Preview Newsletter
PM ACC 6/27/2016
-
(ACC Mentioned) A Shampoo Bottle That Empties Completely–Every Last Drop
Jun 26, 2016 | Ohio State University News
By Pam Frost Gorder
It’s one of life’s little annoyances: that last bit of shampoo that won’t quite pour out of the bottle. Or the last bit of hand soap, or dish soap, or laundry detergent. -
(ACC Mentioned) NE Ohio Reviving 'Rubber Capital' Claim
Jun 27, 2016 | Tire Business
By Dan Shingler
Akron. In Latin, it means “pinnacle of polymer science.” OK, that’s a lie. But for much of the last century and continuing today, the city’s name has been synonymous with rubber, plastics and the science behind the polymers that make such materials effective, cheap and abundant. -
Firms Claim Biobased Routes to Ethyl Acetate and Glycols
Jun 27, 2016 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Melody M. Bomgardner
Producers of consumer and industrial products will have new options for biobased intermediates—if scale-up efforts for ethyl acetate and glycols prove economical in today’s cheap fossil-fuel environment. -
Citing TSCA Reform, Advocates Push for Asbestos Ban
Jun 27, 2016 | Chem.Info
By Andy Szal
For years, critics of decades-old U.S. chemical regulations argued that they were too weak to properly ban asbestos despite its widely known dangers. -
Could Toxic Chemicals Along the Ohio River Be a Danger to Our Drinking Water?
Jun 27, 2016 | WPCO
By Lisa Bernard-Kuhn
Arsenic. Lead. Mercury. Sulfuric Acid. At a closed Duke Energy power plant, at least 10 billion pounds of coal ash containing these toxins and more are sitting on the banks of the Ohio River – a source of drinking water for more than 5 million people. -
Is BLM's Power on Slippery Slope After Fracking Rule's Fall?
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer
In the wake of a federal court's decision to strike down the Obama administration's hydraulic fracturing rule, stakeholders in the case are wondering just how far that ruling will reach. -
Obama to Make Clean Energy Pledge with Mexico, Canada: Report
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Obama will set a goal this week for the United States to get half of its electricity from clean energy sources by 2025. -
Are Hillary Clinton’s Clean Energy Goals Achievable?
Jun 25, 2016 | Denver Post (In Real Clear Energy)
By Elizabeth Shogren
As Hillary Clinton headed into her last big day of primaries — including contests in California, Montana and New Mexico — she placed an opinion piece in the San Jose Mercury News highlighting her plans for using the public lands of the West to help achieve her goal of turning the United States into a “renewable energy superpower.” -
Did New Drilling Techniques Hasten Bakken Output Fall? — Fuel for Thought
Jun 27, 2016 | Platts
By Brian Schneid
About nine months ago, analysts at Petrologica began questioning the oil production data coming out of North Dakota. -
EPA Solicits Information on Oil and Gas Wastewater
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Tiffany Stecker
U.S. EPA is seeking more information on wastewater from the oil and gas industry that eventually makes its way to municipal water treatment plants. -
Good News from Diablo Canyon
Jun 27, 2016 | New York Times
By Editorial Board
Few nuclear power plants have been as contentious as Diablo Canyon. The plant, which went online in 1985 after years of ferocious opposition, sits on a gorgeous stretch of California coastline, surrounded by several earthquake faults and reliably producing enormous quantities... -
New York’s Standby Tariff: Standing in the Way of Distributed Energy?
Jun 27, 2016 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Marc Rauch
Late last month, New York took a major step toward rethinking utility economics when it issued the “Order Adopting a Ratemaking and Utility Revenue Model Policy Framework” (also known as Track 2 Order). -
Gov. Snyder Moves to 'Disassociate' Mich. from MATS Challenge
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Sean Reill
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) has formally parted company with the state's attorney general, Bill Schuette, also a Republican, over the latest legal challenge to U.S. EPA's mercury regulations on power plants. -
Shell Closes Its Final chapter in U.S. Arctic Campaign
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
Royal Dutch Shell PLC has closed the last chapter in its $7 billion campaign to explore for oil and gas in the American Arctic, dropping its two-year bureaucratic battle over how long it should be allowed to retain its Chukchi and Beaufort seas leases. -
Arctic Exploration: Securing a Winning Hand for America’s Energy Future
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By Aileen Yeung
Producing more oil and natural gas in the United States has dramatically lowered energy prices – anyone who has pumped gas at $2 a gallon recently can tell you that. But America’s newfound role as the world’s leading producer of oil and natural gas affects... -
California Regulators Approve PG&E Gas Storage/Pipeline Rate Case
Jun 27, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
California regulators on Thursday approved nearly $950 million in increased rates to support Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s (PG&E) natural gas storage and transmission pipeline operations. -
Obama Heckled by Oil Protesters in Seattle
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Lisa Friedman
It's always something with those climate change activists. At least that's the message President Obama sent when anti-oil protesters heckled him as he spoke at a Seattle fundraiser Friday, demanding he stop crude shipments on Northwest railways. -
Railroad Blamed for Fiery Oil Train Derailment on Oregon Washington Border
Jun 27, 2016 | Claims Journal
By Matthew Brown and Gillian Flaccus
Federal investigators on Thursday blamed Union Pacific Railroad for a fiery oil train derailment along the Oregon-Washington border, saying the company failed to properly maintain its track. -
3 Questions Brexit Poses for Climate and Energy Policy
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Jean Chemnick
As the dust settles on Britain's unexpected decision to depart the European Union, there are more questions than answers about what the pullout means for everything from trade to energy policy. -
Democrats Adopt Climate Change Science Investigation in Platform
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
Members of the Democratic National Committee’s platform panel have formally endorsed federal investigations into fossil fuel companies' climate science, including a high-profile probe into Exxon Mobil Corp. -
Sulfate Aerosols Implicated in Global Warming Slowdown
Jun 27, 2016 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Jyllian Kemsley
The rise of global mean surface temperatures slowed in the first years of this century. Scientists have pinpointed variation in Pacific Ocean surface temperatures that occur over timescales of decades as the primary cause of this warming slowdown. -
Death Toll to Rise Without Policy Changes -- IEA
Jun 27, 2016 | Reuters (In E&E Greenwire)
By Nina Chestney
A new International Energy Agency report says premature deaths from air pollution will continue rising if major changes in energy policy are not made. -
It’s Official: Humans Are Making the Earth Much Greener
Jun 27, 2016 | Washington Post
By Chris Mooney
Earlier this month, NASA scientists provided a visualization of a startling climate change trend — the Earth is getting greener, as viewed from space, especially in its rapidly warming northern regions.
Industry and Association News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation News
Environment News
-
(ACC Mentioned) A Shampoo Bottle That Empties Completely–Every Last Drop
Jun 26, 2016 | Ohio State University News
By Pam Frost Gorder
It’s one of life’s little annoyances: that last bit of shampoo that won’t quite pour out of the bottle. Or the last bit of hand soap, or dish soap, or laundry detergent.
Now researchers at The Ohio State University have found a way to create the perfect texture inside plastic bottles to let soap products flow freely. They describe the patent-pending technology in a paper to appear in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society on June 27.
The technique involves lining a plastic bottle with microscopic y-shaped structures that cradle the droplets of soap aloft above tiny air pockets, so that the soap never actually touches the inside of the bottle. The “y” structures are built up using much smaller nanoparticles made of silica, or quartz—an ingredient in glass—which, when treated further, won’t stick to soap.
If it sounds like engineers Bharat Bhushan and Philip Brown went to a lot of trouble to solve this problem, you’re right. But the solution they found is actually simpler and less expensive than alternatives under development elsewhere. And it works for a common plastic used to package foodstuffs and household goods: polypropylene.
“It’s what you’d call a first-world problem, right? ‘I can’t get all of the shampoo to come out of the bottle.’ But manufacturers are really interested in this, because they make billions of bottles that end up in the garbage with product still in them,” said Bhushan, Ohio Eminent Scholar and Howard D. Winbigler Professor of mechanical engineering at Ohio State.
Coatings already exist to help food, but not soap, pour out of their containers, he said. “Compared to soaps, getting ketchup out of a bottle is trivial. Our coating repels liquids in general, but getting it to repel soap was the hard part.”
The key, he explained, is surface tension—the tendency of the molecules of a substance to stick to each other. Ketchup and other sauces are made mostly of water, and water molecules tend to stick to each other more than they stick to plastic.
But surfactants—the organic molecules that make soap “soapy”—are just the opposite: They have a very low surface tension and stick to plastic easily, explained Brown, a postdoctoral fellow.
“It was an extra challenge for us to make a surface that could repel surfactant,” he agreed.
Their goal, which was suggested by a commercial shampoo manufacturer, was to create a shampoo bottle lining that was cheap, effective and environmentally friendly.
Soap and shampoo clean our skin and hair by bonding chemically with both oil and water, so the surface oils that were on our bodies wash off when we rinse. The same goes for dishes. During clothes washing, detergent performs double-duty, releasing oils and also helping water penetrate fabrics. It’s that tenacity that makes the last drops of surfactant cling to the insides of bottles.
Bhushan and Brown came up with a method to spray-coat a small amount of solvent and ultra-finesilica nanoparticles onto the inside of bottles. Manufacturers already use solvents to change the texture of molded plastics, because they cause the surface of the plastic to soften a little. By mixing the silica and solvent, the researchers were able to soften the surface of the polypropylene just enough that when the plastic re-hardened, the silica would be embedded in the surface.
The structures are only a few micrometers—millionths of a meter—high, and covered in even smaller branchlike projections. They look like shaggy heart-shaped pillows, but they’re hard as glass.
They don’t cover the inside of the bottle completely, either, but instead are planted a few micrometers apart. The main branches of the “y” overhang the plastic surface at an angle less than 90 degrees—steep enough that water, oils and even surfactant can’t physically sustain a droplet shape that would fall in between the branches and touch the plastic.
“You end up with air pockets underneath, and that’s what gives you liquid repellency,” Brown said.
Instead of spreading out on the surface, the soap droplets form beads and roll right off.
Researchers have known for some time that a support structure with the right angle of overhang would solve this problem, and some have tried to carve the shapes into plastic manually usingphotolithography—the same technique that shapes computer chips.
“That’s expensive and time consuming,” Brown said. “Plus, they end up with fragile little overhangs that snap off. We embedded a hard material directly into the polymer surface, so we know it’s durable.”
Polypropylene isn’t the most common plastic bottle material, but 177 million pounds of it were made into bottles and bottle lids in the United States in 2014 alone, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC). Aside from shampoo, soap and detergent bottles, it’s also used for yogurt tubs, ketchup bottles and medical bottles, single-serve coffee pods and Starbucks iced beverage cups.
Polypropylene is classified as a “number 5” plastic by the Resin Identification Coding System. A recent ACC report found that recycling of number 5 plastics is on the rise, increasing from 44.2 million pounds in 2013 to 45.6 million pounds in 2014. Only about two-thirds of American curbside recycling services accept it, but commercial companies such as Preserve of Waltham, Massachusetts, and Whole Foodsgrocery stores nationwide are working with manufacturers and retailers to collect number 5 plastic containers and make them into useful products.
The Ohio State invention could actually aid recycling. Before plastic bottles can be recycled, they have to be rinsed completely clean, and Bhushan suspects that he’s not the only person who doesn’t bother.
“We all struggle with shampoo bottles at home,” Bhushan said. “I have a few in my shower right now. Trying to get the last drop out, I put it upside down, and my wife adds water to the bottle and fights with it for a while, and then we give up and just throw it away.”
With further development, the university hopes to license the coating technique to manufacturers—not just for shampoo bottles, but for other plastic products that have to stay clean, such as biomedical devices or catheters. They have already applied the same technique to polycarbonate, a plastic used in car headlights and smartphone cases, among other applications.
https://news.osu.edu/news/2016/06/26/shampoo/
-
(ACC Mentioned) NE Ohio Reviving 'Rubber Capital' Claim
Jun 27, 2016 | Tire Business
By Dan Shingler
Akron. In Latin, it means “pinnacle of polymer science.”
OK, that’s a lie. But for much of the last century and continuing today, the city’s name has been synonymous with rubber, plastics and the science behind the polymers that make such materials effective, cheap and abundant.
It’s a field of science and endeavor that the city continued to nurture, decades after the tire-making jobs that put Akron on the map — making it the so-called “Rubber Capital of the World” — were gone.
The old rubber industry left Akron with some substantial assets in terms of world-leading companies that call the city and region their home, and two major universities that draw students from around the globe to their expertise in polymer science — the University of Akron and Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.
Region of innovation
Some say the region is the Silicon Valley of polymer science.
“That’s exactly the reference I make all the time — Silicon Valley,” said Chris Murphy, who is vice president and chief innovation official for the specialty polymer materials company PolyOne Corp., located in Avon Lake, Ohio, just west of Cleveland and about an hour from Akron,
Mr. Murphy and others say the region achieved its prominence in the polymer science field similar to the way that Silicon Valley developed its reputation in computer science — by having a core group of companies that worked closely with universities to develop not just the science itself, but a critical mass of knowledge, business endeavors and technical people who provide the workforce that drives it all forward.
Luis Proenza knew of the region’s strength in the field when he took over as president of the University of Akron in 1999 — a school long known around the world for its expertise in polymer science.
When he first got to the school, local and state policymakers needed an education, he said — and the university gave it to them. One of the first things the school did under Mr. Proenza was to take stock of the region’s and state’s polymer science assets.
“We calculated the annual shipment of polymer products at about $50 billion,” he said, “and Ohio was, I believe, the largest employer in terms of polymer-related jobs in the country.”
While it was well known that Akron had lost most of the thousands of jobs once provided by four big rubber companies — Goodyear, Firestone Tire & Rubber Co., BFGoodrich Co. and General Tire & Rubber Co. — it had gone largely unnoticed that the city and surrounding area had become home to about 1,800 other tire industry supply-related companies, many of them small, working in plastics and related fields.
“Nobody realized that, prior to that,” Mr. Proenza said.
The University of Akron’s research helped convince those in Ohio’s state government to fund more efforts aimed at developing the polymer science field, he said. It spurred the formation of entities like the industry groupPolymerOhio, and also got existing state economic development efforts more focused on the sector, Mr. Proenza said.
But is Akron and the “polymer valley” region around it holding on to its position as a world leader in polymer science?
There have been setbacks, most notably at the University of Akron. The school regularly competes with the University of Massachusetts for top honors in polymer science.
Akron U has seen troubles in recent years and is bracing for a 23-percent drop in student enrollment this year. Like many schools with a technical specialty, however, Akron has a bit of a split personality. It’s been largely a commuter school for most of its general, non-technical programs, but draws students internationally for its vaunted polymer science degrees.
Students from around the world, who often are less price sensitive than local students, continue to flock to the school’s polymer science program, said Eric Amis, dean of Akron’s College of Polymer Science and Polymer Engineering. That’s especially true of the college’s post-graduate programs, he said.
“Whenever I’m in (South) Korea, they know about the University of Akron — and it’s the same when I go to China,” Mr. Amis said. “So we have a large graduate program — about 350 students. About 125 of them are master’s students and the rest are Ph.D. students.”
Many of the companies that work with the university say they have so far seen no reduction in output from the school, in its number of graduates, the quality of their education or the research that the university conducts.
“I don’t know what the future holds, but at this point in time it has not impacted our ability to get qualified folks,” said Joe Zekoski, Goodyear’s senior vice president and chief technical officer.“We’re fortunate to have an early indicator with the interns and co-ops,…and so far I have not seen it (a negative impact.) Our co-op program is still strong and we feel good about that.”
David Zanzig, Goodyear’s director of global materials science, added: “I haven’t seen any decline in polymer science there, I think that’s holding pretty steady.”
Goodyear, university collaborate
Other firms, including PolyOne and suburban Akron-based A. Schulman Inc., echoed those sentiments, but Goodyear might know better than most how the school is doing — it sponsored and works closely with the university’s Goodyear Polymer Center, which opened in 1991.
Students don’t just come to the school for the education, either. Some come, in part, because they also know that Northeast Ohio is a hotbed for technical jobs in polymer science and related fields.
Mr. Amis said his students have little to no problems finding jobs, especially in Northeast Ohio.
“Certainly, this spring, we’re not having any trouble with students getting offers. They’re getting four or five offers — which they like, because it gives them a lot of choices,” he said. “I always say that we have ‘essentially’ a 100-percent placement rate — because I know if I just say 100 percent, someone will find somebody,…but our students continue to do very well.”
That mix of students and available jobs is the symbiotic, chicken-and-egg relationship that most say makes the region’s polymer science work and continue to succeed. It’s always a struggle for a region to foster a new industry before there is a critical mass of both industry and educational institutions working together — but Akron already has such a structure in place.
“There’s research institutes, government agencies, associations — there really is a great network here — and it makes a lot of sense to be here if you’re in the polymer industry,” said A. Schulman President and CEO Bernard Rzepka.
That’s why, when Schulman built a new headquarters in 2013, or when it consolidated many of its corporate services this year, it didn’t even consider another location.
“We’ve made a very conscious decision to stay in this area and to reinvest in this area, primarily because of Akron U. But not just because of Akron U.… There are so many benefits to being here, I could talk for probably an hour about that,” Mr. Rzepka said.
Like his counterparts at Goodyear, PolyOne and other companies, Mr. Rzepka said the region is the best place for his company because of the available technical workforce, the opportunity to conduct research at both the University of Akron and Case Western Reserve, University and because there are so many other firms located in the region that can be potential partners on technical and business initiatives.
Even financial subsidies would be unlikely to cause A. Schulman to move, Mr. Rzepka said.
“If someone were to say, 'Come here, you’ll be tax free,’ we would struggle with it. It’s good on the P&L tomorrow, but you don’t have the equated people,…and you don’t have all the other companies around you. You lose part of your future if you don’t have those things,” Mr. Rzepka added.
Such attitudes don’t surprise Goodyear’s Mr. Zekoski.
“We see that a lot of competitors starting R&D organizations in this area — even those that aren’t headquarters here — we assume for these same reasons,” he said.
South Korea’s Hankook Tire Co. Ltd. has had a tech center in the region for 20 years, and in the past 10 years Taiwan-based Kenda and China’s Giti Tire Group and Triangle Group Co. Ltd. have all opened technical facilities in and around Akron, while Kumho Tire Co. Ltd., opened one in 1990.
These facilities collectively employ more than 100, most of whom are in highly technical — i.e., high-paying — positions.
Nexen Tire Corp. of South Korea will join this group of five later this year when it opens its own tech center in Richfield, Ohio.
In 2010-12, Bridgestone made one of the biggest commitments, opting to invest $100 million in a new R&D center in the city where the former Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. once had its headquarters, rather than move it closer to its commercial headquarters in Nashville, Tenn.
The city of Akron, Summit County and state of Ohio contributed more than $7.5 million in financial and/or logistics resources to the project to keep the center and its 450-plus high-paying jobs in Akron.
All of them are here for the region’s technical talent, Goodyear’s Mr. Zekoski said.
Stability, longevity?
What about the future? The U.S. tire and rubber business is not known as a high-growth industry, and much of the U.S. plastics industry has clustered around the Gulf Coast region, where many of its raw materials are produced.
But, at the same time, the industry’s technical needs have increased—medical devices, aerospace applications and vehicle makers seeking to make cars and trucks lighter and more efficient are constantly demanding more from the plastics industry, noted Bruce Fawcett, executive director of PolymerOhio. And while Houston might lead the nation in plastics production, Akron is still the major center for research and development.
Mr. Fawcett, whose group has its headquarters just outside of Columbus, said Akron remains a hotbed for his industry.
Akron’s polymer and plastics industry might be getting another boost as well, thanks to a shale-gas drilling boom that’s erupted in eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania.
Royal Dutch Shell announced in June that it will build a $4 billion ethane cracker in Pennsylvania about 90 miles east of Akron — something many say will spur more plastics and specialty chemical companies to locate operations near the newfound cheap supply of raw materials.
“Ethane, a natural gas liquid, is the U.S. chemical industry’s main feedstock,” the American Chemistry Council noted, as it applauded Shell’s big announcement on June 7.
If the cracker is built and attracts the plastics and chemical industry as promised, it could be Akron’s second boom in the field of related manufacturing and material science.
Dan Shingler is a reporter for Crain’s Cleveland Business magazine, a sister publication of Tire Business.
http://www.tirebusiness.com/article/20160627/NEWS/160629946/ne-ohio-reviving-rubber-capital-claim
-
Firms Claim Biobased Routes to Ethyl Acetate and Glycols
Jun 27, 2016 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Melody M. Bomgardner
Producers of consumer and industrial products will have new options for biobased intermediates—if scale-up efforts for ethyl acetate and glycols prove economical in today’s cheap fossil-fuel environment.
Greenyug, a Santa Barbara, Calif.-based technology developer, says it will build an industrial-scale ethyl acetate facility that will use corn ethanol as a feedstock. Separately, Vancouver, British Columbia-based S2G BioChem says it is successfully producing glycols made from nonfood sugars at a contract manufacturing site.
The Greenyug facility will be located adjacent to an Archer Daniels Midland corn processing facility in Columbus, Neb. ADM will supply ethanol for Greenyug’s process, which uses a dehydrogenation catalyst that works in the liquid phase to make ethyl acetate.
The renewable ethyl acetate can compete on price with synthetic ethyl acetate made by Celanese and Eastman Chemical, according to the company. A solvent, it is used in adhesives, paints, nail polish removers, and coffee and tea decaffeination.
Meanwhile, S2G has begun commercial-scale production of biobased glycols at the Memphis site of Pennakem, a specialty chemical firm that makes furans from agricultural waste. The S2G process hydrotreats waste-derived sugars to make a mixture of ethylene and propylene glycols.
Output from the facility has been sold to an industrial resin plant and is being evaluated by other industrial customers, according to S2G. The company claims to be competitive with petrochemical glycols, even at today’s low oil and gas prices.
http://cen.acs.org/articles/94/i26/Firms-claim-biobased-routes-ethyl.html
-
Citing TSCA Reform, Advocates Push for Asbestos Ban
Jun 27, 2016 | Chem.Info
By Andy Szal
For years, critics of decades-old U.S. chemical regulations argued that they were too weak to properly ban asbestos despite its widely known dangers.
Now, advocacy groups want to make sure the carcinogen is among the first substances addressed under a chemical reform law signed by President Obama this week.
“The success of the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act hinges on the EPA’s ability to prioritize asbestos in the first 10 hazardous chemicals and to expeditiously ban asbestos,” Linda Reinstein, president of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization, told Bloomberg.
The bill, in part, establishes new procedures and deadlines for the Environmental Protection Agency to begin evaluating the thousands of chemicals currently used in commerce.
The EPA will begin by addressing a handful of chemicals considered to be at the highest risk of causing health problems, a list that could include formaldehyde, styrene, phthalates, BPA and asbestos.
The EPA implemented its first ban on asbestos-containing material in 1973 and banned most products outright in 1989. Two years later, however, a federal appeals court tossed out the ban and ruled that it violated the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act.
Critics, including President Obama, commonly cited that decision when pushing for the TCSA reform bill that ultimately drew support from both industry and public health groups.
Some expect the first rules under the new bill to be implemented by 2022, but others question whether the EPA will be given the resources to properly enforce the law. One estimate predicted that regulating the first 90 "high-priority" chemicals alone would take 90 years.
http://www.chem.info/news/2016/06/citing-tsca-reform-advocates-push-asbestos-ban
-
Could Toxic Chemicals Along the Ohio River Be a Danger to Our Drinking Water?
Jun 27, 2016 | WPCO
By Lisa Bernard-Kuhn
Arsenic. Lead. Mercury. Sulfuric Acid.
At a closed Duke Energy power plant, at least 10 billion pounds of coal ash containing these toxins and more are sitting on the banks of the Ohio River – a source of drinking water for more than 5 million people.
How the polluted ponds got there is a story that began long before environmental laws were created to keep people and drinking water safe from toxic waste.
How much longer the dumps might stay — and put our drinking water at risk — is a saga that’s just beginning to unfold.
“Think about what happened in Flint, (Mich.), and think about just how important this is to public health and safety,” Clermont County Commissioner David Uible said. “To think that this day and age, that we have a water supply right next to these ash pits, it’s just unbelievable.”
ocal environmental experts agree.
“The worst-case scenario is that you get a major flood on the Ohio, then you get a breach of the dams and all that ash is washed into the Ohio River,” said Paul Braasch, who leads Clermont County’s Office of Environmental Quality. “Then you have a plume of ash going down the Ohio River. That’s a big problem, and lot of bottled water to be handing out.”
As early as next year, Duke Energy has said it will begin tearing down the more than 60-year-old plant. The electric utility giant closed the plant in late 2014 just the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was writing new federal standards for how coal ash ponds should be managed.
Although federal rules went into place in 2015 that set new standards for how coal ash ponds should be managed and closed, the guidelines don't apply to Beckjord because the plant closed in 2014. That means most of the rules for how the coal ash ponds are closed will fall under a limited set of Ohio laws governing coal ash ponds.
“Ohio is one of the largest coal ash producers in the country, and they have some of the worst state regulations,” said Lisa Evans, an attorney with Earthjustice, a nonprofit D.C.-based environmental law firm. “These ponds fall into a very dangerous regulatory gap.”
So far, Duke hasn’t said what its plans are for the ash ponds, which span nearly 170 acres of riverfront in New Richmond and Pierce Township.
The company has been “conducting comprehensive scientific and engineering studies at the site to determine the best method to safely close ash basins,” Duke’s Ohio and Kentucky spokeswoman Sally Thelen said.
But some say that might not be enough to guard against the biggest threats that ash-polluted ponds pose.
"The public should be very concerned," Evans said. “These ponds are filled with some of the worst poisons for human health.”
Across the country, there is a “plethora of examples of problems” from these coal ash sites, said Frank Holleman, an attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center. He points to incidents in Pennsylvania, Tennessee and North Carolina where lack of maintenance and attention at aging power plants led to massive spills of coal ash into nearby rivers and streams from ponds like those at Beckjord.
A WCPO review of government and environmental records reveals a history negligence and pollution at the Beckjord plant and a big dilemma with coal ash that stretches across Ohio.
http://www.wcpo.com/longform/big-decisions-loom-for-toxic-ponds-on-ohio-river
-
Is BLM's Power on Slippery Slope After Fracking Rule's Fall?
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer
In the wake of a federal court's decision to strike down the Obama administration's hydraulic fracturing rule, stakeholders in the case are wondering just how far that ruling will reach.
Will it ripple through the Bureau of Land Management, decimating the agency's power to regulate development on public lands? Or is the ruling more narrow, merely re-emphasizing BLM's traditional powers?
The answer depends in large part on whom you ask. In an interview with EnergyWire, former Interior Secretary Gale Norton said the court's decision simply preserves the traditional division of powers and keeps BLM in its regulatory lane.
"States over decades have developed expertise in regulating the down-hole side of the oil and gas development, while BLM is focused on the surface land use," said Norton, who served during the George W. Bush administration. "I think BLM is not really equipped to deal with the whole new area of fracking."
Other experts, meanwhile, fear the worst if the court's decision is upheld at the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
"If the bottom line of his opinion is bought, that would be quite dramatic and virtually revolutionary," said John Leshy, Interior's top attorney during the Clinton administration.
The bottom line, according to the court, is that BLM has no authority over fracking. Judge Scott Skavdahl, an Obama district court appointee, ruled last week that Congress has explicitly left fracking on states' regulatory turf (EnergyWire, June 22).
The U.S. District Court for the District of Wyoming's decision is based on a complex mix of statutes that govern energy development. The four states challenging the rule put forth the winning argument that the Safe Drinking Water Act delegated fracking regulation to U.S. EPA and that the Energy Policy Act of 2005 subsequently exempted fracking from EPA's purview -- thereby taking it out of the feds' hands entirely.
And more fundamentally, the states and industry have argued, BLM has traditionally regulated surface activity around oil and gas wells, not the down-hole side of operations, a characterization BLM is quick to contest.
The fracking rule would set new requirements for down-hole activities, including stricter well construction standards and disclosure of chemicals used in the fracking process. The rule would also govern wastewater management and require operators to get an additional permit before fracking.
'That's just not the law'
Supporters of the rule have consistently countered that the Interior secretary has broad, inherent powers to regulate all types of development on public lands -- powers established through the Mineral Leasing Act and Federal Land Policy and Management Act.
They say the court's decision is based on a misreading of the statutes.
"Limiting EPA's authority doesn't mean repealing Interior's [Mineral Leasing Act] authority," Leshy said. "You don't repeal authority by implication that way. It's pretty revolutionary as a general principle."
And environmentalists fear a rollback of authority could have dire consequences for BLM's ability to regulate.
"If BLM's required to continue using 30-year-old regulations [for oil and gas], it means the agency will have to work without adequate protections for oil and gas development," said Earthjustice attorney Mike Freeman, who represents environmental intervenors in the litigation. "It guarantees that oil and gas development on public lands will cause accidents."
Now the agency's allies worry that the ruling, if upheld, will not only hamstring BLM on fracking oversight but will chip away at the agency's right to deference on its own interpretation of law.
"If the Court of Appeals buys this, it would revolutionize not just the government's regulatory power over oil and gas leasing, but administration law -- because he just reverses the presumption of regularity in agency authority and deference," Leshy said. "He goes to the opposite extreme and says you've got to prove down to the last dotted i and crossed t that you have specific authority from Congress for this regulation.
"That's just not the law, and it hasn't been for decades," he added. "I'm trying to remember if I've ever encountered a decision that is so wrong as this one. I can't remember any, actually."
'Divide responsibility with the states'
Industry attorney Mark Barron says many rule backers are jumping to dramatic conclusions about the ruling. It doesn't fundamentally change BLM's oversight over oil and gas operations, he said; it's guided by the unique legal circumstances -- the fact that Congress specifically addressed fracking.
"There is no need to extrapolate this decision to any other technique," he said last week. "This is a pretty unique situation, one that Congress has spoken to specifically and expressly."
Norton agreed. "What is different in the case is looking at the 2005 Energy Policy Act and the congressional expression of intent that it ought to be the states doing the regulation of fracking," she said.
So, how should BLM handle oversight of fracking, the production process that has helped open huge new swaths of land for development in recent years?
"I think the best approach, one that has existed for a long time, would be to work more closely with the states," Norton said. "The states have updated their regulations as the understanding of fracking has developed."
A collaborative approach is most effective, she said, because BLM simply cannot keep up with its regulatory duties as it is.
"My frame of reference is knowing that when I was secretary, we were struggling to keep up with the workload that BLM faced," she said. "Adding an additional layer of fracking regulation on top of that only increases the red tape.
"I think it's important to have protection for public lands and public resources," Norton said, "but the best way to do that is to divide responsibility with the states and try to work with them."
To the 10th Circuit
To the Obama administration and environmentalists, that scenario is not good enough. States have widely disparate levels of fracking oversight, leaving huge areas vulnerable to mishaps, they argue.
Their focus now is on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where Interior has already filed an appeal (E&ENews PM, June 24).
"This is way too important a decision," Leshy said. "I'm sure the career lawyers at the Justice Department, whether they're Republican or Democrat, are alarmed if this kind of decision is surviving. They're viewing this as a serious threat that has to be dealt with."
Leshy said the lower court's decision is significant enough to merit hearing by all the judges on the 10th Circuit, known as en banc review, and may even make its way to the Supreme Court.
And environmentalists are feeling confident.
"This opinion is such an outlier that it is unlikely to have any broad presidential value and will almost certainly be overturned on appeal," Center for Biological Diversity attorney Brendan Cummings said in an email, adding that the decision was "an unfortunate speed bump but not a roadblock" to environmental protection.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039435
-
Obama to Make Clean Energy Pledge with Mexico, Canada: Report
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Obama will set a goal this week for the United States to get half of its electricity from clean energy sources by 2025.
CBC News, citing sources familiar with the plans, said Obama will make the pledge as part of a summit in Ottawa, Canada, with the leaders of Mexico and Canada.
The United States got only 13 percent of its electricity from clean sources like wind, solar and hydropower last year, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). It’s unclear if the pledge would include nuclear power, which is also emission-free and supplies 20 percent of the country’s power.
The United States's pledge would largely be up to the next president to enforce. Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton has committed to sweeping clean energy goals, including to have half of the country’s electricity be clean by 2030, while Republican Donald Trumphas promised to greatly expand the production and use of fossil fuels and roll back environmental regulations.
Mexico will make a similar clean energy pledge at the summit, and Canada already gets 63 percent of its electricity from clean power, CBC said.
The clean electricity pledge would be the latest in a series of cooperative measures on climate change and energy Obama has made with Canada since last year’s election of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
The two leaders have agreed together to dramatically cut methane emissions from the oil and natural gas sector and to reduce short-lived greenhouse gases like black carbon and hydrofluorocarbons. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto plans to sign onto those agreements as well, CBC reported.
The three leaders will also commit to taking steps to encourage biodiversity across North America.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/285019-obama-to-make-clean-energy-pledge-report
-
Are Hillary Clinton’s Clean Energy Goals Achievable?
Jun 25, 2016 | Denver Post (In Real Clear Energy)
By Elizabeth Shogren
As Hillary Clinton headed into her last big day of primaries — including contests in California, Montana and New Mexico — she placed an opinion piece in the San Jose Mercury News highlighting her plans for using the public lands of the West to help achieve her goal of turning the United States into a “renewable energy superpower.”
“While protecting sensitive areas where development poses too great a risk, we can accelerate our transition to a clean energy economy by increasing renewable energy generation on public lands and offshore waters tenfold within a decade,” Clinton wrote.
Clinton has been talking about clean energy and climate change since she launched her campaign. But as she establishes herself as the presumptive Democratic nominee, her plans for the country’s energy and environmental policy take new prominence.
If this was a traditional campaign, these issues might attract increasing attention in the run-up to the general election in November, given the candidates’ starkly different visions for the nation’s energy future. But Donald Trump’s propensity for insults and Clinton’s legal peril over the private e-mail account she used while she was secretary of state are likely to overshadow this and other policy discussions.
Still, the difference between the candidates on energy and environment is immense. Trump is enthusiastic about fossil fuels. He pledges to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency, pull the U.S. out of the international climate change treaty negotiated in Paris last December, revive coal jobs and undo President Obama’s Clean Power Plan. He is dismissive about climate change and renewable energy, saying the latter still is too expensive and not ready for prime time.
Clinton is bullish on renewable power, particularly solar. Her goals include increasing solar energy 700 percent by the end of her first term and producing enough electricity from renewable sources to power every American home within 10 years of taking office.
How she plans on accomplishing this isn’t entirely clear. Many experts say that the only way to make such huge strides is by putting a price on carbon emissions. “My view is that by and large without an economy-wide carbon pricing mechanism (such as a carbon tax or a cap and trade system for carbon dioxide) most of this is very unlikely to be achievable,” says Robert Stavins, a professor of environmental economics at Harvard University.
Without such pricing, natural gas, which is cleaner-burning than coal but still emits carbon dioxide, is simply too cheap for solar and wind to compete. While renewables have gained ground in recent years, they still made up only 7 percent of the nation’s energy mix last year, compared to 33 percent for natural gas,according to the Energy Information Agency.
Getting such a tax through an obstructionist GOP-led Congress – or even a divided Congress if Democrats take back the Senate – is unlikely. So Clinton is not counting on it. “If lightning strikes, and there’s the possibility of maybe forging an agreement with Congress, I’d certainly try and take it,” John Podesta, who chairs Clinton’s campaign, said at a conference at Stanford University last month.
Instead President Clinton likely would focus her efforts vis-a-vis Congress on trying to win support for increased investments in clean energy. For instance, she wants to create a $60 billion competitive grant program to incentivize states,cities and rural communities to become leaders on clean energy. A major selling point to Congress would be the jobs that would come from these projects.
Clinton’s renewable goals would be especially difficult to reach if President Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which requires states to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, is overturned or gutted by the Supreme Court.
Amy Myers Jaffe, executive director of Energy and Sustainability at UC Davis,says she’s not troubled that Clinton’s goals for renewable power seem overly ambitious. “I’m not sure that matters; what you’re trying to do is signal the market,” Jaffe says. The federal government’s role is limited, but presidents can make a difference through the bully pulpit and pushing Congress to incentivize clean power, as it did last year by approving five-year extensions of key subsidies for renewables.
And prices for solar panels have plummeted so far that wide-scale adoption is inevitable, says Ron Durbin, executive director of the University of California Advanced Solar Technologies Institute. “Solar energy is coming and it’s here tostay.”
But even if solar and wind power capacity was added at unprecedented rates, it wouldn’t necessarily be enough, because both are intermittent power sources. To smooth out the fluctuations in generation without fossil fuels, some sort of energy storage is necessary. “I don’t think there’s any problem in being solar-heavy; it should be coupled with more government intervention to promote storage solutions,” Jaffe says.
Clinton does have a plan for expediting siting of transmission lines needed to bring renewable power to the grid. She even would create a White House transmission office to coordinate permitting on the local state and federal level.
And if communities near federal lands want renewable power, she’ll help site the solar arrays or wind turbines on public lands through a program called the“good neighbor renewable energy partnership.”
As she told an MSNBC town hall earlier this spring: “Somebody is going to be the 21st century clean energy superpower. It’s either going to be China, Germany or us. I want it to be us because there will be a lot of jobs, again, that have to be done right here in America.”
Elizabeth Shogren is High Country News’ Washington, D.C., correspondent.
http://www.denverpost.com/2016/06/25/are-hillary-clintons-clean-energy-goals-achievable/
-
Did New Drilling Techniques Hasten Bakken Output Fall? — Fuel for Thought
Jun 27, 2016 | Platts
By Brian Schneid
About nine months ago, analysts at Petrologica began questioning the oil production data coming out of North Dakota.
Faced with low prices, spending cuts and a rapidly falling rig count, production out of the Bakken play was down, but only modestly from December 2014 levels, when production peaked at about 1.23 million b/d.
North Dakota operators were certainly struggling, but with new technology and a drilling focus on only the most prolific portions of the Bakken, supply was holding steady.
Lynn Helms, the state’s top oil and gas regulator, said production would likely stay above 1 million b/d even if prices and rig counts continued to fall.
“Operators are now committed to running fewer rigs than their planned 2015 minimum as drill times and efficiencies continue to improve and oil prices continue to fall,” Helms said in October.
Many heralded the ingenuity of North Dakota producers and shrewd cost-cutting measures by oil services contractors as staving off a serious decline in Bakken supply.
But Petrologica’s analysts believed that the supply picture could be more dismal than initial state data led many to believe. By using new technology and a variety of innovative drilling and completion techniques, these analysts said, North Dakota producers may have been boosting near term production to the detriment of long term supply.
“On the one hand, forcing a high [initial production rate] by, for example, using more proppant may be a risk/reward play—when done correctly it leads to gains in the first year, but risks clogging the fractures made during the fracking process that allow the oil to flow,” Petrologica wrote in a note in October. “On the other, increasing IP merely front-loads production at the expense of later output.”
Petrologica analysts believe their theory proved true last week when the North Dakota’s Department of Mineral Resources announced that just over 1.04 million b/d of oil was produced in North Dakota in April, a drop of more than 70,400 b/d from March, the largest supply drop in state history.
North Dakota as bellwether
North Dakota is viewed by many analysts as a bellwether for the US shale renaissance: if supply begins to crater there, the thinking goes, the overall US shale supply is likely following.
In North Dakota, 1 million b/d is popularly viewed as the psychological threshold where the production decline will be serious, a point the state is likely to see late this year if market fundamentals remain unchanged, Helms said.
But the analysis by Petrologica indicates that the state will fall below the 1 million b/d mark much sooner than Helms believes. North Dakota has not averaged less than 1 million b/d since March 2014, when production averaged less than 977,000 b/d.
One technique that analysts focused on is the increased use of natural sand, which costs less than alternative materials such as ceramic or metal beads. While more costly, Graham Walker, an oil market analyst with Petrologica, said these manufactured materials are less likely to clog fractures and slow down production rates as quickly as using a large amount of natural sand would.
Walker said this may explain why production declines earlier this year may have been more modest.
Production fell by about 8,400 b/d from February to March and 2,668 b/d from January to February.
November was the last month that North Dakota saw a month-over-month oil production increase.
Helms blamed much of the unexpectedly large drop in April production on statewide road restrictions that limited the movement of trucks carrying oil, water, fracking sand and drilling equipment and 15 days in the month where wind restrictions prevented wells from being completed.
This significant production drop was not the start of a trend, he told reporters, and would likely prove to be an aberration as production continued to either stabilize or decline more gradually.
But Walker said weather conditions would only impact completion activity, which fell from 66 wells in March to 41 in April, according to preliminary state data. This would account for about 20,000 b/d of the 70,400 b/d decline in a “best case scenario” for producers.
In addition, about 8,000 b/d in the overall decline came from wells that produced in March but were shut-in or otherwise did not produce in April.
The remaining, estimated 42,000 b/d likely came from declines in wells completed last year, which is a much larger hit to production that many analysts expected, he said.
Advanced drilling techniques helped birth the shale revolution, and the accelerated production it allowed is also what may hasten production declines.
http://blogs.platts.com/2016/06/27/new-drilling-techniques-hasten-bakken-output-fall/
-
EPA Solicits Information on Oil and Gas Wastewater
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Tiffany Stecker
U.S. EPA is seeking more information on wastewater from the oil and gas industry that eventually makes its way to municipal water treatment plants.
The agency last week released its "Preliminary 2016 Effluent Guidelines Program Plan," a biennial publication to identify potential industrial wastewater discharges that may need additional scrutiny.
The agency did not recommend any additional industries for new or revised guidelines but said it would continue to review existing sectors. In particular, EPA is asking for more information on wastewater from conventional and unconventional oil and gas extraction that undergoes pretreatment at centralized waste treatment facilities before being hauled to municipal water treatment plants.
Centralized waste treatment facilities often have less stringent standards than municipal plants, said Cynthia Finley, director of regulatory affairs for the National Association of Clean Water Agencies.
The agency issued a final rule earlier this month effectively banning the disposal of oil and gas wastewater directly to wastewater treatment plants (Greenwire, June 14).
EPA will also solicit data from the industry on the reuse of well treatment and workover fluids for wildlife or agricultural irrigation.
Existing sectors under review include petroleum refineries, centralized waste treatment for oil and gas wastewater, metal finishing, pesticides, nanomaterials, and oil and gas extraction in Cook Inlet, Alaska.
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039462
-
Jun 27, 2016 | New York Times
By Editorial Board
Few nuclear power plants have been as contentious as Diablo Canyon. The plant, which went online in 1985 after years of ferocious opposition, sits on a gorgeous stretch of California coastline, surrounded by several earthquake faults and reliably producing enormous quantities of power — almost a tenth of California’s in-state generation. It also reliably kills enormous quantities of marine life with a cooling system that depends on huge intakes and discharges of seawater. David Brower, the executive director of the Sierra Club, got so angry with the organization when it refused to oppose the plant that he left to establish Friends of the Earth.
Mr. Brower, who died in 2000, would have been pleased with last week’s news. After long negotiations that involved, among others, Friends of the Earth and the Natural Resources Defense Council, the plant’s owner, Pacific Gas and Electric, announced that it would shut down Diablo Canyon when licenses for its two reactors expire in 2024 and 2025 and that it would replace the power with lower-cost, zero-carbon energy sources.
Approvals will be needed from two state agencies, the California State Lands Commission and the state’s Public Utilities Commission. Both should say yes; this is an event of potentially great significance for the future of energy generation in this country and for the health of the earth itself — and not just because a bunch of sometimes quarrelsome forces (unions, environmental groups, the power company) came together to make it happen.
First, the agreement is a recognition by PG&E, which generates a big chunk of its electrical output (and revenues) from Diablo Canyon, that it can provide the same amount of energy at lower costs by investing in wind and solar power and in energy efficiency improvements throughout the system, including its customers. As one negotiator put it, the deal is further evidence that “the age of renewables has arrived” — at least in California, which has long led the nation in energy innovation and last year passed a law requiring state-regulated utilities to get half their electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
Equally important, the agreement could serve as a positive example for other states and nations that may in time need to replace aging nuclear plants without increasing carbon emissions. However old and creaky some of them may be, America’s 99 nuclear reactors produce nearly a fifth of the nation’s power and two-thirds of its low-carbon energy; at a time of mounting fears about climate change, the country would be foolish to shut them down prematurely. When the time comes to retire them, it would be no less foolish to replace their power with anything other than zero-carbon sources like wind, or solar or energy efficiency.
One governor who understands this is New York’s Andrew Cuomo. Mr. Cuomo has proposed an ambitious clean-energy agenda that includes not only substantial investments in wind and solar power, but also subsidies to keep open several upstate nuclear plants that are at risk of closing because of low electricity prices driven by cheap natural gas.
Mr. Cuomo would be happy to close down the Indian Point plant, north of New York City. Indian Point has a terrible track record and last weekwas forced to shut down one reactor. But losing the upstate plants, he argues, would mean increased reliance on fossil fuels and the greenhouse gas emissions they generate until the day when renewables kick in. A similar drama is playing out in Illinois, where Exelon, a big power producer, has threatened to close down two money-losing nuclear plants unless it gets help from the Illinois legislature.
From a climate perspective, the smart strategy in such cases would be to hold on to the nuclear plants until a California-like transition to greenhouse-gas-free electricity is feasible. Not every state has California’s natural blessings, or its aggressive renewable energy mandates. But its commitment and imagination are worth emulating.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/27/opinion/good-news-from-diablo-canyon.html?_r=0
-
New York’s Standby Tariff: Standing in the Way of Distributed Energy?
Jun 27, 2016 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Marc Rauch
Late last month, New York took a major step toward rethinking utility economics when it issued the “Order Adopting a Ratemaking and Utility Revenue Model Policy Framework” (also known as Track 2 Order). This action aims to better align New York’s electricity system with Reforming the Energy Vision (REV), the state’s initiative to transform the electric grid into a cleaner, more efficient, and affordable system.
But buried in this 180-plus page document is another important development for New York’s clean energy future: Nearly 10 pages are dedicated to re-examining the state’s controversial standby tariff.
Frequently cited as a major obstacle to distributed power generation (e.g. combined heat and power (CHP) systems, rooftop solar panels, energy efficiency, and storage), the standby tariff is a special electricity rate charged to large commercial and industrial customers who produce some of their own electricity but remain connected to the grid. While utilities say they need standby tariffs to recover the costs of maintaining a reliable electric grid, many potential and existing large electricity customers producing their own power see standby tariffs as perversely designed to undermine the business case for distributed generation.
Unless the standby tariff is fixed in a manner that clears the way for investment in customer-owned and sited distributed generation, it will be hard to make REV’s revolutionary vision for a decentralized, competitive electricity market a reality.
In their argument for standby tariffs, utilities say they must recover not only their ordinary costs of distributing electricity, but also their incremental costs of maintaining the reserve electricity needed in case customer generators break down and need to draw more electricity from the grid. Additionally, utilities argue the standby tariff protects non-power-generating customers by ensuring reserve-electricity costs are not shifted from the power-generating customers to non-power generating customers. The utilities claim that absent a standby tariff, there would be an unfair subsidy for large customers who choose to generate their own electricity.
But the standby tariff must be viewed in the context of how conventional, regulated utilities have made money for more than 100 years. Unlike just about every industry in our economy, utilities and their investors are guaranteed above-market rates of return on capital investments, such as new power plants, transmission lines, and distribution facilities. Since distributed generation lessens the need for investment in these types of facilities, utilities have scant incentive to encourage its adoption. Hence, the widespread skepticism on the part of large electricity customers producing their own power.
Con Ed’s standby tariff critics
The potential and existing large energy consumers who own and operate distributed generation, notably New York City’s real estate developers and their trade association, the Real Estate Board of New York, have been among the most vocal and persistent critics of Con Ed’s standby tariff.
In fact, the Durst Organization, a prominent New York City real estate developer, announced in January that its Hallets Point residential project slated for development in Astoria, Queens would generate all of its own electricity, and not connect to the grid. This announcement was widely viewed as a reflection of the Durst Organization’s prior disputes with Con Ed over the standby tariff.
At a panel discussion on standby tariffs convened by the Public Service Commission (PSC), New York’s utility regulator, in late January, the concerns voiced by representatives of large energy consumers fell into four broad categories:
· The standby tariff amounts to an excessive and arbitrary tax on distributed generation;
· The exemptions that have been inserted on the tariff over the years (e.g. for small scale CHP plants) have stunted growth of distributed generation, as the main goal of project developers has become to keep generators small enough to qualify for exemptions rather than to install bigger generators that could provide cost savings and other benefits to facility owners;
· The exemptions tend to be time-limited, leading to regulatory uncertainty on whether they will be renewed or extended, which further discourages investment; and
· The tariff is so complex and difficult to apply that even high-priced energy consultants can only predict its financial impact with great difficulty and many qualifications, creating still another disincentive to investment in distributed generation.
Customer proposals for “fixing” Con Ed’s standby tariff
Short of a Durst Organization-style grid defection, the large energy consumers who own and operate distributed generation (or would be inclined to do so) offer three types of proposals for “fixing” Con Ed’s standby tariff. Some insist that the standby tariff should simply be abolished. Nearly all stress the need for more transparency to make the underlying rationales for divvying up reserve capacity costs among different categories of customers clearer, and to make it easier for power-generating customers to understand the complex tariff formulas that must be applied. Many seek quick and dirty fixes such as modifying particular cost allocation formulas, credits or exemptions.
The recent issue of Track 2 Order serves as an important starting point for reforming the standby tariff, and shows that state officials are beginning to work toward comprehensive, long-lasting solutions. But much more work must be done to hash out the complexities of the standby tariff and its barriers to clean, distributed energy. In Part two of this post, I will expand on the large energy consumers’ proposals to fix the standby tariff, show how a course can be charted toward long-term, equitable, and broadly-acceptable solutions that can foster significantly more investment in distributed generation, and propose modifications that will lead to cleaner distributed generation.
This is one of two blogs exploring the standby tariff in New York and how it discourages distributed, on-site, customer-owned and operated power generation. In part two, we’ll explore how a course can be charted to fix it.
http://blogs.edf.org/energyexchange/2016/06/27/new-yorks-standby-tariff-standing-in-the-way-of-distributed-energy/
-
Gov. Snyder Moves to 'Disassociate' Mich. from MATS Challenge
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Sean Reill
Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R) has formally parted company with the state's attorney general, Bill Schuette, also a Republican, over the latest legal challenge to U.S. EPA's mercury regulations on power plants.
In an email to Greenwire this morning, Snyder spokeswoman Anna Heaton confirmed that the governor asked Schuette to "disassociate" the state from the lawsuit filed late last week over EPA's supplemental finding to its Mercury and Air Toxics Standards.
Even if the appeal were successful, "there would be no practical impacts," Heaton said, citing the state's own regulations on mercury emissions from power plants.
"There is no value to the citizens of Michigan in pursuing further legal action to challenge MATS," she added.
As a result, the appeal filed late last week with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is brought in the name of "Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette, on behalf of the people of Michigan," not the "State of Michigan" (E&ENews PM, June 24).
The difference is not purely symbolic, said Howard Learner, executive director of the Environmental Law and Policy Center, a Chicago-based advocacy group that had asked Snyder in March to end the state's participation.
First, the change "sends a strong signal" to the court that the governor of the state that was the lead party in the litigation "is reassessing his position," Learner said. In addition, it makes clear to state attorneys general "that there is a political cost to endless litigation" over pollution standards that the public supports, he said.
A Schuette spokeswoman did not immediately reply to a request for comment today.
Michigan was the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit brought by 21 Republican-led states challenging the mercury regulations, which were officially published in 2012 and were projected at the time to be among the most expensive rules in EPA history. That suit led to last June's Supreme Court ruling that the agency had failed to consider compliance costs in making its original decision to regulate releases of mercury and other dangerous air pollutants from power plants.
EPA's supplemental finding, released in April in response to that ruling, reaffirmed that its original decision was "appropriate and necessary" under the Clean Air Act (Greenwire, April 15). Fourteen states have joined Schuette in the lawsuit filed last week with the D.C. Circuit Court. They have not yet spelled out the grounds for their appeal.
Earlier this month, the high court refused to hear an appeal from Michigan and other states arguing that the mercury regulations were illegally
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039468
-
Shell Closes Its Final chapter in U.S. Arctic Campaign
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
Royal Dutch Shell PLC has closed the last chapter in its $7 billion campaign to explore for oil and gas in the American Arctic, dropping its two-year bureaucratic battle over how long it should be allowed to retain its Chukchi and Beaufort seas leases.
In a motion to an Interior Department review board, Shell indicated that it no longer wishes to appeal the department's 2015 ruling that denied the company's request to hold onto its Arctic leases for an additional five years.
Last week, Interior's Board of Land Appeals granted that motion and closed the case.
Lois Epstein, Arctic program director for the Wilderness Society, said Shell's decision is "good news for the Arctic Ocean, and for Arctic residents and coastlines, which will no longer face the threat of a major oil spill in the near term."
In its 2015 ruling, Interior said it was rejecting Shell's bid for additional time because the company hadn't provided a schedule for future exploration.
Shell had originally asked for the five-year lease extension in late 2014, as the company was eagerly preparing to explore for oil in the Chukchi Sea during last summer's 2015 open water season (EnergyWire, Oct. 28, 2014).
But in September, Shell announced it had hit a dry hole and closed down its Chukchi operation for the foreseeable future.
Since then, the company relinquished all but one of its Chukchi leases. That remaining lease is due to expire in 2020. Shell also owns more than 60 Beaufort Sea leases on its own or in partnership with other companies. Those units will begin to lapse in 2017.
Shell isn't alone in being denied more time to explore in Alaska's northern waters. Over the last two years, Interior also rejected similar requests from Statoil ASA and ConocoPhillips Co. Both of those companies have since given up all of their U.S. Arctic leases.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039433
-
Arctic Exploration: Securing a Winning Hand for America’s Energy Future
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By Aileen Yeung
Producing more oil and natural gas in the United States has dramatically lowered energy prices – anyone who has pumped gas at $2 a gallon recently can tell you that. But America’s newfound role as the world’s leading producer of oil and natural gas affects even more than household budgets and the broader economy. It has granted America the independence to pursue a foreign policy that is firmly rooted in our values without the threat of jeopardizing our energy supply. It has even inspired headlines like “There Would Be No Iranian Nuclear Talks If Not for Fracking.”
But energy is a prerequisite for energy independence, and to keep America strong and secure for future generations, we as a country have an obligation to embrace every opportunity to fortify our energy supply.
For this reason, a group of former high-ranking military leaders – the Secretary of Defense for President Clinton and 15 generals and admirals, representing over a hundred combined years of service to our country – recently called on the Obama Administration to support energy exploration in the Arctic.
It may be easy to dismiss the importance of Arctic drilling today, given the abundant oil and natural gas production currently happening in the Lower 48. But geopolitics and national security are a much longer game, played out across decades. Countries that think long-term, plan ahead and leave themselves plenty of options, win. Nations that don’t, lose.
“We in government have an obligation to be a little foresighted,” emphasized Robert J. Papp Jr., former Coast Guard Commandant and now the State Department’s Special Representative to the Arctic.
The link between energy and national security is inextricable: In the words of Tom Donilon, former National Security Adviser to President Obama, “America’s new energy posture allows us to engage from a position of greater strength” and “affords us a stronger hand in pursuing and implementing our international security goals.”
But America’s hand in diplomacy can stay strong for only as long as our energy security remains robust, and this “new energy posture” is neither guaranteed nor indefinite. With oil production in the Lower 48 projected to decline in the coming decades, America needs new supplies of energy to avoid risking renewed dependence on foreign oil – and to keep an indispensable and peaceful force multiplier in our foreign policy toolkit.
Luckily, we are blessed with abundant energy resources: The U.S. Arctic alone holds the equivalent of 15 years of domestic net oil imports at 2015 levels. But for reasons ranging from a more complex regulatory regime to shorter exploration seasons, offshore Arctic oil and gas development takes longer than elsewhere in the U.S. – at least ten years – so the process has to start now in order for Arctic resources to be available when production in the Lower 48 begins to fall.
But after the Interior Department so readily excluded the Atlantic from its upcoming 2017-2022 offshore oil and gas leasing program, there are signs that it is now considering barring access to the Arctic, threatening our future energy security and our leadership position on the world stage.
The Obama Administration has called increasing America’s energy independence “a critical national security strategy,” and its National Strategy for the Arctic Region warned that an “undisciplined approach to exploring new opportunities in this frontier could result in significant harm to the region, to our national security interests, and to the global good.”
It is time for the Interior Department to take the disciplined approach and allow for Arctic offshore oil and gas leasing in the next five years. How Interior chooses to act now will reflect President Obama’s commitment to keeping our country safe and secure long into the future for everyone who calls America home.
Aileen Yeung is a spokesperson for the Arctic Energy Center, a joint initiative of the Alaska Oil and Gas Association and the Independent Petroleum Association of America to further public understanding of the science, technology and opportunity associated with Arctic energy exploration and development.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-environment/284879-arctic-exploration-securing-a-winning-hand-for
-
California Regulators Approve PG&E Gas Storage/Pipeline Rate Case
Jun 27, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
California regulators on Thursday approved nearly $950 million in increased rates to support Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s (PG&E) natural gas storage and transmission pipeline operations.
The approval on a 4-0 vote does not include the pending $850 million disallowance associated with the combination utility's identified shortcomings in handling the 2010 San Bruno transmission pipeline failure. (see Daily GPI, April 9, 2015).
A PG&E spokesperson said the San Francisco-based utility doesn't agree with parts of the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC)decision, but "we want our customers to know that the dedication to our mission of becoming the safest, most reliable gas company in the country is as strong as ever."
Rather than an almost 80% increase in gas operations revenues requested by PG&E, the CPUC, with commissioner Mike Florio recusing himself, unanimously approved a 27.1% rate hike, or $192.9 million more than 2014 in an overall 2015 revenue requirement of $908 million. The utility tied most of the increase to efforts to enhance safety in its transmission pipeline and gas storage system since the San Bruno pipeline failure.
Separately, the five-member CPUC voted 5-0 to adopt a general rate case settlement for Sempra Energy's San Diego Gas and Electric Co. and Southern California Gas Co., totaling $1.8 billion and $2.2 billion, respectively. Each total represented about a $100 million decrease from the amounts each had as part of an earlier submitted settlement.
The lead CPUC commissioner for the PG&E case, Carla Peterman, called the utility's natural gas operations "a massive aging system" whose total transmission pipelines laid end-to-end would stretch from San Francisco to New York City and back, with pipe left over. "It carries high volumes of gas near population centers, and the tragic San Bruno explosion is a constant reminder of the need for safe operation of the system," Peterman said.
Peterman acknowledged that dozens of stakeholders and consumer advocates involved in the case argued that PG&E's request was too high. "But there was also a broad consensus that the work in this rate case needs to be completed to improve the overall safety of the PG&E system," said Peterman, adding that the decision is aimed at safety improvements while using rate mechanisms to improve affordability for consumers.
San Francisco utility watchdog group The Utility Reform Network (TURN) balked at this, alleging that regulators approved an 85% rate hike at the same time PG&E is involved in a federal court criminal trial regarding its alleged safety and other operating violations tied to the San Bruno incident (see Daily GPI, June 21). TURN Legal Director Tom Long alleged that the utility "let its pipes rust and now wants customers to pay again for maintenance that should have been done all along."
This rate decision includes requirements for the utility to complete hydrostatic testing of another 680 miles of transmission pipelines to detect defects and replace another 60 miles of aging pipes, according to Peterman.
"PG&E's rates are already among the highest in the United States," said TURN Executive Director Mark Toney. "These high rates have not guaranteed safety or reliability, but instead resulted in well more than a quarter of a million households being shut off in 2015."
Peterman said the decision also requires PG&E to provide additional information tied to the aftermath of the Aliso Canyon underground gas storage field's four-month storage well leak in Southern California that ended in February this year (see Daily GPI, Feb. 18). Regulators are requiring information from the utility on safety orders, risk management, and emergency response plans for each of its storage facilities.
Also as part of Thursday's action, the CPUC is imposing a penalty on PG&E for the long delays in the proceeding based on ex-parte communications violations in the so-called e-mail scandal between the utility and some key decision-makers at the CPUC, Peterman said (see Daily GPI, Sept. 16, 2014). The penalty is estimated at close to $140 million.
Because of these and other penalties paid for by shareholders, PG&E's actual investments in safer, more reliable gas infrastructure will be much greater than the nearly billion-dollar price tag put on the rate case, Peterman said.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/106888-california-regulators-approve-pge-gas-storagepipeline-rate-case
-
Obama Heckled by Oil Protesters in Seattle
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Lisa Friedman
It's always something with those climate change activists.
At least that's the message President Obama sent when anti-oil protesters heckled him as he spoke at a Seattle fundraiser Friday, demanding he stop crude shipments on Northwest railways.
"Mr. President, use your authority to ban oil trains now!" someone in the crowd shouted as Obama made remarks at a fundraiser for Gov. Jay Inslee (D).
"It's all right. This is what I love about the Democratic Party," Obama responded. "It doesn't matter how much I do, I've always got a bigger 'to do' list. It's like, I'm sorry -- you organized the world around climate change? Got a Paris Agreement signed? Nope, you didn't deal with this yet.
"So I've still got six months. Give me a little time," he said to laughter and applause.
Indeed, climate change was a major theme of Obama's jaunt through Seattle. He noted the United States has cut the oil it buys from foreign countries in half, doubled clean energy generation and worked to curb emissions.
He slammed Republicans and "big polluters" for blocking emissions regulations and lauded Inslee as "one of the strongest advocates on this issue in the country" for enacting a carbon cap.
"You can roll back the progress that we've made on climate, or you can come together to protect our planet," Obama said. He struck a similar note in separate remarks at a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee fundraiser, where he slammed climate skepticism in the GOP.
"I would like to say that what we've had over the last eight years and what we're having now is a serious conversation between two parties, where we've agreed on the facts that there is climate change," Obama said. But, he added, "that's not what's happened, because we have a party right on the other side that ignores the science and facts of climate change."
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039415
-
Railroad Blamed for Fiery Oil Train Derailment on Oregon Washington Border
Jun 27, 2016 | Claims Journal
By Matthew Brown and Gillian Flaccus
Federal investigators on Thursday blamed Union Pacific Railroad for a fiery oil train derailment along the Oregon-Washington border, saying the company failed to properly maintain its track.
Preliminary findings on the June 3 derailment in the Columbia River Gorge raise questions about why the company didn’t find the broken bolts that triggered the wreck when it inspected the tracks right before the derailment. Union Pacific faces potential penalties for safety violations, officials said.
he Associated Press obtained the findings ahead of their Thursday release.
Advanced electronic brakes proposed by regulators could have made the derailment less severe, Federal Railroad Administrator Sarah Feinberg said. The brakes could have reduced the number of cars that went off the tracks and prevented the one that first burst into flames from being punctured, officials said.
“We’re talking about upgrading a brake system that is from the Civil War era,” Feinberg said. “It’s not too much to ask these companies to improve their braking systems in the event of an accident so fewer cars are derailing.”
The railroad industry, through the Association of American Railroads, has lobbied against new braking requirements, saying they would provide “minimal safety benefits” at a price tag topping $3 billion. Federal officials say putting new brakes just on locomotives hauling large loads of oil and other flammable liquids would cost far less, around $80 million.
The derailment released 42,000 gallons of crude oil and sparked a massive fire that burned for 14 hours.
The mayor of Mosier, the tiny river town where the train derailed, reacted with alarm to the preliminary findings.
Union Pacific said Wednesday that it would resume running oil trains through the gorge sometime later this week despite objections from residents and elected officials.
“Where else are there rusty bolts that could fail?” said Mayor Arlene Burns. “I think it’s outrageous that they’re telling us it’s safe.”
Union Pacific said its inspections didn’t detect the broken bolts that caused the derailment. The company tests for sideways movement in the rails using a machine that puts an amount of pressure equivalent to a locomotive on the rails – a stress test that would reveal loose or broken bolts, said Justin Jacobs, a Union Pacific spokesman.
The stress test previously was conducted every 18 months but will now be done every three months, Jacobs said. Union Pacific also has expanded inspections of all its tracks in Oregon and Washington state, particularly in curved portions of track, he said.
The company has said the rails were inspected as recently as May 31, but it wasn’t clear if the inspection included the stress test. Jacobs didn’t know.
The government’s preliminary report said walking inspections along the rails were critical to detect broken bolts and track movement. Feinberg said it was the railroad’s responsibility to detect those problems.
“We feel like it could have been prevented with closer inspections, better maintenance,” she said.
At least 27 oil trains have been involved in major derailments, fires or oil spills in the U.S. and Canada during the past decade, according to an AP analysis of accident records. Federal officials have responded with requirements for tougher tank cars, speed restrictions and other actions, but the accidents have continued.
Steven Ditmeyer, a rail consultant who worked in leadership positions at both the Federal Railroad Administration and at Burlington Northern Railroad, said sheared-off bolts like those seen in the Oregon derailment are likely symptoms of a larger problem.
In the 1990s, he said, Burlington Northern had a series of derailments on tracks in Washington state that all involved sheared off railroad spikes, which served the same function as the bolts in question in the recent wreck.
Investigators eventually determined overloaded cars, a lack of lubrication between the wheel assembly and the body of the tanker cars and not enough gravel in the railroad bed combined to put strain on the track when the train was in a curve. That strain loosened the bolts holding the rails to the rail ties and pushed the rails apart, causing derailments, he said.
“When they said those sheared lag bolts, that was the hint that said they really need to look in the direction of these other aspects,” Ditmeyer told the AP. “These are heavy cars when they’re fully loaded,” and a treatment to reduce the volatility of the Bakken crude makes the oil heavier, he said.
The Oregon Department of Transportation last week asked federal rail authorities for a moratorium on oil trains in the Columbia River Gorge after also expressing concerns that the weight of the oil trains might be too much for the tracks.
In a presentation last week, department administrator Hal Gard said the lag bolts found at the scene were rusted on both ends, indicating they were sheared off before the derailment. State officials showed a photo of a pile of lag bolts collected at the site.
Feinberg said there are weight limits on tank cars that haul crude oil and other products, but there’s been no suggestion Union Pacific’s cars exceeded those.
“Whether a railroad is moving heavy cars or lighter cars, it is still their responsibility to maintain the track,” she said.
http://www.claimsjournal.com/news/west/2016/06/27/271827.htm
-
3 Questions Brexit Poses for Climate and Energy Policy
Jun 27, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Jean Chemnick
As the dust settles on Britain's unexpected decision to depart the European Union, there are more questions than answers about what the pullout means for everything from trade to energy policy.
Bewildered European policy analysts -- many of whom assumed the "Brexit" referendum would deliver a narrow victory for the "remain" camp -- are still grappling with Thursday's result. What will the split between Britain and the other 27 nations of the European Union mean for British expats? Do a tumbling pound sterling and nervous markets presage a long post-split recession? And what does Brexit mean for Britain's access to the single market and for its climate policy, which is now a mixture of domestic law and international engagement that is likely to take years to untangle as Britain departs?
"It's early to say, but I'm assuming that part of the negotiations that will happen over at least the next two years will be how the U.K. will align itself with the E.U.'s climate and energy policy," said Wendel Trio, president of Climate Action Network Europe.
But the United Kingdom's continued involvement with the continent won't necessarily follow the preferences of the departing country, analysts say. Instead, it will have to be approved by a European Union that might be keen to make an example of the country that jilted it to quash similar movements in other member states.
Here are three of the top unanswered energy questions the United Kingdom must resolve:
1. What does Brexit mean for the Paris Agreement on climate change?
One of the first questions to be settled is how Brexit will affect Europe's commitment to last year's landmark Paris climate agreement. The European Union put forward a combined promise to cut emissions at least 40 percent compared with 1990 levels by 2030, and Brussels planned to spend the summer divvying that responsibility up among its members in preparation for joining the deal. But the impending departure of the European Union's second-largest emitter throws a monkey wrench in that plan.
Member of Parliament Barry Gardiner, the Labor Party's shadow energy and climate minister, told ClimateWire that Brexit could jeopardize the global warming accord.
"The implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate may now be seriously undermined," he said, noting that the United Kingdom played a leading role in pushing for greater E.U. ambition ahead of the deal and also acted as a bridge between Western European powers and Eastern and Central European countries like coal-dependent Poland on climate and other issues.
The United Kingdom is on a pathway to cut its emissions 57 percent by 2030 under a 2008 domestic law -- a trajectory that would have gone a long way toward delivering the European Union's collective commitment.
That raises the question of how the United Kingdom will formulate its own contribution to the Paris Agreement now that it is leaving, and how that exercise will affect the rest of Europe.
Trio said Britain's pledge would need the approval and input of the other 27 nations because national contributions were considered in the E.U. contribution. But he didn't think the European Union could renege on its pledge simply because it is losing Britain.
"A number of countries will have to do more than in a scenario where the U.K. would stay in the E.U., but I'm also assuming that there might be discussions about how to mitigate that," he said. "But I think it would be very hard for E.U. leaders to reduce the pledge."
Elliot Diringer of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions said the Paris Agreement allows countries to change the pledges they made in Paris only if they increase them.
"The E.U. will obviously be encompassing a smaller share of emissions, and how they go about recalculating that we can only speculate," he said.
Britain's path to joining the agreement is expected to be much the same as it would have been had the referendum vote gone the other way. There was some speculation last week that Britain might buck the European Union and join Paris unilaterally -- a move that would help the deal enter force this year.
But doing that would be in violation of E.U. procedure, and Prime Minister David Cameron has promised an orderly withdrawal from the union.
2. How will Brexit affect U.K.'s participation in the E.U. ETS?
The United Kingdom also introduced carbon trading before the rest of Europe embraced it. It enacted the world's first multisector cap-and-trade system in 2001, which informed the European Union's Emissions Trading System that premiered in 2005 and is now in its second commitment period.
But last week's referendum casts doubt on whether Britain can continue to participate in the E.U. program, which is part of the single market to which analysts warn Britain may have difficulty gaining access.
Trio said the European Commission would have a strong incentive to let Europe's second-largest emitter participate and might not throw up barriers.
"It's an important part of the market, and the bigger the market is, the more relevance the instrument has," he said. "So I would expect that the European commission would be very strongly in favor of keeping the U.K. inside the ETS."
But he acknowledged that participation in the ETS would now be subject to negotiations between Britain and the compact it is leaving.
The tone of those talks "is, of course, hard to predict," he said.
There is precedent for non-E.U. countries to participate in the ETS. Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein all do.
"The Brexit verdict does not mean that the U.K. cannot continue to play a central role in the carbon market," officials with the International Emissions Trading Association said in a statement. "Continuity is vital to maintaining the integrity of the market, and it's also critical to maintaining the global momentum from the Paris climate talks last December."
But the three non-E.U. members of the ETS abide by trade policy set by the European Union and even contribute to its budget as a condition of accessing the union's single market -- strictures a post-Brexit Britain is unlikely to embrace.
In Switzerland, which is also not part of the compact, talks have stalled for the moment over whether and how that country would link its ETS with the European Union's program. Switzerland has balked at E.U. policies concerning movement of labor -- one of the top concerns expressed by pro-Brexit voters in the United Kingdom.
And observers say the European Union would be unlikely to ease U.K. access to any part of the joint market -- whether for trading, participation in the European electricity and gas markets, or anything else -- for fear of encouraging populist movements in other countries.
"The security that the U.K. felt as part of the wider European Energy Union will now be lost," said Gardiner. "[That] is likely to make the U.K. decide that it must press ahead with domestic fracking and the production of unconventional gas. In the U.K. context, this would lock our energy infrastructure into a pathway that rendered it impossible to meet our long-term emissions reductions."
3. What will Brexit mean for the U.K.'s own climate laws?
For the moment, there aren't votes in Parliament to roll back Britain's domestic climate policies, but advocates worry that could change.
Cameron announced after the vote that he would step down to make way for other leadership this autumn, and one of the top contenders for his job is former London Lord Mayor Boris Johnson.
The new prime minister will have a lot of sway over how the United Kingdom formulates domestic policies to replace European policies, like the E.U. ban on hydraulic fracturing.
"One of the fears that we have is that the Brexit victory will actually strengthen those who are to the right of the political spectrum in the U.K., many of them more critical to ambitious climate and energy policy," said Trio. "So it might be that even while climate and energy were part of the Brexit debate, that those who are favoring less strong policies might feel stronger and might attack existing legislation."
Gardiner noted that many of the political operatives who supported the E.U. exodus are also skeptics of climate action or science.
Johnson's statements on the issue have been mixed, while fellow Brexit leaders like former Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove and figurehead Lord Nigel Lawson have disputed the scientific consensus. Anti-regulatory sentiment was also a major driver of the Brexit movement.
"Sad to relate, perhaps, but nonetheless true, is the fact that the very people who have criticized the U.K.'s 'excessive zeal' on climate policy are those who have led us out of the E.U.," Gardiner said. "They have done so because in almost all cases, they want less regulation."
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039411
-
Democrats Adopt Climate Change Science Investigation in Platform
Jun 27, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
Members of the Democratic National Committee’s platform panel have formally endorsed federal investigations into fossil fuel companies' climate science, including a high-profile probe into Exxon Mobil Corp.
While forming their platform this weekend, members of the committee included language saying, “all corporations owe it to their shareholders to fully analyze and disclose risks they face including climate risks," according to Inside Climate News.
“Those who fail to do so should be held accountable. Democrats also respectfully request the Department of Justice investigate allegations of corporate fraud on the part of fossil fuel companies accused of misleading shareholders and the public on the scientific reality of climate change."
The platform didn’t name Exxon, but the company has become the highest-profile target for Democratic attorneys general, who are probing claims it mislead the public about the extent of its knowledge about climate change.
Exxon has denied the allegations and fought back against the investigations, calling them an infringement on the company’s First Amendment rights.
Both presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, who appointed members to the platform committee, have called for a federal investigation into Exxon.
Despite the climate science amendment — and a call to use 100 percent renewable energy by 2050 — the committee voted down a host of other environmental issues critical to liberals, including a call to ban fracking, end fossil fuel production on federal lands and put a price on carbon.
In a statement, RL Miller, the cofounder of the green group Climate Hawks Vote, typified greens’ response to the committee, saying she was “thrilled” by the fossil fuel investigation plank and “happy” with the renewable energy goal.
“However, we don’t see how we’ll make that bold leap with baby steps - and appalled by the incrementalist approach adopted by the majority of the committee,” she said.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/285000-democrats-adopt-climate-change-science-investigation-in-platform
-
Sulfate Aerosols Implicated in Global Warming Slowdown
Jun 27, 2016 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Jyllian Kemsley
The rise of global mean surface temperatures slowed in the first years of this century. Scientists have pinpointed variation in Pacific Ocean surface temperatures that occur over timescales of decades as the primary cause of this warming slowdown.
But the shift of this so-called Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) to a cooler phase may not have been an all-natural event. Instead, changes in fossil-fuel emissions may have driven the swing, according to a climate modeling study by a team from the U.K. government weather and climate office (Nat. Clim. Change 2016, DOI: 10.1038/nclimate3058).
Sulfur dioxide released by fossil-fuel combustion leads to the formation of sulfate aerosols, which reflect sunlight and consequently have a local cooling effect. In China, an increase in emissions and aerosols resulted in cooling during the time period studied. In North America and Europe, decreasing emissions and aerosols resulted in warming.
The consequence was a strengthening of the Pacific trade winds, which acted to bury heat below the water’s surface, says Doug M. Smith, who led the work. The modeling cannot say for certain whether the effect pushed the PDO into a cooler phase or strengthened what was already happening naturally.
The modeling study further indicates that as China reduces emissions to improve air quality, the PDO may move into a warmer phase and drive global surface temperatures to increase faster. “There are some signs that this could be happening now, but we need more years to know for sure,” Smith says.
http://cen.acs.org/articles/94/i26/Sulfate-aerosols-implicated-global-warming.html
-
Death Toll to Rise Without Policy Changes -- IEA
Jun 27, 2016 | Reuters (In E&E Greenwire)
By Nina Chestney
A new International Energy Agency report says premature deaths from air pollution will continue rising if major changes in energy policy are not made.
Around 6.5 million people every year die from poor air quality both outside and inside. It's the fourth-largest threat to human health; high blood pressure, dietary risks and smoking are the first three.
IEA's report predicts that outdoor air pollution deaths will rise to 4.5 million in 2040 from 3 million today. But indoor deaths will decrease to 2.9 million in 2040 from 3.5 million today.
The release of pollutants, according to IEA, is from unregulated and inefficient production and use of energy. And even though global emissions are projected to decline overall by 2040, status quo energy policy is not enough to prevent further air pollution-caused deaths.
The organization prescribed a 7 percent increase in energy investment, or $4.7 trillion, by 2040.
"This is completely peanuts. With a 7 percent increase, you can save over 3 million lives," IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol told reporters in London (Nina Chestney, Reuters, June 27).
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2016/06/27/stories/1060039447
-
It’s Official: Humans Are Making the Earth Much Greener
Jun 27, 2016 | Washington Post
By Chris Mooney
Earlier this month, NASA scientists provided a visualization of a startling climate change trend — the Earth is getting greener, as viewed from space, especially in its rapidly warming northern regions. And this is presumably occurring as more carbon dioxide in the air, along with warmer temperatures and longer growing seasons, makes plants very, very happy.
Now, new research in Nature Climate Change not only reinforces the reality of this trend — which is already provoking debate about the overall climate consequences of a warming Arctic — but statistically attributes it to human causes, which largely means greenhouse gas emissions (albeit with a mix of other elements as well).
The roughly three-decade greening trend itself is apparent, the study notes, in satellite images of “leaf area index” — defined as “the amount of leaf area per ground area,” as Robert Buitenwerf of Aaarhus University in Denmark explains in a commentary accompanying the study — across most of the northern hemisphere outside of the tropics, a region sometimes defined as the “extratropics.” Granted, there are a few patches in Alaska, Canada and Eurasia where greening has not been seen.
Starting from this set of observations, the researchers, led by Jiafu Mao of Oak Ridge National Laboratory but including 18 others from multiple institutions in the U.S., France, and China, conducted what scientists call a “detection and attribution” study. This is an experiment in which differing sets of climate model runs are used to determine whether a particular event or change — ranging from an extreme heat wave, to a coral bleaching event, to a major trend like Arctic greening — is more likely to happen in simulations that include human greenhouse gas emissions, than it is to happen in those that do not.
Sure enough, the greenhouse-gas filled computer simulations looked much more like the satellite observations than did simulations that only included natural variability. The study therefore concludes that “the trend of strengthened northern vegetation greening…can be rigorously attributed, with high statistical confidence, to anthropogenic forcings, particularly to rising atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases.”]
While this formal detection and attribution appears to be new, the report is at least the third study in the past several months alone to highlight northern hemisphere greening and to reinforce this basic conclusion. It’s one that has often been celebrated by climate change skeptics and contrarians who have long contended that global warming won’t be all bad, and that plants might help offset any global warming trend.
“We first find this kind of human fingerprint…particularly the greenhouse gas impact, on this kind of enhanced vegetation growth,” says Mao, the study’s lead author.
The researchers also dove in more closely to try to determine precisely why so much greening is happening in the Northern Hemisphere’s colder latitudes. Sure enough, the overall trend was tied to warmer temperatures, although in areas where greening was missing, declining precipitation trends seemed to partly explain the result as well. (The study did not discuss whether growing wildfires in northern forests may also be countering greening in some areas.)
Another factor enhancing plant growth, meanwhile, seems to be more human-induced falling of nitrogen out of the atmosphere, as we have amped up the global nitrogen cycle with our fertilizers and our fossil fuels (nitrogen also can enhance plant growth).
In his accompanying essay evaluating the research, Aarhus University’s Buitenwerf praises the study but notes that in some ways, the current satellite-based approach represents a blunt instrument. An examination of total leaf area, he notes, doesn’t record whether a particular areas has changed its type of vegetation, say from smaller tundra shrubs to small trees.
Buitenwerf also notes that the science is less clear about what is happening in the global tropics and in the Southern hemisphere, where greening trends are either less apparent, or more difficult to explain.
Still, the subtext of all of this research is clear — a key fraction of all the greenhouse gases that humans pour into the atmosphere each year is pulled back into plants through the process of photosynthesis. This is happening even as the overall warming of the planet may, by lengthening growing seasons and moistening the atmosphere, further stoke plant growth. They don’t call it the “greenhouse effect” for nothing.
The key question then becomes how much this process can offset overall global warming over time. And that’s quite unclear.
There’s a lot, after all, that we don’t understand. For instance, a recent National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report found that while Arctic tundras have indeed been greening over the past 30 years, in the the last two to four years, that trend has reversed itself.
“Although we already identify this kind of human impact on this historical vegetation growth, for the future, it’s hard to predict,” says Mao. He said he is not sure to what extent the greening trend will continue, as “disturbances” like wildfires might counteract it, or plants may become “acclimated to this kind of high temperature.”
Still, the trend is already prompting more optimistic assessments of our climate future in some quarters. Arctic greening was recently cited, in a major report by the U.S. Geological Survey, as the central reason that the state of Alaska, despite worsening wildfires and more thaw of permafrost, might still be able to stow away more carbon than it loses over the course of the 21st century.
It is clear, then, that greening is emerging as a factor with the potential to blunt some of the worst impacts of human greenhouse gas emissions. But thus far, researchers do not seem to be arguing that it’s enough to counterbalance the entire human-induced warming trend.
“While we are perhaps lucky that CO2 has this effect on plant physiology, in addition to being a greenhouse gas, it is not our ‘get out of jail free’ card when it comes to our ongoing emissions of CO2,” climate scientist Richard Betts of the UK’s Hadley Centre wroterecently.
Instead, global greening is perhaps better taken as yet another indicator, visible from space, of how much we are causing the Earth to change.
“Given the strong evidence provided here of historical human induced greening in the northern extratropics, society should consider both intended and unintended consequences of its interactions with terrestrial ecosystems and the climate system,” the new study concludes.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/06/27/its-official-humans-are-making-the-earth-much-greener/
Industry and Association News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation News
Environment News
Add recipients
Suggested