he needs to be right now.”
Bush is looking to add policy heft to his campaign and hold steady in the upper tiers of the GOP presidential field by supporting fossil fuels to primary voters as part of his pledge to raise annual economic growth to 4 percent.
“What he’s outlined is much more comprehensive than anything any candidate in either party has said,” said C. Boyden Gray, a former ambassador and energy diplomat who worked in the administrations of Bush’s father and brother, and who has also advised Jeb Bush’s presidential campaign.
But Gray also acknowledged Bush will need to talk more about climate change. “He’s going to have to address it in a more detailed way,” he said.
Grey did equate Bush’s push for increasing the use of natural gas with a climate policy. "Natural gas is very climate-friendly," he said.
The former Florida governor said shipping U.S. liquefied natural gas to Europe would also be cheaper and cleaner than the Russian natural gas that dominates the market there. “We’re much more committed to protecting the environment,” Bush said.
Bush is currently sitting in polls behind a trio of conservative outsiders — Donald Trump, Ben Carson and Carly Fiorina — with fellow Floridian Marco Rubio, who outlined a similar pro-fossil fuel strategy to Oklahoma oil and gas producers in early September. Rubio is promising to release a broader proposal later this fall.
And a memo from Bush distributed by his campaign late Monday teased proposals that it plans to release in the coming months that will “complement our status as an energy superpower by revitalizing our position as the superpower of energy innovation.”
That memo also emphasized using federal research to “further accelerate the discovery of game-changing technologies" by hiking high-priority basic research and increasing the effectiveness of our national labs. “The private sector often underfunds energy research that could greatly benefit society,” it said. “Government can correct that.”
Energy producers and consumers, Bush said, “must have better access to new technologies such as ‘intelligent’ electricity-management devices, unconventional transportation fuels, advanced nuclear power designs, and cutting-edge energy-conservation methods.”
His memo also offers at hint at a possible proposal to overhaul the energy tax structure.
“We must create a level playing field for all energy sources including, but not limited to, nuclear, renewables, coal, natural gas, oil and alternative fuels,” Bush noted in the memo. “We unnecessarily drive up energy costs on Americans when we play favorites and suppress the dynamism of free markets.”

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Preps Revisions to Greenhouse Gas Reporting Rule

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Anthony Adragna

The Environmental Protection Agency is preparing changes to how power plants, refineries, chemical plants, underground coal mines and other large facilities report their greenhouse gas emissions, the agency told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 28.
Laura Allen, an EPA spokeswoman, said the changes would “streamline implementation of the rule, improve the consistency of the data collected under the rule and implement corrections for minor editorial or reference errors or clarifications to existing requirements.”
U.S. industries are required to report their emissions under an agency reporting requirement Congress authorized in a fiscal year 2008 EPA-Interior funding bill (Pub. L. No. 110-161).
The proposed rule, which the agency sent to the White House Office of Management and Budget to begin its review Sept. 25, has not previously been listed on the EPA's regulatory agenda. The agency declined to provide additional information on the proposal (RIN 2060-AS51).
According to the most recent data from the program (40 C.F.R. pt. 98), power plants, the petroleum and natural gas sectors and refineries are the largest emitting sectors of the U.S. economy. Other major source emitters covered by the program include the chemical, waste, metal manufacturing, cement and other mineral production and pulp and paper industries.
Reported data from 2013, the most recent years posted by the EPA, show 7,879 facilities from nine industry sectors reported direct emissions of 3.18 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent, which is about half of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions.
The EPA has tinkered with program since its introduction. Most recently, the agency eliminated an option for oil and natural gas producers to use alternative methods for calculating their greenhouse gas emissions under the reporting program (36 DEN A-3, 2/24/14).

Return to headline | Return to top
Rep. Poe Reintroduces Bill to Kill Flagship Climate Rule

Sep 29, 2015 | E&E PM

By Jean Chemnick

Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) reintroduced a bill yesterday that would bar U.S. EPA from implementing its Clean Power Plan or from using the Clean Air Act to introduce cap and trade.
Poe first introduced his "Ensuring Affordable Energy Act" in the last session of Congress, but EPA has since finalized the existing power plant carbon rule. The rule does not impose a cap-and-trade scheme, but it does allow states or regions to use that policy model to achieve reductions.
Poe's bill plays up the GOP talking point that EPA has done an end run around Congress in using the Clean Air Act to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
"The Clean Power Plan is just another regulation forcefully imposed on the American people and another attempt to circumvent Congress to push legacy-driven agendas," he said in a statement.
While it is co-sponsored by 10 of his GOP colleagues, Poe's offering is not House Republicans' flagship effort to kill the EPA rule. Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) saw his measure, H.R. 2042, which would allow states to opt out of the rule, clear the House in June. Whitfield, who chairs a powerful Energy and Commerce subcommittee, announced today that he will retire at the end of this Congress (see related story).
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) has introduced similar legislation that, like Whitfield's bill, would bar EPA from stepping in with a federal implementation plan if states refuse to comply. It is working its way through the Senate, though it is unclear when it might come to the floor for a vote. Congressional Republicans are also eyeing using the Congressional Review Act to knock down the rule, though anything they do would ultimately be subject to a presidential veto.

Return to headline | Return to top
House's Chief Clean Power Plan Critic Heads for the Exits

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Jean Chemnick and Jennifer Yachnin

The architect of the House Republican strategy to kill U.S. EPA's carbon rules suggested yesterday that he is not seeking another term because his enthusiasm for fighting policies he opposes is waning.
With the Capitol already reeling from House Speaker John Boehner's announcement last week that he plans to resign in late October, Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) added another surprise yesterday when he announced he would retire at the end of 2016.
"It was just time," the 72-year-old lawmaker told reporters yesterday at the Capitol. "I just didn't have quite the enthusiasm I think you need against the major problems the country still faces."
One of those "major problems," Whitfield said, is EPA's bid to regulate power plant carbon.
Yet as chairman of a key Energy and Commerce subcommittee, Whitfield has shown great "enthusiasm" for coming up with strategies to try to remove those rules. He has presided over numerous hearings of the Energy and Power Subcommittee aimed at highlighting their costs and authored several letters demanding that EPA hold off on implementing them.
And Whitfield shepherded two bills through committee and onto the House floor that would effectively kill the existing power plant standard.
Whitfield's bill in the last Congress would have barred EPA from basing rules for new power plants on technology that has not been widely deployed in this country, like carbon capture and storage (E&E Daily, Jan. 27, 2014). It would have made an existing source standard contingent on congressional approval.
This year's effort H.R. 2042, would allow states to opt out of the now-final Clean Power Plan.
Both cleared the Republican-controlled House easily. But while Whitfield coordinated them closely with sympathetic senators -- Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) was the lead sponsor of a companion to Whitfield's 2013 bill -- the Senate has been slow to act. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) has introduced a bill that is roughly similar to Whitfield's opt-out measure, but it is unclear whether it will receive a vote.
Whitfield met with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on the Senate side of the Capitol yesterday afternoon, but he said the Clean Power Plan was not on the agenda. But he said that both chambers would vote on a Congressional Review Act resolution to kill the rule this fall, after it is published in the Federal Register, and its Capitol Hill opponents would trust that states would follow McConnell's advice and refuse implementation.
"We're going to continue to do guerrilla warfare in every way possible, because we don't want the president to be running into Paris [climate talks in December] claiming victory," he said.
When Republicans regained the House majority in 2011, Whitfield hoped the committee would find a way to reopen the Clean Air Act to give cost-benefit analyses more weight in EPA's decision to move forward with new rules. He said at the time that he expected some Democrats to back a revision (Greenwire, March 6, 2012).
But recently, he says, even minor policy items have met with major Democratic pushback.
"Even on this energy bill, we're talking about minor things," he said, referring to changes Republicans made to the language of an omnibus energy bill yesterday ahead of committee votes today -- after weeks of trying to reach a compromise with Democrats (see related story).
It should not be controversial, he said, to direct the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to look at the impact of EPA's power plant regulations on power supply -- as the new manager's amendment does.
"But the Democrats drew a line in the sand -- 'Oh, now, we can't do that,'" he said.
"I just think it's time for a new face with new ideas," Whitfield added.Changes afoot on panel
The most likely of those new faces is Rep. Pete Olson (R-Texas), the subcommittee's vice chairman. Olson represents an energy-heavy Houston-area district and is favored to take over the subcommittee in 2017.
With Whitfield's decision to leave, Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.), who is next in seniority to Whitfield on the full committee, is now well-positioned to replace full committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.), who must surrender his gavel at the end of this Congress due to GOP term limits.
"Yeah. It's no surprise that's my interest," said Shimkus yesterday at the Capitol. "I ran against Fred six years ago and tried to be a good player and do all the things I needed to do. Hopefully, I'm competitive."
Shimkus, who has served as chairman of the Environment and Economy Subcommittee in this Congress, said he was not surprised by Whitfield's decision. The Kentuckian will have served for 22 years.
"I think some people thought he was going to do it last cycle," he said. "He's done a great job."
Whitfield said his move had nothing to do with a House Ethics Committee investigation over allegations that he acted improperly by pushing legislation that would benefit the Humane Society of the United States, where his wife was a lobbyist.
"If I had to do it all over again, I would do it exactly the same way," he said. The legislation at issue would ban the soring of Tennessee walking horses -- a practice that involves inflicting pain on them to change their gait.
Whitfield's decision to leave and Boehner's resignation announcement are unrelated.
Whitfield said he looked forward to a post-congressional career, perhaps involving energy issues.
Fossil fuels advocates praised him as a champion.
"From an energy policy perspective, Chairman Whitfield has been a true workhorse, producing bill after bill that addressed key regulatory issues," said Scott Segal of Bracewell & Giuliani.
Segal lauded Whitfield's legislative efforts, which he said showed a "keen understanding of the challenges in providing affordable and reliable power. His legislation and oversight efforts as subcommittee chairman "established an important record that will be of use in demonstrating the legal shortcomings of the Clean Power Plan," he said.
Luke Popovich, a spokesman for the National Mining Association, added, "He brought something that is increasingly in short supply: good judgment when seeking a balance between environmental improvement and the needs of working people."GOP certain to hold seat
Although Whitfield first won election to the 1st District seat in the Republican Revolution of 1994 by sweeping out then-Rep. Tom Barlow (D) and becoming the first Republican ever to hold the seat, there is little question Republicans will retain the seat in the 2016 election.
More likely, the western Kentucky district will hold a contentious GOP primary battle, given that that contest will all but decide the district's next lawmaker.
Among the most likely candidates is Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner James Comer, who lost the Republican gubernatorial primary to businessman Matt Bevin earlier this year by just 83 votes.
Prior to his statewide win to the agriculture commissioner's post in 2012, Comer spent a decade in the Kentucky state House, where he represented a trio of counties -- Monroe, Metcalfe and Cumberland -- that share boundaries with the 1st District.
During an appearance at the Hemp Industries Association on Monday, Comer hinted he could seek Whitfield's congressional seat if the opportunity arose, even as he suggested he would not seek statewide office again.
"Anytime you run for office you risk losing, but the way that election ended is something I'll never probably get over," Comer told the Lexington Herald-Leader.
He added that the gubernatorial race "left a bad taste in my mouth. But I'll say this: There is no place like home. If I ever did anything again it would probably be around home and not so much statewide."
But Murray State University public radio station WKMS confirmed yesterday that Comer would face competition from Whitfield District Director Michael Pape, who confirmed that he plans to seek the seat.
"Whoever it is, I don't think there will be any one person who has any more experience with this 1st Congressional District, its people and the issues than me," Pape told the radio station.
Whitfield won his last re-election bid with 70 percent of the vote. Republicans have similarly claimed a wide margin in recent presidential cycles. GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney took 66 percent in the 2012 election.
Reporter Manuel Quiñones contributed.

Return to headline | Return to top
Lawmakers Hit EPA Air Chief Over Climate, Ozone Plans

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Amanda Reilly

Senate Republicans yesterday questioned whether the benefits of two major U.S. EPA air regulations would outweigh their costs.
At a hearing of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, GOP members also said they were concerned that EPA had not collaborated with states and that the agency had not been transparent about the effects of the rules.
At issue: EPA's Clean Power Plan and the agency's forthcoming final rule to lower the national ambient air quality standard for ozone.
"Your agency is attempting to restructure our entire energy system while simultaneously controlling economic expansion," EPW Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) told EPA acting air chief Janet McCabe, who was the sole witness at the hearing.
Democratic members, on the other hand, defended the agency's actions and argued that opponents of EPA have always inflated the costs of air rules. They sparred with committee Republicans over public support for the two rules.
The hearing was the first meeting between McCabe and Senate EPW Committee members since EPA finalized its Clean Power Plan in early August. Through the rule, states must craft plans to lower carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants.
The hearing also came two days before a court-ordered deadline for EPA to choose a final ozone standard. In November, EPA proposed to tighten the national limit of the pollutant -- a key component of smoggy air -- from 75 parts per billion to between 60 and 70 ppb.
McCabe focused most of her testimony on the Clean Power Plan, the hallmark of the Obama administration's climate change agenda.
GOP members raised several concerns: that EPA had not collaborated with states in shaping the final rule, that the Obama administration was dragging its feet in publishing the rule in theFederal Register and that EPA was not being transparent about the costs.
Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) characterized her state as "one of the top biggest losers" under the final plan. Because Nebraska is the only 100 percent public power state in the country, Fischer said that the rule would unfairly punish the state's citizens with high electricity costs.
"There seems to be an underlying theme of uncertainty and confusion among my state officials and the local stakeholders as well regarding this rule," she said.
McCabe countered that EPA had done an analysis on the expected impact on the price of energy and had already submitted the rule to the Federal Register, consistent with earlier comments by EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy (EnergyWire, Sept. 25).
She also pushed back on contentions that EPA had not addressed states' concerns in shaping the final rule.
"It's really hard for me to imagine how any state can say we did not make every opportunity available to work with them," McCabe said.
McCabe also faced several questions over how EPA intended to address air pollution that crossed state borders under a tighter ozone standard. The agency has programs in place that are intended to help states in those cases, but Republican members said they worried that the programs wouldn't be able to handle a more stringent limit.
Industry and GOP critics contend that EPA's ozone regulation stands to be the most expensive in history. In a statement after the hearing, Inhofe disputed EPA's contention that only nine counties would be out of compliance with a 70 ppb standard largely thanks to air pollution regulations that are already in place.
"It is unarguable that tightening EPA's ozone standard to 70 ppb would have significant detrimental impacts to our economy," he said.
Democrats on the committee said they supported EPA's efforts to tighten the standard. Sen. Thomas Carper (D-Del.) said he supported the agency's work in cleaning up the air but worried that upwind states had not done enough to reduce pollution drifting across Delaware's borders.
"A number of upwind states to the west of us have not made the same commitment to reducing harmful pollution by investing in cleaner air," he said.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) accused critics of EPA of habitually inflating the estimated costs of air pollution regulations and "muddling" the science behind air rules.
McCabe agreed.
"We have often heard on the eve of a regulation that there would be significant regulatory impacts," she said, "but that has not been true."
Frank Maisano, an energy specialist and senior principal with the law firm Bracewell & Giuliani, slammed McCabe for giving "non-answers" to questions about the costs of the two regulations.
"Once again today at the Senate Environment Committee," he said, "EPA showed it has little understanding or concern of the significantly adverse consequences on American workers and their families that accompany its overreaching regulations."

Return to headline | Return to top
High Compliance Rate Seen for Clean Power Plan

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Anthony Adragna

Relatively few states—even the ones that dislike it—ultimately will elect not to submit their own compliance plans for the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan, the heads of groups representing state air and utility regulators said Sept. 29.
Many states are digesting the regulation but continue to wrestle with key questions of whether to write their own plans, pursue multistate agreements, ask the EPA for additional time to prepare compliance strategies and participate in energy efficiency incentive programs, the executive directors of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies (NACAA) and the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) said.
“I can only tell you that from our experience there is nothing to be gained from doing that,” Bill Becker, executive director of NACAA, said of not submitting a plan at a forum sponsored by the Environmental & Energy Study Institute. “There is nothing to be gained by implementing or by being subject to the federal plan other than drawing attention to one's self.”
States that don't submit compliance plans would be subject to a federal plan developed by the EPA. Before the final rule was issued, at least half a dozen states threatened to force the EPA to impose a federal plan on them, but just one—Oklahoma—has formally confirmed after the rule's Aug. 3 finalization that it still plans to do so.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has led the push for states to “just say no” to the regulation (150 DEN A-1, 8/5/15).
But Charles Gray, executive director of NARUC, agreed that “not a large number of states” ultimately would force the EPA to impose a federal implementation plan on them.
“Even states that don't particularly care for the [Clean Power Plan] are going to work on plans,” Gray said. “They clearly see the benefit in flexibility and control.”
The EPA's final Clean Power Plan (RIN 2060-AR33) sets unique carbon dioxide emissions rates or alternately mass-based targets for the power sector in each state. State regulators will be tasked with developing plants to meet the targets, which will be phased in through 2030.
Many on Path to Compliance
Nine states already essentially are in compliance with their final carbon dioxide reduction goals and “don't have to do anything practically to attain their targets,” Becker said.
An additional 30 states are at least half way toward meeting their interim 2022 goals, and 20 of those states are at least half way toward meeting their final 2030 goals, according to Becker.
“Many states are well on their way toward meeting both the 2022 interim strategy as well as the 2030 targets,” he said. “That said, a lot more work needs to be done by a lot of states.”
NACAA is developing model language for states to incorporate into their plans. It is expected to be out by the end of the year, Becker said, and it will be “similar, but a bit more expansive” than the model plan language the EPA proposed with the final Clean Power Plan.
“We are anxious for states to meet their obligations on time,” Becker said, although he and Gray both said they expect many states would seek extensions from the EPA in submitting their plans.
Don't Predetermine State Path
Gray and David Terry, executive director of National Association of State Energy Officials, said their groups haven't taken positions on the Clean Power Plan.
Terry said his group, which represents governor-designated energy officials, doesn't want to predetermine which path states take in developing their responses to the regulation.
NACAA and NARUC also urged Congress to fund a request for $25 million from President Barack Obama's administration dedicated to the implementation of the Clean Power Plan.
“If [this funding] doesn't go through this year or even next year, then we will be having to implement this resource-intensive program without any new money,” Becker said. “And that's problematic.”
Joe Goffman, EPA associate assistant administrator for air and radiation, said even critics of the EPA's plan are engaged in how they might comply with it and said he expects they would “vigorously litigate” the regulation.
“The utility industry has generally been cordial, in terms of engagement with us since the final rule has come out,” Goffman said. “The industry is spending a lot of time interacting with us and focusing on their options.”
New Legislation to Kill Rule
Meanwhile, House Republicans continue attempts to undermine the regulation.
Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) introduced legislation Sept. 28 that would prohibit the use of federal dollars to implement or enforce the Clean Power Plan.
The Ensuring Affordable Energy Act (H.R. 3626) also would bar the use of federal funds by the EPA for any similar policy options, such as a national cap-and-trade system.
“The Clean Power Plan is just another regulation forcefully imposed on the American people and another attempt to circumvent Congress to push legacy-driven agendas,” Poe said in a statement.

Return to headline | Return to top
Caucus Addresses Justice Impacts of Power Plan

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Rachel Leven

Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus are working to ensure that vulnerable communities are consulted and considered during states’ Clean Power Plan planning process, the caucus co-chairs told Bloomberg BNA Sept. 29.
The caucus is already pushing for its members to hold community meetings in their districts on the power plan, co-chair Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) said. Co-chair Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) separately said he and other members are considering taking legislative action or introducing a resolution on this issue, actions that probably would result in raised awareness.
“It's going to be a state-by-state kind of struggle,” Grijalva said regarding implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency final rule.
The Clean Power Plan (RIN 2060-AR33) sets unique carbon dioxide emissions rates or alternatively mass-based targets for each state's power sector. States must develop their own plans to meet these goals and must show that they have engaged overburdened communities in that planning. But environmental justice advocates have expressed concern that the most vulnerable communities may not have the resources in each state to ensure that pollution isn't worsened in their communities by state plans (172 DEN A-2, 9/4/15).
Grijalva and Ellison made these comments following the Green for All event, Clean Power for All: National Forum on Climate Change, Clean Energy and Communities of Color.
The local meetings by members of Congress are intended to start engaging communities on their own state's plan development and to combat misinformation that is being disseminated by opponents of the rule, Ellison said.
“It's all about the local impacts,” Ellison told Bloomberg BNA. “What we need to do is engage the community in the process where we have that [plan development] conversation, so we don't let the people who want to trick the public get the first word in and then the last word in.”
Grijalva said any congressional action such as a resolution would be important to raise awareness about the need for states to have adequate resources to prepare their plans, and the need for “disproportionately neglected communities” to be “front and center” in plan-development discussions.
It is unlikely that this Congress will make more impactful legislation a priority, Grijalva said, citing strong opposition to the rule by many members.
“Rather than spending a lot of energy trying to pass something that I think is going to be very difficult if not impossible, we want to raise the discussion and the awareness [of this issue],” Grijalva said.

Return to headline | Return to top
McCabe Downplays Publication Delay for Carbon Rule

| BNA Daily Environment Report

By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency's top air official disputed claims that the EPA is taking an unusually long time to formally publish the final Clean Power Plan, noting that the agency submitted the regulation for publication more quickly than it had other major environmental rules.
Janet McCabe, EPA acting assistant administrator for air and radiation, told the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Sept. 29 that the agency followed a normal process for reviewing and making minor corrections to regulatory text before submitting it to the Office of the Federal Register for formal publication. The final Clean Power Plan, which sets state goals for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants, was signed Aug. 3 and submitted for publication on Sept. 4.
That month-long gap between issuing the final rule and submitting it for publication was “actually quicker” than the same process for a number of major regulations previously issued by the EPA, McCabe said. Since the rule was submitted, the EPA and the Office of the Federal Register have been having a normal “back and forth” conversation as the rule is prepared for formal publication, according to McCabe.
The formal publication of the Clean Power Plan (RIN 2060-AR33) is significant because it will open a 60-day window for filing legal challenges in federal appeals court. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit Sept. 9 denied lawsuits brought by 15 states and Peabody Energy Corp. that sought to block implementation of the regulation before it was published in the Federal Register (In re West Virginia, D.C. Cir., No. 15-1277, 9/9/15; In re Peabody Energy Corp., D.C. Cir., 15-1284, 9/9/15; 175 DEN A-16, 9/10/15).
The agency, in a filing with a federal appeals court, said it expects to publish the final rule in late October.
Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) said an official with the Nebraska Energy Office believes the delayed publication of the Clean Power Plan is “unacceptable.” Fischer asked McCabe to explain the reason for the delay and questioned whether the agency would be making any substantive changes before the rule is formally published.
The substance of the Clean Power Plan will not be changed, McCabe said. The rule was reviewed in order to find and correct minor technical issues, such as grammatical errors and typos, McCabe said.

Return to headline | Return to top
Court Won't Help EPA's Foes in Failed Carbon Rule Suit

Sep 30, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard

By Alex Guillen

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit today shot down the last ditch attempt by opponents of EPA’s Clean Power Plan to keep a panel of three Republican judges for upcoming lawsuits over the rule.
In a short order, the court said that none of the circuit’s judges were interested in voting for an en banc rehearing of the suite of lawsuits brought by Murray Energy and a number of states opposed to the power plant carbon rule. And in another brief order, the three-judge panel that tossed out the lawsuit in June as premature declined to hold their own rehearing.
The three judges also rejected a request from the rule's challengers to postpone formally issuing their ruling until after the final rule was published in the Federal Register, a legal maneuver that would have meant that panel of three Republican appointees would have been able to hear the lawsuits over the final rule.
A new randomly chosen panel will hear the suits over the final rule, and its members could include Democratic appointees seen as possibly friendlier to administration arguments.
The D.C. Circuit and several other courts have declined to block the rule before it is published in the Federal Register, which EPA expects to happen in mid-to-late October.

Return to headline | Return to top
Feds Set to Impose Major Ozone Rule

Sep 30, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Devin Henry and Tim Devaney

The Obama administration is poised this week to issue a final rule on ozone levels that business groups contend would be the single most expensive regulation ever imposed by the U.S. government.
The air pollution rule, due by Thursday, will touch off another flurry of legal battles and congressional tussling over the president’s environmental agenda, with business groups and Republicans opposed to the rule looking to block it.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expected to tighten its standard for surface-level ozone from 75 parts per billion to between 65 and 70 parts per billion. Green groups and health organizations say a tighter standard will help the environment and improve public health, but they too feel they could be left disappointed in the long-awaited rule.
Industry groups mounted a massive blitz against a draft version of the rule, warning that large sections of the country would fall out of compliance with the standards
and that it would be expensive to bring many locales into compliance.
The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), which is leading the charge against the rule, commissioned a study earlier this year showing compliance costs topping $1.1 trillion, though environmental groups dismiss those numbers. The manufacturers have taken to calling the rule the most expensive regulation in history, a talking point picked up by Republicans.
Greg Bertelsen, NAM’s director of energy and regulatory policy, said his group was one of dozens to talk with the White House over the last few weeks about the rule. He said NAM still hopes the Obama administration will consider not tightening the standard, though he acknowledged the general assumption is that the EPA will make it more stringent.
“Even at a 70 parts per billion standard, this will be an extremely challenging rule for manufacturers,” he said.
Bertelsen stopped short of saying his group would sue over the standard until he sees it. But he predicted a rule as wide-ranging as the ozone standard will kick off a round of lawsuits from those tasked with implementing it. Other EPA regulations, such as new water rules and power plant standards, have led to scores of lawsuits and threatened court challenges.
Industry lawsuits might put green groups into the position of defending the EPA while also suing for a stronger standard.
On Monday, a coalition of groups warned that the EPA should institute the strictest rule it can and said they might sue the agency if it doesn’t.
“The last time [the EPA issued an ozone rule], we did intervene to defend the standard, not because we thought it was strong enough but because the science was so strong that it needed to be even more protective than what the Bush administration had done,” David Baron, a managing attorney at Earthjustice, said.
“It’s not unusual for us to do that, where we’re both suing to make the standards stronger and intervening to help deflect industry attempts to make it even weaker.”
Lawmakers are likely to assail the rule as well. As they’ve done for other Obama-era EPA regulations, members have proposed bills to preempt the rule. House lawmakers tried to effectively block it via an appropriations bill this summer.
During a hearing on Tuesday, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) accused the EPA of colluding with climate “extremists” on the rule.
“The EPA is essentially cutting corners in a shameless attempt to promote President Obama’s environmental legacy,” Inhofe, a frequent critic of President Obama’s climate policies, said.
But Democrats have fiercely defended the ozone rule’s projected environmental and health benefits.
“If you cling to the dirty old energies of the past, you’re doomed in this world, because the people are not going to support dirty energy when they see what it’s doing to the planet,” Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said.
John Walke, director of the National Resources Defense Council’s Climate and Clean Air Program, said green groups would look to defend any new rule from legislative attacks, as well as legal ones.
“You would see uniform opposition to that recklessness from the same groups who are criticizing EPA for not protecting Americans with a standard that goes far enough,” he said.

Return to headline | Return to top
Final Methane Rules Due by Early Summer 2016, EPA Says

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Anthony Adragna

Regulations meant to curb methane emissions from new and modified sources in the oil and natural gas sectors are expected to be finalized by “late spring or early summer” 2016, a senior official with the Environmental Protection Agency's air office said Sept. 29.
Joe Goffman, associate assistant administrator for air and radiation, said the proposed regulations were the latest in President Barack Obama's “very methodical and consistent approach” to addressing emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. The agency's approach would combine mandatory and voluntary aspects to drive down methane emissions.
“We see an industry that is large and very diverse, and our thinking—and it's been this way for a while—is we need to put in place a diversity of tools,” Goffman said at an event sponsored by publishers of The Hill.
On Aug. 18, the EPA released a series of proposed rules (RIN 2060-AS27; RIN 2060-AS06; RIN 2060-AS30) to curb methane emissions from new and modified oil and natural gas wells (160 DEN A-1, 8/19/15).
The agency is in the midst of a series of public hearings on its proposals, and the public comment period will last until Nov. 17.
Perciasepe Backs Approach
Bob Perciasepe, president of the Center for Climate & Energy Solutions and a former EPA deputy administrator, backed the agency's approach to a combination of voluntary and mandatory programs to drive down methane emissions.
“I think EPA did the right thing here to come up with a mix,” Perciasepe said, calling the public comment period a “golden opportunity” for industry and the business community to figure out the right balance in lowering emissions.
Petroleum industry representatives have called the regulations “redundant” and say the proposed rules will not reduce methane emissions as effectively as private-sector programs. They point to a decade of declining emissions, noting methane is a commodity that the industry has an incentive to capture as efficiently as possible (184 DEN A-1, 9/23/15).
‘Foundation' for Future Climate Policy
The methane rules should also be seen as the latest in a broad effort from the Obama administration to “lay the groundwork for our successors to continue to take on the challenge of climate change,” according to Goffman.
Goffman pointed to the variety of initiatives undertaken in Obama's 2013 Climate Action Plan and said they demonstrate the administration is “setting the foundation for climate policy over the long-term.”

Return to headline | Return to top
Ozone Rule Will Protect Health, EPA Official Says

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency's forthcoming final decision on where to set national ozone standards will be protective enough to meet Clean Air Act requirements, the agency's top air official said.
The final rule will set the ozone standards at a level that is “requisite to protect the public health” while allowing for an “adequate margin of safety,” in line with the statutory language of the Clean Air Act, Janet McCabe, the EPA acting assistant administrator for air and radiation, said Sept. 29 during a hearing of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
McCabe offered her comments in response to Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who said he was concerned the EPA's decision might “stop short” of the level needed to adequately protect people from adverse health effects. There is an Oct. 1 deadline for EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy to sign a final decision on whether to revise or retain the current 75 parts per billion ozone standards, set in 2008 under former President George W. Bush.
“I don't believe she [McCarthy] would sign a rule if she didn't believe that's what she was signing,” McCabe said after Markey questioned whether the final decision will achieve an adequate margin of safety.
The EPA in November proposed (RIN 2060-AP38) to revise the standards to somewhere in the range of 65 ppb to 70 ppb. Markey said that available data shows that a level of 70 ppb, the least protective level proposed by the EPA, would leave thousands of people at risk of premature death due to exposure to unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone.
Markey's comments echoed statements that have been made by environmental and public health organizations that would like to see a more stringent ozone standard. The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club and other organizations held a Sept. 28 press call to discuss their opposition to 70 ppb ozone standards.
During that call, David Baron, managing attorney at Earthjustice's Washington, D.C., office, told reporters that there is a “good likelihood” that the organizations would sue the EPA if the ozone standards were set at 70 ppb.
Baron previously told Bloomberg BNA that 70 ppb ozone standards likely would prompt legal arguments over the agency's failure to follow clear scientific recommendations from the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, which cautioned the EPA there is strong evidence of adverse health effects at 70 ppb (187 DEN A-1, 9/28/15).
The Environment and Public Works Committee hearing focused on the economic costs of the ozone standards and the EPA's final Clean Power Plan, which established state goals for cutting carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants. Committee Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) said the two rules would “skyrocket the cost of doing business” in the U.S.

Return to headline | Return to top
Smog Kills

Sep 29, 2015 | Politico Magazine

By David Baron

One of the biggest environmental fights right now involves the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal to strengthen protections against ozone pollution—a proposal that’s in the crosshairs of major polluters and their allies in Congress.
This week the Obama EPA faces a court ordered deadline to set a final standard on ozone, commonly called smog, a greenhouse gas that forms from the exhaust of power plants, factories, cars and trucks. The Administration has a decision to make: will it stand strong and set standards at the protective level doctors say we need to safeguard our lungs? Or, will it cave in to over-the-top and baseless claims by polluters and set a weak standard?
Story Continued Below
We’ve long known that current smog standards are woefully inadequate. Four times in the last eight years, the EPA’s independent science advisors have unanimously called for stronger standards. But thanks to politics, we’ve remained stuck with standards that allow the air to be so dirty it leaves people literally gasping for breath. When former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson tried to strengthen smog limits in 2011, the White House shot the proposal down, citing economic concerns, after massive lobbying by big oil and other polluting industries.
The science supporting stronger standards is now more compelling than ever. Literally thousands of studies now link ozone to an array of serious health impacts, including bronchitis, asthma attacks, emergency room visits, hospitalizations and premature deaths. The research shows these harms occur at levels well below those allowed by the current standard. Kids, senior citizens and asthmatics are especially at risk.
Given the wealth of the evidence, the decision on whether to strengthen the standard is a no-brainer. The crucial question is how much to strengthen the standards. The current standard, adopted in 2008, is 75 parts per billion (ppb), and the EPA has proposed to strengthen it to somewhere in a range of 65-70 ppb. A standard at the top of that range would leave millions of Americans without the protection that doctors say they need from this dangerous pollutant. The American Lung Association has called for a much stronger standard of 60 ppb, a call joined by the nation’s leading medical and health organizations, including the American Medical Association, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Heart Association, American College of Preventative Medicine, American Thoracic Society, American Public Health Association, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, National Association of County and City Health Officials and others.
In light of this strong medical consensus, setting the standard at 70 ppb would be nothing short of a betrayal of Clean Air Act’s promise of healthy air. It would be a capitulation to Big Oil and the manufacturer’s lobby. By the EPA’s own estimates, a 70 ppb standard would allow thousands of deaths and hospitalizations, hundreds of thousands of asthma attacks and more than a million missed work and school days that would be avoided by the much stronger 60 ppb standard doctors say we need. But corporate lobbyists are spending millions to fight any strengthening of protections from ozone. The National Association of Manufacturers(NAM) and the American Petroleum Institute (API) have been leaders in this charge, claiming—based on wildly inflated compliance cost estimates—that we can’t afford healthy air.

Consideration of costs is flatly illegal in setting clean air health standards: The Supreme Court ruled more than 14 years ago, in an opinion by Justice Scalia, that the standards must be based solely on what’s necessary to protect health with an adequate margin of safety. In any case, the industry claims are baseless. Since 1970, according to the EPA, we have cut air pollution by around 70 percent while the U.S. economy has more than tripled. A study by Synapse Energy Economics just released by Earthjustice finds that a widely disseminated report sponsored by NAM exaggerates the cost of meeting stronger smog standards by more then 700 percent.
The Synapse study further finds “unfounded and unsupportable” claims that a stronger standard would lead to economic harm or job losses.
Equally outlandish are ads by NAM, echoed by the API, suggesting that stronger smog standards must be irrational because some national parks won’t meet them. What they don’t tell you is that, sadly, air quality in most of our parks in anything but pristine, thanks to air pollution blown in from power plants, oil and gas drilling and other industries. A recent report from the National Parks Conservation Association finds that 75 percent of our nation’s parks have air that’s unsafe, at times, even under current deficient standards. The National Park Service has repeatedly called for stronger ozone standards, not only to protect the lungs of visitors, but also to prevent the serious damage that ozone causes to trees and forest ecosystems.
NAM can’t even keep its story straight. Even as it ignores that wind blows air pollution into parks, it’s running new ads blaming China (and the wind) for our air pollution. But the vast majority of the ozone pollution we breathe comes from our own country. And the Clean Air Act has specific provisions to relax compliance obligations for communities that truly can’t meet standards due to pollution from other nations.
Then there are the ads by API claiming we don’t need a stronger smog standard because ozone levels have gone down since 2000, and this shows the current standard “works.” That’s like saying that someone who has cut back from six packs of cigarettes a day to five doesn’t need to cut back any further. What API cannot truthfully say is that the current standard assures safe air: The nation’s leading doctors say it doesn’t.
A parent deciding whether to let an asthmatic child go outside to play needs to know if the level of air pollution poses a health threat, not whether it merely reflects the air quality that polluters are willing to pay for. For six days the week of August 31, the Washington, D.C., region recorded levels of ozone air pollution that doctors say are unsafe for kids, seniors and people with asthma. But because our national smog standards are so weak, the public was told on all but one of those days that air quality was “acceptable.” And that week was hardly unusual: In August alone there were 16 days when people were misled to believe the air was safe to breathe when it wasn’t.
The goal of the polluters’ disinformation campaign is obvious: Churn up enough political noise to scare the Administration away from adopting a truly protective standard. It worked the last time when President Obama gave in to political pressure and rejected stronger standards that his own EPA Administrator said were needed. Let’s hope, this time, the President and the EPA have the courage to do the right thing and fulfill the promise of the Clean Air Act.

Return to headline | Return to top
Do More on Methane Rules, Groups Urge EPA in Pittsburgh

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Leslie Pappas

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's proposed rules for methane emissions for the oil and gas industry do not go far enough and should be expanded, speakers from environmentalist groups, community and parent coalitions, religious orders and state environmental regulators told the agency during a public hearing Sept. 29 in Pittsburgh.
Several speakers urged the EPA to do more to regulate existing sources of methane emissions rather than only new and modified sources of methane emissions as currently addressed by the proposed rule.
“The EPA rules go to a first step but not far enough,” said Larry Schweiger, president of PennFuture, an environmental group. Schweiger called on the EPA and Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf (D) “to regulate those existing sources of methane leakage both from existing operations, as well as addressing those abandoned wells that checker the state.”
It was the third public hearing the EPA has held on a trio of regulations it proposed in 2015. Hearings also were held Sept. 23 in Denver and Houston (185 DEN A-7, 9/24/15)(185 DEN A-8, 9/24/15)
The proposed standards would require methane and VOC reductions from hydraulically fractured oil wells, complementing the EPA's 2012 New Source Performance Standards (NSPS). In addition, the new rules would require operators to find and repair leaks and capture natural gas from the completion of hydraulically fractured oil wells. The new methane emissions standards for new and modified sources are expected to reduce up to 400,000 short tons of methane in 2025, according to the EPA, the equivalent of reducing 7.7 million to 9 million metric tons of carbon dioxide.
Calls for Stronger Standards
The Rev. Mitch Hescox, speaking on behalf of 37,000 pro-life Christians from Pennsylvania who are concerned about the negative impact air toxins have on the unborn, said it was “well past time for us to fix methane leaks” and more is needed to control a minority of operators responsible for the bulk of methane emissions. Recent studies have shown that 80 percent of natural gas leaks come from 30 percent of producers, Hescox said.
“What that tells me is that the good guys do a good job. In fact, I met with the leading producers of natural gas recently this year. None of them cried foul over this regulation. They only asked performance standards be met,” he said. “We want to see the EPA move as strongly as possible in creating a (Clean Air Act) 111(d) standard for existing sources.”
Pennsylvania is now the second-largest producer of natural gas in the country, “an achievement that has come at the cost of the health of Pennsylvanians,” said Aaron Jacobs-Smith, staff attorney for the Philadelphia-based advocacy group the Clean Air Council. In comparative studies of counties in northeast Pennsylvania, researchers found that hospital utilization rates were “noticeably higher” in areas where gas development had occurred.
“The EPA cannot ignore the sources of air pollution already in operation,” said Jacobs-Smith. “By 2018, nearly 90 percent of oil and gas sector methane emissions will come from sources now in existence, which are sources not covered by the proposed rule.”
The proposed rule also leaves “significant sources of pollution unregulated or under-regulated,” Jacobs-Smith added. “For instance, the transmission, storage and distribution segments are not covered at all.”
The “shortcomings in the proposed rule” lead the Clean Air Council to renew its call to Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to build upon the EPA's previous work and pass stronger regulations for the state, Jacobs-Smith said. “The DEP must pass best-in-the-nation methane regulations that apply common-sense controls to all new and existing sources of air pollution in the oil and gas sector.”
Industry Opposition
Industry representatives who attended the hearing told the EPA that the proposed rule was not needed because the EPA's 2012 standards already regulate methane indirectly and emissions are decreasing.
Methane emissions from hydraulically fractured natural gas wells have fallen nearly 79 percent since 2005 and total methane emissions from natural gas systems were down 11 percent during the same period, even as U.S. natural gas production increased 44 percent, said Matthew Todd, a senior policy adviser for the American Petroleum Institute.
Directly regulating methane as proposed in the rule is unnecessary because the EPA's 2012 final rule “indirectly regulates methane by regulating natural gas as a surrogate for VOC,” Todd said. “Since methane is the primary constituent of natural gas, there are no additional emission reductions that will occur from replacing the surrogate regulatory concept with direct regulation of methane.”
Todd urged the EPA not to “get in the way of the success story by developing one-size-fits-all regulatory solutions.”
“Our industry is big, it's complex, and operations vary substantially across the nation,” Todd said. “Duplicative and costly regulations” would just end up increasing energy costs for all Americans.
What Is Expected
Other speakers stressed health concerns.
Patrice Tomcik, a mother from Mars, Pa., a community about 30 minutes north of Pittsburgh where natural gas drilling is prevalent, told the EPA of children in the community who suffered from nosebleeds, asthma, watery eyes and leukemia, which she attributed to increased pollution from oil and gas development.
“Nationwide, the people, especially children, need stronger protective emissions rules,” she said, “because industry does what is INspected—they do not do what is expected. There must be action taken now.”
Steven Hamburg, chief scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund, who claims to have led the “largest scientific effort to date” to quantify and characterize methane emissions across the U.S. natural gas supply chain, told the EPA that it could be underestimating the amount of methane emissions from the oil and gas industry.
The EPA's most recent inventory estimates that methane emissions from oil and gas exceed 7 million metric tons a year, equivalent to the 20-year climate warming effect of 160 coal-fired power plants, Hamburg said. Yet the Environmental Defense Fund's studies to quantify emissions show that emissions from the oil and gas sector “were at least 50 percent higher than estimated based on the EPA greenhouse gas inventory.”
Yet state environmental regulators encouraged the EPA not only to directly regulate methane but also to go further in the proposed rule.
Regulation Under Section 111
“We urge EPA to regulate methane emissions directly from sources in the oil and gas industry under Section 111 of the Clean Air Act,” testified Mark Gorog, regional air program manager of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. As currently proposed, further reductions in methane emissions from natural gas sources located in ‘dry gas' areas, such as the north-central and northeast regions of the state, would not be achieved under the proposal.
The EPA's leak detection and repair requirements (LDAR) also are not as stringent as the state's existing regulations, Gorog said. “PA DEP's LDAR requirements specifically target the reduction of methane emissions,” he said. “EPA's proposed LDAR requirements, which apply solely to VOC leaks, would not address methane leaks at dry gas drilling, compression and processing operations.”
Pennsylvania supports strong leak detection and repair requirements and is evaluating stronger state-specific requirements, he said.
The EPA's proposed regulations also “do not require any measures to reduce VOC emissions from truck load-out operations” and do not include requirements for “pigging” operations, a process of cleaning and inspecting pipelines, “which are a significant sources of methane and VOC emissions,” Gorog said.
“In the final rulemaking, we strongly urge EPA to address methane leaks directly—not as a collateral benefit of VOC reductions,” he said. The final rules also should address dry gas operations and VOC and methane emissions from central impoundments of produced water, he added.

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Sends GHG Reporting Revisions For OMB Review

Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA

EPA has taken a step toward revising its greenhouse gas reporting program, sending a series of proposed revisions to the White House Office of Management & Budget for review on Sept. 25.
The revisions to the program, according to the agency's March 2015 “Action Initiation List,” would make “targeted technical amendments” to the reporting process for municipal solid waste landfills, as well as “improve and streamline multiple source categories covered by the program.”
EPA's reporting program -- authorized by Congress in 2007 -- collects GHG data and other information from large sources, with the aim of collecting information that will inform policy decisions.
According to the agency, the most recent revisions would amend the program by “clarifying rule requirements, enhancing data quality to ensure the data collected is representative of industry and comparable to the US GHG Inventory, and streamlining requirements to improve implementation efficiency.”
Once OMB review is completed -- a process that is intended to take around 90 days, though most reviews take much longer -- the measure will be published in the Federal Register for comment.
Amendments to GHG reporting requirements for municipal solid waste landfills would have little effect on the newly proposed rules to curb methane from new, modified and existing landfills, standards that industry has tentatively embraced.
However, a shift in the GHG reporting process for the sector could inform future regulations. And a new study published Sept. 22 in Nature Climate Change finds that EPA could be underestimating the amount being dumped in U.S. landfills, and thus the amount of methane emissions from these landfills.
According to the study, landfill disposal rates “significantly” exceed national estimates, “with this study reporting 262 million tonnes in the year 2012 compared with 122 million tonnes in 2012 as estimated by [EPA].”

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Says NSPS, State Rules Will Inform Need To Regulate Existing Drilling

Sep 29, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Bridget DiCosmo

A top EPA air official says the agency's proposed rule to cut methane emissions from new and modified oil and gas operations combined with state air programs and a new EPA voluntary plan for reducing the sector's air pollution will ultimately determine whether the agency ever pursues a rule to cut methane from existing drilling sources.
Joseph Goffman, EPA's associate assistant administrator for climate and senior counsel for the air office, told a Sept. 29 event in Washington, D.C, that the combined impact of the various suite of regulatory efforts -- which also includes draft non-binding EPA guidelines to reduce ozone-forming emissions from existing sources -- will create a “record that we'd anticipate would be compelling in one direction or another” on the need to target existing drilling.
Goffman at the event, hosted by The Hill, reiterated previous EPA officials' remarks that for now the agency's focus is on curbing new and modified sources of methane from the sector under the proposed new source performance standards (NSPS). But he also added that “if we're having this conversation six months from now” on existing sources, EPA will have more data on which to base a determination, and the response could be different.
While the agency is directly regulating methane for the first time under a Clean Air Act section 111(b) NSPS, EPA to date has rejected environmentalists' calls to regulate methane from existing sources under section 111(d). The agency has regulated GHGs from the existing power sector through its recent 111(d) rule for that industry.
Environmentalists have argued that under the Clean Air Act, once EPA sets regulations for new and modified sources under section 111(b), the agency “shall prescribe regulations” that would require states to craft plans for meeting standards for existing sources under section 111(d). They argue that if the agency finalizes its NSPS for oil and gas drilling to cap methane emissions, it must also pursue mandatory methane limits for existing drilling.
But EPA officials have suggested they believe they have flexibility on when they must promulgate an existing source standard -- an argument Goffman echoed in his remarks to The Hill event.
“History has supported a wide range of outcomes,” Goffman said, including a 2014 U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruling rejecting environmentalists' bid for regulating GHG emissions from the coal mining sector under section 111. The court said EPA has wide latitude to prioritize such rules depending on its resources. “The statute does not specify a timeline for undertaking” a 111(d) rule, Goffman said.
'Well-Constructed' Policies
Also during the event, Bob Perciasepe, former Obama EPA deputy administrator and currently president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, told Inside EPA that “we don't know what the timing will be” for potential regulation of existing sources. But he said if the NSPS and voluntary programs are “well-constructed” it is likely EPA would be able to point to emissions reductions to show an existing source rule is not necessary.
Southwestern Energy's Mark Boling said at the event EPA “made it very clear if industry will step up to the plate” and undertake voluntary efforts to reduce methane emissions, that -- plus the NSPS -- could forestall the need for an existing source rule, especially considering the air law requires such controls must be “cost-effective.”
During an Aug. 18 press call announcing the release of the NSPS proposal and other drilling regulations, EPA's acting air chief Janet McCabe declined to say whether the agency would pursue an existing source standard, saying that “we're not ruling anything out," but that for now EPA will focus on the proposed rule.
“We're really focusing on this proposal for today and the conversations we expect to have on this proposal," she said, calling the proposed rule an "important step to get us significantly along the way” to reducing methane emissions from the sector by 40-45 percent, the goal that President Obama set in his broad methane strategy.
EPA has held public hearings on its suite of drilling air rules, which includes the NSPS, the draft control techniques guidelines (CTGs) for reducing ozone-forming emissions from existing drilling, and other policies.
The proposed NSPS would set first-time emissions limits for methane from the industry, as well as set controls for volatile organic compounds and methane for some sources not regulated under an earlier 2012 NSPS, such as hydraulically fractured oil wells and downstream compressors and other equipment.
The CTGs would be used by states with areas out of attainment with EPA's ozone national ambient air quality standards, while EPA has also proposed a rule to clarify oil and gas drilling permitting.
Voluntary Program
The agency is also seeking input on its draft “Methane Challenge Program,” which builds on its existing Natural Gas Star voluntary program for operators to reduce methane emissions.
EPA says the new proposal includes more flexibility for industry, such as company-wide options, than the facility-based “Gas Star Gold” approach that the agency was forced to withdraw last year in the face of industry opposition. In an effort to provide more flexibility, the agency has scrapped the facility-based framework it proposed in 2014 and instead is floating two options that companies would be able to choose to comply.
The options are a best management practice (BMP) approach that would aim to drive near-term, widespread implementation of mitigation activities from specific sources of methane, such as liquids unloading, and an approach in which companies could participate through One Future, an existing industry-led program involving ambitious reduction targets based on emission rates. EPA is taking comment on the proposal through Oct. 13.
Speaking during The Hill event Sept. 29, Boling said that he prefers the One Future option, praising the proposal as a “more flexible design” than a performance-based goal or more prescriptive controls for specific sources. Boling said he believes that the voluntary program will drive more industry participation in One Future.

Return to headline | Return to top
Ex-Sen. Talent Launches Advocacy Group to Boost RFS

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Amanda Reilly

Former Sen. Jim Talent (R-Mo.) today will launch a new group to boost the nation's biofuel policy.
The group, Americans for Energy Security and Innovation, will seek to mobilize elected officials in support of the renewable fuel standard, which Congress first passed in 2005 and significantly expanded in 2007 to require the use of ethanol and advanced biofuels by refiners.
Talent, who was a key supporter of the original renewable fuel standard, said in a statement that he believed biofuels were the "most feasible replacement" for oil as a fuel for vehicles.
"We need a strong RFS," he said, "so that private investors can develop the biofuels industry with adequate assurance that their potential market won't be destroyed by manipulations from the foreign oil cartel."
The new group will join several existing biofuels organizations in pushing for robust annual renewable fuel targets under the RFS program. The Obama administration is considering a proposal that would boost ethanol and advanced biofuel use in 2014, 2015 and 2016 but falls short of the levels that Congress wrote into the 2007 statute.
Talent questioned U.S. EPA's proposed use of its authority to lower the levels based on fueling infrastructure limitations known as the "blend wall."
"The RFS has been the only consistent and effective energy policy that Washington has produced," he said. "Yet, the Obama administration plans to ax the only policy we have on the books that actually works to wean us off our dependence on fuels controlled by foreign oil cartels, while creating jobs at home."
Talent was elected to the Senate in a 2002 special election and served until defeated by now-Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) in 2006. He served in the House from 1993 to 2001 and spent four years as chairman of the Small Business Committee.
Talent is currently a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he's directed the group's National Security 2020 project. He was a senior adviser on foreign policy and defense on Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's failed bid for the Republican presidential nomination.

Return to headline | Return to top

Transportation News

Bipartisanship Frays as Dems Protest House Package

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Geof Koss

After months of negotiations on a bipartisan energy bill, House Democrats say they won't support the measure during today's markup without further changes.
Leading members of both parties expressed frustration yesterday during opening statements for the markup, which continues this morning, with Democrats accusing Republicans of reneging on an agreement to only move the bill through committee with provisions agreed to by both sides.
"Unfortunately, you seem to have abandoned that agreement and instead have introduced a substitute amendment that inserts significant and controversial changes," House Energy and Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) said at the outset. "This bill only aims to help polluters. Meanwhile, it continues to ignore the impacts of climate change, which remains the biggest threat to our energy security and way of life."
Pallone took the unusual step of detailing a list of policies the two sides had agreed the bill should address.
"We also agreed that we would need to find funding for infrastructure programs, in order to repair, replace and upgrade our nation's aging energy infrastructure," Pallone said.
"We agreed that deteriorating, leaky natural gas pipelines are a public safety and environmental hazard and so we committed to include funding for a grant program to help accelerate pipeline replacement and offset rate increases for vulnerable households. In addition, we also agreed to fund a competitive grant program to help states and local government upgrade outdated electricity infrastructure in ways that enhance its reliability and resiliency."
Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) noted that much of the bill builds on recommendations made by the Energy Department's landmark Quadrennial Energy Review and includes input from both parties and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz.
"And while it has been difficult to find bipartisan consensus on as many fronts as I would have liked, I believe we have written a substantive, thoughtful bill," Upton said. "Our goal remains getting something to the president's desk that will be signed into law."
But Energy and Power Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), who yesterday announced plans to retire at the end of the 114th Congress (see related story), said he was frustrated at the inability to strike a deal on the bill.
"To be truthful about it, I think the fact that we weren't able to reach an agreement says a lot about this institution," said Whitfield, who noted that Republicans worked to find billions of dollars to support Democratic priorities.
He said discussions with Democrats broke down over a handful of items, including a provision that would require the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to analyze the effects of complying with any proposed or final "billion dollar" federal rule that affects electric generating units; a provision that would repeal a 2007 law requiring the phaseout of fossil fuel power in new and renovated federal buildings; and a provision imposing new "transparency" requirements on DOE in setting building codes.
All those provisions were included in the substitute amendments introduced yesterday (Greenwire, Sept. 29).
Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), the ranking member on Energy and Power, pleaded with Republicans to continue discussions with Democrats in the hopes of bringing a bipartisan bill to the floor.
"Don't throw the baby out with the bath water," he said.
However, Whitfield noted that Democrats can offer amendments when the markup reconvenes this morning.
He later told reporters that Upton made the decision to move the bill without Democrats' support, noting that the minority was dug in on issues that were relatively minor.
"I think they're so concerned about environmental groups, that anything you could even make an argument would affect climate change, they don't want to deal with this," Whitfield said. "That's my honest feeling from talking with them, I mean these are not major issues."

Return to headline | Return to top
Inhofe Urges McCarthy to Move 'Now' on House Highway Bill

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Sean Reilly

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) can't wait for a promotion before tackling a long-term surface transportation bill, a key senator said yesterday.
"Do it now," Senate Environment and Public Works Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) urged in a brief interview at the Capitol. McCarthy is the presumed front-runner in the race to replace outgoing Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). But Boehner plans to leave Congress on Oct. 30, one day after the existing stopgap highway and transit funding extension expires.
As a result, McCarthy "doesn't have the luxury" of waiting to act until becoming speaker, Inhofe said.
But the fact that Inhofe was fielding questions on the issue testified to the flurry of interest fanned by McCarthy's comments earlier in the day highlighting passage of a six-year transportation bill as a priority (Greenwire, Sept. 29).
Turning that hope into reality, however, hinges on finding a way to cover the legislation's cost. McCarthy, who indicated that he wants to move a bill before next month's deadline, touted the work of House Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to unearth more money for highway projects by revamping the tax treatment of U.S. multinationals' earnings held overseas.
In theory, that approach -- often labeled under the umbrella term of "repatriation" -- has the endorsement of everyone from President Obama to Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.). In practice, specific proposals vary drastically in their potential impact on corporations' bottom lines. None has yet succeeded in gaining widespread acceptance on Capitol Hill, and the political logistics are only expected to get more intricate as the 2016 election year draws closer.
"I would say right now it looks more bleak than it has for a while," Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx told reporters at a separate news conference yesterday.
Ryan has thus far shown no interest in adopting the financing mechanisms used by the Senate in H.R. 22, its three-year road, rail and transit funding bill passed in July, but has yet to unveil an alternative or even say when it might be coming.
"The sooner, the better," Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) said, "because it's going to take some time to go through the issues over here."

Return to headline | Return to top
Clean Reauthorization of Pipeline Programs Unlikely

Sep 29, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Rachel Leven

An unchanged reauthorization of pipeline safety programs isn't completely off the table, but the prospects for it dimmed in light of issues such as those raised in a Senate subcommittee hearing Sept. 29.
The American Gas Association again requested a clean reauthorization at a Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation subcommittee hearing. But other pipeline industry representatives, federal officials and senators pointed to issues ranging from data collection to technology use that could be addressed in the upcoming bill for the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.
“I don't think we're going to say, ‘Geez, everything's been going great,' ” Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), chairman of the Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety and Security Subcommittee, told Bloomberg BNA following the hearing regarding whether there would be a clean bill.
But Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), the subcommittee's ranking member, told Bloomberg BNA that while he couldn't speak to the likelihood of a “clean reauthorization” at this time, he was “hopeful” it could still happen.
Some members of the pipeline industry and other interested parties also have called for a clean reauthorization of pipeline safety programs, as more than a dozen mandates from the last authorization in 2012 remain unfinished. The Pipeline Safety, Regulatory Certainty and Job Creation Act of 2011 (Pub. L. 112-90) was set to expire Sept. 30, but no reauthorization bill had been introduced.
Mandates Needed Under Reauthorization
Many parties acknowledged that PHMSA has several mandates from the reauthorization that must be handled, but that didn't stop groups from pointing to new areas for action.
For example, the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America called for PHMSA to issue new underground natural gas storage tank rules, to update the agency's user fee funding model, and to again collaborate with industry on safety research and development.
Michael Bellamy, general manager of PII Pipeline Solutions, said the agency's rules should better encourage pipeline safety technology innovation and adoption and the rules should be goal-centered, rather than descriptive in nature.
Meanwhile, the Government Accountability Office pointed to areas for growth for the agency. For example, PHMSA should expand certain data collection and examine the issue of unregulated gathering pipelines, many of which are operating similarly to transmission lines in light of increased shale production, said Susan Fleming, director of physical infrastructure issues for the office.
“There is no requirement to have emergency response plans [for these unregulated gathering pipelines,” Fleming said. “We need them to come on line in terms of having emergency response plans because there are some emerging trends out there that I think are affecting larger populations than in the past.”
Senator Raise Concerns
Senators also highlighted their own concerns.
Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) questioned whether PHMSA should have a larger role in the siting and permitting of pipelines, a process typically led by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Chris Hart, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, agreed that was an area of concern.
But the most direct call for change came from a Democrat. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (Conn.) said PHMSA overall seemed “in need of serious reform,” whether that comes from offering the agency more authority or addressing potential coziness with industry.
“PHMSA needs an overhaul,” Blumenthal said.
PHMSA's Petition Response
In other pipeline program developments, PHMSA will delay indefinitely a part of a miscellaneous rule (RIN 2137–AE59) that would have altered operator's post-construction inspection requirements for any transmission pipeline or main system, according to a public inspection notice to be published in the Federal Register Sept. 30.
Instead of implementing changes that would have restricted who can inspect a line or system following construction, PHMSA will further vet the issue through workshops and other steps. The agency will develop guidance on the issue and consider what, if any, regulations are warranted, it said.
PHMSA also will consider whether to exempt certain pressure vessels from a test pressure requirement that was included in the final rule, the notice said.
These changes to the rule that was finalized March 11 were made in response to petitions for reconsideration filed by the American Public Gas Association, the American Gas Association, the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America and the National Association of Pipeline Safety Representatives. The interstate gas group also has filed a petition with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Return to headline | Return to top
Blumenthal Weighs Legislation to Overhaul PHMSA

Sep 30, 2015 | E&E Daily

By Hannah Northey

Sen. Richard Blumenthal said yesterday he is considering legislation to reform the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, an agency that's been scrutinized recently for a series of pipeline explosions and leaks.
The Connecticut Democrat made the comment in an interview after a Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing that touched on the need for better oversight and understanding of exactly where pipelines are expanding to as shale plays are plumbed deeper for domestic gas.
"It seems to me that this agency basically is in need of serious reform, whether it's regulatory capture or lack of resources, lack of determination and will, PHMSA needs an overhaul," Blumenthal said. "It's not personal. ... If they need more resources, they should get it. If there's too much coziness with the industry, there should be an investigation."
The lawmaker seemed most alarmed over gathering pipelines, which collect gas from producing areas and -- unlike other types of pipes -- are not subject to PHMSA regulation because they're generally located in rural areas and are smaller in diameter.
National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Christopher Hart told the Subcommittee on Surface Transportation and Merchant Marine Infrastructure, Safety and Security that his agency has made 64 recommendations to PHMSA since 2000 with little result.
"Only one of these has been closed in an unacceptable status," Hart wrote in remarks prepared for the hearing.
PHMSA has been scrutinized at a number of hearings in the midst of a leadership change and uncertainty over its reauthorization.
House members in July accused the agency of failing to implement 17 of 42 mandates under the Pipeline Safety, Regulatory Certainty and Job Creation Act of 2011 within the statutory deadlines, which they believe could significantly enhance pipeline safety (E&E Daily, July 13).
Yet industry sources have said the agency's rules are still being implemented and have pushed back against changing laws anytime soon. Some have also noted that the Senate in August confirmed Marie Therese Dominguez to lead the agency, which had been under acting leadership since October (E&E Daily, Aug. 6).
Although PHMSA's authority officially expires today, Sen. Deb Fischer of Nebraska, the subcommittee's Republican chairwoman, said in an interview after yesterday's hearing that she expects to move legislation quickly and get the agency reauthorized, but that timing was dependent on Commerce Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.).
Fischer also said a field hearing earlier this month in Montana that examined PHMSA and pipeline safety shined a positive light on Dominguez and her new leadership.
"I think it really highlighted the good working relationship PHMSA has with the operators; it also showed the administrator in a very good light on the goals she's set out, that she wants to achieve," Fischer said. "I think we're going to move forward and get it reauthorized."

Return to headline | Return to top
Oil Train Law Still in the Works

Sep 28, 2015 | Everett Herald

By Jerry Cornfield

A new state law requires cities, counties and fire departments be told ahead of time when an oil train is coming through their community.
But it may be the summer of 2017 before they start getting such a heads-up.
The state Department of Ecology is working to determine what details on the type and source of oil being shipped must be in the notices to help communities prepare for a derailment, spill or other type of accident.
“They really want to know the nature of the products getting transported through their area. We have to figure out what’s feasible to require,” said David Byers, response manager for the agency.
“We have a lot of work to do but we believe we can implement it before that.”
The law’s prime sponsor in the state House hopes so.
Rep. Jessyn Farrell, D-Seattle, said the advance notice requirement is “the heart” of the comprehensive bill intended to increase safety in the transport of oil by rail, marine tankers and pipelines.
“It’s very concerning to me that it is going to take as long as it is going to take. I am working to see if we can move that date forward,” she said. “To me, it’s a cornerstone of the law. You can’t make good decisions about the need for further policy if you don’t know what’s happening now.”
State lawmakers passed House Bill 1449 in response to a surge in oil shipments by train as well as a spate of accidents, some deadly.
Many expressed concern about the ability of rail carriers to safely transport oil and the capability of communities to respond to an incident and protect the public’s safety.
As recently as 2011 no oil trains traveled through Snohomish County or the rest of the state. Oil arrived only in pipelines and by marine tanker. In 2013, 700 million gallons moved on the rails through Washington, according to figures compiled by the state.
Now in a typical week a dozen trains carry at least 1 million gallons of Bakken crude travel through Snohomish County to refineries in Skagit and Whatcom counties.
Under the new state law, Washington will hire more rail inspectors to increase track inspections, assist emergency response agencies in buying equipment and get warning signs installed at private rail crossings.
Also, the state will require rail firms to develop contingency plans for responding to a spill and prove they are financially able to pay the costs incurred in a “reasonable” worst case accident.
“I don’t think you can ever remove all risk. This (law) will definitely help reduce the risk,” said Jason Lewis, a policy adviser for the Utilities and Transportation Commission. The agency oversees rail safety programs and is drafting a rule for the financial responsibility component.
With the advance notice requirement, the law says refineries will give the ecology department at least seven-day notice of expected oil train deliveries.
Each notice should contain the train’s route, if known, and scheduled time of arrival. The type, volume and origin of the oil being shipped will be sought as well. But questions have arisen on the degree of specificity about the product itself.
The law says the “region per bill of lading” of crude oil must be provided. Is it good enough to say Alberta, Canada or must it be the Bakken region of North Dakota or something else?
The ecology department is writing a rule to answer that question plus others related to the composition of the oil getting shipped. When a draft is released — no target date has been set — it will be shepherded through a gauntlet of public review, including hearings.
That process could wrap up in eight months or take until June 30, 2017, to complete. That is the presumed deadline to get it done, Byers said.
Representatives of oil firms, refineries, railroad companies, environmental organizations and public agencies are all keeping tabs on the process.
A spokeswoman for BNSF Railways said their chief concern is assuring that whatever information is required does not compromise the confidentiality of their customers.
“We are making sure we have a good understanding of the language and how it affects our process,” said Courtney Wallace, of BNSF. “Everybody in the state of Washington has an overall concern about the safe transport of hazardous materials including oil. We share the concerns.”
Environmentalists are pressing for as much detail as possible — and for getting it into the hands of first responders as soon as possible.
“The public needs this information to understand the level of risk. The risk is now,” said Rebecca Ponzio, oil campaign director for the Washington Environmental Council.

Return to headline | Return to top

Add recipients

Suggested