Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 7/18/16
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Why Chemicals in the U.S. Are Still “Innocent Until Proven Guilty”
Jul 18, 2016 | Smithsonian Magazine
By Alissa Cordner
Last month, President Barack Obama signed a chemical bill that was meant to solve a problem few people knew they had. That problem was the substandard safety of everyday chemicals—an issue that affects anyone who uses household cleaners, has a couch or wears clothing. -
Grinding Chemicals Together in an Effort to be Greener
Jul 18, 2016 | The New York Times
By Xiaozhi Lim
The timer started, and a middle school student named Tony Mack began his first chemistry experiment. As he weighed chemicals under a graduate student’s supervision, his father, James, a chemist at the University of Cincinnati, assembled glassware next to him, engrossed in his own experiment. -
High Rates Of Bladder Cancer Linked To Arsenic In Drinking Water
Jul 18, 2016 | Environmental Working Group
By Curt DellaValle
The recent crisis in Flint, Mich., sounded the alarm on the dangers of lead contamination in drinking water. Now there’s potentially more bad news for the nation’s water supply. -
Trump Pick Pence Held Muddled Views on Clean Power Plan
Jul 18, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Emily Holden and Rod Kuckro
Donald Trump's running mate, former Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, since at least 2000 has been railing against the proposition that greenhouse gas emissions are changing the Earth's climate (ClimateWire, July 15). -
North Dakota Sues Over New Methane Rule
Jul 18, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
North Dakota’s attorney general has sued the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over new methane emission rules at oil and gas facilities. -
Fracking May Worsen Asthma for Nearby Residents, Study Says
Jul 18, 2016 | Associated Press (in Washington Post)
By Lindsey Tanner
Fracking may worsen asthma in children and adults who live near sites where the oil and gas drilling method is used, according to an 8-year study in Pennsylvania. -
The Future of US Fracking and Finding Who Gets the Final Say
Jul 18, 2016 | Platts - Podcasts
Fracking helped unleash a flood of new US oil and gas production, but regulating it is no simple task. -
Inside the Diabolical Ukrainian Hack That Put the U.S. Grid on High Alert
Jul 18, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak and Peter Behr
Eastern Europe was blanketed in a heat wave last summer. In Kiev, Ukraine, a state of desperate resignation had set in as fighting intensified between pro-Russia rebels and Ukrainian forces to the east. -
House Dem Agenda Focused on Security, Not Green Issues
Jul 15, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By George Cahlink
House Democrats rolled out their fall campaign agenda this week, urging members to talk about economic and security issues as they seek re-election -- but making little mention of green topics. -
Oil & Gas Industry Groups Say CWA Jurisdiction Rule Creates NWP Doubts
Jul 18, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
Oil and natural gas industry groups say EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers’ Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction rule has created significant uncertainty from litigation and implementation over the Corps’ new draft streamlined CWA nationwide permits (NWPs), urging the Corps to clarify the rule’s impacts on the permit program. -
Advocates Threaten Suit Over EPA Plan To Cut NO2 Monitors In Small Cities
Jul 18, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
Environmentalists appear to be preparing the ground for a lawsuit to challenge EPA's forthcoming rule that will scale-back previously promulgated measures requiring smaller towns and cities to install new roadside nitrogen dioxide (NO2) air monitors, with advocates warning that EPA's policy reversal is poorly justified and therefore unlawful.
Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.
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Environment News
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Why Chemicals in the U.S. Are Still “Innocent Until Proven Guilty”
Jul 18, 2016 | Smithsonian Magazine
By Alissa Cordner
Last month, President Barack Obama signed a chemical bill that was meant to solve a problem few people knew they had. That problem was the substandard safety of everyday chemicals—an issue that affects anyone who uses household cleaners, has a couch or wears clothing. In a month filled with dramatic political news, this seemingly small legislative achievement received little media attention. Yet it actually represents a major reform, providing the decades-old Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) with a much-needed retrofit.
In the European Union, safety laws guarantee that both industrial and household chemicals are vetted for their potential risks to human health and the environment before they appear on the market. In the United States, however, chemicals are generally “innocent until proven guilty”—a maxim that’s good for people, but bad for potential toxic chemicals. Scientists at the Environmental Protection Agency have found that the majority of chemicals in use today have not been sufficiently examined for human health toxicity or environmental exposure. How can this be?
Originally passed in 1976, the old TSCA was meant to help the EPA regulate the safe production and use of industrial chemicals. But the act was founded on scientific assumptions and practices that are far outdated today. Perhaps worse, TSCA also grandfathered in a long list of “existing” chemicals—which made it extremely difficult for the EPA to pull them from the market even if they were later shown to be harmful. (It has been easier for the EPA to require companies to develop data on chemicals that are new to the market, but many hurdles still exist.)
As a result, people have been exposed to toxic chemicals left under-regulated by the EPA for decades—with devastating effects. This has been the case since 1989, when a federal court overturned the EPA’s ban on asbestos, one of the best-known carcinogens ever used. Since then, the EPA has never attempted to completely pull an existing chemical from the market. Lead, which is known to harm children’s brain development at extremely low levels and was banned from use in house paint in 1978, is still used in ammunition and some industrial manufacturing.
Newly developed chemicals approved by the EPA through the TSCA review process have also proved to be hazardous. FireMaster 550, a flame retardant, was developed as a supposedly safer replacement chemical after the leading flame retardant for furniture foam was banned in several states and pulled from the market. Yet in 2012, after being reviewed and approved for use by the EPA in 1997, scientists were uncovering evidence that it was a neurotoxic obesogen (a compound that can lead to weight gain by altering fat metabolism).
Despite the fact that the EPA has recently labeled FireMaster 550 to be of “high” or “very high” concern for reproductive, developmental, neurological and aquatic toxicity, it remains on the market. In fact, today it's still praised by its manufacturer as “an innovative move to greener chemicals.”
Responding to these failures, public health advocates have been pushing for TSCA reform for decades. Activists pursued an uneven “patchwork quilt” of regulations that made it hard for chemical manufacturers and retailers to stay ahead of chemical restrictions around the country. As an advocacy leader from the manufacturing industry told me in an anonymous interview for my book on the topic: “We would like to have a level playing field across all 50 states, and have preemption over anything a state might try to develop.” To push for their preferred version of TSCA reform, the chemical industry spent more than $125 million on lobbying since 2014.
The new act ensures that the EPA will now prioritize and evaluate chemicals based on risk, not cost-benefit calculations. In other words, the agency has to affirm the expected safety of newly developed chemicals. The act also somewhat reduces chemical companies’ abilities to hide important data behind the veil of “confidential business information.” In addition, the act requires that the EPA rely less on animal testing and more on high-throughput testing and screening—guidelines that are not only more humane, but are in line with recent developments in toxicity research in recent decades.
These are all major strides. “The general consensus is that this bill is ‘better than current law,’” notes Nancy Buermeyer of the Breast Cancer Fund, a nonprofit that aims to prevent environmental causes of cancer, including toxic chemicals. But it still “falls far short” in important ways, she says, as should be expected from any piece of legislation so enthusiastically supported by the industry it is charged with regulating. The act requires risk evaluations of only 20 high-priority chemicals at a time, a fraction of the more than 80,000 chemicals currently on the TSCA inventory. It also preempts states from enacting their own restrictions on potentially dangerous chemicals as soon as EPA begins its review, even though such reviews can take years, and bars future action on EPA-evaluated chemicals with few exceptions.
Ultimately, the effectiveness of the act will come down to how it is implemented. The EPA has already released a timeline for the next year. Of particular note is the establishment of a “Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals,” which is meant to provide independent expertise and consultation to the EPA. These efforts by EPA scientists, federal regulators and involved stakeholders like the chemical industry and environmental advocates will determine whether the agency can achieve its goal of evaluating chemicals based on the “best available science.”
The new law is a step in the right direction, but it remains to be seen whether it will do enough to hold potentially harmful chemicals accountable.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/why-chemicals-us-are-still-innocent-until-proven-guilty-180959818/?no-ist
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Grinding Chemicals Together in an Effort to be Greener
Jul 18, 2016 | The New York Times
By Xiaozhi Lim
The timer started, and a middle school student named Tony Mack began his first chemistry experiment. As he weighed chemicals under a graduate student’s supervision, his father, James, a chemist at the University of Cincinnati, assembled glassware next to him, engrossed in his own experiment.
The two were racing to prepare a mix of stilbene molecules used to make dyes, but were employing different methods. For Dr. Mack, the ingredients simmered in a stirred solution in a heated flask. But for Tony, they were crushed with balls that tumbled and hit them as a machine called a ball mill shook them vigorously. Tony crossed the finish line while Dr. Mack was still two hours away, and did so with about 30 percent more stilbene.
“He was so happy he beat me,” Dr. Mack said, laughing.
Conducted at Dr. Mack’s laboratory in 2014, the race was designed to prove a point: that milling, or grinding chemicals together without a solvent, could outperform established methods and yet be safe and simple enough for an inexperienced eighth grader to do.
The technique, based on so-called mechanochemistry, or chemistry driven by mechanical force, is radically different from the traditional way of dissolving, heating and stirring chemicals in a solution. Removing solvents could help make many chemical processes used by industry more environmentally friendly.
Chemists can produce a solvent-free chemical reaction by mechanically agitating two solids with vibrational ball milling.
“Chemists typically aren’t as concerned about solvents as they should be,” said David Constable, the director of the American Chemical Society’s Green Chemistry Institute. Many commonly used solvents, like chloroform,acetone and hexane, are harmful and volatile, posing risks to people who inhale them as well as the environment. Solvents also make up the vast majority of chemical waste, and consume most of the energy used in a chemical reaction.
But because solvents have been the norm for centuries, many chemists tend to doubt the viability of mechanochemistry. “We learn that solution is just the way to go,” Dr. Mack said, “and never think about alternatives.”
The green chemistry movement has motivated some chemists to ditch the old solution methods in favor of mechanochemistry.
“Green chemistry is a recognition that chemistry could do better through design,” said Paul Anastas, a chemistry professor at Yale University who developed the Environmental Protection Agency’s groundbreaking green chemistry program in 1991.
Milling has traditionally been used to reduce particle sizes, for example, by geologists to grind rock into powder. It is also a common technique for making metal alloys and facilitating chemical reactions that involve insoluble materials like fullerenes, a molecular form of carbon with tubular or spherical structures known as carbon nanotubes or “buckyballs.”
But persuading scientists to extend mechanochemistry to the vast majority of chemical reactions normally conducted in solutions was a hard sell, in part because it was uncharted territory.
In solutions, particles get the energy they need to react from heat: Chemists carefully choose the temperature for their experiments and ensure that heat is evenly distributed. But in a ball mill, energy is imparted through mechanical force when the balls strike the particles as they are tossed around. That energy is very difficult to quantify, Dr. Mack said. Without a solvent, chemists could not be confident that all the particles would mix well enough to meet each other and react.
Stuart James, a mechanochemist at Queen’s University Belfast in Northern Ireland, related the first time he brought a ball mill, which cost 3,000 pounds, or about $4,870, into his laboratory in 2003. “I told the group what it was, and my students thought I was crazy,” he said.
“It’s really about taking a risk,” Dr. Mack said of those chemists who eventually adopted the newer method. They demonstrated that a ball mill could impart enough energy to break and form strong bonds like carbon-carbon and carbon-metal bonds. They also discovered that milling enabled reactions that could not be performed in solutions, opening up new possibilities.
In 2011, the mechanochemist Tomislav Friscic and his team used mechanochemical methods to make bismuth subsalicylate, the active ingredient of Pepto-Bismol, by grinding together bismuth oxide and salicylic acid. The method not only does away with solvents, but also uses bismuth oxide, a safe reagent, in lieu of toxic bismuth salts.
In 2013, Dr. Friscic reported a new single-step process to prepare sulfonylguanidines, a family of chemicals used in herbicides and pharmaceuticals, through grinding. His research team at McGill University in Montreal tried to reproduce the process in solution, but failed.
Last year, a research group from the Ames Laboratory at Iowa State University applied for a patent on a mechanochemical method to make pure alane, an aluminum-based material for hydrogen storage. Solution methods typically produce impure alane because solvent molecules tend to stick to it.
“There is really an explosion of what mechanochemistry can do,” Dr. Friscic said. “It is clearly becoming a new reaction environment.”
Figuring out the rules of the game has been a major research task. The mechanochemists slowly learned how to control the milling process by changing parameters like the shaking speed, number of balls, ball size and materials of the reaction vessel and the balls.
Some chemists have started to apply the technique to industry. Dr. Friscic is introducing mechanochemistry to drug and mining companies.
In 2012, Dr. James set up a company called MOF Technologies to produce a type of porous material with potential applications in storing hydrogen and natural gas, without using solvents. The company’s facilities can churn out several kilograms of product an hour, and recently received funding to build a pilot plant that would operate on a much larger scale.
Despite the progress, it is unlikely that mechanochemistry will completely eliminate solvents. “Mechanochemistry, like many other technologies, is very promising,” Dr. Constable said, “but it will not solve all the problems.”
But the method has fostered a growing awareness that chemistry can be both practical and environmentally friendly, its proponents say. At McGill, chemistry students are taught to measure the energy, water and materials used in each experiment they perform, to understand the environmental costs of chemistry. In addition to milling, other research areas include developing an energy efficient way of heating chemical reactions with microwaves and clean, nontoxic solvents like supercritical carbon dioxide — carbon dioxide held at such a high temperature and pressure that it behaves like a gas and a liquid at once. (It’s used to decaffeinate coffee, for example.)
“When we focus on making things environmentally friendly, most people think of it as restrictions,” Dr. Anastas said. “But this has been opportunity and discovery.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/19/science/green-chemistry-mechanochemistry.html?_r=0
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High Rates Of Bladder Cancer Linked To Arsenic In Drinking Water
Jul 18, 2016 | Environmental Working Group
By Curt DellaValle
The recent crisis in Flint, Mich., sounded the alarm on the dangers of lead contamination in drinking water. Now there’s potentially more bad news for the nation’s water supply.
New research suggests that arsenic in drinking water may be an important contributor to the risk of bladder cancer. This comes on the heels of the discovery of unsettling amounts of arsenic in rice and infant rice cereals.
For decades, New Englanders have been developing bladder cancer at rates more than 20 percent higher than the national average. Researchers led by a team at the National Cancer Institute set out to investigate what might be causing this “excess” amount of bladder cancer. Their results, published in the May edition of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, suggest that 14 percent or more of bladder cancer cases in the region may be caused by elevated levels of arsenic in drinking water wells. (Smoking and occupational exposures account for most of the risk.)
The Environmental Protection Agency’s legal limit for arsenic in drinking water is 10 micrograms per liter. The EPA considers this level “acceptable,” but its stated goal is for water to contain no arsenic at all.
This standard may not help people who rely on private wells, though. Wells are usually only tested when they’re newly dug or a house is sold, and levels of arsenic and other contaminants in groundwater can change over time.
Even more troubling, the legal limit for arsenic may not be safe for long-term exposures. The new research found that people who drank an average of just 13.5 micrograms of arsenic in drinking water per day over their lifetimes – that’s a little more than six cups per day at EPA’s current regulatory limit – had nearly double the risk of bladder cancer compared to individuals with minimal arsenic intake.
New England homes have a high number of private wells, and the geology is such that arsenic levels in groundwater can be naturally high. Some areas also suffer arsenic contamination from historical use of pesticides on apple and blueberry crops. But the problem is not limited to this one region. In 2000, the U.S. Geological Surveyfound that 10 percent of groundwater samples across the country exceeded EPA’s regulatory limit.
Many of the regulations designed to keep water clean and safe come up short in protecting health because they fail to consider the effects of long-term exposure. Only about 5 percent of the wells in the New England study were estimated to have arsenic exceeding the EPA limit, yet the researchers found a substantial excess risk of bladder cancer over people’s lifetimes.
The stories of Flint and now New England make it painfully clear that we cannot take for granted that what comes out of the tap is safe to drink. It’s easy to lose sight of the dangers of water contaminants like lead and arsenic because the health risks can occur at levels we can’t see, smell or taste. But there are two important things we can do to reduce these risks:
A good water filter can effectively remove many contaminants, although arsenic can be more difficult to eliminate. Test your water if you live in an area where arsenic may be present.
Use your political voice to elect politicians who understand and prioritize public health.
There’s no reason why we can’t have clean, safe drinking water no matter where we live.
http://www.ewg.org/enviroblog/2016/07/high-rates-bladder-cancer-linked-arsenic-drinking-water
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Trump Pick Pence Held Muddled Views on Clean Power Plan
Jul 18, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Emily Holden and Rod Kuckro
Donald Trump's running mate, former Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, since at least 2000 has been railing against the proposition that greenhouse gas emissions are changing the Earth's climate (ClimateWire, July 15).
And the Republican governor repeatedly told Indiana media in the past year that he would defy U.S. EPA's carbon rule even if it is upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
But that rhetoric was not in sync with what his administration actually was doing.
In February, Dan Schmidt, policy director for energy and environment in Pence's office, told E&E that "the stay and [Supreme Court] Justice [Antonin] Scalia's death have added multiple layers of complexity to an already complex situation."
But, "if the courts ultimately uphold the Clean Power Plan, the governor absolutely prefers a state plan," Schmidt said in an email.
Under the EPA rule, if a state were to choose not to submit a compliance plan, the federal government would impose one.
Schmidt had been leading meetings of a group made up of the Indiana Department of Environmental Management, Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, Indiana Office of Energy Development and state utility consumer counselor.
Before the stay, they had been meeting privately with stakeholders and the state's grid operators about what compliance scenarios could look like.
There's even a chance that Indiana could experience what Louisiana did last year when the state elected Democrat John Bel Edwards as governor and one of his first acts was to name Chuck Carr Brown, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality, who told E&E the agency will continue to move forward in examining a possible state plan and meeting with stakeholders.
In Indiana, former Democratic Speaker of the House John Gregg, who was leading Pence in some polls before he withdrew from the race to run with Trump, won't know who his opponent will be until July 26, when the Republican Party will choose a candidate.
Events and papers
The Great Plains Institute on Friday released the first in a series of white papers to help states and stakeholders make decision about how to implement the Clean Power Plan.
The institute has convened the Midcontinent Power Sector Collaborative -- a group including investor-owned utilities, generation and transmission cooperatives, merchant generators and a municipal joint action agency together with environmental organizations and state environmental and utility regulators -- to help guide states on their options.
The first white paper examines the goals that states may set as they ponder how to allocate emission allowances under a mass-based trading program.
EPA will hold the second of two webinars tomorrow to provide an overview of the proposed Clean Energy Incentive Program design details rule. Information on how to participate can be found here.
On Thursday, the Environmental Council of the States will hold a one-day meeting in Washington, D.C., to explore issues affecting water, air and energy innovation. The agendaincludes a keynote by Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and a panel discussion on how energy infrastructure must evolve in response to new state and federal policies and regulations.
In case you missed it:
California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) released a plan to extend the state's landmark cap-and-trade program in a bid to slash greenhouse gas emissions through midcentury (ClimateWire, July 13).
The nine-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative should leave the door open to trading carbon allowances with other states under the Clean Power Plan, according to a report from consultants at the Analysis Group Inc. (ClimateWire, July 12).
Joe Goffman, senior counsel in EPA's Office of Air and Radiation, said the agency has not decided whether to finalize a model rule for carbon trading that states could use under the Clean Power Plan (ClimateWire, July 12).
The Obama administration's climate rule for power plants could result in Western coal production falling by 155 million tons between 2015 and 2040, compared with a decline of 31 million tons if the rule is not enacted, said an analysis by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (ClimateWire, July 11).
A panel of state lawmakers at a meeting of the Southern States Energy Board in Lexington, Ky., railed against the Clean Power Plan and said they need to do a better job touting the benefits of baseload fossil-fuel generation (EnergyWire, July 11).
http://www.eenews.net/interactive/clean_power_plan/column_posts/1060040405
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North Dakota Sues Over New Methane Rule
Jul 18, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry
North Dakota’s attorney general has sued the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over new methane emission rules at oil and gas facilities.
In a filing in the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, the state said it considers the new rule “arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion and not in a accordance with law."
The EPA’s rule, part of an Obama administration strategy to reduce methane emissions, sets new standards for methane leaks along the natural gas production line, including drilling and pumping, at new or modified gas wells. The EPA published the rule in the Federal Register in June.
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, with 25 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. It’s also the main component of natural gas, and drillers have warned the EPA’s rule could hurt production of the fuel. Industry groups say they have cut down on methane effectively on their own, and have resisted the new rule.
North Dakota stands to be particularly affected by the EPA’s rules: the state has seen a natural gas boom, with its production growing from nearly 63 billion cubic feet of gas in 2006 to almost 582 billion cubic feet in 2015.
The EPA's rule, released in May, would reduce 520,000 short tons of methane in 2025, or the equivalent of 11 million metric tons of carbon dioxide.
The EPA has said it’s also formulating rules for existing oil and gas wells. Reducing oil and gas-sector methane emissions has been a key compose of Obama’s climate work with Canada and Mexico, as well.
http://www.thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/288156-north-dakota-sues-over-new-methane-rule
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Fracking May Worsen Asthma for Nearby Residents, Study Says
Jul 18, 2016 | Associated Press (in Washington Post)
By Lindsey Tanner
Fracking may worsen asthma in children and adults who live near sites where the oil and gas drilling method is used, according to an 8-year study in Pennsylvania.
The study found that asthma treatments were as much as four times more common in patients living closer to areas with more or bigger active wells than those living far away.
But the study did not establish that fracking directly caused or worsened asthma. There’s also no way to tell from the study whether asthma patients exposed to fracking fare worse than those exposed to more traditional gas drilling methods or to other industrial activities.
Fracking refers to hydraulic fracturing, a technique for extracting oil and gas by injecting water, sand and chemicals into wells at high pressure to crack rock. Environmental effects include exhaust, dust and noise from heavy truck traffic transporting water and other materials, and from drilling rigs and compressors. Fracking and improved drilling methods led to a boom in production of oil and gas in several U.S. states, including Pennsylvania, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Texas and Colorado.
Johns Hopkins University researcher Sara Rasmussen, the study’s lead author, said pollution and stress from the noise caused by fracking might explain the results. But the authors emphasized that the study doesn’t prove what caused patients’ symptoms.
More than 25 million U.S. adults and children have asthma, a disease that narrows airways in the lungs. Symptoms include wheezing, breathing difficulties and chest tightness, and they can sometimes flare up with exposure to dust, air pollution and stress.
Previous research has found heavy air pollution in areas where oil and gas drilling is booming.
The new study was published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine.
The researchers noted that between 2005 and 2012, more than 6,200 fracking wells were drilled in Pennsylvania. They used electronic health records to identify almost 36,000 asthma patients treated during that time in the Geisinger Health System, which covers more than 40 counties in Pennsylvania. Evidence of asthma attacks included new prescriptions for steroid medicines, emergency-room treatment for asthma and asthma hospitalizations.
During the study, there were more than 20,000 new oral steroid prescriptions ordered, almost 5,000 asthma hospitalizations and almost 2,000 ER asthma visits.
Those outcomes were 50 percent to four times more common in asthma patients living closer to areas with more or bigger active wells than among those living far away.
The highest risk for asthma attacks occurred in people living a median of about 12 miles from drilled wells. The lowest risk was for people living a median of about 40 miles away.
Dr. Norman H. Edelman, senior scientific adviser for the American Lung Association, called the study “interesting and provocative.” But he said it only shows an association between fracking and asthma, not a “cause and effect,” and that more rigorous research is needed.
“Asthma is a huge problem,” he said. “Anything we can do to elucidate the causes will be very useful.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/fracking-may-worsen-asthma-for-nearby-residents-study-says/2016/07/18/49667de8-4cfb-11e6-bf27-405106836f96_story.html
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The Future of US Fracking and Finding Who Gets the Final Say
Jul 18, 2016 | Platts - Podcasts
Fracking helped unleash a flood of new US oil and gas production, but regulating it is no simple task. The Obama administration has not embraced the environmental movement to keep all fossil fuels in the ground and the topic has become a wedge issue in this year's presidential race. Given that a Wyoming federal judge recently overturned a major fracking rule, where does the future path of oversight of the oil and gas industry lead? Platts senior editor Brian Scheid interviews Michael Freeman, a staff attorney with Earthjustice, and Kathleen Sgamma, a vice president with the Western Energy Alliance, to try and find out.
Podcast Found Here: http://www.platts.com/podcasts-detail/crude/2016/july/capitol-crude-071816
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Inside the Diabolical Ukrainian Hack That Put the U.S. Grid on High Alert
Jul 18, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak and Peter Behr
Eastern Europe was blanketed in a heat wave last summer. In Kiev, Ukraine, a state of desperate resignation had set in as fighting intensified between pro-Russia rebels and Ukrainian forces to the east. Separatists closed highways and attacked ports. Meanwhile, a silent incursion had started to worm its way into the email accounts of employees at media outlets, national railroads and power distributors in the western half of the country.
The digital-era Trojan horse looked like a call to arms from the nation's embattled capital. The subject line read simply, "Mobilization."
As Ukraine's civil war raged, a few mouse clicks at three local power companies set in motion the covert intrusion. It was the first successful attempt at planting a bug, then disabling an electric grid serving hundreds of thousands of people.
At 3:30 p.m. on Dec. 23, 2015, lights winked out in parts of the Ivano-Frankivsk regional capital. A minute later, another part of the grid went down. Soon, a third utility -- and almost one-quarter of a million households and businesses had lost electricity.
Workers at the Prykarpattyaoblenergo, Kyivoblenergo and Chernivtsioblenergo utilities watched helplessly as cursors moved across their workstation screens at the intruders' commands, shutting down substations. Other hidden commands destroyed vital equipment. The attackers were invisible and precise, and they showed the world how fragile critical infrastructure is when hacking is used as a weapon of war.
Ukraine's battle to wrest control from the hackers elevated the story of frequent blackouts in a poor country to the latest in a series of cyberattacks with implications for the United States. Months in the making, it represented an escalation in attack methods that frightened U.S. authorities and executives. The hack methodically corrupted standard programing and subverted controls. It laid bare the work of persistent planners.
Seven months after the Ukraine attack, U.S. security officials are still trying to understand whether the much larger, and more sophisticated, North American power grid is equally as vulnerable to a determined, insidious assault. A more ominous warning has been sounded to utilities and federal agencies: Step up preparations to recover from a cyberattack that may one day break through.
Hackers didn't simply crack a code and pull the off-switches at local substations -- they rendered some crucial station devices inoperable. Then, they corrupted software and servers designed to turn the power back on.
The unparalleled grid strike in Eastern Europe has led to stronger, more frustrated complaints by industry and security experts about the performance of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security as a source of rapid, actionable cyberthreat intelligence for the electricity sector. It also has raised concerns that federal guidelines applicable to the high-voltage interstate grid don't guarantee the security of local utilities that distribute power to millions of homes and businesses.
A four-part investigation by EnergyWire found that relationships between DHS and outside experts with deep knowledge about grid security became badly frayed in the weeks after the December hack. For several months, DHS put out conflicting internal and public messages about the dangers posed by the Ukraine hack, compounded by tug of wars around the use of closely held information inside the diffuse intelligence community.
What resulted was a slow and halting response by the U.S. government in the aftermath of the Ukraine takedown.
In an age that pits state-sponsored hackers against private companies like power utilities, critics of congressional inaction and government secrecy are starting to hammer at what they view as glaring failures around threat-sharing.
Ukraine is one of a cluster of cyberattacks in the past two years that grabbed headlines. The November 2014 attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment mushroomed into a national security and free-speech entanglement with North Korea. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) disclosed last summer that computer breaches included the theft of Social Security numbers of 21 million Americans. Hackers also stole fingerprints of government workers and compromised security clearances.
The Obama administration in September 2015 publicly acknowledged suspicions that China was the source of the OPM breach.
In the Ukraine case, top administration officials have kept quiet, refusing to give credence to experts' widely held view that Russian hackers likely planned and executed the first-known takedown of a power grid.
Reconnaissance
The email messages snuck through the Ukrainian utility servers in droves last summer, asking employees there to "enable content" to read the attached document. When they clicked, the file unloaded the BlackEnergy attack software on their office computer systems, burrowing deep into the information technology side of the business.
Once out of sight, BlackEnergy established hidden lines of communication the hackers could use to extract information and download malware, all under the noses of the grid operators. There was plenty of time to inventory systems and search for passwords and pathways that would take the intruders from business-side computers into the protected heart of the utilities' operations, including the grid operators' control room.
Over many months and perhaps after additional runs of "spear phishing" emails, the hackers were able to find utility officials with credentialed access to the operating systems and steal their passwords, too. With login info, the hackers could escalate from espionage to attack. All they needed was a trigger.
Incitement
On the eve of the assault, utility employees in Ukraine, Russia and a few former Soviet states were slapping each other on the back for a job well done.
It was Energy Day, a holiday to recognize and celebrate electricity workers in parts of Eastern Europe. In a Dec. 22, 2015, speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated his country's power industry professionals. He singled out their "great, strenuous and highly demanding" work keeping the lights on in Crimea.
It was not an offhand comment. Putin's forces annexed the predominantly Russian-speaking peninsula in 2014, setting off a violent and ongoing territorial conflict that leaked into eastern Ukraine. Crimea, despite its de facto status as a Russian republic, remains connected to Ukraine's electric transmission network. Power outages in the contested territory have been attributed to Ukrainian saboteurs.
Observers have suggested those blackouts set the stage for Russian vengeance, a theory that would explain the timing and rationale for the Dec. 23 cyberattacks, and why the biggest impacts were confined to pro-Western portions of the country.
The message in that scenario: You hit our grid in Crimea, we hit yours.
Attack
The takedown itself was quick and clinical, backed as it was by months of planning.
Western Ukrainian grid operators could only watch as hackers booted them from workstations, dragging cursors around control system screens to achieve their own harmful ends. The attackers changed passwords so the Ukrainians couldn't log back in to grab the reins.
Utility industry workers were sidelined during those first frantic minutes. In hacker parlance, they had been owned.
No one online could be trusted. The computers, however, were inherently trusting. They dutifully carried out the hackers' commands to open high-voltage circuit breakers at dozens of substations across western Ukraine, knocking out power. The machines had never been programmed to question why so many users would simultaneously log in from unusual internet protocol addresses. The virtual network tied to the operational workstations asked for a username and password -- nothing more -- to grant unfettered access.
With credentials in hand, the attackers still had to understand Ukraine's Soviet-era electricity infrastructure to do any real damage. After all, they were dealing with three different power distribution management systems at three different companies.
At 6 p.m. on Dec. 23, the situation moved from bad to worse for one operator when the hackers cut off the backup power source to a critical control center, preventing the system from rebooting. Once merely spectators, utility workers were now blind to what was happening in the far-flung power distribution networks that had once been under their control.
Impact
The blackout itself lasted less than six hours in most places. It was hardly calamitous for Ivano-Frankivsk, which is "no Manhattan," as one Ukrainian source put it. The two other, mostly rural areas affected by the outages were similarly accustomed to power disruptions.
Many Ukrainians put up with electricity rationing for the better part of a decade following independence from the Soviet Union in 1990. More recently, war in the East has made reliable energy something of a luxury there. While western districts are more secure, critical services -- hospitals, key government buildings and the like -- still keep backup generators as standard practice.
December normally brings brutal cold for much of Ukraine, with the capital, Kiev ,averaging just 28 degrees Fahrenheit throughout the month. But highs on the Wednesday of the cyberattack stretched into the 50s across swaths of the country, meaning the outages were less likely to endanger human lives.
Still, until that day, hackers had never carried out such a surgical strike on civilian infrastructure. And even if Ukrainians pride themselves on their resilience, no one, from Ivano-Frankivsk to Manhattan, likes living without electricity for long.
Interference
Prykarpattyaoblenergo offered the first sign the blackout was more than just a routine interruption.
The day before much of the West would celebrate Christmas Eve, the Ukrainian utility warned its customers not to call in to report power outages, so its workers could get a grip on the unfolding crisis.
The Ivano-Frankivsk-based company's phone lines had been swamped by a barrage of calls that investigators later traced to Russia.
This "telephone denial of service" would be bad enough during a normal blackout. But Prykarpattyaoblenergo's technical director added that "outsiders" had tampered with the utility's control systems, forcing the company to revert to manual operations across its territory.
The hackers didn't want to switch off power only to see their work undone minutes later. They were actively sabotaging recovery efforts, leaving no trace of doubt as to their intent.
Coercive updates went out to boxes used to translate data from grid equipment, a move that effectively turned the converters into bricks. Analysts later found that the attackers must have tested the malicious code beforehand, so they knew it would cause delicate field devices to fail.
Before calling off their assault, the online attackers left behind another nasty gift: "KillDisk" malware to wipe victims' computers and render them useless. It was the digital equivalent of kicking the power companies while they were down.
Aftershocks
At least three other energy companies in Ukraine were targeted in the campaign, but were able to stop the hackers from causing physical damage. Meanwhile, the hardest-hit power companies spent months in "manual mode," unable to trust their networks enough to go back to normal operations.
The attackers weren't done yet. In January this year, more emails made the rounds at energy companies in Ukraine, but they ditched the BlackEnergy malware in favor of a different, less sophisticated Trojan horse.
This time, the emails claimed to come from Ukraine's main electricity market overseer, the National Power Company "Ukrenergo."
"When I read through the email that [hackers] prepared for the Oblenergo companies, originating from the regulator, it was perfect," said Vlad Styran, co-founder and manager of operations at the Kiev-based cybersecurity firm Berezha Security. "There was either a lot of work behind that, or they had access to an insider" who knew the writing style and types of files normally shared by the Ukrenergo, he added.
The targeted utilities were on guard following the attacks, and no follow-up physical disruptions are known to have happened in Ukraine beyond Dec. 23.
Styran, whose day job challenges him to think about ways to break into companies as a "white hat" hacker, has suggested the Dec. 23 cyberattacks were a warning shot rather than an attempt to disable Ukraine's infrastructure indefinitely.
Among the dozens of security experts contacted by EnergyWire, the vast majority agreed that the level of sophistication, organization and time that went into the attack points to a state-sponsored hacking group with control system expertise.
Russia remains the most likely culprit, even though two of the three utilities harmed are majority-owned by Russian businessmen, including one reported ally of Putin. The Security Service of Ukraine wasted no time in blaming the Kremlin for the attacks. Russian authorities have yet to comment on the case.
"It was a demonstration of power, maybe just field testing of the tools and the tactics," Styran said. "That's how we can treat it. If the goal was to make harm, the targets would be completely different."
From theory to practice
The attack was a call to arms in the inchoate language of cyber warfare.
To Robert Lipovsky, who was among the first cybersecurity analysts to examine the Ukraine case, the events of Dec. 23 showed "that things such as this aren't just theoretically possible," he said, "that things like this can happen."
"It shouldn't have been so easy for the attackers," said Lipovsky, a Slovakia-based senior malware researcher at cybersecurity firm ESET.
He cited the attackers' ability to hop from utility computers on the business side over to operational workstations that directly communicated with control systems. Such a threadbare "air gap" between operational and informational networks is not unusual in other parts of the world, he noted.
"There are definitely loopholes, generally. It's not just limited to Ukraine," he said. "This shouldn't be taken lightly."
Part 2 in EnergyWire's "The Hack" series explores the Department of Homeland Security's response to the Ukraine attack.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2016/07/18/stories/1060040399
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House Dem Agenda Focused on Security, Not Green Issues
Jul 15, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By George Cahlink
House Democrats rolled out their fall campaign agenda this week, urging members to talk about economic and security issues as they seek re-election -- but making little mention of green topics.
Democratic leaders outlined a "stronger America" agenda that is focused on the broad themes of "securing our nation," "securing our future" and "securing our democracy." Democrats circulated a two-page guide for members that emphasized legislative priorities that fit those themes, such as gun control, protecting Social Security and immigration reform, without any reference to green issues.
"These are our priorities; we are going to echo these priorities in districts across America," Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.), the head of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, said yesterday, unveiling the plan with more than a dozen other Democrats who made no mention of climate change or environmental protection.
The campaign agenda is the product of 18 months of work by the DPCC, which included extensive polling of voters in battleground states. A Democratic aide said security issues were a top priority for many voters in the wake of the recent shootings across the nation and terrorist activities around the world.
Israel later told Greenwire that lawmakers are not precluded from running on issues like climate security and said the agenda was only meant to serve as a "starting point."
"Any of our colleagues can talk about the importance of climate security," Israel said. "What we have tried to do is create three broad themes for our colleagues, and our colleagues can then fill in those themes based on their values and priorities. I would expect climate security will be an important part of it."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said at a news conference today that Democrats will stress that their first responsibility is protecting the American people. She emphasized traditional security issues like gun control and defending the homeland but also made the case for campaign finance reform as part of an effort to secure democracy, with a nod to its impact on climate change.
Democrats are "never going to succeed on so many things that money has an impact on [like] climate change," she said. "You name the subject, money in politics is a problem."
Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), the ranking member on the House Natural Resources Committee, said it would be a "mistake" for Democrats not to talk about green issues on the campaign trail. He noted the enthusiasm that Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) had generated and said it was in part by calling for more environmental protections and a carbon tax.
"This is not a throwaway issue, particularly to young voters, and I think members should emphasize it in their districts because it is an issue that crosses political lines," Grijalva said.
Grijalva said he believes there's a significant bloc of Democrats who will emphasize climate change and similar issues as they seek re-election.
"Everyone is going to do their own thing regardless of the guide," he added.
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2016/07/15/stories/1060040371
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Oil & Gas Industry Groups Say CWA Jurisdiction Rule Creates NWP Doubts
Jul 18, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
Oil and natural gas industry groups say EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers’ Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction rule has created significant uncertainty from litigation and implementation over the Corps’ new draft streamlined CWA nationwide permits (NWPs), urging the Corps to clarify the rule’s impacts on the permit program.
The Clean Water Rule, published in the June 29, 2015, Federal Register faces a host of ongoing lawsuits and the groups in comments to the Corps argue this makes it impossible to gauge how it affects the latest NWPs. The rule aims to clarify the scope of the CWA, but critics say it expands the law’s reach far beyond Congress’ intent. It is central to the NWP debate because whether a water is jurisdictional determines permitting mandates for the water.
NWPs govern actions with limited environmental impacts -- confined to half an acre -- and aim to speed permitting for those projects. Regulated entities generally seek coverage under the permits, which requires them to comply with the permit’s terms but also shields them from CWA enforcement actions alleging unlawful discharges.
“Given the ongoing litigation concerning the stayed 2015 Clean Water Rule, public commenters are being asked to make their own interpretations on a wide range of scenarios and definitions which may likely never materialize,” the America Exploration & Production Council and Independent Petroleum Association of America say in a July 5 letterto the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on the NWPs published in the June 1 Register.
The groups say they appreciate the Corps’ call for comment on how the CWA rule may affect the applicability and efficiency of the NWPs, but that “it is irresponsible to burden the public with the task of determining the potential impacts when the outcome is uncertain and possibly year(s) away” given that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit has stayed implementation of the CWA rule nationwide while suits over it proceed.
In their letter, the groups reiterate their call for a 60-day comment deadline extension on the NWPs from the Aug. 1 deadline, and highlight what they say are undue burdens in collecting the information the Corps seeks on the CWA rule. Moreover, the groups charge that the corps failed to adequately consider the impacts of the jurisdiction rule on the proposed NWPs, although the draft permits appear to incorporate certain provisions of the final rule.
The groups also ask OMB to review the Corps’ methodology as it relates to the CWA rule, specifically an assertion that a “net-effect on the public is zero” because the time spent on an NWP with pre-construction notifications equals that of obtaining an individual CWA permit under section 404 of the water law.
OMB should seek clarification from the Corps on how it arrived at its determination “Given the uncertainty of the stayed 2015 Clean Water Rule,” according to the groups’ comments.
New Permits
The Corps’ NWP proposal includes new permits for bank stabilization techniques known as living shorelines, and for removal of low-head dams, and a proposed new “general condition” setting a higher approval threshold for projects that would alter or occupy structures built by the federal government.
The plan would revise a number of existing NWPs, including NWP12, for utility line activities, NWP14, for transportation projects, NWPs for land- and water-based renewable energy generation and other activities.
Activities that the Corps determines would have significant environmental impacts must be authorized under individual CWA section 404 permits, which involves a more rigorous, site-specific review of potential adverse effects, gives EPA a stronger oversight role and often becomes the target of environmentalist litigation.
The CWA requires the Corps to reissue its NWPs every five years as a way of streamlining the permitting process for dredge-and-fill operations conducted in “waters of the U.S.” that are associated with minor impacts to the aquatic environment. Advocates say the program does not adequately guard against species and other harms because there is not a sufficient mechanism to track the acreage approved for coverage under the NWPs.
The Corps is also taking comment on a number of issues, including how the CWA jurisdiction rule might affect the efficiency of the proposed NWPs, changing the pre-construction notice thresholds for the NWPs that require the added notifications, whether to impose new acreage limits on a number of NWPs, including for utility, transportation and mining projects.
Environmentalists have already raised concerns with the draft NWPs. A spokesman with the Center for Biological Diversity previously told Inside EPA that “The Army Corps is basically guaranteeing litigation if they go down this path,” pointing to the Corps’ statements that its permits will not have any adverse impacts on species, and that any concerns about potential impacts could be raised with a Corps district office.
The approach is “incredibly dangerous and would set back ESA compliance by decades,” the spokesman said.
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/oil-gas-industry-groups-say-cwa-jurisdiction-rule-creates-nwp-doubts
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Advocates Threaten Suit Over EPA Plan To Cut NO2 Monitors In Small Cities
Jul 18, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
Environmentalists appear to be preparing the ground for a lawsuit to challenge EPA's forthcoming rule that will scale-back previously promulgated measures requiring smaller towns and cities to install new roadside nitrogen dioxide (NO2) air monitors, with advocates warning that EPA's policy reversal is poorly justified and therefore unlawful.
But state and industry officials are welcoming the agency's plan, saying it will limit monitoring burdens.
EPA in a proposed rule published in the Federal Register May 16 outlined its plan to remove a requirement for metropolitan areas, or "core-based statistical areas," with populations between 500,000 and one million people to install at least one near-road NO2 monitor by Jan. 1. Installation of NO2 monitors in these areas would have been the third phase of a new near-road monitoring network that EPA established in a 2012 rule.
The agency in the proposal said the move is justified because emissions levels detected in larger cities are well below the 2010 national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) for NO2, set at 100 parts per billion (ppb) over one hour. Therefore NO2 levels in smaller cities should also be well below the NAAQS, EPA reasoned.
In comments submitted ahead of a June 30 deadline for public input, environmental law firm Earthjustice and seven other groups say EPA's decision undermines public health protections and is poorly explained. "The early and limited monitoring data EPA relies upon do not justify this substantial reduction in monitoring capability," the groups say.
"The data do not show, or even suggest, that near-road monitors in metro areas with populations of 500,000 to 1 million persons are less likely to capture maximum exposures or show an exceedance of the NAAQS than the monitors already installed in larger areas. Rather, the data indicate there may be problems with the sites selected for the currently-installed monitors," they claim.
Further, "EPA's proposal conflicts with its determination only a few years ago to require near-road monitoring in all metro areas with more than 500,000 people. EPA unlawfully fails to explain its reversal in position and ignores the facts and factors it had previously found determinative." The groups call EPA's change of course "myopic."
Under legal doctrines of reasoned decision-making, EPA must explain the rationale for reversals of position, the groups note. They refute EPA's assertion that NO2 measurements from near-road monitors in larger cities indicate there is no need for the monitors in smaller cities, pointing to deficiencies in the monitoring network.
"Indeed, about three out of every 10 sites are not even next to a top ten highest trafficked roadway in the area, and about one out of every 10 sites is not even installed next to a top 25 highest trafficked roadway," the groups say, adding that 41 percent of monitors are not within the required distance to the road either.
"The facts underlying EPA's 2010 findings and conclusions have not changed. More recent science continues to show that higher concentrations of NO2 can be found near roads, where it threatens health. EPA does not claim that the factors it considered relevant in 2010 -- including the need for a network of sufficient size and that has geographic and spatial diversity -- are no longer important or relevant," they say.
Network Size
A broad coalition of public health groups, including the American Lung Association, American Thoracic Society, and others in separate June 30 comments also urges EPA to scrap its decision not to require roadside monitors in smaller cities. The groups say EPA is prematurely basing its decision on early data from a network of monitors that is too small; that a possible tougher future NAAQS may require more monitoring; and that better monitoring data is important to the NAAQS-setting process itself.
"Unfortunately, the network remains too small to determine if the monitors adequately reflect air quality near these roadways," the groups say.
States commenting on the proposal, however, welcome EPA's decision to ease their monitoring burden. For example, the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, representing air regulators in 40 states, in its June 30 comments says it "supports the proposal to eliminate Phase 3 of the near-road NO2 network and commends EPA for recognizing and working to ameliorate the burden it would place on state and local agencies in exchange for minimal public health or research benefits."
The Central States Air Resource Agencies Association in June 29 comments notes that establishing a monitoring location "can be an arduous process." The group, representing Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas praises not having to site new monitors "in areas where monitoring will not provide new information or help the state or EPA learn more about NO2 leaves times and resources to work on higher priorities."
Industry groups also welcome EPA's proposal to scrap monitors for smaller cities. In its June 30 comments, the American Petroleum Institute says it "finds this proposal to adjust the requirements of Phase 3 will provide states with flexibility moving forward with their implementation efforts by streamlining the NO2 monitoring requirement near roadways."
Similarly, the Utility Air Regulatory Group, representing power generators, says it "agrees that EPA should act to eliminate an unnecessary burden on states to install and operate such monitors."
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/advocates-threaten-suit-over-epa-plan-cut-no2-monitors-small-cities
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