Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 1/30/2017
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(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Opposes Binding Global Agreement for Post-2020 Framework
Jan 30, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
The International Council of Chemicals Associations (ICCA) will argue that a legally binding agreement should not replace the UN's voluntary programme, Saicm, during discussions next week on a post-2020 global chemicals framework. -
(ACC Mentioned) Ewire: A Daily News Roundup
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
House Republicans are poised to begin rolling back Obama administration rules under the rarely used Congressional Review Act (CRA) but EPA measures that may be eligible for elimination do not appear to be among them. -
(ACC Mentioned) Green Biologics Recognized as a Clean Technology Leader by Two Prestigious Industry Awards
Jan 30, 2017 | World Press Online
Ashland, Virginia and Abingdon, Oxfordshire U.K. (January 25, 2017) – Green Biologics, Inc., the U.S. subsidiary of Green Biologics Ltd., a U.K. industrial biotechnology and renewable chemicals company, today announced that it has been named to the prestigious 2017 Global Cleantech 100 and recognized in the 2016 Global Clean Energy Awards as the Best Renewable Specialty Chemical Company – UK. -
Political Discord Mounts in US Ahead of Pruitt Vote
Jan 30, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By David Stegon
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will vote on 1 February to consider recommending Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt for administrator of the US EPA. -
EPA May Take 3 Years to Issue Warning
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
U.S. EPA's three-year time frame to warn millions of Americans about potential exposure to asbestos has agonized health experts who say more people could be affected in the interim. -
Despite New Law, EPA Fails to Tell Millions of Montana Asbestos Danger
Jan 30, 2017 | Billings Gazette
By Andrew Schneider
A change in federal law that could warn tens of millions of residents and homeowners across the country about the dangers of a Montana-mined mineral insulation in their ceilings and attics may be too little, too late. -
EPA’s Proposed Retroactive Notification Requirements Impact Manufacturers and Processors
Jan 29, 2017 | National Law Review
By Michael J. Gray
EPA has proposed a new rule requiring companies that manufactured (including imported) chemicals for non-exempt commercial purposes at anytime between June 21, 2006 and June 21, 2016 to electronically file a notification with EPA. -
(ACC Mentioned) Monsanto to Fight Calif. Court Ruling on Roundup Labeling
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Marc Heller
Monsanto Co. said today it will fight a court ruling that could allow California to require labels declaring a widely used weed killer may cause cancer. -
Target Demands Suppliers Reveal Endocrine Disruptors in Products
Jan 30, 2017 | Organic Authority
By Emily Monaco
In order to achieve better transparency and to help consumers avoid dangerous chemicals and endocrine disruptors, Target has requested that all of its suppliers list ingredients in the products sold at its stores by 2020. -
Where Will Clean Power Plan Organizers Refocus Their Efforts?
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Interactive
By Emily Holden and Rod Kuckro
A cottage industry that grew up around U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan now must rethink how to be useful to states and companies still looking to cut power-sector carbon emissions. -
GOP Lawmakers Move to Block BLM Rule
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Pamela King
Republican lawmakers are calling on state leaders and the energy industry to craft alternative methane rules for oil and gas operations on public lands. -
As House Moves to Kill Methane Regs, Colo. Asks Why
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Climatewire
By Brittany Patterson
House Republicans today will begin to scrap an Interior Department directive to cut methane from oil and gas wells on federal lands, calling it a "bad rule" and "regulatory overreach." -
Trump's Election Complicates Gas Politics in Pa.
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
President Trump is casting a long shadow on Pennsylvania politics, empowering Republicans in a long-running battle with Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf over how to tax the state's natural gas industry. -
Nothing Trumps a Clean, Equitable and Wildlife-Friendly Energy Future
Jan 29, 2017 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By Chad Tudenggongbu
Since Election Day, there have been countless articles forecasting possible Trump-induced reversal on clean energy growth, and even more optimistic analyses arguing clean energy growth is “Trump-proof.” -
Draft Trump Order Would Review U.S. Cyberdefenses
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
President Trump is ready to convene a series of cyber "review teams" for new strategies to protect government and critical infrastructure networks from hackers, according to an unsigned executive order obtained by The Washington Post last week. -
Calif. Cyber Incident Underscores 'Routine' Threat
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
Days before an overblown cybersecurity incident set off a media firestorm at a small power company in Vermont, another utility across the country was busy responding to an actual network breach, according to multiple sources and federal records. -
CPUC to Take Up to Two Years to Decide Aliso Storage Field's Fate
Jan 30, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
In keeping with a state law passed last year (SB 380), California regulators said Friday they will launch an 18- to 24-month investigation to determine whether to reduce or eliminate operations at Aliso Canyon, the state's largest underground natural gas storage facility. -
Did STB Capitulate to Trump and Lenin?
Jan 30, 2017 | Railway Age Magazine
By William C. Vantuono
This is peripherally about a vote on an unremarkable administrative order delaying for 60 days a rulemaking affecting railroad reporting of certain service performance metrics. -
CSAPR Update Rule’s Opponents Outline Issues in New D.C. Circuit Suit
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
State and industry opponents of EPA’s updated Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) for power plant emissions trading are setting out their arguments in litigation against the rule in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, amid doubts over whether the Trump EPA will defend the rule. -
Trump Signs Order Setting 'One In, Two Out' Mandate for New Regulations
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Jan. 30 directing EPA and other regulatory agencies to eliminate two existing rules for every one they enact, while also setting an overall “budget” for new regulatory costs each year -- the first concrete step in the new administration's plan to slash environmental rules they consider too burdensome. -
Trump Will 'Definitely' Pull Out of Paris Climate Deal, Ex-Aide Says
Jan 30, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Trump will “definitely” pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, with some action possible within days, according to a former top aide.
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(ACC Mentioned) ICCA Opposes Binding Global Agreement for Post-2020 Framework
Jan 30, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
The International Council of Chemicals Associations (ICCA) will argue that a legally binding agreement should not replace the UN's voluntary programme, Saicm, during discussions next week on a post-2020 global chemicals framework.
The meeting in Brazil on 7-9 February will begin a series of talks – known as the intersessional process – on whether the Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (Saicm) should continue beyond 2020, or be replaced with an alternative framework.
A decision on how to move forward will be made at the fifth International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM5) in 2020.
Speaking to Chemical Watch on behalf of the ICCA, Greg Skelton, senior director of regulatory and technical affairs at the American Chemistry Council (ACC), said "an obvious major drawback" of a legally binding approach is that it would "close off the sort of multi-stakeholder collaboration that has made Saicm unique".
"One of the key strengths of Saicm is the recognition of the importance of engaging all stakeholders and the facilitation of that engagement. A more legally binding approach would inevitably change the nature of that engagement."
Mr Skelton said arguing for a multi-stakeholder approach, once Saicm's current mandate ends in 2020, will be the ICCA's priority for the intersessional process.
Marco Mensink, Cefic director general and ICCA council secretary, said the European chemical organisation does not favour a global legally binding framework. "Saicm offers more value as a voluntary approach, allowing governments and stakeholders to collaborate and the process to grow and evolve over time and reflect current and future issues in sound management of chemicals and waste."
Saicm, he added, is unique because it’s a "flexible framework" in which all kinds of stakeholders can contribute equally.
"It has also facilitated sharing best practices, and enabled a focus on practical needs on the ground," said Mr Mensink.
The ICCA's position follows the release of a report, funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers, which sets out options for a post-2020 global chemicals framework, including a legally binding agreement.
Some NGOs have supported such an idea before. In 2013, a report released by the Center for International Environmental Law (Ciel) advocated a new legally binding framework to "bring greater coherence, coverage and coordination" to international chemicals management.
And in 2012, in the run up to the Rio+20 summit, the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) called for a legally binding treaty on chemicals. The ICCA responded to the EEB's proposal, saying that because of the positive contributions achieved through Saicm, it did not see the need to develop a new international regime and "would not support any effort to exclude non-governmental stakeholders from direct participation in decision making".
Multi-stakeholder approach
The ICCA, said Mr Skelton, has been a strong supporter of Saicm since it was established in 2006: "The programme has made some important progress since then. There is obviously still a long way to go, but we think the multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral nature of Saicm has led to collaboration that would not have happened otherwise."
Saicm, he added, has built trust between stakeholders who are all working towards the same goal. "We might have different views on how to reach the goal but it's acknowledged that all those in the process want to improve the management of chemicals around the world."
Joe Digangi, senior scientific advisor at NGO the International POPs Elimination Network (Ipen) told Chemical Watch there is broad agreement that the multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral approach gives Saicm a "special value and should be preserved".
But, he said, the post-2020 framework should involve a broader range of sectoral representatives. For example, ministries of agriculture and labour are "largely absent".
"Saicm provides a framework that stimulates and enables government officials, public interest NGOs, community groups, UN agencies, the private sector, the health sector, trade unions, and other relevant actors to interact and collaborate with one another in support of sound chemicals management objectives."
In the absence of this framework approach, such collaboration would often be difficult and sometimes not feasible, said Mr Digangi.
Intersessional process
The intersessional process will involve four meetings, three of which have been scheduled.
The first will take place in Brazil on 7-9 February. The second will be held in March 2018 and the third in June 2019, both of these are yet to have a location confirmed. The fourth meeting will be scheduled if further discussions are necessary.
The interessional process must end with a set of recommendations for ICCM5 delegates to consider and adopt.
Jacob Duer, Saicm secretariat principal co-ordinator, said the purpose of the first meeting is to start setting the frame for how a future approach to managing chemicals globally can be "articulated and ultimately adopted at ICCM5".
"We hope that at the end of the first meeting we will have established some initial ideas of what a future decision document could look like."
https://chemicalwatch.com/52417/icca-opposes-binding-global-agreement-for-post-2020-framework
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(ACC Mentioned) Ewire: A Daily News Roundup
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
House Republicans are poised to begin rolling back Obama administration rules under the rarely used Congressional Review Act (CRA) but EPA measures that may be eligible for elimination do not appear to be among them.
According to The Hill, House Republicans will begin voting this week on CRA disapproval resolutions that would eliminate Obama-era Interior Department rules protecting streams from coal mining and limiting methane emissions from oil and natural gas operations, among others, though none from EPA.
The paper reports that Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah), the chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, called the rules “abusive, last minute regulations.”
“Congress has an obligation to ensure executive actions are consistent with congressional intent, and that agencies operate in accordance with their statutory mandate,” he said late last week. “When they don’t, and in this case they haven’t, it is our responsibility to act.”
While energy industry groups are pleased with lawmakers' plans, many industry groups want at least one EPA regulation added to the list of rules that lawmakers repeal. Inside EPA's Dave Reynolds reported last week, chemical and other industry officials launched an 11th-hour lobbying blitz urging Republicans to add EPA's risk management plan (RMP) regulation to the short list of measures slated for repeal.
In a Jan. 25 letter to congressional leaders, 21 trade associations including the American Chemistry Council, the American Petroleum Institute and the National Association of Manufacturers charge EPA's final RMP rule fails to improve safety and increases risks that facilities will become a target for terrorists.
“The final RMP rule not only imposes significant new costs without identifying or quantifying the safety benefits that will be achieved through these new requirements, it may actually compromise the security of our facilities, emergency responders, and our communities,” the industry letter says. “For these reasons, we believe it is appropriate that Congress disapprove the final RMP rule under the Congressional Review Act.”
If, as expected, the RMP rule is not repealed by Congress under the CRA, industry will have to rely on the Trump administration to repeal or amend the measure -- a step the administration began last week when it delayed the rule's effective date by 60 days.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/ewire-daily-news-roundup-10
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Jan 30, 2017 | World Press Online
Ashland, Virginia and Abingdon, Oxfordshire U.K. (January 25, 2017) – Green Biologics, Inc., the U.S. subsidiary of Green Biologics Ltd., a U.K. industrial biotechnology and renewable chemicals company, today announced that it has been named to the prestigious 2017 Global Cleantech 100 and recognized in the 2016 Global Clean Energy Awards as the Best Renewable Specialty Chemical Company – UK. Both highly-selective awards programs honor companies worldwide for efforts aimed at tackling today’s energy challenges and contributions to a more sustainable future. Green Biologics was recognized for its Clostridium fermentation platform, which uses sustainable feedstocks to produce high-performance chemicals, such as n-butanol and acetone. These high-value chemicals provide a renewable alternative to conventional petrochemical-based
commodities for a growing number of consumer and industrial applications.
“We are extremely proud to receive these two distinguished clean technology recognitions that acknowledge our tireless efforts in bringing renewable chemical alternatives to market,” said Sean Sutcliffe, Chief Executive of Green Biologics. “Both accolades reinforce the industry’s confidence in our technology and are a testament to the significant progress we’ve made over the past year in strengthening our position as a global renewable speciality chemicals company.”
The Global Cleantech 100, produced by the Cleantech Group (CTG), is comprised of the most innovative companies across a wide range of industries and represents those enterprises with the greatest potential to make a significant market impact within the next five to 10 years. Now in its eighth year, the Global Cleantech 100 list is collated by combining propriety Cleantech Group research data and inputs from a global 86-person expert panel composed of leading financial investors, industrialists, and representatives of multi-national corporations across Asia, Europe and North America.
The Global Clean Energy Awards are produced by Global Energy News, a global publication on the pulse of the latest news, research and developments impacting the energy sector. Winning companies are selected through a combination of votes gathered from the Global Energy News network and its rigorous in-house research.
These recognitions follow closely behind the start of commercial shipments at Green Biologics’ first commercial facility in Little Falls, MN. Green Biologics is a member of the American Chemistry Council (ACC), and its commercial facility is actively working toward meeting Responsible Care® standards.http://www.worldpressonline.com/PressRelease/green-biologics-recognized-as-a-clean-technology-leader-by-two-prestigious-industry-awards-56286.html
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Political Discord Mounts in US Ahead of Pruitt Vote
Jan 30, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By David Stegon
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will vote on 1 February to consider recommending Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt for administrator of the US EPA.
Following the meeting, the committee will send its recommendation to the Senate floor. The full senate will then vote to confirm Mr Pruitt to the position. This will bring to an end a contentious confirmation process that taken place amid the Trump administration's block on all EPA communications with the public.
Mr Pruitt appeared before the committee on 19 January, answering more than 200 questions in a six-hour hearing. On 24 January, a group of senate democrats led by Senator Tom Carper (D-Delaware), ranking member of the EPW committee, held an unofficial hearing on Mr Pruitt.
In an attempt to sway fellow senators to vote against Mr Pruitt's confirmation, the meeting included witnesses primarily from his home state of Oklahoma.
"Looking at Scott Pruitt's record, it seems he is perfectly in line with our new President's mission to stymie or eliminate the EPA," said Mr Carper. He added that despite Mr Pruitt's earlier testimony before the EPW committee questions remained about his record and vision for the agency.
The meeting came during a week of arguments between senators over the confirmation.
On 24 January, six senators sent a letter to Mr Pruitt outlining several overarching concerns that remained from the confirmation hearing, including:
a believed lack of environmental policy and enforcement efforts;
his alleged failure to disclose fundraising from companies and trade associations with matters before the EPA;
ongoing Open Records Act requests – legal inquiries for information from citizens, advocacy groups or media – "languishing" from his office, including one for more than 740 days; and
an embrace of 'alternative facts' concerning well-established science.
But on that same day, Senator Tom Barrasso (R-Wyoming), chairman of the EWG committee, took to the Senate floor to voice his approval for Mr Pruitt.
"Through six hours of questioning before our committee last week, Scott Pruitt showed that he understands the need to return the Environmental Protection Agency back to its proper course," he said.
"His record as the attorney general of Oklahoma showed that he is committed to restoring and maintaining the rule of law.
"I'm confident that Attorney General Pruitt will be able to right the ship at the EPA."
https://chemicalwatch.com/52572/political-discord-mounts-in-us-ahead-of-pruitt-vote
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EPA May Take 3 Years to Issue Warning
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
U.S. EPA's three-year time frame to warn millions of Americans about potential exposure to asbestos has agonized health experts who say more people could be affected in the interim.
The concerns come as the Trump administration's position on asbestos is being called into question. Prior to taking office, President Trump tweeted his support for the compound (Greenwire, Nov. 10, 2016).
EPA included asbestos last year in its list of 10 priority compounds to tackle under the recently reformed Toxic Substances Control Act (E&E News PM, Nov. 29, 2016).
Extensive, peer-reviewed EPA studies confirmed that Zonolite insulation — which is pervasive in American homes — poses a significant risk to health.
Linda Reinstein, CEO and president of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization, said it is "inexcusable that EPA is willing to wait years before telling homeowners they're at risk of exposure to deadly Zonolite."
Asbestos is a carcinogenic mineral linked to mesothelioma and other diseases. The chloralkali industry is the largest user of the compound today.
"TSCA requires these chemical risk evaluations be completed within three years," said a senior EPA spokesperson, adding that it's "too early to say what the results will be."
But public health experts castigated EPA for the pace of its movement.
"Asbestos is one chemical for which the evidence of harm is overwhelming and there's no compelling need for more study," said Celeste Monforton, a public health researcher at George Washington University. "An EPA warning about Zonolite contaminated asbestos is long overdue and well within EPA's authority".
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049191
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Despite New Law, EPA Fails to Tell Millions of Montana Asbestos Danger
Jan 30, 2017 | Billings Gazette
By Andrew Schneider
A change in federal law that could warn tens of millions of residents and homeowners across the country about the dangers of a Montana-mined mineral insulation in their ceilings and attics may be too little, too late.
Public health officials say the addition of asbestos to the government’s recently released list of most dangerous chemicals will save lives, especially people across the country who are living with lethal fibers dug from a Montana mine.
Before the Trump administration’s gag order last week on the Environmental Protection Agency, a senior spokesperson said even though extensive, peer-reviewed studies confirmed the significant danger from the asbestos-coated Zonolite insulation, the EPA has three years to take action. That delay, coupled with the new administration's position, could mean more people are unwittingly exposed to the asbestos which can be toxic or lethal even with a tiny exposure.
Linda Reinstein, the CEO and president of the Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization, called it "inexcusable that EPA is willing to wait years before telling homeowners they’re at risk of exposure to deadly Zonolite."
"There’s no reason to wait," Reinstein said. "We’ve known the facts about the asbestos-contaminated wall and attic insulation for decades. The time is now for the EPA to warn an estimated 30 million homeowners about the asbestos in their attics. The longer they wait, the more people will get sick and die from preventable diseases. As a mesothelioma widow I know the pain; I buried my husband.”
The legislation at the heart of the issue is the historic revision of the Toxic Substances Control Act, first passed in 1976. It was crafted to control the production, importation, use and disposal of more than 83,000 chemicals.
The regulation was the subject of endless corporate lobbying and congressional debate and ultimately accomplished little.
"In the law’s 40-year history, only a handful of the tens of thousands of chemicals on the market when the law passed have ever been reviewed for health impacts, and only five have ever been banned,” EPA’s former Administrator Gina McCarthy recalled when former President Barack Obama signed the bill last June.
Finally, on Nov. 29, the EPA announced the first 10 chemicals it will evaluate for potential risks to human health and the environment under the new TSCA, formally named the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act.
The mica-like Libby vermiculite — usually marketed as Zonolite — was heavily tainted with asbestos, which permeated the mine. At hundreds of Grace processing plants throughout the country, clouds of the deadly fibers were spewed into the air in communities where the Montana ore was transformed into wall and attic insulation and also gardening and other home products.
The federal agency hasn't committed to warning tens of millions of home and business owners likely living with insulation made from asbestos-contaminated vermiculite from Libby.
“It’s too early to say what the result will be and what action EPA will take. TSCA requires these chemical risk evaluations be completed within three years,” said a senior EPA spokesperson.
The dangers from exposure to Zonolite insulation have been proven time and time again. For decades, Grace’s own scientists and then others from federal health agencies documented the hazard of breathing the invisible fibers which can cause incurable respiratory diseases and mesothelioma, lung, laryngeal, colorectal and ovarian cancers.
According to death certificates, interviews with survivors and studies by the Centers for Disease Control and the EPA in 1999 and 2000, more than 480 deaths in Libby and its surrounding county were attributed to asbestos exposure. Those with symptoms of various forms of asbestos-related diseases totaled more than 8,000. Many health experts believe that nationally — especially including Zonolite processing plants — the the body count from exposure to Montana vermiculite ore is 10 to 30 times greater, but those figures have not been confirmed.
More recently, extensive studies have been done by Drs. James Lockey and Alan Whitehouse, both leaders in occupational, environmental and pulmonary medicine. Their research, done independently, showed the most infinitesimal exposure to Libby asbestos can cause illness and death.
The peril of exposure to Zonolite was further proven by Jean Pfau, an immunologist at Montana State University, in Bozeman.
Pfau’s groundbreaking work with colleagues at the University of Montana in Missoula repeatedly showed that an alarming number of cases of autoimmune disease including lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and systemic sclerosis are related to asbestos exposure.
There is wide agreement among federal health experts that the research done by Lockey, Pfau and Whitehouse is solid and doesn't need repeating before the EPA takes action.
“The new law says EPA has up to three years to study its top ten picks, but it surely doesn't mean they need to take three years,” said Dr. Celeste Monforton, a top public health researcher from the Department of Environmental & Occupational Health at George Washington University and a lecturer at Texas State University.
“Asbestos is one chemical for which the evidence of harm is overwhelming and there's no compelling need for more study. An EPA warning about Zonolite contaminated asbestos is long overdue and well within EPA's authority,” she said.
Trump praises asbestos
Federal health agencies have mostly ignored the well-documented risk from asbestos-containing products for years, regardless of who sat in the Oval Office.
President Donald J. Trump has often said that the danger of asbestos is overblown. The 45th president brought with him a well-documented history of defending asbestos as safe.
Testifying as a New York landlord and developer, Trump touted the safety of the "miracle fiber" to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management on July 21, 2005.
He hammered home his belief in numerous speeches, tweets and in his 1997 book, "The Art of Making a Comeback."
“I believe that the movement against asbestos was led by the mob, because it was often mob-related companies that would do the asbestos removal,” Trump wrote in that book. “Great pressure was put on politicians, and as usual, the politicians relented. Millions of truckloads of this incredible fire-proofing material were taken to special ‘dump sites’ and asbestos was replaced by materials that were supposedly safe but couldn't hold a candle to asbestos in limiting the ravages of fire.”
However, the Centers for Disease Control and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration insist that there is no safe level of exposure to any asbestos fiber.
Expressing concern about Trump’s defense of asbestos, Monforton said it was irresponsible for the EPA to not issue a warning before the change of administrations.
Courageous researchers
Jim Lockey conducted an extensive occupational health study spanning three decades on the same cohort of workers from the O.M. Scott factory in Marysville, Ohio, who had been exposed to Libby vermiculite used in the company’s lawn products.
Lockey, a physician and professor of occupational, environmental and pulmonary medicine at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, found by repeatedly testing the same surviving workers that the mineral from the Grace mine in Libby sickens and kills at lower and shorter exposures than anyone believed possible.
“People are touching this stuff all the time. They drill a hole in the ceiling, or they rip a wall out. An electrician strings new wiring through a wall to put up additional outlets or cables, or the attic, walls or floor joists are packed with Zonolite,” said Lockey. “Where it's used in home insulation should be identified. The homeowners should be warned that it's in the air, and they should keep it isolated and avoid moving it at all.”
Dr. Aubrey Miller shares Lockey’s concern on the danger to residents and workers.
“Tens if not hundreds of thousands of remodelers, installers and cable workers throughout the nation go into attics that have exceedingly high exposures and ones that could easily result in disease from contamination, Of course, the same dangers face the residents of those homes,” said Miller, the senior medical adviser to the director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the first government physician to arrive in Libby in 1999.
He also expresses concern that without publicizing the potential hazards, physicians will not know enough to properly question their patients about asbestos exposure, and “a lot of lives may be lost throughout the country.”
“Doctors need to know that there is reason to ask their patients about exposure to asbestos and if patients don’t know they’ve been exposed, the results could be fatal,” Miller said.
Even those trained in hazardous substances might not recognize the danger of Zonolite.
Public was almost warned
The decision not to warn citizens of the potential danger cannot be blamed on politics, as EPA administrators from both parties did nothing despite repeated warnings by public health experts in their agencies.
EPA documents show that career bureaucrats urged political appointees not to issue warnings. They feared the agency could get stuck with a cleanup bill for the contaminated homes of between $60 billion and $80 billion.
Experts within the EPA and the public health community who were on the front lines in Libby and at Grace vermiculite processing plants were not urging a decontamination of any kind. All they wanted then and now was for the public who may be at risk to be told so they could make their own decisions on their family’s safety.
The one exception who openly called for a public warning was Christine Todd Whitman, who headed the EPA under President George W. Bush. In 2001, she had buckled under enormous White House pressure to downplay the debilitating breathing hazard confronting residents of Manhattan and nearby New Jersey from the collapsed Twin Towers, which government scientists called as caustic as drain cleaner. However, Whitman stood strong when it came to danger from the huge pit mine in Libby.
She listened as EPA health and safety experts anguished over the millions of home and business owners throughout the country that Grace sales records said may be living with lethal asbestos fibers contaminating the vermiculite insulation where they lived and worked.
She approved a 14-page detailed “rollout plan” for warning the public of the hazard in the Zonolite. She and other top agency officials would go on morning TV shows, talk radio outlets and public service announcements in large and small newspapers and all the major home improvement and hardware chains.
The rollout was to be unleashed June 27, 2003. It never happened. Instead, that morning, it was announced that Whitman had resigned.
http://billingsgazette.com/business/despite-new-law-epa-fails-to-tell-millions-of-montana/article_78079e94-0f81-5945-9f73-e862f833c0f3.html
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EPA’s Proposed Retroactive Notification Requirements Impact Manufacturers and Processors
Jan 29, 2017 | National Law Review
By Michael J. Gray
EPA has proposed a new rule requiring companies that manufactured (including imported) chemicals for non-exempt commercial purposes at anytime between June 21, 2006 and June 21, 2016 to electronically file a notification with EPA. In the retroactive notification, the company must identify whether the chemical substance on the TSCA Inventory is either “active” or “inactive” in U.S. commerce. EPA plans to use this updated information to prohibit the manufacture or processing of chemical substances that it designates as inactive.
EPA proposes this rule as part of TSCA Reform, which Congress enacted last year in the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, Public Law 114–182. Under TSCA section 8(b), 15 U.S.C. 2607(b), if EPA does not receive notification of the active manufacture of a chemical substance on the TSCA Inventory, it will list the chemical as inactive going forward.
EPA also proposed forward-looking notification requirements under TSCA section 8(b)(5)(B) for companies planning to manufacture or process chemical substances listed as inactive on the TSCA Inventory. After EPA’s first publication of the TSCA Inventory with active and inactive designations, companies that intend to manufacture or process for nonexempt commercial purposes chemicals listed as inactive on the TSCA Inventory would be required to notify EPA 30 days before the date of manufacturing or processing.
While the proposed mandatory notification requirement applies only to manufacturers and not processors, processors are still significantly impacted by the proposed rule because of the potential that EPA could list a chemical they process as inactive. In addition to banning manufacturing of inactive chemical substances, TSCA Reform bans the processing of these substances. Therefore, processors have a significant interest in ensuring that chemicals they process are listed as active on the TSCA Inventory. Processors must pay close attention to EPA’s development of the TSCA Inventory active and inactive list to avoid disruption of their operations.
The information required in the notification includes the chemical identity and the date range when the manufacture occurred in the specified 10-year range. Companies will report their notifications electronically through EPA’s existing Central Data Exchange (CDX) (https://cdx.epa.gov/). EPA will require the notification by no later than 180 days after publication of the rule for chemical manufacturers, and 360 days after publication for processors. EPA estimates that the rule could impact 6,169 chemical manufacturers, with an estimated cost of $1,346 for those that must submit notifications. Likewise, EPA estimates that the rule will impact 161,550 processors, with only around 100 companies ultimately having to file notifications at $300 per notification.
http://www.natlawreview.com/article/epa-s-proposed-retroactive-notification-requirements-impact-manufacturers-and
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(ACC Mentioned) Monsanto to Fight Calif. Court Ruling on Roundup Labeling
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Marc Heller
Monsanto Co. said today it will fight a court ruling that could allow California to require labels declaring a widely used weed killer may cause cancer.
The St. Louis-based company took issue with a California Superior Court judge's tentative ruling that the state can require the weed killer glyphosate to be labeled as a possible carcinogen based on a finding by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.
"Regulators around the world, including the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the State of California itself, have determined that glyphosate does not cause cancer," a company spokeswoman said in an email.
The judge, Kristi Culver Kapetan of Fresno County Superior Court, said her ruling was tentative and that a formal decision would be forthcoming.
At issue is whether California can include glyphosate — sold by Monsanto under the brand name Roundup — on a list of chemicals considered possible carcinogens, under the state's Proposition 65, which requires the state to publish a list of chemicals known to cause cancer, birth defects or other reproductive harm. The 30-year-old list, which must be updated at least once a year, includes approximately 800 chemicals.
Monsanto today called that proposal "flawed and baseless" and said it "not only contradicts California's own scientific assessment, but it also violates the California and U.S. Constitutions. Monsanto will continue to challenge this unfounded proposed ruling on the basis of science and the law."
Groups seeking a ban on glyphosate cheered the tentative ruling.
"California's wise decision to require labeling of the controversial pesticide Roundup to clearly state that it may cause cancer is based on the world's most reliable, transparent and science-based assessment of its active ingredient, glyphosate," said Nathan Donley, senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity and a former cancer researcher.
The International Agency for Research on Cancer is part of the World Health Organization. It said in 2015 that glyphosate probably causes cancer, but that was at odds with findings by EPA and European authorities.
IARC's finding has led some lawmakers in Congress to question the organization's credibility. House Science, Space and Technology Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) and House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) have been especially critical and have questioned U.S. funding of IARC through the National Institutes of Health.
Citing the California case, the American Chemistry Council last week said it would push for changes at IARC to make its work more transparent.
"Public policy must be based on a transparent, thorough assessment of the best available science," said ACC President and CEO Cal Dooley, a former Democratic congressman from California. "Currently, IARC's monographs do not meet this standard, though U.S. taxpayers foot the bill for over two-thirds of the international program's budget."
The chemical is used in pesticides sold in home gardening stores, and it's widely used by farmers on corn and other crops. Monsanto also sells corn bred for resistance to glyphosate, which critics say has led to increased use of the weed killer.
http://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049212
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Target Demands Suppliers Reveal Endocrine Disruptors in Products
Jan 30, 2017 | Organic Authority
By Emily Monaco
In order to achieve better transparency and to help consumers avoid dangerous chemicals and endocrine disruptors, Target has requested that all of its suppliers list ingredients in the products sold at its stores by 2020. The store has also asked that companies remove certain ingredients, such as perfluorinated chemicals, formaldehyde, and phthaletes, from products in certain categories by this date.
Target plans to invest as much as $5 million in green chemistry by 2022 to develop replacement ingredients where none exist to help achieve these goals.
The key product categories for this overhaul are currently categories consumers encounter closely, such as beauty, baby, personal care, and cleaning goods, but ultimately, Target hopes to disclose all ingredients in all products, according to Bloomberg.
“Part of knowing what’s in products is understanding where they come from and how they’re made,” says Irene Quarshie, vice president, quality & compliance, Target Sourcing Services. “So we’ll build on our work in the responsible sourcing space to help us verify that supply chain processes are sustainable, as well as ethical and responsible, from beginning to end.”
Target’s decision will likely push hundreds of suppliers to list ingredients on packaging, according to Fortune.
“It’s ambitious, but using our size, scale and expertise, we think we’ll be able to make significant progress,” said Jennifer Silberman, Target’s chief sustainability officer, in a blog post following the announcement.
Target has been encouraging manufacturers to be more transparent in listing ingredients on its products since 2015. The company has also requested that producers remove more than 1,000 “unwanted chemicals” from these products, such as bisphenol A (BPA), one of several known endocrine disruptors present in the packaging of many food and beverage items, triclosan, and coal tars.
A November report released by Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families named Target the second-highest ranking U.S. retailer in terms of chemical-disclosure policies, after Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart announced that it was pushing suppliers to restrict the use of eight hazardous chemicals from some of its products six months before Target’s announcement.
http://www.organicauthority.com/target-demands-that-suppliers-reveal-endocrine-disruptors-in-products/
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Where Will Clean Power Plan Organizers Refocus Their Efforts?
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Interactive
By Emily Holden and Rod Kuckro
A cottage industry that grew up around U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan now must rethink how to be useful to states and companies still looking to cut power-sector carbon emissions.
Think tanks and other groups around the country for the past few years have convened officials and run modeling looking at how states could comply with the federal climate standards.
As the Clean Power Plan dies a slow death under the Trump administration, those organizers turn their focus to the contemporary questions states face as they navigate a still-changing electricity system.
Tim Profeta, director Duke University's Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, said his group's work "on climate policy and clean energy extends beyond a single policy."
"Ultimately, power sector planning does not occur in four- or even eight-year increments," he said.
Profeta's institute will continue to work with states on a host of challenges, including potential nuclear plant closures, issues integrating renewable power and general planning while the details of federal climate policy remain largely uncertain.
He said unprecedented analysis and engagement under the Clean Power Plan advanced the dialogue on climate and energy issues and promoted peer learning across state borders. That means officials better understand the electricity system, trends affecting it and ways to keep the grid reliable, he said.
Another organization, the Minnesota-based Great Plains Institute, had worked with the Nicholas Institute and states within the PJM grid region, as well as the Bipartisan Policy Center and states that are part of the Midcontinent States Environmental and Energy Regulators (MSEER) group.
Those groups didn't take a position on the rule but instead focused on how to comply with it if it moved forward. That meant states for and against the Clean Power Plan were able to participate, said Doug Scott, vice president of strategic initiatives for the Great Plains Institute.
The process brought together states with differing opinions, helped environmental and energy regulators work together often for the first time and let policymakers look at power-sector issues through a regional lens, Scott said.
"The modeling work that was done in conjunction with the groups provided state regulators with a great deal of information about their state and region, and how a variety of energy trends and policies (not just the CPP) impact their state and region," Scott said. "All of this information will serve the states as they approach energy/environmental issues going forward."
Scott said the various regional groups will continue, focusing on energy trends and issues that may affect their states and regions, rather than one specific regulation.Grid groups foresee more decarbonization
Regional grid organizations will still be helping states crunch the numbers for that work.
"As far as CPP, we don't have a position on it as it is not our role," said Paula DuPont, spokeswoman for the PJM Interconnection, the nation's largest grid operator.
At the request of regulators in the states it serves, PJM's role was to "provide them with independent, neutral information," she said.
"We're always ready to assist states in the region with independent information analysis about electric reliability and wholesale electricity markets," she said.
In September, for example, PJM produced an analysis that found that power plants in its jurisdiction could comply without spiking electricity costs.
The Midcontinent Independent System Operator said it will continue to monitor the external landscape and decisions that might affect the region.
A MISO spokesman emphasized that economics play a major role in which fuels are used to generate electricity.
"Over the past eight years, MISO's generation fleet evolved from a primarily coal-based fleet to a more balanced mix of coal, natural gas, and renewables," said Jay Hermacinski, a corporate communications officer for MISO. "We expect that trend to continue regardless of how the Administration moves on the CPP.
"It comes down to economics. With natural gas prices as low as they are, it may be difficult for coal to survive," he said.
Ken Colburn, a former state air regulator with the Regulatory Assistance Project, said, "If anything, the Clean Power Plan is not the cause" of changes sweeping the power markets.
"What you're already seeing is a power sector transformation operating in such a way that it's actually cleaning up the grid anyway," a phenomenon that appears to be occurring "even earlier that we expected," he said.
Meanwhile, Northeastern states continue to debate what level of carbon emissions reductions to pursue within the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a nine-state, cap-and-trade program.
Those states hold a webinar tomorrow as part of an ongoing program review. RGGI had been considering how to tweak its program to comply with the Clean Power Plan, although it was already poised to meet the mandated carbon levels.
Laurie Burt, a former commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection who has been working on analyses about RGGI states and companies, said RGGI has never done its work in a bubble and will keep looking at what other states may or may not pursue.
"I think the Clean Power Plan was able to give a wonderful backlight to what states were discussing anyway," Burt said. "All states face these same issues. It's just not an East Coast/West Coast thing."
Chris Van Atten, a senior vice president for the firm M.J. Bradley & Associates, helped provide states and utilities with a tool for calculating how to reach Clean Power Plan goals.
He said states will continue to consider future supply options, despite the change in administration, and they will need power-sector analysis to make those evaluations.
This week, the Senate votes on the nomination of former Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson to run the State Department. On Wednesday, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will vote on the nomination of Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to head EPA (E&E News PM, Jan. 27).
In case you missed it
Even before the final death knell, the Clean Power Plan is history (Climatewire, Jan. 24).
Air regulators in Minnesota, one of the few states still planning for the Clean Power Plan, signaled a stakeholder meeting in February will likely be their last (Climatewire, Jan. 26).
Across the Midwest, clean energy advocates vow to continue their push under Trump (Energywire, Jan. 23).
In responses to senators, Pruitt questioned the impacts of global warming (Climatewire, Jan. 26).
Pruitt also acknowledged to senators that he raised money for a super political action committee that has raked in big-dollar contributions from coal, oil and gas interests (Energywire, Jan. 27).
Pruitt sought to kill a Clean Line power line project from Oklahoma to Tennessee (Energywire, Jan. 27).
http://www.eenews.net/interactive/clean_power_plan/column_posts/1060049164
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GOP Lawmakers Move to Block BLM Rule
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Pamela King
Republican lawmakers are calling on state leaders and the energy industry to craft alternative methane rules for oil and gas operations on public lands.
GOP legislators today will begin the process of repealing a pair of Interior Department regulations, House Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah) said on a Friday conference call with reporters (Greenwire, Jan. 27). One of the two rules in the crosshairs is the Bureau of Land Management's methane venting and flaring rule, which requires oil and gas operators to use existing technologies to curb release of the primary constituent of natural gas.
Bishop expects to introduce a joint resolution today that would use authority granted under the Congressional Review Act to undo federal regulations enacted within the last 60 legislative days. Using the CRA to stop the BLM rule would pre-empt the agency from weighing in on methane control in the future.
"It is our responsibility to act," Bishop said.
Montana Rep. Ryan Zinke (R), President Trump's choice to lead Interior, has said he would support efforts to strike down the methane rule but lamented waste of a lucrative resource. The gas could be captured and transported for sale if the industry had a better network of pipelines and gathering lines in place, Zinke told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee during his nomination hearing (Greenwire, Jan. 18).
Methane leakage can be managed at the state level, as demonstrated by Colorado, Wyoming and North Dakota, said Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Western Energy Alliance. Flaring, the practice of burning escaped gas, declined more than 20 percent in North Dakota in the two years after state regulators promulgated a restriction in 2014, the U.S. Energy Information Administration wrote in June 2016.
"They worked together with industry," Sgamma said.
Wyoming last year approved a rule requiring producers to report how much and what type of gas they vent or burn from well sites (Energywire, Feb. 11, 2016). Environmental groups raised concerns over the regulation because it still allows venting, which directly releases gas to the atmosphere.
At the federal level, green groups are calling for BLM to remain involved in methane regulation because of the agency's role as a trustee of natural gas extracted from public lands.
"CRA is not just a death penalty for the rule," said Mark Brownstein, vice president of climate and energy for the Environmental Defense Fund. "It's a death penalty for the agency coming back with anything that's newer or better."
Lawmakers who favor regulatory reform should approach BLM to take steps to tailor the rule to better accommodate industry and state input, Brownstein said. Invoking CRA removes that option.
"You're taking a chain saw to a problem that might better be fixed with a scalpel," he said.
Calling on states to share their regulatory strategy implies a recognition that free-market forces are not enough to spur emissions reductions, Brownstein said.
"The problem these states are facing can't be solved simply by relying on industry to address this issue through voluntary measures," he said.
Bishop would not say whether he planned to introduce legislation directing BLM to rewrite the rule if the CRA invocation is successful.
"I can't tell you exactly what I plan on doing right now," he said.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049149
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As House Moves to Kill Methane Regs, Colo. Asks Why
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Climatewire
By Brittany Patterson
House Republicans today will begin to scrap an Interior Department directive to cut methane from oil and gas wells on federal lands, calling it a "bad rule" and "regulatory overreach."
But just a few years earlier, oil and gas companies sat down with environmentalists in Colorado to develop first-in-the-nation regulations for the potent greenhouse gas. Those rules were considered so comprehensive that both the Interior Department and U.S. EPA borrowed from them when they crafted their own federal rules.
Despite having been in effect just a few years, proponents of the rule say Regulation No. 7, or Reg. 7 as it's called, has both reduced methane leaks and created economic growth for Colorado. It's a pattern many in the state expected to see go nationwide when federal rules were promulgated.
Now supporters — which include both industry and environmentalists — say the GOP move to claw back similar federal methane regulations could stifle the growth of the budding methane mitigation industry in Colorado and upend the ability of the United States to lead a growing field.
"There seems to be an ideological opposition to federal regulations by industry that trumps just about everything else," said Dan Grossman, national director of state programs for the Environmental Defense Fund's Oil and Gas Program. "What the Colorado case study has demonstrated is that methane mitigation is highly cost-effective and it certainly does not impede operators' ability to stay competitive and produce oil and gas."
Federal efforts to roll back the Bureau of Land Management's venting and flaring rule are supported by industry, which has called the Obama-era regulations duplicative and costly. But with House Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop (R-Utah) poised to introduce a resolution of disapproval to overturn the rule, analysts say the experiences of Colorado can be helpful in understanding both the challenges and opportunities of curbing methane.
New businesses created in detection
Reg. 7 was drafted in 2013 between EDF and some of the biggest players in Colorado's oil and gas industry, including Anadarko Petroleum Corp., Noble Energy Inc. and Encana Oil and Gas Corp. It requires operators to find and fix leaks and install devices to capture 95 percent of methane emissions.
In a sign that things seem to be working, oil and gas companies operating in Colorado haven't sued to block the Colorado rule. That's despite state estimates that the methane regulation, in conjunction with two other ozone rules, was likely to cost the oil and gas industry, conservatively, about $42 million per year.
According to data submitted to Colorado's Air Quality Control Commission, the number of leaking oil and gas facilities has dropped by 75 percent since the rule went into effect.
"Colorado has really set the tone, not only here for our state, but also nationally," said Mark McMillan, stationary sources program manager for the Colorado Air Pollution Control Division. "There are four or five really good regulatory things that have come from this."
One of those things, supporters say, is new jobs.
Under Reg. 7, operators must inspect their oil and gas wells often, and if a leak is detected, they must fix it. To do that, operators can use technologies like infrared cameras to identify leaks.
Many larger companies took the plunge and purchased the cameras, which cost thousands of dollars, and created in-house teams to comply.
"These are blue-collar, high-paying jobs program that are impossible to export," said Allison Lami Sawyer, CEO and co-founder of Rebellion Photonics, a gas imaging company based in Houston.
Industry yearns for more flexibility
Yet some concerns remain. The Colorado rule includes a compliance pathway for new leak detection technologies, but people creating those new technologies say they haven't seen the benefits yet.
Apogee Scientific, based in Englewood, Colo., for example, offers a non-camera detection system that finds not only leaks of methane but all hydrocarbons that are present, as well as carbon dioxide, and it can measure the concentration of those components in the leaked gas.
But Jim Armstrong, president of Apogee Scientific, said that when the company applied for a permit to be certified under Colorado's regulation, it was denied because it could not prove its technology catches 100 percent of leaks, despite its being used by utilities and the state to measure other chemical leaks from things like coal seam mining facilities and power plants.
"My concern is we have a lot of people trying to innovate new technologies, but if they hit the wall of having to find every leak, they're going to run into a problem," he said. "Nobody is going to find every leak, and regulators know that."
To date, the state has approved just one new technology for use under Reg. 7.
The oil and gas industry, while sharing the concerns voiced by methane mitigation companies worried that Colorado's rule may not be flexible enough to spur innovation, has been largely supportive.
"You're seeing emissions reductions and seeing leaks that are caught through this program and fixed," said Andrew Casper, director of legal and regulatory affairs for the Colorado Oil and Gas Association (COGA).
Grossman, who helped craft the rule, said he recognizes that the new technology bar is hard to meet, but said it was set intentionally high. He also sees evidence that Colorado's rule has created a blueprint for both federal agencies and states for methane regulation. As that practice becomes standard, Grossman argued, it opens the door for new technologies to join the field.
The Center for Methane Emissions Solutions, a business group formed to represent companies targeting methane emissions, estimated that in 2015, there were at least 72 companies working on methane mitigation headquartered in the United States.
The government has also seen the high potential of methane mitigation technologies. In 2014, the Department of Energy's Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, which funds early-stage startups that could have a high impact in the clean technology field, gave out $30 million to support 11 projects focused on developing low-cost, highly sensitive systems to detect methane leaks from oil and gas wells.
It 'made sense'
Warren King, an energy specialist at the Wilderness Society, said repealing EPA's and BLM's federal rules could have impacts beyond just on the amount of methane, a greenhouse gas 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide, that is released into the atmosphere.
"We've seen how these requirements have impacted Colorado for the better both in terms of reducing emissions and also increasing jobs and creating new jobs," he said. "I think because of the way both the BLM rule and EPA rule were structured and the similarities between them and the Colorado rule, nationwide we would have seen similar impacts on the economy."
COGA's Casper called Colorado a leader in regulations, with one of the most stringent air-quality rules in the country. Of Reg. 7, he said, "I think one of the benefits you're seeing is decreased emissions despite increased production."
If the BLM methane regulation is overturned through the use of the Congressional Review Act, not only will the methane regulation be invalidated, but the agency will be barred from crafting a similar replacement rule.
Bishop said he would like Congress to take up some of regulatory issues in the BLM rule, but isn't clear yet about which parts.
For King, who used to work in oil and gas regulation at Colorado's Air Pollution Control Division, repealing federal regulations is a loss on many levels.
"To me, it's surprising that if you have this buy-in from other states and companies that are saying the Colorado regulations made sense and they agreed to those, yet they don't support federal regulations, and that just doesn't make sense," he said. "I understand the argument against duplicative regulations, but EPA and especially BLM did a terrific job in allowing for compliance if state regulations were met."
http://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049171
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Trump's Election Complicates Gas Politics in Pa.
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
President Trump is casting a long shadow on Pennsylvania politics, empowering Republicans in a long-running battle with Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf over how to tax the state's natural gas industry.
Wolf is preparing to ask the state Legislature for a tax on gas production for the third time since he was elected in 2014. The GOP-dominated House and Senate have rebuffed him twice, even though polls show the idea of a gas tax is popular with voters.
Trump's odds-defying victory in Pennsylvania — he's the first Republican to carry the state since 1988 — appears to tilt the field toward the GOP in the state House. And Republican candidates are already jockeying to challenge Wolf in 2018.
That makes it unlikely the two sides will find a solution this year to the long-term budget problems that have led to underfunding in schools and layoffs at state agencies, said Christopher Borick, a political science professor at Muhlenberg College who follows Pennsylvania politics.
"This has all the makings of ugliness," he said.
Wolf pitched the severance tax as a clean solution to the state's problems when he took office in 2015. His predecessor, Republican Tom Corbett, had cut funding to Pennsylvania's schools in the wake of the 2008 recession. At the same time, the gas industry was booming as companies drilled into the Marcellus Shale formation using advances in hydraulic fracturing.
Pennsylvania is the only major energy-producing state that doesn't tax natural gas production. Instead, drillers pay an annual fee for each well. Wolf's first budget proposal, for the 2015-16 fiscal year, would have raised about $1 billion in new revenue by taxing the gas industry.
The Legislature came close to passing a compromise version of Wolf's budget, but negotiations broke down just before Christmas 2015, and the state went months without a working budget.
Wolf tried again to introduce a gas tax in 2016. The Legislature rebuffed him and balanced the budget with a patchwork of one-time spending and targeted tax increases (Energywire, July 19, 2016).
Since then, the state's Independent Fiscal Office has projected there will be a $2.8 billion gap between its projected revenue and spending in the upcoming fiscal year.
Tax seen as a non-starter in Pa. House
Wolf won't release his budget for the 2017-18 fiscal year until February. However, he's already ruled out increases in sales and personal income taxes and is planning to reintroduce the gas tax as a way to help close the budget gap, said his spokesman, J.J. Abbott.
A few Republican legislators have even introduced versions of the gas tax, with the revenue targeted to schools or other priorities.
The Marcellus Shale Coalition, a trade group for the drilling industry, said in a statement that companies are already reeling from low prices and competition. That makes a new tax a non-starter in the House, where Speaker Mike Turzai has said taxing the gas industry will lead to job losses.
The state Senate has been more willing to compromise and even passed a version of a gas tax in 2015, before it was stripped out by the House.
It'll be harder for senators to negotiate this year, with the governor's race hanging over the session, Borick and other observers said.
Republican state Sen. Scott Wagner, a populist businessman from York, has already opened his campaign. He's borrowing from Trump's populist playbook, declaring that Wolf is "a failed governor" and vowing to make state government live within its means.
Other senators, some of whom are also considering running for governor, may see little benefit in negotiating with Wolf.
"They're not going to give him much," Borick said.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049167
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Nothing Trumps a Clean, Equitable and Wildlife-Friendly Energy Future
Jan 29, 2017 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By Chad Tudenggongbu
Since Election Day, there have been countless articles forecasting possible Trump-induced reversal on clean energy growth, and even more optimistic analyses arguing clean energy growth is “Trump-proof.” The reality is that as Trump has stacked his Cabinet with avowed climate change deniers like Scott Pruitt, who writes in National Review op-ed that climate science is “far from settled”, and industry titans like Exxon oilman Rex Tillerson, who downplays the seriousness of climate change and states our ability to predict climate change effect is very limited.
As President Trump prepares to gut our federal environmental policies and regulatory agencies, we need to be prepared to fight for an accelerated transition to a clean, equitable and wildlife-friendly energy future. This means defending the progress we've made, increasing public demand for clean energy and calling for renewed commitments from state and local governments to pursue strong clean energy targets.
There's a lot Trump can and likely will do – as detailed in the leaked memo prepared by the head of his energy transition team – to stall the progress of renewable energy development. Frankly, we'd be better off picking a random person off the street to run the country for the next four years.
Unlike the incoming administration, which actively denies the reality of climate change, at least 7 out of 10 Americans believe in the science of human-induced climate change, and 9 in 10 favor expanding the use of solar power. But it's not time to start planning a funeral for renewable energy; it's time to start plotting the renewable-energy revolution. Simply put, we don’t have four years to wait.
Trump can stall clean energy development by eliminating renewable energy targets and restricting supportive policy tools, and he’s vowed to do both. The president has made his intentions clear: He’s looking to scrap the Clean Power Plan, which set reasonable goals to reduce emissions and spur renewable energy growth, and walk away from the Paris Climate Agreement soon after he takes office. And fossil fuel-friendly Cabinet choices (along with a one-sided Congress) mean the new administration is already stacking the deck against a wildlife-friendly energy future – there’s even further opportunity to create political distortion with federal judge appointments. This could all mean court decisions that favor fossil fuel interests and budget choices that eliminate clean energy development and research incentives while keeping polluting industries on government-funded life support.
So how do we go about not just protecting the progress we’ve made, or pushing for more renewable energy in general, but ensuring that as we accelerate clean energy development across the country, we do so in a way that protects the most vulnerable communities, species, and habitat?
All told, these threats may feel like a death knell, but there are many reasons why continued clean energy growth is still possible even in absence of a supportive federal government. Demand for clean energy continues to get stronger, and rooftop solar has become more competitive and affordable across the country. More than 30 communities – big and small – are pursuing a goal of 100 percent renewable energy, and even red states like Iowa and Texas are experiencing unprecedented clean-energy growth.
Yet a Trump administration dripping with fossil fuel interests will embolden renewable energy challengers at every level of government. To prevent steps backward in the fight for clean energy, we have to defend key renewable energy policies at the federal level and ensure that the federal extension of tax credit for solar and wind does not fall victim to a Trumpian tax reform. We have to remain steadfast in defending reasonable electricity rates for renewable customers like the net metering challenge in Nevada, Utah and Arizona; preventing anti-solar legislative changes like the failed ballot measure in Florida; demanding stronger and expanding programs at the state and local level. This means making sure rooftop solar owners get compensated for the value they bring to the grid, families have viable financing options to put solar panels on their homes, and those who can’t install solar on their own homes can join community shared solar programs. States must also set ambitious goals for renewable energy. We need our local governments to hasten their steps towards running entirely on clean energy.
Trump is in the White House, but with public demand for clean energy on our side, we will fight to ensure that, rather than allowing wildlife-friendly renewable energy growth to be stopped by Trump's presidency, the clean energy revolution results in a clean and equitable energy future.Chad Tudenggongbu is a senior renewable Energy Campaigner for the Center for Biological Diversity.
https://origin-nyi.thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-environment/316639-nothing-trumps-a-clean-equitable-and-wildlife-friendly
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Draft Trump Order Would Review U.S. Cyberdefenses
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
President Trump is ready to convene a series of cyber "review teams" for new strategies to protect government and critical infrastructure networks from hackers, according to an unsigned executive order obtained by The Washington Post last week.
A White House spokesman declined to confirm the document's authenticity Friday, although multiple cybersecurity experts tracking the Trump administration said the draft order appeared to be legitimate. The executive action on "strengthening U.S. cyber security and capabilities" also aligns with Trump's prior pledge to review U.S. cyber preparedness during his first few months in office.
"America's civilian and government institutions and critical infrastructure are currently vulnerable to attacks from both state and non-state actors," the order says, before adding that malicious online "operations may disrupt or disable the functioning of important economic institutions and critical infrastructure, and may potentially cause physical effects that could result in significant property damage and loss of life."
To combat the threat, the order proposes setting up review teams composed of experts from the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security and various counterterrorism and intelligence authorities. One such team would focus on a review of "the most critical U.S. cyber vulnerabilities," while another would take a look at the "principal U.S. cyber adversaries" and report back to Trump.
A third effort would examine U.S. capabilities in cyberspace and single out areas "needing improvement to adequately protect U.S. critical infrastructure."
Finally, the executive order would clear the way for a report on "options to incentivize private sector adoption of effective cyber security measures," to be submitted to the secretary of Commerce within 100 days of Trump's signature.
The language in the document, combined with the familiar spectrum of agencies tapped for the review process, are both broadly consistent with the cybersecurity policies of Trump's predecessor in the White House. In 2013, then-President Obama ordered a similar effort to improve the security of crucial computer networks that resulted in the publication of the Commerce Department's "Framework for Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity" the following year.
If they're carried out, it's not clear which if any of the reports will be made public by the new administration.
Joshua Corman, director of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative at the Atlantic Council, said he was encouraged by Trump's acknowledgement of the potential for cyberattacks to have physical consequences, from deaths due to hacked medical devices to widespread damage to industrial control equipment.
"I think a lot of the discussion in the last eight years has been about information sharing and the loss of confidential information," he said. While data theft is still important, Corman pointed out that hacking "also potentially affects public safety, human life."
Corman added he was "very pleased" to see the executive order make "significant and repeated mention of non-state actors in cyberspace."
"One of the more dangerous blind spots in conversations about national cybersecurity is the assumption that this is all nation-state activity," he said.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049166
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Calif. Cyber Incident Underscores 'Routine' Threat
Jan 30, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
Days before an overblown cybersecurity incident set off a media firestorm at a small power company in Vermont, another utility across the country was busy responding to an actual network breach, according to multiple sources and federal records.
The Dec. 13, 2016, "cyber event" at an unnamed utility in Riverside County, Calif., did not cause a blackout but "potentially" could have affected grid reliability, according to a vaguely worded account on file with the Department of Energy. There is no evidence that the incident was part of a deliberate attempt to hack U.S. electricity infrastructure.
On Dec. 30, a separate "cyber event" at Burlington Electric in Vermont triggered widespread fears that Russian hackers had infiltrated part of the U.S. power grid, though initial reporting surrounding the episode later proved to be false (Energywire, Jan. 4).
While little is publicly known about the unrelated Dec. 13 intrusion, sources say it offers a case study of the day-to-day cyberthreats that utilities must parry in an increasingly interconnected world.
Michael Assante, head of industrial control system security at the SANS Institute cyber training organization, said it is fairly "routine" for organizations to have an infection on a desktop computer at a utility. Such infections are only rarely part of a targeted effort to purposely intrude upon a power system, but they could still enable a hacker to attempt deeper penetration of the network, he said.
Assante pointed out that such malware may gain a "foothold" when a worker opens an infected file on email. Malicious code can also hitch a ride into a protected environment via an employee's USB stick or some other media.
"Prevention can't be the only goal of a security program," Assante said in an email, adding that utilities "must develop the ability to detect and have the necessary competencies and capabilities" to respond to a run-of-the-mill malware infection and more.
"We are typically good at detecting non-targeted malware infections, but not as successful when up against more sophisticated and targeted threats," he said. "In this case it appears the entity involved detected the infection and responsibly filed a report."
E&E News could not confirm which company was affected by the Dec. 13 event. Electricity distribution in Riverside County, east of Los Angeles, is provided by five organizations of varying sizes and geographic ranges: Southern California Edison, Moreno Valley Electric Utility, Anza Electric Co-op, Riverside Public Utilities, and the city of Banning's Utility Department. Spokespeople for all five utilities said the Dec. 13 cyber event did not affect their networks.
Kimberly Mielcarek, a spokeswoman for the North American Electric Reliability Corp., which enforces cybersecurity standards for the bulk power grid in the United States, said the organization was aware of the event but declined to share any details.
Steven Greenlee, a spokesman for the California Independent System Operator, which directs power transmission and electricity markets in the state, also declined to share details of the event or the cybersecurity measures the nonprofit has in place. He noted in an email that "there has been no effect on the ISO grid systems or reliability" owing to the event.
An agent at the FBI field office in Los Angeles said she was unaware of the incident.
Historically, companies who alert DOE to cyber events, weather-related power disruptions or other service issues have had their names listed in "electric emergency" summaries posted by DOE's Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability.
Last month, that office quietly scrubbed the names of specific companies from all of its public reports, for reasons that are not clear. An agency spokeswoman said the department is in the process of reviewing all agency policies.
Assante suggested the policy change "might be as a result of concern for future media reporting," effectively helping companies hit by cyberattacks to stay anonymous. Still, he pointed out that the data in the public forms provide enough specifics that "usually will indicate who the owner/utility is" for a given incident.
http://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/01/30/stories/1060049165
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CPUC to Take Up to Two Years to Decide Aliso Storage Field's Fate
Jan 30, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Richard Nemec
In keeping with a state law passed last year (SB 380), California regulators said Friday they will launch an 18- to 24-month investigation to determine whether to reduce or eliminate operations at Aliso Canyon, the state's largest underground natural gas storage facility.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) is expected to vote at its next meeting (Feb. 9) to establish an investigation into "the feasibility of minimizing or eliminating the use of" the Southern California Gas Co. (SoCalGas) 86-Bcf capacity Aliso field. Two public hearings on the controversial 3,600-acre facility are scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday in the San Fernando Valley section of Los Angeles.
The CPUC's proposed order instituting investigation (OII) calls for two phases. The first would complete an analysis of whether it is feasible to reduce or eliminate the use of Aliso Canyon and still maintain gas and electric reliability for the region. The second phase would take into consideration the first phase results and consider "whether the CPUC should reduce or eliminate the use of Aliso, and if so, under what conditions and parameters and in what time frame," a CPUC spokesperson said.
A final decision is expected by mid-2018, but the CPUC has slated a 24-month time frame from opening the proceeding to completing all work, the spokesperson said. CPUC expectations are that the first phase analysis would include an assessment of potential impacts on utility rates, which would be accomplished through stakeholder participation in public workshops.
Last week, Sempra Energy withdrew small volumes of gas from Aliso to avoid the possibility of curtailing some of its largest industrial and commercial customers because of cold weather, which increased demand to its highest daily peaks so far this winter.
SB 380 mandated that the CPUC open a statewide proceeding by July 1. The CPUC plans to consult with the state Energy Commission, the California Independent System Operator, local public sector utilities, the state Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources and relevant government entities.
"The CPUC expects and welcomes involvement and input from a wide range of interested entities to inform its decision-making process," the spokesperson said. A CPUC administrative law judge would be assigned to oversee the proceedings and to set a pre-hearing conference and hearing schedule.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/109221-cpuc-to-take-up-to-two-years-to-decide-aliso-storage-fields-fate
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Did STB Capitulate to Trump and Lenin?
Jan 30, 2017 | Railway Age Magazine
By William C. Vantuono
This is peripherally about a vote on an unremarkable administrative order delaying for 60 days a rulemaking affecting railroad reporting of certain service performance metrics.
The issue is the Board’s lack of respect for its cherished regulatory independence from the Executive Branch as defined and conferred by Congress. Also troubling is a seeming violation by these Senate-confirmed voting members of their oath of office to defend the Constitution’s separation of powers.
Following a gratuitous reference to the STB as “an independent regulatory agency” not subject to Executive Branch control in their unanimous decision, Begeman, Elliott and Miller voluntarily surrendered that distinction. They accepted as absolute a “Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies from Reince Priebus, Chief of Staff to President Trump … that the effective date of rules already published in the Federal Register, but that have not become effective, be postponed for 60 days.”
The purpose of the Priebus memo, as confirmed in an STB press release, is to allow the Executive Branch “time for further review.” Whoa. Further review by the Executive Branch of lawful rulemakings by a congressionally created independent regulatory agency—one considered an “expert body” by the federal judiciary that routinely gives “great deference” to STB expertise?
What Begeman, Elliott and Miller accomplished on behalf of their constitutionally created independent federal regulatory agency was consent to abasement by an Executive Branch functionary whose memo deserved the identical response that 101st Airborne Division Brig. Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe gave a 1944 Nazi ultimatum to surrender at Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge—“Nuts.”
Word leaked that Begeman, Elliott and Miller voted as they did because “it wasn't worth the risk of becoming a target.” Expediency over principle.
Discarded was a 130-year fight their more resolute predecessors have waged for regulatory independence from the Executive Branch. This voluntary capitulation creates a slippery slope inviting further Executive Branch intrusion directed by a President increasingly tainted as a dictatorial demagogue.
Congress declared STB predecessor Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) to be independent of the Executive Branch in 1889, two years following its creation. A subsequent dilution of ICC powers was eliminated by a short lived (1910-1913) Commerce Court. When President Warren G. Harding walked two blocks from the White House to the ICC’s then offices on Pennsylvania Avenue in 1921 to lobby Chairman Edgar Clark on freight rates, there is no evidence the President received more than a polite audience.
Subsequent efforts to dilute ICC independence by Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy and Johnson were rebuffed. In 1947, the Association of American Railroads warned that Executive Branch intrusion into ICC affairs would cause the ICC’s independence to “denigrate into fiction.”
Although certain administrative functions were transferred to the Department of Transportation by Congress in 1967, there was no chipping away at ICC regulatory independence. Those non-regulatory administrative functions were restored to the STB by the 2015 Surface Transportation Board Reauthorization Act.
The lone dilution of ICC regulatory authority was allowed by Congress in agreeing to President Nixon’s 1969 government reorganization plan, permitting the President authority to appoint a permanent ICC—now STB—chairman. But the 1976 Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform (4-R) Act provided that no federal officer shall have any authority to impede the free communication between the ICC and Congress with respect to budget requests.
Congress preserved the ICC’s regulatory independence and “free communication” with Congress in the 1995 ICC Termination Act that created the STB.
Public choice theory may suggest the self-interest of federal officials owes loyalty to Presidents who nominate—or may renominate—them, but Begeman and Elliott are term limited. No Board member risks removal for defending the independence of their agency. Begeman is in no fear of losing her Acting Chairman title as she intends to relinquish it once another Republican is Senate-confirmed to one of two vacant Republican seats.
Nor is there logic for the capitulation in defense of the STB budget. The STB’s budget request proceeds directly to Congress, and notions of the President’s Executive Branch Office of Management and Budget (OMB) punishing the STB through the President’s separate budget recommendations to Congress are unwarranted. The STB and its mission have exceedingly strong congressional support.
The only recognized lawful limitation to STB regulatory independence exists in the 1996 Congressional Review Act, which allows an incoming President, but only with concurrence of Congress, to nullify regulations, including those of independent regulatory agencies, finalized during previous Administrations.
That is unlikely for the rulemaking at issue—public reporting of railroad service performance metrics on shipments of fertilizer and other agricultural products. Indeed, this rulemaking is of consequence to South Dakota farmers—the home state of Begeman and Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.).
This brings us to the principle, and implications of not defending it. President Trump’s Cabinet and senior advisers are documented as the wealthiest in history, with the most business interests since the Eisenhower Administration, and sprinkled with investment bankers. It is not an “alternative fact” that Wall Street makes money—big money—on mergers and acquisitions (although this does not suggest government officials would benefit while in office).
Would it be offensive if a President, previously assured of his influence over independent regulatory agencies, sought to bully the STB on a proposed railroad merger, or in favor of increased competition through, say, competitive switching—and the STB capitulated?
We leave the answer to Vladimir Lenin: “Probe with bayonets. If you encounter mush, proceed; if you encounter steel, withdraw.”
http://www.railwayage.com/index.php/blogs/frank-n-wilner/did-stb-capitulate-to-trump-and-lenin.html
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CSAPR Update Rule’s Opponents Outline Issues in New D.C. Circuit Suit
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
State and industry opponents of EPA’s updated Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) for power plant emissions trading are setting out their arguments in litigation against the rule in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, amid doubts over whether the Trump EPA will defend the rule.
The CSAPR rule issued in October updates the trading program to help states meet EPA’s 2015 ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) of 70 parts per billion (ppb), which the agency tightened from a prior level of 75 ppb set in 2008. The updated program applies to nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions from 22 eastern states, and leaves the earlier CSAPR program’s sulfur dioxide emissions trading requirements unchanged.
Litigation against the rule has been consolidated as State of Wisconsin, et al. v. EPA, et al., after multiple states and industry groups joined the suit to either attack or defend the rule. Also, the rule is thought to be a prime target for a possible disapproval by Congress under the Congressional Review Act.
Texas in its Jan. 23 statement of issues says the rule “is arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law because the EPA proposed a federal implementation plan [FIP] for States before the EPA acted on state implementation plans [SIPs], which States, such as Texas, previously submitted” to implement the Clean Air Act’s “good neighbor” provision.
The provision requires states to mitigate their air pollution that compromises attainment of national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) in other states. The D.C. Circuit and Supreme Court have previously upheld the so-called “FIP-first” approach, however, in litigation over the earlier iteration of CSAPR.
Texas also says that EPA “fails to properly consider actual monitoring data and trends, and impermissibly relies on a model that is flawed with inappropriate assumptions and conditions” when deciding what states’ air pollution reduction obligations are.
Generation Shifting
In their earlier Dec. 29 statement of issues, Wisconsin, Alabama, Arkansas, Ohio, and Wyoming say “EPA impermissibly relied on generation shifting, failed to account for the differences in ozone levels between areas above ground and areas above water, and made other unjustified assumptions in its modeling.”
Like Texas, they also fault EPA for treating areas classed in “nonattainment” for NAAQS the same way as those classed as “maintenance,” meaning they previously violated the standards but are now meeting them. The group of states led by Wisconsin further fault EPA for its failure “to provide adequate relief for downwind States that cannot achieve compliance with the NAAQS due to ozone generated outside their borders.”
Also, “EPA deliberately did not consider Western states when developing the model associated with this rule and notified those states that this rule would not apply to them. But in finalizing this rule, the EPA ran the model for Western states, improperly establishing a baseline for good neighbor determinations in the West.”
In a Jan. 4 statement of issues, the Prairie State Generating Company, an electric utility, says that EPA wrongly calculated heat input rates for some power plants, and allocated NOx caps wrongly for the state of Illinois.
Meanwhile, coal mining firm Murray Energy in its Jan. 23 statement of issues says only that it intends to raise whether the CSAPR update “sets limits on the emission of nitrogen oxides from coal-fueled electric generating units that are arbitrary and capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with the law.”
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/csapr-update-rule%E2%80%99s-opponents-outline-issues-new-dc-circuit-suit
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Trump Signs Order Setting 'One In, Two Out' Mandate for New Regulations
Jan 30, 2017 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Jan. 30 directing EPA and other regulatory agencies to eliminate two existing rules for every one they enact, while also setting an overall “budget” for new regulatory costs each year -- the first concrete step in the new administration's plan to slash environmental rules they consider too burdensome.
But the order is unclear on whether the new mandate -- which goes even farther than the “one in, one out” policy that some congressional Republicans have pushed as part of a regulatory reform agenda -- will apply to the 30 Obama administration regulations that the administration “froze” shortly after taking office or whether it will apply solely to new or still-incomplete rulemakings.
“Unless prohibited by law, whenever an executive department or agency (agency) publicly proposes for notice and comment or otherwise promulgates a new regulation, it shall identify at least two existing regulations to be repealed,” the order says.
It does not set out a procedure for identifying or repealing those rules, instead ordering the White House Office of Management & Budget to issue guidance on what counts as a “new” regulation, gauging regulatory costs, how different agencies' rules might offset each other, and potential waivers of the order, among other issues.
Regardless of OMB's decisions, how much freedom EPA has to fulfill the White House order is sure to be hotly debated, since many of its most significant rules, such as the national ambient air quality standards, are required by statute, a fact pointed out by environmentalists in their early criticism of the policy.
Ken Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said in a statement that the order will impose a “Sophie's choice” on agencies. “If, for example, the EPA wants to issue a new rule to protect kids from mercury exposure, will it need to get rid of two other science-based rules, such as limiting lead in drinking water and cutting pollution from school buses?”
Kimmell also indicated that environmentalists are likely to challenge the order. “Congress has not called upon EPA to choose between clean air and clean water, and the president cannot do this by executive fiat. As is the case with so many other actions we have seen since the inauguration, Mr. Trump is capturing showy headlines while he drives us off a cliff.”
During the televised signing ceremony, Trump said the order requires agencies to “knock out” two existing rules for each one they submit for White House approval, while also noting that the administration will simply reject any pending regulations it sees as redundant. “If you have a regulation you want, number one, we're not going to approve it, because it's already been approved probably in 17 different forms,” he said.
Compliance Costs
The order also creates a “budget” that sets the total new compliance costs agencies can impose through regulation each year, with a 2017 limit of $0 -- meaning new EPA rules found to increase costs must be balanced by cutting existing rules with equal or greater compliance burdens.
“For fiscal year 2017, which is in progress, the heads of all agencies are directed that the total incremental cost of all new regulations, including repealed regulations, to be finalized this year shall be no greater than zero, unless otherwise required by law or consistent with advice provided in writing by the Director of the Office of Management and Budget,” it says.
If the 30 regulations currently stayed are considered to be “new rules” under the Jan. 30 order, then the first test of its effects could come as soon as March 21, when the stayed policies are due to come into effect -- although the Trump administration is likely to further extend or formally withdraw any rules among the the 30 that it opposes.
Beyond the pending Obama-era regulations the agency is under a statutory requirement to issue final rules on implementing the reformed Toxic Substances Control Act this summer.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/trump-signs-order-setting-one-two-out-mandate-new-regulations
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Trump Will 'Definitely' Pull Out of Paris Climate Deal, Ex-Aide Says
Jan 30, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
President Trump will “definitely” pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, with some action possible within days, according to a former top aide.
Myron Ebell, who led Trump’s transition efforts for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), told reporters in London Monday that the president would stick to his campaign promises, including to stopping the country’s participation in the Paris accord.
“I expect Donald Trump to be very assiduous in keeping his promises, despite all of the flack he is going to get from his opponents,” Ebell said, according to the Independent.
“The U.S. will clearly change its course on climate policy. Trump has made it clear he will withdraw from the Paris Agreement. He could do it by executive order tomorrow or he could do it as part of a larger package,” he said, according to Reuters. “There are multiple ways and I have no idea of the timing.”
Ebell leads the energy and environment policy team at the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute. He is no longer involved with the Trump administration, and was not speaking on its behalf. He said at the London event that he has not met Trump in person.
The talk came amid some uncertainty about Trump’s plans for the Paris agreement, in which nearly 200 nations agreed in late 2015 to limit or reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, the first such accord to have that level of participation.
Rex Tillerson, Trump’s pick to lead the State Department, told senators earlier this month that he thinks it’s best for the United States to remain in the Paris agreement.
“We’re better served by being at that table than by leaving that table,” Tillerson said at his confirmation hearing in the Senate.
But Trump promised repeatedly on the campaign trail to “cancel” the Paris accord. Shortly after the election, he told the New York Times that he has an “open mind” about it.
The Times reported last week that Trump is preparing an executive order to formally review whether the United States should stay in the Paris accord and other international agreements.
http://www.thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/316894-trump-will-definitely-pull-out-of-paris-climate-deal-ex-aide-says
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