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AM ACC 5/18/2017
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(ACC Mentioned) Industry Groups See White House Distractions Stalling Deregulatory Push
May 18, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Dave Reynolds
Chemical and consumer products manufacturers say chaos at the White House due to ongoing scandals are distracting from their deregulatory agenda, curbing, for now, their high hopes that the election of President Donald Trump and Republican congressional majorities... -
(ACC Mentioned) Washington Distracted From Economy's Needs, CEOs Say
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
Industry needs the White House and Congress to move past distractions and focus on tax reform, infrastructure improvements and other policies to create jobs and sales, the heads of chemical, product manufacturing and retail trade associations said May 18. -
(ACC Mentioned) Global Resin Makers Want Chinese Support on Marine Pollution
May 18, 2017 | Plastics News
By Steve Toloken
An alliance of global plastics resin makers and trade associations from the United States and Europe came to the Chinaplas trade fair May 17 with a very specific goal — recruit China's state-owned plastics giants into their efforts to address plastic pollution in the ocean. -
(ACC Mentioned) FACTBOX-U.S. Industry Wish List in Trump Regulation Overhaul
May 18, 2017 | Reuters
By Richard Valdmanis
U.S. industry groups have submitted hundreds of pages of recommendations to President Donald Trump's administration in recent weeks, detailing ways they think he could ease their regulatory burden. -
Senate Energy Panel to Grill DOE, FERC Appointees Next Week
May 18, 2017 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Darius Dixon
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has scheduled a hearing for next week to review nominees for the DOE's No. 2 spot and two open seats at FERC. -
Democrats Use Interior Nominee to Raise Red Flags on Trump Science, Climate Policy
May 18, 2017 | PoliticoPro
By Esther Whieldon and Ben Lefebvre
Democrats are using David Bernhardt's nomination for the No. 2 spot at the Interior to raise red flags over the Trump administration's approach to science and climate change. -
Industry Groups Expect Long Wait for Pipeline Safety Chief
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
Industry groups aren't holding their breath as the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration waits for a presidentially nominated chief. -
(ACC Mentioned) What Humans Can Learn from Research on Turtles Exposed to Plastics and Birth Control
May 18, 2017 | Consumer Affairs
By Amy Martyn
Chemicals that mimic hormones in the body, known as endocrine disruptors because they can confuse and affect the endocrine system, cause irreversible changes to the brains of turtles, according to new research conducted by University of Missouri researchers. -
(ACC Mentioned) ACC, Lawmakers Say Appalachian NGL Storage Hub Key to Petchem Buildout
May 18, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Jamison Cocklin
Momentum continues building for efforts to attract a substantial natural gas liquids (NGL) storage hub in the Appalachian Basin, with the American Chemistry Council (ACC) unveiling a study on Thursday touting the potential economic benefits... -
(ACC Mentioned) ACC Report: Appalachia Could Become Second Major US Petchem Center
May 18, 2017 | Oil & Gas Journal
By Nick Snow
The Appalachian region potentially could become a major US petrochemical and plastic resin manufacturing center similar to the Gulf Coast, the American Chemistry Council said in a May 18 report. -
(ACC Mentioned) W.Va. Lawmakers Revive 'Game Changer' Ethane Storage Bill
May 19, 2017 | E&E Daily
By Dylan Brown
West Virginia lawmakers renewed their push to revitalize their state's chemical manufacturing industry with a new ethane storage hub in Appalachia. -
(ACC Mentioned) West Virginia Congress Members Support Ethane Hub
May 19, 2017 | Wheeling Intelligencer
By Joselyn King
West Virginia’s congressional delegation is showing a unified front in pushing for an ethane storage hub for central Appalachia, and they hope state leaders in Ohio and Pennsylvania join them. -
(ACC Mentioned) Capito, Manchin and McKinley Discuss Potential of Multi-Billion Dollar Energy Infrastructure Project
May 18, 2017 | The Exponent Telegram
By Charles Young
Three of West Virginia’s congressional representatives hosted a press conference at the U.S. Capitol Thursday to discuss the potential economic benefits of undertaking a multibillion-dollar energy infrastructure project in the Appalachian region. -
(ACC Mentioned ) Capito, Manchin, McKinley Outline Benefits of Natural Gas Storage Hub in Appalachia
May 18, 2017 | WV Metro News
By Carrie Hodousek
On a call with reporters Thursday, three West Virginia congressional leaders outlined the economic benefits of establishing an ethane storage and distribution center in central Appalachia. -
(ACC Mentioned) Lawmakers Push for Ethane Storage & Distribution Hub in Central Appalachia
May 18, 2017 | WDTV
State lawmakers are pushing to get a natural gas storage and distribution hub built in the Appalachian region. -
Court Suspends Litigation over EPA Methane Rule
May 18, 2017 | E&E News PM
By Amanda Reilly
A federal court today agreed to indefinitely pause litigation over the Obama administration's methane curbs for new oil and gas operations. -
Atlantic Seismic Surveys May Get Permits But Await Action
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Alan Kovski
Six companies are hoping to get permits to conduct seismic surveys in the U.S. Atlantic offshore as a step toward identifying the most promising places to drill for oil or natural gas. -
Refiners Need Better Maintenance Plans to Protect Workers: CSB
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
Refiners too often fail to adequately prepare for non-routine maintenance operations, raising the risk that workers are harmed, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board said May 18. -
California Refineries Face Tougher Safety Rules, Balk at Costs
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Carolyn Whetzel
New safety standards require California oil refineries to anticipate and prevent major accidents, but industry groups are voicing concerns about the rules. -
Ethanol Shipping Fuels Controversy
May 19, 2017 | Urban Milwaukee
By Graham Kilmer
A small strip of land at Milwaukee’s port has become a point of controversy now that an energy company wants to ship ethanol from there. -
Tri-Rail Signs Wabtec for PTC
May 19, 2017 | RailwayAge Magazine
By Stuart Chirls
Wabtec Corp. announced it has signed a contract worth about $40 million to design, install, test and commission Positive Train Control (PTC) for the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, operator of the Tri-Rail commuter service. -
Top Federal Environment Lawyer Outlines Trump Priorities
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Renee Schoof
A priority in Justice Department environmental work is looking at what cases should be reviewed for possible changes in line with Trump administration policies, the top environmental attorney representing the federal government said at a law conference May 18. -
NAS Panel to Develop Carbon Capture Research Agenda
May 18, 2017 | Inside EPA
Even as the Trump administration proposes to end federal climate research at EPA and other agencies, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is launching a study sponsored by the agencies that will provide advice on their future research agendas for carbon capture... -
Trump Acting as Climate ‘Bully’ Galvanizes Work at UN Talks
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jessica Shankleman
President Donald Trump's threat to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement on climate change has catalyzed envoys from much of the rest of the world working to give the deal a boost at United Nations talks in Germany this week. -
EPA to Set Aside $12 Million for Buyouts in Coming Months
May 18, 2017 | Washington Post
By Brady Dennis
The Environmental Protection Agency plans to set aside $12 million for buyouts and early retirements in coming months, as part of an effort to begin “reshaping” the agency’s workforce under the Trump administration.
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(ACC Mentioned) Industry Groups See White House Distractions Stalling Deregulatory Push
May 18, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Dave Reynolds
Chemical and consumer products manufacturers say chaos at the White House due to ongoing scandals are distracting from their deregulatory agenda, curbing, for now, their high hopes that the election of President Donald Trump and Republican congressional majorities would bring significant rollback of EPA and other agency rules.
“The window will not be open forever,” Stephen Caldeira, president and CEO of the Consumer Specialty Products Association (CSPA), told the group's mid-year conference at National Harbor in Oxon Hill, MD, May 18.
“Hopefully we can move through this to get the ball rolling sooner rather than later.”
Caldeira and others was one of a number of chemical industry trade group CEOs who told the conference that chaos emanating from the Trump White House, including allegations of Russian interference in the November election, are stalling progress.
They charged that White House distractions have slowed the appointment of political appointees who are urgently needed at EPA to begin review of the 70,000 comments the agency received in response to administration requests to review existing rules for repeal, replacement or modification.
But Caldeira called the appointment of former FBI Director Robert Mueller as special counsel for the Russia investigation a positive step toward getting to the bottom of the controversy and back to the business of government and creating jobs. “Hopefully we can move beyond some of these issues that are sucking up all the oxygen in Washington,” Caldeira said.
Caldeira, along with Cal Dooley, president and CEO of the American Chemistry Council, said they generally back Trump's deregulatory stance and that the new administration, combined with Republican majorities in the House and Senate, provide a major opportunity for progress on deregulation and lowering corporate income tax, though they cautioned that the opportunity could close with the midterm elections.
Dooley argued that the chemical sector has an historic opportunity for growth given increasing U.S. energy independence and increasing capital investment from abroad, but said that deregulation is also needed to boost growth.
“How do we work together to ensure that we have a competitive advantage from a regulatory policy” perspective as well, Dooley said. He and other CEO's called tax reform a top priority, with Dooley saying he considers lowering the corporate tax rate a deregulatory priority.
The panel of CEOs detailed a variety of priorities, including tax reform, improving infrastructure and rolling back regulations, that coincide with Trump's platform, which have either been shelved or progressed slowly given recent focus on chaos surrounding the White House.
They also raised significant concerns over the administration's slow pace in selecting, vetting and nominating officials to key leadership posts. They noted that the Trump administration has pushed a mere 5 percent of political appointees through Senate confirmation, leaving EPA and other agencies lacking leadership to significantly advance deregulation despite the White House's stated willingness to work with industry trade groups.
Nancy Beck
Dooley said that throughout the Trump transition, ACC has offered candidates for administration posts only to learn that those prospective officials have not been vetted by the White House, much less confirmed by the Senate.
“One of the unfortunate outcomes of the continuing fire drills in the White House is the distraction” from getting agency officials confirmed, Dooley said.
ACC has nevertheless had some success in getting its preferred candidates tapped for key jobs. In April, ACC's Nancy Beck was appointed principal deputy assistant administrator in EPA's Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, a position that does not require Senate confirmation.
But her appointment has sparked significant concern from environmental groups, who have urged EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to block Beck from much of the agency's toxics work given likely conflicts of interest due to her past work at ACC.
But any broad recusal is unlikely, as it would effectively prevent her from participating in the vast majority of agency actions to implement the reformed Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), a significant ACC priority.
Asked if ACC was going to push other candidates who, like Beck, don't require Senate confirmation, Dooley said the group has “had opportunities throughout the Trump transition to make our offer potential candidates for consideration that we think have the experience, as Nancy Beck does.”
“Individuals of that nature could be considered,” he said, adding that ACC has already suggested appointees.
“Unfortunately if you talk to a lot of the cabinet [secretaries] they are very frustrated that these people haven't been vetted by the White House or haven't been advanced” for congressional approval, he said.
Dooley and others said the lack of political appointees will hamper the Trump EPA's ability to meaningfully address the more than 70,000 comments the agency received on a docket requesting recommendations of agency rules that may be subject to repeal, replacement, or modification.
EPA sought the input through May 15 in response to Trump's Feb. 24 Executive Order 13777, which directs agencies to establish a Regulatory Reform Task Force to oversee the evaluation of existing rules as part of a process scaling back “burdensome” federal regulations.
Dooley said that during the Trump administration, ACC hopes to significantly advance its long-standing calls for science-based chemical risk assessment, which he argued should consider chemicals' exposure as well as hazards.
He also suggested that EPA should better shield chemical reviews from political influence, through steps such as adhering to weight of evidence approach and possibly removing peer review panels from EPA control to ensure their independence.
Caldeira said CSPA priorities include enacting the the fourth iteration of the Pesticide Registration Improvement Act (PRIA), which brings industry funds to EPA pesticide reviews in exchange for greater efficiency, and preserving and expanding EPA's Safer Choice program, a voluntary EPA labeling program that the Trump administration is proposing to eliminate.
Caldeira also said CSPA is seeking meetings with Pruitt to push for expanding Safer Choice, which reviews consumer cleaning products, and allows companies to place the program's logo on packaging for those products that meet EPA's standard.
While CSPA has submitted comments to EPA's deregulatory docket, Caldeira expressed skepticism that EPA has the political leadership in place to efficiently address those concerns given the slow pace of political appointments.
“That will be an impediment in the short term certainly,” he said, suggesting the lack of political leadership at the agency is bad for business. “When you have political uncertainty, it's going to lead to economic uncertainty.”
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/industry-groups-see-white-house-distractions-stalling-deregulatory-push
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(ACC Mentioned) Washington Distracted From Economy's Needs, CEOs Say
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
Industry needs the White House and Congress to move past distractions and focus on tax reform, infrastructure improvements and other policies to create jobs and sales, the heads of chemical, product manufacturing and retail trade associations said May 18.
“Hopefully we can move beyond some of these issues that are sucking all the oxygen out of the room right now in Washington,” said Steve Caldeira, president and chief executive officer of the Consumer Specialty Products Association. Any administration has some disarray during its first 100 days, but so far the Trump administration has been a little more chaotic than most, he said.
Caldeira spoke during the Consumer Specialty Products Association's mid-year meeting, “Transition 2017: A Year of Disruption.” Other speakers were Cal Dooley, president and CEO of the American Chemistry Council; Matthew Shay, president and CEO of the National Retail Federation; and Farah Ahmed, president and CEO of the International Fragrance Association of North America; and Jerry Porter, vice president for research and development at the Procter & Gamble Co.
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which the Trump administration is renegotiating, has been good for all the North American economies, but could be improved and modernized, Caldeira, Shay and Dooley said.
Tax Reform
Tax reform is retailers’ top priority, said Shay, whose association represents apparel, grocery, pharmacy, restaurant and other retailers including Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., McDonald's Corp., Starbucks Corp., and the Container Store, Inc.
“Tax reform is a metaphor for economic growth,” Shay said.
“Infrastructure investments will do it. Trade would do it,” he said. “Immigration would do it.”
“Ultimately, it's about creating the U.S. as a destination for economic activity,” Shay said.
In the current political environment, the two policies likely to get the most traction are tax reform and infrastructure investments, he said.
Infrastructure
Infrastructure investments offer a tremendous opportunity to chemical manufacturers and the downstream industries they serve, said Dooley, whose trade association represents large and small chemical manufacturers including AkzoNobel N.V., Momentive Performance Materials Inc., PPG Industries Inc., and the Shepherd Chemical Co.
Domestic and foreign chemical manufacturers are investing billions of dollars in new and increased capacity in the U.S., Dooley said. “This new capacity that's coming into the United States isn't solely to serve the domestic market. It's using the U.S. as a platform to serve the global market.”
“We need infrastructure. We need more pipelines. We need more roads. We need better rail service. We need deeper ports,” Dooley said. “We need to make sure we are capitalizing on our natural resources, particularly natural gas.”
NAFTA
Asked about NAFTA, Dooley said passage of that trade agreement was among his proudest accomplishments during the years 1991-2004 when he represented California's District 20member in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The agreement has helped all North American economies, Dooley said. It's is working reasonably well, and modifications—rather than wholesale reform—should be sufficient to enhance the opportunities available, he said.
Appointees Needed
Staffing up the administration, which has filled only 5 percent of its political appointments, would be helpful for all federal initiatives, said Dooley and Caldeira.
Skeletal crews are running agencies, and they are not empowered to make many of the decisions that would help trade associations headquartered in Washington, Caldeira said.
Members of the Consumer Specialty Products Association include Amway, the BASF Corp., Clean Control Corp., the Clorox Co., the Dow Chemical Co. and State Industrial Products.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997732&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997732&jd=111997732
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(ACC Mentioned) Global Resin Makers Want Chinese Support on Marine Pollution
May 18, 2017 | Plastics News
By Steve Toloken
An alliance of global plastics resin makers and trade associations from the United States and Europe came to the Chinaplas trade fair May 17 with a very specific goal — recruit China's state-owned plastics giants into their efforts to address plastic pollution in the ocean.
Leaders of the World Plastics Council said they're trying to build stronger ties with the Chinese because Asia has become a key in the debate and battle over how to address plastic litter in the ocean.
The outreach is part of a larger political push by the WPC to build support and additional resources for solutions the industry prefers on marine litter.
WPC leaders, for example, told the Chinese executives that they like the direction the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum is taking on marine litter, because APEC says the problem is lack of government infrastructure in collecting waste.
They contrasted that sharply with the United Nation's environment program, which in February said it launching a "war on ocean plastic" and urging product bans. WPC leaders said they hoped to build on the APEC approach.
"We believe that establishing a regionally strong and credible approach in the Asia Pacific region will be a good defense against the more problematic proposals of the United Nations," said Steve Russell, vice president of the plastics division of the Washington-based American Chemistry Council.
During a public portion of the meeting, WPC officials said they hoped to get more Chinese firms to join. The meeting, on the sidelines of Chinaplas May 16-19 in Guangzhou, included executives of Sinopec, Chinachem and Sinochem.
"I have a very specific ask today, and that's that you join us," said Mark Nikolich, CEO of Braskem America Inc., a member of the WPC executive committee, at the meeting. "We ask for your membership. We ask for your support."
He said the WPC wants to be a global organization and he added that more participation from Chinese firms in programs and funding would help "to have the impact that we need."
Russell said in an interview in Guangzhou that having the Chinese more involved is not mainly about financial support.
"China is roughly a third of global production, and it is a destination for a lot of our products," Russell said. "It's a growing consumer market. Having the perspective of the Chinese producers at the table when we're talking about strategies is essential."
He said Chinese government initiatives in trying to improve waste management are attracting attention worldwide, and including that knowledge in the WPC's work would help build solutions in other countries.
He also noted that the Beijing-based China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Federation is part of the WPC.
"What we haven't had is the state-owned enterprises," Russell said.More attention in China
The Chinese executives did not respond immediately to the request to join but several said they welcomed the dialogue. Li Shouqing, chairman of the CPCIF, noted that last year the government unveiled a six-point "green action plan" for the petrochemical industry.
He said the issue of marine pollution is getting more attention from China's government, and he said more importance should be given to plastic litter pollution both on land and in the oceans.
The WPC formed in 2013 in part because the global resin manufacturing industry wanted a forum where top executives would gather and make quick decisions on funding industry proposals, decisions that would be much harder for other industry groups to do quickly.
The WPC has spent more than $100,000 a year for the last three years, for example, to join the steering committee of the Trash Free Seas Alliance, which was formed in 2012 by the Washington-based non-governmental organization Ocean Conservancy.
The American Chemistry Council is also a member of that steering committee, along with Dow Chemical, Amcor, the World Wildlife Fund and Coca Cola.
At the meeting, the WPC presented statistics estimating that world plastics production will grow 50 percent in a decade, from about 250 million tons in 2015 to 380 million tons by 2025. More than sixty percent of that growth is estimated to come from Asia Pacific countries.
WPC officials said that economic growth and rising plastics consumption means marine litter will worsen unless steps are taken.
"It's an issue … of development having outpaced investment in collection and processing of waste," Russell said, noting that while Asia gets much of the attention now, the same problem potentially exists in Africa.
In his presentation in Guangzhou, Russell said the Trash Free Seas Alliance is discussing how to build funding models for boosting waste management infrastructure in emerging countries.
For example, he said the Closed Loop Fund, which has raised $100 million from industry to provide low-interest loans to communities across the U.S. to boost recycling, is considering setting up an international component to its work and is looking for a pilot project.
As well, APEC, which is made up of 21 member countries around the Pacific Ocean, including the United States and China, said in an April press release that it was studying how to make it more attractive for private financing to play a role in funding and getting returns on investment in waste collection in places like Indonesia.
The Guangzhou meeting included WPC representatives from CPChem, LyondellBasell, Sabic and the trade group PlasticsEurope.
http://www.plasticsnews.com/article/20170518/NEWS/170519886/global-resin-makers-want-chinese-support-on-marine-pollution
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(ACC Mentioned) FACTBOX-U.S. Industry Wish List in Trump Regulation Overhaul
May 18, 2017 | Reuters
By Richard Valdmanis
U.S. industry groups have submitted hundreds of pages of recommendations to President Donald Trump's administration in recent weeks, detailing ways they think he could ease their regulatory burden.
The comments can be found at the following web sites: here and here
Here is a selection of some of their suggestions:
EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE
* GREENHOUSE GAS REPORTING RULE - Modify the U.S. Clean Air Act's Greenhouse Gas Reporting rule to create incentives for carbon capture and storage technology, in which carbon dioxide emissions are captured and stored underground.
* STACK TESTING - Eliminate redundant stack testing currently required under parts of the U.S. Clean Air Act.
* ONCE IN-ALWAYS IN - Eliminate a provision of the U.S. Clean Air Act that requires a major source of emissions to always be treated as a major source, even if it later adds technology to reduce those emissions. This change was also requested by other groups, including the American Fuel & Petrochemicals Manufacturers and the American Petroleum Institute.
AMERICAN FUEL & PETROCHEMICALS MANUFACTURERS
* NEW SOURCE REVIEW - Modify the New Source Review permitting process required under the U.S. Clean Air Act to eliminate the need to consider emissions increases from non-modified affected emission units at a plant, and allow "project netting" that accounts for emissions reductions elsewhere at a plant.
* NATIONAL AMBIENT AIR QUALITY STANDARDS - Review an EPA decision to tighten ozone standards in a way that would likely expose more company facilities to tougher Clean Air Act rules.
* RENEWABLE FUEL STANDARD - Ensure average mandated ethanol content in gasoline does not exceed 9.7 percent of projected U.S. demand.
IOWA RENEWABLE FUELS ASSOCIATION
* RENEWABLE FUEL STANDARD - Ensure EPA continues to boost the mandated volumes of biofuels in gasoline and other road fuels.
AMERICAN CHEMISTRY COUNCIL
* AIR PERMITS: Reduce the burden of air and ozone permitting regulation to make it easier to greenlight projects.
* EPA TRANSPARENCY: Increase the transparency of the science EPA relies upon in its rule-making.
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS
* NEW SOURCE PERFORMANCE STANDARDS: "Streamline specific NSPS and NESHAP regulations to eliminate redundant requirements, conflicts between rules, and undue complexity, resulting in practical and understandable regulations without reduced protection of the environment."
INDEPENDENT PETROLEUM ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA
* NEW SOURCE PERFORMANCE STANDARDS: Review rules seeking to limit fugitive emissions from oil and gas installations.
* NATIONAL AMBIENT AIR QUALITY STANDARDS: Like AFPM and others, IPAA wants a review of planned tightening of ozone standards that could ramp up regulatory burdens.
* MORE COLLABORATIVE ENFORCEMENT: "EPA needs to thoroughly review and revise its federal enforcement process. It needs to create an enforcement program that treats the regulated community with fairness, respect and dignity."
AMERICAN PETROLEUM INSTITUTE
* NEW SOURCE REVIEW: "There continues to be a need for NSR reforms that simplify and streamline permitting."
* NATIONAL AMBIENT AIR QUALITY STANDARDS: Review various aspects of ozone standards and enforcement to ease regulatory burdens.
* GREENHOUSE GAS REPORTING RULE - Require less frequent, and less arduous reporting of greenhouse gas emissions.
NATIONAL MINING ASSOCIATION
* NEW SOURCE PERFORMANCE STANDARDS: Reconsider aspects of this regulation, including those requiring a New Source Review permit for a plant undergoing any modification - "an enormous additional environmental review process that stifles modernization and efficiency upgrades."
* FINANCIAL ASSURANCE FOR HARD ROCK MINING: Eliminate EPA rule that would require an increase in funds available to reclaim post-mining sites.
* ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT: Overturn "misuse of the Endangered Species Act which has put 10 million acres across a few western states off limits from mining." (Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by David Gregorio)
http://in.reuters.com/article/usa-trump-regulation-factbox-idINL8N1IJ5O4
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Senate Energy Panel to Grill DOE, FERC Appointees Next Week
May 18, 2017 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Darius Dixon
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee has scheduled a hearing for next week to review nominees for the DOE's No. 2 spot and two open seats at FERC.
President Donald Trump announced his plans to appoint Dan Brouillette for deputy energy secretary early last month, but only sent the nomination to the Senate last week. Trump's FERC picks Neil Chatterjee and Rob Powelson will share the witness table with Brouillette.
The hearing is set for 10 a.m. on May 25 in Dirksen 366, the energy committee’s hearing room.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard
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Democrats Use Interior Nominee to Raise Red Flags on Trump Science, Climate Policy
May 18, 2017 | PoliticoPro
By Esther Whieldon and Ben Lefebvre
Democrats are using David Bernhardt's nomination for the No. 2 spot at the Interior to raise red flags over the Trump administration's approach to science and climate change.
At his confirmation hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Thursday, Bernhardt faced questions from the panel's ranking Democrat Maria Cantwell of Washington and Sens. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Al Franken (D-Minn.) about his previous stint at Interior during the George W. Bush administration. While there, Bernhardt touched on endangered species protections, fossil fuel development and how to interpret scientific data to guide the agency's work, among other issues.
Most Democrats and environmentalists have been alarmed by President Donald Trump's doubts about man-made climate change as well as his administration's efforts to reverse policies to limit greenhouse gas emissions and to reshape scientific advisory bodies whose recommendations shape the work of agencies like Interior and EPA. In that context, they expect to press Bernhardt on many of those issues in follow-up questions for the record to be sent over the coming days.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Democrats would keep drawing attention to how the administration's views put the U.S. out of sync with the rest of the world when it comes to climate change.
“I think through words we expose the international embarrassment of having a president and administration who reject what the overwhelming majority of scientists are saying,” Sanders told POLITICO. “That is not a good place for the United States to be.”
With support from Republicans and moderate Democrats like Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Bernhardt's nomination is unlikely to be derailed. But Trump administration critics are using the opportunity to highlight many broader concerns they have with its tendency to promote fossil fuel development and the president's dismissal of climate change as a hoax invented by the Chinese.
"In terms of climate change and endangered species, I would call Bernhardt the most dangerous man in Washington, D.C., right now if he gets approved in that position," said Noah Greenwald, endangered species director at the Center for Biological Diversity. "I think he's going to push forward a massive increase in oil and gas development on federal lands, and I think he's going to do everything in his power to ensure that the endangered species that are at risk because of that development aren't given the protections that they need," Greenwald said.
But Republicans say Bernhardt's background is an asset. Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), who was unable to attend Thursday’s hearing but has met separately with Bernhardt, defended the nominee’s approach to policymaking.
“Look, this is someone who’s got a lot of experience with Interior. I think he’s going to bring a very pragmatic approach,” Hoeven said in a brief interview. “I think he’s going to respect wildlife, the environment and all those things, but he’s going to bring a practical, common-sense, multi-use approach that I think is the right approach.”
At Thursday's hearing, Stabenow grilled Bernhardt on whether he would respect the findings of the agency's scientists. Bernhardt pointed to his involvement in the Bush administration's decision in 2008 to list the polar bear as threatened, but not endangered, under the Endangered Species Act.
Bernhardt, then Interior solicitor, wrote a memorandum arguing it would be scientifically impossible at that time to link climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions from power plants in one part of the nation with melting sea ice in the polar bear's habitat. That policy has been in place since then and means that for the foreseeable future, greenhouse gas emissions will not be accounted for when it comes to wildlife protections.
"You take the science with all of its significance and its warts, and then you look at that and evaluate it, and then you make the legal decision you need to make," Bernhardt told Stabenow. "In some instances, the legal decision may allow you to consider other factors, such as jobs. In other instances, it might not. But if you’ve given us whatever that standard is, we’re going to look at it and apply the law and be honest with the science."
Also at the hearing, Bernhardt faced off with Franken over climate change. The senator tried to corner Bernhardt into taking a definitive stance, but the nominee instead suggested he would follow Trump's lead on policy regardless of the science behind climate change.
"Here’s the reality: We’re going to look at the science whatever it is, but ... policy decisions are made — this president ran and he won on a particular perspective," Bernhardt said. "That perspective’s not going to change to the extent we have the discretion under the law to follow it," he continued. "In some instances we might not, but those that we do we’re absolutely going to follow the policy perspective of the president. And here’s why: That’s the way our republic works, and he is the president.”
After the hearing, Cantwell said she remains "very" concerned about Bernhardt's answers on scientific integrity.
"We clearly have an administration who thinks that they can just decide everything in the executive branch, and obviously that’s not true," Cantwell told POLITICO. She said she intends to follow up on that issue in her questions to Bernhardt. "The president just doesn’t get to decide his interpretation of the law. I know he might have counsel who keeps telling him that every day," Cantwell said.
Nick Juliano, Anthony Adragna and Annie Snider contributed to this report.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/story/2017/05/democrats-using-bernhardt-nomination-to-raise-red-flags-on-trump-science-climate-policy-157059
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Industry Groups Expect Long Wait for Pipeline Safety Chief
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
Industry groups aren't holding their breath as the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration waits for a presidentially nominated chief.
The agency has traditionally had vacancies for more than 300 days between administrators. With a few exceptions, industry groups think the agency's core functions are running smoothly under acting leadership.
“Generally speaking, PHMSA is doing a good job on its core safety and auditing function, despite its lack of a new administrator,” Cathy Landry, spokesperson for the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America, told Bloomberg BNA.
But, she said, the association hopes an administrator is nominated soon to help speed up the agency's progress on a proposed “mega rule” regarding safety of gas transmission pipelines.
The public comment period for the proposed rule was extended, then closed July 2016. A final rule has not yet been issued.
The administrator vacancy is “certainly not the main reason behind the delay, but it's not helping matters,” Landry said in an email.
The American Petroleum Institute has been less patient, according to Mike Tadeo, a spokesperson for the industry association. It urges President Donald Trump to nominate a PHMSA chief in order to move forward with energy infrastructure, Tadeo told Bloomberg BNA.
“With good leadership in place, the agency can develop a workforce that is not only suitably staffed but also properly trained and qualified to carry out their mandates,” he said in an email.
History of Delays
The agency's first permanent administrator, Thomas Barrett, was sworn in nearly 500 days after President George W. Bush took office. Since PHMSA was created in 2004, vacancies of over 300 days have occurred between agency administrators’ terms.
The current delay seems to be in line with Trump's nomination pace for agency heads, Paul Rankin, president of the Reusable Industrial Packaging Association, told Bloomberg BNA.
“This is no surprise,” he said. “This is not to say the other administrators’ positions are being filled quickly. It's certainly not a surprise to PHMSA.”
More urgent matters, such as approvals for exceptions to pipeline safety or hazardous material transport regulations, have been moving along at an adequate pace, he said.
PHMSA has been slow to move on pending regulations, but that may be caused by the executive order asking agencies to drop two regulations for every new one, Rankin said.
“They're not putting out many regulations, but neither is anyone,” he said.
Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.) also didn't express any outward concern about the delay in a May 17 statement to Bloomberg BNA.
“Senator Thune is aware of active efforts by the administration to put forward a nominee,” Thune's office said in the statement. “In his role as chairman of the Commerce Committee, he looks forward to confirming a qualified candidate as soon as possible.”
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997706&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997706&jd=111997706
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(ACC Mentioned) What Humans Can Learn from Research on Turtles Exposed to Plastics and Birth Control
May 18, 2017 | Consumer Affairs
By Amy Martyn
Chemicals that mimic hormones in the body, known as endocrine disruptors because they can confuse and affect the endocrine system, cause irreversible changes to the brains of turtles, according to new research conducted by University of Missouri researchers.
Dr. Cheryl Rosenfeld and Scott Givan collected cells from the brains of turtles who were exposed to ethinyl estradiol, a synthetic hormone used in birth control pills, and Bisphenol-A, an endocrine-disrupting chemical that is used to produce hard, polycarbonate plastic and is often found in food packaging. Because BPA easily leaches into products it touches, such as the acidic tomatoes in a can that is lined with BPA, nearly every person in the United States is likely to have traces of BPA in their urine, as previous research has shown.
According to Rosenfeld and Givan’s work, the endocrine disruptors changed the behavior of turtles in such a way that they essentially rewired the gender of turtle’s brains, as the University of Missouri’s Decoding Science blog puts it.
Male turtles exposed to either chemical were found to “act like females” in their behavioral responses. The research has important implications for wildlife because both BPA and ethinyl estradiol “have been identified in all aquatic environments tested to date, including rivers and streams,” Decoding Science explains. “Thus, exposure of turtles and other species that inhabit such environments can potentially lead to irreversible effects.”
How birth control and plastics chemicals end up in the water
Chemicals from birth control pills are present in the water supply due to the phenomenon known as pharmaceutical pollution. Researchers say that drugs pollute waterways when nursing homes or hospitals flush unused products down the toilet.
Nursing homes especially “have often been guilty of flushing medications down the toilet or drain after a patient dies or is transferred to another facility,” Harvard Medical School’s newsletter wrote in 2011. Additionally, “the typical American medicine cabinet is full of unused and expired drugs, only a fraction of which get disposed of properly.”
And researchers have identified industrial waste-water as one potential source of BPA pollution in aquatic waterways.The lesson for humans
f course turtles and humans don't respond to environmental exposures the same way, but the impact that BPA has on the amphibians' brains still carries important lessons for people, Dr. Rosenfeld explains. She says that her research looked at the turtle’s cortex and hippocampus specifically, two parts of the brain that also guide cognition, learning and memory in humans. "They're governing the same types of processes in turtles and humans,” she tells ConsumerAffairs.
Previous research has already found a link between BPA exposure and behavioral problems in girls, as well as a potential link between BPA exposure and autism.
Researchers like Dr. Rosenfeld are particularly concerned about the impact that endocrine disruptors have on the developing brains of fetuses and babies, who are more vulnerable to chemical exposures than adults. “BPA is one chemical that can easily cross the placenta,” Rosenfeld says.
Though it’s difficult for anyone to avoid BPA entirely, Rosenfeld says the best way for expectant mothers and other concerned people to minimize exposure is to avoid canned food and eat fresh as much as possible. In the long-term, with United States regulators unwilling to say that BPA is harmful or remove it from consumer products, Rosenfeld would like to see companies label products that contain endocrine disruptors. "If you're not going to regulate it, at least let the consumer know which products contain it," she said.
Plastics industry cries Fake News
e idea of labeling products with endocrine disruptors like BPA is one that will likely never win support from the American Chemistry Council, the group that represents the plastics industry. One recent blog post by trade group spokeswoman and researcher Dr. Steven Hentges describes research on Bisphenol-A alternatives, which are often still from the Bisphenol chemical family, and therefore may pose similar problems, as “Fake news.”
“If BPA-Free were a substance, it’s now being studied — and that’s the origin of the fake news,” Hentges proclaimed.
https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/what-humans-can-learn-from-research-on-turtles-exposed-to-plastics-and-birth-control-051817.html
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(ACC Mentioned) ACC, Lawmakers Say Appalachian NGL Storage Hub Key to Petchem Buildout
May 18, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Jamison Cocklin
Momentum continues building for efforts to attract a substantial natural gas liquids (NGL) storage hub in the Appalachian Basin, with the American Chemistry Council (ACC) unveiling a study on Thursday touting the potential economic benefits and U.S. lawmakers calling on state legislatures to get more deeply involved.
ACC's analysis projects that nearly $36 billion in capital investment would be generated in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentucky if five ethane crackers and two propane dehydrogenation facilities are built in the region.
CEO Cal Dooley joined U.S. Sens. Shelley Moore Capito and Joe Manchin, along with Rep. David McKinley of West Virginia on Thursday to unveil the study's findings during a call with reporters. He said it would take about $10 billion to build the kind of ethane storage hub and pipeline network that would fully capture the petrochemical investment modeled in the study.
"We have a once in a lifetime opportunity to further expand the U.S. chemical manufacturing base by capitalizing on the tremendous resources of wet gas in the Marcellus and Utica as well as the Rogersville shale formations," Dooley said.
The study was released just days after Capito, Manchin and Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio introduced legislation that would require federal agencies to study the feasibility of an underground ethane storage and distribution hub in Appalachia. According to the lawmakers, the study would help inform future infrastructure projects, demonstrate the economic potential of such a hub and help attract private investment funds.
"We want to keep the value of the resource in our region," Capito said. "We want to help the manufacturing, power and energy sectors in our states. And we want to start revitalizing our chemicals industry and plastics industry in and around the Marcellus Shale.
A unit of Royal Dutch Shell plc is currently building a multi-billion dollar ethane cracker in Western Pennsylvania that's expected to come online next decade. Four other similar facilities have been proposed for the region as well.
Manchin called the possibility of further petrochemical development in a part of the country where chemical manufacturing already generates billions of dollars in economic output a "game changer." He said he would be working to encourage all three states to invest more in attracting a storage hub.
McKinley said he plans to introduce similar legislation in the U.S. House on Friday. He's also had a conversation with President Trump about the matter and said the administration's desire for infrastructure modernization legislation aligns well with the bipartisan storage push. McKinley also wants Kentucky included in the mix to help any future legislation pass the Senate, where the proposed study has failed before as an amendment.
The Appalachian Basin is home to abundant natural gas storage. It's long been a staging area to move gas to the Northeast. But its NGL storage and pipeline options are inadequate.
A Pennsylvania-commissioned study released earlier this year found that the Marcellus and Utica shales hold enough ethane to accommodate up to four more ethylene crackers in addition to Shell's. But that analysis also estimated that the region needs 3.5-7 million bbl of liquids storage to foster more development. It currently has none. Mountaineer NGL Storage LLC has plans for a 2 million bbl underground facility in southeast Ohio.
As the public sector continues to explore its options, a study is already underway by private industry players, including Antero Resources Corp., American Electric Power Co., Blue Racer Midstream LLC, Chevron Corp. and XTO Energy Inc., among several others, to investigate NGL storage potential in the basin. The companies came together last year to match a $100,000 grant from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation.
The ACC noted Thursday that public sector efforts will continue to be extremely important for attracting capital investment. "Policymakers can help by affirming that NGL storage and distribution projects are eligible for existing private-public financing programs," Dooley said.
He added that Appalachia has "distinct benefits" that could make it a "major petrochemical and plastic resin-producing zone." Storage hub locations are typically underground in salt domes, natural gas caverns or other formations. Hubs include pipelines from source locations to manufacturers along with other equipment to move materials through a network.
Some have suggested that an Appalachian hub could also include a financial exchange structure with price-setting based on regional supply and demand, such as Mont Belvieu, TX. The Gulf Coast generates about two-thirds of North America's ethylene output.
More liquids storage has been a constant refrain since Shell announced its final investment decision last year for the Pennsylvania cracker, siting cost-advantaged feedstock, market proximity and strong local support. The Appalachian Storage Hub Conference also has been organized for June 15 in Canonsburg to further discuss the matter.
The ACC found that the economic benefits of a petrochemical buildout could be substantial. By 2025, the study said, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentucky could see 100,000 new jobs and an additional $2.9 billion in new federal, state and local tax revenue annually.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/110512-acc-lawmakers-say-appalachian-ngl-storage-hub-key-to-petchem-buildout
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(ACC Mentioned) ACC Report: Appalachia Could Become Second Major US Petchem Center
May 18, 2017 | Oil & Gas Journal
By Nick Snow
The Appalachian region potentially could become a major US petrochemical and plastic resin manufacturing center similar to the Gulf Coast, the American Chemistry Council said in a May 18 report. “Proximity to a world-class supply of raw materials from the Marcellus-Utica and Rogersville shale formations and to the manufacturing markets of the Midwest and East Coast has already led several companies to announce investment projects, and there is potential for a great deal more,” ACC Pres. Cal Dooley said.
The report presented a scenario that included the development of a storage hub for natural gas liquids and chemicals such as ethylene and propylene, a 500-mile pipeline distribution network, and associated petrochemical, plastics, and other energy systems and manufacturing in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky.
It predicted that by 2025, the four-state region could see 100,000 permanent new jobs, including 25,700 chemical and plastic products manufacturing jobs, 43,000 jobs in supplier industries, and 32,000 “payroll-induced” jobs in communities where workers spend their wages.
The investment also could lead to $2.9 billion/year of federal, state, and local tax revenue, the report said.
“The right policies are critical to realizing this opportunity,” Dooley said at a Capitol Hill release of the report, which also included West Virginia’s two US Senators—Democrat Joe Manchin and Republican Shelley Moore Capito—and US Rep. David McKinley (R-W.Va.).
Dooley cited S. 1075—The Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act of 2017, which Capito introduced on May 9 and Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Manchin cosponsored—as “an important step forward [which] will help inform efforts to maximize America’s domestic energy and manufacturing potential.”
“Uncertainty around financing is a key barrier to the development of energy infrastructure in the Appalachian region,” Dooley said. “Policymakers can help by affirming that NGL storage and distribution projects are eligible for existing private-public financing programs. As Congress and the administration consider infrastructure modernization legislation, the Appalachian Hub should be a priority.”
ACC released the report a day after Manchin and Capito sent a letter to National Economic Council Director Gary D. Cohn outlining benefits of constructing a world-class gas liquids storage and distribution hub in the Appalachian region.
“An abundance of wet natural gas in the Marcellus, Utica, and Rogersville shale formations has recently resulted in significant announcements of new investment in the Appalachian region, particularly by the petrochemical industry. In fact, the region’s supplies of [natural gas liquids are] highly underutilized,” it maintained.
“Stakeholders in the industry and Appalachian communities are increasingly optimistic that the development of a regional storage hub could attract at least six world-scale petrochemical complexes, along with a number of smaller facilities,” the letter said.
http://www.ogj.com/articles/2017/05/acc-report-appalachia-could-become-second-major-us-petchem-center.html
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(ACC Mentioned) W.Va. Lawmakers Revive 'Game Changer' Ethane Storage Bill
May 19, 2017 | E&E Daily
By Dylan Brown
West Virginia lawmakers renewed their push to revitalize their state's chemical manufacturing industry with a new ethane storage hub in Appalachia.
Sens. Shelley Moore Capito (R) and Joe Manchin (D) rolled out S. 1075 yesterday. And, Rep. David McKinley (R-W.Va.) said at the same news conference that he will introduce a companion House bill today.
The "Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act" would task the Energy and Commerce departments to determine the feasibility of building a facility in states home to the Marcellus, Utica and Rogersville shale booms.
Ethane, propane and butane are examples of natural gas liquids separated from natural gas that is used to produce electricity. "Wet gas" is a key feedstock for chemical manufacturing.
"Natural gas and ethane is to the chemical industry as flour is to bakery," American Chemistry Council President and CEO Cal Dooley said at the news conference.
The natural gas renaissance over the last decade has transformed the United States from one of the most expensive countries to manufacture chemicals to one of the most affordable. According to ACC, 301 projects — nearly half completed or under construction — have been announced since 2010, but almost half that investment went to the Gulf Coast.
With major shale formations nearby, Capito and Manchin, as well as co-sponsor Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), want to see a local resource stay close to home, like with the proposed multibillion-dollar ethane cracker plant near Pittsburgh, which will produce polyethylene to make plastics (Greenwire, Aug. 30).
"We want to help the manufacturing and power and energy sectors in our states," Capito said, "And we want to start revitalizing our chemical industry, our plastics industry."
Manchin said it could be a "game-changer" for the Chemical Valley, the region surrounding Charleston, W.Va., where a once-thriving chemical manufacturing industry has faded.
Pollution concerns and economic impact
With that, though, come major pollution and safety concerns in a region still grappling with fallout from the 2014 Elk River chemical spill that left nearly 300,000 people without water for weeks.
"We would acknowledge that there have been some tragic accidents in the past, but we are an industry that is fully committed to continuous improvement," Dooley said.
To backstop the push for renewed manufacturing, ACC yesterday released a new report gauging the impact of building a natural gas liquid storage hub as well as a 500-mile pipeline distribution network and associated petrochemical and plastics infrastructure.
All told, the price tag would be about $10 billion, but ACC projected that spending would spur $35.8 billion in petrochemical, plastics and other investment.
That would translate, according to the report, into five ethane crackers and two propane dehydrogenation facilities.
Researchers also used the IMPLAN economic model employed by federal agencies and many private-sector companies to estimate the job and tax revenue impacts in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Kentucky.
According to the report, federal, state and local tax revenue would be nearly $3 billion a year and 100,000 permanent new jobs would be created by 2025. Most jobs would be in supplier industries or jobs tied to a local wage bounce, but 25,700 jobs would be in chemical and plastic manufacturing, where pay averages around $90,000 a year, according to ACC.
"There's not a better investment that the [states] could make," Manchin said, pushing for states to invest their own money.
Bill sponsors also want to see untapped Department of Energy Office of Fossil Energy loans used.
Chiming in at the news conference, Walter Howes, who ran DOE's loan program under former President George W. Bush, said the storage hub is a "bull's-eye" if the Trump administration doesn't do away with the loan guarantee program.
McKinley, whose district is the heart of West Virginia's booming natural gas industry, ribbed his Senate colleagues that the House has passed the bill twice already on its own. Capito said that the only reason the bill failed to pass last year was that it was attached to the Senate's ill-fated energy bill.
"In all likelihood it's going to be attached to some other vehicle," Capito said about this year's version. "It really is irrelevant to us what vehicle."
McKinley, however, pointed to the infrastructure package being pushed by the Trump administration.
"When we talked to the president, he wants this trillion-dollar program, what a better fit," McKinley said.
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2017/05/19/stories/1060054806
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(ACC Mentioned) West Virginia Congress Members Support Ethane Hub
May 19, 2017 | Wheeling Intelligencer
By Joselyn King
West Virginia’s congressional delegation is showing a unified front in pushing for an ethane storage hub for central Appalachia, and they hope state leaders in Ohio and Pennsylvania join them.
U.S. Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., were joined Thursday by Rep. David McKinley, R-W.Va., and American Chemistry Council President Cal Dooley for a news conference to tout the economic benefits of placing the hub near oil and gas reserves in Appalachia rather than near chemical industry operations on the Gulf Coast.
Manchin and Moore, along with Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, last week introduced the Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act of 2017. The measure calls for studying the feasibility and potential benefits of establishing a subterranean ethane storage and distribution hub in central Appalachia.
McKinley announced Thursday he would introduce companion legislation in the House today.
“As we all know, energy and manufacturing are two segments that are critical to growth in the state,” Capito said. “We have the resources, with the Marcellus, the Utica and the Rogersville shale plays in our area. For West Virginians, we want to keep the value of the resource in our regions … and we want to start revitalizing our chemical industry and our plastics industry in and around our Marcelus Shale.”
She added it’s important for West Virginia to see the state’s resources processed in the state, and not piped to Florida, Texas or other areas.
Manchin said the possibility of an ethane storage hub in West Virginia “could be a game-changer for the state.”
“We have a tremendous footprint as far as a chemical valley in West Virginia that can be reinvigorated … ,” he said. “And we have three states (West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania) working together, crossing energy borders — and basically following the energy flow.”
He encouraged the legislatures in the three states to band together to invest money in the storage hub project.
“The geologics are being done now,” Manchin said. “Once we get the geologics back, this should be a no-brainer. I’m hoping all three legislatures get involved. This is a tremendous opportunity for the state of West Virginia to produce jobs for the future, and a great return on investment for the people of West Virginia.”
McKinley said similar legislation to establish and ethane storage hub in West Virginia has passed the House three times, but in the past hasn’t been taken up by the Senate.
“I think there is strong support for this concept,” he said. “The idea of having the storage up in the Northeast — as compared to the Gulf Coast — is very instrumental so we can be able to keep it. West Virginia is the biggest producer of shale gas in the country. East of the Mississippi, we’re one of the biggest producers of gas overall.”
Dooley it would take about $10 billion to create the ethane storage hub and the related pipeline. He estimates this would then result in about $32 billion in private investment, and in about $28 billion in annual output.
There would also be about 100,000 jobs created — including temporary construction jobs — according to Dooley. He said the average pay in the chemical industry is about $90,000 annually.
http://www.theintelligencer.net/news/top-headlines/2017/05/west-virginia-congress-members-support-ethane-hub/
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May 18, 2017 | The Exponent Telegram
By Charles Young
Three of West Virginia’s congressional representatives hosted a press conference at the U.S. Capitol Thursday to discuss the potential economic benefits of undertaking a multibillion-dollar energy infrastructure project in the Appalachian region.
Republican Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin and Republican Rep. David McKinley held the conference to talk about the Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act of 2017.
The act was introduced in the Senate last week by Capito, Manchin and Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio. The bill aims to assess the feasibility and advantages of building a subterranean ethane storage and distribution hub to serve West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Kentucky.
If passed, the bill would direct the secretaries of energy and commerce, along with other relevant federal agencies, to conduct a feasibility study on establishing the storage and distribution hub.
The study would include an analysis of potential locations based on favorable geology, economic feasibility and benefits, infrastructure and proximity to production sites and potential industrial consumers.
Construction of the hub would allow producers and distributors of natural gas commodities from the region to reap the full benefits of the sale of their products without being reliant on outside infrastructure for storage and distribution, Capito said.
“As we know, energy and manufacturing are two segments that are critical to growth in our state,” she said. “We have the resource, and we want to keep the value of the resource in our region.”
Capito said she was proud to have support from members of both parties for the bill.
“A lot of the time, you hear that things are either Republican or Democrat,” she said. “But this is totally bipartisan.”
Manchin said the project would be a “game changer” for the region.
“We have a tremendous footprint, as far as the ‘Chemical Valley’ in West Virginia, which can be reinvigorated,” he said. “We have the potential to have a whole manufacturing base started with the ethane and propane which can be stored there.
“There’s not a better investment that the state of West Virginia, the state of Pennsylvania, the state of Ohio could make,” Manchin added.
McKinley said the project would help keep the profits from oil and gas sales from leaving the state.
“West Virginia now has become the largest producer of shale gas in the country,” he said. “This would be very instrumental in the potential development that could occur, which would allow us to keep it.”
Cal Dooley, president and CEO of the American Chemistry Council, said his organization had conducted an independent study of the storage and distribution hub’s potential impact.
“We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to further expand the U.S. chemical manufacturing base by capitalizing on the tremendous resources of wet gas,” he said.
According to the study, the storage and distribution hub would cost more than $10 billion to build.
The completed project would result in more than $28 billion of economic output annually, Dooley said. It would also result in the creation of more than 100,000 jobs, paying an average salary of more than $90,000.
“We think this really could be an important contribution in creating significant economic development in a four-state region,” he said. “We have a tremendous economic opportunity which would pay dividends to both consumers and the people that the chemical industry employs.”
https://www.theet.com/news/free/capito-manchin-and-mckinley-discuss-potential-of-multi-billion-dollar/article_d289fe9b-b827-563f-9e81-e631d989e9e6.html
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(ACC Mentioned ) Capito, Manchin, McKinley Outline Benefits of Natural Gas Storage Hub in Appalachia
May 18, 2017 | WV Metro News
By Carrie Hodousek
On a call with reporters Thursday, three West Virginia congressional leaders outlined the economic benefits of establishing an ethane storage and distribution center in central Appalachia.
U.S. Senators Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), First District Congressman David McKinley (R-W.Va.) and American Chemistry Council President and CEO Cal Dooley were part of the call and all spoke in favor of the plan.
Bills were introduced in both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives to establish the storage hub in West Virginia. Capito, Manchin and Senator Rob Portman (R-Ohio) introduced the Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act of 2017 earlier this month. The Senate’s version would incorporate West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Ohio. McKinley said he has a similar bill pending in the House that includes Kentucky.
Capito, the bill’s main sponsor, said establishing the hub in West Virginia makes sense because the state already has access to natural gas and that the state’s proximity would attract manufacturers in the Midwest and the East Coast.
“We think it’s critical to the development and to really maximum the resource that we have,” she said. “We want to help the manufacturing, power and energy sectors in our state and we want to start revitalizing our chemical industry and plastics industry in and around the Marcellus Shale.”
The bill directs the secretaries of the U.S. Departments of Energy and Commerce to conduct a feasibility study on the hub for the Marcellus, Utica and Rogersville natural gas shale formations.
West Virginia has become the largest producer of shale gas in the country, McKinley said.
“Certainly East of the Mississippi we’re one of the largest producers of gas overall, so we have some tremendous opportunities to do this,” he said.
The hub would create nearly 100,000 jobs and generate billions of dollars, according to Dooley.
“By our calculation, that would generate almost $3 billion in additional tax revenue,” Dooley said.
Manchin called the idea “a no brainer” and a “game changer” for West Virginia’s economy.
“There’s not a better investment the state of West Virginia, the state of Pennsylvania and state of Ohio can make if they would take a certain portion and commit to, basically, what we call ‘prime the pump’ to get the private sector involved,” he said.
The feasibility study, if passed, would look at the economic impacts and potential sites for the storage hub. It would be completed within two years after passage.
http://wvmetronews.com/2017/05/18/capito-manchin-mckinley-outline-benefits-of-natural-gas-storage-hub-in-appalachia/
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(ACC Mentioned) Lawmakers Push for Ethane Storage & Distribution Hub in Central Appalachia
May 18, 2017 | WDTV
State lawmakers are pushing to get a natural gas storage and distribution hub built in the Appalachian region.
Last week, Senator Shelley Moore Capito, Senator Joe Manchin and others introduced the bipartisan Appalachian Ethane Storage Hub Study Act of 2017 to assess the feasibility and benefits of establishing a subterranean ethane storage hub in central Appalachia.
During a press call Thursday, Senators Capito and Manchin, along with Congressman David McKinley, said it would be a game changer. The lawmakers said an American Chemistry Council Study showed this development would create 100,000 jobs and bring $36 billion in new investments.
Senator Manchin related it to the field of dreams, saying build it, and they shall come.
"We have a tremendous footprint as far as chemical valley in West Virginia that can be reinvigorated. We have the potential for having a whole manufacturing base starting with ethane, propane that can be stored there," he said. "And the tri-state arrangement that we already have, we have three states working together, crossing borders and not really paying attention to borders, basically following the energy flow."
The region they're talking is the Mountain State, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and some say Kentucky as well.
McKinley said the House plans to introduce its bill, Friday.
http://www.wdtv.com/content/news/Lawmakers-push-for-ethane-storage--distribution-hub-in-central-Appalachia-423056754.html
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Court Suspends Litigation over EPA Methane Rule
May 18, 2017 | E&E News PM
By Amanda Reilly
A federal court today agreed to indefinitely pause litigation over the Obama administration's methane curbs for new oil and gas operations.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit granted the Trump administration's April request to hold the consolidated cases in abeyance.
The administration made the request after President Trump's "energy independence" executive order requiring U.S. EPA to review the methane rule, along with a host of other Obama administration actions to address climate change.
Shortly after the executive order, EPA said it would reconsider the rule in response to an administrative petition from industry groups. The agency also announced a 90-day stay on compliance requirements (Greenwire, April 19).
The methane rule was a key part of former President Obama's goal of reducing methane emissions from the oil and gas industry between 40 and 45 percent by 2025 compared with 2012 levels.
The 2016 rule required new and heavily modified oil and gas operations to check for and repair leaks of methane, a greenhouse gas that's more than 25 times as potent as carbon dioxide. It also eliminated an exemption for low-producing wells (Greenwire, May 12, 2016).
More than a dozen states and several oil and gas trade organizations challenged the rule, arguing that voluntary measures were sufficient to lower methane leaks. The D.C. Circuit combined the suits with litigation over EPA's 2012 standards limiting emissions of volatile organic compounds from new oil and gas operations.
Though the Trump administration is reconsidering the rule, supporters of the Obama measure had asked the court to continue hearing the litigation. They argued that the case involves legal issues that should be resolved regardless of what EPA does.
The Justice Department, however, said that moving forward with the lawsuits would be an "exercise in futility" (Energywire, April 24).
The lawsuit is just one of several that the D.C. Circuit has agreed to suspend as the Trump administration reconsiders Obama EPA rules. The court is requiring EPA to submit status reports every 60 days as it reviews the methane curbs.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2017/05/18/stories/1060054770
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Atlantic Seismic Surveys May Get Permits But Await Action
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Alan Kovski
Six companies are hoping to get permits to conduct seismic surveys in the U.S. Atlantic offshore as a step toward identifying the most promising places to drill for oil or natural gas.
The Trump administration is supportive of the seismic work, but uncertainty remains over whether the surveys actually will be conducted. No lease sales for exploration drilling have been scheduled for the Outer Continental Shelf in the Atlantic, and without the prospect of lease sales, the service companies that do the seismic work may be unable to find clients among oil companies to finance the surveys.
“We only see seismic surveying going ahead in the Atlantic if we see enough companies coming in with funding,” said Will Ashby, vice president of human resources and communications for TGS NOPEC Geophysical Co. ASA, one of the six companies seeking permits.
Ashby told Bloomberg BNA he was skeptical oil companies will fund a seismic survey without lease plans scheduled. As a result, permits may expire at the end of their one-year terms if no Atlantic leasing appears likely, although there is nothing to prevent the companies from seeking new permits in the future if the prospect of Atlantic leasing grows.
Along with TGS, the other five geophysical companies that have pending applications for Atlantic seismic surveys are Petroleum Geo-Services ASA, Spectrum ASA, ION Geophysical Corp., CGG S.A. and WesternGeco Ltd., a subsidiary of Schlumberger Ltd.
There is no time frame for how long the permit reviews will take, said a spokesman for the permitting agency, the Interior Department's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
‘There's a Lot of Interest’
President Donald Trump ordered reconsideration of possible oil and gas leasing in the Atlantic, with a clearly expressed interest in mid-Atlantic and southern Atlantic leasing though without any commitment. The leasing program review will take about two years to complete, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said.
Zinke issued an order May 10 to resume evaluation of the permit applications from the six service companies. The Obama administration denied those applications Jan. 5 on the assumption there was no point in allowing them without lease sales scheduled.
The Obama administration in 2015 tentatively proposed a lease sale in 2021 for oil and gas exploration somewhere in the mid-Atlantic and southern Atlantic from Virginia to Georgia, then dropped the idea in March 2016 after running into opposition from environmental activists and residents of coastal communities.
“Over 80 percent of the last administration's proposed lease plan [for the Atlantic] has never been surveyed,” said Nikki Martin, president of the International Association of Geophysical Contractors. “So there's a lot of interest in finding what the potential is.”
Asked what the most promising offshore areas might be, Martin said, “I think that's exactly the kind of information they're hoping to attain,” adding that the government as well as industry needs the seismic data to inform future decisions.
Wells Drilled in Atlantic
The last seismic work in the Atlantic was conducted in the 1980s. New seismic work will use better technologies to give the government a better sense of what resources might be available, Zinke said in his May 10 statement along with his order to resume permit review.
Companies drilled 51 exploratory wells in the Atlantic offshore during 1976-1984, a period when nine lease sales were held.
The wells were drilled by Exxon Corp. and Mobil Corp. before their merger, Chevron Corp. and Texaco Inc. before their merger, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, ConocoPhillips Co.’s predecessor Conoco Inc., Murphy Oil Corp. and a few other companies such as Gulf Oil Corp. before its acquisition by Chevron.
Several wells found some hydrocarbons, but none led to followup development.
The Baltimore Canyon Trough, a sedimentary basin off New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland, saw 32 wells drilled. Farther south is the Carolina Trough, a sedimentary basin off North and South Carolina, within the area temporarily considered for exploration by the Obama administration. It has never been drilled.
Ten wells were drilled farther north on the Georges Bank offshore of New England, and a handful were drilled elsewhere, notably off North Carolina north of the Carolina Trough.
Much Opposition Remains
Many people hope the surveys never happen, either because they worry about the commercial and environmental impacts of eventual oil drilling or because they are concerned about possible harm to marine mammals from the seismic surveys themselves.
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) in April introduced a bill (H.R. 2158) to prohibit seismic activities in the Atlantic for oil and gas work. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) in early May introduced a bill (H.R. 2272) to prohibit offshore drilling in the Atlantic.
There is no reason to expect a Republican-dominated Congress to go along with such legislation, although a few Republicans from coastal states signed on as cosponsors of the bills.
When the Obama administration suggested Atlantic exploration drilling, many Atlantic coastal communities in the Southeast expressed very strong opposition. Recreation and fishing are important parts of the Southeastern coastal economies and were seen by the critics as threatened by offshore drilling.
Concerns for Marine Mammals
The companies applying for seismic survey permits also need “incidental take permits” under the Marine Mammal Protection Act to minimize harm to whales, dolphins and other marine mammals. The take permits are issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service, which also consults with the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on endangered species, including several whale species.
Some academic biologists worry about the impacts on sea life. Douglas Nowacek, a marine mammal specialist at Duke University, led a group in 2015 that advocated international regulation of seismic surveys to protect marine life.
Part of the worry is that the sound waves generated in seismic work can severely harm whales, possibly deafening them.
For seismic surveys, airguns are dragged behind a boat and fire acoustic signals down through water and subsea geologic layers. Reflections of the acoustic waves provide information about the geology of the subsurface.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management requires mitigation measures such as avoidance of firing airguns when whales are spotted near a survey boat.
There is no documented scientific evidence that noise from airguns used in seismic surveys adversely affects marine animal populations, BOEM has said.
Canada Keeps Offshore Active
Ashby at geophysical company TGS said the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador demonstrates how to keep the investments in offshore work flowing.
The province has a system of annual lease sales for the Atlantic offshore, and that has encouraged much seismic survey work in an area of great potential that is “hugely underexplored,” as Ashby put it.
TGS and Petroleum Geo-Services have been teaming up for multi-client surveys in the Canadian offshore. In the typical multi-client arrangement, oil companies provide upfront funding for seismic work, and those companies get first access to the data and a discount on the price. At a later date, other companies also can buy the data.
Some geophysical companies have a different approach, doing a survey for one client and letting that client take ownership of the data.
This summer will see the seventh consecutive season of data acquisition by the TGS and Petroleum Geo-Services joint activity.
Mexico, too, has seen much seismic work recently as it has opened up its offshore to exploration by foreign companies. Much seismic activity also has occurred in the North Sea and off the coasts of Australia, New Zealand and West Africa.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997707&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997707&jd=111997707
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Refiners Need Better Maintenance Plans to Protect Workers: CSB
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
Refiners too often fail to adequately prepare for non-routine maintenance operations, raising the risk that workers are harmed, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board said May 18.
The board released a safety bulletin May 18 on what it described as a Delaware oil refinery's poor planning prior to a worker sustaining second- and third- degree burns during a flash fire Nov. 29, 2015.
More broadly, the board said 37 percent of incidents it has investigated involved actions taken before, after or during maintenance work. Together, the incidents were linked to 86 deaths and 410 injuries.
Delaware City Refining Co., which is owned by PBF Energy Inc., failed to adequately prepare for maintenance being performed on the refinery's alkylation unit, CSB Chairperson Vanessa Sutherland said at a May 18 news conference in Wilmington, Del.
The fire was the third incident in less than five months at the Delaware City refinery. The worker was burned while following his colleague's handwritten instructions to drain and isolate a section of piping in preparation for a maintenance operation. Workers had to modify the operation when one side of the pipe would not seal properly, the board found. The actions caused a flash fire that sent the worker to an area hospital for three days.
In Delaware City, the refiner lacked standard procedures for the kind of work it asked its employees to complete, the CSB said.
“This event reminds us that these incidents continue to occur repeatedly but can be prevented,” Sutherland said.
Past Incidents
The board chose to publish a safety bulletin on the incident, rather than a full investigative report. The document said that companies need to use standard operating procedures for maintenance preparation tasks, use pre-planning and hazard identification prior to beginning work and avoid relying on single valves that may fail or malfunction, among other suggestions.
Sutherland said companies should know that “if you are engaged in an action that is non-routine, you take the time to have the appropriate procedures and policies in place prior to engaging in that activity.”
A spokesman for PBR Energy did not respond to a request for comment May 18.
The board now has seven other pending investigations:
• April 2017: Loy-Lange Box Co. explosion,
• February 2017: Packaging Corporation of America welding explosion,
• November 2016: ExxonMobil Corp. Baton Rouge, La. chemical release and fire,
• October 2016: MGPI Processing Inc. Atchison, Kan. chemical release,
• August 2016: Sunoco Logistics Partners L.P. Nederland, Texas terminal facility fire,
• June 2016: Enterprise Pascagoula Gas Plant, Pascagoula, Miss., explosion and fire, and
• November 2014: DuPont LaPorte facility, LaPorte, Texas, chemical release.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997724&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997724&jd=111997724
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California Refineries Face Tougher Safety Rules, Balk at Costs
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Carolyn Whetzel
New safety standards require California oil refineries to anticipate and prevent major accidents, but industry groups are voicing concerns about the rules.
California's Division of Occupational Safety and Health approved a new workplace safety and health regulation May 18, designed to better protect workers and nearby communities from chemical releases, fires and other incidents.
The Western States Petroleum Association “always supports improving refinery process safety,” but it has concerns with the regulation,” the organization's president, Catherine Reheis-Boyd, told Bloomberg BNA in an email statement.
“We're concerned with the implementation deadline and how these new and over-reaching requirements unduly burden a critical California industry. This is another case of agencies writing new regulations because they think it's a good idea and working out the details later, without regard to the impact on our business economy or workforce.”
The new refinery safety order will move refineries from controlling risks to substantially reducing and preventing risks, Mike Wilson, director of Occupational and Environmental Health at the BlueGreen Alliance, told Bloomberg BNA May 18. BlueGreen Alliance works with labor and environmental organizations on policy issues like worker safety.
“This is a fundamental shift,” Wilson said of the updated regulation. The safety order also gives skilled workers a role in making safety decisions, he said.
Cal/OSHA's Process Safety Management Unit will enforce the updated regulation, which grew out of recommendations the state task force formed following chemical release and fire at Chevron's Richmond refinery in 2012.
Neither the Chevron incident nor the 2015 accident at the Exxon Mobil refinery in Torrance would have happened if these rules were in place then, Wilson said.
“This is the most protective regulation in the nation for the safety and health of refinery workers and surrounding communities,” Department of Industrial Relations Director Christine Baker said in a written statement.
Key elements of the regulation require reviews of equipment and material degradation, analysis of human factors like staffing and training, root causes analyses and process hazard analysis.
The rules require adoption of the industry's best engineering and management practices, which some California refineries have put in place, Cal/OSHA said. Still too many refineries have experienced major incidents that pose a risk to workers, neighboring communities and disrupt fuel services, Cal/OSHA said.
The federal Chemical Safety Board has completed five accident investigations in California since 2001, four of which were at oil refineries at big name companies like Tesoro and Exxon Mobil.
A corresponding regulation through the California Accidental Release Prevention program will be submitted for approval in coming weeks. That regulation will aim to prevent the accidental release of hazardous substances.
The Office of Administrative Law has 30 days to review and approve the regulation.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997730&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997730&jd=111997730
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Ethanol Shipping Fuels Controversy
May 19, 2017 | Urban Milwaukee
By Graham Kilmer
A small strip of land at Milwaukee’s port has become a point of controversy now that an energy company wants to ship ethanol from there.
U.S. Oil, a terminal operator, marketer and distributor of fuels and renewable energy products and a subsidiary of U.S. Venture Inc. headquartered in Appleton, operates a terminal on Jones Island that stores canola oil and biodiesel and transports it via train and truck.
Representatives from the company went before the Common Council’s Public Works Committee Wednesday seeking an amendment to their lease allowing them to secure land, about .8 acres, to build a small pipeline between their Jones Island terminal and the liquid cargo dock at the Port of Milwaukee, thus allowing them to ship cargo from the port.
“The primary cargo that we’ve been looking at for a number of years is ethanol,” said Richard Sawall, director of business development for U.S. Oil. “Wisconsin has a very strong ethanol industry and it’s an export market for the state. So we’ve always looked at Jones Island as an outlet for that product, for international markets primarily.”
But citizens and aldermen raised concerns about the increased traffic of ethanol, federally classified as highly hazardous and flammable, into Milwaukee, as well as the possibility that the small project could turn the city into a hub for transporting crude oil and other fuels through the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Seaway. Underlining all their concerns is the fear of a spill or accident and the danger it poses to local residents and the environment.
The measure was approved unanimously, though not without pointed reservations by committee members, and next goes to the full council.
The original lease was approved by the council and signed by the Mayor Tom Barrett in 2014. In that lease, the city agreed to allow U.S. Oil access to the water shipment terminal. But at the time there was no agreement in place as to how they would gain access or for what cargo.
Sawall said that denying the lease, and thereby access to the lake, could constitute a breach of contract allowing them out of their 10- year lease. An attorney for the city corroborated this reading of the language.
“We’ve invested millions of dollars in improving that asset,” Sawall said.
Aldermen Nik Kovac and Jim Bohl voted for approval of the amendment but objected ethically to the project.
“At this point, I think our back is to the wall in terms of the overall lease,” Bohl said. “I may wind up not supporting it and abstaining or doing something else at council.”
U.S. Oil operates three other port terminals on the Great Lakes, one of them in Green Bay. If the pipeline is built, the company has a 60,000-barrel barge they would use to transport liquid cargo, like ethanol, on the Great Lakes. One barrel is 42 gallons, so their barge holds about 2.5 million gallons.
The U.S. Oil terminal essentially acts as a rail and truck terminal on Jones Island right now, but is mostly used for storage. Sawall said the current volume is “not rateable” as it varies from month to month, but, “Average, you’re talking a couple trucks a day.”
Sawall said this terminal held ethanol years ago. And U.S. Oil has already been given a permit by the Department of Natural Resources for ethanol at the Jones Island terminal, said Chris Gray, the project engineer, so they could store ethanol now, but currently do not.
Concerns abound over project?
Kovac noted that once U.S. Oil starts transporting ethanol, using their pipeline to the liquid cargo dock, they would be able to also start transporting crude oil with proper permitting from state and federal agencies.
Kovac said he had faith in the employees of the permitting agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency and the DNR, but questioned state and federal leadership of them.
“I say this in all seriousness, (as to) the federal and state government protecting us in is the permitting process, I have a lot less comfort in the state since 2010 and a lot less comfort in the country since 2017,” he said. “Our lease here is perhaps our main lever of environmental control.”
Kovac also noted comments made by Sawall to trade journals about U.S. Oil using its Jones Island terminal to ship crude oil.
A story in the January/February 2015 issue of Canadian Shipper read, “U.S. Oil is considering the Jones Island terminal at the Port of Milwaukee” to ship Canadian crude through the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence seaway.
Another report from Canadian Sailings on March 16, 2015 attributed a description of the potential operation to Sawall saying, “Jones Island would receive crude via rail in volumes ranging from 5,000 to 60,000 barrels.”
But Sawall told the committee it was “unlikely” his company would ship crude oil out of Milwaukee’s port if it had other business like ethanol, saying the market for shipping crude oil is less lucrative then for shipping ethanol.
“I don’t think it’s crazy to think that they’re gonna come back with crude, just based on Mr. Sawall’s previous comments,” Kovac said, and “if the federal government stops subsidizing ethanol, which I think is not an unlikely scenario.”
As long as there has been a capital investment in infrastructure like a pipeline, firms will use them, Kovac said.
“Infrastructure is destiny,” he added, “a concept made famous in the movie we’ve all seen, Field of Dreams — ‘If you build it they will come’.”
Eric Hansen, of Citizens Acting for Rail Safety, said his organization is seriously concerned about the safety and environmental risks associated with an increased volume in hazardous materials that would be trafficked into Milwaukee via truck or rail if the pipeline is built.
“We seem to be setting up a magnet for high hazard, flammable material,” he said.
Hansen said he wants more public discussion about what Milwaukee’s position should be before it accepts that more hazardous materials will be brought into the city, in light of potential derailments or accidents during transport to the Jones Island terminal. The freshwater in Lake Michigan is a natural resource for Milwaukee, Hansen said, and leaders should think twice before potentially endangering it.
According to Don Johnston, director of environmental quality for U.S. Venture, the parent company of U.S. Oil, the ethanol that would be handled in the Jones Island terminal is “denatured ethanol” which is 95 percent ethanol and five percent natural gasoline, “basically a condensate of natural gas,” Johnston said.
In the event of a spill, the ethanol would dissolve into the lake water and sap the oxygen from the immediate area, killing plant and animal life. The natural gasoline would form a “sheen” on the surface water
Johnston said the company does have a disaster plan in place for any spill or accident that happens at their terminal. He said they work closely with and donate to the Milwaukee Fire Department so that they have the necessary equipment on hand for an ethanol fire. Their plan for responding to a spill in the lake includes containing the natural gasoline sheen with booms and collecting it with skimmers.
“Damage should be minimal,” Johnston said.
An attorney for the city said the company would be liable for an event like that, and that their lease stipulates that they carry a $2 to $4 million insurance policy.
Committee member, Ald. Robert Bauman, maintained that this hearing was not the place to mete out discontent with the shipping of hazardous materials, as it is simply a land deal.
“You can’t stop the petroleum industry at this council meeting,” he said.
Bauman also said the transport hazard by truck or train is beyond the scope of U.S. Oil’s jurisdiction, as they use third parties for that transport.
Bohl noted that transport routes like this are regulated by the state’s Department of Transportation, but said his confidence in the department has been reduced, adding “They are continuously defunded by state government as well.”
Bauman said he too has concerns about petroleum products, but also made the case that fuels are in demand and need to be transported somehow.
“And frankly, we need a little dose of reality here,” he said to the rail safety advocates, “maybe we should limit testimony to everyone who came here on foot or on horseback.”
http://urbanmilwaukee.com/2017/05/18/ethanol-shipping-fuels-controversy/
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May 19, 2017 | RailwayAge Magazine
By Stuart Chirls
Wabtec Corp. announced it has signed a contract worth about $40 million to design, install, test and commission Positive Train Control (PTC) for the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, operator of the Tri-Rail commuter service.
Under the contract, Wabtec will provide its Interoperable Electronic Train Management System (I-ETMS®) equipment for 42 locomotives and cab cars; a back-office server, wayside communications and signals; a dispatch system; training, and system integration. Installation is expected to be completed by the end of 2018.
Tri-Rail operates more than 70 miles of track along the east coast of Florida between Mangonia Park and the Miami Intermodal Center.
Wabtec said the SFRTA’s PTC system will be fully interoperable with the system being implemented by all Class 1 railroads.
http://www.railwayage.com/index.php/ptc/tri-rail-signs-wabtec-for-ptc.html
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Top Federal Environment Lawyer Outlines Trump Priorities
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Renee Schoof
A priority in Justice Department environmental work is looking at what cases should be reviewed for possible changes in line with Trump administration policies, the top environmental attorney representing the federal government said at a law conference May 18.
The Environment and Natural Resources Division also is being kept busy hearing from private attorneys asking for reconsideration of many of the nearly 7,000 cases and matters pending before it, something that happens in every new administration, the division's chief, Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey H. Wood, said at an American Bar Association event in Washington.
“We spend a lot of time on the rules and regulations that are going to be revisited. That's a big part of it,” Wood said, citing a number of high-profile cases that are being reviewed, such as the Clean Power Plan—which would put carbon dioxide limits on power plants—and rules involving energy production on federal lands.
But Wood also said environmental enforcement is a priority in the Trump administration, with an emphasis on helping companies comply with laws and Justice Department collaboration with state regulators.
“Where the law has been broken and environmental harm ensues, the Department of Justice will take action and protect the environment and public health,” he said.
Wood is a former energy, environment and transportation counsel for Attorney General Jeff Sessions when Sessions was a Republican U.S. senator from Alabama. Wood went on to lobby for Southern Co. and its Alabama Power Co. subsidiary and advised the Trump campaign. He has recused himself from the Clean Power Plan and other cases.Wood told the ABA conference that the administration believed “a compliance-based approach can be win-win.” He was referring to helping businesses understand how they can comply with environmental regulations so they don't end up facing legal cases.
“I think you're going to see the agencies take a close look at compliance options before you come in with the heavy hand of enforcement,” Wood told Bloomberg BNA after the talk.
New Leadership at ENRD
The administration is still in the early stages, with leadership at the Justice Department and agencies still just coming on board, Wood said.
The Senate on May 18 confirmed Rachel Brand as associate attorney general, overseeing the environment division.
In addition, two other political appointees recently joined the division: Deputy Assistant Attorney General Eric Grant and Special Assistant and Counsel Brandon Middleton, Wood said. He also praised the hundreds of career attorneys working at the department.
“We're doing the best we can to make sure the trains run on time,” he said. “Most of what happens is not the controversial stuff that will be revisited. It's enforcing the laws and defending the agencies—what we've always done.”
Worker Enforcement Initiative
Also continuing is the Worker Endangerment Initiative of 2015, the joint Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration work on criminal prosecutions.
The policy allows for bigger penalties under environmental laws than under Occupational Health and Safety Act.
“A lot of policies of the previous administration may be revisited at the appropriate time, but now those cases are going forward,” Wood said in response to a question from the audience about the initiative. “In fact, we have some new ones we're looking at.”
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997725&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997725&jd=111997725
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NAS Panel to Develop Carbon Capture Research Agenda
May 18, 2017 | Inside EPA
Even as the Trump administration proposes to end federal climate research at EPA and other agencies, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is launching a study sponsored by the agencies that will provide advice on their future research agendas for carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).
NAS will host May 24 its first meeting on the study, “Developing a Research Agenda for Carbon Dioxide Removal and Reliable Sequestration,” an event that suggests continued high-level focus on the technology even as the administration pulls back on climate policy.
At that meeting, representatives from the study's sponsors -- EPA, DOE, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the United States Geological Survey and the V. Kann Rasumussen Foundation -- will speak.
According to a brief description, the study will focus on carbon dioxide removal technologies, aiming to “develop a detailed research and development agenda needed to assess the benefits, risks, and sustainable scale potential for carbon dioxide removal and sequestration approaches and increase their commercial viability.”
NAS outlines four goals for the study: to identify “the most urgent unanswered scientific and technical questions” needed to both assess benefits, risks and potential of CCS approaches and increase their commercial viability; to define “essential components” of a research and development program designed to answers those questions; to assess costs and benefits of that program; and to recommend means for implementation of the program.
“These approaches have been garnering new attention as the international community has identified lower thresholds for global temperature increases, which can only be accomplished with net negative carbon emissions to the atmosphere,” the study's description reads. “However, many of these [CO2 removal] technologies are not yet viable in terms of cost and scalability, and any potential risks that deployment of these technologies would entail are not fully understood.”
While the funds for this study may have been provided to the Obama administration, the NAS study comes as the Trump administration has pledged to end funding for CCS research and slash funding for other clean energy technologies in its proposed fiscal year 2018 budget.
“We’re not spending money on [climate research] anymore. We consider that to be a waste of your money,” White House budget director Mick Mulvaney told reporters March 16.
At EPA, Administrator Scott Pruitt is supporting White House plans to cut the agency's research office budget by 43 percent, in large part by eliminating its focus on climate research.
In addition, recent reports indicate that the Trump administration will propose a more than 50 percent cut to DOE's fossil energy office, which has largely focused on CCS research and development.
“It would be very difficult, especially on the carbon capture front, to keep some of the promises that the administration made to the coal community if it's not going very deep on innovation in this space,” Rich Powell of ClearPath, a conservative group that supports clean energy, told Axios of the potential DOE cuts.
Nevertheless, the administration has expressed interest in boosting CCS, and has taken some steps to help the technology domestically. For example, EPA earlier this month proposed to approve North Dakota as the first state to win “primacy” for issuing Safe Drinking Water Act permits for CCS wells. That proposal will appear in the May 19 Federal Register.
The NAS study, according to its description, intends to explore a number of CO2 removal approaches, including: “land management, accelerated weathering, bioenergy with capture, direct air capture, geologic sequestration, blue carbon approaches, and other approaches deemed by the study committee to be of similar viability.”
The committee conducting the study includes various CCS experts, and it is chaired by Stephen Pacala, a professor at Princeton University and co-director of Princeton's Carbon Mitigation Initiative.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/nas-panel-develop-carbon-capture-research-agenda
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Trump Acting as Climate ‘Bully’ Galvanizes Work at UN Talks
May 19, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jessica Shankleman
President Donald Trump's threat to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement on climate change has catalyzed envoys from much of the rest of the world working to give the deal a boost at United Nations talks in Germany this week.
Diplomats from more than 190 nations gathered in Bonn are due May 18 to conclude two weeks of discussions putting finer details on measures agreed to in Paris in 2015 to curb the pollution behind global warming.
Known for bickering over fine details and recurring divisions between richer and poorer nations over how to pay for the impact of warmer temperatures, the envoys have been unusually cooperative in reaching a deal this week, delegates and observers gathered in Bonn said.
“We're very concerned about what's going to happen if the U.S. pulls out,,” William Calvo, adjunct chief negotiator at Costa Rica's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in an interview. “However, we're all together on this. You can see in the room—we're together, we're working. Things are moving.”
Their willingness to cooperate may be driven by the potential for the richest nation at the talks to withdraw from the deal. Trump has called climate change a “hoax” and vowed to scrap Paris, though his advisers are divided on the issue and the administration hasn't yet confirmed its policy. In the absence of a new stance from the U.S., the UN envoys are moving forward.
“We're actually not preparing for that, and we're rather hoping they stay in the talks,” said Patricia Espinosa, the United Nations climate change chief, in an interview in Bonn May 17. “We know that we need to wait and see what kind of decisions are taken.”
The European Union May 18 said it would contribute 800 million euros ($890 million) as part of a partnership with 79 nations from the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States to support the Paris Accord.
“We, developed and developing countries together, will defend the Paris Agreement,” Miguel Arias Canete, European commissioner for climate action and energy, said in an emailed statement about the partnership. “We are all in, and our joint commitment to this agreement today is as in Paris: irreversible and non-negotiable.”
As they adjourn May 18, the envoys are likely to agree on:
• The outline of draft negotiation text for the “Paris rulebook,” a set of guidelines for implementing the 2015 deal. This would be a sort of operating manual for countries on how to use the agreement to advance climate action over the coming decades.
• Preparations for a global stocktaking of emissions in 2018, known as the Facilitative Dialogue. This is a key moment that will help countries get ready for 2020 when they are required to submit more ambitious climate action plans.
• Work toward a two-year budget for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which will affect support from the secretariat for the talks.
Trump's advisers are divided on the issue. Several of Trump's top advisers are pushing him to exit, including chief strategist Stephen Bannon and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt. The president's daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner, along with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, have been urging him to remain in the deal.
Businesses including Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Apple Inc., Facebook Inc. and big oil companies like Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell Plc as well as ex-military brass have all been putting pressure on Trump to stay in the Paris agreement.
“The U.S. has been playing hardball, saying it doesn't have a position on certain elements of the talks, and that's been rubbing a lot of people up the wrong way,” Alden Meyer, director of strategy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an advocacy group, said. “Countries are showing they are not going to bow down to pressure, not wanting to cower before a bully.”
American View
A handful of U.S. State Department officials are engaged in the talks in Bonn but sidestepped questions about the direction of Trump's policy. Trigg Talley, the lead U.S. envoy from Washington, said at a briefing on May 12 that the overarching priority of the U.S. is to strengthen its economy and national security.
“In this broader context our climate policies are under review” Talley told reporters in Bonn on May 12. “The administration had not yet developed a formal policy on climate change, and that includes both domestic and international climate change issues generally.” He declined to provide any new details in Bonn May 17.
Roadblock
Any decision by the U.S. to pull out of Paris or stay in and water down its targets would be a major roadblock to the agreement's success. The U.S. confirmed May 12 it won't give any money this year to the Green Climate Fund, which enables rich countries to help poorer ones deal with the worst impacts of climate change.
“There may be changes in the future, but we are optimistic of the existing situation,” said Debasu Bayleyegn Eyasu, director general of the climate change coordination directorate and the environment ministry of Ethiopia.
Oil exporter Nigeria May 17 became the 146th country to ratify the Paris deal, and India last week said it would pursue clean energy “irrespective of what others do.” The coal-reliant country also announced that it plans to sell only electric cars by the end of the next decade.
Negotiation Strategy
Some countries panicked earlier this month when the Trump administration raised a debate about Article 4.11 in the Paris deal, which says a nation “may at any time adjust its existing nationally determined contribution with a view to enhancing its level of ambition.” Rather than be drawn into a debate about whether the words are meant to ratchet up ambition for fighting climate change, negotiators sidestepped the issue.
“After a while they realized it's a trick and they need to be smarter in their response,” Yamide Dagnet, senior associate at the World Resources Institute, said in an interview. As a result, the talks haven't seen the “agenda fight” that usually occurs at intersession talks that come with UN gatherings of the envoys who discuss global climate deals.
“The mood is pretty good, and everybody's is on board and working pretty hard,” said Aziz Mekouar, the lead negotiations for Morocco. “We've made a lot of progress. This session has been very positive.”
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=111997710&vname=dennotallissues&fn=111997710&jd=111997710
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EPA to Set Aside $12 Million for Buyouts in Coming Months
May 18, 2017 | Washington Post
By Brady Dennis
The Environmental Protection Agency plans to set aside $12 million for buyouts and early retirements in coming months, as part of an effort to begin “reshaping” the agency’s workforce under the Trump administration.
In a memo, the EPA’s acting chief financial officer, David Bloom, said the move is how the agency plans to spend part of roughly $24 million in “carry-over funds” — essentially, money that was not spent in the previous fiscal year and is rolled over to the current one.
Beyond the looming buyouts, the memo details $800,000 allocated for travel expenses for EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s security detail, $1.4 million for cloud-computing services and other data storage, and $2 million for consolidating the agency’s physical footprint.
“Senior leadership made decisions to allocate the carry-over funds set aside earlier this year to address agency’s priorities for incentive payments for workforce reshaping, support for the Office of Enforcement and Compliance (OGC), travel for the Administrator’s protective detail, rent, continued space reduction efforts, eDiscovery, agency cloud services and the OGC’s workforce support,” Bloom wrote.
“Streamlining and reorganizing is good government and important to maximizing taxpayer dollars. This includes looking at developing opportunities for individuals to retire early,” EPA spokeswoman Liz Bowman said in a statement. “It’s a process that mirrors what the Obama Administration EPA did about four years ago, to ensure that payroll expenses do not overtake funds used for vital programs to protect the environment.”
An initial White House budget for fiscal 2018 proposed slashing the EPA’s budget by 31 percent and its 15,000-employee workforce by more than 3,000 people. The administration is likely to revise those numbers when it unveils an updated budget proposal early next week, though the EPA is still expected to face deep cuts. Congress would have to approve any such plan.
Last month, the EPA made clear it intended to begin offering buyouts as part of its response to an executive order by President Trump aimed at streamlining agencies throughout the federal government. Acting deputy administrator Mike Flynn wrote in a letter to regional administrators and other EPA officials that the White House had asked agencies to start taking “immediate actions” aimed at reducing their workforce.
“In light of this guidance, we will begin the steps necessary to initiate an early out/buy out … program,” he wrote, adding that the goal is to complete the first buyouts by the end of September.
Flynn also noted that while a government-wide hiring freeze had been lifted, hiring at the EPA would remain at a standstill. “Given our resource situation, we will continue a freeze on external hiring,” he said. “Very limited exceptions to this external hiring freeze may be permitted on a case-by-case basis.”
Neither that letter nor this week’s memo contained details about how much the EPA plans to shrink its workforce.
There are two main ways the agency could entice employees to leave. A buyout — also known as a “voluntary separation incentive payment,” or VSIP — is a cash payment to encourage a federal worker to leave voluntarily. In most cases, the maximum payout is $25,000, which is taxable. Employees who accept a buyout must leave by a specific date and can’t return to federal employment within five years unless they repay the entire, pretax buyout amount.
Voluntary Early Retirement Authority (VERA), in federal lingo, allows federal employees to retire before they typically would qualify for full benefits. Early retirement generally allows employees under either of the federal government’s main retirement systems — the Civil Service Retirement System and the Federal Employees Retirement System — to retire at age 50 with 20 years of service or at any age with 25 years of service.
In 2014, during the Obama administration, the EPA paid more than $11 million in incentives to compel 436 employees to voluntarily leave their jobs. It also paid accumulated annual leave payments of $4.9 million, for a total of $16.2 million, according to EPA union officials.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/05/18/epa-to-set-aside-12-million-for-buyouts-in-coming-months/?utm_term=.752bc308ad8e
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