Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 10/16
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(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Commits Funding to Saicm
Oct 16, 2015 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Chynoweth
The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) has agreed to provide its first significant funding to the secretariat of the UN’s Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (Saicm). -
A Surprising Natural Flame Stopper
Oct 16, 2015 | The Wall Street Journal
By Daniel Akst
Polyurethane foam, commonly used in household furnishings, is worrisomely flammable. -
FIRA Releases Report into Impact of Flame Retardant Chemicals on Furniture Recycling
Oct 16, 2015 | Furniture News
By Victoria Noakes
A report into the impact the use of flame retardant (FR) chemicals in upholstered furniture has on its disposal and recycling has been released by the Furniture Industry Research Association. -
Leaders of House Panel Unveil Long-Term Funding Bill
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Sean Reilly
Leaders of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee released a long-term road and transit authorization bill today that would maintain existing funding levels adjusted for inflation for as long as fiscal 2021. -
Congress Heads Toward Rail-Upgrade Extension
Oct 16, 2015 | CT Post
By Dan Freedman
Much like the little engine that could, Congress is chugging uphill toward bipartisan agreement to extend the Dec. 31, 2015 deadline for Positive Train Control, the satellite-based safety system designed to prevent rail crashes and speed-related accidents. -
Metra Proposes Fare Hike to Cover PTC Costs in 2016
Oct 16, 2015 | Progressive Railroading
Metra has proposed a $945.5 million budget for 2016 that includes a 2 percent net increase in fare revenue to help cover operating costs associated with a new positive train control (PTC) system, the Chicago commuter-rail agency announced yesterday. -
U.S. Gas Rescues Foreign Chemical Plant
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
U.K. chemical manufacturers struggling with the oil and gas depletion in the North Sea are finding new life in U.S. shale. -
New Ozone Rule is Unnecessary and Costly
Oct 16, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By H. Sterling Burnett, Ph.D.
Most of what Americans “know” about air pollution is false. -
111(d) Author Says Clean Air Act 'Not the Best Way' to Curb Emissions
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Elizabeth Harball
A key figure behind the Clean Air Act provision being used by U.S. EPA to regulate the power sector's carbon emissions yesterday said an economywide cap-and-trade system proposed in 2009 would have been a less costly way to curb America's greenhouse gas output than the statute he wrote. -
Oil and Gas Companies Make Statement in Support of U.N. Climate Goals
Oct 16, 2015 | The New York Times
By Stanley Reed
Ten of the world’s bigoil companies, mainly from Europe, on Friday jointly acknowledged their industry’s role in global climate change and said that they agreed with the United Nations’ goals of limiting global warming.
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(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Commits Funding to Saicm
Oct 16, 2015 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Chynoweth
The International Council of Chemical Associations (ICCA) has agreed to provide its first significant funding to the secretariat of the UN’s Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (Saicm).
The move has been welcomed by several Saicm stakeholders, but some NGOs are concerned about how the money will be spent.
Discussions on how industry could support the under-resourced Saicm secretariat began between ICCA and the UN Environment Programme (Unep) under a memorandum of understanding that was signed in 2010, but which has subsequently expired.
As such, a commitment by ICCA to provide $150,000/year for two years will now be part of a new partnership agreement the two groups are negotiating. A letter of intent for the agreement was signed at the recent International Conference on International Chemicals Management (ICCM4).
Greg Skelton, senior director of regulatory and technical affairs at the American Chemistry Council, said the ICCA funding is not tied to any required use or outcomes. “The [Saicm] secretariat has chosen to use the ICCA commitment to strengthen its broader outreach to industry, in particular downstream industry.”
The ICCA also helped the secretariat find a consultant – former Cefic head of international chemicals management Lena Perenius - “who could support them with that,” said Mr Skelton.
But NGOs such as the International POPs Elimination Network (Ipen) and the Centre of International Environmental Law say Unep’s choice of a chemical industry representative poses a potential conflict of interest. One NGO participant in the ICCM4 budget discussions questioned why Saicm was engaging only an industry stakeholder, as opposed to other stakeholders and sectors.
Jacob Duer, Saicm secretariat principal co-ordinator, said any accusation regarding a conflict of interest was "an allegation against the integrity of the UN", and that contrary to what some NGOs may have believed, the consultant’s role will not include Saicm financing mechanisms. Full details of the consultants role will, he added, be published shortly,
Ms Perenius’ successor at Cefic, Veronique Garny, said the consultant's objectives “are set by the Saicm secretariat".
Financing issues
At ICCM4, NGOs sought to get wording on the internalisation of costs of sound chemicals management into the Saicm budget – to ensure the chemical industry, as Ipen says “would pay the true costs for managing their products, instead of externalising their toxic liabilities”.But this was strongly resisted by the industry, say the NGOs, and instead the conference agreed to call for enhanced industry involvement and “integrated financing” – which includes cost recovery methods, taxes, technology transfer and voluntary programmes.
Responding to comments by European Commission delegate Jill Hanna that industry should bear the costs of chemicals management (1 October 2015), Mr Skelton said private sector financial flows from developed to developing countries “dwarf” those of official development assistance. “While mainstreaming of chemicals management in national development plans is important, it is obvious that aid is not the total answer.”
The most significant impacts in chemicals management will be made at national level through the establishment of basic capacity to manage chemicals safely, he added. “But there is no one-size-fits-all for this approach – it depends on a country's particular needs. Some… impose fees on industry for registering chemicals. Others fund activities out of general taxation, which industry is a significant contributor to.”
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A Surprising Natural Flame Stopper
Oct 16, 2015 | The Wall Street Journal
By Daniel Akst
Polyurethane foam, commonly used in household furnishings, is worrisomely flammable. But health concerns over the use of existing flame retardants have ignited research to develop safer alternatives. Now a team led by scientists at the University of Texas at Austin has demonstrated a way of using a derivative of the neurotransmitter dopamine, a chemical that occurs naturally in humans, to dampen the flammability of foam.
The team’s interest arose from its research into melanin, the body’s natural protection from the sun. The team showed that it also has potential as a thermal stabilizer in plastics. In looking for other human-derived molecules with similar potential, polydopamine was an obvious choice, says lead scientistChristopher Ellison.Watch a polydopamine demonstration.
Polydopamine and melanin have some things in common, but unlike melanin, polydopamine is really sticky; mussels rely on something similar to glom onto things. In their testing, the scientists found that polydopamine was more effective than conventional flame retardants in suppressing fire in polyurethane foam. “We believe polydopamine could cheaply and easily replace the flame retardants found in many of the products that we use every day,” says Dr. Ellison.
Dopamine has come to be associated with pleasurable sensations, so some may assume that marinating foam in a dopamine derivative will produce a kind of whoopee cushion. Not so. Dopamine does seem to play a role in signaling the likelihood of reward (it also helps to regulate movement, attention and even the production of breast milk). But Dr. Ellison notes that polydopamine wouldn’t function in the body like dopamine; its characteristics make it highly unlikely to enter the body in the first place. That means it’s “extremely likely to be less toxic than what is used today,” Dr. Ellison says.
Dr. Ellison’s team seems to be the first to publish a peer-reviewed article on using polydopamine as a flame retardant. But another team of scientists, at American University, has already applied for a patent on a version of the technology. Douglas Fox, a chemistry professor at American, said that his group did so last year based on a technique that uses polydopamine together with one of several additional substances, particularly ammonia.
“The study from UT Austin is a good control experiment,” he says, adding that “the results shown by Ellison’s group are very similar to what we found in our lab.” Dr. Fox notes that the Texas team used an extensive washing procedure to eliminate stray dopamine. “I would be surprised if any measurable amount...would be detected and believe that there would be no significant health risk,” he says.
“Bioinspired Catecholic Flame Retardant Nanocoating for Flexible Polyurethane Foams,” Joon Hee Cho, Vivek Vasagar, Kadhiravan Shanmuganathan, Amanda R. Jones, Sergei Nazarenko and Christopher J. Ellison, Chemistry of Materials (Sept. 9)
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FIRA Releases Report into Impact of Flame Retardant Chemicals on Furniture Recycling
Oct 16, 2015 | Furniture News
By Victoria Noakes
A report into the impact the use of flame retardant (FR) chemicals in upholstered furniture has on its disposal and recycling has been released by the Furniture Industry Research Association.
Sherree Felice, furniture technologist at FIRA International, has been leading the project ‘FR chemicals and their impact on upholstery at end-of-life’.
She explains: “Flame retardants continue to be important to the UK furniture and furnishings industry as they ensure that current high levels of fire resistance performance are maintained, thus minimising deaths and injuries attributable to fires in furniture. The chemical nature of flame retardants has led to many of them being assessed for their potentially hazardous environmental impact.
“The upholstered furniture industry is now facing challenges as a number of flame retardant chemicals being placed on REACH candidate lists. In addition, some are also being considered for designation as Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). These factors would have a significant impact on the use of, and responsibilities for, such chemicals and on how to deal with product containing them at the end of its life.”
REACH is a European Union regulation concerning the registration, evaluation, authorisation and restriction of Chemicals. Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) are chemical substances that persist in the environment, bio-accumulate through the food web, and pose a risk of causing adverse effects to human health and the environment.
Sherree continues: “If an FR chemical is placed on the POPs list, it could be determined as hazardous waste in finished products if the concentration exceeds the acceptable limits, and also how waste is categorised by the waste authority. If classed as hazardous, this has a number of implications such as export of waste to overseas and the import of flame retardant chemicals into the UK. This report ascertains how much the furniture industry will be impacted by projected changes to flame retardants currently used on upholstered goods and if there are changes to the way we dispose of these articles as a result.”
The project has also considered the possibility of an effective labelling system that would indicate the FR chemical used on cover fabrics/fillings so that waste centres would have a way of knowing how to handle items in the future.
Key points addressed by the project include:
- Why do we use FR chemicals in upholstery?
- Flame retardant chemicals, classification and their uses
- Brominated flame retardants
- What is REACH and how are brominated flame retardants such as decaBDE and HBCD affected?
- What is the Stockholm Convention and what are Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs)?
- POPs related to the furniture industry
- Directives and programmes related to the incorporation and disposal of brominated flame retardants and POPs
- The waste stages of brominated flame retardants and polybrominated diphenyl ethers
- Labelling systems for POPsA summary of the findings from the project is available to download here. The document can be accessed free of charge by members of the Furniture Industry Research Association.
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Leaders of House Panel Unveil Long-Term Funding Bill
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Sean Reilly
Leaders of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee released a long-term road and transit authorization bill today that would maintain existing funding levels adjusted for inflation for as long as fiscal 2021.
The approximately 540-page bipartisan bill comes with a large question mark. While the committee plans a markup for Thursday, it's going forward without a path for fully covering the $325 billion cost -- the job of the Ways and Means Committee.
A senior T&I Committee aide said he expects the Ways and Means panel to come up with a funding package within the next few weeks that would pay for the first three years. Without that package, which has been awaited for months, the bill will not move to the House floor.
"I don't think we will take an unfunded bill to the floor," the aide said at a background briefing for reporters.
According to the briefing and a summary, the transportation measure would also:Create a National Surface Transportation and Innovative Finance Bureau within the Department of Transportation to provide "one-stop shopping" for states, local governments and businesses seeking to pursue projects. About a half-dozen DOT offices would be consolidated.Revamp federal truck and bus safety grant programs.Update transportation research standards to reflect technological advances.
The House is currently playing catch-up with the Senate, which passed a road, railroad and transit authorization bill in July that contains assured funding for three years.
The Senate measure would also extend the December deadline for implementation of the automated rail safety system known as positive train control until the end of 2018.
While House Transportation Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) recently introduced a stand-alone bill to grant a three-year extension under somewhat different conditions, the committee aide this morning didn't rule out incorporating a compromise into the final version of broader surface transportation legislation.
More immediately, however, lawmakers must agree on another short-term extension to replace the existing stopgap road and transit funding authorization measure that expires Oct. 29, given that there is no chance of lawmakers sending a longer-term measure to President Obama before then.
Any new stopgap would be the fourth since July of last year; no agreement has been reached on its length, the aide said.
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Congress Heads Toward Rail-Upgrade Extension
Oct 16, 2015 | CT Post
By Dan Freedman
Much like the little engine that could, Congress is chugging uphill toward bipartisan agreement to extend the Dec. 31, 2015 deadline for Positive Train Control, the satellite-based safety system designed to prevent rail crashes and speed-related accidents.
Any delay in the start-up date of PTC could have major implications for Connecticut, which in recent years has weathered a long list of Metro-North Railroad accidents resulting in injuries and lost lives.
Rail safety experts have said PTC could have averted the 2013 Metro-North derailment which killed four at Spuyten Duyvil in the Bronx.
PTC, a GPS-like system that can slow or halt trains that are speeding or on the verge of collision, also could have prevented the Amtrak derailment in Philadelphia earlier this year that killed eight.
But railroad executives insist the 2015 deadline for implementation of PTC on 60,000 miles of track nationwide is not feasible because installation is too technically challenging.
Along with their Republican allies on Capitol Hill, the railroads have warned they will have to start curtailing service if Congress does not approve an extension. Economic dislocation and job losses could result, they argue.
Connecticut lawmakers on transportation committees in Congress acknowledge the likelihood of Congress granting an extension. But they are wary of railroads using the extension as an excuse for unnecessary foot dragging.
“I’m going to use every bit of implicit or direct power my colleagues and I have to protect the public,’’ said Sen.Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., who is on the Senate Commerce, Science & Transportation Committee. “We’re not insisting on the impossible. I don’t want jobs to be lost, but the railroads have proven year after year they will exploit any delay for their financial advantage.’’
A Senate bill approved in July would allow railroads to apply for extensions beyond 2015, with Dec. 31, 2018 set as the date for full installation and activation. The bill contains no absolute end date, although railroads needing extra time would have to set one to win approval from the Department of Transportation. A similar House bill introduced two weeks ago would set a deadline of 2018 but allow for two years’ worth of extensions.
Blumenthal said PTC should be fully operational by the end of 2018, no excuses.
“It’s an unfortunate reality that we need to extend the deadline, recognizing the difficulty with budget challenges and other concerns we’ve been hearing from railroads,’’ said Rep.Elizabeth Esty, D-Conn., a member of the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee. “I have repeatedly urged Congress to provide railroads with the resources they need to implement this life-saving system that will help keep commuters in Connecticut and across the Northeast safe.’’
Metro-North has said it needs until the end of 2018 to get PTC up and running on its lines.
In a letter last week, Amtrak said “a vast majority of our network would be inoperable without an extension of the deadline.’’
Amtrak, which runs over 21,000 miles of track, will spend $162 million on PTC by year’s end and says it will meet the 2015 deadline for most of its Boston-Washington Northeast corridor.
One 56-mile stretch where PTC will not be present is between New Rochelle, N.Y., and New Haven, where Amtrak runs on Metro-North tracks.
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Metra Proposes Fare Hike to Cover PTC Costs in 2016
Oct 16, 2015 | Progressive Railroading
Metra has proposed a $945.5 million budget for 2016 that includes a 2 percent net increase in fare revenue to help cover operating costs associated with a new positive train control (PTC) system, the Chicago commuter-rail agency announced yesterday.
The budget proposes $759.8 million for operating costs and $185.7 million for capital improvements, according to a Metra press release. The agency proposed a 2 percent fare hike, which is lower than the 5 percent hike agency officials previously projected they would need for 2016.
“We told our customers that we would do everything we could to avoid or minimize higher fares next year and that is precisely what we have done,” said Metra Chairman Martin Oberman. “At the same time, we are committed to being a responsible steward of public funds and finding ways to continue to invest in our railroad infrastructure with increasingly limited financial resources.”
Metra officials expect the agency will receive $165.4 million from federal sources and $4.7 million from the Regional Transportation Authority for its capital needs. The agency is anticipating no capital funds from the state next year.
Fare revenue typically funds the agency’s operating budget, with a small amount going toward capital improvements. Next year, however, Metra proposes allocating $15.6 million in fare funds to capital costs, which would be $3.2 million more than the 2015 budget.
The remaining $3.3 million in new fare revenue will go toward higher operating costs related to PTC. PTC implementation is expected to cost Metra more than $350 million out of the capital budget. The operating budget also will be impacted, as the agency ramps up the federally mandated safety technology, Metra officials said.
By the time Metra’s PTC system is fully implemented by 2019, the maintenance and operating costs are expected to be $15 million to $20 million a year. The 2016 operating budget will increase 2 percent compared with a year ago, Metra estimated.
In terms of revenue, the budget proposes $19.6 million in sales tax revenue, assuming no change in state funding policy. That increase is partially offset by a $5.4 million reduction in other revenue and an expected $2.4 million reduction in revenue as riders switch to cars due to lower gasoline prices. That leaves a net revenue increase of $11.8 million.
Metra’s proposed capital budget calls for $85.4 million for rail-car and locomotive work; $23.9 million to replace or improve ties, ballast, crossings, bridges and other track and structure work; $36.9 million for signal, electrical and communications work; $17.1 million for facilities and equipment; $13.2 million in station and parking improvements; and $9.3 million in support activities.
About 57 percent of the capital budget, or $106.4 million, is proposed for Metra’s modernization plan for rail cars, locomotives and PTC.
The budget proposal will be the subject of eight public hearings throughout the Chicago area to be held Nov. 4-5. -
U.S. Gas Rescues Foreign Chemical Plant
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
U.K. chemical manufacturers struggling with the oil and gas depletion in the North Sea are finding new life in U.S. shale.
Ineos Group Ltd. makes chemicals for jet fuels and other consumer products and brings in about 3 percent of Scotland's gross domestic product. Once the North Sea reserves started providing less, having fallen 50 percent since 2005, the company cut down to half capacity and was looking at a dismal future.
In the same time frame, the United States saw a 16-fold increase for liquefied natural gas exports caused by high shale activity. Ineos took notice and is now in the middle of a $1 billion plant overhaul to update equipment in preparation to start importing U.S. shale-drilled ethane gas, which is about half the price as it is in Europe.
Ineo's move is a big financial risk for the company and for the Grangemouth, Scotland, area, including not only the renovations but the manufacturing of new ships to bring in the gas.
"We had to convince the site and the government that this is a workable plan," said John McNally, CEO for Ineos Olefins & Polymers U.K. "It was the only plan, the survival plan for Grangemouth chemicals."
Ineos is also investing in British oil fields in the North Sea, which the company estimates has enough gas to supply 8 percent of the United Kingdom's demand.
All of Ineo's investment in U.S. gas is risky because if the prices of oil fall further, this could put the company in a bad situation as other nearby fuels become more price-competitive.
However, after five years of having a price advantage, many are skeptical that the price of U.S. shale gas will be rising beyond that point anytime soon.
"We really do believe U.S. ethane will be cheap -- forever is a long word -- but for a long time," said Charles Blanchard, a Houston-based Bloomberg analyst (Kelly Gilblom, Bloomberg, Oct. 14). -- MB
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New Ozone Rule is Unnecessary and Costly
Oct 16, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By H. Sterling Burnett, Ph.D.
Most of what Americans “know” about air pollution is false.
Polls show most Americans believe air pollution (1) has been steady or rising during the past few decades, (2) will worsen in the future, and (3) is a serious threat to people’s health. Despite the impression created by government bureaucrats, environmental lobbyists, and the media, air quality in the United States is the best it has been since before the Industrial Revolution and is continuing to improve. Environmentalists and regulators paint a false picture of the nation’s air quality to pad their budgets and increase their power.
The Obama administration imposed a new 70 parts per billion (ppb) ozone limit on October 1. States and counties will have to meet the standards by 2037.
Obama’s predecessor, George W. Bush, last made the ozone standard more stringent in 2008, his last year in office. Even before many states have begun implementing recently approved plans to meet the previous standard, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has chosen to make the standard even stricter, throwing more counties and cities out of compliance with federal ozone standards and necessitating a new round of hearings, the formulation of new state plans to meet the new standards, and a high likelihood of costly litigation.
EPA estimates the new rule will be among the most expensive in history, costing more than $1.4 billion per year. Research examining previous federal estimates of the costs of regulations show agencies, including EPA, consistently miscalculate the costs of the regulations they impose on the economy. Government cost estimates are routinely far lower than actual costs, so the cost of the new ozone rule could be much higher than EPA claims.
Despite spending billions, possibly trillions, to meet the new standard, the government’s own data show air quality has improved and continues to do so, indicating stricter rules are unnecessary. Real-world experience shows the new rules are unlikely to protect human health.
Air quality in America’s cities is better than it has been in more than a century. Ozone in particular has declined 33 percent since 1980 and 9 percent since 2008, despite the limits imposed by the Bush administration only recently having been implemented in many jurisdictions.
What makes these air quality improvements so extraordinary is they occurred during a period of increasing motor vehicle use, energy production, and economic growth. Miles driven each year and the dollar value of goods and services (our gross domestic product) have both more than doubled since ozone was first regulated as a pollutant.
The Obama administration has justified making ozone limits stricter, as all scoundrels do when proposing illegitimate expansions of government power, by claiming it’s “for the children.” In particular, EPA claims the ozone limits will reduce childhood asthma attacks.
That claim is bunk.
Although the incidence of asthma among children has doubled since 1980, air pollution cannot be the cause: It declined while asthma prevalence increased. Moreover, emergency room visits and hospitalizations for asthma are lowest during July and August, when ozone levels are highest.
Researchers have offered several hypotheses to account for the rise in asthma, none of them linked to air pollution—such as increased exposure to roach castings in urban areas, a deleterious effect on the immune system by squeaky-clean suburban homes, and the increase in obesity.
If ozone could be reduced for free, making the standards stricter wouldn’t matter, but it isn’t free. And even EPA admits the new standard would, at best, only reduce hospital visits for asthma and other respiratory diseases by a few tenths of a percent while being among the most costly regulations ever. People will ultimately pay these costs through higher prices, lower wages and fewer choices, and fewer jobs. The higher costs of energy and goods and services due to Obama’s unneeded ozone regulations reduce people’s discretionary income, preventing them from spending more on healthier foods, exercise, and medical care, which are much more effective at improving health and welfare than stricter air rules.
Recognizing the high costs and negligible benefits of the proposed lower limit, approximately 260 organizations—businesses, trade associations, unions, and consumer and public interest groups—asked the administration to keep the existing standard, saying research shows the current 75 ppb standard already protects public health.
The newly proposed EPA standard poses a significant risk with little reason to expect much in the way of benefits. EPA should withdraw its proposal to tighten the ozone standard and acknowledge the current standard already protects Americans’ health—with room to spare.
Burnett. (hburnett@heartland.org) is a research fellow on energy and the environment at The Heartland Institute, a conservative, libertarian, nonprofit research center headquartered in Arlington Heights, Illinois.
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111(d) Author Says Clean Air Act 'Not the Best Way' to Curb Emissions
Oct 16, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Elizabeth Harball
A key figure behind the Clean Air Act provision being used by U.S. EPA to regulate the power sector's carbon emissions yesterday said an economywide cap-and-trade system proposed in 2009 would have been a less costly way to curb America's greenhouse gas output than the statute he wrote.
Robert Nordhaus, now a partner with Van Ness Feldman LLP, was in 1970 a legislative draftsman in the House Office of the Legislative Counsel. Nordhaus was assigned to write the 1970 amendments to the Clean Air Act, one of which became Section 111(d) -- the provision underpinning the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan, a sweeping regulation aimed at reducing the United States' CO2 emissions 32 percent by 2030.
At an event hosted by the think tank Resources for the Future in Washington, D.C., Nordhaus indicated that the "American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009," known as the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill, would have been a further-reaching and more economically sensible alternative to the Clean Power Plan.
"Regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act is not preordained by some divine power, but it's a policy choice that became necessary once what I would regard as a more administrable, efficient and less costly program ... to control these gases failed in the Senate," Nordhaus said.
Nordhaus, who later served as general counsel to both the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy, added that the Clean Power Plan only regulates CO2 from power plants, leaving a significant percentage of U.S. emissions from sectors like transportation and manufacturing to be regulated through other mechanisms.
"You're looking at a program that can't reach all of the emissions, and one that reaches them in a way that's not necessarily economically efficient," Nordhaus said, explaining that an economywide carbon-trading program involving emissions beyond power plants is impossible under the Clean Air Act.
While EPA is encouraging interstate trading within the power sector as a compliance method under the Clean Power Plan, Nordhaus emphasized that there is "no guarantee" that all states will choose this method.
"If you look at the Clean Air Act as a regulatory mechanism, it's what we've got; it can reach a significant proportion of our greenhouse gas emissions, but stepping back, it's not the best way to do it," he said.A 'forward-looking' statute?
Once the final Clean Power Plan rule is published in the Federal Register, EPA will face litigation challenging its authority under the Clean Air Act to limit CO2 emissions from power plants. One question sure to be raised in those lawsuits is what Congress intended when it wrote and amended the law.
Congress amended the Clean Air Act again in 1990, and court battles are likely to center around conflicting changes enacted that year by the House and the Senate. The dispute revolves around whether EPA is forbidden from issuing duplicative regulations for an emission source -- in this case, power plants -- or a specific pollutant. EPA has already regulated power plants under Section 112 of the law, but it has not regulated carbon emissions.
Lisa Heinzerling, an administrative law expert and professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said at an event in D.C. earlier this week that EPA should be on firm ground as long as the agency explains its reasoning and how it interpreted that ambiguity in the law while also reaching out to affected stakeholders.
Jeff Holmstead, an industry lawyer with Bracewell & Giuliani, disagreed and said EPA's rule is contrary to the statute. He believes the courts will find that Congress never intended to entrust such a high level of regulatory reach to the agency.
But Heinzerling said court decisions won't be based on whether Congress intended to give EPA certain powers but rather whether EPA made a permissible interpretation of the statute.
Nordhaus said that although global warming likely wasn't on the minds of lawmakers working on the Clean Air Act in 1970, they were aware that the science of air pollutants was still evolving and 111(d) was written to account for this issue.
"Did Congress intend to regulate greenhouse gases in 1970? Well, I would say probably not," Nordhaus said. "But the Clean Air Act in 1970 was really designed not to deal only with the problems they knew about in 1970. What they knew about air pollution and how to control it in 1970 was pretty limited.
"They had no idea exactly how they were going to do what they had to do then, much less what they would ultimately have to do over the years as emissions increased, as the economy grew and as we had better knowledge on air pollution science," he added. "The statute itself, in my view anyways, was really designed to be forward-looking."
But Nordhaus also acknowledged that 111(d)'s authority has grown into something policymakers in 1970 may not have imagined at the time.
"I think nobody really looked at it seriously for many years because it was not clear at that time what pollutants would fall into this tiny little gap -- what we thought was a tiny little gap," he said.
Reporter Emily Holden contributed.
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Oil and Gas Companies Make Statement in Support of U.N. Climate Goals
Oct 16, 2015 | The New York Times
By Stanley Reed
Ten of the world’s bigoil companies, mainly from Europe, on Friday jointly acknowledged their industry’s role in global climate change and said that they agreed with the United Nations’ goals of limiting global warming.
The point, in a public declaration, was to try convincing an increasingly skeptical world that the oil companies, whose fossil fuels are a big source of greenhouse gases, are serious about delivering cleaner energy and combating climate change. But the impact of that statement might be limited.
None of the biggest American oil companies took part. And the companies that were involved — including BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Saudi Aramco and Total — made no specific commitments to helping meet the climate challenge.
The group, the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative, also held a news conference on Friday in Paris, looking ahead to the United Nations climate conference that will open there on Nov. 30 and run through Dec. 11.
The companies declared their collective support for an effective global climate change agreement to be reached at the Paris conference, and they specifically cited the United Nations’ target of staving off a rise in the atmospheric temperature of 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius).
By recognizing that goal, the executives are putting themselves in a tricky position. Meeting that target would require leaving much of the world’s existing oil, gas and coal reserves unburned and would force the companies to make major changes in the way they do business.
Many experts, including people in the oil industry doubt that the goal can be met.
The executives acknowledged that “the existing trend of the world’s net global greenhouse gas emissions is not consistent with this ambition.” In other words, the world’s factories and vehicles are still pumping out far too much carbon dioxide.
However, the executives, who said their companies provided nearly 10 percent of the world’s energy, did not commit to any new limits on their own activities. Instead, they left it up to governments to establish regulations and other measures that would encourage them “to take informed decisions and make effective and sustainable contributions to addressing climate change.”
Neil Beveridge, an oil analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein, said the industry deserved credit for acknowledging its role in climate change. “It is a big, big step for such a large number of companies to gather,” he said. “Over the years, a lot of companies have been in denial on this issue.”
But Anthony Hobley, chief executive of Carbon Tracker, a London-based organization that advises on the risks of investing in energy companies, noted the limits of Friday’s statement. “There was no commitment to get out ahead of government,” he said.
American giants like Chevron and ExxonMobil have declined to join the group.
The American companies appear to disapprove of the European-led initiative, partly because the potential remedies — like carbon taxes or the trading of carbon-emission permits — that many experts say are necessary to successfully curb greenhouse gases would almost inevitably raise the price of their fuels.
“I’ve never had a customer come to me and ask to pay a higher price for oil, gas or other products,” John S. Watson, the chief executive of Chevron, told a meeting hosted in Vienna in June by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.
Rex W. Tillerson, ExxonMobil’s chief executive, has repeatedly said that he would support putting a price on carbon as long as it was “revenue neutral.”
An explicit call for putting a high price on carbon emissions was deliberately omitted from Friday’s declaration. Claudio Descalzi, chief executive of the Italian oil company Eni, and a participant in the group, said in an interview on Friday that most of his European colleagues agreed that some form of carbon tax would eventually be essential.
“Carbon pricing is the only way to have a reasonable energy mix” to sustain the 3.6-degree ceiling, he said. But he said Friday’s declaration used less-specific language to bring some of the international companies on board. “Now we are trying to create a consensus,” he said.
The United Nations goal of limiting global warming to about 3.6 degrees is based on a comparison to climatic temperatures in the preindustrial 19th century. That level of warming, although potentially producing dire effects on agriculture, sea level and the natural world, could stave off the most severe impacts of drought, food and water shortages, and widespread flooding — events that could profoundly harm the world’s population and economy.
But to achieve that limit would require drastic reductions in carbon emissions by 2050.
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