Preview Newsletter
ACC AM 9/01/16
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(ACC Mentioned) PP, Solid PS Prices Rise, While PET Bottle Resin Drops
Aug 31, 2016 | Plastics & Rubber Weekly
By Frank Esposito,
After an uneventful July, North American resin markets became active again in August, with prices for polypropylene and solid polystyrene climbing while prices for PET bottle resin fell. -
Groups Call On EPA To Protect Workers From Chemicals
Aug 31, 2016 | Manufacturing.net
By Andy Szal
The Environmental Protection Agency should take steps to regulate workplace exposure to chemicals, environmental groups and union representatives told the agency earlier this month. -
Industry Group Calls for Tougher Paint Stripper Labeling
Sep 1, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson and Pat Rizzuto
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is seeking public comment on an industry request to make tougher warning label language for some paint strippers. -
Liver Effects Central to Draft EPA Review of Fuel Oxygenate
Sep 1, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The Environmental Protection Agency is scheduled to release Sept. 1 a draft assessment of a fuel oxygenate called ethyl tertiary butyl ether, according to a prepublication Federal Register notice. -
Bisphenol AF Linked To Impaired Reproductive Function
Sep 1, 2016 | Chemical Watch
Developing male rats exposed to bisphenol AF (BPAF) via their mothers bioaccumulate the compound and have higher testis testosterone levels, according to a Chinese study. This exposure can impair reproductive function, the authors say. -
Union, Anti-Fossil Fuel Advocates Square Off Over Dakota Access
Aug 31, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
The Labors' International Union of North America (LiUNA) and a newly created activist group, Bold Iowa, are bumping heads over the four-state, nearly 1,200-mile Dakota Access oil pipeline that is now under construction. -
Takata Truck Blast Revives Concerns Over Airbag Propellant
Aug 31, 2016 | Bloomberg
By Jeff Plungis
Critics of the embattled airbag manufacturer Takata Corp. said last week’s deadly explosion of a truck carrying parts to its Mexican factory underscores questions about the safety of the chemical compound at the center of the largest automotive recall in U.S. history. -
Advocates Say California's Refinery Safety Rule Supports EPA IST Mandate
Aug 31, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Dave Reynolds
Advocates say California's proposal to mandate that petroleum refineries use strict inherently safer technology (IST) to improve facility safety in order to protect workers and prevent accidents supports their request for EPA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to mandate IST in future facility safety rules. -
Sources: Obama, China Aim To Formally Join Paris Climate Pact Ahead Of G-20
Sep 1, 2016 | PoliticoPro
By Andrew Restuccia and Eric Wolff
President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping are expected to formally commit their nations to last year’s Paris climate change agreement in the coming days, a move that would increase pressure on other nations to follow suit and serve as an implicit rebuke to the deal’s skeptics inside the U.S. -
Obama Rolls Out Climate Initiatives For Western US
Aug 31, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Obama is unveiling millions of dollars in programs Wednesday to help the Western United States adapt to the effects of climate change. -
California Moves to Add Methane Limits to Climate Agenda
Sep 1, 2016 | AP (In The New York Times)
California Democrats are taking further steps to advance the state's ambitious climate-change agenda, agreeing to regulate methane emissions from landfills and dairy farms for the first time and approving $900 million in spending on environmental programs.
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(ACC Mentioned) PP, Solid PS Prices Rise, While PET Bottle Resin Drops
Aug 31, 2016 | Plastics & Rubber Weekly
By Frank Esposito,
After an uneventful July, North American resin markets became active again in August, with prices for polypropylene and solid polystyrene climbing while prices for PET bottle resin fell.
The North American PP resin market was able to end its pricing slide in August, with average selling prices moving up an average of 3.5 cents (2.7p) per pound.
That matches a similar price increase for propylene monomer feedstock. Market sources said propylene supply issues played a role in the resin hike, as did a moderate decline in the amount of imported PP available in North America. Prior to the August increase, regional PP prices had declined for five consecutive months, with those decreases totalling 10 cents (7.6p) per pound.
North American PP demand grew only 0.5% in the first seven months of 2016, according to the American Chemistry Council. Domestic sales were flat, but the overall market was lifted by a 24% jump in export sales.
Regional selling prices for solid PS resin also increased in August, bouncing up an average of two cents per pound. That increase was tied to a jump in prices of benzene feedstock, which is used to make styrene monomer. Benzene prices for August were up 17 cents (12.9p) to $2.29 (£1.74) per gallon, a hike of 8% against the prior month.
The August increase basically cancels out a two cent (1.5p) drop that hit the PS market in June. Prices for the material had been flat in July.
Regional prices for PET bottle resin went in a different direction than PP and PS in August. Prices for the material fell by an average of one cent (0.8p) per pound, due in part to a drop in prices for paraxylene feedstock.
The PET price drop ends a run of three straight months in which prices for the material were flat. Regional PET prices hadn’t moved since climbing two cents (1.5p) per pound in April.
http://www.prw.com/article/20160901/PRW/160839952/pp-solid-ps-prices-rise-pet-bottle-resin-drops
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Groups Call On EPA To Protect Workers From Chemicals
Aug 31, 2016 | Manufacturing.net
By Andy Szal
The Environmental Protection Agency should take steps to regulate workplace exposure to chemicals, environmental groups and union representatives told the agency earlier this month.
Bloomberg reports that the EPA meetings held Aug. 9 and 10 to take input on how the agency should implement a broad overhaul of the nation's chemical oversight laws.
The Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, which was signed into law in June, replaces the outdated Toxic Substances Control Act and, in part, changes how the EPA regulates thousands of chemicals currently used in commerce.
Environmental advocates and unions noted that the law requires the government to protect "exposed or susceptible subpopulations" and suggested that the EPA should include workers in chemical facilities under that qualifier.
Unions, in particular, expressed hope that the EPA's new authority could complement current workplace safety regulations, particularly in areas where the Occupational Safety and Health Administration fell short.
“OSHA isn't doing it,” Earthjustice attorney Eve Gartner told Bloomberg.
Although the chemical industry largely supported the TSCA overhaul, observers said that that it would likely resist proposals for the EPA to encroach on workplace safety.
“People aren’t going to sit back and watch EPA take over regulations of chemicals in the workplace,” W. Caffey Norman, a Washington, D.C., attorney who represents chemical companies, told the publication.
https://www.manufacturing.net/news/2016/08/groups-call-epa-protect-workers-chemicals
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Industry Group Calls for Tougher Paint Stripper Labeling
Sep 1, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson and Pat Rizzuto
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is seeking public comment on an industry request to make tougher warning label language for some paint strippers.
The Halogenated Solvents Industry Alliance Inc.petitioned the commission Aug. 17 and asked it to require companies making household products with methylene chloride to add a warning to their labels about the risks the chemical may pose following short, high exposures, also called “acute” exposures.
The commission acknowledged the petition in a notice scheduled to be published in the Federal Register Sept. 1. The commission is accepting public comments on the trade association's request through Nov. 1.
The commission's current requirement, issued in a 1987 policy statement under the Federal Hazardous Substances Act, is that household products containing methylene chloride carry a warning about risks from chronic exposures—but not acute ones. Methylene chloride is also known as dichloromethane or DCM.
The petition said 14 workers have died following use of DCM-based paint strippers while refinishing bathtubs. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health also published a hazard alert after one worker's death, the petition said.
Consumers are also at risk when they perform this work, the petition said.
“Many stripping products contain substantial amounts of methylene chloride,” the petition said. “Use of these chemicals in bathrooms, which are often small, enclosed spaces with little or no ventilation, can be very dangerous.”
Dozens of Products Listed in National Database
More than 40 auto, home maintenance and other consumer products are listed as containing methylene chloride, according to the National Library of Medicine's Household Products Database. These products include concentrations of the solvent ranging from 5 percent to 100 percent, the database said.
Manufacturers of these products include the Radiator Specialty Co., Savogran Co., and W. M. Barr & Co.
Faye Graul, the alliance's executive director, told Bloomberg BNA Aug. 31 it was important that the petition be adopted to ensure all companies use labels that incorporate the latest knowledge.
Graul said commission staff agreed in meetings that the change was necessary but declined to present the matter to the full commission for approval because the panel is already working on other issues.
Alliance in Touch With Manufacturers
Graul said the alliance has been in touch with “at least 95 percent of the community” that manufactures the products but wants to see the changes made official commission policy.
“We just want to make sure that no one uses the product and is harmed,” Graul said.
Separately, the Environmental Protection Agency has said it plans to propose a rule by the end of 2016 to restrict the use of methylene chloride in paint strippers.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=96612796&vname=dennotallissues&fn=96612796&jd=96612796
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Liver Effects Central to Draft EPA Review of Fuel Oxygenate
Sep 1, 2016 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The Environmental Protection Agency is scheduled to release Sept. 1 a draft assessment of a fuel oxygenate called ethyl tertiary butyl ether, according to a prepublication Federal Register notice.
Ethyl tertiary butyl ether is used as a fuel additive for gasoline to increase octane rating and has been used to meet air pollution reduction goals under the Clean Air Act, according to information from the EPA. The use of oxygenates such as ETBE in reformulated gasoline in the U.S. was effectively eliminated in 2006, but use and production has continued to increase gasoline's octane rating, the EPA said.
The assessment, conducted under EPA's Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS), will examine the human health hazards of ETBE and the doses at which those hazards could manifest. Final IRIS assessments, or “toxicological reviews,” are used throughout the agency, U.S. states and regulators in other parts of the world as part of the information they use to assess the risks a chemical poses at a particular site or when used in particular ways. The resulting risk assessments contribute to decisions on whether an industrial activity, hazardous waste site, or other situation needs to be regulated.
Lyondell Chemical Co. and one other company, which claimed its name to be confidential business information, were the two U.S. manufacturers of ETBE in 2011, the most recent year for which U.S. production data is available from the EPA. The agency withheld ETBE's national production volume information to protect proprietary information.
European companies that have registered ETBE include BP p.l.c., Exxon Mobil Corp. SABIC Petrochemicals and Shell. The oxygenate is registered as having an annual European production volume of 1 million to 10 million metric tons.
2009 Draft Assessment Put on Hold
The EPA's IRIS program has not issued a final assessment of ETBE previously, although the agency published a draft assessment in 2009. That draft assessment proposed to classify ETBE as having “suggestive evidence of carcinogenic potential.” It also proposed a reference concentration (RfC) of 0.006 milligrams per cubic meter of air. RfCs are the agency's estimate of a continuous does that people could inhale over their lifetime without expectation of harm.
The ETBE assessment, however, was among four IRIS chemical evaluations the agency placed on hold after the U.S. National Toxicology Program and an Italian research organization called the Ramazzini Institute reached divergent opinions on cancer data the institute had generated.
In a 2013 presentation, the IRIS program said it was again reviewing ETBE. It was examining kidney, liver, reproductive, developmental and carcinogenic effects, among other potential health problems.
Following that meeting, the Petroleum Industry Technology and Research Institute Inc. of Japan sent the EPA a letter arguing that ETBE did not meet the criteria for an IRIS assessment.
“Current uses of ETBE in the United States are virtually non-existent. Manufacture of ETBE in the U.S. is predominately for export only,” the Japanese trade association wrote.
Questions about the effects ethyl tertiary butyl ether may have on the liver are among the issues the EPA also will discuss at an Oct. 26 public science meeting.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=96612783&vname=dennotallissues&fn=96612783&jd=96612783
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Bisphenol AF Linked To Impaired Reproductive Function
Sep 1, 2016 | Chemical Watch
Developing male rats exposed to bisphenol AF (BPAF) via their mothers bioaccumulate the compound and have higher testis testosterone levels, according to a Chinese study. This exposure can impair reproductive function, the authors say.
BPAF is a fluorinated derivative of bisphenol A. It is used as a crosslinker in fluoroelastomers and as a monomer for speciality polymers. It has oestrogenic properties, but its effects on development are little understood.
The authors, from Beijing's Chinese Academy of Sciences, fed gestating and lactating rats the compound. They found the offspring were exposed via cord blood and milk.
In male offspring BPAF accumulated in the testis and increased testosterone levels.
The authors found that 279 genes were differentially expressed and gene expression between two adjacent germ cell types was disrupted.
The study is published in the journal Chemosphere.
https://chemicalwatch.com/49367/bisphenol-af-linked-to-impaired-reproductive-function
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Union, Anti-Fossil Fuel Advocates Square Off Over Dakota Access
Aug 31, 2016 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
The Labors' International Union of North America (LiUNA) and a newly created activist group, Bold Iowa, are bumping heads over the four-state, nearly 1,200-mile Dakota Access oil pipeline that is now under construction.
LiUNA members turned out in force in Iowa, where the state regulatory commission and a district court judge have rejected last-minute attempts to slow construction of the $3.7 billion Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP) project to bring North Dakota's Bakken Shale crude oil to eastern and Gulf Coast market hubs in Illinois.
An offshoot of the Bold Nebraska group that opposed TransCanada Corp.’s Keystone XL oil pipeline, Bold Iowa on Wednesday held a civil disobedience training session prior to what it called an afternoon of "direct action" to oppose the Dakota Access project.
Early in August, media reports from Newton, IA, identified at least three fires that scorched heavy equipment being used to build the Bakken oil pipeline, which investigators initially labeled as arson. However, Dakota Access Pipeline LLC officials said the incidents have not slowed construction. A county sheriff investigated two fires that caused an estimated $1 million in damage to construction equipment.
There have been reports of violence and intimidation at the protest campground that has been occupied for several weeks in south-central North Dakota near the border with South Dakota and the Standing Rock Sioux Native American Tribe's reservation (see Shale Daily, Aug. 26). The Sioux allege that their ancestral lands and culturally important landscapes are at risk.
A labor-supported group, the Midwest Alliance for Infrastructure Now, has released a detailed account of court documents outlining the review process used for the pipeline project, noting that the Sioux tribe has steadily refused to participate. The report cited a long process covering more than two years since ETP submitted its first proposals for Dakota Access.
During the permitting process, the alliance's report said 389 meetings on cultural survey results were held between Native Americans and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), along with 180 filings in four states by Native American tribes and environmental groups and another 11 meetings between USACE and the Sioux tribe, from which only two filings of comments were made by the Sioux.
Legal action by both ETP against the Sioux tribe and the tribe's request for a temporary injunction against the pipeline construction are pending in federal district courts (see Shale Daily, Aug. 17).
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/107602-union-anti-fossil-fuel-advocates-square-off-over-dakota-access
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Takata Truck Blast Revives Concerns Over Airbag Propellant
Aug 31, 2016 | Bloomberg
By Jeff Plungis
Critics of the embattled airbag manufacturer Takata Corp. said last week’s deadly explosion of a truck carrying parts to its Mexican factory underscores questions about the safety of the chemical compound at the center of the largest automotive recall in U.S. history.
Senators Edward Markey of Massachusetts and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said the National Transportation Safety Board should look into the Aug. 22 explosion, which killed one and injured four others on U.S. Highway 277 between Del Rio, Texas and Eagle Pass, Texas. The truck was carrying 14,000 cylinders of ammonium nitrate, the propellant linked to deadly airbag failures.
The incident raises questions about the inherent instability of ammonium nitrate, they said.
“We already know Takata has endangered millions behind the wheel,” Democrats Markey and Blumenthal said in a statement Wednesday. “The recent tragedy in Texas raises questions about how many millions more are in harm’s way because of Takata’s practices transporting its hazardous product.”
The Texas explosion created a blast crater and blew out windows in houses two miles away. A woman in a nearby house killed by the explosion had to be identified by teeth found at the site.Ammonium Nitrate
On Wednesday, the NTSB said it had requested shipping and other documents in connection with the Texas explosion, which it said was caused after the truck failed to negotiate a curve and crashed into a house.
“Initial indicators are that the materials were packaged properly,” NTSB spokesman Eric Weiss said in an e-mail. “If the review of documents and other information shows cause to investigate, the NTSB will do so.”
The safety board also will assist if Texas state officials investigating the crash ask for help, Weiss said.
The Texas incident recalled a series of explosions at a TRW Inc. airbag inflator plant in the 1980s and 1990s that involved a different chemical compound, said Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a Washington watchdog group. The Takata blast raises serious questions about the safety of transporting ammonium nitrate by truck across the country as tens of millions of recalled airbags are replaced, he said.
“This incident shows there’s a need to get completely away from ammonium nitrate,” Ditlow said. “Takata’s choice of ammonium nitrate was one of the biggest engineering mistakes in automotive history. Why are they still using it?”Complex Recall
Almost 70 million Takata airbag inflators are scheduled for replacement between now and 2019, the largest and most complex auto-safety recall in U.S. history. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has identified a combination of time, exposure to moisture and fluctuating high temperatures as the highest risks in making ammonium nitrate unstable. When Takata inflators have exploded with too much force, drivers have been killed by shrapnel.
Many of the replacement Takata inflators also rely on ammonium nitrate, which other airbag manufacturers have avoided using due to safety questions. NHTSA concluded that airbags with the compound were safe if they also used a drying agent.
All ammonium nitrate inflators without a drying agent are either being recalled or will be recalled in the future, NHTSA spokesman Bryan Thomas said. Takata has been banned from entering into new contracts to produce that kind of airbag inflator, he said.
The ammonium nitrate inflators that incorporate a drying agent are under study, and Takata has until 2019 to demonstrate they’re safe. If not, those airbags will also be recalled and phased out, Thomas said.Track Record
Some of the replacement inflators in the current recalls will eventually be recalled a second time when a permanent fix is designed, Thomas said. The temporary replacement inflators are deemed safe for the time being because it takes years for ammonium nitrate to degrade enough to present a risk, he said.
Takata has a “terrible track record of cutting corners to put profits before safety” and lying to federal regulators, the senators said. Markey and Blumenthal asked Takata to recall all vehicles with ammonium nitrate-based airbags in August 2015 and have repeatedly expressed concern about the pace of the national airbag recall.
Takata spokesman Jared Levy declined to comment. The Tokyo-based company has said it followed safety procedures that met or exceeded regulatory requirements, and it doesn’t expect the accident to affect its ability to meet commitments made to customers.Manufacturing History
Takata’s history of flawed manufacturing of airbag inflators goes back decades and has been well-documented, said Sean Kane, president of Safety Research and Strategies Inc., a Rehoboth, Massachusetts-based firm that works on product-liability lawsuits.
“You’ve got a company that couldn’t make them right even under the best circumstances,” Kane said. “All of a sudden, now that they’re under the gun, we’re expecting them to build them perfectly and ship them perfectly?”
The U.S. Transportation Department said Monday it was looking at whether the trucking company Takata contracted to carry its airbag chemicals complied with federal safety regulations, including how the cargo was handled and packaged, and the route the truck took.
The Texas Department of Public Safety is investigating the explosion, said spokesman Lieutenant Juan Hernandez. There’s no specific timetable to complete the investigation. So far, the department hasn’t found any hazardous-materials violations, he said.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-31/takata-truck-blast-revives-u-s-concerns-over-airbag-propellant
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Advocates Say California's Refinery Safety Rule Supports EPA IST Mandate
Aug 31, 2016 | Inside EPA
By Dave Reynolds
Advocates say California's proposal to mandate that petroleum refineries use strict inherently safer technology (IST) to improve facility safety in order to protect workers and prevent accidents supports their request for EPA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to mandate IST in future facility safety rules.
An advocate for stricter federal regulation says the state adopting a potentially precedent-setting IST mandate, “really has the potential to influence the future of national approaches to chemical facility safety more broadly.”
Industry officials have long opposed any federal mandates for IST -- which usually means alternative chemicals or processes that advocates say reduce the risk or consequences of an accident -- and said it would mean government officials dictating business decisions. Industry sources acknowledge that the California rule could be important for some future regulations, but doubt EPA or OSHA will adopt it in their planned safety rule updates.
California's Office of Emergency Services and the state's Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) is convening an Aug. 31 public hearing on aspects of the state's proposal to bolster refinery safety through new requirements, including that facilities “adopt inherently safer designs and systems, to the greatest extent feasible.”
The July 14 package of proposed state rules backs an IST mandate, echoing advocates' long-standing calls for EPA and OSHA to require facilities to use IST.
EPA and OSHA are currently weighing tightening their facility safety rules as part of their implementation of President Obama's Executive Order 13650 on improving the safety and security of industrial plants. The August 2013 order calls for improved communication and coordination, and for modernizing policies, rules, and standards.
EPA is seeking to finalize by year-end its March proposed rule revising its Risk Management Plan (RMP) facility accident prevention rule, which calls for facilities to analyze whether safer processes would improve safety, but declines advocates' long-standing calls to require their use.
OSHA, meanwhile, has floated potential updates to its process safety management (PSM) worker safety rule, but is still far from issuing a proposed rule. A federal panel advising OSHA's potential PSM overhaul has opposed requiring facilities to use IST, and supported allowing companies flexibility in meeting potential future requirements.
Potential Precedent
While EPA and OSHA appear to have rebuffed long-standing calls for an imminent IST mandate, advocates argue that if California finalizes its requirement for oil refineries to implement IST, that could prove that such a regulation is feasible and should serve as model for future federal rules.
Industry officials also acknowledge that the California rule could potentially influence future federal requirements. However, industry continues to believe that the federal agencies' current thinking -- at least as evidenced by EPA's proposed RMP rule -- is for regulators to require companies to consider IST, but allow facilities to decide what processes are most appropriate.
Additionally, one industry source says with EPA slated to forward a final version of its RMP rule for White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) review in the coming weeks, a reversal on such a contentious issue is unlikely regardless of whether California implements an IST mandate successfully.
Still, the source acknowledges the California proposal adds to mounting pressure for a future federal regulation to include an IST requirement. “Certainly, it's all inter-related in that California in some ways can foreshadow federal policy,” the source says. State rules sometimes pressure federal regulators to issue national standards to avoid a patchwork of different rules across the country, the source adds.
A chemical sector source calls it “conceivable” that the California proposal could press OSHA to issue stricter rules. But the source argued that OSHA would struggle to meet an Occupational Safety and Health Act requirement to show that any strengthened regulation would actually reduce risks to worker safety.
The source says that new requirements in California's package of updated refinery rules strengthens the state's rules to mirror those of Contra Costa County, which has the most stringent refinery safety rules in the country, though they have failed to prevent accidents in the past. To improve safety, the source says, California should increase enforcement of existing rules rather than imposing new requirements on all facilities.
Refinery Safety
California's proposal to overhaul its refinery accident prevention and worker safety rules results from a multiyear effort to bolster refinery safety prompted by an August 2012 fire at a Chevron's refinery in Richmond, that prompted thousands of nearby residents to seek medical attention. Richmond is in Contra Costa County.
Numerous California agencies, along with EPA Region 9 officials, participated in the effort that eventually informed the state's July 14 two-part proposal. The plan consists of complimentary regulations -- one proposal overhauling Cal/OSHA's worker safety regulations as they apply to refineries, and a second strengthening California Accidental Release Prevention (CalARP) program rules.
In a July 15 notice of proposed rulemaking amending the CalARP requirements, the state says the change includes requirements that facilities follow programs “that drive refiners to analyze and implement processes and select materials that offer the highest levels of risk reduction."
In addition to the IST requirements, the package of proposed changes call for increased worker involvement in safety and accident prevention planning, periodic workplace safety culture assessments to ensure management emphasizes safety over production pressures, and public reporting of refinery safety metrics, among other changes.
While advocates say EPA and OSHA should consider California's proposed IST requirement as those agencies seek to strengthen their RMP and PSM rules, CalEPA has also pressed EPA to mandate that facilities use safer process where feasible in the final RMP rule.
In May 13 comments on EPA's March proposed rule, CalEPA said EPA's final version “should require facility owners or operators to implement any of the feasible options identified” in the analysis of safer alternatives that EPA's proposed revisions would require.
CalEPA also backed revisions EPA did propose to bolster RMP, such as requiring root cause analysis and third party audits after a reportable releases, and for improved coordination between facilities and local communities.
EPA Rulemaking
Despite calls from California and advocates to require facilities to use IST where feasible, EPA officials have said they conducted extensive outreach in advance of the March RMP proposal and so significant changes -- such as reversing the position on IST -- are unlikely in a final rule.
EPA waste chief Mathy Stanislaus told Inside EPA March 29, that the agency “struck a very good balance” on the contentious issue of IST. The balance requires that companies analyze whether IST would improve safety at their facility, while allowing companies to decide for themselves what processes are most appropriate.
A source with the Coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters, which in 2012 petitioned EPA to use Clean Air Act authority to require IST said advocates will seek meetings with OMB officials during the upcoming review and point to the California rule as an indication that requiring facilities use IST is the best alternative.
“EPA should be looking to [the California proposal] to inform their final rule, which is due out” this year, the source says. “EPA hasn't sent it to OMB yet, and even there they could fix it.”
http://insideepa.com/daily-news/advocates-say-californias-refinery-safety-rule-supports-epa-ist-mandate
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Sources: Obama, China Aim To Formally Join Paris Climate Pact Ahead Of G-20
Sep 1, 2016 | PoliticoPro
By Andrew Restuccia and Eric Wolff
President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping are expected to formally commit their nations to last year’s Paris climate change agreement in the coming days, a move that would increase pressure on other nations to follow suit and serve as an implicit rebuke to the deal’s skeptics inside the U.S.
Two sources briefed on the possible announcement told POLITICO that U.S. and Chinese officials are laying plans for Obama and Xi to officially join the agreement this weekend during the president’s trip to China for the G-20 summit in Hangzhou.
Story Continued Below
The move would put the weight of the world's top two carbon dioxide polluters behind the pact, and comes as Republicans including Donald Trump continue to pillory the international agreement. Obama has made leading an international charge to fight climate change a top priority of his final years in office.
The White House declined to comment.
The sources cautioned that the exact timing of the announcement is in flux, and they said negotiations between the two countries are ongoing. Obama and Xi are scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting on Saturday in China, but one source said the announcement could come even earlier. Obama will speak on Wednesday in Nevada at an energy and water summit hosted by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, and he’ll travel to Hawaii for a conservation summit with leaders from Pacific Island nations. On Thursday he'll stop in Midway Atoll to talk about the recently created national monument before continuing on to China.
Obama has pressed several initiatives to address climate change in his second term, issuing a myriad of executive orders and administrative rules to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, and joining forces with world leaders to engineer the landmark international accord that nearly 200 nations finalized in Paris last December. Obama does not have to submit that international pact to the Senate, a move that has drawn fierce criticism from Republicans who control Congress and would certainly vote it down.
While the U.S. and more than 170 other nations signed the agreement at the United Nations in the spring, 55 nations representing 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions must take the additional procedural step of joining or ratifying the agreement before it can take effect.
The U.S. and China together comprise 40 percent of world emissions, putting the deal much closer to Obama's goal of bringing it into force this year. The two leaders are planning to pressure the G-20 leaders — whose countries produce 80 percent of world greenhouse gas emissions — to follow suit. Should enough countries join the deal to put it into effect before the end of the year, the next president, regardless of party, might be stuck with its terms.
It would take years for the United States to formally withdraw from the Paris agreement once it enters into force and international diplomats warn that any effort by Trump to turn his back on the deal would compromise delicate relationships with other nations. But there is little stopping Trump from ignoring the deal altogether, since it contains no penalties for failing to uphold the national pledges to reduce emissions.
Trump, who once tweeted that “the concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive," told Fox News earlier this year that “China does not do anything to help climate change. They burn everything you could burn; they couldn't care less. … In the meantime, they can undercut us on price.”
One person briefed by the administration told POLITICO that Obama is slated to hold a bilateral meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to China (though the White House did not announce a meeting with Modi in a Monday briefing on the trip schedule). Obama will encourage the Indian leader to quickly join the Paris deal and support an ambitious amendment to the Montreal Protocol to phase out hydrofluorocarbons, powerful greenhouse gases that exacerbate climate change. Diplomats are scheduled to meet in Rwanda in October to iron out the final details of the amendment.
The decision to join the agreement marks the culmination of a years-long campaign by the Obama administration to build strong ties with China on climate change. In November 2014, Xi and Obama unveiled a historic breakthrough in the decades-long negotiations over tackling climate change, with each country committing to limit their emissions. Since then, U.S. and Chinese officials have built close ties, with Secretary of State John Kerry, U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change Jonathan Pershing, White House climate adviser Brian Deese and others keeping in regular contact with officials there.
Deese traveled to China earlier this month to meet with senior officials to lay the groundwork for the announcement. Meanwhile, Kerry and Pershing are currently in India meeting with senior officials, and climate change is on the agenda.
Obama administration officials hope the announcement will embolden other countries to quickly join the agreement. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is holding a summit on Sept. 21 in New York aimed at further pressuring countries to formally ratify the deal.
"This is the beginning of the final big push on international climate by the president," said Paul Bledsoe, a former Bill Clinton White House climate adviser who closely tracks climate negotiations.
The South China Morning Post reported last week that the U.S. and China were planning to join the agreement ahead of the G-20 summit.
Republicans and conservative groups are furious that the U.S. is pushing forward with the deal despite what GOP leaders see as significant legal shortcomings.
“I expect more hot air on this so-called announcement," Sen. Jim Inhofe, chairman of the Environment Public Works Committee, said in a statement. "This is another attempt by the president to go around Congress in order to achieve his unpopular and widely rejected climate agenda for his legacy. The Senate does not support the Paris Agreement which is why his administration prefers to not call it a treaty."
The agreement was crafted to help the U.S. avoid Senate ratification, as is constitutionally required for treaties. Instead the structure of the agreement, which lays out goals but contains few legally binding requirements, allows the U.S. to formally join the agreement by having the president sign documents and then submit them to the U.N.
Republican presidential nominee Trump has threatened to "cancel" the climate agreement if he is elected, but putting it into force could make such an action more complicated.
“I’m disappointed the Obama Administration plans to take this miserable executive action which allows countries like China and India to continue growing their economies and increasing greenhouse gas emissions while we subject our economy to unnecessary limits on greenhouse gas emissions," North Dakota Congressman and Trump adviser Kevin Cramer said in a statement. "The only thing this action has going for it is the lack of full force and effect of law.”
Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton counts progress toward the agreement as one of her successes from her time as Secretary of State and has promised to support the accord if elected.
Greens have praised the Paris agreement from the moment it was struck, and they were pleased to hear the U.S. and China were laying plans to join.
"This announcement will be the clearest indication yet that the world is coming together to tackle the climate crisis and embrace the transition from dirty fossil fuels to a clean energy economy,” Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said in a statement.
The agreement is a major portion of the administration's broad attempt to curb U.S. contributions to climate change. In August 2015, the EPA finalized a rule to reduce emissions from power plants. Though the Supreme Court put a hold on the rule while legal issues are untangled, the agency has continued to work with states aiming to implement the rules' goals.
The Interior Department is in the process of reviewing coal leasing on public land, and it has produced a rule to limit methane emissions from the oil and gas industry. And the administration has issued executive orders calling on the federal government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across its operations and in its supply chain.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/story/2016/08/paris-join-g-20-128078
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Obama Rolls Out Climate Initiatives For Western US
Aug 31, 2016 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Obama is unveiling millions of dollars in programs Wednesday to help the Western United States adapt to the effects of climate change.
The announcements come as Obama travels to southern Nevada for the 20th Lake Tahoe Summit, a gathering to celebrate progress in cleaning up the lake and plan for future environmental efforts.
The White House said Obama’s speech and his visit, along with a trip to Alaska last year and Yosemite National Park earlier this summer, “provides another vivid example of the new challenges we face as climate change threatens communities and ecosystems through impacts like increasingly frequent and severe drought and wildfires.”
With an eye toward helping the West through its historic drought, the Interior Department is setting aside $29.5 million to remove dead and dying trees from public and private land, a process known as hazardous fuels reduction.
The Environmental Protection Agency and Fish and Wildlife Service are rolling out new initiatives to help Lake Tahoe’s water quality. The EPA’s grants, totaling more than $230 million, focus on stormwater management, while the Fish and Wildlife Service’s nearly $1 million program will try to stop invasive mussel species.
The Department of Energy, meanwhile, is picking two projects to get up to $29 million for geothermal energy research in Nevada and Utah.
A number of the actions announced Wednesday are meant to help the Salton Sea, California’s largest lake, which has lost significant amounts of water and is very polluted.
Other programs announced Wednesday focus on renewable energy in California’s southern desert, water conservation and more.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/293941-obama-rolls-out-climate-adaptation-initiatives-for-western-us
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California Moves to Add Methane Limits to Climate Agenda
Sep 1, 2016 | AP (In The New York Times)
California Democrats are taking further steps to advance the state's ambitious climate-change agenda, agreeing to regulate methane emissions from landfills and dairy farms for the first time and approving $900 million in spending on environmental programs.
The approval came in the final hours of the two-year legislative session Wednesday following a flurry of negotiations involving Gov. Jerry Brown, Democratic legislative leaders and the affected industries.
It was approved just a week after Democrats voted to extend California's landmark climate change law, the most aggressive in the nation, by another 10 years, solidifying the state's reputation as an environmental leader through at least 2030. That move, pushed by Brown and environmentalists, came amid fierce opposition from oil companies and other business interests.
The legislation, which now heads to the Democratic governor's desk, would require steep reductions in a variety of climate-changing gases known as short-lived climate pollutants, including methane, HFC gases used in aerosols and air conditionnts and soot, known as black carbon. While these pollutants live in the atmosphere for relatively short periods, they have an outsized impact on climate change, according to legislative researchers.
"With this bill we prove again that California doesn't shy away from tackling major climate change legislation. We lead," said Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, who wrote the bill and brokered the compromise with the dairy industry.
The compromise package, tied to $50 million in methane emissions funding, would set a requirement that dairies and livestock producers reduce methane emissions from manure to 40 percent below their 2013 levels by 2030. It allows for the regulation of cow flatulence — another source of methane emissions — if experts determine that technology exists to reduce it.
California would also be pushed to significantly increase composting in order to reduce organic waste, which emits greenhouse gases when it breaks down in landfills. SB1383 sets a goal of reducing the flow of food products to landfills by 50 percent within four years.
While the bill has the support of some environmental groups, others were angry that Lara made concessions to ease the transition for the dairy industry, including a delay in implementation until 2024.
"It's important that we reduce emissions of these super-pollutants rapidly," said Bill Magavern, policy director for the Coalition for Clean Air, which initially supported Lara's proposal but dropped its support once the changes were made.
Lawmakers also approved a $900 million spending package that for environmental programs, agreeing to spend nearly two-thirds of the available money generated by the state's cap on carbon pollution under a deal between the Democratic governor and top Democratic legislative leaders.
The deal includes $363 million for clean vehicle incentives and hundreds of millions for urban plants and efforts to create cleaner air in disadvantaged communities. It also includes $50 million to reduce emissions of methane and other climate-changing gases associated with landfills and dairy production
"This plan gets us the most bang for the buck," Brown said in a statement. "It directs hundreds of millions where it's needed most - to help disadvantaged communities, curb dangerous super pollutants and cut petroleum use - while saving some for the future."
The compromise ends two years of indecision over what to do with $1.4 billion in revenues collected from California's fee on polluters, known ascap-and-trade. About 60 percent of program revenues are earmarked for specific projects including high-speed rail. The spending announced Wednesday covers the remaining 40 percent and also leaves $462 million for future years.
De Leon had proposed spending nearly all the available funds, and Rendon and Brown, who advocated a more frugal approach, particularly given plummeting revenue and uncertainty about the program's long-term viability.
It comes just a week after Democrats voted to extend California's landmark climate change law, the most aggressive in the nation, by another 10 years, solidifying the state's reputation as an environmental leader through at least 2030. That move, pushed by Brown and environmentalists, came amid fierce opposition from oil companies and other business interests.
Pollution permits consistently sold out after the cap-and-trade program began in 2012, regularly generating billions of dollars to combat climate change. But demand this year has plummeted amid a legal challenge that threatens to end the program.
Republicans have consistently opposed the program as an illegal tax and rejected the spending plan Wednesday.
The money "goes to many Democrat pet projects throughout the state at the expense of wildfire prevention issues and pursues long-term greenhouse gas reduction goals that will continue to harm families and jobs," said Sen. Jeff Stone, R-Temecula.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2016/09/01/us/ap-us-climate-change-funding.html
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