Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 4/14/2017
-
(ACC Mentioned) As White House Lags on Nominees, Pruitt Builds His Team
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
Republican congressional and campaign aides are starting to fill out the Trump administration's U.S. EPA roster. -
(ACC Mentioned) PS, PVC Resin Prices Climb in March
Apr 14, 2017 | Plastics News
North American selling prices for solid polystyrene and suspension PVC both increased in March, as tight supplies and higher feedstock costs impacted those markets. -
(ACC Blog) Helping EPA Ensure Its Chemical Review ‘Pipeline’ Under Lautenberg Act Delivers as Congress Intended
Apr 14, 2017 | American Chemistry Matters
By American Chemistry
The Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act (LCSA) is described as having three “framework rules” – Inventory Reset, Prioritization, and Risk Evaluation. All three are designed to work together to set the stage for, and then deliver, efficient and streamlined risk evaluations of chemicals under the federal program. EPA has described this ongoing process of prioritization and risk evaluation as a “pipeline.” -
Dems Push FDA on Chemical in Bath Products
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Cecelia Smith-Schoenwalder
The Food and Drug Administration should remove a likely carcinogen from consumer and children's products like shampoos, shower gels and lotions, according to New York Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand. -
How Businesses are Responding to Rising Demand for Chemical Transparency
Apr 14, 2017 | Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families
By Beverley Thorpe
It’s been over thirty years since the US Community Right to Know Act was passed in 1986. At the time the idea that companies would publically report their emissions of toxic chemicals to a Toxics Release Inventory seemed far reaching yet corporations now know this is part of doing business. -
After Petra Nova, What's Next for NRG and Carbon Capture?
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Edward Klump and Nathanial Gronewold
As a host of VIPs celebrated here yesterday, praising the Petra Nova project for capturing carbon dioxide from a coal plant and boosting oil output, one question went largely unanswered: What's next? -
UPDATE 1-Dakota Access Pipeline to Start Interstate Service May 14
Apr 14, 2017 | Reuters (via Real Clear Energy)
By David Gaffen, Sharon Bernstein, Sandra Maler, and Leslie Adler
The controversial Dakota Access Pipeline will begin interstate crude oil delivery on May 14, according to a filing with the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. -
Safety Board 'Shocked' by Proposal to Nix Budget
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Cecelia Smith-Schoenwalder
Members of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board expected a budget cutback in the Trump administration's proposed "skinny budget" released last month. -
Trump’s EPA Chief Scott Pruitt Calls for an ‘Exit’ to the Paris Climate Agreement
Apr 14, 2017 | Washington Post
By Chris Mooney and Brady Dennis
President Trump’s top environment official called for an “exit” from the historic Paris agreement Thursday, the first time such a high-ranking administration official has so explicitly disavowed the agreement endorsed by nearly 200 countries to fight climate change. -
EPA’s Pruitt Seeks State, Local Input on Rescinding, Revising Clean Water Rule
Apr 14, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
The Trump administration has a twofold strategy for targeting the controversial Clean Water Rule (CWR), enacted during the Obama era: have the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) initiate a rulemaking to rescind the rule first, then revise the definition of what constitutes Waters of the United States (WOTUS). -
No Time to Waste for Trump Admin's Assault on WOTUS
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Ariel Wittenberg
The Trump administration must sprint if it wants to repeal and replace the Clean Water Act rule that determines which wetlands and streams get automatic federal protection. -
Ozone Transport Commission's Agenda Faces Hurdles Under Trump EPA
Apr 14, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
The Ozone Transport Commission's (OTC) agenda pushing for stricter state and federal rules to curb emissions of ozone-forming pollutants faces hurdles under the Trump EPA, given minimal contacts between OTC states and EPA leadership, as well as the administration's proposed budget cuts and deregulatory agency for the agency. -
States Duel Over Claims of 'Flawed' EPA Ozone Air Modeling Information
Apr 14, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
States are dueling over competing claims of flaws in EPA's latest modeling data on transported ozone air pollution, with East Coast states charging that the data seriously underestimates ozone caused by upwind emissions sources, while upwind states fault the information for showing cross-state linkages in pollution where there are none. -
EPA Staff Recommend Keeping NO2 Standard
Apr 14, 2017 | Politico Pro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen
EPA staff have recommended keeping in place the agency's 2010 standard for nitrogen dioxide under the National Ambient Air Quality Standards program, leaving Administrator Scott Pruitt an easy path to decide against tightening the standard.
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Environment News
-
(ACC Mentioned) As White House Lags on Nominees, Pruitt Builds His Team
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
Republican congressional and campaign aides are starting to fill out the Trump administration's U.S. EPA roster.
Administrator Scott Pruitt has been steadily building his leadership team while waiting for the White House to offer nominees to fill posts requiring Senate approval. Pruitt is still President Trump's only EPA pick so far.
Here's the EPA lineup so far:
Public affairs
J.P. Freire has joined EPA as associate administrator for public affairs. Freire was communications director for Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) for more than two years, and before that, he served as then-Rep. Mike Pompeo's (R-Kan.) communications director and speechwriter. The Cornell University graduate also has experience in journalism, having spent nearly two years at The Washington Examiner as an associate editorial page editor.
Also working in EPA's public affairs office is Liz Snyder Bowman. She comes to the agency from the American Chemistry Council, where she handled issue and advocacy communications. Snyder Bowman also worked at public affairs firm HDMK and at the Pew Charitable Trusts.
John Konkus, who helped handled press inquiries for Pruitt's confirmation team, is based in the agency's public affairs shop, too. Konkus was a Trump campaign aide as well as a member of the president's EPA "beachhead" team.
Amy Graham has come to EPA as its deputy associate administrator for public engagement. Graham was Sen. Shelley Moore Capito's (R-W.Va.) deputy communications director and also has experience in the House. She worked on Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign and was a press official for Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R).
Jahan Wilcox has joined EPA as a strategic communications adviser. Wilcox has worked on several Republican campaigns, including Sen. Marco Rubio's (R-Fla.) 2016 White House bid, as well as the Republican National Committee.
Pruitt's press secretary when he was Oklahoma's attorney general, Lincoln Ferguson, is also now at EPA as a senior speechwriter and communications adviser.
Congressional relations
Troy Lyons, formerly a Hess Corp. lobbyist, is leading EPA's congressional and intergovernmental relations office (Greenwire, March 30).
One of his deputies is Tate Bennett. She comes to EPA from the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association and was a legislative aide on energy and agriculture issues for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
Aaron Ringel will also be joining EPA's congressional and intergovernmental relations shop. He was deputy chief of staff to Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.) and has been legislative director for Pompeo when he served in the House.
Layne Bangerter is part of EPA's congressional and intergovernmental relations team, as well. He was Trump's state campaign director for Idaho and is a former aide to Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho). Bangerter was a beachhead team member, as well.
Kenneth Wagner, a longtime legal associate of the EPA administrator, is a senior adviser for state and regional affairs (Greenwire, April 13).
Policy
Samantha Dravis is the agency's policy chief and was one of Pruitt's first hires at EPA.
Brittany Bolen is serving as deputy associate administrator for EPA's policy shop. Bolen was policy counsel for the Senate Republican Policy Committee and before that was majority counsel on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee under then-Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.).
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/04/14/stories/1060053120
-
(ACC Mentioned) PS, PVC Resin Prices Climb in March
Apr 14, 2017 | Plastics News
North American selling prices for solid polystyrene and suspension PVC both increased in March, as tight supplies and higher feedstock costs impacted those markets.
Regional solid PS prices shot up an average of 6 cents per pound for the month, with suspension PVC prices in the region climbing an average of 2 cents, according to market sources contacted by Plastics News.
PS prices now have climbed for three straight months after being flat in December. Increases in January and February totaled 13 cents per pound.
The March price hike for PS surprisingly went against directional pricing for benzene, which declined by 7 cents per gallon for the month. Benzene is used to make styrene monomer and in recent years has had a strong effect on prices for PS resin.
North American PS sales grew 2 percent in the first two months of 2017, according to the American Chemistry Council. Sales of the material into electrical/electronic uses in particular were strong, growing more than 3 percent in that two-month period.
The regional PS market also should benefit from PS maker Americas Styrenics LLC’s recent resumption of full production of styrene momomer st its plant in St. James, La. Production had been down at the site in recent months because of repairs that were needed on critical equipment.
For PVC, the 2-cent hike was the second straight monthly increase for that material. Prices had risen 4 cents in February. Prior to that, prices had been flat since November.
The PVC market is moving into the construction season, which is traditionally strong for the material. More than 60 percent of domestic PVC demand comes from the construction market.
Through February, U.S./Canadian PVC sales were up 3.3 percent, according to ACC. Domestic sales grew almost 6 percent, but were dampened somewhat by an export sales drop of more than 1 percent.
Among end markets, PVC’s dominant rigid pipe and tubing sector saw two-month sales growth of almost 8 percent. Smaller demand markets for fencing and decking were up almost 20 percent and for film and sheet were up just over 23 percent during the period.
http://www.plasticsnews.com/article/20170414/NEWS/170419939/ps-pvc-resin-prices-climb-in-march
-
Apr 14, 2017 | American Chemistry Matters
By American Chemistry
The Lautenberg Chemical Safety Act (LCSA) is described as having three “framework rules” – Inventory Reset, Prioritization, and Risk Evaluation. All three are designed to work together to set the stage for, and then deliver, efficient and streamlined risk evaluations of chemicals under the federal program. EPA has described this ongoing process of prioritization and risk evaluation as a “pipeline.”
A system that works as Congress intended
LCSA creates a long-term framework for evaluation of chemicals. Part of the promise of LCSA is a system that assures that all chemicals in commerce will be reviewed for safety. LCSA gives EPA many tools to achieve this.
First, there’s the structure of the statute itself. Risk evaluation actually begins with a “reset” of the TSCA Inventory which is the full catalog of chemistries in U.S. commerce. The LCSA requires that the TSCA Inventory be sorted, so that chemicals that are currently active in commerce are separated from those not currently manufactured, imported or processed. This enables EPA to focus resources for its multi-year, time-and-resource intensive risk evaluations on chemicals that are actually in current use.
Next, the Prioritization step allows EPA to refine its focus a second time, designating low priority chemicals and high priority chemicals that warrant moving on to a risk evaluation.
Then, the Risk Evaluation step allows EPA to hone its focus yet again, as EPA must decide on the scope of the risk evaluation—that is, exactly what will be included in the evaluation.
Criteria for designating high or low priority
The Inventory Reset process helps ensure that prioritization can focus on those chemicals that are in active use. The prioritization process then uses a risk-based screening process — in which EPA integrates hazard, use, and exposure information — to designate chemicals or categories of chemicals as either high or low priority for risk evaluations. Mandatory timelines kick in for chemicals designated high priority, and they move to risk evaluation on a defined schedule.
All scientific decisions under LCSA decisions in both prioritization and risk evaluation must be based upon the science standards of LCSA Section 26, including best available science and weight of the scientific evidence. The basis for prioritization designations must be transparent, and EPA’s decisions must be communicated objectively and in neutral terms.
As we illustrated in our comments to EPA, ACC envisions a prioritization process that follows six steps:
1.) Pool and Batch: EPA must “pool” active chemicals in commerce as candidates for designation as high or low priority for risk evaluation based on transparent criteria/methods/approaches/tools and processes. EPA should then “batch” these candidates for information gathering.
2.) Information Gathering: Because Congress intended prioritization decisions to be based on reasonably available information, EPA should take a sequenced approach to information gathering on chemicals that it “batches” for prioritization. EPA should first gather reasonably available information it has or has access to; if needed EPA should then use voluntary call-ins to industry and other stakeholders to gather additional, reasonably available information; if needed, EPA should then use its Section 8(a) and 8(d) rules to gather more reasonably available information. Under the LCSA, only if EPA determines that new information is needed for prioritization can EPA use Section 4(a) rules/order/consent agreements to develop new information for prioritization If
3.) Sufficient Information to Designate: Once EPA has the information it needs to designate the priority of a substance, it can move that substance to the “Initiation of prioritization” step.
If EPA concludes it has sufficient information to designate a substance as a high priority chemical, it should conduct a “pre-screening” review to identify potential data/information needs for scoping the risk evaluation (a bridging step between prioritization and scoping).
If information on the chemical is deemed sufficient for scoping, the chemical can then be put into the queue for “initiation” of the prioritization process at the appropriate time.
If information is determined not sufficient for scoping, EPA should begin to collect/develop the information needed.
4.) Initiate the Priority Designation: EPA must announce a candidate for prioritization and request “relevant information” about that chemical from manufacturers and processors.
5.) Propose Priority Designation: EPA must propose a designation of a chemical as a high or low priority, including the basis for its proposal.
6.) Finalize the Designation: EPA must finalize its designation of the chemical as either a high or low priority within the statutory deadlines (no less than 9 months and no more than 12 months after EPA has “initiated” the prioritization process).
High priority chemicals move to the risk evaluation stage.
Risk Evaluation: Realizing the vision Congress described
If EPA is to get its job done, risk evaluations must be scoped, conducted, and completed to meet both statutory deadlines and quality requirements. Congress gave EPA the tools to meet its statutory deadlines by using tiered approaches, flexibly scoping risk evaluations, and encouraging prioritization and focus. Congress gave EPA flexibility to consider aggregate exposures in those risk evaluations where appropriate, but did not mandate it. While Congress defined susceptible subpopulations, Congress also gave EPA flexibility to determine whether and which subpopulations are appropriately considered for each risk evaluation. And Congress gave EPA flexibility to determine which conditions of use are relevant and appropriate to each risk evaluation. Now, it’s up to EPA to use these tools wisely and well.
EPA should apply a tiered approach throughout the risk evaluation process. The tiered approach includes an initial screening-level evaluation; if necessary, a more detailed evaluation to quantify potential risks would then be conducted.
EPA must flexibly scope risk evaluations to focus on the most relevant, greatest potential for risk, considering one or more conditions of use in an efficient and practical manner. This means the Agency rightfully focuses on conditions of use that are relevant and meaningful to a fit-for-purpose risk evaluation, and well-tailored to the problems and decisions at hand.
We cannot overstate the importance of tiering and flexible scoping – these tools are essential to delivering the throughput on risk evaluations contemplated by Congress.
So, the entire “pipeline” “flows” – the process should look like this.
Finally, just like in the earlier prioritization process, EPA must incorporate Section 26 science standards including using the best available science and a full weight of the scientific evidence approach throughout the risk evaluation process.
These requirements are fundamental to the proper function of LSCA risk evaluations so they must be described fully and defined in the regulation so they are applied consistently. Only then will stakeholders have adequate notice to participate and contribute fully in the development of the risk evaluations. This means that EPA must articulate in the risk evaluation itself, with specificity, the scientific approaches and methods it will use in the risk evaluation, rather than simply pointing to Agency guidance, which is often outdated, inconsistently interpreted, and inconsistently applied.
Working together to get it right
ACC and our members are excited about rolling up our sleeves and working with EPA to improve its proposed rules for the Inventory reset, prioritization and risk evaluation. If we get these framework rules right, the amendments to TSCA will do what they were intended to do: enhance protections for human health and environment, while enabling our industry to continue to innovate, create jobs, and grow the economy.
https://blog.americanchemistry.com/2017/04/helping-epa-ensure-its-chemical-review-pipeline-under-lautenberg-act-delivers-as-congress-intended/
-
Dems Push FDA on Chemical in Bath Products
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Cecelia Smith-Schoenwalder
The Food and Drug Administration should remove a likely carcinogen from consumer and children's products like shampoos, shower gels and lotions, according to New York Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.
The senators filed a formal petition yesterday urging FDA to remove 1,4-dioxane, which is not required to be listed on ingredient labels, from consumer products through a cost-effective "stripping" process.
"The fact that 1,4-Dioxane, a potentially dangerous chemical, is hiding out in everyday products expected to make us clean is very disturbing, and to make matters worse, likely carcinogens like this one can be even more harmful to kids," Schumer said in a statement.
The chemical, which U.S. EPA lists as a likely human carcinogen, was recently found in Rhode Island's water supply.
"This likely cancer-causing toxin serves no purpose in these products and is not even identified on packaging so it's time we drain it from everyday products to make Long Island's water safer," Schumer continued.
The senators introduced a bill last month to require EPA to set Safe Drinking Water Act limits on several chemicals, including 1,4-dioxane (E&E Daily, March 8).
Additionally, the chemical is on EPA's list of the first 10 chemicals it wants to review under the new Toxic Substances Control Act (E&E News PM, Nov. 29, 2016).
1,4-dioxane is used as a solvent in many toiletry items that produce suds, such as shower gels, body washes, shampoos and hand soaps.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/04/14/stories/1060053111
-
How Businesses are Responding to Rising Demand for Chemical Transparency
Apr 14, 2017 | Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families
By Beverley Thorpe
It’s been over thirty years since the US Community Right to Know Act was passed in 1986. At the time the idea that companies would publically report their emissions of toxic chemicals to a Toxics Release Inventory seemed far reaching yet corporations now know this is part of doing business. Touting the success of TRI chemical reporting, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy proclaimed “People deserve to know what toxic chemicals are being used and released in their backyards, and what companies are doing to prevent pollution. By making that information easily accessible through online tools, maps, and reports, TRI is helping protect our health and environment.”
Fast forward to 2017 and disclosure is growing from chemical emissions reporting to include chemical ingredient reporting. Sustainable business news is awash with articles on company transparency, ingredient disclosure and new tools that track materials from source to product.
According to the Harvard Business Review, winning in the ‘age of radical transparency’ will bring great marketing opportunities for companies as consumers demand more information about the products they are buying. In a consumer survey sponsored by major chemical and formulated product companies, including DuPont and SC Johnson, 84% of respondents from developed countries and 88% of respondents from developing countries listed ingredient transparency as one of the most important issues companies should solve.
Of course getting full disclosure from the supply chain can be hard work but the cost of not doing so can be formidable. Our multi group project investigating the use of Bisphenol-A (BPA), a highly hazardous hormone disruptor, in food can lining materials discovered that most brands did not demand, or could not get, comprehensive disclosure from their can suppliers about the identity and chemical hazards of their can lining materials. But not knowing what’s in your products is a growing business liability. Take the case of Sigg USA who had to file for bankruptcy in 2011 with $13 million in liabilities when their claims of BPA-free bottles were found untrue, generating consumer anger and a quick response from retailers who pulled their products off their shelves.
Company leaders understand the value of knowing all the chemicals in their products. Seagate, the world’s largest disk drive manufacturer, requires full disclosure of all chemicals in all components from their global supply chain and by doing so have been rewarded with reduced costs by ‘staying ahead of the regulatory curve’. When new chemical concerns or draft regulations come up, the company has full information at their fingertips to proactively respond. Business to business company procurement specifications are increasingly demanding full chemical ingredient disclosure through tools like the WERCS and UL Purview. Kaiser Permanente, the largest non-profit health care system in the US with a $56 billion operating revenue requires full ingredient disclosure from their suppliers – transparency is simply part of doing business.
The business case for knowing the chemicals in your products has now evolved to the business case for becoming publicly accountable. Calls for more public transparency about a company’s chemicals policy and product ingredients will only continue to grow and company executives must take note. The Mind the Store campaign’s 2017 retailer report card evaluated companies across 13 categories of criteria, including both business to business transparency as well as consumer transparency. Results from the 2015 Chemical Footprint Project survey of companies’ chemical management systems, report that most companies are not disclosing the actual extent of their internal chemical policies. For example, while 79% of companies surveyed had an internal Restricted Substances List, only 17% of them made this public. In this ‘age of radical transparency’ there are multiple benefits in being more transparent. Of course, company leaders, particularly in the beauty and personal care sector, understand this already.
A 2015 Harris poll found that 60% of women in the US report that they read labels on personal care products and avoid products that contain certain chemicals. In response, some retailers and brands are demanding full ingredient disclosure, including fragrance formulations, from their suppliers. Health concern around the thousands of chemicals used in ‘fragrances’ have trumped traditional claims of confidentiality and some formulators, retailers and brands are now disclosing ingredients on their product labels and company websites. Seventh Generation has been a leader in chemical transparency and others are now following suit including Reckitt Benckiser, Clorox, SC Johnson & Son and Unilever US. The retailer Target, has announced it will push for suppliers to disclose all ingredients in beauty, baby, personal care and household cleaning goods by 2020.
As calls for ingredient transparency grow, and new regulations on chemical disclosure are proposed and implemented, retailers and other business leaders and laggards will be differentiated and consumers and investors will take note. Even better, we will see increasing innovation in healthier and safer chemical formulations for products on the shelves and in our homes.
http://saferchemicals.org/2017/04/14/how-businesses-are-responding-to-rising-demand-for-chemical-transparency/
-
After Petra Nova, What's Next for NRG and Carbon Capture?
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Edward Klump and Nathanial Gronewold
As a host of VIPs celebrated here yesterday, praising the Petra Nova project for capturing carbon dioxide from a coal plant and boosting oil output, one question went largely unanswered: What's next?
It's too early to know, according to NRG Energy Inc., whose W.A. Parish power plant site southwest of Houston is home to Petra Nova. NRG is leaving the door open to further use of carbon capture technology, but shifting market conditions make any plans hard to pin down.
Petra Nova carried a $1 billion price tag and was operational in late December, thanks to the use of partnerships and about $190 million from the Department of Energy. Being able to say the project is on time and on budget is a bright spot for NRG, which has undergone a series of overhauls and may see further cost-cutting and asset sales.
David Greeson, a vice president of development at NRG, couldn't speak to possible corporate changes. But he said getting beyond government help will be necessary for carbon capture and storage (CCS) to continue advancing.
"The challenge is going to be how to figure out how to do one of these without government subsidies," Greeson said in an interview after Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) praised Petra Nova. "We doubt that we'll see unending government subsidy, like wind and solar have seen, in the CCS industry."
The term CCUS also is used, meaning carbon capture, utilization and storage. That's because Petra Nova sends CO2 to enhance oil recovery at Hilcorp Energy Co.'s West Ranch oil field. Greeson said oil production there already has climbed from less than 300 barrels a day to more than 3,000 barrels a day. Oil is a key aspect of the plant because NRG gets some revenue from the field.
"Since there's not a price on carbon, price of oil is everything," Greeson said. "So, yes, fluctuations in oil price does cause swings in the economics of the project."
Greeson said investors get their money back with oil at about $50 a barrel. Oil at less than that could bring a downside, but higher prices could usher in better returns at Petra Nova. Benchmark U.S. oil was trading for around $53 a barrel yesterday, according to Bloomberg data.
Some other high-profile carbon capture projects have failed to materialize or struggled along the way, including Southern Co.'s Kemper County Energy Facility. That project in Mississippi is different because it relies on gasifying coal. It has also seen numerous delays and is billions of dollars over budget.
Greeson said Petra Nova's arrival "validates our approach to how to do a first-of-a-kind project" as NRG worked with partners to share risk. The project involves a carbon capture retrofit linked to a coal-fueled unit at W.A. Parish.
News in 2 to 3 years?
Now it's time for NRG to keep gathering information to see how Petra Nova performs, though market conditions and shifting priorities could influence decisions.
"I would say that two to three years from now, we will be looking at possibly announcing the start of another project," Greeson said, adding, "There's a lot of technologies out there. This is not the only way to capture CO2."
Ed Hirs, an energy economist with the University of Houston, said this sort of carbon capture project may be "too little, too late" for coal, given the emergence of cheap natural gas for power generation. Not mining coal is the best way of sequestering the carbon, he said.
"I don't think we'll see any more of these for coal-fired plants," Hirs said of carbon capture projects. "Potentially we could see them for gas-fired plants in the future."
The Petra Nova project relied heavily on Japanese technology, consulting and financing. It's a joint venture between NRG and JX Nippon Oil & Gas Exploration Corp. Petra Nova relies on a process from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. and Kansai Electric Power Co.
The system extracts CO2 from flue gas using a solvent that forms a temporary bond with the emissions, removing more than 90 percent of CO2 from a 240-megawatt slipstream. A reheating of the mixture releases carbon dioxide from the solvent, and CO2 can be piped out to Hilcorp's oil field.
JX Nippon CEO Shunsaku Miyake said yesterday that he hopes the project can be replicated for other enhanced oil recovery, or EOR, developments.
"In the future, we would like to develop this type of CO2 EOR project not only in Texas but also across the United States, and indeed globally, by applying" technical expertise gained through this project, he said, adding, "All of us who have supported this project must continue to cooperate in order to achieve our overall goal, which is increasing oil production and decreasing the emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere."
CO2 for EOR is practiced largely in the Permian Basin oil patch of western Texas and southeastern New Mexico. Hilcorp CEO Jeffery Hildebrand said the technology will be used to bolster marginal wells at West Ranch, about 80 miles from the Petra Nova site.
"The West Ranch field is getting a new lease on life," he said.
Addressing 'reviled CO2'
Perry, speaking at the Petra Nova site yesterday, said there isn't a better example of a public-private partnership than what he witnessed there. He didn't directly address how potential federal budget cuts could affect projects like Petra Nova.
It's a "tremendous example of how investments in clean technology can also lead to increased development of conventional sources of energy," he said. Perry added that the environment and the economy don't have to be on different sides.
Abbott, Texas' governor, tied Petra Nova to the state's history of oil production. He expressed appreciation for having "this transformative technology" in Texas, reviewing how carbon dioxide as a byproduct of electric generation is harnessed to boost oil output.
"The reviled CO2 is being captured and put to use doing what Texans know best how to do, and that is to produce even more energy from our oil fields," he said.
Balanced Energy for Texas, which includes coal and electricity interests, joined the applause for the Petra Nova project yesterday.
The "project is symbolic of Texas' role as an energy leader," Michael Nasi, Balanced Energy's general counsel, said in a statement. He said Perry and Abbott "understand the great potential of projects like Petra Nova to develop technology that improves lives with markets, not mandates."
Nasi also said the significance of technology at Petra Nova can't be overstated because it "moves us closer to the ability to both address the carbon issue and meet global energy needs."
Still, Hirs at the University of Houston said higher oil prices will be needed to make projects like Petra Nova work. Crude was priced higher when the project was discussed several years ago.
"Just doing projects to break even is not a good use of capital, and shareholders will reject that" at some point, Hirs said.
If another carbon capture project were to move forward at NRG, Greeson said it also might "need to be in somewhat reasonable proximity to oil" that could respond to CO2.
"Fortunately, a big swath of the United States has that," he said.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/04/14/stories/1060053094
-
UPDATE 1-Dakota Access Pipeline to Start Interstate Service May 14
Apr 14, 2017 | Reuters (via Real Clear Energy)
By David Gaffen, Sharon Bernstein, Sandra Maler, and Leslie Adler
The controversial Dakota Access Pipeline will begin interstate crude oil delivery on May 14, according to a filing with the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Energy Transfer Partners LP on Thursday filed what is known as a tariff, which lays out details about the line and the oil to be delivered.
The 1,172-mile (1,885-km) Dakota Access line runs from western North Dakota to Patoka, Illinois. The $3.8 billion project became a focus of international attention, drawing protesters from around the world, after a Native American tribe sued to block completion of the final link of the pipeline through a remote part of North Dakota.
The Standing Rock Sioux tribe said the pipeline would desecrate a sacred burial ground and that any oil leak would poison the tribe's water supply.
Thousands of protesters demonstrated in North Dakota and Washington, D.C., many staying to support the tribe in a makeshift camp near the pipeline's construction site last fall. Many opponents also said reliance on the pipeline and the petroleum it was intended to carry would exacerbate climate change.
The outgoing administration of Democratic President Barack Obama said it would reconsider the permits issued for the pipeline's route near tribal lands, delaying the project by several months.
But that move was quickly reversed after the inauguration of Republican President Donald Trump in January.
Among Trump's first acts in office was to sign an executive order that reversed a decision by the Obama administration to delay approval of the pipeline.
The tribe also lost several lawsuits aimed at stopping the pipeline.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/north-dakota-pipeline-idUKL1N1HL1ZP
-
Safety Board 'Shocked' by Proposal to Nix Budget
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Cecelia Smith-Schoenwalder
Members of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board expected a budget cutback in the Trump administration's proposed "skinny budget" released last month.
When they were called to a March 15 meeting by the White House Office of Management and Budget, they had prepared proposals for areas that could get cutbacks and were "shocked" to learn that the administration didn't want to just cut back the agency's relatively small $11 million budget, CSB Chairwoman Vanessa Sutherland said yesterday.
The White House was proposing to effectively shut down the entire agency with a new budget of zero dollars (Greenwire, March 16).
The agency has been defensive of its work since the president's fiscal 2018 budget request (Greenwire, March 17).
"We haven't been told exactly why the CSB does not perform a necessary function," board member Rick Engler said at the agency's business meeting yesterday.
Sutherland stressed that the CSB is the only agency of its kind and performs "truly impactful" work.
Today, the agency released a "business case for safety" that detailed four accident investigations to emphasize that safety measures can save a business money. Sutherland added that the CSB's budget goes toward protecting human lives.
"If the CSB's many safety lessons prevented at least one catastrophic incident, the money saved by preventing damage to the facility and surrounding community, avoiding legal settlements, and saving human lives far exceeds the agency's $11 million annual budget," Sutherland said in a statement.
Engler pointed out that when the board was created by the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, it was unfunded. But after lawmakers pushed to get it unique funds separate from U.S. EPA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the investigations were of a much higher quality.
The CSB does not have regulatory power. Instead, it makes recommendations based on industry standards. Yesterday, CSB issued preliminary recommendations on its investigation into a chemical incident at a Kansas processing plant that left a chlorine gas bubble over parts of the state and sent 140 people to hospitals (Greenwire, April 13).
But the board in recent years has dealt with mismanagement and whistleblower retaliation. In 2015, then-Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso resigned at the request of the White House (E&E Daily, March 27, 2015).
Sutherland and Engler thanked industry officials, lawmakers and constituents who have spoken out in support of the agency.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/04/14/stories/1060053117
-
Trump’s EPA Chief Scott Pruitt Calls for an ‘Exit’ to the Paris Climate Agreement
Apr 14, 2017 | Washington Post
By Chris Mooney and Brady Dennis
President Trump’s top environment official called for an “exit” from the historic Paris agreement Thursday, the first time such a high-ranking administration official has so explicitly disavowed the agreement endorsed by nearly 200 countries to fight climate change.
Speaking with “Fox & Friends,” Pruitt commented, “Paris is something that we need to really look at closely. It’s something we need to exit in my opinion.”
“It’s a bad deal for America,” Pruitt continued. “It was an America second, third, or fourth kind of approach. China and India had no obligations under the agreement until 2030. We front-loaded all of our costs.”
Pruitt’s claim about China and India having “no obligations” until 2030 is incorrect — while these countries do indeed have 2030 targets, they are already acting now to reduce their emissions by investing in renewable energy and other initiatives.
Pruitt had called the Paris accord a “bad deal” in the past but does not appear to have previously gone so far as to call for the United States to withdraw.
The Trump administration has previously said it is currently reviewing its position on climate change and energy policy and remains noncommittal, for now, on whether it will follow through on the president’s campaign pledge to “cancel” the 2015 Paris climate agreement.
“You might’ve read in the media that there was much discussion about U.S. energy policy and the fact that we’re undergoing a review of many of those policies,” Energy Secretary Rick Perry said in Texas on Thursday, according to prepared remarks. “It’s true, we are and it’s the right thing to do.”
Amid this uncertainty, the statement aligns Pruitt with a more hard-line approach held by some in the Trump administration, such as chief strategist Steven Bannon, rather than the more moderate take of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who had saidin his confirmation hearing that the U.S. should have a “seat at the table” in the Paris negotiations, and Ivanka Trump and her husband and Trump confidant Jared Kushner.
Tillerson’s former company, the oil giant ExxonMobil, has also supported the Paris accord, and in late March wrote a letter to the White House reiterating its view that “the United States is well positioned to compete within the framework of the Paris agreement, with abundant low-carbon resources such as natural gas, and innovative private industries, including the oil, gas, and petrochemical sectors.”
If the Trump administration wants to take a more moderate approach to the Paris deal, it could consider modifying the United States’ current pledge to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, rather than seeking to exit altogether.
That’s a tack advanced in a letter to Trump, previously reported on by E&E News, by North Dakota Republican Rep. Kevin Cramer, who argued that “the U.S. should present a new pledge that does no harm to our economy,” one that would highlight “the importance of baseload power generation, including highly efficient and low emission coal-fired and nuclear power plants.”
The Obama administration had promised the world that the United States would reduce its emissions by 26 to 28 percent below its 2005 levels by the year 2025. The Trump administration could simply revise that pledge and make it less ambitious, and easier to attain.
In the energy sector, U.S. carbon dioxide emissions have already declined by 14 percent from 2005 to 2016, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The reason is more burning of natural gas rather than coal and a growing profusion of renewables.
“It is looking like we may see them announce that they’re going to stay in Paris and also announce simultaneously that they’re going to revise the U.S. target under Paris to 2025,” Andrew Light, a senior fellow in the global climate program at the World Resources Institute, noted in an interview earlier this week. But as he added, “look, these guys are unpredictable, and I don’t think we can know.”
It is far from clear how the Trump administration could actually “exit” the Paris agreement, assuming that the Pruitt line wins and the administration determines that it wants to. Now that the agreement has entered into force, it takes three years under its terms for a party to withdraw, followed by a one-year waiting period — a length roughly equal to Trump’s first term in office.
While the Trump administration has backed away from the global leadership on climate change that President Obama pursued, other countries have embraced that role.
“The Paris Agreement is a hard-won achievement which is in keeping with the underlying trend of global development,” Chinese President Xi Jinping said at the World Economic Forum earlier this year. “All signatories should stick to it instead of walking away from it as this is a responsibility we must assume for future generations.”
The country also has announced plans to spend more than $360 billion dollars over the next several years investing in renewable energy sources such as wind and solar. In January, China’s National Energy Administration outlined a plan to make massive investments in clean energy through 2020, even as President Trump has focused almost exclusively on supporting the fossil fuel industry. The country said it expects such funding to create roughly 13 million jobs, reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses responsible for global warming and lessen the smog that has long plagued Beijing and other Chinese cities.
As for India — which is on course to greatly increase its energy demand in coming years as electrification reaches more and more of the country’s vast population — it, too, is moving to address climate change.
“India is not backing away from its Paris commitments and goals for renewable energy because the country has a need and desire to be more efficient as its economy grows,” said Priyavrat Bhati, an energy analyst with Center for Science and Environment in New Delhi.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/04/14/trumps-epa-chief-scott-pruitt-calls-for-an-exit-to-the-paris-climate-agreement/?utm_term=.dee463b4d401
-
EPA’s Pruitt Seeks State, Local Input on Rescinding, Revising Clean Water Rule
Apr 14, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
The Trump administration has a twofold strategy for targeting the controversial Clean Water Rule (CWR), enacted during the Obama era: have the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) initiate a rulemaking to rescind the rule first, then revise the definition of what constitutes Waters of the United States (WOTUS).
That strategy is spelled out in a letter EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt sent last week to officials in state and local government and with various water associations, whom Pruitt invited to contribute their "input and wisdom" at a meeting near the agency's headquarters on Wednesday.
"Consulting with state and local government officials, or their respective national organizations, is a priority to both myself and President Trump," Pruitt wrote in the letter, dated last Monday. "We believe this is an important step in the process prior to proposing regulations that may have implications on federalism as defined by the EPA's policy for implementing the order."
According to the letter, EPA is planning a two-step process over the CWR. It will first initiate a public rulemaking to rescind the rule and revert to laws governing water protection that were first enacted in 1986. The agency will then promulgate a revised definition of WOTUS, which defines what waterbodies deserve protection under the federal Clean Water Act.
The meeting is scheduled for 2-4 p.m. on Wednesday in a room at the William Jefferson Clinton East Building in Washington, DC. The building was formerly called the EPA East Building.
"We greatly look forward to the opportunity to sit at the table with our state and local partners from across the country to discuss the rule and develop an approach to address this significant issue while keeping the states at the forefront of our mission," Pruitt said.
EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman told NGI's Shale Dailyon Thursday that the agency invited several organizations to the meeting, including the National Governors Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures, the Council of State Governments, the National League of Cities, the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National Association of Counties, the International City/County Management Association, the National Association of Towns and Townships, the County Executives of America, and the Environmental Council of States.
Bowman added that the National Association of Clean Water Agencies, the Association of Clean Water Administrators, and the Association of State Wetland Managers were also invited to participate.
The meeting follows President Trump'sexecutive order (EO) at the end of February calling for EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to review the CWR. EPA and USACE jointly promulgated the CWR and unveiled it in May 2015, but in October of that year the Sixth District Court issued a stay and blocked it from being implemented.
Although Trump's EO did not repeal the CWR outright, it kicked off a review and rulemaking process expected to extend into 2018.
According to EPA, the proposed WOTUS definition would include all territorial seas, interstate waters and wetlands and all waters that are currently being used -- or which were used in the past or which may be susceptible for use in interstate or foreign commerce -- including all waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide. It also includes certain impoundments, tributaries and adjacent waters, including wetlands.
Opponents of the rule worry that it is so broad that it could be used to include ditches and ruts in dirt roads that captured rainwater.
Shortly before his confirmation as EPA administrator, Pruitt vowed to quickly withdraw the CWR. Trump has also derided the rule as an example of federal regulatory overreach.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/110124-epas-pruitt-seeks-state-local-input-on-rescinding-revising-clean-water-rule
-
No Time to Waste for Trump Admin's Assault on WOTUS
Apr 14, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Ariel Wittenberg
The Trump administration must sprint if it wants to repeal and replace the Clean Water Act rule that determines which wetlands and streams get automatic federal protection.
Legal experts say agencies overseeing the Clean Water Rule — U.S. EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers — must dump former President Obama's regulation before the Supreme Court decides which court should handle multiple legal challenges to it.
EPA said this week that it intends to do two rulemakings to repeal and replace the rule, which is also known as the Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS) rule. The regulation has drawn fierce fire from farmers, developers and the oil and gas industry, which say it's regulatory overreach.
The agency has one eye on the high court, which is expected to decide on WOTUS jurisdiction by the end of this year.
If the justices decide the litigation belongs in district court, it could endanger a nationwide stay issued by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that barred WOTUS from taking effect.
"If the court says the 6th Circuit doesn't have jurisdiction, the stay is dissolved," said Pat Parenteau, a professor at Vermont Law School. "They already tried to stop the court from taking the case, and that didn't work, so this is the next best way around that question."
But replacing WOTUS won't be done quickly or easily given likely legal challenges to a revamped regulation and a long history of battling over Clean Water Act protections for isolated wetlands and waterways (Greenwire, Feb. 10).
So the Trump administration likely felt it had to proceed with a repeal to ensure it could get that done before the Supreme Court rules, said Larry Liebesman, a senior adviser with Dawson & Associates, a Washington lobby shop and consulting firm that specializes in water resources.
"I think they probably looked at the practical realities of doing it one at a time and realized that this was the easier path, given the Supreme Court decision, rather than trying to do it all in one fell swoop," he said.
Jonathan Adler, a law professor at Case Western Reserve University, agreed.
"I think this strategy probably makes sense in the sense that they want the old rule gone and they admit that a replacement will take time," he said. "There is a certain logic to doing it in two stages."
Adler noted that the Trump administration has said it will write a new regulation that relies on an opinion written by the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in the famously messy 2006 Rapanos v. United States, a 4-1-4 split decision.
Scalia, who died last year, had argued that the Clean Water Act applied only to relatively permanent bodies of water or wetlands connected to "navigable waters" by a surface flow at least part of the year. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito joined him.
But Justice Anthony Kennedy issued a concurring opinion stating that waters must have a "significant nexus" to navigable rivers and seas, including through biological or chemical connections. Until now, EPA has followed Kennedy's "significant nexus" test in regulating clean water.
Both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations relied on Kennedy's test.
"The more aggressive the administration wants to be, the more care and attention will be required," Adler said. "Writing a regulation that is more in line with Scalia's plurality opinion can be done lawfully, but it would take care to do it right. It's not something you can do on the fly."
Reed Hopper, an attorney at the conservative Pacific Legal Foundation, said WOTUS challengers could convince a district court to issue a nationwide stay, but the matter would be easier if the administration can repeal the regulation before the Supreme Court rules.
"They are going to withdraw the rule sometime, so they might as well do it now," he said. "It can take a while to do a replacement, there is no question about it, and you have a litigation that is still pending, so why not get rid of it now and start from a clean slate?"
'Legal roadblocks'
Still, while conducting separate rulemakings to repeal and replace the regulation might be easier for the Trump administration than trying to do both at once, it's far from a sure path.
Splitting the rulemakings gives environmentalists two opportunities to challenge the administration and start another round of litigation.
"Even the rescission is going to be challenged, and certainly the replacement will be," Parenteau said.
Liebesman agreed: "This strategy will run into legal roadblocks, there is no way around that."
But the PLF's Hopper said the administration has little choice but to take that route.
"It is probably the most economical and efficient approach, even though we are confident that the courts would ultimately overturn the regulation," he said.
Liberal-leaning legal experts say a strategy of splitting up WOTUS repeal and replacement into separate procedures could mean a replacement is never written. They say that would bring Clean Water Act jurisdiction back to guidance from the George W. Bush administration, which would likely be less restrictive than the Trump administration would prefer.
Jon Devine, a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, said he believes the Trump administration is "desperately afraid" that any attempt to write a more conservative regulation will flop.
"They're scared that their preferred plan of changing the legal test to radically roll back what the law protects will fail, so they don't want to tie their repeal of the Clean Water Rule to that anchor," he said.
Parenteau agreed.
He said while the courts might not appreciate the Trump administration repealing the regulation without even setting a timeline for replacing it, "that risk may be less than the risk of coming up with a Scalia-based test."
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/04/14/stories/1060053119
-
Ozone Transport Commission's Agenda Faces Hurdles Under Trump EPA
Apr 14, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
The Ozone Transport Commission's (OTC) agenda pushing for stricter state and federal rules to curb emissions of ozone-forming pollutants faces hurdles under the Trump EPA, given minimal contacts between OTC states and EPA leadership, as well as the administration's proposed budget cuts and deregulatory agency for the agency.
At an April 11 stakeholder meeting in Washington, D.C., officials with the OTC -- which consists of 12 East Coast states -- said proposed funding cuts would reduce grants to states that help them pay for environmental work. That in turn would make it harder for states to implement programs to reduce ozone-forming emissions. "There is a lot of competition for the money, and there is very little money," according to one OTC source.
Further, the new administration has a deregulatory agenda that does not favor tougher federal measures to curb ozone that the OTC has long sought but that states cannot pursue on their own. For example, OTC states want stricter EPA limits on nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions from heavy-duty vehicles to help reduce ozone levels, but the Clean Air Act bars any state but California from setting stricter mobile source air rules than EPA's rules.
The Trump EPA also currently lacks key political appointees in important positions, such as a Senate-confirmed head of the Office of Air & Radiation. The source says OTC members therefore are limited to conversations with career staff who cannot make sweeping ozone policy decisions without the political officials in place.
When combined, the funding cuts, the deregulatory agenda, and the dearth of political leadership at EPA therefore create significant problems for the OTC winning new measures to help reduce ozone.
That is a major concern for members of the group, whose states have historically struggled with high ozone levels due to transported ozone pollution from upwind states. They fear being placed out of attainment with the 2015 ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) of 70 parts per billion (ppb), which the Obama administration tightened from the prior 2008 ozone standard of 75 ppb that some states said was difficult to achieve.
The Trump EPA recently told a federal appeals court it is weighing whether to reconsider the 2015 decision to tighten the ozone NAAQS, and the court then placed litigation over the 70 ppb standard on hold.
The OTC source defends the 2015 NAAQS as necessary to drive down ozone levels in the OTC region, saying "momentum" will be lost if the standard is scrapped or relaxed. Currently, both the 2008 and 2015 standards remain in effect, forcing state regulators to craft compliance plans for both, drawing loud complaints from some quarters about duplication of effort -- but not from OTC. The two standards are "complementary," the source says.
Another rule of key significance for the OTC that faces an uncertain future is the agency's Oct. 26 "update" to the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR), an emissions trading program for power plants in 22 eastern states. The Obama EPA in the update tightened NOx caps, or "budgets," for participating states, in order to target the rule toward meeting the 2008 ozone NAAQS, rather than the older, weaker 1997 standard expressed as 84 ppb.
Pollution Transport
There is no federal pollutant transport program aimed at meeting the 2015 ozone NAAQS, and under the Trump administration's policy of deferring to states on environmental regulation, there might not be one. But states must still under the air law submit "good neighbor" plans showing how they will curb interstate emissions.
However, even the limited CSAPR update rule appears to have shaky prospects, the OTC source says. OTC officials outlined at the April 11 meeting their concern that the price of NOx allowances traded under CSAPR will remain too low to force some power plants to run their existing emissions controls.
Some OTC officials have suggested EPA adopt a regulatory solution to force power plants to run their controls on high-electric demand days, when weather conditions are often already conducive to ozone formation. But this too appears a remote prospect when the CSAPR update rule is under litigation from states and industry who say it is already too tough, and the rule is further subject to several petitions for administrative reconsideration.
Litigation against the rule is consolidated in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit case State of Wisconsin, et al. v. EPA, et al. Further, at least nine groups have now filed petitions for reconsideration of the rule, including electric utility groups the Midwest Ozone Group and Utility Air Regulatory Group.
In addition to failing to secure new or stricter EPA rules for stationary sources of ozone, the OTC states might also struggle to persuade the Trump administration to grant their bid for stricter mobile source air rules.
For example, OTC urged the Obama EPA to craft a new, tougher limit on NOx emissions from heavy-duty vehicles that would update a 2010 limit. Emissions of NOx, an ozone precursor, have fallen sharply in recent years from stationary sources such as power plants, driven by both federal regulations and also fuel-switching to natural gas for economic reasons. However, NOx from heavy duty vehicles continues to be a problem, as the focus shifts from power plants to mobile sources of pollution, and OTC said stricter standards could help states attain the NAAQS.
EPA under Obama committed to start work on such a new NOx rule, spurred by OTC and also California, which is already pursuing tougher NOx limits for trucks. In a Dec. 20 memorandum, the Obama EPA said it would, in concert with California, work toward tougher NOx limits that could be in place for model year 2024 vehicles. California is developing a new standard based on an emissions limit of 0.02 grams per brake horse power-hour (g/bhp-hr ) of NOx.
But prospects for a new federal NOx standard appear dim at present. The OTC source says that because of this, the California effort becomes doubly important. Other states around the country, including several OTC states, use California auto emissions standards that are tougher than federal law requires.
OTC's Agenda
OTC's current agenda also includes a range of suggestions for state-based measures, some of them voluntary. For example, the group is looking at ways to boost truck stop electrification and other steps to reduce idling of heavy-duty diesel vehicles, such as idling bans. Such measures could also apply to locomotives, and certain OTC states such as Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Delaware are already pursuing their own rules.
OTC is also investigating strategies to reduce emissions at ports, following an Obama EPA effort to identify non-regulatory means to curb port emissions -- but this too remains in doubt. One issue is funding, as the Obama EPA and OTC have, for example, identified Diesel Emissions Reduction Act funding as a resource to retrofit or replace diesel engines in ports. The Trump administration has proposed to eliminate this funding, however.
In terms of stationary sources, OTC is working on recommendations for states when crafting their air law "good neighbor" plans. These may focus more on source categories that have received less attention on the past, such as emissions from natural gas drilling and transportation, OTC officials said.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/ozone-transport-commissions-agenda-faces-hurdles-under-trump-epa
-
States Duel Over Claims of 'Flawed' EPA Ozone Air Modeling Information
Apr 14, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
States are dueling over competing claims of flaws in EPA's latest modeling data on transported ozone air pollution, with East Coast states charging that the data seriously underestimates ozone caused by upwind emissions sources, while upwind states fault the information for showing cross-state linkages in pollution where there are none.
EPA will have to grapple with the opposing arguments -- detailed in comments submitted to the agency ahead of an April 6 deadline -- as part of its ongoing planning for interstate air pollution policies. The data will be crucial in EPA's determinations of which states face a Clean Act Act "good neighbor" mandate to curb air pollution that transports to downwind states and hinders their ability to attain federal air standards such as the ozone ambient limit.
In a Jan. 6 draft notice of data availability (NODA), the Obama EPA released computer modeling data showing air pollution transport patterns across the country for the agency's 2015 ozone national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) of 70 parts per billion (ppb), which tightened the limit from the prior 2008 standard of 75 ppb.
Using the methodology developed for the Obama-era Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) power plant emissions trading program, the data suggests that some 21 states may face a Clean Air Act obligation to curb interstate pollution. The NODA leaves open the possibility that EPA will not use the strict CSAPR test for determining the good neighbor mandate, instead possibly allowing more flexibility in how states meet their air law mandates.
However, in comments submitted to the agency on the NODA, various states and industry groups criticize the approach taken by EPA, arguing that it under predicts or overestimates interstate emissions, or is simply based on a flawed conceptual approach.
EPA in the NODA relies on a threshold of one percent of the relevant NAAQS to determine which states have a "significant" contribution to air pollution downwind, the same approach it used in CSAPR. States with such a contribution must craft state implementation plans (SIPs) to mitigate their emissions.
The Obama EPA last year issued a CSAPR "update" to gear the trading system to meeting the 2008 ozone NAAQS of 75 ppb, rather than the 1997 NAAQS expressed as 84 ppb that the original rule sought to meet.
But January's NODA does not prescribe precisely how upcoming SIPs must be crafted, leaving it to the discretion of states and the Trump EPA to determine which states must impose controls to limit pollutant transport. Given the Trump administration's deregulatory agenda and stated goal of returning decision-making to states, it is questionable whether EPA would issue a CSAPR-type rule to deal with the good neighbor issue.
'Technical Deficiencies'
The Ozone Transport Commission (OTC) of 12 Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic states that experience high levels of transported ozone in its April 6 comments says, "the Transport NODA in its current form has technical deficiencies that should preclude its use" in good neighbor SIPs.
Projections for the Obama EPA's CSAPR "update" are "clearly under predicting" current monitored ozone levels, or "design values," in the OTC region, "often by large amounts," OTC says.
"Since the projections contained in the Transport NODA rely on the same underlying platform and many of the same methodologies, the 2023 projections are likely to underpredict as well," OTC says.
One of the group's chief complaints is EPA's choice of meteorological assumptions, which it says underplays transport of pollution from the Southeast. EPA in the NODA projections relied on weather data from 2011, but in that year the "southern" transport component was largely absent, OTC says.
Also, EPA should better account for short bursts of high emissions of ozone-forming pollutants, such as nitrogen oxides (NOx), on hot days conducive to ozone formation, OTC says. The current averaging methods fail to capture such spikes in pollution, the group says.
At an April 11 meeting of the group in Washington, D.C., OTC officials further criticized EPA's haste in trying to finalize the NODA by the fall, which they said would result in poor data accuracy.
Among OTC's other complaints are EPA's reliance on its Integrated Planning Model (IPM), a proprietary computer model often faulted for unrealistic projections. "The potentially unrealistic predictions and assumptions associated with the IPM modeling have resulted in significantly overoptimistic emissions reduction projections, compared with other [electric generating unit (EGU) emissions projection tools such as the Eastern Regional Technical Advisory Committee (ERTAC) EGU Forecasting Tool," OTC says in its written comments. For example, IPM tends to predict the closure of coal-burning power plants that have not subsequently closed, the group says.
Criticism of IPM is not limited to OTC states complaining about under prediction of emissions, however. The American Petroleum Institute (API) in its April 6 comments says, "Several stakeholders have raised concerns over the use of the IPM, particularly with respect to its proprietary 'black-box' status and documented cases of incorrect assumptions on plant-level activity and closures," and recommends use of the ERTAC model.
API further raises two key issues that several other industry and state critics also discuss on their comments. The first is EPA's one percent significance threshold, which some consider arbitrary and inappropriate. EPA should consider using a higher threshold because the existing threshold "is below monitoring accuracy and well below systematic and unsystematic errors inherent in complex modeling systems."
API also says EPA should not assume in its NODA modeling that the agency's Clean Power Plan (CPP) for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from existing power plants will remain in effect. The Trump EPA has committed to review and if necessary revise or scrap the plan, which would otherwise produce "co-benefits" of reducing NOx along with GHGs. The CPP is already stayed by a federal court, pending resolution of litigation over the issue.
Competing Comments
Upwind states in their comments are at odds with downwind states, arguing that the NODA appears to overestimate some ozone problems. For example, the Ohio EPA in April 6 comments warns that flawed EPA modeling could lead to overestimates of states' contributions to pollution downwind.
Critical corrections are required "to ensure states are not faced with an inevitable over-control of its sources that will result from the current contributions" determined by EPA, Ohio says. Over-control is the cutting of upwind emissions by more than is required to eliminate NAAQS attainment problems downwind.
Another key question raised in public comments on the NODA is whether it is appropriate to use the CSAPR framework, developed for Eastern states, in the mountain West where high ozone levels can result from a different set of circumstances. For example, western areas at higher elevations experience higher levels of naturally-occuring and foreign-sourced "background" ozone, and can experience high ozone in the wintertime due to atmospheric "inversions" that trap polluted air at lower levels between mountain ranges.
The Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality (WDEQ) in its April 6 comments says, "Until EPA works with western states on developing more accurate and reliable modeling techniques for modeling transport in the western U.S., it should not use modeling related to [CSAPR] for approving or disapproving SIPs for western states."
WDEQ is in a legal dispute with EPA over the agency's disapproval of the state's air transport SIP for the 2008 ozone NAAQS of 75 ppb, suing the agency April 4 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in an effort to reinstate the state's finding that it does not cause or contribute to ozone NAAQS attainment problems in Colorado.
Wyoming further finds the use of a one percent significance threshold unreasonable, and urges EPA not to determine pollution transport using computer modeling alone.
The Association of Air Pollution Control Agencies (AAPCA), representing 20 states mainly in the South, Midwest and West, in its March 13 comments expresses concern that SIPs based on the NODA may not be legally defensible. It makes this argument by citing concerns over the accuracy of IPM, what it calls questionable assumptions by EPA, and highlighting criticisms of the appropriateness of the one percent threshold.
"EPA should consider whether an alternative threshold above 0.7 ppb is appropriate, particularly as this preliminary modeling includes complex, uncertain, six-year projections for linkages across long distances for contributions virtually undetectable by monitors," AAPCA says.
Final NODA
Meanwhile, at the April 11 OTC meeting the Midwest Ozone Group (MOG) of utilities also criticized EPA's apparent rush to finalize the NODA modeling despite widely alleged flaws in the data. The haste is driven by a fall 2018 deadline for states to submit good neighbor SIPs, MOG says.
The timetable is "rendering it impossible" for "EPA to create a modeling platform that provides the accuracy needed to assess the complex issues of interstate transport." EPA should wait and use 2014 emissions data as the basis for that platform, not the 2011 data used in the NODA.
MOG supports its position with a citation from a Feb. 22 EPA legal brief in litigation involving Kentucky's SIP, in Sierra Club et al., v. EPA, now before the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. "Using a more recent modeling platform than the 2011 base year used in the CSAPR Update would allow EPA to 're-anchor' projected" pollution levels and states' contributions "to more recently measured data."
This would allow inclusion of "more accurate data" on non-power plant emissions, EPA says. The 2016 CSAPR Update rule shares the same 2011 base year emissions inventory as the NODA.
MOG says that EPA should also slow the pace of the NODA order to allow improvements in air quality to be realized and measures form existing regulatory programs, and that trying to force states through good neighbor SIPs to make cuts now risks over control.
MOG "asks the OTC to join us in urging EPA to undertake new modeling work to address the many concerns that exist" with the NODA data "and provide for adequate time to allow that modeling to be completed." EPA should issue guidance to states about its plans to provide the improved data, MOG says. OTC officials at the meeting broadly agreed with MOG's timing concerns.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/states-duel-over-claims-flawed-epa-ozone-air-modeling-information
-
EPA Staff Recommend Keeping NO2 Standard
Apr 14, 2017 | Politico Pro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen
EPA staff have recommended keeping in place the agency's 2010 standard for nitrogen dioxide under the National Ambient Air Quality Standards program, leaving Administrator Scott Pruitt an easy path to decide against tightening the standard.
A 436-page staff-authored policy assessment concludes that there is “appreciable uncertainty” that lowering the standard would further protect public health, it adds. The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, an independent panel of experts that advises EPA on science issues, agreed that the evidence supports retaining the current standard.
Ultimately the decision is left up to Pruitt.
Nitrogen dioxide and related gases covered by the standard worsen or cause respiratory diseases, including asthma. They also form acid rain, contribute to haze and hinder photosynthesis in plants.
The 2010 rule set a national primary one-hour NO2 standard of 100 parts per billion. A secondary standard, aimed at protecting against environment damage, has remained unchanged since 1971.
EPA does not always ratchet down air quality standards following reviews; for example, last year EPA decided against revising the lead air quality standard.
WHAT'S NEXT: EPA likely will propose not changing the standard and take public comment before issuing a final determination.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Environment News
Add recipients
Suggested