Preview Newsletter
AM ACC 5/11/2016
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(ACC Mentioned) US EPS Market Quiet After Recent Price Rollover
May 10, 2016 | ICIS
By David Love
The US expandable polystyrene (EPS) market was largely quiet this week after prices rolled over from April to May last week, market participants said on Tuesday. -
(ACC Mentioned) Animal Testing Debates Amount to a Test of Conscience
May 10, 2016 | Humane Society of the United States
By Wayne Pacelle
Before manufacturers can sell pesticides in the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency must evaluate their safety to protect human health and the environment -
Inhofe, Boxer Expect Final Deal on Chemicals
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Anthony Adragna
House and Senate lawmakers are likely to reach a deal by the end of the week overhauling the nation's primary industrial chemicals statute, the top Democrat and Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee told reporters May 10. -
As Lawmakers Near TSCA Reform Deal, Questions Remain On Key Policies
May 10, 2016 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
As lawmakers near a potential final deal on legislation to overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), chemical industry sources say significant questions remain on how an agreement might affect a host of key policies in the bill including preemption of state chemical programs... -
New York Probes Sources of PFOS in Newburgh
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Gerald B. Silverman
New York state is looking into possible sources of contamination in the city of Newburgh where levels of the chemical perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) have been detected in the city's drinking water and other water supplies, according to a letter obtained by Bloomberg BNA. -
One City’s Solution to Drinking Water Contamination? Get Rid of Every Lead Pipe.
May 10, 2016 | Washington Post
By Darryl Fears and Brady Dennis
Long before Flint, Mich., faced a water-contamination crisis, this city dealt with one of its own. The local utility had sampled residents’ tap water in accordance with the federal government’s new Lead and Copper Rule and discovered unacceptable levels of lead. -
What the Mattress Industry’s Explosive Growth Means to Fire Chiefs
May 11, 2016 | Fire Chief
By Jim Spell
Fans of the original Star Trek series will remember "The Trouble with Tribbles," where furry little alien creatures multiplied at an alarming rate on the deck of the Enterprise. Cities and suburbs are seeing their own troubling tribble issue in the form of mattress stores. -
Senate Energy Spending Bill Nears Finish Line
May 10, 2016 | E&E News PM
By George Cahlink
The Senate is planning to pass its $37.5 billion fiscal 2017 energy and water spending bill as soon as tomorrow, key appropriators said today. -
'We're Not Ready to Go to Conference' -- Upton
May 11, 2016 | E&E Daily
By Geof Koss
A key Republican last night said the House is unlikely to name conferees to reconcile the competing energy bills this week, thereby punting on a development that was expected and stalling progress on the legislation. -
EPA Should Rethink Clean Power Plan Trading, Utility Says
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Andrew Childers
The Environmental Protection Agency should reconsider allowing trading between states that choose rate-based and mass-based compliance options for the Clean Power Plan, a utility official said as power companies and states alike grapple with meeting the rule's carbon dioxide emissions reductions. -
Shale Gas Production Rising as Drillers Become More Efficient
May 10, 2016 | Fuel Fix
By Bloomberg
Natural gas futures have soared since March on speculation that supplies are finally falling after a decade of gains. Production numbers tell a different story. -
Fracking on the Defensive
May 11, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The once-booming hydraulic fracturing industry is suddenly on the defensive.In recent months, the industry has suffered a $4.2 million jury award over alleged groundwater contamination from fracking... -
As Firms Abandon Arctic Drilling, Obama Comes Under Pressure to do More to Avert Dangerous Warming There
May 11, 2016 | Washington Post
By Juliet Eilperin
Major oil and gas firms abandoned most of their leases in the Arctic this week, just as President Obama and others are coming under increased pressure to avert dangerous warming in the region. -
Canada's Oil-Sands Restart as Fires Pass
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rebecca Penty and Robert Tuttle
Canada's oil-sands companies that just shut down production as a wildfire ripped across Northern Alberta are already planning to restart. -
House GOP, North Carolina Fault EPA Over Speed, Costs of RMP Proposal
May 10, 2016 | InsideEPA
By Dave Reynolds
House Republicans and North Carolina are criticizing EPA's proposed overhaul of its facility safety program, with GOP lawmakers urging the agency to grant more time for input on what they say is a rushed rule and North Carolina officials warning that the proposal could... -
Cause of Texas Fertilizer Explosion That Killed 15 to be Announced
May 11, 2016 | CNN
By Ralph Ellis
The cause of a fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15 people three years ago in Texas will be revealed at noon Wednesday, officials said. -
Senate Passes Crude-By-Rail Response Bill
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Ari Natter
Senate legislation aimed at bolstering emergency response efforts for crude-by-rail transport and other incidents was approved by unanimous consent. -
PHMSA Agrees to 30-Day Extension of Comment Period for Proposed New Rules
May 10, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
The Transportation Department's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) said it will extend the public comment period for proposed rules governing natural gas transmission and gathering lines by another 30 days... -
States, Chamber Back Keystone Lawsuit Against Obama
May 10, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and several states this week filed supporting briefs in a lawsuit over President Obama’s November rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline. -
(ACC Mentioned) House Panel Sets Vote on Olson's Ozone Bill
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee is set to vote May 12 on legislation (H.R. 4775) that would delay implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency's 2015 ozone standards. -
The Growing Stress on the World’s Water
May 10, 2016 | Washington Post
By Editorial Board
The World Bank has warned countries that one of climate change’s most significant impacts will be on a precious resource that many people, particularly in advanced nations, take for granted: water.
Industry and Association News
Chemical Management News
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Chemical Security News
Transportation News
Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) US EPS Market Quiet After Recent Price Rollover
May 10, 2016 | ICIS
By David Love
The US expandable polystyrene (EPS) market was largely quiet this week after prices rolled over from April to May last week, market participants said on Tuesday.
One major reason for the rollover was the direction of feedstock benzene spot prices in April, market sources said.
Benzene contract prices jumped by 41 cents/gal at the end of March, but spot benzene traded below the contract price during the entire month of April. As a result, May benzene contracts settled down by 9-11 cents/gal at $2.08/gal.
Additionally, it became apparent in April that EPS demand was lower than expected. Some of that was the result of pre-buying in March, as buyers knew that prices would likely be going up in April.
US and Canada total sales and captive use jumped by 27.6% in March year on year, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC).
Producers were successful in pushing through a price increase of 5 cents/lb in April. Producers separately announced the 5 cents/lb price increase for April around mid-March.
Market participants say that May volumes are increasing from where they were in April.
North American EPS producers include Dart Polymers, Flint Hills Resources, Grupo Idesa, Nexkemia Petrochimie, Nova Chemicals, Plasti-Fab, StyroChem International and Styropek.
http://www.icis.com/resources/news/2016/05/10/9996616/us-eps-market-quiet-after-recent-price-rollover/
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(ACC Mentioned) Animal Testing Debates Amount to a Test of Conscience
May 10, 2016 | Humane Society of the United States
By Wayne Pacelle
Before manufacturers can sell pesticides in the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency must evaluate their safety to protect human health and the environment. As part of this process, the EPA currently requires pesticide manufacturers to perform dozens of tests on rabbits, rats, mice, and guinea pigs, including six tests – called the toxicity “six-pack” — to measure the potential for a pesticide to cause harm. The tests result in agony and death for thousands of animals each year.
Following negotiations with The HSUS and other stakeholders, EPA announced a plan last month to phase out at least some of these obsolete animal testing practices in favor of alternatives that can provide the same information, sometimes more effectively, without using animals. This offers the prospect of saving the lives of the animals who are subjected to skin and eye irritation, force-feeding and inhalation of chemicals, and intentional lethal poisoning. The EPA’s new plan is part of a larger move by the agency to embrace more modern technology that is humane, cost-effective, and better at predicting pesticide reactions.
The “six-pack” tests are inhumane and possibly the most painful battery of animal tests ever conceived. The first three tests expose animals to a mega-dose of a pesticide via force-feeding, forced inhalation, and absorption through their skin to determine the dose that will kill 50 percent. It is common for the animals in these tests to endure convulsions, bleeding from the mouth or nose, seizures or paralysis. The final three tests in the “six-pack” require placing these caustic chemicals in the eyes or on the skin of the animals to determine levels of irritation or allergic response. EPA estimates that as many as 500 pesticide formulations undergo six-pack animal testing every year.
Most of this animal suffering is completely unnecessary because we now have non-animal alternatives for many of these tests. But even as the science is trending away from animal testing, there are still regulatory barriers that prevent the full implementation of non-animal testing strategies. EPA’s pesticide regulations are a perfect example, as they still require most manufacturers to perform all of the “six-pack” tests despite the availability of alternatives already available to determine eye and skin corrosion, and irritation and skin allergy.
A new guidance document released by the EPA will allow pesticide manufacturers to waive the need for cruel dermal toxicity tests by accepting information already obtained through oral toxicity tests. The agency has also published a letter to stakeholders stating that its “immediate goal is to significantly reduce the use of animals in acute effects testing [for pesticides].” The letter outlined steps the agency is taking now, and in the near future to address each of the “six-pack” tests.
The EPA is requesting comments on its draft guidance. Please join The HSUS in our efforts to #EndPesticideCruelty by expressing your support for the agency’s proposal to allow pesticide manufacturers to waive cruel skin poisoning tests. Comments close May 16, so it’s crucial you act now.
P.S. There is other big news looming on the animal testing front – in this case, relating to chemicals. The House and Senate are negotiating final terms for reform of the Toxic Substances Control Act, a 1976 statute that requires oversight over tens of thousands of chemicals in commercial use in our society. So many key lawmakers are aligned on the issue, pushing for the policy goal of requiring the use of scientifically appropriate alternatives to animal testing for safety. Amazingly and shockingly, New Jersey Democrat Frank Pallone is standing in the way of this forward-thinking outcome, despite agreement on terms to reduce animal testing from The HSUS, the Humane Society Legislative Fund, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, the Environmental Working Group, the Environmental Defense Fund, and even the American Chemistry Council. Please call Rep. Pallone’s office at 202/225-4671 and tell him to get on board and stop threatening countless animals with needless chemical tests, at a time when we can rely on 21st century science to help animals and protect public safety.
http://blog.humanesociety.org/wayne/2016/05/animal-testing-debates-amount-test-conscience.html
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Inhofe, Boxer Expect Final Deal on Chemicals
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Anthony Adragna
House and Senate lawmakers are likely to reach a deal by the end of the week overhauling the nation's primary industrial chemicals statute, the top Democrat and Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee told reporters May 10.
Both Sens. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said they believed both chambers could move the bill overhauling the Toxic Substances Control Act quickly after a final deal emerges. Inhofe said he hoped to secure a commitment from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for floor time for the bill during a meeting scheduled for May 11.
“We're getting close—we are—we really are,” Inhofe said. Several additional people closely tracking the negotiations—on and off Capitol Hill—also told Bloomberg BNA an agreement appeared close.
Negotiators have been trying to resolve differences between a broad Senate bill (S. 697) revamping the Toxic Substances Control Act and a narrower House-passed version (H.R. 2576). Supporters of the effort include Dupont, Dow Chemical Co., 3M, BASF Corp., National Association of Manufacturers and National Retail Federation.
‘Vast Majority' Will Support
Boxer, who for months vigorously opposed the Senate's bill over the issue of federal preemption of state chemical laws and regulations, said her concerns had been addressed and that she expected the “vast majority” of lawmakers would support the final compromise.
“Is it perfect? No. It's a compromise,” the California Democrat said. “Does it, in fact, address the issue of preemption in a really smart, good way? Yes.”
She said the compromise found what she described as a “sweet spot” concerning preemption that will “give the states the opportunity to act.” Language from Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) served as the foundation for the ultimate agreement on preemption, Boxer said.
One person familiar with the compromise said it would broaden the ability for states and local jurisdictions to get a waiver from preemption. The compromise would mandate the EPA to grant a preemption waiver if certain conditions are met, according to the source.
The House bill would preempt states from passing future bans or restrictions on chemicals after the Environmental Protection Agency has taken final action, while the Senate bill allowed a range of state chemical regulations, but could preempt some once the EPA began to assess the risks a chemical posed.
Inhofe and Boxer announced they reached agreement on the “key sticking points” of TSCA reform in a May 6 statement after weeks of negotiations (89 DEN A-10, 5/9/16).
House Floor Time Next Week?
House members might try to move the final agreement as soon as the week of May 16 under an expedited procedure known as suspension of the rules, Boxer said.
Legislation considered under suspension of the rules requires a two-thirds majority to pass. An aide to House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who controls the chamber's schedule, was not immediately available to comment on Boxer's suggestion the measure could come up that quickly.
Once it does pass the House, though, Boxer and Inhofe said the Senate would likely take it up under a time agreement and pass it quickly.
“I don't think there would be anything in the way, assuming our preemption language sticks,” Boxer said.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222161&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222161&jd=89222161
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As Lawmakers Near TSCA Reform Deal, Questions Remain On Key Policies
May 10, 2016 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
As lawmakers near a potential final deal on legislation to overhaul the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), chemical industry sources say significant questions remain on how an agreement might affect a host of key policies in the bill including preemption of state chemical programs, the scope of EPA risk assessments, and more.
Senators announced a pact that sources say would place a hold on state chemicals programs pending EPA reviews of the same substances, but it is unclear whether House lawmakers will agree to that and other compromises.
Senate Environment & Public Works Committee (EPW) Chairman James Inhofe (R-OK) and ranking member Barbara Boxer (D-CA) on May 6 announced a compromise on “key sticking points” but have not disclosed what issues the agreement affects. Lawmakers trying to reconcile the House and Senate TSCA bills have struggled with questions such as whether the legislation should block state chemicals programs, and other provisions.
In addition to preemption, other concerns include chemical safety requirements, confidential business information (CBI) protections, and a provision regarding new chemicals, one industry source says following the Inhofe-Boxer deal. “I think they can smell the finish line but are not quite there yet,” the source says.
House Energy & Commerce Committee members including Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI), ranking member Frank Pallone (D-NJ), energy subcommittee Chairman John Shimkus (R-IL) and panel ranking member Paul Tonko (D-NY) in a May 6 statement said the senators' announcement was “an important step forward.”
The House lawmakers said they looked forward to reviewing the undisclosed agreement and added, “We look forward to keeping the momentum going” on crafting a final TSCA reform bill.
A second industry source says that the deal appears to include placing a hold on states taking action to regulate “high-priority” chemicals while EPA performs a risk assessment of the substances. Boxer had long raised concerns about a regulatory gap if EPA failed to act under a revised TSCA bill to assess and regulate a chemical, yet states would be powerless to impose their own rules due to preemption language in both versions of the bill.
While it is not clear the extent to which the “hold” on state action that the senators agreed to would be temporary or permanent, the first industry source says, “I'd suspect if it were an indefinite hold, because EPA's got a lot of chemicals to look at, I think states will kick and scream if isn't a finite time limit on preemption.”
The source adds that Democratic senators are likely “testing” the compromise with environmental groups, several of whom have also favored the more narrow scope of preemption in the House bill.
The first industry source says there are other issues that lawmakers have been in talks over, including CBI protections, saying “I think they're close” to a resolution.
Another unresolved issue affects EPA's new chemicals program, that source says. The House bill would make small changes to the program, while the Senate bill would for the first time require EPA to make an affirmative safety determination for each new chemical before new substances enter the marketplace.
The issue said to being discussed for a potential compromise is whether a new substance may still be manufactured in the event that EPA misses its statutory deadline for making the safety determination, the source says, adding that, “It's a hard compromise, but doable, they're still talking about it.”
TSCA Reform
Both bills would rework the 1976 TSCA and give EPA much broader authority to regulate existing chemicals that are already in the marketplace, eliminating hurdles the current law places on such rules that have hindered the agency's efforts to restrict some high-profile chemicals -- including its failed 1991 attempt to ban asbestos.
But they differ greatly on how to treat states' restrictions on chemicals that were previously not subject to federal TSCA regulations but which EPA later asserts authority over.
S. 697 would "grandfather," or preserve, states' existing chemicals laws as of its passage, but any such restrictions enacted after TSCA reform is implemented would be preempted as soon as EPA defines and publishes the scope of a safety assessment and safety determination under its TSCA section 6 authority to review existing chemicals' risks.
However, the House bill, H.R. 2576, took a narrower approach and only preempts new state restrictions when EPA uses its TSCA authority to restrict the same substance. It would also include a grandfathering clause similar to the Senate bill, and would preserve state toxic tort claims even after EPA takes final action on regulating a chemical, unless they "actually conflict" with the new federal requirement.
The difference between the bills' preemption language, and Boxer's strident opposition to broad preemption, has led many observers to label that issue as the biggest obstacle to crafting a consensus bill.
Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM), lead author of S. 697, said in a statement, “I've been pushing all along to get the strongest bill with the most bipartisan support possible. We’ve been making good progress over the last few weeks in reconciling the two bills, and I am optimistic that we can send much-needed TSCA reform to the president’s desk very soon.”
EPW member Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) told Inside EPA last month that “ongoing and fragile negotiations” were continuing between House and Senate lawmakers on trying to craft a final compromise TSCA reform bill, adding that EPA has been offering its support in the long-running bid for a deal.
In response to Boxer and Inhofe's May 6 announcement, Dr. Richard Denison, Environmental Defense Fund lead senior scientist, said, “We welcome the announcement that Senators Inhofe and Boxer have found common ground on chemical safety reform legislation. We look forward to seeing the details and are more hopeful than ever that Congress will be able to move quickly to pass comprehensive, health-protective reform legislation and send it to the president’s desk.
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/lawmakers-near-tsca-reform-deal-questions-remain-key-policies
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New York Probes Sources of PFOS in Newburgh
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Gerald B. Silverman
New York state is looking into possible sources of contamination in the city of Newburgh where levels of the chemical perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS) have been detected in the city's drinking water and other water supplies, according to a letter obtained by Bloomberg BNA.
The May 9 letter said tests found PFOS levels at below the Environmental Protection Agency's provisional health advisory level for drinking water, ranging from 2.5 parts per trillion to 155 parts per trillion in eight samples. The provisional standard is currently 200 ppt.
Tests of non-drinking water, however, found PFOS levels as high as 5,900 parts per trillion at a nearby site and above 250 parts per trillion at seven other nearby sites, according to the letter. The EPA doesn't have an advisory level for PFOS in non-drinking water.
Sources for the contamination could be held liable for remediation costs. The state's investigation comes as the personal injury law firm Weitz & Luxenberg P.C. considers legal action related to the contamination (90 DEN A-12, 5/10/16).
Newburgh switched its drinking water source earlier this month after detecting small concentrations of PFOS and declaring a one-day state of emergency.
“Although levels of PFOS remain below the EPA's provisional health advisory level, both DEC and DOH are assisting the City with investigation of potential sources of PFOS contamination,” the letter said, referring to the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and the Department of Health (DOH).
“DEC and DOH are also assisting the City with investigating alternative drinking water and treatment options and performing additional testing of the City's supplies of both drinking and non-drinking water,” said the letter to city officials from Robert Schick, director of DEC's Division of Environmental Remediation and Nathan Graber, director of DOH's Center for Environmental Health.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222149&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222149&jd=89222149
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One City’s Solution to Drinking Water Contamination? Get Rid of Every Lead Pipe.
May 10, 2016 | Washington Post
By Darryl Fears and Brady Dennis
Long before Flint, Mich., faced a water-contamination crisis, this city dealt with one of its own. The local utility had sampled residents’ tap water in accordance with the federal government’s new Lead and Copper Rule and discovered unacceptable levels of lead.
But Madison’s response was like hitting a gnat with a sledgehammer. It was so aggressive that only one other major municipality in the United States has followed its approach so far. It’s also why some people now call Madison the anti-Flint, a place where water problems linked to the toxic substance simply couldn’t happen today.
Madison residents and businesses dug out and replaced their lead pipes — 8,000 of them. All because lead in their water had been measured at 16 parts per billion — one part per billion over the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard.
That’s a microliter, one-
millionth of a liter of water. The utility’s water quality manager, Joe Grande, explains the reasoning in seven words: “The safe level of lead is zero.”Radical though it was, what occurred from 2001 to 2011 in this state capital could help guide cities across the country as they consider taking action to protect public health. The extreme, months-long leaching of lead into Flint’s water supply has highlighted the danger of the estimated 6 million or more lead pipes that remain in use nationwide — by more than 11,000 community water systems that serve as many as 22 million Americans.
Increasingly, voices are calling for complete replacement of these lines. As Madison showed, it’s possible, but not easy.
“As long as there are lead pipes in the ground or lead plumbing in homes, some risk remains,” David LaFrance, chief executive of the American Water Works Association, noted when its board voted unanimously in March to back such efforts. The association, which represents water utilities, regulators and plant operators, drew more than 100 managers to Washington this week to discuss various strategies.
“As a society,” LaFrance said, “we should seize this moment of increased awareness about lead risks to develop solutions for getting the lead out.”
Madison’s solution was to go for broke. The Madison Water Utility dismissed the easy fix recommended by the EPA regulations, which entailed treating pipes with phosphates to lower corrosion that releases trace metals. The company instead ripped out every lead line it owned. Then it made some 5,500 of its customers do the same.
Dozens of streets were torn up for a decade of digging and copper-pipe replacement at a cost of nearly $20 million. It was noisy, messy and disruptive, but successful.
“People walk up to me in the streets now and say, ‘Thanks,’ ” said Susan J.M. Bauman, who as mayor helped persuade the City Council to force property owners to act.
Five years after the project’s completion, Madison’s lead levels are well under the Lead and Copper Rule’s “action” threshold of 15 parts per billion. Its highest measure since 2011 is 3.5 parts per billion, which is so low that the EPA requires the utility to collect water samples every three years instead of annually.
Only Lansing, Mich., is known to have taken a similar all-out approach. As Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration remains under fire for its mishandling of Flint’s water debacle, the city where he lives is about to finish removing 14,500 lead pipes. That 10-year, $40 million program will end in June, said Stephen Serkaian, a spokesman for the Lansing Board of Water and Light.
One advantage for the effort there: The local utility, unlike many, owns every pipe in its system, even those leading up to houses.
Other cities have called both Madison and Lansing in recent months for advice.
“Our phone is ringing off the hook from utilities across our state and the country,” Serkaian said. Utility executives from Iowa flew in last month to study the program’s scope and approach.
And Lansing’s mayor has asked the utility to provide technical assistance to Flint, 60 miles to the west. Hit hard by its water contamination, which could have serious and permanent health consequences for many of its children, Flint is now pushing to replace 15,000 lead service lines. Yet city officials want to accomplish that in a single year, not 10. The projected expense is $55 million.
For every Lansing and Madison, there are thousands of other cities that simply have not kept up with the problem,” said Erik Olson, health program director for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
While the greatest concentration of lead service lines is in the Midwest, the pipes can be found nationwide. The cost of replacing them could exceed $30 billion, and the American Water Works Association understands that homeowners won’t be eager to help pick up the tab.
“It doesn’t increase value like granite countertops or a new deck,” said Tracy Mehan, its government affairs director. “Homeowners are going to have to be convinced that this is an important thing to do.”
In the wake of Flint’s crisis, Washington’s water utility found itself on the defensive at a congressional hearing in mid-March when a Virginia Tech professor declared that its lead problem in the early 2000s was up to 30 times worse.
D.C. Water did not dispute Marc Edwards’s testimony before a House committee. In a report to its board that same week, officials said lead pipes have been replaced at more than 20,000 addresses since 2004. But a nearly equal number of lead pipes remain, the property of either the utility or individual homeowners.
That’s no longer the case in Madison. The city of 245,000 sits on an isthmus between two large and scenic lakes that give the area its easygoing character. Planners put the city’s long shoreline to good use, with paths, running trails and boat ramps.
Back in 1992, when the elevated lead levels were detected, the EPA’s fix called for Madison Water to inject phosphate into the water supply. At the local wastewater treatment plant, which was under state orders to remove phosphorous, officials were stunned.
For one, phosphate pollutes lakes by causing algae blooms that suck away oxygen and suffocate marine life. “We did tell them that would not be a good idea,” said David Taylor, director of ecosystem services for the Madison Metropolitan Sewerage District.
There was also a good chance that the chemical would fail. A chemist hired by the city tested the lead pipes to determine whether adding phosphates would lower lead contamination. In some cases, levels instead increased.
“I kept testing things in the field and drawing conclusions that were opposite of what I was told in the literature,” Abigail Cantor recounted last month. “The Lead and Copper Rule said you have to use one of these chemicals — polyphosphate or orthophosphate. None worked.”
Finally, after four years of testing, Cantor told the utility in 1996 that there was only one sure solution. “You have to get rid of the lead,” she said.
The utility opted to take out all suspect pipes, which dated to the 1920s and earlier. The next step was even more challenging. Backed by the city and state, Madison Water required its customers to remove the lead pipes that connected their houses and businesses to the system.
Grande says there was no alternative. Removing lead pipes only up to a property — a partial replacement — could make contamination worse because metals inside the pipe dislodge during excavation. It takes years to flush it out of the system.
“There certainly was a lot of opposition from people who thought it was ridiculous . . . who thought it didn’t need to happen,” Grande said of the project.
Thanks to utility rebates of up to $1,000 for homeowners who switched, their average cost was $1,300. Bauman said apartment owners paid more, but they likely passed on the cost to renters.
Yet for many reasons, Madison remains a tough act to follow. The capital is also home to the University of Wisconsin. The city is full of professors, students and highly educated residents who earn a comfortable living. More than 50 percent have undergraduate degrees, and the median household income is about $50,000 per year.
“A relatively high willingness to pay for quality drinking water” among Madison residents made the lead-removal project easier for officials to sell, said Greg Harrington, a University of Wisconsin engineering professor who served on the Madison water utility’s board during the project.
Lansing, another state capital and university town, is similar in many ways to Madison. The two are now linked by their extraordinary effort to go beyond the federal rule and protect their water supply from lead contamination.
Olson argues that the complete removal of faulty underground pipes, some of which date to the time of slavery, should also be the EPA’s main focus.
“We’re basically living off investments that were made by our great-grandparents,” he said. “So many pipes are being used past their design date. You can only live on the edge for so long.”
Dennis reported from Washington.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/one-citys-solution-to-drinking-water-contamination-get-rid-of-every-lead-pipe/2016/05/10/480cd842-0814-11e6-bdcb-0133da18418d_story.html
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What the Mattress Industry’s Explosive Growth Means to Fire Chiefs
May 11, 2016 | Fire Chief
By Jim Spell
Fans of the original Star Trek series will remember "The Trouble with Tribbles," where furry little alien creatures multiplied at an alarming rate on the deck of the Enterprise. Cities and suburbs are seeing their own troubling tribble issue in the form of mattress stores.
American Public Radio's Marketplace recently reported that Chicago has 10 bedding storefronts in one mile. One mattress company has over 3,500 stores in the lower 48 states holding one-third of the market.
In total, there are over 10,000 specialty stores accounting for half the market share. The rest include furniture and appliance outlets.
The development is not without cause. The industry boasts annual sales of over $7 billion putting 35 million mattresses into the homes.
And while you can buy your next mattress online, most sales come from traditional brick-and-mortar stores as customers prefer to test-lie several models.
The rapid growth of these retail mattress outlets represents a real fuel-load hazard for fire departments. Moreover, mattresses and the challenge of a growing population is the recipe for an increase in bedding-related fires and ultimately room-and-contents fires growing into structural conflagrations.
A bit of history
In a recent five-year study, mattresses, with their concentrated materials and new chemistry, were reported as the first item ignited in over 10,000 residential fires accounting for over 371 deaths, 1,340 civilian injuries and over $400 million in direct property damage.
Granted, the total number of fires has decreased with the advent of sprinkler and alarm systems, increased regulations and their compliance by most manufacturers. Yet the Fire Science Reviewsreports that the number of deaths per 1,000 of these types of fires is increasing at an alarming rate.
The problem becomes more urgent as storefronts continue popping up and mattress and foundation chemistry is being revolutionized from cotton and springs to molecular marvels and exotic foams.
The word mattress comes from the Arabic "matrah," meaning "to throw down" as in putting a mat or cushion on the floor. Eventually wooden frames on legs with a rope cross pattern were devised to support such cushions. This medieval design gave rise to the expression "sleep tight" in faint hope that the ropes would not sag.
The invention of the steel coil spring in 1857, led to the first innerspring mattress being developed in 1871 in Germany by Heinrich Westphal. He received no ownership and died a poor man while his invention became the standard in mattress construction until the mid-20th century.
In the 1990s, queen size beds became the preferred size as the population grew and materials began to be created from various foams and polymers. Add to this the resurgence in air and water filled mattresses and it is evident a new era in bedding was beginning.
Early regulation
The dangers of mattress fires were acknowledged as far back as 1972 when the Standard for the Flammability of Mattresses and Mattress Pads was issued by the U.S. Department of Commerce under the Flammable Fabrics Act. These standards were very narrow in scope and were the result of subjecting various bedding products to a lighted cigarette, an unfiltered Pall Mall cigarette, to be specific.Although these standards still exist under 16 CFR 1632.4(a)(2), it became obvious that other tests dealing with alternative ignition sources were needed. Studies were implemented but limited to fabrics, related materials and products that presented an unreasonable risk.
Tangible progress was slow and under the parameters of these new tests, unreasonable risk was not initially assigned to bedding fuel load as related to the fireground. Sadly, such materials would eventually become a major strategic determinate in fighting such fires.
During the tragic events of the Charleston Sofa Super Store fire of 2007, the concentration of fuel was misread and, despite of visual clues to the contrary, the large panel windows of the storefront were broken.
There were gray and yellow markers of flashover conditions in the dripping products of incomplete combustion streaming down from a line created by the intense heat pushing against the glass panes. This was a thermal balance exacerbated by the inventory and assemblies of furniture, beds and bedding as well as stuffed sofas and chairs.
When added to the fact that there were no sprinklers in the 60,000-square-foot warehouse store, the fuel load played a significant role in fire spread and ultimately in the death of nine firefighters.
New regs, new response
The deaths of 12 people on Oct. 31, 2006 in the Mizpah Hotel fire in Reno, Nevada, were determined to be a direct result of the excessive fuel load generated by mattresses stored in the hallways of the hotel's second and third floors. The Federal Emergency Management Agency's fire report characterized the mattresses as having a significant contribution to the overall intensity and spread of the fire.
In both cases, hazards associated with normal tasks were magnified. Open flame quickly deteriorated into hot gasses. In an atmosphere lacking oxygen and thermally balanced, mattresses sustain their smoldering and become an oxygenated bomb to an unsuspecting civilian or firefighter opening the wrong door or window.
One of the National Institute of Standards and Technology recommendations to come out of the Mizpah Hotel and Sofa Super Store fires was to concentrate on the science of ignition and fire spread as well as the production of smoke and gasses.
The experimental focus in these areas formed the criteria of the Open Flame Mattress Flammability Regulations beginning with 16CFR 1632 and 1633, established in the same year as the Charleston fire, 2007. The government was asking bed makers to create a mattress that would not ignite as quickly, burn as long or stay as hot.
Reputable manufacturers agreed with these new regulations driven by science and set out to make a safer product. Producers could do little about the various incantations of fiberglass and foam used in making beds so they impregnated their mattresses with flame-retardant chemicals thereby changing the ignition and sustainability levels of the final product to mutually acceptable federal standards.
Firefighters' risk
For mattress and chemical companies, being flame-retardant while in compliance with federal regulations was seen as a major product improvement as well as protection from liability suits. Not having to change the content of mattresses by simply adding more chemicals seemed to be the most cost effective solution.
In reality, such a prevention measure adds 15 seconds of escape time to a bed's occupants in the event of fire.
Health officials and scientists see a major health risk when it comes to introducing more chemicals into the home in the guise of another flame-retardant creation. These product defined by such elements as polyvinylchloride, antimony and butadiene-styrene creating bioaccumulators — chemicals that persist in our environment. Other chemicals found in mattresses and their additives have been determined to be developmental toxicants and carcinogens.
Already seen in many consumer goods such as furniture and paint, impregnating mattresses with such chemicals is questioned by some and considered by many to be the last straw. Currently, it is estimated that over 90 percent of today's population has some level of flame-retardant chemicals in their body.
Firefighters know that flame-retardants give off higher levels of carbon monoxide, soot and smoke than untreated objects. They belong in the same class as DDT and PCBs. As one firefighter put it in an HBO documentary, "It's Love Canal and it's on fire.… These fires that we're going to now are an absolute toxic soup."
California's conundrum
Following the flammability standards of 1972, California initially embraced the idea of making seating furniture safer when legislators passed Technical Bulletin 117 in 1975. This required cushioned furniture manufacturers to inject flame-retardant chemicals into all upholstered furniture sold in the state.
This de facto national standard resulted in a typical furniture piece to be loaded up with two to three pounds of additional chemicals. Concurrently, scientists found that exposure to these flame-retardant chemicals were directly related to an increase in various forms of cancer and reproductive problems.
California Gov. Jerry Brown responded by trying to initiate a new standard, eliminating the need for manufacturers to inject chemicals into upholstered furniture. Legislators agreed that the health risk was greater than the immediate threat of fire, but were unable to change the law due to the impediment of no voluntary standards at any level of government.
Any change would have to be an amendment to an existing federal mandatory standard, a high governmental hurdle for any state. To their credit, California lawmakers began reviewing and seeking public input in anticipation of moving regulations in the right direction.
Manufacturers saw such changes as having a direct impact on their businesses. Realizing this, they initiated steps to delay any new laws until their technology could respond in a manner appropriate to their business model, that of making money.
Material changes
While TB117 does not directly affect the flame-retardant requirements of mattresses, industry leaders and government officials recognized that commerce would not survive two separate laws pertaining to such intermingling of production.A private group known as Citizens for Fire Safety began their own efforts to define the issue, but disbanded when it was found to have been organized by the three largest chemical companies known to contribute to the furniture and bedding industry.
Today, the work of company lobbyists is being carried out under another name. While serving to essentially delay changes in the law through an extensive marketing campaign, their extended expectation is to have the flame-retardant materials and their application become "greener" and more environmentally friendly in the future.
Victories in postponing legislation have given manufacturers the necessary time to create more products focused on health and safety. While the jury is still out on what to do about such hostile environments, mattress manufacturers see the writing on the wall.
California's attention to changing the fire retardant laws is acknowledged to be a direct factor in pressuring bedding manufacturers to change their chemistry and products to provide a safer environment for consumers throughout the country.
Such changes in the content of bedding materials will make firefighting safer. While increasing fuel loads cannot be controlled, having a less toxic outcome to a lower level of flammability is critical toward lessening the health and hazard risks associated with such a fireground environment.
There were over 1,500 tribbles on the set of Star Trek. Such an abundance of latex, foam, glue and synthetic fur was described by lighting grips and scene technicians to be a direct fire hazard.
Today we see that same concern on spaceship Earth, as mattresses old and new accumulate in every corner of our planet.
http://www.firechief.com/2016/05/10/what-the-mattress-industrys-explosive-growth-means-to-fire-chiefs/
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Senate Energy Spending Bill Nears Finish Line
May 10, 2016 | E&E News PM
By George Cahlink
The Senate is planning to pass its $37.5 billion fiscal 2017 energy and water spending bill as soon as tomorrow, key appropriators said today.
Lawmakers will first take a procedural vote on a controversial amendment by Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) related to the Iran nuclear deal. Talk of the amendment has helped stall the broader spending measure.
"Almost every senator has some significant contribution to the bill, so I think we'll get a good vote," said Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the chairman of the Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee.
The panel's top Democrat, Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, also said she expected the spending measure to pass tomorrow. She said a few more amendments may come up, but none appears to be contentious.
Alexander said those amendments could include a proposal from Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) to prohibit Republican River Basin federal water projects that don't enjoy state approval or comply with the Republican River Compact, which determines how several plains states allocate the river's water.
The Iran amendment, offered by Cotton, would bar the United States from buying heavy water, a component used in nuclear reactors, from Iran.
Democrats say it would undermine the Obama administration's nuclear deal. Republicans counter that the amendment is fair game on a bill that deals with nuclear issues.
The Cotton amendments needs 60 votes to move forward, an unlikely threshold given solid opposition from the chamber's 44 Democrats (E&E Daily, May 10).
Once senators block the amendment, the Senate could move on to any new amendments to the spending bill and then final passage, which is all but certain.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said he would support the Cotton provision but also stressed the importance of passing the broader spending measure, the first of the fiscal 2017 spending bills to hit the floor.
"Passing it would set a good example for the 11 other appropriations bills," said McConnell, who has made moving as many of the 12 spending bills as possible a top priority this year.
McConnell also did not rule out packaging a few spending bills together to help speed their passage. Some aides say that could include pairing the transportation and housing spending bill with the military construction and veterans affairs legislation once energy and water is out of the way.
Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois said Democrats would support that strategy provided the bills do not contain any "poison pill" policy riders.
Reporter Hannah Hess contributed.
http://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2016/05/10/stories/1060037014
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'We're Not Ready to Go to Conference' -- Upton
May 11, 2016 | E&E Daily
By Geof Koss
A key Republican last night said the House is unlikely to name conferees to reconcile the competing energy bills this week, thereby punting on a development that was expected and stalling progress on the legislation.
Before the recess, members and aides said conferees could be named as early as this week, but House Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) yesterday said the lower chamber is still mapping out its strategy (E&ENews PM, April 29).
"We're not ready to go to conference," Upton said in a brief interview, as he entered the chamber to vote. "We're going to have some discussions this week, and then we'll see where we are."
While noting that the decision to name conferees ultimately rests with Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), Upton added, "Don't expect any conferees this week."
Earlier yesterday, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) said she hoped to receive word this week from the House on proceeding to conference.
"Basically, we've got eight weeks until we shut this thing down in July," Murkowski said in an interview, regarding the extended summer recess. "That's not a lot of time."
However, Murkowski said that she plans to convene a meeting of senators expected to be involved in the negotiations, but added, "We can't do anything until we get the report from the House and then the discussion about appointing conferees."
While both the House bill (H.R. 8) and the Senate version (S. 2012) broadly address infrastructure, renewables and efficiency and would speed natural gas exports, the Senate bill is broader and includes a permanent reauthorization of the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
The LWCF provisions are likely to be a major hurdle in the House, given the opposition of Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah), who wants to see sweeping changes made to the program (E&E Daily, April 21).
Murkowski said yesterday that she plans to meet soon with Bishop to discuss the bills, while acknowledging that the Senate's LWCF provisions will be problematic in the House.
"I think that there is clearly room for discussion about some of the reform pieces that we had incorporated in ours that Congressman Bishop is interested in," she said. "I think it will be one area where you will start out the discussion with people in different camps. And I kind of view my job to be one where we get the people in those camps listening to why we look at the program at the whole. Do I think it's going to be an issue? Yes. Do I think it's an unresolvable issue? No."
One efficiency advocate said this week that recent discussions with House staff demonstrated concerns over the influence of the several dozens of Freedom Caucus members on the conference. While few Republicans opposed the House version in December, that measure included an amendment that repealed the long-standing ban on crude oil exports. The repeal was later signed into law that month as part of the omnibus tax deal.
But conservative groups have already opposed provisions of the Senate bill, raising questions over how much of the upper chamber's measure can survive in the House (E&E Daily, April 19).
House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) yesterday said conference talks would be "tough, but if we could do that, hopefully we would pursue it."
"There are a lot of very substantive differences within the Republican Party, which is where we have found obviously our inability to act," he said. "And there are differences between the Democratic and the Republican parties on these issues, as well, but the most significant is the internal divisions they find themselves in."
But Murkowski noted that the majority of House Democrats opposed the bill in December, as well.
"The fact of the matter is you did not have a bipartisan bill coming out of the House," she said. "It's making sure that you've got some understanding with the members who are part of the Freedom Caucus. It's making sure that we make some headway with those who had opposed it on the D side of the aisle. We've got some work that we need to be doing."
http://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2016/05/11/stories/1060037032
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EPA Should Rethink Clean Power Plan Trading, Utility Says
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Andrew Childers
The Environmental Protection Agency should reconsider allowing trading between states that choose rate-based and mass-based compliance options for the Clean Power Plan, a utility official said as power companies and states alike grapple with meeting the rule's carbon dioxide emissions reductions.
“We think there are a lot of advantages to this,” Boyd Vaughan from Oglethorpe Power Corp. said May 10 at the Electric Power Research Institute's ENV-Vision conference in Washington, D.C. “It would lower costs to us and to a lot of our customers. It makes this decision between mass and rate a lot less critical.”
The EPA's Clean Power Plan (RIN:2060-AR33) limits carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants. The standards would be implemented by state regulators through either mass-based plans that cap total carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector or by a rate-based plan that limits the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted per megawatt-hour of electricity generated.
While the rule does allow states to trade, it only allows trading between states with similar mass-based or rate-based plans.
Though the U.S. Supreme Court has stayed implementation of the EPA's rule until it can be fully litigated, some states and utilities are still mulling their compliance options should the rule survive judicial scrutiny.
State Decisions Vary by Circumstances
The EPA's rule gives states a bevy of compliance options from choosing between rate- and mass-based plans to deciding whether to join regional trading programs or whether to include new natural gas units as part of the standards.
The choices states make will largely be dictated by their current circumstances, David Young, principal technical leader at the Electric Power Research Institute, said. States with a higher proportion of coal-fired generation will likely consider a mass-based option, while the rate-based approach is more appealing for states with a significant amount of nuclear or renewable power, he said.
“The reference case really matters when you're assigning costs,” Young said.
A significant factor in what the rule will cost is how much states choose to embrace regional trading, Young said. Typically, states have chosen to set their own compliance path for environmental regulations, because that provides a greater degree of certainty and control. However, if markets don't develop, that could drive up Clean Power Plan costs for utilities and consumers, he said.
What About Markets?
“There's no one right path, but one big issue is market,” Young said. “Everyone would like to trade with markets, but are markets going to form? If they do form, what is the price going to be?”
Looking at its Appalachian Power Co. subsidiary in Virginia and West Virginia, American Electric Power said trading would be between $200 million and $400 million cheaper than closing existing coal plants and building new natural gas generation to meet the emissions standards.
Scott Weaver, manager of strategy policy analysis at American Electric Power, said complying with the Clean Power Plan is expected to cost Appalachian Power between $300 million and $600 million, which translates into a rate increase to customers of between 2 percent and 5 percent.
“It is a rate increase, but it's not as significant as we've looked at with other environmental regulations in the past,” Weaver said.
Oglethorpe Favors Emissions Rates
Though mass-based plans are largely viewed as the simpler option, Vaughan said Oglethorpe, which has joined the Utility Regulatory Group and the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association in challenging the rule, favors a rate-based approach in Georgia where the Vogtle Electric Generating Plant will add two new nuclear reactors.
A rate-based approach would be “much clearer and much more defined in terms of the benefit of new nuclear,” Vaughan said.
While nuclear generation wouldn't count against Georgia's emissions cap under a mass-based plan, it also wouldn't generate emissions allowances, either.
Under a rate-based scenario, Oglethorpe's 30 percent stake in the new Vogtle reactors will create as many as 5 million emissions rate credits annually for the company that could be used to meet its emissions reduction obligations elsewhere or sold to other utilities, Vaughan said.
Utilities Compare Past Efforts to New Obligations
Though some utilities have already made great strides toward reducing their carbon dioxide emissions, power company officials said not all of those efforts neatly align with the Clean Power Plan's requirements.
American Electric Power's Weaver said that company has already reduced its carbon dioxide emissions from across its portfolio by 30 percent since 2005—nearly to the EPA's targets—but the emissions reductions haven't come from all of its assets equally.
Some of those reductions won't count toward the EPA's goals because they were achieved before the rule's 2012 baseline, and some emissions in some states have increased as new generation has come into service, he said.
That variation—American Electric Power operates across 11 states and only Virginia is currently working on its compliance plan, Weaver said—means the company has yet to make any decisions on whether mass-based or rate-based compliance plans would be more advantageous.
“The reductions we've made across our fleet have not been uniform,” Weaver said.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222156&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222156&jd=89222156
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Shale Gas Production Rising as Drillers Become More Efficient
May 10, 2016 | Fuel Fix
By Bloomberg
Natural gas futures have soared since March on speculation that supplies are finally falling after a decade of gains. Production numbers tell a different story.
Prices have gained about 30 percent from a 17-year low in March, the biggest advance for the period since 2002, as investors including Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn bet the market would put a dent in supply. While money managers turned bullish on the fuel last month for the first time since 2014, government forecasts show output climbing for the next seven quarters. Explorers including Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. and EQT Corp. outpaced their own production outlooks.
Drillers are beating estimates as the price collapse forced them to become leaner, producing more fuel with the fewest rigs since at least the 1980’s. Gas output from the Marcellus shale in the U.S. East is pushing stockpiles toward an all-time high. A rebound in crude oil prices threatens to boost supplies of gas extracted as a byproduct.
“The Marcellus is still going like gangbusters,” said Stephen Schork, president of energy consulting company Schork Group Inc. in Villanova, Pennsylvania. “We’re probably going to see some oil production rising as prices improve, which means associated gas production will also come back.”
Next-month gas futures have climbed from a low on March 3. Futures for 2017 have risen even more, surging 37 percent to trade above $3 per million British thermal units. West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. benchmark, has risen about 17 percent this year and traded at $43.62 a barrel at 8:09 a.m. in New York on Tuesday.
Explorers are extracting more gas from the Marcellus formation, America’s biggest reservoir of the fuel, even as prices trade at the lowest seasonal levels since the 1990’s. Production expanded 18 percent at EQT Corp. in the first quarter and 8.4 percent at Cabot. Marketed gas output rose to a fifth straight annual record last year, driven by shale output, which now accounts for two-thirds of total U.S. production.
“Cabot will be able to economically grow our natural gas production in 2017,” Dan Dinges, the company’s chief executive officer, said on Cabot’s first-quarter earnings call April 29. ““It does not take a lot of rigs and does not take many frack crews to be able to ramp our production with the quality of rock that we have.”
Gas bulls need a hot summer to spur demand from power plants. Unless that happens, inventories will approach physical storage limits, capping any prices gains.
“There’s always the risk of lower prices,” said Gordon Douthat, a senior equity analyst at Wells Fargo & Co. in Denver. “It’s probably going to come down to the demand side. If we get a cool summer, we’re going to start to have concerns about high stockpiles.”
Companies that primarily produce oil have also contributed to the gas supply gains. Continental Resources Inc., the Oklahoma City-based company credited with kick-starting the oil boom in North Dakota’s Bakken shale, boasted record-high output in the first quarter largely because of rising gas production.
Improved drilling technology has made explorers more efficient, boosting output even as they reduce costs. While the number of rigs has fallen dramatically, producers are drilling several wells from the same site, cutting longer horizontal segments through shale rock to yield more gas.
“Efficiency gains have enabled producers to drill wells faster, and some gathering pipelines came online earlier than expected, allowing them to beat well performance estimates,” said Douthat. “There were a few things that came together that allowed these guys to come in ahead of expectations.”
Bullish traders are undeterred, looking to pipeline data that signal a slowdown in production after supplies reached an all-time high in February. Most of the first-quarter production gains came from wells that were drilled months ago, and demand is climbing as U.S. exports rise and power plants switch to gas from coal, Douthat said. And meteorologists are predicting a hot summer in the eastern and central U.S., which would stoke demand from electricity generators.
“The high cost of liquefying and transporting natural gas limits competition to North American sources,” Greenlight’s Einhorn said in a quarterly letter to investors. “As existing wells deplete, supplies should fall.”
Still, output has proved more resilient than analysts anticipated, making the gas market vulnerable to further price declines. The so-called fracklog, or backlog of wells drilled before 2016 but still uncompleted, in the Marcellus has expanded to about 650 as low prices force producers to reduce expenses, data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence show. If gas rallies, explorers may start to produce gas from these wells, curtailing a rebound.
Analysts have had a hard time gauging when the tipping point for gas production will occur. This time last year, forecasters were expecting futures to average $3 in 2015. The actual price was almost 40 cents lower. Prices also fell short of estimates in 2014 and 2013.
“Never underestimate the Marcellus,” Mark Hanson, an equity analyst at Morningstar Inc. in Chicago, said by phone May 6. “Hypothetically, if gas goes to $3.50 tomorrow, the Marcellus becomes an insanely attractive play. It would only take 15 or 20 more rigs to ramp up production in a meaningful way.”
http://fuelfix.com/blog/2016/05/10/shale-gas-production-rising-as-drillers-become-more-efficient/
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May 11, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The once-booming hydraulic fracturing industry is suddenly on the defensive.
In recent months, the industry has suffered a $4.2 million jury award over alleged groundwater contamination from fracking, seen the two Democrats running for president argue over who would be tougher against the drilling practice and been embroiled in a public fight over the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) comprehensive analysis of fracking’s impact on groundwater.
Meanwhile, polls indicate there is growing public opposition to the process of injecting high-pressure mixtures of water, sand or gravel and chemicals into an oil or natural gas well to break up rock formations — the technique at the heart of fracking.
A March poll from Gallup found that just 36 percent of Americans support fracking, down from 40 percent a year earlier.
“The more folks learn about this, the more they realize what a detrimental effect fracking is having on our society and our planet,” said Seth Gladstone, spokesman for Food and Water Watch, which opposes all fracking.
The headwinds are coming at a perilous moment for the industry, with federal regulators working on sweeping new environmental rules for fracking and a prolonged price slump hurting profits like never before.
The oil and gas industry says the science is settled on the safety and environmental impact of fracking, but the public debate is far from over. That’s forcing the industry to wage a multipronged campaign aimed at convincing the public that the drilling practices are safe.
One of the principal players in that push is Energy In Depth, a program backed by the Independent Petroleum Association of America and run by FTI Consulting.
Steve Everley, a spokesman for the program and one of the authors on its blog, said it’s important to resist opposition to fracking.
“The reason this is important is because bad information can lead to bad policy, or just bad decisions,” Everley said. “You can see things like fracking bans or restrictions on fracking based on claims that have no scientific merit. You’ve put people out of work, you’ve destroyed economic opportunity based on a fiction.”
Since fracking is such an essential part of oil and gas production, shutting it down means shutting down the industry, Everley said.
Energy In Depth has worked with its industry allies to respond to each of the major developments against fracking, arguing that they’re not what they seem or that the source cannot be trusted.
For example, a federal jury in March awarded $4.2 million to families in Dimock, Pa., who said that Cabot Oil and Gas Co.’s drilling and fracking contaminated their well water.
“The verdict itself was based on a nuisance claim, not health or other contamination-related items, the latter of which require a much higher burden of proof,” said Everley, pointing to a 2012 EPA investigation of the Dimock case that found no health concerns.
Multiple industry groups responded forcefully in April when the EPA revised its previous estimates of methane emissions from the oil and gas sector and said the output was much more than it had thought. Methane is a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide, and the EPA will soon make final a major regulation mandating measures to cut down on the fracking industry’s pollution — something companies think is unnecessary.
“EPA’s inventory has consistently shown a downward trend in emissions even as oil and natural gas production has soared,” said Kyle Isakower, the American Petroleum Institute’s vice president for regulations. “Somehow, in this year’s inventory, using a flawed new methodology, EPA has erased that progress from its historic data.”
Gretchen Goldman, an analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said oil and gas companies are under a level of scrutiny that didn’t exist when the fracking boom started a decade ago.
“In the beginning, we saw that companies could operate under the radar without having to do a lot publicly. That allowed them to operate in a different way than they’ve had to now,” she said.
“They’re drilling in places with bigger populations. It’s become a bigger issue in some states in the Northeast and places where they’re meeting more opposition. It’s helped put it on people’s radars.”
Goldman said events like the April Democratic presidential debate in New York City, during which candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders sparred over what to do about fracking, show the issue has gone national.
To Gladstone, the fracking fight entered a new phase in December 2014, when New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) banned the practice. It wasn’t the first state ban, but with New York’s spot over the lucrative Marcellus and Utica shale formations, it was a big win for environmentalists.
“Since then, more research has come out, more studies, new examples of the air contamination, the water contamination, new stories of public health consequences,” Gladstone said. “The news keeps coming.”
Fracking opponents think the tide has shifted in their favor.
“I think what we’re seeing is a growing shift in momentum, based upon the facts, based upon the science and based upon public awareness continuing to grow. And what we’re seeing now is a string of victories for the anti-fracking and pro-renewable energy movement,” Gladstone said, pointing to a fracking ban in Maryland and the failure of a pro-fracking bill in Florida this year.
But industry officials say the numbers tell a different tale. Oil and gas production has been growing in recent years in the United States, thanks mostly to unconventional drilling techniques like fracking and horizontal drilling.
“Has it really materially stopped the United States from proceeding with producing oil and gas? No,” Everley said.
“I don’t think, at the end of the day, they’ve had much of an impact beyond maybe a niche political element.”
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/279440-fracking-on-the-defensive
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May 11, 2016 | Washington Post
By Juliet Eilperin
Major oil and gas firms abandoned most of their leases in the Arctic this week, just as President Obama and others are coming under increased pressure to avert dangerous warming in the region.
Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips, Eni and Iona Energy have relinquished all but one lease in the Chukchi Sea, company officials confirmed Tuesday, as well as some in the Beaufort Sea. The move to give back roughly $2.5 billion worth of oil and gas leases spanning 2.2 million acres of the Arctic Ocean, in the same week that the leaders of five Arctic nations are coming to Washington for a White House summit, has reignited the debate over how best to protect an area that is showing new signs of vulnerability to climate change.
“Today we are an important step closer to a sustainable future for the Arctic Ocean,” said Michael Levine, Pacific senior counsel for the advocacy group Oceana. “Hopefully, today marks the end of the ecologically and economically risky push to drill in the Arctic Ocean.”
In a statement Tuesday, Shell spokesman Curtis Smith said, “After extensive consideration and evaluation, Shell will relinquish all but one of its federal offshore leases in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea.”
“Separate evaluations are underway for our federal offshore leases in the Beaufort Sea,” Smith said, adding that the company plans to remove its remaining drilling equipment from the Arctic in the summer. “This action is consistent with our earlier decision not to explore offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future.”
Many Democratic lawmakers and environmental activists, however, are pushing for the administration to ban Arctic drilling altogether as part of the next five-year leasing plan, which runs from 2017 to 2022. Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), joined by Robert Dold (R-Ill.) and 66 House Democrats, sent a letter last week to Interior Secretary Sally Jewell calling for the administration to revise the leasing plan before it becomes final.
“As this administration laid out in the U.S.-Canada Joint Agreement, our nation should be focusing on achieving strong conservation goals for the Arctic and making decisions to develop oil and gas resources only when the highest safety and environmental standards are met, including national and global climate and environmental goals,” they wrote. “To meet these goals, the Arctic Ocean should be permanently protected from oil drilling, not used to drill for more fossil fuels that we will not need — and must not burn — if we are serious about powering our future with clean energy.”
Cindy Shogan, executive director of the Alaska Wilderness League, said Tuesday that there was no longer a way to reconcile oil and gas extraction in the Arctic with the administration’s climate goals. “The president has made a commitment to address climate change and protecting the Arctic must be part of that equation,” she said.
Some advocacy groups, such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, are lobbying Obama to ban leasing in the Arctic altogether, under a provision in the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. The president has invoked that authority twice, once to protect Alaska’s Bristol Bay in 2014, and again in 2015 to safeguard part of Alaska’s Arctic coast.
The new push comes as the leaders of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Sweden and Norway will meet with Obama at the White House Friday, to discuss issues including global security, trade and climate change. The precarious state of the Arctic will come under discussion, according to both U.S. and foreign officials, and the group is still negotiating the final communique they will issue on the topic.
Rafe Pomerance, who heads a coalition of nongovernmental organizations researching Arctic climate science and policy known as Arctic 21, said that when it comes to the summit, “the real elephant in the room is climate change.”
In March, the maximum winter sea ice extent hit an all-time recorded low, as it shrunk below the 2014-15 record low. That same month, parts of the Arctic were more than 4 degrees Celsius, or more than 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit, higher than the historic average. April marked the lowest Northern Hemisphere snow cover on record.
And further south, in Alberta, raging wildfires have decimated a major oil-producing area for Canada, Fort McMurray. The fires have prompted the evacuation of more than 80,000 people from the northwestern Canadian city and destroyed at least 1,600 buildings there.
“The Arctic is losing its brightness,” Pomerance said, adding that trend will in turn accelerate sea ice loss in an area that warms two to three times as fast as lower parts of the globe.
Walt Meier, a research scientist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center’s Cryospheric Sciences Laboratory, said that “weather conditions in a given year, and even in a given location” help determine the maximum extent of the winter ice each year. But the fact that the maximum winter ice cover is now 7 percent below the average for the past three decades, he added, is significant.
“The main thing is there’s a downward trend since 1979,” Meier said in an interview. “That’s an indication that warming’s going on.”
Officials from the Nordic nations are debating whether to call for a study of how a global temperature rise of 1.5 degrees Celsius from pre-industrial levels–which is below the 2 degree C increase the world’s nations pledged to meet as part of the recent Paris accord–would impact the Arctic. Scientists such as Meier noted that even the lower temperature increase would have an enormous affect on the Arctic. because the region warms so much faster than other parts of the world.
A 1 or 1.5 degree temperature rise in a place like Washington is something you may not notice that much, but up in the Arctic it can be the difference between skating on the ice, and swimming,” Meier said.
In an interview Monday, Sweden’s ambassador to the United States, Bjorn Lyrvall, said that the energy and climate components of this week’s agreement “will be substantial,” but the world’s nations must focus on implementing the global climate accord reached in December in Paris before committing to more ambitious climate targets.
“We’re obviously concerned about the science and the recent developments being reported,” he said. “First of all, we have to make sure what has been agreed will be implemented.”
Norway’s ambassador to the United States, Kare Aas, said in an interview that his nation was keenly aware of climate impacts, which is why it had pledged to spend $366 million a year for the next two decades to preserve forests in poorer countries.
“As an Arctic country, we are really witnessing the climate change as we are living. We are happy to see more countries are interested in paying a visit to the Arctic to see what’s happening there for themselves,” he said. “What Norway is doing on forests, including deforestation in developing countries, is part of our global agenda in fighting climate change.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/05/10/as-oil-and-gas-firms-abandon-arctic-drilling-obama-comes-under-pressure-to-do-more-to-avert-dangerous-warming-there/
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Canada's Oil-Sands Restart as Fires Pass
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rebecca Penty and Robert Tuttle
Canada's oil-sands companies that just shut down production as a wildfire ripped across Northern Alberta are already planning to restart.
Producers including Suncor Energy Inc., Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Syncrude Canada Ltd. and ConocoPhillips took an estimated 1 million barrels a day offline over the past week. Now they are seeking to bring workers back and start up plants as the blaze moves away from their facilities. Canadian officials said May 9 that rain and cooler temperatures were helping firefighters battle the inferno, though it still covered an area twice the size of New York City.
Resuming Action
Shell already has resumed production at reduced rates from its Albian Sands project and ConocoPhillips has sought permission from Alberta to send a small team to its Surmont facility to assess the site, the companies said. Suncor is looking to fly workers back to its sites in the next couple of days and may begin the restart process in as early as a week, said two people familiar with operations, declining to be identified because the information isn't public.
The mines, upgraders and drilling operations came out largely unscathed from the fires that forced the evacuation of more than 80,000 people from the energy hub of Fort McMurray since May 3. Minor damage was found at Cnooc Ltd.’s Long Lake site operated by its unit Nexen. Operators including Suncor and Syncrude said they did properly managed shutdowns that will allow them to optimally resume operations, pending the restart of pipelines and power supplies in the region.
“They're designed for big natural catastrophe survival,” said Michal Moore, a professor of energy economics at the University of Calgary's School of Public Policy. He said he expects the sites to start producing oil again anywhere from three days to a week after the threat of fire has been cleared. “The facilities and the wells and everything else are in a position where they can be restarted pretty easily.”
IHS Energy's estimate of 1 million barrels of daily production offline amounts to about 40 percent of the oil-sands region's output. That has pushed up Canadian crude prices. Western Canadian Select crude's discount to WTI was $11.35 a barrel on Monday, the narrowest since June, data compiled by Bloomberg show. The spread was $14.75 three weeks ago.
Winds Shift
Winds shifting the fires away from oil-sands facilities reduced concern that the production cuts would make a substantial dent in U.S. oil stockpiles, helping to reverse earlier gains for West Texas Intermediate crude. The U.S. benchmark traded at $43.31 a barrel at 8 a.m. in New York.
If companies can get access to their sites by the end of this week and ramp up production over 10 days, the shutdowns would translate into a loss of about 650,000 barrels a day during a three-week period, or 14 million barrels, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said in a note May 9.
Even with the fire risk ending, production restarts may be slowed by ongoing outages of pipelines and power generation taken offline during the emergency. Statoil ASA said that it shut its Leismer oil-sands plant south of Fort McMurray, Alberta, after deliveries of the light oil it uses to thin the bitumen, known as diluent, were cut off.
Imperial Oil Ltd. said in a statement May 9 it has completed a controlled shutdown of its Kearl mine, due to “ongoing uncertainties associated with inbound and outbound logistics,” in a statement. Lisa Schmidt, a spokeswoman, declined in an e-mail to comment further.
Meeting Planned
Alberta Premier Rachel Notley plans to meet with oil executives on May 10 to discuss the impact on their industry. A longer-term challenge that may hinder companies from getting back to optimal production is finding enough staff for operations, given that some of their workers lost homes in Fort McMurray, Moore said.
“The issue will be, can you restart them and be able to run them efficiently with the kind of labor you've got access to?” Moore said.
The fire left about 85 percent of the city intact, including most of downtown, though decimated some neighborhoods.
--With assistance from Sheela Tobben and Doug Alexander.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222135&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222135&jd=89222135
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House GOP, North Carolina Fault EPA Over Speed, Costs of RMP Proposal
May 10, 2016 | InsideEPA
By Dave Reynolds
House Republicans and North Carolina are criticizing EPA's proposed overhaul of its facility safety program, with GOP lawmakers urging the agency to grant more time for input on what they say is a rushed rule and North Carolina officials warning that the proposal could impose costs that violate the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA).
"We are concerned that EPA has been proceeding on an accelerated time line that will not allow for meaningful and thorough public review of the proposal, or for appropriate agency consideration of public comments," write Reps. Fred Upton (MI), chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee; Steve Chabot (OH), chairman of the Small Business Committee and Ed Whitfield (KY) in a May 6 letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy urging an additional 30 days to comment on the plan.
EPA is currently taking comment through May 13 on its Feb. 25 proposed rule revising its Risk Management Plan (RMP) accident prevention program. The revisions are part of a broad federal effort to implement President Obama's Aug. 1, 2013, Executive Order 13650 on improving the safety and security of the nation's industrial facilities.
EPA officials have said they are seeking to finalize the rule by the end of the year, and rebuffed industry calls to extend the comment deadline, noting that they have allowed numerous opportunities for input in developing the proposal.
But the congressmen argue that EPA's time frame for the rule has not allowed the agency to fully consider recommendations from small businesses and local governments -- noting that EPA sent its rule proposal to the White House for review two months before the Small Business Advocacy Review (SBAR) panel EPA convened to advise it on the rule had completed its final report and recommendations.
Currently, the RMP program established under section 112(r) of the Clean Air Act requires companies to craft a plan to submit to EPA that outlines how the facility will reduce risks from releases. The congressmen note that the air law also authorizes the Occupational Safety and Health Administration's (OSHA) Process Safety Management (PSM) program, which is updating. "These pending PSM regulations have the potential to propose requirements that are conflicting or duplicative, and create significant uncertainty for the regulated community," the congressmen write.
EPA's proposed revisions strengthen hazard analysis and facility inspections, and also require certain facilities to conduct exercises with local authorities to ensure they are prepared to respond to an accident. The proposal includes language requiring companies to be prepared to respond to emergencies if local emergency responders are unwilling.
'Unfunded Mandate'
In comments to EPA, posted to the agency's electronic docket May 4, the North Carolina State Emergency Response Commission (NC SERC) argues that a proposed increase in mandatory emergency response exercises "appears to impose an unfunded mandate" on local first responders and emergency management officials.
"Developing, coordinating and executing high-quality exercises can be costly, and jurisdictions with multiple facilities subject to the requirement could be significantly impacted," NC SERC says. "These costs could also adversely affect smaller RMP facilities and communities with municipal-owned RMP facilities, i.e. water treatment facilities and wastewater treatment facilities."
Industry officials have also faulted the plan, arguing at a March public meeting that proposed new mandates for independent audits and root cause analysis of accidents and near accidents are unwieldy and risk diverting resources to unnecessary reviews. But EPA officials have noted they did significant outreach in developing the proposal, suggesting major revisions are unlikely.
North Carolina's assertion that EPA's RMP revisions impose "an unfunded mandate" could trigger additional analysis as part of the rulemaking that EPA hopes to finish before the end of the Obama administration.
For rules that may cost local governments and the private sector more than $100 million in a year, UMRA requires that agencies conduct certain analyses, including of costs and benefits, and less costly alternatives.
Observers say the agency's Feb. 25 proposal appears not to reflect the federal SBAR panel's call to weaken proposed requirements for third-party audits and incident reviews, and to justify new hazard analysis -- as the congressmen hint in their letter.
Emergency Response
In the recent comments, NC SERC also faults language in the proposal that empowers Local Emergency Planning Committees (LEPCs) to mandate that a facility respond to an emergency if local officials lack resources to adequately respond. NC SERC recommends that that authority be delegated to county emergency managers.
"Execution of this new authority may exceed the capabilities of many LEPCs, which are volunteer organizations," NC SERC says. "The LEPC should be able to delegate this authority to the county emergency manager as deemed necessary, or the authority should be vested with the county emergency manager."
LEPCs are formed under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-To-Know Act (EPCRA), which is administered by EPA, and may be composed of state and local officials, as well as facility and community representatives.
NC SERC also says the new requirement may cause smaller facilities to divert resources to responding to emergencies, limiting their ability to comply with other EPA or OSHA rules, including EPCRA.
Additionally, the state officials argue that EPA's proposed requirements for sharing facility information may conflict with information sharing protocols under the Department of Homeland Security's Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/house-gop-north-carolina-fault-epa-over-speed-costs-rmp-proposal
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Cause of Texas Fertilizer Explosion That Killed 15 to be Announced
May 11, 2016 | CNN
By Ralph Ellis
The cause of a fertilizer plant explosion that killed 15 people three years ago in Texas will be revealed at noon Wednesday, officials said.
The news conference will be held by the Houston office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Texas State Fire Marshal's Office.
Twelve first responders were among the people killed in the April 17, 2013, blast that rocked the town of West, about 70 miles south of Dallas, injuring 200 people and wrecking homes and buildings.
It registered on seismographs as a magnitude-2.1 earthquake and left a crater nearly 100 feet wide and 10 feet deep.
"It was like a nuclear bomb went off," West Mayor Tommy Muska said.
The ATF has not announced a cause, though the Texas Fire Marshal's Office has ruled out several possibilities in the last three years.
The explosion tore through the roof of West Fertilizer Co., charring much of the structure and sending massive flames into the air, followed by a plume of smoke bigger than the plant itself. A deafening boom echoed for miles. The blast stripped an apartment complex, with 50 units, of its walls and windows.
It was "massive -- just like Iraq, just like the Murrah (Federal) Building in Oklahoma City," said D.L. Wilson of the Texas Department of Public Safety. The blast came as the nation remained on edge after the Boston Marathon bombing.
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/11/us/texas-fertilizer-plant-blast/
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Senate Passes Crude-By-Rail Response Bill
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Ari Natter
Senate legislation aimed at bolstering emergency response efforts for crude-by-rail transport and other incidents was approved by unanimous consent.
The bill (S. 546), approved May 9, would create a National Advisory Council subcommittee to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to review accidents involving the shipment of crude-by-rail and other hazardous materials to review emergency response training, resources, best practices and hazardous materials rail transport response and offer recommendations to Congress.
The legislation was re-introduced by Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) in February in response to a series of high-profile accidents involving crude-by-rail shipments.
“First responders—the vast majority of whom are volunteers in North Dakota—selflessly put their lives on the line and run toward danger to protect our families,” Heitkamp said in a statement. “To make sure they are protected and able to do their jobs to keep our communities strong and safe, it's absolutely critical for the federal government to show emergency response teams the same support.”
High Profile Derailments
The legislation would establish a public-private council that combines emergency responders, federal agencies, and leading experts to review training and best practices for first responders, according to a bill summary.
The council, co-chaired by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, would provide Congress with expert recommendations on how to address first responders’ safety needs for increased railway safety challenges so they can best protect communities across the country.
Companion legislation (H.R. 1043) was introduced in the House in February 2015 by Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wis.), but it has yet to be acted on.
Heitkamp's bill comes in respond to a number of high profile oil train derailments, including crashes involving trains shipping crude oil from the Bakken Shale region in North Dakota. The derailments included a 2013 incident in the province of Quebec that killed 47 people (37 DEN A-23, 2/25/15).
Shipments by Rail
According to Heitkamp, more than 40 percent of North Dakota crude oil is being transported by rail, and rail transport of crude will likely continue into the future, even with the current downturn in oil production.
The number of railcars carrying crude oil in the U.S. grew by more than 4,000 percent between 2008 and 2013, with additional increases in 2014, Heitkamp said.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222159&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222159&jd=89222159
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PHMSA Agrees to 30-Day Extension of Comment Period for Proposed New Rules
May 10, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
The Transportation Department's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) said it will extend the public comment period for proposed rules governing natural gas transmission and gathering lines by another 30 days, but it was half of what the oil and gas industry had requested.
Meanwhile, within the halls of the oil and gas trade associations that had asked for an extension, some areas of concern are beginning to emerge over the regulatory changes contained in PHMSA's notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM), a 549-page tome that the agency unveiled on March 17 (see Daily GPI, March 21). The most mentioned is an expansion in the definition of a transmission line that would include gathering lines, including some just eight inches in diameter.
Extension Granted
In a statement last Thursday, PHMSA said the public comment period would be extended from June 7 to July 7 [Docket No. PHMSA-2011-0023].
"The proposed regulations address the emerging needs of America's natural gas pipeline system and include commonsense measures to better ensure the safety of communities living alongside pipeline infrastructure and protect our environment," PHMSA Administrator Marie Therese Dominguez said in a statement. "We want to be responsive to stakeholders who have requested additional time to review the proposed regulations and, with this extension, we have effectively provided a public comment period of 112 days.
"Once the comment period closes, we will fully consider all comments that were received, as we evaluate options for finalizing the rule."
In March, trade organizations representing the oil and gas industry asked PHMSA for a 60-day extension (see Daily GPI, March 28). The organizations include the American Gas Association (AGA), the American Petroleum Institute (API), the American Public Gas Association (APGA), the Gas Processors Association (GPA), which is now the GPA Midstream Association (see Daily GPI, April 11), the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA), and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA).
'More Time Was Needed'
"The extension granted will have to be okay," AGA spokesman Jake Rubin told NGI on Monday. "We were hoping for more time to analyze a rule that is more than 500 pages long, but this definitely helps. We will not be asking for another extension."
But API spokewoman Sabrina Fang was more candid. "It has taken PHMSA more than five years to develop the more than 500-page rule in which only 60 days were provided for comment," she told NGIon Tuesday. "In addition to the sheer volume of the NPRM, API feels that more time was needed to develop sufficient feedback on many provisions of the rule.
Susan Ginsberg, vice president for crude oil and natural gas regulatory affairs for the IPAA, agreed.
"IPAA and the other trade associations firmly believed that [the original] 60 days was too short in which to comment on such a lengthy and far-reaching proposal," Ginsberg said Monday. "All too often, agencies will grant an extension just a few days prior to the comment deadline, which takes away much of the benefit to the regulated community and other commenters."
Early Red Flags
One item that has drawn criticism is a new broader definition of a transmission line that will vastly expand the size and variety of pipelines coming under PHMSA’s jurisdiction.
John Erickson, vice president for operations at APGA, said his organization's operations and safety committee will hold its first conference call to discuss PHMSA's proposals later this week, and to "identify what sections are initially the ones we're most concerned with." But he said three items -- new definitions for Moderate Consequence Areas (MCA) and distribution centers, and a revised definition for a transmission line -- have caught the APGA's attention.
"The proposed definition of a transmission line is one that we're probably unique in looking at and considering that's something important," Erickson said Tuesday, adding that of the approximately 1,000 public gas systems nationwide, only 56 have lines that are currently classified as transmission. "It has the definition that anything over 20% of specified minimum yield stress is transmission, but it also has a clause that says any line that transports gas from a storage facility to a distribution center is a transmission line, regardless of its pressure.
"That one will pull in a lot of our members' lines. It's been interpreted that if they take gas from an interstate transmission line, the line that takes the gas from the transmission line up to the town is also a transmission line."
For example, Erickson said a five-mile, two-inch diameter pipeline in Lorimor, IA, which operates at just 150 pounds per square inch (psi), would be classified as a transmission line.
"A lot of the lines that are out there aren't really what you would think of as transmission," Erickson said. "More than half of them are eight inches or less in diameter and one-third of them are less than four inches. By DOT's definition, they're transmission. But we're still not sure exactly what it does. It's still kind of vague, and we'll probably have to be talking with PHMSA to find out what they think it means."
Erickson said some of its approximately 730 members would probably have their lines reclassified and would be required to have a distribution -- rather than a transmission -- integrity management program. The transmission program includes mandatory inspection requirements over and above what's required for leak surveys. It also requires smart pigging, hydrostatic testing and direct assessment requirements.
"We think it would be a good thing if it resulted in them being treated as distribution, because that's what they really are," Erickson said. "A lot of those lines are rural, and under the current rules their potential impact radius is so small that they don't have any high consequence areas that they pass through, therefore the integrity management rule doesn't really affect them.
"But that's why we're also interested in this new definition for an MCA. If the potential impact circle includes the right-of-way for an interstate, freeway, expressway or other principal four-lane arterial highway, that's an MCA. Some of our members that have lines that are not near any populated area, but cross a highway, that could affect them. They probably wouldn't have to perform any additional inspections, but they would have to prepare and write an integrity management plan, which for a system with less than $1 million a year in revenue, spending $100,000 just to write a document, is a complete waste of money."
Erickson said PHMSA has been receptive to industry in the past to proposed changes, but added that pipelines were "a very political issue," and it was unclear at this juncture how things would pan out.
"The whole process of them putting out a notice like this, and for us to file written comments to it -- I know that's the way officially it's supposed to work, but having the opportunities to have some give and take [would have been helpful]. It's really not clear what their intent is. We're hoping that there can be a little dialogue to find out what they mean by [the definitions], and perhaps we can help them by providing some alternative language that accomplishes what they want to accomplish."
Matthew Hite, vice president for government affairs at GPA Midstream, said his organization is "still prioritizing the issues that will impact us," and was also evaluating the government's lengthy cost-benefit analysis.
"We're looking at a lot of the gathering line portions of the NPRM," Hite said Tuesday. "One of the things that we were led to believe was the rule would be going after large diameter gathering lines. The proposal actually goes all the way down to 8.5-inch diameter gathering lines, which are not something we would define as large gathering lines."
'Not Written Very Clearly'
Many of the aforementioned trade organizations were still poring through the NPRM.
INGAA spokeswoman Cathy Landry told NGI “some of our main concerns are: the cost of the proposal (and PHMSA's cost-benefit analysis); maximum allowable operating pressures [MAOP] and integrity re-verification; and rules surrounding the new MCAs under the Integrity Management Program."
Ginsberg said the new deadline would give IPAA more time "to make the best use of our resources to push back against PHMSA's proposed expansion of jurisdiction to gathering.”
PHMSA said its proposed regulations would meet four congressional mandates from the Pipeline Safety, Regulatory Certainty and Job Creation Act of 2011, one recommendation by the Government Accountability Office, and six recommendations from the NTSB, including one requiring that more modern testing be performed on pipelines built before 1970. PHMSA officials told NGI that approximately 57% of all onshore gas transmission pipelines were constructed before 1970.
The agency said a notice of the extension will be published in the Federal Register. PHMSA added that it would also hold public webinars and host briefings at two upcoming advisory committee meetings.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/106378-phmsa-agrees-to-30-day-extension-of-comment-period-for-proposed-new-rules
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States, Chamber Back Keystone Lawsuit Against Obama
May 10, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and several states this week filed supporting briefs in a lawsuit over President Obama’s November rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline.
TransCanada sued the Obama administration in January over the president's veto of the Keystone XL pipeline. In a filing in the U.S. District Court in Houston, the Chamber joined the suit, arguing Obama overstepped his bounds in rejecting Keystone.
The Constitution gives Congress, not the president, the power to “regulate commerce with foreign nations,” and Congress has frequently voted in favor of the pipeline, the Chamber wrote.
Obama had the power to deny Keystone because it crosses a foreign border. But the Chamber argued his decision gave the White House too much power over foreign commerce.
“The government’s approach not only violates the Constitution’s separation of powers, but also would create severe uncertainty over trade policy, destabilizing the American economy and hurting American businesses,” the Chamber wrote in its brief.
The states — Oklahoma, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, South Dakota and Texas — made similar arguments, telling the court in a Monday filing that Obama “seeks to prohibit a means of interstate and international commerce desired by both the states and by Congress because, in his view, overriding the states and Congress is necessary to preserve his stature on the world stage and his bargaining position in ongoing or future multinational negotiations.”
Officials for the states — through which Keystone would run — argued the pipeline’s denial would hurt employment opportunities there. They asked the court to decide “that the executive lacks the authority to prohibit construction of the pipeline because that authority lies exclusively with Congress and Congress has not delegated that power to the president.”
TransCanada sued the Obama administration in January, arguing he exceeded his authority when he rejected the Keystone project.
The company also filed an international petition under the North American Free Trade Agreement seeking $15 billion in costs and damages related to the pipeline.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/279375-states-chamber-back-keystone-developer-lawsuit-against-obama
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(ACC Mentioned) House Panel Sets Vote on Olson's Ozone Bill
May 11, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee is set to vote May 12 on legislation (H.R. 4775) that would delay implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency's 2015 ozone standards. The bill, introduced by Rep. Pete Olson (R-Texas), would give states an additional eight years to make recommendations for areas that fail to attain the EPA's standard of 70 parts per billion and make various changes to the agency's process for reviewing national ambient air quality standards for ozone, particulate matter and other pollutants. Energy and Power Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) said in a May 9 statement announcing the markup that providing states with additional time to comply with the more stringent ozone standards would be “good for jobs, the economy and public health.” H.R. 4775 is supported by hundreds of industry associations, including the American Chemistry Council and the National Association of Manufacturers and 60 conservative organizations (90 DEN A-14, 5/10/16). The American Lung Association and other public health groups voiced opposition to the bill, which they said would “permanently weaken” implementation of national ozone standards. The Subcommittee on Energy and Power will convene the markup May 11 for opening statements and continue on May 12 with a vote on whether to advance H.R. 4775 to the full committee.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=89222148&vname=dennotallissues&fn=89222148&jd=89222148
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The Growing Stress on the World’s Water
May 10, 2016 | Washington Post
By Editorial Board
The World Bank has warned countries that one of climate change’s most significant impacts will be on a precious resource that many people, particularly in advanced nations, take for granted: water. The concerns go far beyond sea-level rise, which is perhaps the most predictable result of the planet’s increasing temperature, or an uptick in extreme weather. Countries must worry about whether their people will have enough fresh water to farm, produce electricity, bathe and drink.
Global warming will not change the amount of water in the world, but it will affect water’s distribution across countries, making some much worse off. The World Bank calculates that water strain from population growth and climate change could reduce growth in some major economies by an astonishing 6 percent by 2050. That would push some countries into “sustained negative growth,” which would mean prolonged suffering for millions of people.
The countries most responsible for climate change are not most at risk; instead, a belt of nations from Africa through the Middle East to central and east Asia are in most danger, the World Bank concluded. And within those relatively poor countries, water stresses “are felt disproportionately by the poor, who are more likely to rely on rain-fed agriculture to feed their families, live on the most marginal lands which are more prone to floods, and are most at risk from contaminated water and inadequate sanitation.”
About 4 billion people already live in areas suffering from water stress. By 2030, “the world may face a shortfall in water availability of approximately 2,700 billion cubic meters,” the bank reports, “with demand exceeding current sustainable water supplies by 40 percent.” Though the bank tamps down speculation that countries will fight with one another for water, it warns that water scarcity could encourage other sorts of conflict and dislocation, such as civil wars.
The first order of business is to limit the amount of warming humans will induce. That means slashing the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for driving up global temperatures. The world has started down this path, but the effectiveness of the global climate effort likely depends, in the first instance, on the results of this year’s presidential election.
And limiting emissions will not be enough. Warming is happening, areas of the world are already experiencing significant water challenges, and population growth will place increasing demands on existing resources. Countries have to manage water use more rationally. As California’s drought exposed, the United States is hardly a great role model. Rather, the answer is to treat water like any other precious resource: Create a fair and transparent market for it, allowing supply to meet demand, which will let the water flow to its most efficient uses. Meanwhile, governments should invest in water storage and gird their infrastructure against floods and other extreme weather events.
Reforms that override the parochial arrangements that often govern water access will not be easy. But, as the World Bank made clear, the alternative may be widespread misery.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-growing-stress-on-the-worlds-water/2016/05/10/2caa959e-1241-11e6-93ae-50921721165d_story.html
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