Preview Newsletter
ACC Sunday 28/05
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(ACC Mentioned) Chemical Hub Pitched For Appalachia
May 29, 2017 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Marc S. Reisch
A four-state region in Appalachia could become a petrochemical supply and manufacturing hub on par with similar hubs on the U.S. Gulf Coast. -
(ACC Mentioned) 3 Reasons the Oil Industry's Bet on Plastics May Not Reap Big Rewards
May 26, 2017 | Chem Info
By Meagan Parrish
The increase in building projects in the Gulf Coast region has been staggering. The American Chemistry Council estimates that chemical industry announced investments linked to affordable natural gas has reached $179 billion so far. -
(ACC Mentioned) On EPA Scientific Integrity, Wall Street Journal is Short of Facts
May 26, 2017 | Union of Concerned Scientists
By Gretchen Goldman
An opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal misrepresents the facts about an annual meeting on scientific integrity at the EPA and the role of the EPA scientific integrity officer. -
Clariant And Huntsman To Join In $20 Billion Deal
May 29, 2017 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Melody M. Bomgardner
Swiss specialty chemical company Clariant will combine with U.S. chemical maker Huntsman Corp. in a merger of equals valued at about $20 billion. By joining, the companies hope to become a larger operation better positioned to compete, expand profits, and reduce costs. -
Budget Cuts Seen Limiting EPA's Ability to Implement Deregulatory Push
May 26, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Abby Smith
The White House plan to drastically cut EPA's budget and workforce could, if enacted, undermine its ability to comply with President Donald Trump's deregulatory orders, observers say, complicating what could already be a difficult feat for an agency that faces many statutory and legal obligations to regulate. -
(ACC Mentioned) EPA to Clear Backlog of New Chemical Approvals by July
May 30, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The backlog of new chemicals being reviewed by the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to be cleared by July due to staffing, policy and procedural changes the agency has made. -
(ACC Mentioned) Blood Test Guidelines Released By Department Of Health Give 'False Sense Of Security', Residents Say
May 27, 2017 | Newcastle Herlad
By Carrie Fellner
Williamtown residents are being told to feel "reassured" if they have toxic chemicals in their blood at levels seven times higher than what is considered safe in Germany. -
(ACC Mentioned) Plastics-to-Fuel Technology Proven to Have Sustainable Advantages
May 27, 2017 | Packaging World
By Anne Marie Mohan
Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), part of the U.S. Department of Energy, has determined that using pyrolysis to convert non-recycled plastics into ultra-low-sulfur diesel (ULSD) fuel results in significant energy and environmental benefits. -
Florida Pipeline's Legal Battles Persist After Construction
May 30, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Chris Marr
The owners of almost 700 miles of new pipeline into Florida aim to start the flow of natural gas in June—if federal regulators give the go-ahead despite objections and lawsuits from the Sierra Club and others. -
US Agency Won't Let Company Resume Drilling for Gas Pipeline
May 27, 2017 | AP (in The New York Times)
A federal agency has told a company building a high-pressure natural gas pipeline it cannot resume drilling beneath creeks in southeast Ohio and northern West Virginia. -
Targa Planning $1.3B Grand Prix NGL Pipeline in Texas, Prices Public Stock Offering
May 26, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Targa Resources Corp. said it plans to build a $1.3 billion natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline to connect the Permian Basin and the company's North Texas gathering system to its fractionation and storage complex at the NGL market hub at Mont Belvieu, TX. -
Saudi Arabia’s Motiva Plans For Billions In Texas Growth
May 26, 2017 | FuelFix
By Jordan Blum
Saudi Arabia’s Motiva Enterprises said it plans to spend billions of dollars more to expand its Port Arthur Refinery — already North America’s largest — and grow more in the petrochemical and refining sectors. -
Fire Kills One, Injuries Three at Anadarko Tank Battery in Colorado
May 28, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tripp Baltz
An Anadarko Petroleum Co. oil tank battery caught fire in Mead, Colo., killing one worker and injuring three others. -
US Safety Board to Probe Plant Explosion in West Virginia
May 26, 2017 | AP (in The New York Times)
An independent national agency is joining investigations into this week's explosion at a West Virginia industrial plant that left the owner and an employee dead. -
California Wants to Prevent 'Bomb Trains' From Running Through Neighborhoods
May 26, 2017 | Sacramento Bee
By Angela Hart
California’s chief law enforcement officer wants to prevent rail cars carrying highly flammable, potentially explosive crude oil from cutting through cities across California, including Sacramento. -
Trump Decides Next Week If He'll Quit Paris Climate Accord
May 27, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Joe Ryan & Josh Wingrove
Donald Trump continued to distance himself from fellow world leaders over climate change at the G-7 summit, and said he’ll determine next week whether to pull the U.S. out of the landmark Paris climate accord. -
What if US Quits Climate Deal? Doesn't Look Good for Earth
May 27, 2017 | AP (in the Washington Post)
By Seth Borenstein
Earth is likely to reach more dangerous levels of warming even sooner if the U.S. retreats from its pledge to cut carbon dioxide pollution, scientists said. That’s because America contributes so much to rising temperatures. -
A Delay on Cap-and-Trade Vote Would be a Victory for Donald Trump, Gov. Jerry Brown's Office Says
May 26, 2017 | LA Times
By Chris Megerian
Despite hesitance and resistance from state lawmakers, Gov. Jerry Brown is refusing to budge from his goal of reaching a deal next month to extend California's cap-and-trade program. -
EPA Appeals Ruling Setting Deadlines On Risk Reviews Of Air Toxics Rules
May 26, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA is appealing a federal district court ruling imposing deadlines for the agency to conduct long-overdue reviews of whether to revise 13 air toxics rules to address risks to human health, planning to ask the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to overturn the decision that is one of two such deadline rulings. -
Trump DOJ Urges Justices To Pass On Equipment-Breakdown Case
May 26, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Amanda Reilly
The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to pass on a case challenging an Obama-era policy requiring industrial facilities to meet air pollution rules even when equipment breaks down.
Industry and Association News
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Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) Chemical Hub Pitched For Appalachia
May 29, 2017 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Marc S. Reisch
A four-state region in Appalachia could become a petrochemical supply and manufacturing hub on par with similar hubs on the U.S. Gulf Coast.
That’s the thesis of a new report from the American Chemistry Council. The trade association envisions underground cavern storage facilities and an 800-km pipeline for ethane, propane, ethylene, and propylene “along an arc stretching from Monaca, Pa., to Catlettsburg, Ky., including a spur to serve the Charleston, W.Va., area.”
Driven by a surfeit of natural gas liquids from the Marcellus, Utica, and Rogersville shale formations in the northeastern U.S., the $10 billion storage hub and pipeline could create 100,000 permanent jobs by 2025, the trade group says. Included in that tally are 25,000 chemical and plastic manufacturing jobs, 43,000 supplier jobs, and 32,000 additional jobs in communities where workers spend their earnings.
The report envisions five big ethylene crackers built in the Ohio River Valley. Along with them will be projects for polyethylene, other derivatives, and propane dehydrogenation. All told, the report suggests, chemical makers could invest nearly $36 billion.
So far, though, the only definite project is Shell’s cracker and polyethylene plant in Monaca. PTT Global Chemical is considering a cracker in Mead Township, Ohio, but has yet to put steel in the ground. In 2015, Braskem put off a cracker and polyethylene project it was considering in West Virginia.
U.S. Sens. Shelley Capito (R-W.Va.), Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) are backing the concept of a petrochemical hub. The three introduced a bill on May 9 directing the government to conduct a feasibility study of an Appalachian ethane storage hub.
https://cen.acs.org/articles/95/i22/Chemical-hub-pitched-Appalachia.html
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(ACC Mentioned) 3 Reasons the Oil Industry's Bet on Plastics May Not Reap Big Rewards
May 26, 2017 | Chem Info
By Meagan Parrish
Early this month, we reported the building boom in the petrochemicals industry, and the potential for an oncoming bust.
The increase in building projects in the Gulf Coast region has been staggering. The American Chemistry Council estimates that chemical industry announced investments linked to affordable natural gas has reached $179 billion so far.
Most of these projects are ethane cracker plants that produce ethylene, a primary building block in most plastics. And many of the firms shelling out the cash for these new plants are Big Oil companies, including Shell, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and even Total, a French oil, natural gas and solar energy company.
Will these billion-dollar gambles reap big rewards? According to a recent report in The Wall Street Journal, there are three major trends that could derail the push towards plastics.An Oncoming Glut
As noted in the WSJ, the chemical sector has a tendency to overbuild. Some companies, like Dow, are starting to sense that the industry could be approaching max capacity and scaling back new projects related to polyethylene.
Overcapacity could also be created by recessions around the world. Because demand for plastics is closely tied to GDP, if countries like China and India slip into hard times, it quickly trigger a troublesome glut in the U.S.Plastics’ Bad Rap
The problem of plastics pollution is in the news almost daily — especially when it comes to ocean pollution. The concern around the environmental impact of plastics — which can take hundreds of years to biodegrade — is only increasing, which is leading to more consumers seeking alternatives, and more companies looking to develop them.
It is typically difficult for bio-based chemical companies to compete with the price of petrochemicals, but the demand for environmentally friendly alternatives is still likely to increase. And as bioplastics become more price competitive, they’ll have the feel-good edge over traditional plastics.Increasing Regulation
Because of these concerns, governments around the world have been stepping up efforts to curb the use of plastics. Ireland, for example, imposed a tax on plastic bags in 2002 to reduce pollution.
Several places in America have also begun to restrict the use of plastic bags. In 2015, California imposed an outright ban on retailers sending shoppers home with plastic bags.
All told, these factors could weigh on demand for plastics. While plastic remains one of the most commonly used materials in the world, the tide is turning against it, and the future of the plastics business may not be as bright as petrochemical producers hope.
https://www.chem.info/news/2017/05/3-reasons-oil-industrys-bet-plastics-may-not-reap-big-rewards
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(ACC Mentioned) On EPA Scientific Integrity, Wall Street Journal is Short of Facts
May 26, 2017 | Union of Concerned Scientists
By Gretchen Goldman
An opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal misrepresents the facts about an annual meeting on scientific integrity at the EPA and the role of the EPA scientific integrity officer. Here are some details about what that meeting is and the role of federal agency scientific integrity officers. Scientific integrity at federal agencies
Let’s start with the basics. Scientific integrity policies were created at federal agencies in response to cases of political interference in science and the need for policies and practices that protect the role of science and scientists in the government. Now, 28 federal agencies have scientific integrity policies in place and many have scientific integrity officers that oversee the policy.
For example, the EPA’s Scientific Integrity Policy affirms these commonsense and noncontroversial expectations of all agency employees:Ensure that the Agency’s scientific work is of the highest quality, free from political interference or personal motivations.Represent his/her own work fairly and accurately.Appropriately characterize, convey, and acknowledge the intellectual contributions of others.Avoid conflicts of interest and ensure impartiality.Be cognizant of and understand the specific programmatic statutes that guide their work.Welcome differing views and opinions on scientific and technical matters as a legitimate and necessary part of the scientific process.
At EPA, the scientific integrity officer oversees a committee comprised of federal agency scientists. This committee is empowered to investigate allegations of political interference; these allegations can come from anyone. For example, if a coal company thought that Obama administration officials were misrepresenting science in developing power plant rules, they could file a complaint and it would be investigated. If an environmental group thinks that scientific analysis was suppressed to justify an industry-friendly decision, they could file a complaint and it would be investigated.
Importantly and intentionally, the scientific integrity officer is a civil servant not a political appointee so that they can properly investigate inappropriate political influence over the use of science at the agency.
Importantly, the role of the scientific integrity policy (and officer) isn’t about policy at all. The scientific integrity officer does not have authority over the Clean Power Plan, or air pollution standards, or whether or not to protect the public from a toxic pesticide. Rather, the scientific integrity policy is in place to ensure that the science that goes into policy decisions is not suppressed, distorted, or manipulated, and that scientists who work for EPA are able to do their work free from political interference. With these policies in place and fully implemented, it is more likely that scientific information can effectively inform policy decisions. Again, that is just common sense.
And to be clear, ensuring scientific integrity is important no matter what political party is in charge. All modern presidents have politicized science in some way. Here, for example, is a sampling of scientific integrity criticisms I and my colleagues had of the Obama administration. The problems span agencies and issue areas—from drug approvals to endangered species to media access to government scientists.The EPA Annual Stakeholder Meeting on Scientific Integrity
The Environmental Protection Agency has taken scientific integrity seriously and devoted resources to approaching it in a transparent and thoughtful way. Part of that approach has been to have an annual stakeholder meeting led by the agency scientific integrity officer after the annual report is published.
The meeting, which I’ve attended in the past, is designed to provide an opportunity for stakeholders to air any concerns and ask questions about scientific integrity. Here, stakeholders include industry, civil society groups, scientific societies, or anyone else with an interest and stake in scientific integrity.
The meetings started in 2013 as listening session for agency scientific integrity staff to hear from voices both internal and external to the agency. In 2014 and 2015, the agency had separate meetings for civil society groups and industry.
In 2016, at the request of the American Chemistry Council, which represents the chemical manufacturing industry, the meetings were combined. Everyone was in the same room. Nobody complained. There was no controversy. There were no objections from industry.
The EPA has relied on the ACC to invite other industry stakeholders to the meeting and planned to do the same this year. We asked the scientific integrity officer for a list of invitees to last year’s meeting; it includes more than 50 industry affiliates, including representatives from Monsanto, Dow, CropLife America, ExxonMobil, and the American Beverage Association, just to name a few.
It is not a closed meeting and the meeting’s agenda is no secret. So to help demonstrate how non-controversial this meeting really is, my colleague Michael Halpern will be live-tweeting this year’s meeting. In the past, the meetings have centered around the findings of EPA’s annual scientific integrity report—a publicly available document that details scientific integrity cases and progress made at the agency each year. This year the agenda is as follows:
The 2017 Stakeholder MeetingThe Meeting Agenda:Overview of the year’s Scientific Integrity challenges and accomplishments presented by the Scientific Integrity OfficialOpen Q & A
The EPA Scientific Integrity Officer, Francesca Grifo, has for several years been overseeing scientific integrity at the EPA. Dr Grifo, a scientist with a PhD in botany from Cornell University, previously led the scientific integrity program at the Union of Concerned Scientists. You can read more about her position and high qualifications for this job here.Overreactions and underappreciations
The EPA should be lauded for choosing to provide an open and accessible way for those of us outside the agency who care about decision makers having high-quality science and technical data inform decisions to learn more and ask questions. A meeting of stakeholders in business and nonprofits to inform agency work should be a welcomed cornerstone of effective government.
For some reason, since a new administration has come into power, some want to suggest that the meeting is controversial. Notably, nobody from industry has complained about the meeting or the policy. Instead, complaints are coming from one House representative and a Wall Street Journal editorial writer.
Any reader who wants to be more informed about the EPA’s scientific integrity work should read the policy and the annual reports from 2013, 2014, and 2015. I look forward to the meeting and to reporting back on the results.
http://blog.ucsusa.org/gretchen-goldman/on-epa-scientific-integrity-wall-street-journal-is-short-of-facts
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Clariant And Huntsman To Join In $20 Billion Deal
May 29, 2017 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Melody M. Bomgardner
The merger of equals will create the world’s second-largest specialty chemical firm
Swiss specialty chemical company Clariant will combine with U.S. chemical maker Huntsman Corp. in a merger of equals valued at about $20 billion. By joining, the companies hope to become a larger operation better positioned to compete, expand profits, and reduce costs.
The new company will be called HuntsmanClariant. It will combine Huntsman’s advanced materials, performance products, polyurethanes, and textile effects businesses with Clariant’s catalysts, personal care, oil and gas, and plastics and coatings businesses. The two firms expect the deal to close by the end of the year.
With annual sales of more than $13 billion, HuntsmanClariant will vie with Covestro to be the world’s second-largest specialty chemical maker after Evonik Industries.
In a letter to employees, Clariant CEO Hariolf Kottmann said the time is right for the deal. “We are facing an uncertain economic environment with moderate growth and high volatility coupled with political uncertainties,” he said. “When we look at the competitor landscape, we see highly specialized companies like Croda and big players like Evonik—and ourselves stuck in the middle. That’s not where we want to be!”
The planned merger follows years of significant restructuring on the part of both firms. In 2012, Clariant divested its textile and paper chemicals business, and it has recently worked to spin off its plastics and coatings businesses. The latter will stay in the new firm’s portfolio for now.
In 2011, Clariant purchased Süd-Chemie, a maker of catalysts and adsorbants. And it expanded its access to the U.S. oil and gas industry in 2013 when it bought enhanced oil recovery firm Ultimate EOR Services.
Huntsman, for its part, pursued a big merger, with Hexion, in 2008, but the deal fell apart. Huntsman is now separating its pigments and additives business, to be called Venator Materials, in a spin-off to be completed this summer.
Once the merger closes, Huntsman shareholders will own 48% of the new company based on the difference in the values of the two firms’ shares. Peter R. Huntsman, Huntsman’s CEO, will serve as CEO of HuntsmanClariant, and Kottmann will be chair of the board. Clariant’s home base in Pratteln, Switzerland, will be the new firm’s headquarters, and operations will be in The Woodlands, Texas, where Huntsman is based.
Huntsman’s businesses will add some heft to the Swiss specialties firm, analysts say, while Clariant’s strength in R&D will help make Huntsman’s nonspecialty offerings more appealing.
“Huntsman has a large footprint in polyurethanes and undifferentiated products and does not have a lot of research and development or discovery,” points out Ray Will, a specialty and inorganic chemical consultant at IHS Markit. But Huntsman does have customer contacts that Clariant can leverage to sell more of its specialty chemicals.
Overall, HuntsmanClariant aims to sell its polyurethanes, coatings materials, and other chemicals into growing markets such as personal care, packaging, and textiles. The firms’ executives also stress complementary businesses aimed at auto manufacturing.
Will argues that the combined firm’s biggest growth opportunity will be in oil and gas drilling. As operators expand their use of fracking technology to drill more and more miles of horizontal wells, demand for drilling chemicals is rising rapidly, he says.
Huntsman and Clariant say the combined firm will be more profitable than either stand-alone company, in part because of a projected $400 million in annual cost savings. Its combined profit margin of 17.2% will outpace Clariant’s 15.2% and Huntsman’s 13.4%, they say.
The merger continues relentless chemical industry consolidation. Dow Chemical and DuPont expect to complete their historic merger in August. Deals to combine ChemChina and Syngenta, Bayer and Monsanto, and Linde and Praxair continue to advance.
https://cen.acs.org/articles/95/i22/Clariant-Huntsman-join-20-billion.html
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Budget Cuts Seen Limiting EPA's Ability to Implement Deregulatory Push
May 26, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Abby Smith
The White House plan to drastically cut EPA's budget and workforce could, if enacted, undermine its ability to comply with President Donald Trump's deregulatory orders, observers say, complicating what could already be a difficult feat for an agency that faces many statutory and legal obligations to regulate.
“The question I would have for them is: Have they really thought about the resources that will be needed to do the kind of regulatory review they're asking for?” one industry attorney tells Inside EPA. The source notes that “undoing a rule takes just as much effort as doing a rule, in most cases.”
The Trump administration's fiscal year 2018 budget plan, released May 23, proposes a 31 percent cut to EPA's budget, slashing agency spending to $5.655 billion -- a $2.6 billion cut -- and seeking to reduce agency workforce by 25 percent to 11,611 full-time equivalent staffers.
The attorney and others say scaling back resources to those levels may make it difficult to proceed with the notice-and-comment rulemaking process in order to roll back or pare down existing Obama-era climate and environmental regulations.
Trump has signed a series of executive orders (EO) driving his administration's deregulatory agenda, including EO 13783, the energy independence order; EO 13777, which calls for agencies to establish regulatory reform task forces to review existing rules to “repeal, replace or modify”; and EO 13771, better known as the “two-for-one” order that requires agencies to repeal two existing rules for every one new rule and meet a $0 net regulatory cost target.
Some, like the energy independence order, identified specific rules for repeal, including EPA's power plant greenhouse gas rules and its rule regulating methane emissions from new oil and gas sources. A separate EO targeted the Clean Water Act (CWA) jurisdiction rule. EPA has already initiated reviews of these rules.
But the orders also cast a broader net. For example, the March 28 energy independence order outlines a process by which agencies must review existing rules to determine those that potentially burden domestic energy production and appropriately revise or rescind those that “unduly” burden it.
And EPA just ended a comment process to comply with EO 13777 where it sought recommendations from industry and others to identify “burdensome” existing rules for “repeal, replacement or modification,” a process that resulted in scores of rules being nominated for consideration.
The industry attorney says the “question that people aren't really thinking about” is whether the administration can accomplish both goals: to “reduce the burden of unnecessary regulation and dramatically cut EPA's budget.”
The Trump EPA budget plan does specifically include “resources to support the review of the Clean Power Plan,” EPA's GHG standards for existing power plants, though it is unclear the exact level of funding and staff that would be dedicated to this task. The proposal also mentions the agency's ongoing review of the CWA jurisdiction rule, though it does not specify whether resources have been singled out to support that review.
EPA, along with the Army Corps of Engineers, “are implementing” Trump's EO to review the CWA jurisdiction rule “and publish for notice and comment a proposed rule rescinding or revising the rule, as appropriate and consistent with law.”
Additional Funds
The budget request does provide some additional funds to help implement the administration's deregulatory agenda, proposing a $662,000 boost for the Regulatory/Economic, Management and Analysis Program.
According to EPA's budget justification, the increase would help the program oversee implementation of Trump's deregulatory orders, update agency guidelines for assessing rules' cost and benefits, develop “improved” analytical tools to advance EPA's risk assessment methods used in quantifying human health benefits and other functions.
The boost would bring funds for the program from $14.6 million in FY17 to $15.2 million in FY18.
But it is unclear whether the increase in funds for that program would be sufficient to undertake the kind of broad regulatory review and reform Trump outlines for the agency in the deregulatory executive orders.
Despite the modest increase in funds to the regulatory/economic program, the Trump budget proposal includes steep cuts to agency program offices, such as a 47 percent cut from EPA's clean air office and a more than 90 percent cut from the air and radiation office under the environmental programs and management account.
The industry attorney does not have a sense of how involved EPA officials have been in the budget process, but the source is not aware of “any kind of analysis of the resources they would need” to comply with Trump's regulatory reform orders. The source would hope EPA would work with the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) “to figure out the resources it needs to carry out regulatory reform.”
But the attorney adds: “I don't think they've sat down and done that analysis.”
The industry attorney says much of the work EPA does for its various review processes will overlap and ultimately point to the same list of regulations to be repealed or revised. But the source also warns that the processes themselves -- each of which require extensive review and the submission of various plans to the White House -- could hamper the ability of EPA and other agencies to actually carry out the regulatory reforms.
The source compares the predicament to crafting a “to do” list, explaining that taking the time to ensure everything is on the list subtracts from the time one can spend completing the tasks.
The attorney says EPA needs to begin to determine how they will repeal or revise the rules under review. “Ultimately what EPA needs to do is the hard work: developing a proposed rule in a thoughtful way, reviewing the comments, finalizing that rule and doing all that in a way that will stand up in court,” the source says. “Too much time spent on these high-profile public relations efforts is time taken away from the regulatory efforts that ultimately” are going to change the rules.
The industry source also suggests it will be difficult for the Trump administration to make progress on regulatory reform until there are more political appointees at EPA. Thus far, Susan Bodine is the only person to be nominated to fill a sub-cabinet position, as head of EPA's enforcement office. “It really is the assistant administrators and the deputy administrator that really run the regulatory process,” the attorney says, noting that for the review of regulations like the Clean Power Plan or the CWA jurisdiction rule “hundreds of decisions” will have to be made. “If you have to go to the administrator” for each of those decisions “you're not going to get much done.”
In addition, the industry attorney suggests that due to the relatively broad scope of the regulatory review outlined by the Trump administration, EPA officials will need to have some type of “criteria” by which to conduct the process.
'Toughest Time'
Beyond those regulations spelled out in Trump's energy order, Sam Batkins, director of regulatory policy at the American Action Forum (AAF), says actions where EPA has delayed the effective date of existing rules offer signs those regulations are likely to be a focus of regulatory review.
Some such examples include: rules regulating methane emissions from new and existing landfills; the power plant effluent rule; the pesticide applicators rule; and the Risk Management Plan rule.
Batkins and others also say EPA could have an especially difficult time complying with some of the directives in Trump's deregulatory orders, in part because the agency faces statutory and legal requirements to promulgate regulations.
Because of this, he says EPA could have the “toughest time” implementing the two-for-one order in particular. He notes that according to separate analysis by both AAF and OIRA, EPA is typically “the most active regulator in terms of cost,” with $2 billion-$3 billion in regulatory costs per year. And under the two-for-one order, the agency would have to find that much in offsets.
Batkins says AAF has “never found a time when EPA found $2 billion” in regulatory offsets, meaning to meet the two-for-one order requirements, the agency is “really going to have to string together many of these regulatory offsets.” And he notes that the agency's statutory mandates “aren't going to change,” and thus it will face several requirements under the Clean Air Act in terms of national ambient air quality standards and under the updated Toxic Substances Control Act, among others, to promulgate new regulations.
Since 2005, AAF has found 49 instances where EPA reduced regulatory costs, leading to $1.3 billion in fewer annual burdens. “So it's not like Republican and Democratic administrations haven't reduced costs at EPA,” Batkins says, though noting “the scale will be different this time.”
Perhaps making EPA's task more difficult, Batkins adds, is that no EPA rules were repealed by Congress using the Congressional Review Act (CRA), even though lawmakers passed 14 resolutions scrapping various regulations from other agencies. The agencies that did see rules scrapped by the CRA, including the Department of Interior, Department of Education and others, are not “prolific regulators historically,” Batkins explains, noting that those agencies will be able to use CRA credits to offset future regulatory costs under the two-for-one order, while EPA could struggle.
Batkins suggests there were some EPA rules eligible for the CRA process, such as the phase two GHG standards for heavy-duty trucks and the aircraft endangerment finding. But he says politics was likely a driver for why those were not introduced, citing the Senate's failed attempt to pass a resolution scrapping a Bureau of Land Management rule curbing methane leaks from oil and gas sources on federal lands.
Nonetheless, Batkins says it is “not impossible” for EPA to meet its “two-for-one” order goal, especially if it were able to trade with other agencies for credits. That trading program, however, must be approved by the Office of Management & Budget.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/budget-cuts-seen-limiting-epas-ability-implement-deregulatory-push
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(ACC Mentioned) EPA to Clear Backlog of New Chemical Approvals by July
May 30, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The backlog of new chemicals being reviewed by the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to be cleared by July due to staffing, policy and procedural changes the agency has made.
Jeffery Morris, director of EPA's Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics (OPPT), spoke with Bloomberg BNA about adjustments the agency has made that have cut the backlog of manufacturers’ new chemicals requests. The backlog is of pre-manufacture notices (PMNs) the agency is reviewing that currently exceeds its normal volume of about 300 pending requests.
The backlog peaked at about 600 PMNs at the end of 2016 following the overhaul Congress made to the 1976 Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) last June, Morris said. The backlog is now less than 150, EPA said.
Getting new chemicals to market helps industry and consumers because the new molecules typically enhance the performance of the products the chemicals make, Morris said in his first interview about the agency's efforts to speed its new chemical reviews. New chemicals often have a better environmental footprint by cutting energy consumption, hazardous waste, water pollution or other environmental benefits when compared to the chemicals they replace, he said.
Critical Change
The biggest change that the EPA's new chemicals office had to adjust to, Morris said, was the amended law's requirement that the agency make a specific conclusion about the risk each new chemical could pose.
Original TSCA did not require the agency to make specific conclusions about a new chemical's risks. If the agency did nothing during the 90 days the statute gives it to complete new chemical reviews, the molecule could be made or imported for any TSCA-regulated use under the 1976 statute. The amended law retains the 90-day review period, but requires the agency to make “affirmative findings” for each chemical.
The new requirement improved the law, because it enhances public confidence in the government's chemical oversight, Morris said.
The new procedures and policies the agency is implementing also should improve regulatory certainty, he said. An agency website lists possible conclusions the EPA can make including that a new chemical:
• Is “not likely to present an unreasonable risk” to the environment or people—including vulnerable or highly exposed populations;
• May pose an unreasonable risk that would be controlled before the chemical could be made or imported; or
• Has insufficient information to allow the agency to make “a reasoned evaluation” of its health and environmental effects.
Morris described the first six months after amended TSCA as a “real learning curve” as staff figured out how to make those determinations and explain them in ways diverse audiences could understand.“It was a heavy lift,” he said. But, “I'm very happy to say we're confident that by the end of July we will have eliminated the backlog.”
Industry Describes Problem
In early April, Cal Dooley, chief executive officer for the American Chemistry Council, described in an Insights article for Bloomberg BNA the problems the agency's initial new chemical delays were causing. New chemical evaluations had “become mired in inefficiencies, causing significant delay for manufacturers,” Dooley, whose trade association represents companies including the BASF Corp., the Dow Chemical Co., and Honeywell, wrote.
Arkema Inc., which produces acrylic monomers, additives, hydrogen peroxide, coating compounds and other chemicals, is among the manufacturers that discussed its concerns about the new chemicals program as it met with Congressional lawmakers during the first quarter of 2017.
Arkema urged lawmakers to give the EPA sufficient resources for timely implementation of the amended TSCA's changes, including the new chemical provisions, the company said in a statement provided to Bloomberg BNA.
Giving sufficient EPA resources “can help the agency to evaluate and process the approval of pre-manufacture notices, to allow companies like Arkema to innovate and bring to market new materials that better meet the needs of users and consumers, or that deliver benefits such as enhanced sustainability,” the company said.
EPA's Staffing Solutions
The chemicals office tripled the amount of time its scientists focused on new chemicals, Morris said. About 70 scientists work in the program's Risk Assessment Division, he said.
“At any given time about half of those people are involved in some way or other in new chemicals,” Morris said. The rest of the time the risk assessors focus on existing chemicals and questions arising in the agency that call for their particular expertise.
The chemical's office could boost risk assessors time on new chemicals, because it hadn't fully ramped up to begin the risk analyses amended TSCA requires it to undertake for chemicals on the U.S. market, he said.
Having reduced the new chemicals backlog, those same scientists are now focused on developing the scope of risk assessments the agency will conduct for 10 existing chemicals, including solvents. flame retardants and one dye. The scoping documents will describe what health and environmental concerns, exposures and other issues the agency's risk analyses will examine. Amended TSCA requires EPA to complete those scoping documents by June 19.
The agency also temporarily transferred to the new chemicals program about 15 individuals who manage each chemical's review, Morris said. Those individuals work with the agency's scientists, manufacturers and importers who've submitted new chemical requests. The managerial staff will shift back to other duties once the new chemicals backlog is cleared in July, Morris said.
First Major Policy Change
“We've made policy changes that not only reduce the backlog, but make sure a backlog doesn't occur again,” he said.
A critical change the agency has made is to approve a new chemical for a particular use or uses its manufacturer or importer intended, along with reasonably foreseeable uses, he said.
If the agency has concerns because the new chemical could be made, used or released into the environment in ways other than what its original manufacturer intended, it will restrict those uses through significant new uses rules, called SNURs, Morris said.
Chemical manufacturers have urged the agency to use this mechanism, commonly called a “non-5(e) SNUR,” as it implements amended TSCA just as it had under the original law. That specific provision refers to the section of TSCA that gives EPA oversight of new chemicals and a type of regulation it can issue. The term also refers to the EPA's conclusion that intended or reasonably foreseen uses of a new chemical would not likely present an unreasonable risk, but that other manufacturing methods or uses might, leaving the door open in case other firms employ them.
Initially, the EPA needed time to make sure it could make a legally supportable argument that the amended law allowed it to continue making such findings, Morris said.
“We determined it's legally supportable,” provided needed restrictions would be in place before the new chemical was made or imported and that those restrictions protect human health and the environment, Morris said.
Being able to issue non-5(e) SNURs will allow a significant number of new chemicals that had been part of the backlog to get to market, he said.
Two Agency Actions Must Align
Before a new chemical could be made or imported, however, the EPA must align two coupled activities.
First, the agency must work with each manufacturer or importer to determine the manufacturing methods for, environmental releases of, and uses of, the new chemical that would not be likely to pose an unreasonable risk. A consent order negotiated between the agency and the original manufacturer or importer then binds that specific company to the agreed upon manufacturing and use conditions.
Second, the conditions that the EPA concludes would result in the chemical being unlikely to pose an unreasonable risk must be applied to any subsequent manufacturer or importer that could make the chemicals, Morris said. The agency does that through SNURs.
The chemicals office is developing a strategy to align the two related actions: approving the original manufacturer's request to make a new chemical and issuing a rule that would require subsequent manufacturers to meet any restrictions the original company agreed to, he said.
The goal, Morris said, is to allow the original manufacturer to get a “not likely to pose an unreasonable risk” finding, while making sure restrictions are in place to prevent risks that might occur if other companies made or used the chemical in different ways.
Polymers
Similarly, the EPA is allowing certain polymers to get to market quicker than it did in the initial months after TSCA was amended when they are unlikely to cause health or environmental concerns due to their large size and other characteristics.
Under the original and amended TSCA, EPA has allowed such polymers to be made under what was called a “polymer exemption.” That means the company could make the new polymer without filing a new chemicals notice provided the chemical met specified criteria. The EPA's rationale is that that the polymer exemption encourages the manufacture of safer polymers by reducing industry's reporting burden for these types of chemicals. The reduced burden allows the EPA to concentrate its new chemical resources on substances that could pose higher risk, an EPA website explains.
Yet sometimes polymer manufacturers choose to submit new chemical notices. Or perhaps the molecule's characteristics show it could raise concerns if it were made in ways that produced smaller chemicals, called monomers, which could enter and interact with biological systems
The EPA has determined it can allow polymers, which could qualify for the exemption, into commerce with a proviso, Morris said. When the new polymer is added to the TSCA inventory—which lists chemicals that are or have been in U.S. commerce—it will have a flag saying the chemical must be made in ways so that it couldn't be biologically available, Morris said. The EPA announced its first such conditional approval on May 12.
Useful Data For EPA to Get
Another change Morris described has been requested by many chemical makers and the attorneys and trade associations that represent them.
The agency will publicize information manufacturers could submit with their pre-manufacture notices to speed the agency's reviews, he said.
Neither original nor amended TSCA requires manufacturers to submit specific toxicity, exposure or other data when they ask the agency to allow them to make a new chemical.
Faced with a lack of information about use conditions—such as the amount of a chemical that would be released to water, whether workers would be shielded from exposure because the new chemical would be made in a closed system, or whether workers would be required to wear protective gear—the agency makes assumptions. Those “default assumptions” are contained in software the agency uses, for example, to model how much of a chemical may be released in the workplace or what could happen to fish and the bugs they eat if the chemical got into water. To be protective, the agency assumes a new chemical would be released in greater quantities or that exposure is higher than it may be.
The consequence, Morris said, is that the EPA, manufacturers and importers spend time going back and forth working out more realistic use conditions. Depending on how confident a manufacturer is about its potential market for a new chemical, it may chose to pay to generate exposure or other data to prove to the agency that a chemical is less toxic or that exposure to it would be less than the agency assumes. Agency concerns and the cost of generating new data may also prompt a manufacturer to withdraw its new chemical notice rather than face potential controls.
Alerting firms about data needs means “we'll have a much greater chance of receiving information that will allow us to run scientific analyses one time and get companies on the road to commercialization,” Morris said.
The EPA also is encouraging chemical makers to meet with agency staff before they submit a pre-manufacture notice, to spotlight data the agency needs before a new chemical's review begins, Morris said.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=112765121&vname=dennotallissues&fn=112765121&jd=112765121
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May 27, 2017 | Newcastle Herlad
By Carrie Fellner
Williamtown residents are being told to feel "reassured" if they have toxic chemicals in their blood at levels seven times higher than what is considered safe in Germany.
The federal Department of Health has been accused of giving people in the red zone a "false sense of security" with advice widely distributed to GPs and residents about how to interpret the results of blood tests for the per- and poly-fluoroalkyl chemicals [PFAS].
The advice set out a level for each of six age groups that was "consistent with background exposure in the general population" and at which "patients should be reassured".
However instead of using Australian averages, it relied on an estimation of the levels present in the 95th percentile of the population, taken from a research paper from 2014.
The paper's lead author admitted to the Herald there were areas of "uncertainty" in their calculations, including a lack of blood samples for children under four.
But Rhianna Gorfine from the Williamtown and Surrounds Residents Action Group said the most worrying aspect was that many locals did not realise the fact sheet provided a list of levels that were higher than 95 per cent of the population.
"The everyday person hasn't gone through a statistical analysis course," Ms Gorfine said. "The way they have presented it is normalising high levels."
In the fact sheet, a level of 13 ng/ml was given as the ‘background’ level for one of the chemicals - perfluorooctane sulfonate, or PFOS - in an infant under the age of four.
That represents more than six times the Australian average for children that age – which was put at 2 ng/ml in a recent study - and nearly three times the German safe level of 5 ng/ml.
The German Human Biomonitoring Commission last year judged that at or below a level of 5 ng/ml there was "no risk for adverse health effects and, consequently, no need for action."
Robert Bilott, an American attorney who has spearheaded a successful class action over the health effects of the chemicals in the United States, was incredulous at the advice.
To suggest that an individual should feel reassured because five per cent of the population has higher levels in their blood makes no sense. After all, there is no 'normal' ... level for either PFOA or PFOS in human blood."- Robert Bilott, US attorney
"To suggest that an individual should feel ‘reassured’ because five per cent of the population has higher levels in their blood makes no sense," he said.
"After all, there is no ‘normal’ or natural ‘background’ level for either PFOA or PFOS in human blood. Neither chemical occurs naturally in humans. Both are completely man-made substances ... so their presence in anyone's blood is the result of man-made activities."
Mr Bilott said clarification was needed around whether the ‘background' levels included individuals who had a high exposure to the chemicals through their occupations or drinking contaminated water.
That would "artificially raise the upper end of the group's blood levels beyond those that are otherwise now found", he said.
Mr Bilott rejected the Australian government's position that there is no consistent evidence the chemicals cause health impacts, saying the evidence in relation to PFOA was “strong and consistent”.
The Newcastle Herald sent a detailed list of questions to the Department of Health on Tuesday, but it did not provide a response.
However the lead author of the research paper, Lesa Aylward, defended the approach taken in the government advice.
Ms Aylward is a principal of Summit Toxicology, a consultancy based in Virginia in the United States. She said that in medicine, 95th percentiles were often favoured over averages when trying to determine if a group of people had an elevated exposure to a chemical.
"If we use a measure of central tendency, such as a median...then half the general population will be defined as having 'elevated' levels," she said.
Ms Aylward described the science of assessing health risks in individuals exposed to pollutants in the environment as "very uncertain".
"For some people, knowing that many or most people have or have had levels that are similar to their own measured level provides some level of reassurance," she said.
But a senior advisor to the National Toxics Network, Dr Mariann Lloyd-Smith, said levels of PFAS in the general Australian population were “unacceptably” high, and were well above those generally seen in Europe.
“[This] reflects the fact that the EU has taken action on these contaminants and Australia has not,” she said.
Restrictions on the sale of products containing PFOS were introduced by the Council of the European Union in 2008.
Dr Lloyd-Smith argued a responsible approach would be to compare Williamtown residents’ blood levels with the German guidelines.
“The current Australian approach is just another way of downplaying the government’s responsibility for the contamination and for Australia’s ongoing failure to address PFAS.
“And while the authorities continue their nonsensical claims of ‘no consistent evidence of PFAS health effects’, we can unfortunately expect nothing better,” she said.
Further doubt has been cast over the government guidelines amid revelations the original report was mostly based on estimates – rather than actual blood samples – for children under four.
The report said that “no data were [sic] available from the various population representative surveys for the youngest age group … and the coverage of the next oldest age group (5 to 15) was only partial.”
It did not break the numbers down by gender, even though adult males “often” show higher levels than females.
And there were concerns the data, from 2011, did not take into account falling PFOS levels in Australians over the last five years.
There was a “rapid decrease” between 2002 and 2011, a trend expected to continue due to a world-wide phase out of the chemicals.
“It’s not until you delve into the statistics that you realise that they’re using outdated data, and for children they’re using computer models instead of actual blood samples,” Ms Gorfine said. “They would have been better off putting in a range if they didn’t think an average was a good way to go. What we want is transparency.”
Ms Aylward acknowledged the downward trend had probably continued since 2011, but said it was also likely to have slowed due to the “ongoing recycling of low-level contamination in the environment.”
She said the problems highlighted with the study were relevant if testing whether people in Williamtown had levels “exactly” like the rest of the population.
But while they were not necessarily the “precise” numbers, they were the best estimates that could be made based on the available data, she said.
“[The estimates] give a guide that can be used to make a general assessment of whether levels are markedly elevated or not,” Ms Aylward said.
The study was published in peer-reviewed journal Environment International. A member of the journal’s editorial board is Dr John Butenhoff from 3M, the company which has been the major manufacturer of PFAS in the United States.
In the past, Ms Aylward has also done consulting work for the American Chemistry Council, a peak trade organisation for chemical manufacturers including 3M.
But she said she had no financial ties to the company.
“I do not think I have ever met Dr Butenhoff, nor have I ever worked for 3M,” Ms Aylward said. “The majority of my funding over the past five years, including this year, has come from Health Canada.”
http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4688784/blood-is-up-over-guidelines/
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(ACC Mentioned) Plastics-to-Fuel Technology Proven to Have Sustainable Advantages
May 27, 2017 | Packaging World
By Anne Marie Mohan
Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), part of the U.S. Department of Energy, has determined that using pyrolysis to convert non-recycled plastics into ultra-low-sulfur diesel (ULSD) fuel results in significant energy and environmental benefits. These include reductions of up to 14% in greenhouse gas emissions, up to 58% in water consumption, and up to 96% in traditional energy use when compared to ULSD from conventional crude oil.
The peer-reviewed analysis, “Life-Cycle Analysis of Fuels from Post-use Non-recycled Plastics,” was published in the April 14, 2017, edition of the journal Fuel. ANL based the analysis on its highly regarded Greenhouse gases, Regulated Emissions and Energy use in Transportation (GREET®) model, using data provided by five companies. The GREET database contains more than 100 different fuel pathways, has more than 30,000 subscribers, and is used by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in implementing the Renewable Fuel Standard Program enacted by Congress.
“Argonne’s analysis clearly determines that plastics-to-fuel [PTF] technology is a viable and beneficial materials management option,” says Craig Cookson, Director of Recycling and Energy Recovery for the American Chemistry Council. “Not only does PTF reduce waste going to landfills, but these technologies can help reduce GHG emissions while conserving both water and energy.”
PTF facilities use pyrolysis, a process that converts post-use non-recycled plastics into liquid fuels and chemical feedstocks by heating them in the absence of oxygen. ANL assessed the potential energy and environmental benefits of converting non-recycled plastics into diesel using pyrolysis.
https://www.packworld.com/article/sustainability/waste-energy/plastics-fuel-technology-proven-have-sustainable-advantages
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Florida Pipeline's Legal Battles Persist After Construction
May 30, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Chris Marr
The owners of almost 700 miles of new pipeline into Florida aim to start the flow of natural gas in June—if federal regulators give the go-ahead despite objections and lawsuits from the Sierra Club and others.
Construction is finished and testing is underway on a trio of connected pipelines dubbed the Southeast Market Pipelines Project. Despite the pipelines already being built, the Sierra Club and other organizations have asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to postpone letting them go into service until an updated environmental analysis is completed and related federal litigation is resolved.
The largest segment of the project is the 515-mile Sabal Trail, a $3 billion joint venture owned by Spectra Energy, Duke Energy and NextEra Energy Inc., which is the parent of Florida Power & Light. The pipelines are meant to supply natural gas to Florida power plants owned by Duke and FP&L.
The Sierra Club partially got its wish on May 26, when Sabal Trail told FERC that it expects to be ready to begin operating the first phase of pipeline and compressor stations in June. That represents a delay from the previous plan of getting “in-service” authorization from FERC by May 26 and starting the gas flow by May 31.
The Sierra Club has received funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charitable organization founded by Michael Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg L.P. Bloomberg BNA is an affiliate of Bloomberg L.P.
In its letter, Sabal Trail said the change of plans was “based on the progress of commissioning activities.” Sabal Trail spokeswoman Andrea Grover told Bloomberg BNA testing of certain pipeline facilities is taking longer than planned. The company will update FERC with a more specific date and submit a new request for in-service authorization.
“We are taking the necessary time to ensure the pipeline and associated facilities are ready for operations,” Grover said.
FERC spokeswoman Mary O'Driscoll said she couldn't predict when FERC staff might issue a decision on authorizing the pipeline to go into service. She did say FERC staff has the delegated authority to issue in-service authorization, meaning Sabal Trail won't have to wait for new FERC commissioners to get approved and vote on it.
The other pieces of the Southeast Market project are the 126-mile Florida Southeast Connection owned by NextEra and the 43.5 mile Hillabee Expansion Project owned by Transcontinental Gas Pipeline Co. Altogether, the Southeast Market pipelines stretch from a connection with an existing Transco pipeline in Mobile, Ala., through southern Georgia and down the length of the Florida peninsula.
Climate Change Impacts Ignored
The Sierra Club along with two Georgia Riverkeeper groups said in a September 2016 lawsuit that FERC failed to consider all relevant environmental impacts as required by the National Environmental Policy Act—including climate change concerns due to Florida utilities burning the natural gas rather than considering renewable energy alternatives.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit heard oral arguments in the case on April 18.
The plaintiffs also argued FERC didn't adequately consider alternative routes for the pipelines to lessen their impact on the environment and communities of color, failing to adhere to Obama administration policy related to environmental justice considerations.
Grover couldn't comment on the pending litigation. She previously told Bloomberg BNA the company was confident in the various state and federal reviews of the project and the environmental mitigation efforts included in the construction process.
The Sierra Club made its case directly with FERC in a March 23 letter, urging the commission to “correct its use of materially false or inaccurate information to authorize” the pipeline projects.
In particular, the group said FERC relied on the premise that Florida would lose 375 megawatts of power from a coal-fired plant that was expected to close, which didn't happen. It also said FERC underestimated the environmental impacts of the pipeline construction and trusted the energy companies’ assertion that renewable power wouldn't be a viable substitute for the pipeline capacity.
The Sierra Club's lead attorney on the case, Elizabeth Benson, didn't immediately respond to Bloomberg BNA's request for comment.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=112765132&vname=dennotallissues&fn=112765132&jd=112765132
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US Agency Won't Let Company Resume Drilling for Gas Pipeline
May 27, 2017 | AP (in The New York Times)
A federal agency has told a company building a high-pressure natural gas pipeline it cannot resume drilling beneath creeks in southeast Ohio and northern West Virginia.
The Columbus Dispatch reports (http://bit.ly/2qu1x2r ) the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Thursday rejected Texas-based Energy Transfers' request to resume horizontal drilling. The $4.2 billion pipeline project is being built to carry gas from Appalachian shale fields across Ohio and to other states.
A spokeswoman told the newspaper the company hopes to resolve all outstanding issues soon.
The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency has ordered the company to pay $714,000 in civil penalties connected to problems with pipeline construction that began this year.
The state agency says at least eight violations are under review, including mud spills from drilling, storm water pollution and open burning.
https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2017/05/27/us/ap-us-gas-pipelines-ohio.html?mtrref=query.nytimes.com&mtrref=www.nytimes.com
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Targa Planning $1.3B Grand Prix NGL Pipeline in Texas, Prices Public Stock Offering
May 26, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Targa Resources Corp. said it plans to build a $1.3 billion natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline to connect the Permian Basin and the company's North Texas gathering system to its fractionation and storage complex at the NGL market hub at Mont Belvieu, TX.
Meanwhile, the Houston-based company said it has priced an underwritten public offering of 17 million shares of common stock at $46.10/share. Targa also said it granted the underwriter a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 2.55 million shares of common stock.
On Thursday, Targa said its proposed Grand Prix pipeline will have 300,000 b/d of transport capacity from the Permian Basin, with the possibility of expansion to 550,000 b/d. The company said Grand Prix would be supported by its own production volumes and other third party customers, and expects to enter the pipeline into service in 2Q2019.
CEO Joe Bob Perkins said Grand Prix "will enhance our ability to move our customers' volumes from the wellhead in the Permian Basin and North Texas to key petrochemical and export markets. Our ability to offer a highly competitive, fully integrated model, from gathering and processing [G&P] through transportation and fractionation, to current and future customers should drive continued growth for Targa in both our G&P and downstream segments."
Perkins added that Targa has been looking "to identify attractive opportunities to leverage our growing G&P volumes from one of the best hydrocarbon basins in the world into additional downstream opportunities for Targa and our customers, and Grand Prix is an excellent result of those efforts."
Targa plans to spend about $250 million of its capital expenditures (capex) budget for 2017 on the pipeline this year. The company's total capex budget for 2017 totaled approximately $1.25 billion.Grand Prix is the latest in a series of proposed NGL pipelines to serve the Permian.
Executives with Apache Corp. said earlier this month that the company plans to complete an NGL pipeline in the Permian by 2019, but the size of the pipeline had not yet been determined. One month earlier, Enterprise Products Partners LP announced plans to build its 571-mile, 24-inch diameter Shin Oak NGL pipeline, which would run from its Hobbs fractionation and storage facility in Gaines County, TX, to Mont Belvieu. Shin Oak would have an initial capacity of 250,000 b/d, but would be expandable to 600,000 b/d.
DCP Midstream LP is also in the process of expanding the capacity of its Sand Hills NGL pipeline from 280,000 b/d to 365,000 b/d. Sand Hills also connects the Permian to Mont Belvieu.
In a separate statement Thursday, Targa said its offering of the 17 million shares of common stock is expected to close on or about June 1, and is subject to customary closing conditions. The company expects to receive net proceeds of about $777.3 million from the offering, but that figure increases to $893.9 million if the underwriter exercises in full its option to purchase the additional shares.
Targa said it plans to use net proceeds from the offering for several uses, including to help pay for the Grand Prix pipeline; repay outstanding borrowings under the company's credit facilities; redeem Targa Resource Partners LP's 6 3/8% senior notes due in 2022, and for general corporate purposes. The company said the latter may include acquisitions, capex and additions to working capital, among other things.
Last January, Targa Resources Partners LP announced plans to acquire oil/natural gas gathering and processing assets in the Midland and Delaware sub-basins of the Permian for an initial cash payment of $565 million. Specifically, it acquired Outrigger Delaware Operating LLC, Outrigger Southern Delaware Operating LLC and Outrigger Midland Operating LLC.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/110607-targa-planning-13b-grand-prix-ngl-pipeline-in-texas-prices-public-stock-offering
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Saudi Arabia’s Motiva Plans For Billions In Texas Growth
May 26, 2017 | FuelFix
By Jordan Blum
Saudi Arabia’s Motiva Enterprises said it plans to spend billions of dollars more to expand its Port Arthur Refinery — already North America’s largest — and grow more in the petrochemical and refining sectors.
Motiva, which finalized its divorce from Royal Dutch Shell in the beginning of May, said it plans to spend close to $18 billion in the U.S., largely along the Gulf Coast, within the next five years.
Although scant on details, this comes after Motiva already expanded the Port Arthur Refinery in recent years. Motiva emphasized it will continue to expand its crown jewel asset in Texas near the Louisiana border.
Motiva, which operated as a joint venture between Saudi Aramco and Shell for nearly 20 years, is now purely a Saudi venture with a growing headquarters in downtown Houston. The Motiva growth is intended as part of an overall Saudi strategy to diversify its global footprint, including substantial growth in Texas.
“With the joint venture separation behind us, there is a real sense of self-sufficiency at Motiva,” said Dan Romasko, Motiva’s president and CEO. “Our employees have embraced the changing culture, which has turned Motiva into a more agile organization.”
Motiva kept the 600,000-barrel-a-day Port Arthur Refinery, while Shell received the Convent and Norco refineries in Louisiana, both of which combine to process less than 500,000 barrels daily. Aramco paid Shell $2.2 billion as part of the deal, including $700 million in cash and the assumption of additional Motiva debt.
Likewise, Saudi Arabia’s Saudi Basic Industries Corp., called Sabic, has a joint venture with Exxon Mobil to develop a $10 billion chemicals and plastic complex north of Corpus Christi.
Motiva said it plans to branch out into the chemical sector, explore more refining growth and expand its commercial operations.
Motiva already is working with Northstar Terminals on a new marine terminal at the Port of Port Arthur set to open in July.
“Motiva has made significant strides over the last three years to reposition our business through focused improvement efforts and organic growth opportunities,” Romasko added. “Our next chapter will be even more exciting as we expand our reach into new areas of growth and development.”
http://fuelfix.com/blog/2017/05/26/saudi-arabias-motiva-plans-for-billions-in-texas-growth/
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Fire Kills One, Injuries Three at Anadarko Tank Battery in Colorado
May 28, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tripp Baltz
An Anadarko Petroleum Co. oil tank battery caught fire in Mead, Colo., killing one worker and injuring three others.
The May 25 fire is the second fatal incident in northeast Colorado involving equipment owned and operated by the oil and gas company in the last two months. An April 17 explosion and fire at a home in Firestone, Colo.—linked to an underground severed natural gas flow line and a nearby—killed two men and left a woman critically injured.
Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) said in a May 26 statement there is “no reason to believe that there is any relationship between the circumstances that led to these two accidents.” He said because the Mead fire was a workplace incident it will be investigated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration in addition to state and local investigative agencies, which will work closely with “the industry to better understand the cause of this accident and take any necessary action to ensure that this doesn't happen again.”
Cause Under Investigation
In a statement sent to Bloomberg BNA, Anadarko said the tank facility ignited while work crews were finishing projects associated with a facility upgrade. The tank facility was not in operation at the time, said Helen Wells, spokeswoman for the company. The site has been secured and the company is working with local investigators to determine a cause, she said.
When law enforcement personnel arrived on scene they found the battery “fully engulfed in flame,” the Weld County Sheriff's Office said in a statement on its website. Two of the three injured workers were taken to North Colorado Medical Center for treatment.
In a statement issued by the Colorado House Majority Democrats, Rep. KC Becker (D), the House Majority Leader, said in a statement the Mead and Firestone incidents “are unacceptable to me, and they should be to all Coloradans. Every person who works for an oil and gas company and every family who lives in proximity to a drilling operation deserves to know they are safe at work and at home.”
‘Not Freak Accidents’
Rep. Mike Foote (D) said it is clear the state must “take more steps to protect the life, health and safety of all Coloradans who work in the industry, and who live close to industrial sites.”
“Both the industry and policy makers of all political stripes have an obligation to treat these incidents not as isolated or freak accidents, but as indicators that we must do more now—we must take real, concrete steps—for Coloradans to have confidence that deadly explosions and fires won't occur in the future,” he said.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=112765128&vname=dennotallissues&fn=112765128&jd=112765128
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US Safety Board to Probe Plant Explosion in West Virginia
May 26, 2017 | AP (in The New York Times)
An independent national agency is joining investigations into this week's explosion at a West Virginia industrial plant that left the owner and an employee dead.
The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board examines the root causes of chemical incidents.
Board spokeswoman Hillary Cohen said Friday that a team is heading to the Midland Resource Recovery facility outside Philippi. According to information from the federal Office of Safety and Health Administration, the plant cleans and decommissions old odorant tanks from gas companies.
OSHA said owner Jan Strmen and employee Justin Marsh were decommissioning a tank when it exploded. The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection says they were using bleach while preparing a tank for cleaning.
Another employee was hospitalized with serious injuries.
The company has declined to comment.
https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2017/05/26/us/ap-us-industrial-plant-explosion.html?_r=1&mtrref=query.nytimes.com&gwh=C64AB16D02B480E95A2CF3848C01CADB&gwt=pay
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California Wants to Prevent 'Bomb Trains' From Running Through Neighborhoods
May 26, 2017 | Sacramento Bee
By Angela Hart
California’s chief law enforcement officer wants to prevent rail cars carrying highly flammable, potentially explosive crude oil from cutting through cities across California, including Sacramento.
Attorney General Xavier Becerra says he’s concerned that so-called “bomb trains” carrying explosive crude oil could get derailed or explode in major population centers or sensitive ecological areas.
“A derailment or explosion could put countless lives at risk and cause major damage to our land and waterways,” Becerra said in a statement. “This risk is simply acceptable. I urge the Trump administration to act immediately.”
In a letter to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and other federal transportation officials, Becerra on Thursday petitioned the federal government to increase safety standards for crude oil being transported in California – particularly Bakken. Oil produced from the region in North Dakota has components that could make it ignite easier and cause it to be more flammable, including higher gas content and higher vapor pressure, according to federal regulators.
“While the shipment by rail of crude oil into California has not increased as previously anticipated, shipments of crude oil into the state by any means pose potential threats to California’s people and environment and must be addressed,” Becerra said in the letter to federal regulators. “There are high hazard areas for derailments along every rail route into California. Some are located in urban areas, including highly populated areas such as the San Bernardino-Riverside and San Luis Obispo regions.”
Becerra and attorneys general from New York and four other states are asking regulators to adopt new rules requiring crude oil be treated in a way that lowers the vapor pressure, making it less inflammatory. The letter was sent the Department of Transportation and its division of Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration in response to an “advanced notice of proposed rulemaking” by the agencies on crude oil standards. Oil industries have opposed stricter limits on the level of vapor pressure inside traincars carrying crude.
Becerra and others referenced the deadly 2013 freight train derailment in Quebec, Canada. It was carrying Bakken crude oil when it derailed in a city center, killing 47 people.
In the U.S., shipments have declined in the past two years, but “crude-by-rail is certain to continue and likely increase,” the letter said.
WORTH REPEATING: “The new Republican plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act is no better than the old plan – 23 million Americans still lose health care, Medicaid still gets gutted, premiums will still increase and the richest Americans still reap huge tax cuts.” – Sen. Dianne Feinstein
ASSEMBLY APPROPRIATIONS: More than 500 bills that would have a fiscal impact on California are up for a hearing in Assembly Appropriations. The hearing will spell the fate for measures seeking to eliminate the mortgage interest deduction on second homes and generate a pot of money for farmworker and other housing (Assembly Bill 71 from Assemblyman David Chiu, D-San Francisco), reform the bail system (Assembly Bill 42 from Assemblyman Rob Bonta, D-Alameda) and extend the state’s cap-and-trade system (Assembly Bill 378 from Assemblywoman Cristina Garcia, D-Bell Gardens).
SALMON IN CRISIS: With salmon fisheries collapsing, Gov. Jerry Brown and Oregon’s governor, Kate Brown, are seeking a federal disaster declaration from Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross. Brown took action following a request from the state Legislature.
“The California salmon fishery is our state’s oldest and it’s one of the most iconic fisheries in America,” said state Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, responding to Brown’s federal request. “Thousands of working families on the North Coast are in crisis and desperately need our help – today’s action by the governor brings us one step closer to providing that support.”
MEMORIAL DAY: Lawmakers are attending events commemorating fallen military service members are happening all over the state. A Memorial Day ceremony remembering Mexican American veterans is set for Monday at 1 p.m. downtown Sacramento.
Sunday, Vietnam Veterans for America is hosting an annual “reading of the names” remembering those who died in the Vietnam War. It kicks off at 7 a.m. at Capitol Park in Sacramento and is set to conclude at 7 p.m.
http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article152743059.html
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Trump Decides Next Week If He'll Quit Paris Climate Accord
May 27, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Joe Ryan & Josh Wingrove
Donald Trump continued to distance himself from fellow world leaders over climate change at the G-7 summit, and said he’ll determine next week whether to pull the U.S. out of the landmark Paris climate accord.
“I will make my final decision on the Paris Accord next week!” the president told his almost 31 million Twitter followers on Saturday.
Trump, who for months has delayed a decision on the climate agreement, made his announcement at the conclusion of the Group of Seven summit in the resort town of Taormina, Italy.
In an unprecedented step, the U.S. broke from the other six nations in a joint statement issued at the summit’s conclusion, saying America is reviewing its climate policies while the G-7 members others remain committed to the Paris Agreement.
Climate was among the most disputed issues separating Trump from other leaders at the two-day meeting on the Sicilian coast. A top White House adviser said the president’s views were evolving on the issue, but Trump wasn’t immediately swayed by arguments from Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, France’s President Emmanuel Macron and others to honor the Paris Agreement, brokered in 2015 by almost 200 nations to slash fossil fuel emissions and boost funding to ease impacts of global warming.
“The whole discussion about climate has been difficult, or rather very unsatisfactory,” Merkel told reporters after the summit. “Here we have the situation that six members, or even seven if you want to add the EU, stand against one.”
‘Stark Isolation’
Diplomats spent days trying to hammer out language for the G-7 joint statement. Past communiques, which are painstakingly crafted to reflect common goals and values of all seven nations, have dedicated lengthy sections to climate change. At one point this week, the words “Paris Agreement” were nearly excluded from the statement, underscoring how contentious the issue became in Taormina, said a Canadian government official who spoke on the condition on anonymity to discuss private deliberations.
Trump, who once said the concept of global warming “was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive,” repeatedly vowed to pull out of the Paris deal during his election campaign, but has sidestepped the issue since taking office.
Delaying a decision about the accord provided opportunity for G-7 leaders and Pope Francis to press Trump to honor U.S. environmental commitments. Now the president heads back to Washington, where much of his party is pushing him to do the opposite.
Issue Deadlock
Last week, 22 Republican senators, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, sent a letter to Trump urging him to exit the Paris accord. Members of his administration, meanwhile, are deadlocked on the issue. Environmental chief Scott Pruitt and top strategist Steve Bannon are pushing for a pullout. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, White House adviser Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, the president’s son-in-law and daughter respectively, have urged the president to stay in the deal.
John Kirton, director of the University of Toronto’s G8 Research Group, said Trump’s trip home may not bode well for those in favor of Paris. “If you let him go back to the civil war within the White House, Pruitt might win,” he said.
Trump has criticized efforts to cut emissions, saying they limit U.S. economic competitiveness. The president’s views on the Paris accord, however, are evolving, White House National Economic Council director Gary Cohn told reporters Friday in Italy. Trump may be willing to stay in the agreement, Cohn said, if the U.S. can scale back commitments made by former President Barack Obama.
“His views are evolving, and he came here to learn,” Cohn said. “His basis for decision is ultimately going to be what’s best for the United States.”
The Paris Agreement is broader than any previous climate accord. It calls for reducing pollution in hopes of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above temperatures at the outset of the industrial revolution.
Hundreds of corporations and investors have endorsed the pact, including oil majors Royal Dutch Shell Plc, BP Plc and Exxon Mobil Corp., which was previously led by Tillerson. Alden Meyer, who’s followed climate talks for two decades as director of policy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said Trump’s reluctance to support it puts him at odds with much of the world.
“He stands in stark isolation,” Meyer said. “The leaders from Europe, Canada, and Japan have made it crystal clear that they intend to fully implement their national commitments under the Paris Agreement.”
http://news.bna.com/deln/lpages/lpages.adp?pg=breaking_news&bn_product=deln#urn:bna:0000015c4b40d149a1fecfcf57a90000
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What if US Quits Climate Deal? Doesn't Look Good for Earth
May 27, 2017 | AP (in the Washington Post)
By Seth Borenstein
Earth is likely to reach more dangerous levels of warming even sooner if the U.S. retreats from its pledge to cut carbon dioxide pollution, scientists said. That’s because America contributes so much to rising temperatures.
President Donald Trump, who once proclaimed global warming a Chinese hoax, said in a tweet Saturday that he would make his “final decision” this coming week on whether the United States stays in or leaves the 2015 Paris climate change accord in which nearly every nation agreed to curb its greenhouse gas emissions.
Leaders of seven wealthy democracies, at a summit in Sicily, urged Trump to commit his administration to the agreement, but said in their closing statement that the U.S., for now, “is not in a position to join the consensus.”
“I hope they decide in the right way,” said Italy’s prime minister, Paolo Gentiloni. More downbeat was German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who said the leaders’ talks were “very difficult, if not to say, very unsatisfactory.”
In an attempt to understand what could happen to the planet if the U.S. pulls out of Paris, The Associated Press consulted with more than two dozen climate scientists and analyzed a special computer model scenario designed to calculate potential effects.
Scientists said it would worsen an already bad problem and make it far more difficult to prevent crossing a dangerous global temperature threshold.
Calculations suggest it could result in emissions of up to 3 billion tons of additional carbon dioxide in the air a year. When it adds up year after year, scientists said that is enough to melt ice sheets faster, raise seas higher and trigger more extreme weather.
“If we lag, the noose tightens,” said Princeton University climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer, co-editor of the peer-reviewed journal Climatic Change.
One expert group ran a worst-case computer simulation of what would happen if the U.S. does not curb emissions, but other nations do meet their targets. It found that America would add as much as half a degree of warming (0.3 degrees Celsius) to the globe by the end of century.
cientists are split on how reasonable and likely that scenario is.
Many said because of cheap natural gas that displaces coal and growing adoption of renewable energy sources, it is unlikely that the U.S. would stop reducing its carbon pollution even if it abandoned the accord, so the effect would likely be smaller.
Others say it could be worse because other countries might follow a U.S. exit, leading to more emissions from both the U.S. and the rest.
Another computer simulation team put the effect of the U.S. pulling out somewhere between 0.1 to 0.2 degrees Celsius (0.18 to 0.36 degrees Fahrenheit).
While scientists may disagree on the computer simulations they overwhelmingly agreed that the warming the planet is undergoing now would be faster and more intense.
The world without U.S. efforts would have a far more difficult time avoiding a dangerous threshold: keeping the planet from warming more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels.
The world has already warmed by just over half that amount — with about one-fifth of the past heat-trapping carbon dioxide emissions coming from the United States, usually from the burning of coal, oil and gas.
So the efforts are really about preventing another 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit (0.9 degrees Celsius) from now.
“Developed nations — particularly the U.S. and Europe — are responsible for the lion’s share of past emissions, with China now playing a major role,” said Rutgers University climate scientist Jennifer Francis. “This means Americans have caused a large fraction of the warming.”
Even with the U.S. doing what it promised under the Paris agreement, the world is likely to pass that 2 degree mark, many scientists said.
But the fractions of additional degrees that the U.S. would contribute could mean passing the threshold faster, which could in turn mean “ecosystems being out of whack with the climate, trouble farming current crops and increasing shortages of food and water,” said the National Center for Atmospheric Research’s Kevin Trenberth.
Climate Interactive, a team of scientists and computer modelers who track global emissions and pledges, simulated global emissions if every country but the U.S. reaches their individualized goals to curb carbon pollution. Then they calculated what that would mean in global temperature, sea level rise and ocean acidification using scientifically-accepted computer models.
By 2030, it would mean an extra 3 billion tons of carbon dioxide in the air a year, according to the Climate Interactive models, and by the end of the century 0.3 degrees Celsius of warming.
“The U.S. matters a great deal,” said Climate Interactive co-director Andrew Jones. “That amount could make the difference between meeting the Paris limit of two degrees and missing it.”
Climate Action Tracker, a competing computer simulation team, put the effect of the U.S. pulling out somewhere between 0.1 to 0.2 degrees Celsius (0.18 to 0.36 Fahrenheit) by 2100. It uses a scenario where U.S. emissions flatten through the century, while Climate Interactive has them rising.
One of the few scientists who plays down the harm of the U.S. possibly leaving the agreement is John Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the scientist credited with coming up with the 2 degree goal.
“Ten years ago (a U.S. exit) would have shocked the planet,” Schellnhuber said. “Today if the U.S. really chooses to leave the Paris agreement, the world will move on with building a clean and secure future.”
Not so, said Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe: “There will be ripple effects from the United States’ choices across the world.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/what-happens-to-earth-if-the-us-exits-the-climate-deal/2017/05/27/90644828-42ab-11e7-b29f-f40ffced2ddb_story.html?utm_term=.869ce1bb424a
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A Delay on Cap-and-Trade Vote Would be a Victory for Donald Trump, Gov. Jerry Brown's Office Says
May 26, 2017 | LA Times
By Chris Megerian
Despite hesitance and resistance from state lawmakers, Gov. Jerry Brown is refusing to budge from his goal of reaching a deal next month to extend California's cap-and-trade program.
The latest tug-of-war on the issue came this week in an email exchange circulated among Capitol staff members and advocates working on climate change policies.
Kip Lipper, an environmental advisor for Senate leadership, wrote in a Thursday email that there were "no plans to take up a cap and trade reauthorization bill anytime soon."
Echoing concerns that have percolated among lawmakers, Lipper said senators were "gas tax weary" about the possibility of another difficult vote after deciding to raise gas taxes to pay for road repairs earlier this year.
The cap-and-trade program, which is a cornerstone of California's fight against global warming, requires companies to buy permits to release greenhouse gas emissions and could boost the price of gasoline.
With votes hard to come by, Lipper wrote, the issue "should not be rushed."
Camille Wagner, Brown's legislative secretary, responded on Friday saying there was no reason to delay.
"We’ve all been meeting for months on this issue," she wrote. "We know the areas of agreement and disagreement – now is the time to work through those."
She added that "NOTHING is more important" than getting a deal as soon as possible.
"This is not a time for retreat or a time to give aid and comfort to Donald Trump by undermining a pillar of California’s bold program to arrest climate change," Wagner wrote. "If California’s Cap and Trade falls because we fail to act, climate denial wins."
Brown had already faced resistance to his push to reach a deal on cap and trade in June, when the state budget is due. Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Paramount) previously said "we don't have to extend it this year."
The disagreement over the timeline for reaching a deal is only one of the disputes surrounding cap and trade.
Assembly leaders have raised the possibility of pushing legislation with only a majority vote, an idea the governor's office rejected. Brown wants a two-thirds vote to insulate cap and trade from legal challenges.
There are also varied ideas about how the program should function in the future. Assembly legislation would modify cap and trade so it also targets local pollution, rather than just greenhouse gases. Senate legislation would make the program function more like a carbon tax.
http://www.latimes.com/politics/essential/la-pol-ca-essential-politics-updates-jerry-brown-cap-and-1495826027-htmlstory.html
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EPA Appeals Ruling Setting Deadlines On Risk Reviews Of Air Toxics Rules
May 26, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA is appealing a federal district court ruling imposing deadlines for the agency to conduct long-overdue reviews of whether to revise 13 air toxics rules to address risks to human health, planning to ask the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to overturn the decision that is one of two such deadline rulings.
The agency flagged its plan in a May 19 notice filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, saying it intends to appeal Judge Christopher Cooper's March 22 order in Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, et al. v. Scott Pruitt, in which Cooper set a deadline of June 30, 2020, for the 13 overdue risk-and-technology review (RTR) rules.
The Clean Air Act (CAA) requires the agency to review its existing air toxics rules for individual sectors eight years after their implementation to assess whether threats to human health remain from a sector's emissions, or whether new air toxics control technology exists that can further cut emissions. EPA can either leave the rules in place or, if it decides the answer to either question is affirmative, it can revise the air toxics standards.
But tight funding for EPA means that the agency's Office of Air & Radiation has fallen behind with the reviews, prompting environmentalists to file suits seeking court orders imposing deadlines for the RTRs.
Cooper's ruling came just days after a similar opinion issued March 13 in the same court by Judge Tanya Chutkan in California Communities Against Toxics (CCAT), et al. v. EPA. In that order, the court set deadlines for issuance of 20 RTR rules, which combined with Cooper's decision brings to 33 the number of such rules EPA must now issue on a court-ordered schedule that in several instances will be faster than EPA otherwise suggested.
EPA in its congressional justification for the fiscal year 2018 budget says it will “continue to prioritize CAA and court-ordered obligations,” including the eight-year reviews of its air toxics standards. “The program will tier its work with an emphasis on meeting court ordered deadlines to align with priorities and capacity.”
But the agency's notice of its intent to appeal Blue Ridge signals EPA's push-back on being forced to conduct RTRs by the court's deadline, although at press time it has not flagged an appeal of the CCAT ruling.
EPA had pushed for up to four years to complete the reviews of the 13 industrial air toxics standards at issue in Blue Ridge, while environmentalists sought a two-year deadline. EPA must under Cooper's order complete all 13 by June 30, 2020, while the agency's proposed schedule would have extended until October 2021.
Judicial Deadlines
The Trump EPA's Administrator Scott Pruitt has pledged to end the practice labeled “sue-and-settle” rulemaking by the agency's detractors, where environmentalists sue EPA to discharge often mandatory duties, such as RTR review, and the agency then settles on terms agreed with the plaintiffs. In Blue Ridge and CCAT, however, EPA did not settle, instead allowing the courts to set tight deadlines rather than agreeing to deadlines with environmentalists.
Prior to Cooper's ruling, the agency in Blue Ridge argued that it needs longer than environmentalists suggest to complete the reviews because of resource constraints. Many observers have for years regarded the EPA air toxics office as understaffed to conduct the many required RTRs on time, and the president's proposed budget slashing EPA's funding by 31 percent, if enacted, would likely compound this situation.
The 13 industry sectors for which EPA must conduct RTRs under Cooper's order are: printing, coating, and dyeing of fabrics and other textiles; surface coating of metal furniture; surface coating of large appliances; leather finishing operations; surface coating of wood building products; friction materials manufacturing facilities; rubber tire manufacturing; wet-formed fiberglass mat production; taconite iron ore processing; lime manufacturing plants; iron and steel foundries; plywood and composite wood products; and miscellaneous coating manufacturing.
The 20 air toxics rules covered by the CCAT court order are: solvent extraction for vegetable oil; boat manufacturing; surface coating of metal coil; cellulose products manufacturing; ethylene production; paper and other web coating; municipal solid waste landfills; hydrochloric acid production; reinforced plastic composites production; asphalt processing & roofing manufacturing; integrated iron & steel manufacturing; engine test cells/stands; site remediation; miscellaneous organic chemical manufacturing; surface coating of metal cans; surface coating of miscellaneous metal parts and products; organic liquids distribution; stationary combustion turbines; and surface coating of plastic parts and products; surface coating of automobiles & light-duty trucks.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-appeals-ruling-setting-deadlines-risk-reviews-air-toxics-rules
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Trump DOJ Urges Justices To Pass On Equipment-Breakdown Case
May 26, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Amanda Reilly
The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to pass on a case challenging an Obama-era policy requiring industrial facilities to meet air pollution rules even when equipment breaks down.
An industry petitioner is challenging the policy in the context of U.S. EPA's boiler standards, which did not give any special regard to malfunctions.
In a brief for the Supreme Court, the Justice Department said EPA's decision to require continuous emissions limits was consistent with a 2008 ruling in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Nothing in the Clean Air Act requires the agency to take equipment malfunctions into account, DOJ said.
"The rule's treatment of malfunctions is, at a minimum, permissible under the [Clean Air Act]," DOJ said in the brief filed Tuesday. The limits in the Obama-era rule reflect "a reasonable estimate of the emissions achieved in practice by the best-performing sources."
At issue are Clean Air Act standards EPA issued in 2011 to curb toxic emissions from large industrial boilers, process heaters and smaller boilers. The agency rejected industry's call to set work-practice standards instead of numeric emission limits during malfunctions, deciding the rules would apply at all times.
The D.C. Circuit upheld EPA's approach in the boiler rules last year (E&E News PM, July 29, 2016).
The decision tapped into a long-running dispute over how EPA should regulate emissions during equipment malfunctions. Industry has long argued that industrial facilities shouldn't be penalized for increased emissions that occur when equipment breaks down unavoidably.
Environmentalists, on the other hand, have long pushed EPA to require stringent limits during malfunctions, as well as during periods of startup and shutdown.
EPA based its boiler standards off the 2008 decision in Sierra Club v. EPA in which the D.C. Circuit found that the agency couldn't automatically exempt sources from emissions limits during malfunctions. The Clean Air Act, the court found, requires continuous emissions standards.
American Municipal Power, a nonprofit corporation that provides services to communities operating municipal electric systems, in March asked the Supreme Court to take up the issue in the boiler standards.
The corporation argues that the D.C. Circuit initially erred in the 2008 case.
The agency's resulting boiler regulation "requires impossible perfect performance that even EPA admits has never been achieved," the group argued to the Supreme Court, "and is in fact unachievable because accidents are an inevitable fact of industrial life" (E&E News PM, March 24).
DOJ this week argued that EPA "correctly concluded," based on the Clean Air Act's language and the prior court rulings, that it lacks authority to account for malfunctions when setting emissions standards.
EPA "permissibly" interpreted the Clean Air Act's requirement that it must base hazardous air pollution standards off the best-performing sources in an industry category as reflecting sources that are unlikely to malfunction, DOJ said.
"The decision in this case did not break any new legal ground," DOJ said in the brief.
The administration noted that it would have been nearly impossible to set numeric standards accounting for malfunctions in the boiler standards because of the "myriad different types" of equipment breakdowns.
EPA is also not required to set work-practice standards under the Clean Air Act, DOJ said.
"Petitioner does not identify any means by which the EPA could or should have feasibly modified that measurement of actual best performance to account for malfunctions whose occurrence, timing, and nature are inherently unpredictable," the administration brief says.
"And nothing in the [Clean Air Act] compelled the EPA to do so," DOJ added.
If the Supreme Court takes up the boiler standards case and strikes down the D.C. Circuit's string of rulings on malfunctions, it would affect many sectors, including various manufacturers, refineries, chemical plants and mining operations. EPA's 2011 boiler rules alone affected 200,000 sources at 100,000 facilities.
The Pacific Legal Foundation, Competitive Enterprise Institute and National Federation of Independent Business Small Business Legal Center have asked the court to grant review of the D.C. Circuit decision.
"This ruling leaves hundreds of thousands of sources across the country at the mercy of EPA enforcement and citizen suits and threatens to generate unnecessary and unproductive litigation in federal district courts across the country," the right-leaning legal groups said in an April amicus brief.
It takes the votes of four justices for the Supreme Court to grant a petition.
As the petition remains pending in the Supreme Court, the D.C. Circuit last month paused litigation over a separate rule in which EPA required several states to eliminate provisions that automatically exempted facilities from criteria pollution limits during startups, shutdowns and malfunctions.
The Trump administration had requested the pause to take another look at the rule, which also stems from the 2008 Sierra Club case.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/05/25/stories/1060055161
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