Preview Newsletter
PM ACC 7/19/2016
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Chemical Sector Sees Immediate Business Effects from TSCA Reform Law
Jul 19, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
Chemical industry officials say they are seeing immediate effects from the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) reform law on how companies conduct business, including how EPA will manage claims of confidential business information (CBI) during reviews... -
EPA Advisory Panel, Electronic Manifest Fee, FDA GRAS/GRAE Determinations, Nanotechnology: Recent Federal Developments
Jul 19, 2016 | National Law Review
...Both rulemakings are a consequence of risk assessments EPA issued in 2014 and 2015, respectively, as part of its ongoing Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Work Plan for Chemicals Program... -
House Bill Would Help Schools Pay for Lead Testing
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Tiffany Stecker
Illinois Reps. Mike Quigley and Tammy Duckworth introduced legislation yesterday that would reimburse schools that voluntarily test for lead in drinking water. -
DIY Solutions for Your Toughest Laundry Stains
Jul 19, 2016 | Environmental Working Group
By Megan Boyle and Samara Geller
A child’s laundry basket is home to an assortment of stains, spots, strange colors and unwelcome odors. But most stain removers on the market contain hazardous ingredients and make questionable claims. What’s a parent to do? -
Former N.J. Gov., EPA Chief Whitman Says 'Great Number' in GOP Recognize Importance of Climate Change
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E TV
As Republicans convene in Cleveland for the party's national convention, how will the current political dynamic shape the future of energy and climate policy in the United States? During today's OnPoint, Christine Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey and a former... -
Fighting Obama’s Climate Plan, but Quietly Preparing to Comply
Jul 19, 2016 | New York Times
By Coral Davenport
Matt Mead, the Republican governor of Wyoming, the nation’s leading coal-producing state, fiercely opposesPresident Obama’s climate change regulations, which could shutter hundreds of coal plants and deeply wound his state, one of 27 that are suing to block the plan. -
Production from Big Seven Plays to Continue Decline in August, EIA Says
Jul 19, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By David Bradley
Oil and natural gas production from the nation's seven largest unconventional plays, which has been on a downward trend since last fall, will slip again in August, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). -
Marcellus Shale Drilling Tax is Gone, For Now
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
Pennsylvania avoided imposing new taxes on the natural gas industry in its most recent state budget, but Gov. Tom Wolf said he'll ask for one next year and the Republican-led Legislature may come under pressure to allow it. -
New Tool Measures Smart Grid Benefits. A Game Changer for Our Power Industry?
Jul 19, 2016 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Dick Munson
We all know exercise is good for our hearts and bodies, and who doesn’t enjoy stepping on the scale after weeks of good workouts to confirm progress was made? -
How Renewable Energy Is Blowing Climate Change Efforts Off Course
Jul 19, 2016 | New York Times
By Eduaordo Porter
Is the global effort to combat climate change, painstakingly agreed to in Paris seven months ago, already going off the rails? -
How DHS Fell Silent When a Hack Threatened the U.S. Power Grid
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak and Peter Behr
A month after hackers blacked out power in western Ukraine, a team of U.S. security experts touched down in Kiev to piece together the extraordinary assault. -
Union Pacific's Train Derailment in Oregon Mars Railroad Industry’s Turn Toward Revival in Demand
Jul 19, 2016 | Omaha World-Herald
By Russell Hubbard
The railroad industry is facing a new challenge just as customer demand for freight hauling appears to be showing signs of life after almost two years in the doldrums. -
GOP Platform, Which Calls Coal ‘Clean’, Would Utterly Reverse Decades of U.S. Energy and Climate Policy
Jul 19, 2016 | Washington Post
By Steven Mufson
The Republican Party platform adopted Monday night would bring a total about-face on U.S. energy and climate policy, declaring that the priority placed on combating climate change under President Obama “the triumph of extremism over common sense, and Congress must stop it.” -
A Constructive GOP Platform on Climate Change
Jul 19, 2016 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By John D. Graham
Donald Trump says he’s not certain about the validity of climate change. While he mulls that question, scores of Republicans are running for the House and Senate and need sensible guidance from their party. -
Obama Administration Kicks into High Gear on HFC Amendment
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Jean Chemnick
The Obama administration hopes it is closing in on an international deal that will help the world avoid half a degree Celsius of global warming by the end of this century.
Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.
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Chemical Sector Sees Immediate Business Effects from TSCA Reform Law
Jul 19, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
Chemical industry officials say they are seeing immediate effects from the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) reform law on how companies conduct business, including how EPA will manage claims of confidential business information (CBI) during reviews of substances, the law’s industry user fee system, and more.
For example, chemical producers should now consider reviewing their chemicals currently on the TSCA inventory to determine whether they might be subject to a TSCA law mandate that EPA develop a reporting rule under section 8 of the law to inform its list of existing chemicals deemed either “active” or “inactive” in commerce, said attorney Sara Beth Watson of Steptoe & Johnson, during a July 12 webinar hosted by the law firm on “What Does TSCA Reform Mean to You?”
The new law, which took effect when President Obama signed it June 22, grants EPA extensive new authorities to regulate new and existing chemicals in commerce, creating an industry fee system to pay for it.
It includes a number of revisions to EPA’s process for substantiating CBI claims for proprietary information protected from disclosure when the agency is reviewing a substance. Those revisions are among several aspects of the law that have already taken effect, EPA says in its first year implementation plan floated June 29, and the agency is preparing to release later this month its plan for routine review of the CBI claims.
The revisions, which include changes to how EPA substantiates CBI claims and time limits for how long a CBI protection may last, are significant, although they do not require a change to the standard companies must meet, Watson said. “The standard has not changed, it’s the process, having to come forward and re-substantiate” with information to verify that the company has kept the data confidential and that it properly qualifies as a trade secret, she said.
The revisions require EPA to establish a new process for ensuring companies meet certain requirements to support CBI claims, and establish time limits of 10 years for when those claims would sunset.
“EPA has been looking at CBI [more closely] for awhile now but this would really require a wholesale review” by the agency of all existing CBI claims from companies, Watson added.
Watson also spoke about EPA’s plans to begin consulting with stakeholders that might be subject to new user fees under the law, and to issue a proposal by mid-December of this year for how it will structure the new fee system. EPA has a tentative target of June 2017 for a final policy. Watson urged companies to begin to “get involved” in the discussions on the fees that are expected to help pay to implement the new law.
Sen. Tom Udall (D-NM) -- a co-sponsor of the Senate’s version of TSCA reform and ranking member on the Senate Appropriations Committee panel that oversees EPA’s budget -- has said he doubts Congress will give the agency extra funds to implement it, believing the fee system and current funding to be adequate.
Clock Reset
Watson also said during the webinar that EPA is planning to “reset the clock” for already submitted pre-manufacutre notices (PMN) for new chemicals under section 5 of the law, and would restart pending reviews for those PMNs, an issue with which the chemical sector has already flagged concerns.
Companies already submit PMNs under section 5 of the original 1976 TSCA, which allows for a 90-day review period of a chemical before manufacturing begins. Section 5 of the existing TSCA covers EPA’s authority to regulate new chemicals, but advocates have long argued that power is inadequate.
Under the 1976 TSCA, after the 90 days, a company could begin manufacturing and sales barring an EPA finding that the chemical “may present an unreasonable risk,” but would not be required to make an affirmative finding of safety for a substance to enter the marketplace. But sources have said it is unclear what will happen in the case of currently pending PMNs under the new law, given that it took effect upon Obama’s signature.
EPA’s implementation plan says that it will attempt to complete reviews for new chemicals in which notice has already been submitted to the agency without incurring significant delays.
But industry officials are concerned that the new law could affect the status of chemicals nearing the end of the review period under the old law, where EPA was not mandated to complete reviews of new chemicals, and chemicals that were not reviewed could enter the marketplace once the 90 days expired.
During the webinar, Watson suggested that companies should consider how to address potential EPA data needs as it reviews and updates PMNs. In response to a question on whether the new requirements that EPA review new chemicals before they enter commerce and make an affirmative safety finding will result in a greater number of significant new use rules (SNUR), Watson said, “I think that’s possible.”
Under TSCA section 5, EPA can issue “SNURs” to limit or prevent adverse exposures to chemicals if it finds the substance is being utilized in a new way that might create increased risk to human health or the environment.
Watson said that EPA will be applying a new standard of whether the substance presents or may present in the absence of sufficient data an unreasonable risk, and will for the first time be required to make an affirmative finding of safety. As a result of these new steps, she said that an increase in the number of SNURs is a “possibility” because the agency will be reviewing more information and using new criteria.
Active Chemicals
During the webinar, Watson also advised that companies should begin preparing for the TSCA inventory “reset” process that is mandated under the new law, which requires EPA to develop a reporting rule under section 8 of the law to inform its listing of existing chemicals as either active or inactive in commerce.
Only active chemicals will be designated for EPA risk evaluations under the new law, but there are mechanisms for switching a substance from inactive to active. Companies should take stock of what substances they are currently manufacturing, processing and importing to identify those that must remain on the inventory as “active,” updating the nomenclature, toxicity, and exposure data if necessary, Watson said.
Also during the webinar, Steptoe’s Cynthia Taub spoke about the law’s preemption provisions, which stop short of broadly blocking state chemicals safety requirements, which many in industry sought, saying it is “not a preemption panacea, there’s still room for states to regulate chemical safety.”
Taub added that because state requirements would not be preempted until EPA publishes the scope of a safety assessment of a high priority chemical, it “will take some time before we see any preemptive effect” because it is tied to specific safety reviews, which EPA has not yet launched.
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/chemical-sector-sees-immediate-business-effects-tsca-reform-law
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Jul 19, 2016 | National Law Review
EPA Launches Advisory Panels: On June 15, 2016, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) launched two advisory panels designed to facilitate small businesses to provide feedback to EPA on three solvents. EPA has established a Small Business Advocacy Review (SBAR) Panel for a proposed rulemaking seeking to limit trichloroethylene (TCE), a chemical used in commercial degreasing operations, dry cleaning operations, and consumer products. EPA also created a panel for a proposed rule that would limit n-methylpyrrolidone's (NMP) and methylene chloride's (MC) use in paint and coating strippers. Both rulemakings are a consequence of risk assessments EPA issued in 2014 and 2015, respectively, as part of its ongoing Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) Work Plan for Chemicals Program. The Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act requires EPA to convene SBAR panels for most proposed rules unless EPA certifies that a rule will not significantly affect small companies. Stakeholders can track these panels' activities through dockets. More information on the TCE panel is available online. More information on the NMP and MC panel is available online.
http://www.natlawreview.com/article/epa-advisory-panel-electronic-manifest-fee-fda-grasgrae-determinations
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House Bill Would Help Schools Pay for Lead Testing
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Greenwire
By Tiffany Stecker
Illinois Reps. Mike Quigley and Tammy Duckworth introduced legislation yesterday that would reimburse schools that voluntarily test for lead in drinking water.
The Democrats' bill, H.R. 5833, would launch a program to pay schools for lead testing, improve lead guidance for schools and child care facilities, and help provide resources for replacing lead fixtures and pipes.
"Our children should not have to worry about lead contamination in their school drinking water -- they deserve better," Duckworth said in a statement.
The bill is the third introduced by the two lawmakers aimed at reducing lead in water.
Their first, H.R. 4806, would boost notification requirements for communities where lead levels exceed the federal limit of 15 parts per billion. Authorities would have to notify customers of lead contamination 28 days after excessive levels are discovered. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) is sponsoring companion legislation in the Senate (E&E Daily, March 18).
Their second measure, H.R. 4797, would provide grants to reduce lead in community drinking water supplies and delivery systems. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) introduced similar legislation.
The bills come as cities around the country grapple with a legacy of lead pipes in their water systems. Lead is a toxin that can delay brain development in children, as well as harm organs and cause miscarriages.
The widespread lead contamination of Flint, Mich., drinking water last year brought to light the frequent cases of excessive lead in water systems nationwide.
In Flint, state and local officials failed to ensure that water being drawn from the Flint River was properly treated when the city switched from buying Detroit's water to drawing from the river in 2014. The corrosive river water chewed away at lead pipes, tainting tap water.
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2016/07/19/stories/1060040466
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DIY Solutions for Your Toughest Laundry Stains
Jul 19, 2016 | Environmental Working Group
By Megan Boyle and Samara Geller
A child’s laundry basket is home to an assortment of stains, spots, strange colors and unwelcome odors. But most stain removers on the market contain hazardous ingredients and make questionable claims. What’s a parent to do?
Here are our top tips for removing your family’s toughest laundry stains – at home and without the harmful chemicals:
Use lemons to cut grease and get a mild bleaching effect.
· To remove a spot, apply a paste of salt and lemon juice, or baking soda and lemon juice.
· To bleach, soak fabrics in 1/3 cup lemon juice and 2/3 cup water (or equal parts lemon juice and water), then wash as usual.
· As with any spot remover, test first on a hidden area to make sure it won’t harm the fiber or color.
Use white vinegar to deodorize and cut grease.
· Mix equal parts white vinegar and water to get rid of brown or yellow spots (lemon juice works, too).
· For more punch, dab undiluted vinegar on fabric using a cloth or sponge.
Dry clothes in the sun for natural bleaching action.
Use hydrogen peroxide to tackle fruit, juice, blood and grass stains.
· Mix 1 tsp. dish soap and 1 cup hydrogen peroxide. Blot the mixture onto the stain, placing a towel underneath the garment. This helps the mixture soak up the stain from underneath.
More tips and tricks for removing fabric stains:
· Keep it simple: Try scraping the solid bits off of any stained fabric. Most stains will come out using this method alone.
· Pre-soak stained fabrics in water (a natural solvent), then pre-treat in a solution of dish or laundry liquid mixed with water, or a paste of powder detergent and water. Quickly treat protein-based stains, such as blood, vomit, urine, feces or mucus, with cold water to stop them from setting in.
· Get rid of stains using the same laundry detergent you would typically use for washing. Many detergents have directions right on the package for pre-treating stains and spots. Rub detergent into the fabric with an old toothbrush or any other tool that applies a bit of friction. Then rinse and repeat.
· Wash stained clothing in warm water. Detergent can’t do its job as well in cold water.
· To remove mud or clay, wash with powder detergents.
· When applying a stain remover directly to clothing, treat the reverse side of the fabric. This will force the stain off the fabric, not through
· Save yourself some trouble: When possible, avoid synthetic polyester and nylon clothing. It is notoriously difficult to remove stains from these fabrics.
· Stay safe: Don’t mix ammonia, vinegar or other acids with bleach! These combinations can produce toxic gases.
http://www.ewg.org/enviroblog/2016/07/diy-solutions-your-toughest-laundry-stains
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Jul 19, 2016 | E&E TV
As Republicans convene in Cleveland for the party's national convention, how will the current political dynamic shape the future of energy and climate policy in the United States? During today's OnPoint, Christine Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey and a former administrator at U.S. EPA, discusses the future of the Clean Power Plan and the transformation of the electric power sector in today's political climate.
Monica Trauzzi: Hello and welcome to OnPoint. I'm Monica Trauzzi. With me today is Christine Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey, former EPA administrator and now president of the Whitman Strategy Group. Governor Whitman, thank you for joining me.
Christine Todd Whitman: It's good to be with you, Monica. Thank you.
Monica Trauzzi: Governor, you're in town speaking at the Association of Climate Change Officers Climate Strategies Forum, on the energy ecosystem through the lens of the Clean Power Plan. Does the uncertainty that surrounds the future of the Clean Power Plan truly affect states and industry when we really see the momentum of the industry going in that direction?
Christine Todd Whitman: Obviously it has some effect, but you have some 20 states now that are already moving forward. As you point out, there's just a momentum going this way. You have a number now of major businesses with no requirement in law or regulation that are already taking significant steps to reduce their greenhouse gases and their carbon footprint in general, their water usage, to be better environmental stewards. I think it's going to come no matter what.
It's certainly happening around the rest of the world. Come being a cap on carbon, which is what the Clean Power Plan was really getting at and that's one of the reasons why I've been so supportive of nuclear energy because, well, we can and will do better with the renewables, with wind and solar and hydro, we're not going to be able to meet our needs if we're looking at a 40 percent increase in electricity demand by 2030 whatever the numbers are today; 23 percent demand. I can't even remember now, but we're looking at demand growing.
If we're going to meet that by 2040, we're not going to get there with renewables. We're going to have to have some other form of base power --
Monica Trauzzi: How about natural gas?
Christine Todd Whitman: Well, natural gas is certainly better than coal. No two ways about it as far as being clean, but not nearly as clean as nuclear. Nuclear's the only form of base power that produces no greenhouse gases while it's producing power. The good thing about nuclear is that uranium takes such a small amount of uranium to produce so much power that you can lock in long-term contracts. So you're not subject to the whims of natural gas fluctuations and prices and effects of weather and things like that that have an impact on the prices.
So it's an all-of-the-above strategy. We need natural gas and we're always going to have some coal, but if we truly care about clean air and healthier lives, then we want to reduce our carbon emissions.
Monica Trauzzi: What do you make of states who have halted any planning on the Clean Power Plan and are waiting to see what the courts are doing? Are they at a disadvantage in a sense?
Christine Todd Whitman: I think they will be over the long term. I think it's wise to get prepared because they're going to feel such pressure no matter what happens. Something's going to happen. How it comes and what form it comes -- we have to remember EPA really didn't want to do this. They would have far preferred to have Congress act, but Congress has not been able to act on a whole lot of things or much of anything might one say recently.
So it came down to the agency to take some action because they're required to under the Clean Air Act once the Supreme Court had said that carbon was, in fact, a pollutant. So EPA had to take action and this is the action they chose to take.
You can argue the method that they used to do it, but as far as taking action, looking for a curb in greenhouse gas emissions, that is something that's inevitably coming. You see it happening around the world and they're going to put pressure on our country for international businesses trying to do business in other countries where you have to certify what you've done to reduce your greenhouse gas emissions.
They want certainty and they'd like to have harmonized regulations. We're going to need to get in step. While the president did participate and signed on the United States, the president did. Not the Congress yet. To COP 21, the Paris accords.
You had over 190 nations saying this is a real problem of which we had to deal.
Monica Trauzzi: What are the most critical hurdles then to advancing the transformation of the electric power sector here in the U.S.? We have many nuclear facilities closing down. It's a very dynamic situation and there's a lot in flux. So what are the hurdles?
Christine Todd Whitman: Well, really nuclear needs to be recognized for the outsized role it plays in getting us to clean air. Right now most of the regulatory structures are based on getting the lowest price. Natural gas is very low right now. Easy to access with fracking. We have a plentiful supply.
So we should take advantage of that. It's natural, but if we're truly focused on cleaning up our air and giving people a healthier quality of life, then we've got to recognize that those parts of our energy grid, whether it be nuclear or solar or wind or hydro that don't produce those greenhouse gas emissions or those other pollutants and carbon pollution, should get more credit. That should be recognized in the regulatory structure; not just the price.
Monica Trauzzi: But utilities, when they're making their decisions, they're looking at the price and what makes the most sense --
Christine Todd Whitman: Oh sure. But that's part of the regulatory structure in which they work. So if the states actually can change and give them more credit for using something like nuclear or more of the renewables, then they will start to pivot that way because they understand it's dangerous to put all your eggs in one basket and they've been doing so much investment in natural gas and now they're slowing that down because the price has gone.
So you see all these fluctuations at play and it reminds you that you really need to have an all-of-the-above strategy. We're going to need all the different forms of energy. Just hopefully over time those that produce no carbon emissions, have no carbon emissions and no greenhouse gases are going to start to take over and be the dominant forms of our energy mix.
Monica Trauzzi: I want to talk politics for a second. You've been vocal about your opposition to Donald Trump. Is his dialogue on climate change in line with what average Republicans believe?
Christine Todd Whitman: It's hard. If you want to talk about the average Republicans you'll find at the national convention this week, probably it is, but if you talk about Republicans in general, no, I don't believe it is. There are a great number of Republicans and there's some very active Republican organizations that recognize the importance of climate change and the necessity of dealing with it.
The fact that this has very serious implications for our country from a national security point of view, from an economic point of view and a health point of view and want to take some action on it. So I do believe he's out of step with a majority of Republicans not his base. His base is very firmly I think with him on this.
Monica Trauzzi: If he were to be elected, how would that affect your work?
Christine Todd Whitman: Make it much more difficult I believe. He'll do everything he can, from what I understand, to move away from any kind of a commitment to climate change. He said he has no interest in the COP 21, the Paris accords. He has no interest in the Environmental Protection Agency, which again I think will run him into huge amount of problems besides the fact that a lot of what he wants to do he can't just do unilaterally.
He is not going to be a czar. He's not a king. He is a president in a democracy and he's got rules and laws by which even he has to live, but it will make it much more difficult.
He's going counter to what people want because so many forget. EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, was not established because Congress thought this was a good idea. It was because the public demanded it because they were seeing so much pollution. They were told to stay indoors numerable times in the summer because of bad air quality.
The Cuyahoga River in Ohio spontaneously broke into flames, spontaneously combusted. The land was looking like a garbage dump and the people said enough. Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring." That was enough to do it to get a Republican president, Richard Nixon, to work with a Democrat Congress in the midst of a huge amount of turmoil back in 1970.
You have to remember that was the height of the race riots in our cities. The anti-Vietnam riots on college campuses and yet they took this issue up and came to agreement and established it and the Clean Water Act, Safe Drinking Water Act, Clean Air Act.
Monica Trauzzi: So as you alluded to, the Republican Party is clearly very divided right now in terms of next steps. What do you think the solution is then for the party moving towards November or do you think it's past the point of no return and that it's really too late now?
Christine Todd Whitman: Well, I think there's something to me. A major appeal that would solve the problems. I really long ago got over wondering why people do things or wanting them to only do them for the right reasons as long as they do them. That would be to support something like nuclear, which is a huge job creator, among other things.
There are over 100 different nuclear reactors being built around the world. I think we would want our technology to be at the forefront because it's among the best. We don't really want people, the Ukraine for instance, to have to rely on Russian nuclear parts.
They're now trying to pivot to Westinghouse. Westinghouse is building four right now under construction for nuclear reactors in China that's accounting for 15,000 jobs in this country. So that will address climate issue.
No matter where those nuclear reactors are built although I would they'd be built in this country as well and especially small modular reactors, the next generation, but still that's a job creator. That's something Republicans should like.
So whether they believe in climate change or care about clean air, OK. Take that off the table, but say here. You can get to where we want to go on those other two issues, but do it without emphasizing that.
Monica Trauzzi: Is nuclear energy lacking a true champion in Congress? Is that one of the reasons why there's so much --
Christine Todd Whitman: There are a number of people who are supportive of it, but nobody's taken on it as the major issue, but we need it. When you do polls with people you will see that people are overwhelmingly in favor of Congress taking up energy and starting to address our coming energy needs.
They really do favor improving our quality of life. So they want to see reliable, affordable clean energy. That's what we need. We need a national energy policy that just says that and then gets Congress out of the business of all these determinations of how that should be done.
Monica Trauzzi: We'll end it right there. Thank you so much for coming on.
Christine Todd Whitman: Pleasure.
Monica Trauzzi: Nice to see you. Thanks for watching. We'll see you back here tomorrow.
http://www.eenews.net/tv/videos/2151/transcript
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Fighting Obama’s Climate Plan, but Quietly Preparing to Comply
Jul 19, 2016 | New York Times
By Coral Davenport
Matt Mead, the Republican governor of Wyoming, the nation’s leading coal-producing state, fiercely opposesPresident Obama’s climate change regulations, which could shutter hundreds of coal plants and deeply wound his state, one of 27 that are suing to block the plan.
Nevertheless, Mr. Mead has ordered his top environmental officials to prepare to comply with the president’s effort, known as the Clean Power Plan — to prepare for a future in which Mr. Obama’s climate change rules prevail and the country’s coal market is nearly frozen. Wyoming is one of at least 20 states that are moving forward with efforts to comply with the rules or to analyze alternative plans. Several of these states are also suing to stop the rules, according to experts who track state climate change policy.
“Obviously we’re suing and going to fight,” Mr. Mead, a former state attorney general, said in an interview in his office. “But from my court experience, I know you have to prepare not to win.”
Mr. Obama’s ambitious climate change plan is in legal limbo. The Supreme Court has ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to halt the plan until after the states’ lawsuit is resolved. The case will go before a federal court in September, but it is widely expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court and may not be decided until 2018.
Republicans in Congress and their presumptive presidential nominee, Donald J. Trump, have vowed to scrap the climate change rules. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, has urged governors to refuse to comply, and Republican governors in some states, including Indiana, New Jersey and Wisconsin, have issued “pencils down” orders to state regulators to stop work on the Clean Power Plan.
But in other states, governors, including some Republicans, and many environmental officials say that because the plan is so sweeping and ambitious, it would be imprudent to ignore it. The climate plan would force states to fundamentally transform their electricity systems, shutting down hundreds of power plants that run on fossil fuels and building new ones powered by the wind, the sun and other low-carbon sources, along with hundreds of miles of new transmission lines. Governors like Mr. Mead and state-level environment officials are making a political calculation: If Hillary Clinton is elected president and appoints a new Supreme Court justice, Mr. Obama’s climate plan will probably survive.
In some cases, the governors moving forward with drafting state-level climate change plans are Democrats in places that already have some form of climate policy in place, like California and New York.Continue reading the main story
But in some Republican-led states, even those with “pencils down” orders, regulators are sketching out how they might eventually comply.
Mr. Trump “has said what he thinks about climate change, and he’s not likely to look favorably on someone who’s crossways,” Michael McKenna, a Republican energy lobbyist, said of the wariness of politicians in the party.
“But if you’re a state environmental official and you think there’s a chance that Hillary Clinton is going to be president, you’d be unwise not to think about this,” he continued. “I feel bad for these state environmental guys. The ‘pencils down’ order puts them in a lousy spot, where some of what they’re doing has to be surreptitious.”
In South Carolina, after the Supreme Court halted the Clean Power Plan, C. Dukes Scott, the top regulator for Gov. Nikki R. Haley, a Republican, issued an order to stop all work on the plan — or even talk about it.
“I’m trying not to expend any resources on the Clean Power Plan, and I’m expending resources just talking to you,” Mr. Scott said in an interview.
But South Carolina state regulators are moving forward with meetings on a new state energy plan — which, Mr. Scott conceded, will probably include discussion of how to reduce emissions from electric power plants. It will just not be called the Clean Power Plan.
“We’re still working on clean air, just not pursuant to the Clean Power Plan,” Mr. Scott said. He added that if the Clean Power Plan were upheld by the courts, South Carolina’s work on an energy plan that includes lower emissions from power plants could be repurposed in its work to comply with the climate plan.
Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, a finalist in Mr. Trump’s vice-presidential search, issued an executive stop-work order on the plan, and environmental regulators in the state said they had frozen all work on the global warming rules.
“New Jersey is strongly opposed to the Clean Power Plan, and we are not developing any compliance plan, nor do we intend to,” said J. Gregory Reinert, a spokesman for the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities.
But officials at PJM Interconnection, which manages electric power lines that run between 13 states, including New Jersey, said that a board made up of officials in all its member states, including New Jersey, had asked PJM to perform analyses of how they might comply with the climate plan, since it could create major changes in how electricity is produced and moved across state lines.
“If the rules move forward, that could change the entire way the electric transmission system works,” said Ray Dotter, a spokesman for PJM. “States want to be informed about this. If they’re not, it could cost them a fortune.”
In Virginia, supporters of Mr. Obama’s climate change agenda are trying to advance it with the “by another name” approach. Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, backs the president’s climate change agenda, but in May, the Republican-majority state legislature passed a bill blocking the use of public funding for work related to complying with or even analyzing the Clean Power Plan.
So Mr. McAuliffe issued an executive order directing his secretary of natural resources to convene a working group that would put together a plan to cut carbon dioxide emissions in the state, using existing laws or regulations.
“I decided I wasn’t going to wait around for the court,” Mr. McAuliffe said. “I figured I had a way to get creative and do it my own way.”
“We will move forward with our own Virginia plan,” he added. “It won’t be called the Clean Power Plan, but the goals are similar.”
Because environmental officials in many states are preparing their climate change plans behind closed doors, ascertaining the exact number of states that are moving forward is difficult.
Environmental officials from 14 states, most of which are not taking part in the lawsuit, have sent a letter to the E.P.A. requesting technical help as they prepare for the plan. An analysis by Energy and Environment News, an industry publication, estimates that about 20 states, including Republican strongholds like Idaho and Arizona, are actively moving forward with plans, and that an additional eight states are assessing climate plans but are not yet taking steps to carry them out.
“Other than for political reasons, it doesn’t make sense for states to stand down on their preparations,” said William Becker, the director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies. “Very few states are just putting down their pencils and waiting.”
Mr. Becker said his agency had held informational meetings and conference calls about the plan, including a recent call in which he estimated that officials from about 50 state and local governments participated. He declined to identify the officials who had taken part.
“It’s difficult for me to out someone on this,” Mr. Becker said. “I don’t want someone to think they participated in a meeting, and now they’re being ratted out.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/20/us/obama-clean-power-plan.html?_r=0
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Production from Big Seven Plays to Continue Decline in August, EIA Says
Jul 19, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By David Bradley
Oil and natural gas production from the nation's seven largest unconventional plays, which has been on a downward trend since last fall, will slip again in August, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
EIA released its first Drilling Productivity Report in October 2013 (see Shale Daily, Oct. 22, 2013) but didn't forecast month-to-month declines until September 2015 (see Shale Daily, Sept. 15, 2015; April 13, 2015). Since then, the agency's production forecasts have followed a steady downward trend (see Shale Daily,June 13, May 16; April 11).
That trend is expected to continue next month, EIA said in its latest DPR, with oil production projected to decline 99,000 b/d to 4.56 million b/d, compared with 4.65 million b/d in July.
EIA forecast oil production out of the Bakken in August to be 966,000 b/d, compared with 998,000 b/d in July, with declines also expected in the Eagle Ford (1.08 million b/d, compared to 1.13 million b/d), Niobrara (371,000 b/d, compared to 383,000 b/d) and Permian (1.97 million b/d, compared to 1.98 million b/d). A marginal decline is also expected in the Haynesville, with unchanged production from the Marcellus and Utica.
Total natural gas production out of the Bakken, Eagle Ford, Haynesville, Marcellus, Niobrara, Permian and Utica will be an estimated 45.73 Bcf/d in August, a 417 MMcf/d decline compared with an estimated 46.14 Bcf/d this month, EIA said. The only play expected to see an increase in gas production is the Utica (up 5 MMcf/d to 3.67 Bcf/d).
For the second month in a row, EIA said it expects the biggest decline in natural gas production in the Eagle Ford Shale, with the agency forecasting 5.81 Bcf/d in August, down 209 MMcf/d from 6.01 Bcf/d this month.
EIA expects 17.95 Bcf/d out of the Marcellus Shale next month, compared with 17.98 Bcf/d in July. The agency also expects to see month-to-month declines in the Bakken Shale (1.56 Bcf/d, compared with 1.59 Bcf/d in July), the Haynesville Shale (5.88 Bcf/d, compared with 5.92 Bcf/d), the Niobrara formation (3.99 Bcf/d, compared with 4.07 Bcf/d), and the Permian Basin (6.87 Bcf/d, compared with 6.91 Bcf/d).
The productivity of new oil wells in the plays is expected to improve slightly in August. On a rig-weighted average basis, oil production per rig will be 558 b/d, compared to 548 b/d this month, according to the DPR. At the same time, new-well gas production per rig in the plays will decrease slightly, from 2.88 MMcf/d in July to 2.85 MMcf/d in August, EIA said.
More U.S. land-based drilling rigs returned to play in the Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI) rig count released Friday, and the Permian Basin turned in another strong showing (see Shale Daily,July 15). During the week ended July 15, the Permian added two units, making it the biggest gainer among U.S. plays, according to BHI.
http://www.naturalgasntel.com/articles/107115-production-from-big-seven-plays-to-continue-decline-in-august-eia-says
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Marcellus Shale Drilling Tax is Gone, For Now
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
Updated at 8:37 a.m. EDT.
Pennsylvania avoided imposing new taxes on the natural gas industry in its most recent state budget, but Gov. Tom Wolf said he'll ask for one next year and the Republican-led Legislature may come under pressure to allow it.
Wolf, a Democrat, was elected in 2014 after promising to crack down on the gas industry. One of his key talking points was the need for a tax on natural gas production, known as a severance tax (EnergyWire, Nov. 26, 2014).
The Republican-led Legislature has blocked the idea in its last two annual budgets. But the most recent $31.5 billion spending plan relies on more than $300 million in one-time revenue. Once that money is spent, observers on both sides of the state's ideological divide said legislators are likely to be back where they were two years ago when Wolf took office -- trying to decide whether to cut crucial state services like education or find new ways to bring in money.
"The Legislature will have no choice but to talk about raising revenue," said Stephen Herzenberg, an economist at the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, which advocates for a progressive tax system.
Elizabeth Stelle, at the free-market Commonwealth Foundation, said the Legislature could be forced to pick between a tax on the gas industry or a broad-based levy like a higher sales or income tax.
"The way that they balanced this year's budget, they set themselves up for a very difficult situation next year," she said.
Wolf has already staked out his position.
"Gov. Wolf will continue to advocate for a severance tax and reintroduce it as part of his budget proposal next year," Mark Nicastre, a spokesman, said in an email. "It is not right that Pennsylvania is the only natural gas producing state without a severance tax."
Pennsylvania has become the second-biggest gas producer after Texas since advances in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, made it possible to tap into the Marcellus Shale formation, which lies more than a mile beneath the surface.
Unlike Texas and most other oil-and-gas-producing states, Pennsylvania doesn't have a direct tax on gas production. Instead, it levies an annual fee for each well, most of which is earmarked for local governments that are coping with the impact of drilling.
The Marcellus Shale Coalition, which represents the drilling industry, has said its members already pay enough, since Pennsylvania's overall tax burden is higher than most other energy-producing states.
Wolf's first budget proposal, for fiscal 2015-16, would have raised an estimated $1 billion from a severance tax. But it was met with stiff opposition from House Speaker Mike Turzai and other Republicans, who said it would force the drilling industry to leave the state.
"We understand for some, the talking point of getting Pennsylvania a 'severance tax' is paramount, but the fact remains, the industry is already taxed via the Impact Fee," Steve Miskin, a spokesman for the House Republican leadership, said in an email.
The Legislature passed a $30.3 billion plan without a drilling tax and that left out funding for Wolf's other priorities like education. Wolf vetoed parts of it, leading to an impasse that carried on until March (EnergyWire, Feb. 10).
Wolf pared down his severance tax proposal for the 2016-17 budget. It would have brought in an estimated $218 million (EnergyWire, March 31).
The Legislature still rejected the idea, but with an election looming in November, both sides were eager to avoid another budget stalemate. In a compromise, the Legislature increased spending to $31.5 billion, but had to rely on a grab bag of new revenue to cover the higher outlays.
Among the revenue sources: a $200 million loan from an insurance fund, $100 million from delinquent taxes, $100 million from an expansion on gambling that has yet to pass the Legislature and $75 million from a casino license that was granted in 2014, according to the Associated Press.
Once those funds run out, they'll have to be replaced with recurring revenue.
Stelle, with the Commonwealth Foundation, said Pennsylvania needs to reduce the growth of its spending by reforming entitlements and pensions for state workers. That approach would allow it to rebalance the budget in 2017 without new taxes.
On the other hand, a severance tax remains popular with voters, said Chris Borick, a political science professor at Muhlenberg College who has followed the budget debate.
"I'd be shocked if it's not back on the table in 2017," he said.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2016/07/19/stories/1060040457
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New Tool Measures Smart Grid Benefits. A Game Changer for Our Power Industry?
Jul 19, 2016 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Dick Munson
We all know exercise is good for our hearts and bodies, and who doesn’t enjoy stepping on the scale after weeks of good workouts to confirm progress was made?
In a way, power companies are just like people.
As they begin to invest in smart meters and other grid modernization efforts, utilities want to know how well they do. Are grid programs fulfilling environmental promises and cutting pollution? Can they measure success and prove to investors and regulators they’re making smart decisions?
To that effect, Illinois’ largest electricity provider, Commonwealth Edison, is the first in the country to adopt a new tool that calculates clean air benefits from investments such as advanced meters.
Beyond bringing tangible rewards to ComEd, this little-noticed milestone can have major implications for the entire power industry.$2.6 billion for smart grid paved way
After Illinois passed the Energy Infrastructure Modernization Act in 2011, channeling $2.6 billion to ComEd to modernize the grid, the company began to replace customers’ conventional electric meters with advanced meters. The new devices make it easier to provide energy savings programs and other clean energy services, while helping the utility reduce outages.
The company is now more than half-way there, having deployed more than 2 million meters across its territory, along with other sensing and control technology.
This is where the first-of-its kind metric comes in.
ComEd started to use the measurement tool earlier this year to calculate and report greenhouse to state regulators gas savings from its new and advanced energy infrastructure. It was developed in collaboration with Environmental Defense Fund and the Citizens Utility Board, Illinois’ premiere utility watchdog.
The initiative serves, in essence, as a pilot project for other power companies that share ComEd’s objectives to build a modern grid and be held accountable to investors and the public they serve.This metric…does what, exactly?
By determining the carbon value of a kilowatt-hour of electricity for all 8,760 hours in a single year, the new metric can pinpoint how much pollution the advanced meters are keeping out of the air.
For example, when power comes from high-carbon coal, using a kWh of this electricity results in more carbon pollution than when power is coming from mostly low-carbon wind or solar.
Advanced meters can also open the door for numerous clean energy and smart grid tools, such as energy efficiency anddemand response, which rewards customers for conserving electricity when the grid needs it most. The metric will be able to track the greenhouse gas reductions associated with all of these efforts, and more.Rewards too good to pass up
As ComEd continues its advanced meter rollout, the utility hopes to be rewarded accordingly. Illinois offers higher earnings for utilities that show they’re meeting the goals of the state’s grid modernization plan.
As the company gains more experience with the metric’s use, it will also be able to incorporate the findings into future plans and make more informed investment decisions going forward.
ComEd may be first out of the gate with this innovative tool, but it probably won’t be the last in our growing clean energy economy.
https://www.edf.org/blog/2016/07/19/new-tool-measures-smart-grid-benefits-game-changer-our-power-industry
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How Renewable Energy Is Blowing Climate Change Efforts Off Course
Jul 19, 2016 | New York Times
By Eduaordo Porter
Is the global effort to combat climate change, painstakingly agreed to in Paris seven months ago, already going off the rails?
Germany, Europe’s champion for renewable energy, seems to be having second thoughts about its ambitious push to ramp up its use of renewable fuels for power generation.
Hoping to slow the burst of new renewable energy on its grid, the country eliminated an open-ended subsidy for solar and wind power and put a ceiling on additional renewable capacity.
Germany may also drop a timetable to end coal-fired generation, which still accounts for over 40 percent of its electricity, according to a reportleaked from the country’s environment ministry. Instead, the government will pay billions to keep coal generators in reserve, to provide emergency power at times when the wind doesn’t blow or the sun doesn’t shine.
Renewables have hit a snag beyond Germany, too. Renewable sources are producing temporary power gluts from Australia to California, driving out other energy sources that are still necessary to maintain a stable supply of power.
In Southern Australia, where wind supplies more than a quarter of the region’s power, the spiking prices of electricity when the wind wasn’t blowing full-bore pushed the state government to ask the power company Engie to switch back on a gas-fired plant that had been shut down.
But in what may be the most worrisome development in the combat against climate change, renewables are helping to push nuclear power, the main source of zero-carbon electricity in the United States, into bankruptcy.Continue reading the main story
The United States, and indeed the world, would do well to reconsider the promise and the limitations of its infatuation with renewable energy.
“The issue is, how do we decarbonize the electricity sector, while keeping the lights on, keeping costs low and avoiding unintended consequences that could make emissions increase?” said Jan Mazurek, who runs the clean power campaign at the environmental advocacy group ClimateWorks.
Addressing those challenges will require a more subtle approach than just attaching more renewables to the grid.
An analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, narrowly distributed two weeks ago, estimated that nuclear reactors that produce 56 percent of the country’s nuclear power would be unprofitable over the next three years. If they were all to go under and be replaced with gas-fired generators, an additional 200 million tons of carbon dioxide would be spewed into the atmosphere every year.
The economics of nuclear energy are mostly to blame. It just cannot compete with cheap natural gas. Most reactors in the country are losing between $5 and $15 per megawatt-hour, according to the analysis.
Nuclear energy’s fate is not being dictated solely by markets, though. Policy makers focused on pushing renewable sources of energy above all else — heavily subsidizing solar and wind projects, and setting legal targets for power generation from renewables — are contributing actively to shut the industry down. Facing intense popular aversion, nuclear energy is being left to wither.
As Will Boisvert wrote in an analysis for Environmental Progress, an environmental organization that advocates nuclear energy, the industry’s woes “could be remedied by subsidies substantially smaller than those routinely given to renewables.” The federal production tax credit for wind farms, for instance, is worth $23 per megawatt-hour, which is more than the amount that nuclear generators would need to break even.
Nuclear generators’ troubles highlight the unintended consequences of brute force policies to push more and more renewable energy onto the grid. These policies do more than endanger the nuclear industry. They could set back the entire effort against climate change.
California, where generators are expected to get half of their electricity from renewables by 2030, offers a pretty good illustration of the problem. It’s called the “duck curve.” It shows what adding renewables to the electric grid does to the demand for other sources of power, and it does look like a duck.
As more and more solar capacity is fed onto the grid, it will displace alternatives. An extra watt from the sun costs nothing. But the sun doesn’t shine equally at all times. Around noon, when it is blazing, there will be little need for energy from nuclear reactors, or even from gas or coal. At 7 p.m., when people get home from work and turn on their appliances, the sun will no longer be so hot. Ramping up alternative sources then will be indispensable.
The problem is that nuclear reactors, and even gas- and coal-fired generators, can’t switch themselves on and off on a dime. So what happens is that around the middle of the day those generators have to pay the grid to take their power. Unsurprisingly, this erodes nukes’ profitability. It might even nudge them out of the system altogether.
How does a renewables strategy play out in the future? Getting more power from renewables at 7 p.m. will mean building excess capacity at noon. Indeed, getting all power from renewables will require building capacity equal to several times the demand during the middle of the day and keeping it turned off much of the time.
Daily fluctuations are not the end of it. Wind power and sunlight change with the seasons, too. What’s more, climate change will probably change their power and seasonality in unforeseen ways. Considering how expensive wind and sun farms can be, it might make sense to reconsider a strategy that dashes a zero-carbon energy source that could stay on all the time.
A report published last month by the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers suggests there is space for more renewable energy on the grid. New technologies — to store power when the sun is hot or to share it across wider areas — might allow for a bigger renewable footprint.
But there are limits. “There is a very real integration cost from renewables,” said Kenneth Gillingham, an economist at Yale who wrote the report. “So far that cost is small.”
In Germany, where renewables have mostly replaced nuclear power, carbon emissions are rising, even as Germans pay the most expensive electricity rates in Europe. In South Australia, the all-wind strategy is taking its toll. And in California, the costs of renewables are also apparent.
Nuclear energy’s fate is not quite sealed. In New York, fears that the impending shutdown of three upstate reactors would imperil climate change mitigation persuaded Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office to extend subsidies comparable to those given to renewables, to keep them afloat. Even in California, where nuclear energy has no friends, Diablo Canyon, the last remaining nuclear plant, is expected to stay open for almost another decade.
Still, both New York and California expect to eventually phase out nuclear power entirely. An analysis by Bloomberg puts the cost of replacing Diablo Canyon’s zero-carbon power with solar energy at $15 billion. This sum might be better spent replacing coal.
Displacing nuclear energy clearly makes the battle against climate change more difficult. But that is not what is most worrying. What if the world eventually discovers that renewables can’t do the job alone? “I worry about lock-in,” Ms. Mazurek said. “If it doesn’t work, the climate doesn’t have time for a do-over.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/20/business/energy-environment/how-renewable-energy-is-blowing-climate-change-efforts-off-course.html?_r=0
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How DHS Fell Silent When a Hack Threatened the U.S. Power Grid
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak and Peter Behr
Second of a four-part series. Click here to read part one.
A month after hackers blacked out power in western Ukraine, a team of U.S. security experts touched down in Kiev to piece together the extraordinary assault.
Interviews, cellphone video evidence and a crash course in Soviet-era grid equipment helped the dozen or so Americans untangle the Dec. 23, 2015, cyberattack on three utilities. The investigators traveled thousands of miles with one big question in mind: Could the methods used to hack the Ukrainian power distributors, or the hidden code behind the strike, pose a threat to the U.S. electric grid?
But two days into the five-day mission, analysts working in an opaque intelligence aggregator at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security reached their own conclusion. The Ukraine case did not pose any particular risk for U.S. systems, according to a Jan. 27 DHS memo marked "For Official Use Only."
Weeks later, a separate branch of DHS flipped that conclusion on its head, delivering the first in a series of stark warnings to electric utilities and other operators of U.S. critical infrastructure.
The conflicting and drawn-out response to the hack has triggered pointed criticism about DHS's ability to deliver cyberthreat intelligence outside the walls of government. The agency is supposed to spread the word about fast-moving online threats to the networks that underlie everything from the bulk power grid to car factories. But in the case of the Ukraine hack, the first of its kind, it took two months for DHS to disclose lessons from the incident and three more months to provide additional guidance accounting for the attackers' techniques.
"There was a credible threat to the U.S. grid, with realistic mitigations that could have been applied, and instead [DHS] decided to sit on the information," said Robert M. Lee, founder of Dragos Security LLC and a co-author of an influential SANS Institute analysis of the Ukraine case.
"In the midst of the first attack on a power grid that was public, there was no public word from the government," he said.
The war that had been raging in Ukraine for two years was a major source of frustration for U.S.-Russia relations. The agency was struggling to field requests from the utility industry and private analysts to share what the U.S. government considered sensitive information.
Some industry officials had an inside track on earlier attack details, including executives with security clearances and members of the CEO-level Electricity Subsector Coordinating Council, the industry's principal liaison with the U.S. government on security issues. But the broader power sector would have to wait.
The hackers in Eastern Europe had preyed upon equipment and technological vulnerabilities also present in North America's energy infrastructure, even repurposing a malware strain that was unearthed in U.S. systems in 2014.
As DHS officials kept largely quiet, utilities relied on private cybersecurity firms and media reports to fill in the blanks about the methods hackers used. Experts say the early lack of widely shared, actionable data could have left some companies exposed. And that has put DHS at the center of concerns about the effectiveness of cyberthreat-sharing from the U.S. government to the private sector, which controls the vast majority of the nation's critical infrastructure.
"If the U.S. government is seeking to achieve a real partnership with the private sector, what is their value-added proposition?" said Susan Hennessey, a fellow in national security law at the Brookings Institution and managing editor of Lawfare.
Unimportant or 'imperative'?
DHS was still trying to pin down details of the Ukraine attack a month after it happened.
During the on-the-ground investigation in western Ukraine from Jan. 25 to 29, DHS's Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT) joined representatives from the Department of Energy, the FBI and the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC), which develops and enforces cybersecurity rules for the high-voltage bulk power transmission grid.
The itinerary was secret. But the fact-finding mission came as no surprise, given that the hourslong grid takedown in Ukraine was without precedent in the brief history of cyber conflict. Private security firms had already concluded in early January that evidence pointed to computer hackers, not some other form of sabotage or human error.
Still, officials at DHS headquarters saw no reason to wait for investigators to return from Ukraine before issuing a threat assessment. On Jan. 27, with the investigators on the ground, DHS's Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) published an analysis titled, in bold letters, "Damaging Cyber Attacks Possible but Not Likely Against the U.S. Energy Sector."
The report from I&A, which reports directly to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson, said it "is unable to confirm the event was triggered by cyber means," citing "limited authoritative reporting."
I&A is tasked with analyzing top-secret intelligence, and it's charged with being a DHS conduit to state and local authorities. Its direct access to DHS's chain of command also puts it at the center of gravity as the agency considers rising threats. But the office has faced sharp criticism from Congress about its effectiveness, and it has fought turf battles with the FBI over who is tasked with distributing information about domestic threats.
The I&A report, which was later leaked and published by the Public Intelligence accountability and transparency research project, concluded that "this incident does not represent an increase in the threat of a disruptive or destructive cyberattack on U.S. energy infrastructure, which I&A assesses is low."
In explaining the reassuring finding in a footnote, I&A said it was based on the earliest views of the attack expressed at a Jan. 4 meeting that included DHS and industry officials.
But the I&A outlook crumbled fast. DHS's view switched 180 degrees two weeks after the U.S. team returned home. In a February alert pushed out to electricity providers, DHS officials warned of a potential threat against utilities. The seriousness of DHS alerts to industry only escalated from there.
On March 7, the department released a detailed breakdown and alert about the attack and cited an "urgent need" for grid operators and other critical infrastructure owners to take "enhanced cyber measures" to protect themselves.
On the same day, Andy Ozment, DHS assistant secretary for cybersecurity and communications, and Greg Touhill, the deputy assistant secretary in the same office, stated that while there was no evidence of a Ukraine-level attack underway in the United States, it was "imperative" to raise defenses against what happened there.
The DHS alert put the risk in stark terms.
"It is the assessment of ICS-CERT that critical infrastructure [industrial control system] networks, across multiple sectors, are vulnerable to similar attacks," the alert said.
DHS officials rejected repeated requests from EnergyWire for interviews and information about the department's response to the Ukraine attack and any lessons the agency learned.
By spring, senior DHS officials had switched gears from silence about the threat to elevating Ukraine to a top priority.
"It is incredibly important," said Suzanne Spaulding, DHS undersecretary for the National Protection and Programs Directorate (NPPD), in an April 12 podcast interview with a Washington law firm. "We are beginning a multi-city campaign across the country to make sure we get the word to critical infrastructure owners and operators about what happened there."
Spaulding said the "good news" is that the U.S. government knows how to protect against and mitigate a Ukraine-style attack on critical control systems. "But folks have to take steps. They have to take action. They have to understand this is not just something that has the potential to affect the electric grid," but something that could affect any Internet-connected critical infrastructure organization, she said.
NERC, the U.S. grid overseer, has maintained that the impact to the U.S. bulk electric power system would be blunted by best practices and binding federal critical infrastructure protection standards, the latest version of which took effect this month. But the standards rarely trickle down to small electric utilities.
"The grid in North America is larger and more diverse in the design and configuration of its equipment, including industrial control systems," NERC spokesman Martin Coyne said in response to EnergyWire's emailed questions. "As part of the industry's best practices, these systems run on licensed software and are routinely screened for potential threats including malware, which is not the case in Ukraine."
A BlackEnergy link
But there is at least one known and ominous similarity between the Ukraine systems and U.S. electric utilities -- the presence of BlackEnergy, a powerful, elusive intrusion malware that can give attackers a hidden opening to victims' systems. DHS has issued a series of warnings that BlackEnergy 2 has broken into the U.S. grid.
The similarities between the U.S. and Ukraine strains were so striking that DHS reposted the technical indicators in its original 2014 alert on BlackEnergy 2 to help companies root out its newer cousin, BlackEnergy 3, which was spotted on the Ukraine system.
NERC said BlackEnergy 3 has not made its way across the Atlantic.
"There is no credible evidence that the incident could affect North American grid operations and no plans to modify existing regulations or guidance based on this incident," NERC spokeswoman Kimberly Mielcarek said Jan. 7, three days after her colleagues huddled in a closed-door meeting with DHS to talk about what happened in Ukraine.
The regulator posted a confidential alert about the cyberattack, including recommendations, to members of its information-sharing portal in early February and asked U.S. utilities whether they had defenses in place against the series of weapons unleashed against Ukraine.
A month later, NERC shared a public analysis of the attack prepared by experts at the SANS Institute, a Bethesda, Md.-based influential cybersecurity training and research nonprofit.
That paper concluded that "nothing about the attack in Ukraine was inherently specific to Ukrainian infrastructure." It could happen elsewhere.
Duane Highley, CEO of the Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corp., who serves as co-chairman of the CEO-level Electricity Subsector Coordinating Council, testified before Congress last week that the Ukraine event offered a case study for how government could improve information sharing with his industry.
"While the content of the classified and unclassified information from the government was very helpful, the timeliness of getting specific, actionable information to industry must be improved so that we can respond as quickly as possible," Highley said in prepared remarks before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy.
He elaborated on his concerns in a follow-up interview last week, describing how private-sector experts pointed out that there was a vulnerability but were initially barred from sharing the details.
"We've got to become a closer partner with the Department of Energy and DHS, and we need to continue to develop greater trust, because we are on the front lines of the war," Highley said. "It used to just be the army fighting the war; now we've got the private sector fighting the war" in cyberspace.
Highley was optimistic that information sharing would improve post-Ukraine, based on follow-up conversations with administration officials and steps to implement information-sharing legislation.
"They just need to move a little faster," he said.
In fits and starts, DHS and Congress have worked toward reorganizing the agency to prioritize its industrial cybersecurity mission, in part by renaming the nondescript National Protection and Programs Directorate as the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Agency.
SANS Institute's Lee, a critic of DHS, said the agency threatened to take legal steps to block private analysts from sharing their early findings about Ukraine on security grounds. But he drew a distinction between the agency's experts and DHS's political arms.
"They're patriots. They're doing amazing work," he said. "The problem is with the bureaucracy of the larger government, where senior government leaders do not understand the technology, they don't understand the impact, and they don't understand the threat, but they're trying to limit what is said to the community."
'Are we prepared?'
The early warnings about the Ukraine attack's threat came from private industry cyber forensic specialists. For cybersecurity researcher Chris Sistrunk, the alarm arrived on Christmas Eve in a Twitter message from a trusted colleague in his close-knit circle of security professionals, Marina Krotofil. She enclosed a link to a Ukrainian-language news article.
Sistrunk couldn't believe what she was sharing: Hackers had reportedly knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian electricity customers.
"We were questioning if it was a real attack or not," Sistrunk said.
When he and Krotofil found mentions of the cyberattack on power companies' public websites and Facebook pages, their suspicions inched toward certainty. The Ukraine outages looked like they really were the work of hackers.
Sistrunk dialed ICS-CERT, the government's first line of defense against cyberthreats to electric infrastructure. He also notified NERC, which runs its own secure threat information-sharing site.
He said leaving the messages was "just a good thing to do" on the chance there was a similar intrusion and takedown playing out at U.S. utilities.
Get the tactics, techniques and procedures out the door fast enough, the thinking goes, and hackers won't be able to use the same tricks twice. The sooner utilities can learn about specific vulnerabilities, the smaller the window of time during which they can be exploited.
The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, which Congress passed late last year, called on DHS to strengthen distribution of classified cyberthreats and bring information sharing up to "machine speed." This spring, the department launched its Automated Indicator Sharing (AIS) capability to cut out the need for phone calls like Sistrunk's in the future. Only a few electric utilities are participating in the new venture at this point. The power industry's main source of cyberthreat information from the government is the Energy Department.
Such machine-to-machine warning tools work best when fed with concrete data: Which URLs have been hijacked? What internet protocol addresses are the hackers known to be using?
A few of these clues emerged as the dust settled and the lights came back on in western Ukraine. On Jan. 11, DHS published digital signatures that could be used to search for the malicious BlackEnergy payload thought to have been used during the course of the attack.
"We cannot confirm a causal link between the power outage with the presence of the malware," the agency said, adding that it still "strongly encourages" companies to look for BlackEnergy.
But there was much more to the Ukraine attack than strings and conditions, zeroes and ones. This was not a threat that could be spooled through a computer, diagnosed instantly or quickly tamed. The threat was distinctly human, down to the bogus telephone calls designed to hamper the Ukrainian power utilities' ability to respond.
Brookings' Hennessey said DHS's assessment likely evolved as the focus shifted from the immediate attack to its broader implications, though she, too, took issue with the delay.
"It's the natural way that the U.S. government tends to respond to threats: first, in a very specific sense, because that's where the most rapid response potentially is needed," said Hennessey, who formerly worked in the Office of General Counsel at NSA. "Then they move on to the larger questions: What about the electric grid in general? What about critical infrastructure in general? Are we prepared?
"I think DHS was shaken by the outcome of that inquiry," she said.
5.8 out of 10
The limitations of DHS's capacity to navigate cyberthreats may have stemmed from diplomatic sensitivities and bureaucratic hurdles.
DHS was only able to visit Ukraine with a green light from Kiev, according to sources with knowledge of the inquiry.
"Given that this was politically sensitive, and who the likely perpetrator was, and that the U.S. was asked to come in, all of that tempered what could be said to the public," said one informed industry official.
Sources also said DHS analysts were hampered by the Ukraine government's reluctance to publicly broadcast details of the attack. Ukraine's worries are evident from its utilities' about-face on the news blasts that went out in the immediate aftermath of the hack. Kyivoblenergo, one of the three electricity distribution companies that hackers hit hardest, circulated an announcement warning that "third parties" had made "illegal entry" into its control systems. The utility later deleted the Dec. 24 post.
Since then, Ukrainian authorities have been quick to pin the cyberattack on Russia while avoiding detailed discussions of its causes and implications. One cybersecurity expert involved in the investigation declined comment, saying, "We try not to raise this topic anymore." The attack is dead and gone, the thinking goes -- any takeaways have long since been debated, adopted or cast aside.
But many of the technical lessons took more time to trickle down to U.S. utilities.
On May 31, more than five months after the Ukraine blackout, DHS posted a warningabout a commonly used piece of hardware.
In its advisory, DHS described a security glitch in a 7400-series Moxa device designed to translate serial communications in industrial environments to the modern Ethernet protocol. Moxa devices are widely deployed across the United States and worldwide, including in electric substations.
The vulnerability in question was hardly a slam-dunk, according to DHS, which ranked its severity a 5.8 on a 10-point scale. "Crafting a working exploit for this vulnerability would be difficult," the agency's Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team concluded, without mentioning Ukraine.
Yet on Dec. 23, remote hackers managed to disable dozens of the devices in the first-of-its-kind cyberattack on Ukraine's power grid.
Once corrupted by malicious firmware updates, the devices were impossible to repair. Grid operators in Ukraine had to buy and install brand new serial-to-Ethernet converters across affected substations.
Moxa has since stopped producing the UC 7408-LX-Plus device with the critical flaw.
To SANS's industrial cybersecurity expert Lee, DHS's response to the Moxa problem defied explanation.
"We know for a fact that the adversary took advantage of a vulnerability to overwrite the firmware on a Moxa device during a nation-state cyberattack on the power grid," he said. "And how does DHS classify it? 'It would take a really skilled attacker to do this, and we're giving it a 5 out of 10 for vulnerability rating.' What?"
Moscow, maybe
DHS's website is littered with warnings about insecure industrial products coming from big manufacturers like Siemens and Schneider Electric down to smaller companies like Malaysia-based Ecava.
In written testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee earlier this year, U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper listed threats from "cyber and technology" on Page 1.
"Devices, designed and fielded with minimal security requirements and testing, and an ever-increasing complexity of networks could lead to widespread vulnerabilities in civilian infrastructures and US Government systems," he said.
Clapper didn't hesitate to name names. "Russia is assuming a more assertive cyber posture based on its willingness to target critical infrastructure systems and conduct espionage operations even when detected and under increased public scrutiny," he said later in the annual report.
Despite the hint, no senior U.S. official has laid the blame for the Ukraine cyberattacks on Russia.
The Dec. 23 attack "serves as a wake-up call for all types of countries, especially countries like the U.S., where everything is connected," said Nadiya Kostyuk, a fellow at the EastWest Institute's Global Cooperation in Cyberspace Initiative. "And I do hope that the countries discussing potential ways of cooperating move a little faster on these types of issues."
In its Jan. 27 report, DHS's intelligence office came closest to pinning the attack on Russia, but experts don't want hand-wringing over attributing cyberattacks to come at the expense of communicating the tactics behind them.
"Government needs to understand that asset owners need to know quickly the technology behind [an attack], not whodunit," said Marcus Sachs, senior vice president and chief security officer of NERC, at a grid security event last week in Washington, D.C., noting that the two priorities are sometimes "tugging at each other."
He said that events "like Ukraine help us get closer to that kind of understanding; I think we still have a long way to go."
The third story in EnergyWire's Hack series examines how U.S. cybersecurity rules might have fared against a similar attack against the U.S. grid.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2016/07/19/stories/1060040460
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Union Pacific's Train Derailment in Oregon Mars Railroad Industry’s Turn Toward Revival in Demand
Jul 19, 2016 | Omaha World-Herald
By Russell Hubbard
The railroad industry is facing a new challenge just as customer demand for freight hauling appears to be showing signs of life after almost two years in the doldrums.
The issue: safety. A derailment in Oregon last month by a Union Pacific train carrying crude oil again has focused public attention on that aspect of freight hauling, renewing a long-standing industry debate about braking systems. And the main industry safety regulator, the Federal Railroad Administration, last week held hearings on the contentious issue of reducing crew size from two to one on the nation’s freight trains.
It all comes amid some heartening developments for an industry that has been stricken by slumping commodity prices (lower production and lower shipping demand), a strong dollar internationally (lower exports and transcontinental freight) and weak manufacturing (low shipments of finished goods): Volumes of goods shipped still aren’t up, but at least they aren’t falling as fast.
Last week, the Association of American Railroads reported that year-to-date shipments were down 7.7 percent from a year earlier.
While down is down, it is an improvement. It was the first time in many weeks that year-to-date volume declines were less than 8 percent.
The health of the rail industry is a significant concern in Omaha, home to Union Pacific, the second-largest by ton-miles and employer of 8,000 Nebraskans. U.P. trails only Texas-based BNSF Railway, owned by Omaha’s Berkshire Hathaway and an employer of 5,000 Nebraskans. Union Pacific is scheduled to report second-quarter earnings Thursday.
Wall Street analysts expect the company to report earnings per share of $1.17, down from the $1.38 a share the company reported a year earlier, according to Bloomberg. Net income is forecast by Wall Street at $972 million, down from $1.2 billion a year earlier, with revenue estimated at $4.8 billion, down from $5.4 billion in the second quarter of 2015.
Although things appear not to be deteriorating as fast as they were, Union Pacific looks to be headed for a sixth straight quarter of declining freight shipments. Reports the company has filed with the railroad association through July 9 show volumes down 10 percent versus a year ago.
Union Pacific executives declined to comment for this article.
There is the chance of a surprise on the earnings front. Last week, another Class I railroad, Florida-based CSX, reported second-quarter earnings of 47 cents a share, beating estimates by three cents a share.
“Earnings have a chance of being OK, but the year-over-year comparisons are pretty easy,” said Matt Troy, an independent rail-industry analyst in New York. “But the evidence still points to a pretty lackluster situation, still well below what we were seeing in 2006 and 2007.”
Meanwhile, the rail industry is grappling with some contentious safety challenges, highlighted last month when a U.P. train carrying crude oil derailed and caught fire along the Columbia River in the Pacific Northwest. It was the first major oil train incident in about a year but reignited the debate over hauling crude by rail.
The governor of Oregon and one of its U.S. senators last month asked for a moratorium on oil trains through the state (no such action has been taken), and Federal Railroad Administrator Sarah Feinberg said advanced electric brakes would have helped.
The current system using compressed air to apply brakes to train wheels dates to the 19th century, Feinberg said. Electronic braking systems were tested in the 1990s but haven’t been adopted, said John Risch, national legislative director for the United Transportation Union who spent 30 years with BNSF, including as an engineer. That is despite working faster than air brakes, which suffer from a reaction time lag as compressed air is distributed throughout a long string of cars, a lag of up to two minutes.
“They are the greatest safety advancement I have seen in my years in the industry,” said Risch, who had a chance to test them in the 1990s. “They apply braking power twice as fast, at least.”
The Association of American Railroads says that a current advanced technology called electronically controlled pneumatic brakes, or ECP, “will not provide significant safety benefits and is technology that does not prevent derailments,” according to spokesman Ed Greenberg.
“The freight rail industry has experimented with electro-pneumatic brakes in working environments and have found them to be unreliable,” said Greenberg, who maintains that the industry continues to investigate advanced train braking systems using a variety of technologies.
Union Pacific, one of seven large freight railroads operating in the Untied States, concurs with AAR. The railroad said after the Mosier, Oregon, oil-train derailment in response to World-Herald inquiries that “electronically controlled pneumatic braking technology has yet to meet service reliability standards,” including during tests by the railroad.
“The train involved in the Mosier accident was equipped with distributed power, which has a braking capacity very similar to ECP,” a company spokeswoman said. “It is speculative to suggest that ECP brakes would have prevented cars from derailing or prevented a tank car puncture, and we plan to reach out to the FRA to understand the modeling system used to come to its conclusion” that electric brakes would have helped.
Union Pacific also said in the aftermath of the derailment that the rail fastening system cited by regulators as contributing to the accident “has an outstanding history of safety and reliability.” The railroad said it is enhancing its regular track inspection program.
As for Union Pacific’s overall safety record, it has improved dramatically over the years. From 2005 through 2015, reportable rail equipment incidents, which include derailments, fell by a quarter, to 2.42 per million train miles traveled. Industrywide, the derailment rate on the country’s 140,000-mile mainline network reached an all-time low in 2015, down 25 percent compared with 2010 and down 58 percent compared with 2000.
Now, the issue of crew size has emerged. The industry has mobilized to urge the Federal Railroad Administration to withdraw a proposed rule that would require two people at all times on the nation’s freight trains. That typically consists of a conductor and an engineer.
“For the freight rail industry, there is no greater priority than safety, but there are no data supporting this proposed rule and it will provide no safety benefit to railroads, their employees or the public,” said Edward Hamberger, president of the railroad association, in his testimony to the Federal Railroad Administration last week. “With no data showing that one-person operations compromise safety, there is no basis — other than anecdotal storytelling — for enacting a general prohibition on crew size reductions.”
Not everyone agrees. One voice of opposition is Railroad Workers United, a caucus of rail workers from various unions. In an editorial last year in its newsletter, the group said, “We must put the rail carriers on notice that when they next make a push for single-employee train crews, that they are in for a knock-down, drag-out, all-out fight.”
The debate over crew size comes as Union Pacific and its peers are investing billions in a federally mandated safety system called Positive Train Control. It is an array of sensors and wireless communication devices that can stop or slow a train under certain conditions. The price tag is expected to approach $11 billion for the whole industry. Union Pacific said in its annual report last year it spent $400 million on the project, mandated by Congress.
Logan Purk, a transportation industry analyst for wealth adviser Edward Jones who follows U.P., said railroads have been heavily investing in their networks since the disastrous winter of 2013, when snarled traffic kept freight backed up for months. Many of the improvements to the rails also improve safety, he said.
“And with PTC, I don’t really see much more they can do,” Purk said.
Investors are warming back up to the industry. The Standard & Poor’s transportation index, of which Union Pacific is a member, has risen about 10 percent in the past three months. U.P. shares are up about 20 percent year-to-date. (BNSF is wholly owned by Berkshire Hathaway, and doesn’t have shares. Its second-quarter earnings and volumes are expected to be reported along with the parent company’s next month.)
Perhaps more telling, some large investors are seeing a bargain in the shares of Union Pacific. Among the 10 largest shareholders, eight of them reported increasing their stake in Union Pacific as of March 31, according to Bloomberg, including a massive 12-million share purchase by San Francisco mutual fund Dodge & Cox.
http://www.omaha.com/money/railroads/union-pacific-s-train-derailment-in-oregon-mars-railroad-industry/article_dfcabfb0-250e-5390-a7f1-d2ab7bfbe0b7.html
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Jul 19, 2016 | Washington Post
By Steven Mufson
The Republican Party platform adopted Monday night would bring a total about-face on U.S. energy and climate policy, declaring that the priority placed on combating climate change under President Obama “the triumph of extremism over common sense, and Congress must stop it.”
The GOP platform calls coal “clean,” pledges to reverse a Supreme Court ruling on the scope of the Clean Air Act, seeks to open up vast amounts of federally protected public lands and waters to oil, gas and coal exploitation, rejects the Paris climate accord and Obama’s Clean Power Plan, and opposes a carbon tax. It takes aim at “environmental extremists” and calls the environmental movement “a self-serving elite.”
The document says the party would “transform the EPA into an independent bipartisan commission, similar to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.”
In four pages devoted to energy and climate, the platform tosses aside an environmental regulatory structure built on congressional legislation and judicial rulings over more than four decades, dating back to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency under President Nixon. The Republican Party platform would limit agencies’ power to make rules to carry out legislation. And it would seek to bar EPA from regulating carbon dioxide emissions, a power the Supreme Court said unambiguously in a 2007 ruling that the agency possessed.
Responsibility for environmental regulation would be moved from “the federal bureaucracy” to the states, which generally have fewer resources and less commitment to enforcing environmental standards. Oil and gas companies can get drilling permits in as little as 30 days in states like North Dakota, while federal permits for drilling on protected lands can take months.
The platform echoes much of the agendas of the main petroleum, coal and nuclear industries. It would, for example, seek to roll back regulations across the board, saying that new equipment and technologies would bring about improvements in air and water quality without environmental rules. “We assert that private ownership has been the best guarantee of conscientious stewardship, while some of the worst instances of degradation have occurred under government control,” it says, adding that “the environment is too important to be left to radical environmentalists.”
The Republican Party blueprint would also seek a long-term solution to the disposal of nuclear waste in a bid to help revive the nuclear energy industry.
On the international front, the platform would block U.S. funding for the Green Climate Fund and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, citing the UNFCCC’s inclusion of Palestinians. It calls the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an international body regarded as the gold standard for the debate on climate science, “a political mechanism, not an unbiased scientific institution.”
But Andrew Rosenberg, director for center for science and democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that “you can’t duck the evidence on this one.” He said that the “science is incredibly strong” that climate change is already happening, and that people working on issues from fisheries to forest wildlife have had to take it into account in their work.
“The agreement in Paris was a major step,” Rosenberg said. “It was necessary but not sufficient. We need to keep moving.”
Environmental groups have been tracking the GOP platform. Sierra Club political director Khalid Pitts said Monday night: “If this extremist platform were ever actually implemented, it would imperil clean air and clean water for all Americans. Donald Trump has vowed to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency, and now the Republican Party has codified a radical and dangerous path to enable Trump and his anti-environmental ideology.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/07/19/gop-platform-which-calls-coal-clean-would-utterly-reverse-decades-of-u-s-energy-and-climate-policy/
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A Constructive GOP Platform on Climate Change
Jul 19, 2016 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By John D. Graham
Donald Trump says he’s not certain about the validity of climate change. While he mulls that question, scores of Republicans are running for the House and Senate and need sensible guidance from their party.
Addressing the realities of climate change can be a plus for those candidates if they pursue a thoughtful, conservative platform. By grounding the platform in good science and economics, the GOP will appeal to environmentally minded swing voter groups including independents, young people, those who are college educated, Hispanics, and suburban women. Those same voters will be turned off if GOP candidates align with climate skeptics who deny basic findings of the National Academies of Science.
From my experience working on environmental issues in the George W. Bush administration and now at Indiana University’s School of Public and Environmental Affairs, here’s what I recommend as a conservative Republican platform on climate change:
· Adopt a tax on greenhouse gas emissions throughout the economy that would rise over time so businesses and consumers have time to convert to sustainable activities. The tax could replace numerous, intrusive regulations on personal and corporate behavior. It would be a “revenue neutral” tax on emissions but the revenue wouldn’t stay in the government or pay to enlarge it. Instead, the money would go back to U.S. citizens either as a tax break or, preferably, in a quarterly dividend check.
· Establish a tax at the border on products imported to the U.S. from countries with weak environmental standards. Trump advocates a 35% tariff on items from Mexico. His number may be too high but the thinking behind it is worth considering. There shouldn’t be a price advantage for imports from big-time polluters. Nor should companies that disobey environmental laws gain an unfair advantage. Willful and deceitful behavior, such as Volkswagen’s fake pollution controls, should be met with especially severe penalties.
· Reconsider intrusive regulations such as the Clean Power Rule, the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) program, the renewable energy mandates, and the California electric-car mandate. These are well-intentioned efforts to reduce climate change but they’re adding layers of costly regulation to business operations. Sometimes the regulations are outmoded and not even linked to environmental results. Those rules should be scrapped. Sometimes businesses have better solutions to environmental problems than a regulation permits. Toyota’s Prius remains a more cost-effective investment than a plug-in electric car. Those kinds of solutions should be approved by regulators, thereby giving increased flexibility for cost-effective innovations that protect for the environment.
· Repeal subsidies and tax breaks for fossil fuel development and renewable energy. Politicians love to hand out corporate welfare but, as the Solyndra debacle illustrated, the risk of corruption is high. The GOP can say they’re getting the federal government out of the energy business. The amount of money involved isn’t huge but the symbolism is significant.
In sum, this platform should reassure swing voters that a conservative Republican environmental policy is appealing. All GOP candidates down the ballot can offer a coherent policy to address climate change, sustainability and over-regulation – all at the same time.
Graham served as the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs under President George W. Bush. He is currently the Dean of Indiana University’s School of Public and Environmental Affairs.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-environment/288208-a-constructive-gop-platform-on-climate-change
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Obama Administration Kicks into High Gear on HFC Amendment
Jul 19, 2016 | E&E Climatewire
By Jean Chemnick
The Obama administration hopes it is closing in on an international deal that will help the world avoid half a degree Celsius of global warming by the end of this century.
Ministers from at least 40 nations -- including U.S. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy -- are set to converge on Montreal Protocol negotiations in Vienna on Friday. Their goal: an amendment that would limit heat-trapping hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), a class of climate superpollutants that threatens to balloon in the next years, driving up ambient temperatures in the short term.
The successful ozone treaty, which took force in 1989, inadvertently gave rise to HFCs when it classed them as acceptable alternatives to ozone-depleting coolants. The Obama administration has pressed for a fix almost since it took office. As the clock winds down on Obama's second term, that goal finally appears to be within reach.
"It is one of the first things that the Obama administration proposed in 2009, so they've been after this consistently," said David Doniger, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's climate and clean air program.
Durwood Zaelke, president of the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development, called this year "a huge opportunity" to finally address the HFC problem.
"You've seen President Obama do an extraordinary job at the leader level," he said, pointing to a litany of bilateral and multilateral agreements the president has concluded in the last three years with players like China, India, the Persian Gulf states and the Major Economies Forum aimed at securing an amendment.
"He's done his piece," said Zaelke. "Now the ministers are the ones who have to come in and tell the negotiators, 'This is the time to finish; these are the parameters that are acceptable to us.'"
'This is the moment to do the deal'
The goal for this week is to produce an agreement by Saturday night that paves the way for a final version to be adopted when parties next meet in Kigali, Rwanda, in October.
Paul Bledsoe, a former White House climate adviser attending the talks in Vienna, said he hoped as many ministers as possible would participate.
"Given we're talking about an amendment that would reduce temperatures by almost a full degree Fahrenheit, the U.S. and other major countries should send the most senior leaders possible to make sure we get a strong amendment," he said.
Some advocates originally held out hope that Secretary of State John Kerry -- a leader at last year's climate summit in Paris -- would make the trip. But the White House confirmed yesterday that McCarthy would lead a delegation that includes personnel from the White House, EPA, and the State and Agriculture departments.
U.S. officials and advocates in attendance have called the informal discussions thus far productive.
"There's a sense of ability to get things done and a lot of trust among negotiators," said one State Department official attending the conference. Ever since parties agreed in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, last November to pursue an amendment this year, "there has been quite a lot of focus on how to make that happen," the official said.
Zaelke said Obama's imminent departure adds urgency. The next president may not prioritize HFCs as he has, even if that president is Democratic presumed nominee Hillary Clinton.
"I think everybody knows this is the moment to do the deal," he said.
That includes the industry. "From our perspective, this is a watershed moment," said Francis Dietz, vice president of public affairs for the Air-Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute. "This is something the industry has been pushing for for six years."
Dietz said his industry is backing the proposal put forward by the United States, Canada and Mexico that would avoid an estimated 90 metric gigatons pf CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases by 2050. He said manufacturers hope this year's amendment will provide them with regulatory certainty, and they feel the North American amendment -- which limits HFCs over 20 years -- will provide enough time for the sector to adjust.
"If they were to severely tighten that schedule, that could be an issue," he said.
Making friends in hot places
Observers said there are still many issues to be resolved among nations.
Negotiators need to harmonize four distinct proposals that set schedules for how quickly developed and developing countries would stop producing HFCs; resolve issues of financial assistance to help poor countries transition to alternatives; and settle a suite of intellectual property issues that could determine how costly that transition will be.
"I would say that two big outstanding questions are the ambition of the amendment and the cost of the amendment," said the State Department official.
Aside from the basic issue of how quickly the phase-down would occur for each class of country, there is also a question of the baseline against which those reductions would be measured. Also at issue is the date after which no country could produce HFCs.
It is likely that the text that emerges this weekend will contain some bracketed language on issues where parties have not yet reached agreement. How many brackets remain will show how far negotiations are from a successful conclusion in Kigali.
Some disagreement is to be expected, said Zaelke. "Everybody in a negotiation fights until the end for every bit of advantage they can get. It is a struggle," he said. "But there are no major obstacles, and now it's a question of ensuring that there's a balance that the parties consider fair."
Some issues are already moving forward. Doniger noted a proposal recently advanced that would allow countries that may need it the possibility of a four-year exemption to the phase-down if alternative coolants are not immediately available.
The U.S. Department of Energy published an Oak Ridge National Laboratory report last year that demonstrated the viability of replacements for HFCs frequently used in air conditioning in hot climates. But some fears persist that certain chemicals might be flammable. The exemption helps quell those concerns by assuring Persian Gulf countries and others that regularly experience very high temperatures that they will have the ability to continue accessing HFCs if alternatives aren't available.
"That went a long way toward quieting the nerves of Saudi Arabia and some other very hot places," Doniger said.
This weekend also saw some clarity emerging on the aid wealthy countries would give poor ones to cover the incremental cost of adopting new, less climate-forcing technology. Donor countries have committed to keep filling the fund, though they have not offered specific pledges -- in part because the costs are still being assessed, he said.
Advocates see an HFC amendment as a natural follow-up to last year's Paris deal because it would allow the world to avoid short-term warming as countries work to implement their long-term commitments to cut carbon dioxide across their economies. And they say the deal brokered in the French capital could allow the HFC amendment to proceed without some of the political obstacles that have barred its way in the past.
"The Montreal Protocol got sucked into the gravitational pull of climate politics, and you found some countries taking hostages," said Doniger.
Now, with the main U.N. deal complete, negotiations on HFCs have reverted to the more collaborative process that has characterized the Montreal Protocol for the last 35 years, rather than being a venue for proxy battles that had more to do with the other process, such as the relative responsibilities of rich and poor nations.
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2016/07/19/stories/1060040459
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