Preview Newsletter

ACC AM 14/11/17

Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) Inside The Pipe Lobbying Wars
Nov 13, 2017 | PoliticoPro

From The New York Times’ Hiroko Tabuchi: “Two powerful industries, plastic and iron, are locked in a lobbying war over the estimated $300 billion that local governments will spend on water and sewer pipes over the next decade.
(ACC mentioned) Plastic Bottle Recycling Dips In 2016
Nov 14, 2017 | Greener Package

Plastic bottle recycling remained strong in 2016, but declined slightly, slipping 2.4% to just over 2.9 billion pounds, according to figures released jointly by the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR) and the American Chemistry Council (ACC).
Differing U.S. Bonn Strategies • New Environment Moves in China • Military Cleans Up
Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Chuck McCutcheon

State Department negotiators are at the U.N. climate summit in Bonn. So are some of President Donald Trump’s political appointees—but the two appear to have diverging agendas, Dean Scott finds in reporting from the talks.

LCSA News

(ACC Mentioned) D.C. Circuit Grants Industries Role In TSCA Inventory Suit
Nov 13, 2017 | Inside EPA

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has granted a request from groups representing the chemical, fuel and other industry sectors to intervene in support of EPA in environmentalists' lawsuit over the agency's final rule establishing an inventory of existing chemicals subject to review under the revised toxics law.

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Can Plastic Ever Be Made Illegal?
Nov 14, 2017 | The Revelator
By Danielle Corcione

I thought I knew what garbage looked like. Then I arrived in Bangalore, the third-largest city in India.
(ACC Mentioned) Trump’s EPA Chemical Safety Nominee May Be Too Toxic Even For Republicans
Nov 14, 2017 | The Intercept
By Sharon Lerner

MASSIVE CONFLICTS OF interest no longer stand in the way of confirmation to the Environmental Protection Agency’s highest posts, as Scott Pruitt, the EPA’s sworn enemy, demonstrated when he ascended to the agency’s top job.
EPA Nominee Should Scare Us All
Nov 12, 2017 | StarNews
By Editorial Board

Some of President Trump’s appointments to federal office have been, to put it mildly, a bit out there.
The Media’s Tactics To Silence Science At Trump’s EPA
Nov 13, 2017 | The Hill
By Jeff Stier

Activists are whipping the media and politicians into frenzies over Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s reforms.
North Carolina Senators Decline to Back EPA Nominee Dourson (Corrected)
Nov 6, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tiffany Stecker and David Schultz

He’s been nominated to serve as assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution
Final Votes Likely on Defense Bill Targeting Widespread Toxics
Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

The House expects to vote Nov. 14 on the final version of a defense bill that would authorize more than $70 million for the Air Force and Navy to clean up sites contaminated with two chemicals increasingly found in military and civilian drinking water sources.
Amazon Plays Catch-Up in Push to Police Chemicals in Products
Nov 14, 2017 | Bloomberg
By Lauren Coleman-Lochner

Amazon.com Inc. is developing a plan to regulate the chemicals used by suppliers, but it still lags Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Target Corp. and other retailers in the push for greener products.
Norway Finds Online Retailers Failing To Inform On Hazardous Chemicals
Nov 14, 2017 | Chemical Watch

Norway's Environment Directorate found that 11 out of 15 online retailers that it inspected, did not adequately inform customers about hazardous chemicals contained in their products. The companies are subject to the same regulations as high street retailers.
Denmark Issues Report On Chemicals Initiatives' Cost Effectiveness
Nov 14, 2017 | Chemical Watch

Denmark’s EPA has published a report, assessing the effect of the country’s chemicals initiatives between 2014 and 2017.

Energy News

NAM Campaign Aims To Fight Lawsuits Against Energy Companies
Nov 14, 2017 | E&E News PM
By Amanda Reilly

Spurred by lawsuits against energy companies over climate change, the National Association of Manufacturers today launched a campaign to fight what it calls "activist litigation."
Nebraska To Decide On Keystone XL Pipeline Next Week
Nov 13, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Devin Henry

Regulators in Nebraska will announce their decision on the Keystone XL pipeline project next week.
US Gulf Coast Seen As Natural Gas Export Hub For Years To Come
Nov 14, 2017 | Platts
By Harry Weber and Annie Siebert

The US Gulf Coast is expected to be a crude oil, natural gas and LNG export hub for years to come even as supply, demand and geopolitical swings shift market dynamics, industry consultants said Monday.
Why Government Energy-Efficiency Programs Sound Great–But Often Don’t Work
Nov 13, 2017 | The Wall Street Journal
By Sam Ori

Energy-efficiency programs are a kind of darling of energy policy experts. They claim to reduce carbon emissions and save money at the same time.

Chemical Security News

Dover Chemical Agrees to $7.4M Cleanup of Ohio Dioxin Plume
Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Alex Ebert

The public has less than a month to comment on a proposed consent order between the EPA and Dover Chemical Corp. directing the company to clean up, at an estimated cost of $7.4 million, a dioxin plume from its Dover, Ohio, chemical plant.
Agency May Decline To Enact Whistleblower Protections After Deepwater Horizon Tragedy
Nov 13, 2017 | Houston Chronicle
By Jordan Blum

A federal agency may decide Tuesday to withdraw its recommendations to extend whistleblower protections for offshore oil workers made in the aftermath of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico.

Transportation and Infrastructure News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Environment News

Do States Have a Role in Making Climate Policy?
Nov 14, 2017 | The Wall Steet Journal
By Arthur van Benthem and Oren Cass

Proponents say state action is needed to offset the effects of federal policy reversals. Critics say it won’t be effective—and is an overreach.
Singing, Stomping Protesters Roil White House Event
Nov 13, 2017 | E&E News PM
By Jean Chemnick

Protesters disrupted an event today hosted by the Trump administration at the international climate talks as environmentalists channeled American country singer Lee Greenwood in an effort to shame fossil fuel boosters.
Subcommittee To Vote On 4 Rule-Busting Bills
Nov 14, 2017 | E&E Daily
By Sean Reilly

A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee is set to approve four bills tomorrow that would carve out exceptions, exemptions and extensions to compliance with air pollution regulations for a handful of industries.
EPA Poised To Defend Rule Allowing Air Trading As Regional Haze Control
Nov 14, 2017 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker

EPA later this week will defend at oral argument an Obama-era rule that allows power plants to rely on participation in the agency's interstate emissions trading program as an alternative to imposing source-specific regional haze air pollution controls, with the rule facing challenges from environmentalists, utilities, and some states.
Carbon Emissions On Track To Rise This Year
Nov 14, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

Global carbon dioxide emissions are on track to rise slightly this year after three years of staying flat, new research shows.
Bill Wehrum Is Sworn In As Air Chief
Nov 13, 2017 | E&E News PM
By Sean Reilly

Four days after narrowly winning Senate confirmation, Bill Wehrum was sworn in today as U.S. EPA air chief.

Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) Inside The Pipe Lobbying Wars

Nov 13, 2017 | PoliticoPro

From The New York Times’ Hiroko Tabuchi: “Two powerful industries, plastic and iron, are locked in a lobbying war over the estimated $300 billion that local governments will spend on water and sewer pipes over the next decade. … The American Chemistry Council, a deep-pocketed trade association that lobbies for the plastics industry, has backed bills in at least five states — Michigan, Ohio, South Carolina, Indiana and Arkansas — that would require local governments to open up bids for municipal water projects to all suitable materials, including plastic. A council spokesman, Scott Openshaw, criticized the current bidding process in many localities as ‘virtual monopolies which waste taxpayer money, drive up costs and ultimately make it harder for states and municipalities to complete critical water infrastructure upgrades.’”
— “Opponents of the industry-backed bills, including many municipal engineers, say they are a thinly veiled effort by the plastics industry to muscle aside traditional pipe suppliers. ‘It’s simply catering to an industry that is trying to use legislation to gain market share,’ Stephen Pangori of the American Council of Engineering Companies testified this year before a Michigan Senate committee.”Full story.
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/politico-influence/2017/11/13/h-r-block-snags-jeffries-aide-223324

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC mentioned) Plastic Bottle Recycling Dips In 2016

Nov 14, 2017 | Greener Package

Plastic bottle recycling remained strong in 2016, but declined slightly, slipping 2.4% to just over 2.9 billion pounds, according to figures released jointly by the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR) and the American Chemistry Council (ACC). The “27th Annual National Postconsumer Plastic Bottle Recycling Report” indicates the overall recycling rate for plastic bottles for the year was 29.7%, down from 31.1% in 2015.
The five-year compounded annual growth rate for plastic bottle recycling was 2.1%. Following more than 20 consecutive years of growth, factors that contributed to the recent decline include a slight drop in material collected for recycling, changing export markets, and increased contamination of recyclables. In addition, growth in the use of plastic bottles in packaging was offset by continuing progress in lightweighting and increased use of concentrates with smaller, lighter bottles.
In 2016, PET recycling decreased by 44 million pounds. The collection of high-density polyethylene bottles, which includes bottles for milk, household cleaners, and detergents, fell by 31.7 million pounds (2.8%) to just over 1.1 billion pounds for the year. The recycling rate for HDPE bottles slipped from 34.4% to 33.4%.
Exports of HDPE bottles rose nearly 5% from 184 million pounds in 2015 to 193 pounds (or 16.4% of total HDPE bottles collected) in 2016. The amount of HDPE reported processed in the U.S. fell by 37 million pounds (or nearly 4%) to just under 993 million pounds.
“Some U.S. recyclers are seeing these short-term challenges as opportunities to innovate and invest in our plastics recycling infrastructure,” says Steve Alexander, President of APR. “The key to continued growth lies in improving our sorting and collection technologies to deliver consistent, high-quality yields that strengthen our global competitiveness.”
“Plastics recycling has a track record of long-term growth spanning 25 years,” says Steve Russell, ACC’s Vice President of Plastics. “Post-use plastics are valuable materials that have weathered many cycles and different growth factors. From resin suppliers to recyclers to brand owners, the plastics value chain is working together to continue to create new opportunities and long-term solutions.”
This year’s survey found the collection of polypropylene bottles rose nearly 15.3% to reach 36.6 million pounds, as the PP collection rate climbed to over 20%. PP caps, closures, and non-bottle containers are widely collected for recycling in the U.S., and these data are presented in a separate report on recycling non-bottle rigid plastics, which will be released in the coming months.
https://www.greenerpackage.com/recycling/plastic_bottle_recycling_dips_2016

Return to headline | Return to top
Differing U.S. Bonn Strategies • New Environment Moves in China • Military Cleans Up

Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Chuck McCutcheon

State Department negotiators are at the U.N. climate summit in Bonn. So are some of President Donald Trump’s political appointees—but the two appear to have diverging agendas, Dean Scott finds in reporting from the talks.
The negotiators haven’t centered on fossil fuels when they meet with other delegations. And the political appointees—who flew to Bonn in part to keep an eye on those diplomats and ensure fossil fuels get a proper hearing—said they haven’t had an easy time getting their message out.
It hasn’t helped, one of the appointees told Scott, that the political group is based an hour away from the summit and not in two of the German city’s downtown hotels serving as home to the rest of the U.S. delegation.
“They don’t want us here,” the appointee said.
China’s approach to environmental policy is the focus of two articles from Bloomberg Environment correspondent Michael Standaert in Shenzhen.
One of the articles examines China’s efforts to consolidate nearly 300,000 small chemical producers and assume more environmental, health, and safety oversight of their chemical operations and enforcement. A top official says it could take five to 10 years to play out.
The other article says China is on the cusp of launching what would in time become the world’s largest carbon-emissions trading system—but that it has yet to share much information about exactly how that system would work. Some observers are questioning how communist China—the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases—will strike the right balance of market-driven forces and government involvement.
A bill that outlines annual upcoming priorities for the Pentagon is expected to get a vote in the House today.
The legislation calls for more than $70 million for the Air Force and Navy to clean up sites contaminated with two chemicals—perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS)— that increasingly are being discovered in military and civilian drinking water sources. Pat Rizzuto is covering.
Quote of the Day
“If you pollute too much here now you will go to jail.” —Chen Hongjian, general manager at China’s Foshan Nanhai Huasheng Chemical Industry Co., discussing the nation’s tougher environmental enforcement.
Other Stories We’re Covering
• Ivory Coast, the world’s largest cocoa producer, won’t be able to uproot cocoa plantations illegally planted in protected forests and national parks for at least five years.
• William Wehrum is now officially on the job as the EPA’s air chief. Abby Smith looks at how he’ll carry out that closely watched assignment in an article being published this morning.
• Challenges to EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s decision to ban grant recipients from advisory boards may get little traction in courts wary of defining the advice federal agencies seek. Sylvia Carignan explores the issue in a story coming later this morning.
• A geologist will be nominated by Trump to be assistant secretary of the Interior for water and science to oversee the Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Geological Survey: Timothy Petty, deputy legislative director for Idaho Republican Sen. James Risch.
• The National Clean Water Law Seminar runs today through Thursday in Savannah, Ga., looking at legal and regulatory challenges the clean water sector faces. The panels will include discussions of federal-state regulatory roles under the Trump administration and the latest lawsuits that challenge conventional Clean Water Act interpretations. Amena H. Saiyid is tracking.
• The International Energy Agency is scheduled to release its annual World Energy Outlook today. It will include analyses of China, natural gas, and the links between energy and development.
• Federal pipeline safety regulators will host two public meetings today: One is to hear from the public and discuss items an upcoming U.N. conference in Geneva on transporting dangerous materials. OSHA will lead the other, which will talk about proposals in advance of another U.N. meeting in Geneva, this one on classifying and labeling chemicals. Sylvia Carignan is covering.
• Energy Secretary Rick Perry will open the North American Energy Ministerial with Mexico and Canada in Houston today to discuss energy cooperation.
• Two House panels are holding hurricane-related hearings: Energy and Commerce’s environment subcommittee will address environmental-related response and recovery, while Natural Resources will focus on transparency and financial accountability. David Schultz is covering those, and Rebecca Kern will cover a hurricane hearing with Puerto Rico and Energy Department officials in the Senate’s energy committee.
• A California judge in a high-profile court case against Monsanto Co. may delay expert testimony in light of a new study released last week. The move follows the publication of a paper finding no significant link between glyphosate—the main ingredient in Roundup—and cancer in a long-term study of farmers and their spouses. Attorneys for Monsanto and the cancer victims have until today to file briefs on the matter. Tiffany Stecker is watching.
Today’s Events
8 a.m. • Infrastructure •American University law school holds forum on infrastructure permitting, implementation and impacts.
9:30a.m. • Oil and Gas Development • The NAACP and other groups hold briefing on a report on oil and gas development’s impacts on black communities.
10 a.m. • Bills • Senate environment committee’s clean air and nuclear safety panel holds hearing on bills addressing emissions standards and other issues.
Around the Web
• Half a dozen companies, including one partly owned by Bill Gates, are trying to see if removing carbon dioxide from the air could eventually become a trillion-dollar enterprise.
• Global carbon-dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and industry in 2017 are projected to go up by 2 percent to a record 37 billion metric tons after having increased by only one-quarter of 1 percent from 2014 to 2016.
• Former EPA career attorneys lay out a case against Pruitt’s “sue-and-settle” directive.
China’s Long-Range Plans Start to Shake Out in Chemicals Industry
Posted: Nov 14, 2017, 6:30 AM EST
By Michael Standaert
China’s efforts to consolidate nearly 300,000 small chemical producers and assume more environmental, health, and safety oversight of their chemical operations and enforcement could take five to 10 years to play out, a top official said.
An increasing numbers of accidents, protests from residents against chemical facilities near their homes, and an unwieldy number of small producers have prompted the government to eliminate smaller companies and relocate larger producers to industrial parks where they will be better managed, official Chang Jiwen said Nov. 2 at the Ninth Chemical Regulatory Annual Conference in Hangzhou.
“If you cannot adapt, you will be eliminated,” said Chang, vice director-general of the Research Institute for Resources & Environment Policies of the Development Research Center of the State Council. “Over the next 10 years there will be more regulation, and by 2020, we hope to have complete legislation on hazardous chemicals.”
Chang said he was involved in on-site inspections last month in a village where local law enforcement closed down all the businesses and the local village head allowed only the companies that could pay him off to reopen as a means of insurance.
“In the past they weren’t punished,” he said of local officials. “They are really scared about the situation now. Sometimes [a company] has all the proper paperwork and they still won’t give you the go ahead. They are worried that if they go to a company and inspect it and say there are no problems, if that company later has an accident they may be fired or go to jail.”
The central government also is discussing the establishment of a special agency to manage environmental, health, and safety issues for the chemical industry, and this body could be announced at the annual National People’s Congress meetings in March 2018, Chang said.
Consolidations and Inspections
If the government consolidates environmental, health, and safety oversight across several ministries, there will be less overlap and conflicting policies, and more responsibility for companies to implement those policies. Many of these companies produce chemicals like calcium carbide, acetic acid, and methanol, which are used in fertilizers, steelmaking, wood glue, synthetic fabrics, and antifreeze.
“The idea of risk assessment has been appearing in a lot of talks by top leaders and in government documents, but in China many people are not clear about the idea yet,” said Lu Nianming, deputy director of the State Administration of Work Safety. “Businesses are the key players. They are the ones that need to have risk assessments and standards established in their operations.”
There have been widespread inspections of companies across China in recent months related to environmental regulations, as well as safety and occupational health issues, according to Du Huanyong, deputy head of the Occupational Hazards Department of the China Academy of Safety Science and Technology.
Chemical, cement, ceramics, lead-acid battery, automotive, and other heavy polluting industries have been at the center of recent inspections, he said.
Du recounted that one company he inspected used non-hazardous adhesives when inspections were scheduled and then used more hazardous adhesives that were three times cheaper when inspectors were not around. In another instance, factory workers were wearing their face masks backwards because they’d never had proper training on how to use them.
Upgrade or Shut Down
In the Nanhai and Shunde areas around the city of Foshan, south of Guangzhou in Guangdong province, an area known for its home appliance, furniture and coating, and resin and paint producers, inspections began in earnest around Oct. 1, 2016.
“Local environmental officials became very serious at that time and the supply chain was really impacted,” Chen Hongjian, general manager at Foshan Huasheng Chemical Industry Co., which produces industrial paints and coatings.
Inspections are ongoing in the area, averaging about one a week, and Chen estimated that 30 to 40 percent of around 3,000 furniture finishing companies in the area had been shuttered since the start of 2017.
Foshan Huasheng Chemical was not fined or closed down because of inspections but has had to invest more than 1 million yuan ($150,600) in upgrades to air pollution control technology, Chen told Bloomberg Environment.
“Inspectors come down from Beijing, from Guangdong provincial level, from the local level, from all levels,” he said.
The local government also sent the company all the regulations it had to to comply with, and “they made us study these,” he said.
Foshan Nanhai Qiaopai Chemical Co., which also produces paints, coatings, and solvents, has spent around 400,000 yuan ($60,250) on upgrades and would “likely invest more,” General Manager Guo Quanan told Bloomberg Environment.
While his company’s “revenue had definitely been impacted,” on the flip side “overall product quality has improved,” Guo said.
The inspections also have led to consolidation, as larger chemical companies in the area that can afford the upgrades have taken business from smaller ones that have had to shut down.
“Companies are getting bigger and they are cutting out the weak, polluting companies, which are hard to manage [as far as environmental oversight] and hard for them to tax,” Chen said.
The local environmental bureau also has created a WeChat group, an application similar to a hybrid of Twitter and Facebook, which Chen showed Bloomberg Environment. The bureau uses it to notify managers at more than 80 local companies of new inspections and posts pictures of crackdowns.
In addition, local, state-controlled media stories are naming companies that fail inspections.
“If you pollute too much here now you will go to jail,” Chen said.
Independent Consultants
The government would like companies to use third-party evaluators, which in China are independent consultants and EHS service providers, to implement environmental, health, and safety plans at a high level, particularly by training staff in safe production and emergency management, said Du of China Academy of Safety Science and Technology.
“The regulations are top down, made by people with Ph.D.s, and are very good policies, but law enforcement at the local level are often poorly educated,” Chang said. “In this transitional period, we need to give more responsibility to companies and give third-party evaluators a greater role. They are supposed to provide stewardship for enterprises.”
Need for evaluators might be increasing, but the emerging market has not yet fully developed. Outside of the provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, which have ranking systems for third-party evaluators, there has been little standardization of that service and technical assistance industry.
“In general, we need a better system for evaluating these [third-party evaluation] companies across the country,” Chang said.

http://news.bna.com/deln/lpages/lpages.adp?pg=breaking_news&bn_product=deln

Return to headline | Return to top

LCSA News

(ACC Mentioned) D.C. Circuit Grants Industries Role In TSCA Inventory Suit

Nov 13, 2017 | Inside EPA

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has granted a request from groups representing the chemical, fuel and other industry sectors to intervene in support of EPA in environmentalists' lawsuit over the agency's final rule establishing an inventory of existing chemicals subject to review under the revised toxics law.
In a Nov. 13 order, the court grants the Oct. 2 request to intervene filed by the American Chemistry Council (ACC), American Petroleum Institute, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and other groups.
The case, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) v. EPA, is one of several lawsuits environmental and public interest groups have filed in various federal appeals courts challenging three EPA rules the Trump administration issued this summer establishing a framework for reviewing existing chemicals under the revised Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
The court order also gives groups that may seek to support environmentalist petitioners 14 days to file a request to intervene, and says it will set deadlines for parties' briefs in a future order.
EDF Sept. 5 challenged EPA's inventory reset rule targeting what environmentalists say is the rule's overly broad allowance for industry CBI claims that will shield information from the public.
In their Oct. 2 request to intervene, the chemical and other sector groups argued that they meet all requirements to participate in the suit, including that they have an interest in the outcome of the case and that the parties involved do not adequately represent their interests.
The industry groups also said that the environmentalists' lawsuit challenging EPA's rule establishing an inventory of existing chemicals subject to review under the revised toxics law may affect their production or use of chemicals.
The so-called inventory reset rule is one of three final rules that proscribe how EPA will review risks from existing chemicals, which were a driver for TSCA reform, because of longstanding concerns that EPA had limited ability to regulate chemicals already in commerce when the original law was enacted.
In a Nov. 9 nonbinding statement of issues to raise in the case, EDF argues that the so-called inventory reset rule fails to provide for sufficient vetting of secrecy claims and will delay required reporting.
EDF argued that the Trump EPA rule likely violates the updated TSCA law and the Administrative Procedure Act, and suggests that petitioners will ask the court to determine “[w]hether the final rule violates TSCA because it allows submitters to assert claims of confidential business information (CBI) without meeting all of the requirements of TSCA” governing such claims.
The United States Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation in September consolidated the challenges to the prioritization rule in the 9th Circuit and to the risk evaluation rule in the 4th Circuit. EDF's lawsuit challenging the inventory reset rule is proceeding along a different track in the D.C. Circuit.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/dc-circuit-grants-industries-role-tsca-inventory-suit

Return to headline | Return to top

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Can Plastic Ever Be Made Illegal?

Nov 14, 2017 | The Revelator

By Danielle Corcione

I thought I knew what garbage looked like. Then I arrived in Bangalore, the third-largest city in India.
There was trash was almost everywhere you looked. Plastic bottles, food packaging and other waste that could’ve potentially been recycled contaminated the landscape, even in people’s front- and backyards. When I’d ride into the city from the ashram where I was staying in the countryside, I’d inhale toxic fumes of garbage piles burning and observe wild animals rummaging through fields of trash.
During my first day on Commercial Street, one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares, I could feel the pollution sink into my pores and ignite oils on my face. The ground was no better. While wearing only flimsy flip-flops, I nearly stepped on a rat with a candy wrapper in its mouth.
My experiences weren’t just anecdotal. According to a 2016 study by the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore generates 5,000 metric tons of garbage a day, of which only 10 percent on average is recycled. The city’s landfills, however, can only handle 2,100 tons of waste per day.
When I returned home, I quickly learned that Bangalore was not alone, and how the United States plastic lobby keeps its waste pollution behind closed doors. New York City — which has a population 1.5 million fewer people than Bangalore — throws away twice as much garbage; according to GrowNYC, residents of the Big Apple produce 12,000 tons of solid waste a day.
My experiences inspired a radical belief in me, going beyond plastic-bag bans and littering fines: Plastic should be illegal.
Communities around the world have taken action to ban single-use plastic bags. I began to wonder, could we ever take things a step further by banning plastic altogether? That’s not an easy question, I quickly learned, because not all plastics are created — and therefore, disposed of — equally.
When we explore the possibility of banning plastic, we need to be specific about which kinds. The base of all plastic is resins, which are composed of polymers. Different chemicals are required to make the many different types of resin. According to the American Chemistry Council, some common types include:Polyethylene terephthalate, found in water bottles;High-density polyethylene, included in bags for grocery and retail purchases;Low-density polyethylene, used for food packaging and shrink wrap;Polypropylene, utilized for medicine bottles and bottle caps; andPolystyrene, typically in the form of Styrofoam.
Each of those types of plastic comes with different potential environmental costs. “The plastics of greatest concern from an environmental health perspective are polyvinyl chloride (vinyl), polystyrene, polycarbonate, and acrylonitrile butadiene styrene,” says Mike Schade, Mind the Store campaign director of Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families. “Using vinyl products exposes consumers to hormone-disrupting phthalates, which are dangerous at very low levels of exposure.” Even getting rid of vinyl is dangerous, he says, because incinerating it releases dioxins, one of the most toxic man-made chemicals.
Additionally, I found that not all plastics are regulated equally. Although there hasn’t been any federal U.S. legislation yet banning vinyl, or any other type of plastic, cities and states have successfully passed and adopted measures to ban plastic bags. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, Austin, Cambridge, Los Angeles, Chicago, Seattle and San Francisco are among the cities to implement straight bans as opposed to fees. Meanwhile, statewide bans have passed in California and Hawaii.
“When it comes to high density polyethylene and other [types of] plastic bags, the biggest issues are with them clogging up landfills, polluting parks, and waterways,” Schade says. “Plastic bags are a huge solid waste problem and a waste of precious resources.”
According to the Earth Policy Institute, the United States consumes 100 billion plastic bags each year, which is enough to circle the equator 1,330 times.
What if plastic bags were to be banned in the United States, as they were in Kenya earlier this year? Unfortunately that legal battle would require likely copious amounts of money to fight the plastic industry, most notably the American Progressive Bag Alliance, a pro-plastic lobbying group run by the American Chemistry Council. In her documentary Plastic Patch: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which I initially watched after returning from India, journalist Angela Sun revealed that the council is an umbrella organization for Dow Chemical Company, DuPont and ExxonMobil.
According to a recent report in The Huffington Post, the group is the moneybag behind legislation to ban the banning of plastic bags. These types of laws have already passed in states like Florida and Arizona. As depicted in Sun’s film, the American Progressive Bag Alliance ran negative, untruthful commercials urging Californians to vote against that state’s proposed plastic bag ban years ago. This year, the Iowa became the most recent state to ban plastic bag bans following a push from the organization and the American Legislative Exchange Council.
Ironically, experts tell me that plastic-bag bans can actually endanger municipalities by instigating lawsuits from “big plastic.”
“Cities potentially expose themselves to lawsuits over environmental claims if they only ban plastic bags, but allow other bags to be given away for free,” explains Jennie Romer, a New York City-based attorney and founder of Plastic Bag Laws. Romer works with grassroots organizations in New York City to push for plastic-bag fees; according to The New York Times, Governor Cuomo quashed a measure to implement a 5-cent fee on plastic bags earlier this year.
There’s a reason why conversations about the plastics industry revolve around plastic bags: it’s a gateway to other environmental issues. Romer explains that once people get accustomed to having certain plastics banned, the plastic industry becomes concerned about the potential of all plastic products being banned rather than just bags. In other words, I realized that plastic bag legislation isn’t really about plastic bags; it’s about what other types of plastic can be potentially banned in the future.
While governments can regulate the plastics industry, ultimately, the effort to reduce plastic consumption comes down to shifting consumer behavior, Romer says. She adds that implementing fees encourage consumers to be more mindful compared to straight bans.
“People just don’t get a bag when they get an item or two or they bring a bag when they don’t want to pay a fee,” Romer explains.
While plastic bags are her focus, Romer also consults on expanded polystyrene, found in Styrofoam. She believes this type of plastic requires a straight ban because it breaks up more easily and cannot be recycled, unlike high-density polyethylene in plastic bags.
Sun tells me the government should have a role in regulating the labeling of plastic products. “Just because Bisphenol A [or BPA] is a buzz word and in social consciousness, the chemical industry can easily make a slight change and call it something else and still have a BPA-free label on it because it’s technically free of BPA,” she says. “Putting a BPA label on a baby bottle doesn’t mean it’s necessarily OK to be used.”
Sun also stresses that while governments should implement policies to reduce plastic consumption systematically, it’s up to individual people to raise awareness about the issue. No matter how much policy can influence our everyday lives, reducing plastic ultimately falls us — as individual consumers — to take action. This both inspires me and disappoints me, because it’s difficult to fight against a culture specifically designed to consume plastic. After all, bringing your own reusable bag doesn’t go very far when most of the products you purchase are packaged in plastic.
“Social change is hard to do, but it can be done little by little,” explains Sun. “Empowered citizens in different realms have pushed and lobbied for this change. It’s power to the people.”
While bans, whether they are for plastic bags or certain types of resin, seem to be the best idealistic policy for the environment, I learned that they can make governments vulnerable to lawsuits by the plastic lobby. While fees can inspire a change in consumer behavior without the potential of legal action, even those are difficult to just get passed. If we seriously consider banning plastic, not only do we have to specify which kinds, but we also need to work around a system heavily influenced by plastic manufacturers. Otherwise the United States’ garbage problem could start to look a lot more like Bangalore’s.
http://therevelator.org/plastic-illegal/

Return to headline | Return to top
(ACC Mentioned) Trump’s EPA Chemical Safety Nominee May Be Too Toxic Even For Republicans

Nov 14, 2017 | The Intercept

By Sharon Lerner

MASSIVE CONFLICTS OF interest no longer stand in the way of confirmation to the Environmental Protection Agency’s highest posts, as Scott Pruitt, the EPA’s sworn enemy, demonstrated when he ascended to the agency’s top job. Last Thursday, the Senate confirmed a second highly conflicted EPA nominee, fossil fuel lobbyist Bill Wehrum, who will now oversee air pollution protections despite his clear record of working to undermine those very same protections. With only one Republican opposing Wehrum, the 49-47 vote was a reminder of how little Senate Republicans expect of those who are meant to protect us from environmental threats.
Yet Michael Dourson, the industry scientist Trump nominated to head EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, may be unable to clear even this low bar. Though the Senate’s Environment and Public Works committee voted to advance Wehrum’s and Dourson’s nominations at the same October 25 hearing, only Wehrum’s advanced to the floor of the Senate, an indication that Republicans don’t yet have the votes to confirm Dourson.
Resistance to his nomination is coming from red states that have been directly harmed by chemicals Dourson has defended on behalf of industry. The senators from West Virginia, for example, might have been expected to fall in line behind Dourson. But in a hearing last month, West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito questioned the nominee about his involvement with two chemicals that have affected her state: PFOA and MCHM, both of which, Capito said, had “very much touched the lives of my fellow West Virginians.” Capito, who didn’t respond to inquiries for this story, has yet to announce how she will vote.
Dourson was responsible for setting a state standard for PFOA that was thousands of times higher than the EPA’s current safety level. His consulting company Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment also worked on MCHM, one of the chemicals that spilled into West Virginia’s Elk River in 2014, leaving some 300,000 people without drinking water.
West Virginia’s other senator, Joe Manchin, announced his intention to vote against Dourson last month. Though a Democrat, Manchin often votes with Republicans, but not this time. West Virginia is “unfortunately familiar with the dangers that can arise when we neglect to properly comply with and enforce our chemical regulations,” Manchin said in a statement.
Dourson is also facing problems in another red state struggling with chemical contamination: North Carolina. While both Republican senators from the state voted for Pruitt and Wehrum, neither has committed to Dourson. The state is home to Camp Lejeune, the military base where TCE and other carcinogenic chemicals seeped into drinking water, leading to a cluster of cancer cases. As retired Marine Jerry Ensminger pointed out in the Raleigh News and Observer, Dourson’s evaluation of TCE, which was paid for by the American Chemistry Council, calculated a safety level that was less protective than the one set by the EPA. Ensminger, whose daughter died of leukemia at Camp Lejeune, has called on his senators to oppose Dourson, whom he calls a “walking, talking example of conflict of interest.”
North Carolina is also ground zero for GenX, the latest in a family of chemicals known as PFAS to be found in drinking water. DuPont and its spinoff, Chemours, have dumped at least 1 million pounds of PFAS into North Carolina’s Cape Fear River since 1980. GenX and other PFAS are unregulated, which is limiting the state’s ability to clean it up.
While he has stayed mum about whether he will vote for Dourson, North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr wrote to Pruitt on October 31, asking him to consider evaluating GenX and the entire class of chemicals to which it belongs, a step that could lead to regulation. Some have suggested that Burr’s support for Dourson may be contingent on whether the EPA promises to help address his state’s water contamination problem. Burr’s office did not respond to inquiries for this story.
In addition to these possible defectors, Maine Sen. Susan Collins is also expected to break with the Republican ranks to oppose Dourson. Collins was the only Republican senator to vote against both Pruitt and Wehrum.
“Susan has been heroic in so many ways,” said Delaware’s Sen. Tom Carper, who has been leading the charge against Dourson in the Senate.
Because Dourson has worked on behalf of industry to defend dozens of chemicals that have contaminated the water and air of Republicans, as well as Democrats, Carper hopes that some of Collins’s colleagues will join her this time.
“We’ve heard from states around the country where lives have been lost because of exposure to toxic chemicals,” Carper told The Intercept.
“I know some of our Republican colleagues don’t feel good about the votes they cast on the floor,” he said. “After casting votes for one troubling nominee after the other after the other, you reach a point where some of the Republicans will say, Enough already. No more.”
https://theintercept.com/2017/11/13/epa-michael-dourson-nomination-republicans/

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Nominee Should Scare Us All

Nov 12, 2017 | StarNews

By Editorial Board

Some of President Trump’s appointments to federal office have been, to put it mildly, a bit out there.
There was Sam Clovis, the Iowa talk-radio host appointed to be chief science adviser to the Department of Agriculture -- even though he had no training or background in science or agriculture. (Clovis withdrew after reports that he’d been involved in George Papadopoulos’ contacts with the Russians.)
There was the former manager of a muffler shop who became the Energy Department’s adviser on renewable energy; and a former bartender who landed a top Housing and Urban Development post.
The appointment of Michael Dourson to head the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution, however, takes the cake. Talk about the fox guarding the hen house.
Unlike Clovis, Dourson is an actual scientist. He has, however, spent the past 20 years or so working for clients such as DuPont (former owner of Chemours), Monsanto and Dow AgroSciences, defending the safety of pesticides and other chemicals. Generally, he argued that these chemicals were far less risky than EPA scientists or independent researchers believed.
Through a fluke in ethics rules, there is nothing that bars Dourson from ruling on these companies’ chemicals that he was being paid to defend a year or two ago. That’s not exactly draining the swamp.
Dourson helped DuPont defend its use of the chemical PFOA -- better known as C8, the precursor to GenX -- after states sued over water contamination. Starting to sound familiar?
DuPont and Chemours agreed to pay $671 million to settle thousands of C8 lawsuits. Dourson, however, insisted that the levels were safe, even though a panel of scientists convened by DuPont found a probable link with six illnesses: kidney and testicular cancer, ulcerative colitis, thyroid disease, pregnancy-induced hypertension and high cholesterol.
Nobody expected Mr. Trump to name tree-huggers or Greenpeace activists to environmental posts. We would, though, expect at least a principled conservative with an independent mind, not someone who’s spent much of his career essentially as a paid lobbyist for the chemical industry.
This hits home especially for Southeastern North Carolina, with concern over GenX and other chemicals. Much of what the state Department of Environmental Quality does, or can do, is based on EPA standards set under the Clean Water Act. If the head EPA chemical inspector sees nothing wrong with your children drinking these chemicals at extra-high levels, all bets are off.
Here is where Sens. Richard Burr and Thom Tillis can make a difference. Both have shown sensitivity to the GenX issue. Burr has called on the EPA to undertake a major review of its actions regarding GenX. Both have refused to commit to voting for Dourson, saying they need to further weigh the issues. Both also are very aware of the deaths and illnesses caused by chemicals in the water supply at Camp Lejeune.
When Dourson’s nomination comes before the full Senate (and it shortly will), Burr and Tillis should demand that the president name someone else. If you are ever going to contact your U.S. senator’s office about a national issue, this is it.
This isn’t about political ideology or whether you support or don’t support President Trump. This is about nothing less than the very basic safety of our drinking water.
Contacts Sens. Burr and Tillis
Sen. Thom Tillis: Washington office (202) 224-6342; Raleigh office (919) 856-4630; Email form: www.tillis.senate.gov
Sen. Richard Burr: Washington office (202) 224-3154; Winston-Salem office (800) 685-8916; Email form: www.burr.senate.gov/contact/email
http://www.starnewsonline.com/opinion/20171112/editorial-nov-12-epa-nominee-should-scare-us-all

Return to headline | Return to top
The Media’s Tactics To Silence Science At Trump’s EPA

Nov 13, 2017 | The Hill

By Jeff Stier

Activists are whipping the media and politicians into frenzies over Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt’s reforms.
The attacks employ a common narrative: EPA officials have conflicts of interests from prior employment and are now seeking to poison us to please their former chemical industry paymasters.
A new conflict over conflicts exposes what’s really behinds the tactics.

On Oct. 31 Pruitt announced that current EPA grant recipients would no longer be eligible to serve on key EPA scientific advisory boards — at least not if they choose to continue receiving EPA research dollars.
Because the boards influence agency priorities, including millions of dollars in grants, the conflict of simultaneously serving on a board and being a grant recipient is obvious. But rather than applauding the move, those who have been incensed by more tenuous conflicts are seething that Pruitt is cracking down.
The move is “the equivalent of burning books that you don’t like,” according to Elena Craft, a senior scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund.
Reactions like Craft’s are now standard fare from activists and mainstream media alike. But the allegations don’t withstand scrutiny. On Nov. 3, Pruitt reappointed Craft’s fellow fund senior scientist Jennifer McPartland to a coveted seat on the Board of Scientific Advisors. Book-burners would be appalled by the sloppiness.
Let’s be honest. There’s a clash between left and right on nearly every policy issue — for good reason. The disagreements usually stem from differing schools of thought in areas such as economics, foreign policy and yes, even environmental policy.
On environmental policy, the merits of the precautionary principle, risk assessment methodologies and the risk of unintended consequences are debates worth having.
But activists’ dogmatic approach to environmental policy, coupled with constant conflict complaints, suggests they deny the notion that there’s ever any validity to dissenting views.
Rather than having to inform the public with complicated science policy arguments, strident groups score points for taking the low-road.
Nancy Beck, a toxicologist specializing in risk assessment, spent nearly a decade evaluating environmental rules at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB's) Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.
After her work at OMB, she put her regulatory science expertise to work in the private sector, spending five years at the leading chemical industry trade group.
The New York Times turned the stint into what sounds like a conspiracy theory titled, "Why Has the E.P.A. Shifted on Toxic Chemicals? An Industry Insider Helps Call the Shots.”
That Beck’s regulatory approach was well-established at OMB before her work for the trade group, that her positions are scientifically grounded, and that her relevant private-sector experience could make her a better regulator seems like too much news that’s fit to print.
John Graham, who hired Beck at OMB and is now a dean at Indiana University, calls Beck a “public servant at heart.”
Even environmental scientists with opposing views acknowledge Beck’s bona fides. Pruitt critic Thomas Burke, at the Bloomberg School of Public Health admits Beck is a respected scientist. But you are more likely only to read a version of the Environmental Working Group’s claim that Beck is “The Scariest Trump Appointee You’ve Never Heard Of.”
It doesn’t end there. Democrats are now trying to block Pruitt’s choice to lead the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, Michael Dourson.
A professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Dourson has worked for industry.
But it’s Beck’s and Dourson’s restrained regulatory approach, not alleged conflicts, that’s the source of the opposition.
There’s good reason for big-government environmental activists to be threatened by the appointment of scientists like Beck and Dourson, as well as the removal of actually conflicted EPA advisory board members. These leading regulatory scientists with real-world experience are actually effective critics of the EPA’s flawed and even dangerous regulatory over-reach.
Expect the vile attacks on EPA officials to continue, at least so long as the tactics are rewarded. But let’s not ignore that they come with costs.
As the Wall Street Journal editorial board noted on Nov. 1, “Mr. Pruitt has received more than five times as many threats as his predecessor, Gina McCarthy.” The threats, some of which reference his home address, include explicit death threats.
What’s more, personal attacks in lieu of vigorous debate on the merits of opposing approaches harms us all. It undermines not only good policy-making but the environment where healthy democracy thrives.
Jeff Stier is a senior fellow at the National Center for Public Policy Research in Washington, D.C., and heads its Risk Analysis Division. Follow him on Twitter at  @JeffAStier.
http://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/359847-the-medias-tactics-to-silence-science-at-trumps-epa

Return to headline | Return to top
North Carolina Senators Decline to Back EPA Nominee Dourson (Corrected)

Nov 6, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Tiffany Stecker and David Schultz

He’s been nominated to serve as assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution
Burr, Tillis have backed legislation to extend health services for illnesses linked to chemical exposures at Camp Lejeune in N.C.
Two Republican senators will not commit to supporting Michael Dourson, President Donald Trump’s choice to lead the EPA’s chemical safety office—an action that could jeopardize a nominee who already has been a source of Democrats’ complaints.
The offices of both of the Senators from North Carolina, Richard Burr and Thom Tillis, told Bloomberg Environment that they are still weighing where to come down on Dourson’s nomination. If the two Republicans withhold their support, every other Senate Republican would need to vote in Dourson’s favor for him to be confirmed without any Democratic votes.
Burr and Tillis represent a state with a major chemical contamination problem at the Camp Lejeune military base. From the 1950s to the 1980s, Marines and their families drank water with excessively high concentrations of trichloroethylene, a known carcinogen, and other toxic chemicals.
Burr was the chief backer of a 2012 law (Public Law No: 112-154) signed by President Barack Obama that makes it easier for Camp Lejeune veterans to receive cancer care through the Department of Veteran Affairs. Earlier this year, Burr and Tillis introduced a bill (S.758) to extend health services for all illnesses linked to toxic chemical exposures at Camp Lejeune.
Dourson, who would lead the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, has sparked numerous complaints from Democrats and environmental groups over his ties with industry.
Burr spokeswoman Rebecca Glover told Bloomberg Environment in an email that the senator “is evaluating Mr. Dourson’s record and will make a determination based on the best interests of North Carolinians.”
A spokesman for Tillis also stopped short of endorsing Dourson’s nomination. “Sen. Tillis and his staff are doing their due diligence to assess the record of the nominee,” Daniel Keylin told Bloomberg Environment in an email.
‘Scientific Hired Gun’
Dourson—who recently left his position as a professor of risk assessment and environmental health at the University of Cincinnati and serves as an adviser to the EPA as he awaits his confirmation—has come under fire for his work with the chemicals industry.
“He’s basically a scientific hired gun,” said Jerry Ensminger, a retired Marine sergeant who lived at Camp Lejeune. “He does risk assessments for the people with deep pockets.”
Ensminger’s 9-year-old daughter died from leukemia in 1985. Burr named his 2012 legislation to help Camp Lejeune victims after Janey Ensminger.
He co-founded the website The Few, the Proud, the Forgotten, which provides information to Camp Lejeune residents who face health problems as a result of chemical exposure.
Ensminger published an Oct. 31 op-ed in the Raleigh, N.C., News & Observer opposing Dourson. Before he knew his piece had published, he received a text message from Natasha Hickman, Burr’s chief of staff, asking him to call her, he said.
“I told her right upfront, my preference would be for Sen. Burr to go to [Senate Majority Leader Mitch] McConnell and say, ‘Hey, don’t even put this guy up for a vote,’” Ensminger told Bloomberg Environment.
Hickman’s response did not satisfy him, he said.
“She said, you know, it’s kind of difficult for somebody to vote against a Republican nominee from a Republican president when you’re a Republican senator,” he said.
Glover did not comment on that conversation with Ensminger when asked about it by Bloomberg Environment.
Recommended Standards
As a consultant for companies like Dow AgroSciences, DuPont, and Koch Industries, Dourson worked on assessments that downplayed the risks of a number of likely carcinogens. Specifically, he advocated for a 1,4-dioxane safety standard that was 1,000 times weaker than the EPA’s standard. The chemical 1,4-dioxane is a likely carcinogen, according to the Environmental Working Group.
His firm, Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment, was hired by the state of West Virginia to assess the risk of perfluorooctanoic acid, an industrial chemical linked to cancer and other health problems following water contamination in the state.
TERA’s recommended level was more than 2,000 times less protective than the EPA’s current proposed health advisory level. Dourson said at his nomination hearing Oct. 4 that this was a result of advancements in science between his recommendation and the time the EPA’s proposal was released in 2016.
Scott Faber, who heads government relations at the Environmental Working Group, told Bloomberg Environment that he’s part of a coalition of groups opposed to Dourson that are targeting senators in more than a dozen states. He wouldn’t specify the states.
Faber said his coalition includes families of those who lived on military bases.
Dourson’s nomination was voted out of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee 11–10 Oct. 25. McConnell has not yet filed cloture on his nomination or that of several other EPA nominees, with the exception of William Wehrum to serve as the EPA’s assistant administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation.
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), a first term-senator and former Army lieutenant colonel, also published an op-ed criticizing Dourson, focusing on the experience of military bases around the country where the water and soil have been contaminated with chemicals.
(Scott Faber is part of a coalition opposing Michael Dourson's appointment at EPA, not leading it.)
https://bnanews.bna.com/environment-and-energy/north-carolina-senators-decline-to-back-epa-nominee-dourson-corrected

Return to headline | Return to top
Final Votes Likely on Defense Bill Targeting Widespread Toxics

Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

The House expects to vote Nov. 14 on the final version of a defense bill that would authorize more than $70 million for the Air Force and Navy to clean up sites contaminated with two chemicals increasingly found in military and civilian drinking water sources.
The chemicals—perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS)—have been found in at least 90 military and civilian sources of drinking water in excess of the Environmental Protection Agency's health advisory level, according to information provided to the agency under the third Unregulated Contaminant Monitoring Rule.
Additional information came from a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on contamination at military sites.
The National Defense Authorization Act, H.R. 2810, also would authorize $7 million for a federal study of the health effects caused by the two chemicals and the much broader group of chemicals to which they belong, called per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.
PFOS was widely used in firefighter training and at military air fields to suppress jet fuel fires.
The Department of Defense is working to address past contamination from these chemicals and prevent future problems, the department told Bloomberg Environment.
The defense authorization spending plan would set policy and maximum program levels for the fiscal year that started Oct. 1. Actual spending decisions would be made later in appropriations legislation.
The House expects a quick bipartisan compromise and vote on the bill, an aide for House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) told Bloomberg Environment.
No specific floor time has been scheduled in the Senate, but Republican and Democratic aides have said the bill may reach the Senate floor soon after the House takes action.
Cleanup Funds
The provisions addressing the PFAS chemicals are a small part of the $700 billion spending plan.
Of that total, the spending plan authorizes $647 million total for environmental restoration at Navy and Air Force sites. This includes $42 million for the Navy and $30 million for the Air Force to remediate sites contaminated with PFOS and PFOA.
The Navy and Air Force already have taken action to address these two contaminants and prevent non-emergency releases of them, said Jennifer Field, an Oregon State University professor who began studying per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals many years before their widespread contamination was recognized.
The contamination results largely from the legacy of uncontrolled uses of aqueous film-forming foam, or AFFF, for both training emergency responders and putting out fires, she said.
AFFF was and is used to quickly prevent jet fuel and other petroleum-based fires from spreading in air fields and inside Navy vessels. It's no longer made with PFOS. 3M, the sole U.S. producer of PFOS and related long-chain perfluorooctanyl chemicals, voluntarily stopped making them in 2002.
Currently, AFFF is produced with shorter-chain chemicals and used by the military and at U.S. airports. Those shorter-chain chemicals, called fluorotelomers, may have trace levels of PFOA, Field said. “It would be hard to make it zero.”
The bill would direct the Department of Defense to examine safe and effective alternatives to AFFF that don't contain PFOA or PFOS.
Health Effects
The bill also authorizes $7 million for the Department of the Defense to support a health study to be conducted by an agency with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in consultation with the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).
NIEHS and the National Toxicology Program it manages are already investigating potential health effects of more than 20 of the per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals, Linda Birnbaum, director of the institute and program, told Bloomberg Environment.
In animal studies, some per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals disrupt normal endocrine activity, reduce immune function, impact the liver and pancreas, and cause developmental problems in rodent offspring exposed in the womb, according to NIEHS information.
Some research involving people that were exposed to the chemicals have shown they may cause cancer, increase cholesterol, affect thyroid function, and decrease babies’ birth weight. But the findings are inconsistent, says CDC's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR).
DOD Support
DOD representatives agreed that more health and environmental effects information on the PFAS chemicals would be useful.
“The scientific information associated with shorter chain PFAS is limited and additional studies addressing ecological impacts, fate, and transport in the environment and impacts to human health and the environment are needed,” Defense Department spokesman Christopher Sherwood told Bloomberg Environment.
“There are multiple sources of PFAS around the country. DOD agrees that there is likely a need for a nationwide study that includes the full range of sources (e.g., military installations, commercial airports, industrial facilities, disposal facilities) where PFASs may have been released, and all relevant sources of PFAS exposure (e.g., drinking water, food wrappers, non-stick cookware),” Sherwood said.
To prevent the perception of bias, the department said funding for the proposed health study should be provided directly to the ATSDR.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123789200&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123789200&jd=123789200

Return to headline | Return to top
Amazon Plays Catch-Up in Push to Police Chemicals in Products

Nov 14, 2017 | Bloomberg

By Lauren Coleman-Lochner

E-commerce giant is developing its policy, advocacy group says
Apple leads rankings of companies rated on chemical disclosure
Amazon.com Inc. is developing a plan to regulate the chemicals used by suppliers, but it still lags Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Target Corp. and other retailers in the push for greener products.
That’s the assessment of Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families -- a Washington-based coalition that runs a program called Mind the Store. Though Amazon is now developing chemicals procedures, the e-commerce giant fared badly in Mind the Store’s ranking, which tracks how well companies reduce the toxic chemicals in the products they sell and disclose their presence.
As Amazon’s share of retail sales grows, its corporate stewardship is coming under greater scrutiny. That’s raised pressure to evaluate its products -- especially as rivals take a stand on the issue.
“Companies are seeing there’s a market advantage to demonstrating that they’re increasing the transparency of products and taking meaningful action to getting the worst of the worst chemicals out,” said Mike Schade, co-author of the report and Mind the Store’s campaign director.
For now, Amazon’s efforts to police the ingredients in its products are limited. It shuns certain “chemicals of concern” in some of its private-brand products, such as its Elements baby wipes, according to the report. Ty Rogers, a spokesman for the Seattle-based company, declined to comment.Corporate Grades
Apple Inc. received an A grade, putting it in the top spot among 30 retailers ranked for their chemical-disclosure policies by the Mind the Store campaign. It was followed by Wal-Mart (A-), while CVS Health Corp., Ikea, Whole Foods and Target earned B-pluses. Amazon, meanwhile, got a D and a rank of 14th, still better than last year’s failing grade. Toys “R” Us Inc., Trader Joe’s and Dollar General Corp. were among the nine retailers with an F.
Wal-Mart and Target have introduced and expanded programs to significantly reduce the presence certain chemicals in their products, acknowledging consumer demand for greener products and more information about what they buy. Other retailers are also responding, Schade said.
“We’ve seen a tremendous amount of progress among the retailers we ranked last year,” Schade said in a phone interview. Seven retailers have added or expanded chemical policies in the past year, he said.Work in Progress
Two-thirds of those surveyed, however, aren’t implementing such programs. Amazon doesn’t have a public safer chemicals policy, according to the report, but the company is “in the process of developing and evaluating a chemicals policy.”
The report scored companies on a 135-point scale that examined 14 metrics, including whether they got full ingredient disclosure from suppliers and have policies to cut the presence of so-called chemicals of high concern to minimal levels. Schade co-wrote the report with Mike Belliveau, executive director of the Environmental Health Strategy Center, with contributions from other groups.
The report commended Apple for requiring that suppliers provide safety assessments of materials swapped in to replace chemicals of concern. CVS, meanwhile, eliminated substances including parabens and phthlates from almost 600 private-label beauty and personal-care products, while Albertsons removed BPA from more than 80 percent of its own-brand canned foods. Sephora and other retailers, meanwhile, have developed or are developing lists of substances banned from their private-label products.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-14/amazon-plays-catch-up-in-push-to-police-chemicals-in-products

Return to headline | Return to top
Norway Finds Online Retailers Failing To Inform On Hazardous Chemicals

Nov 14, 2017 | Chemical Watch

Norway's Environment Directorate found that 11 out of 15 online retailers that it inspected, did not adequately inform customers about hazardous chemicals contained in their products. The companies are subject to the same regulations as high street retailers.
The random check was part of increased oversight of the retailers by the directorate. Its director Bjørn Bjørnstad said: "It is worrying that most online stores broke the regulations.
"They have now been corrected so that they provide consumers with information about the hazardous properties of the chemicals. This shows the importance of following up on the e-commerce market."
For online sales, information on hazardous chemicals should be stated on the website, so it is clearly visible to the consumer before they buy.
https://chemicalwatch.com/61031/norway-finds-online-retailers-failing-to-inform-on-hazardous-chemicals

Return to headline | Return to top
Denmark Issues Report On Chemicals Initiatives' Cost Effectiveness

Nov 14, 2017 | Chemical Watch

Denmark’s EPA has published a report, assessing the effect of the country’s chemicals initiatives between 2014 and 2017.
The iniatives are based on political agreements made by all the parties in the Danish parliament.
The report is the result of an effect assessment of these, carried out by Danish consulting group Cowi between May and December last year.
They are divided into three main areas: non-toxic products, international collaboration and circulating resources. Between 2014 and 2017 DKK185m (€24.9m) was spent on them.
The main conclusion of the report is that the environmental and socio-economic benefits that could be quantified far outweigh the money invested. The analysis shows a total net benefit of DKK1bn in net present value over a 50-year period.
https://chemicalwatch.com/61032/denmark-issues-report-on-chemicals-initiatives-cost-effectiveness

Return to headline | Return to top

Energy News

NAM Campaign Aims To Fight Lawsuits Against Energy Companies

Nov 14, 2017 | E&E News PM

By Amanda Reilly

Spurred by lawsuits against energy companies over climate change, the National Association of Manufacturers today launched a campaign to fight what it calls "activist litigation."
The campaign of the Manufacturers' Center for Legal Action — NAM's legal arm — will consist mostly of a website, which will feature commentary, social media resources and other information.
NAM alleges that a coordinated network of special interests engages in "frivolous" lawsuits with the goal of disparaging the nation's manufacturing.
The new website's first posts target investigations over energy companies' alleged attempts to cover up knowledge of climate change and litigation against companies over climate change damages.
NAM singles out litigation filed earlier this year by the cities of San Francisco and Oakland against BP PLC, Chevron Corp., ConocoPhillips Co., Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell PLC for damages under state public nuisance law.
"It has become clear that these activist plaintiffs' attorneys, sympathetic academics and agenda-driven media outlets are distorting the use of tort litigation to advance their narratives with the ultimate objective of undermining manufacturers and the engine of the American economy," Linda Kelly, who heads NAM's legal center, said in a statement.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2017/11/13/stories/1060066375

Return to headline | Return to top
Nebraska To Decide On Keystone XL Pipeline Next Week

Nov 13, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Devin Henry

Regulators in Nebraska will announce their decision on the Keystone XL pipeline project next week.
The five members of the Nebraska Public Service Commission will vote on a proposed order for the Keystone XL pipeline on Nov. 20, the agency announced on Monday, though it didn’t detail what that decision might be.
Approval from the Nebraska commission is one of several tasks facing Keystone XL developer TransCanada, which hopes to build the pipeline and deliver oil from Alberta, Canada, to the Gulf of Mexico.
President Trump granted a presidential permit for the controversial $8 billion pipeline in March. But state regulators still need to approve it, and green groups have sued over Trump’s decision, raising a legal barrier against the pipeline as well.
Keystone’s developers also have to decide if the pipeline is economically viable: TransCanada officials told investors this summer that it might not build the project, though the company said earlier this month that it likely has enough demand from potential customers to make the project worthwhile.
TransCanada reapplied for its Nebraska permit in February, putting the decision in the hands of the Public Service Commission. It applied to follow the same route bisecting Nebraska that the state’s governor approved in 2013, before President Obama rejected federal permits for the pipeline.
President Trump routinely cites his approval of Keystone XL — and the Dakota Access pipeline — as one of the biggest accomplishments of his first year in office.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/360178-nebraska-to-decide-on-keystone-xl-pipeline-next-week

Return to headline | Return to top
US Gulf Coast Seen As Natural Gas Export Hub For Years To Come

Nov 14, 2017 | Platts

By Harry Weber and Annie Siebert

The US Gulf Coast is expected to be a crude oil, natural gas and LNG export hub for years to come even as supply, demand and geopolitical swings shift market dynamics, industry consultants said Monday.

At the heart of the forecast is the fact that US supplies are abundant and cheap, and billions of dollars of new infrastructure is being added to link those resources to overseas destinations, particularly in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and South America. Mexico, too, has been heavily reliant on US LNG and pipeline gas from the Gulf Coast.

During the USAEE/IAEE North American Ride the Energy Cycles Conference, government officials, analysts and investment bankers joined industry consultants to explore how shale technology is boosting the US role in global energy markets, and how the Gulf is a key focal point for those efforts.

While Saudi Arabia, Russia, Qatar and China are vying for market position, none looks likely to have the same market clout in terms of excess supply, the experts said.
"While the US may seem to be retreating geopolitically from the outside world, there has never been a hub like the US Gulf Coast. In the future, it will be even bigger," said Edward Morse, global head of commodities research for Citigroup. "It's hard, if not impossible, politically to disrupt that market from the hub position."

Bolstering that expectation, S&P Global Ratings issued a report Monday that forecasts broad stability in the US oil and gas industry over the next several years. Gas prices around $3/MMBtu are a key element of that view.

There is ample natural gas supply in the US, particularly from the Northeast, where the prolific and low-cost Marcellus and Utica shale plays will continue to supply much of the growth in natural gas demand, the report said. Coal-to-gas switching, increased LNG use, and exports to Mexico are helping to drive that.

"Northeast regional differentials continue to remain below the Henry Hub price but we believe they will narrow given the significant amount of takeout capacity being built in the region over the next several years," S&P Global Ratings said. "A lot of associated gas comes from extensive oil drilling occurring in the Permian Basin."

The ratings agency said that companies with strong acreage positions in the Permian, which spans West Texas and southeastern New Mexico, should see the largest growth in 2018 due to its low breakeven drilling costs and double-digit returns, even with $50/b crude prices.

"Outside of the Permian, we forecast volumetric growth in the Marcellus and Utica as construction of infrastructure projects conclude and become fully operational," the report said.

"Once Rover Pipeline is fully operational, which we expect to occur in the first half of 2018, it will improve natural gas takeaway capacity in the Northeast. We also forecast volumes to improve in the SCOOP and STACK basins. Stronger NGL prices will likely result in an increase in processing and fractionation volumes across the US."

With such projections, investors are making big bets on the future of US oil and gas production, as well as midstream activity and, of course, exports.

For LNG, the ramp-up of exports from North America, especially from the US, will continue to grow because of increasing demand from emerging markets, said Ning Lin, an analyst with consulting firm RBAC.

"The world really needs a lot more LNG out of North America," Lin said. "The fastest ramp-up will be in the next five to 10 years."
https://www.platts.com/latest-news/natural-gas/houston/us-gulf-coast-seen-as-natural-gas-export-hub-21534818

Return to headline | Return to top
Why Government Energy-Efficiency Programs Sound Great–But Often Don’t Work

Nov 13, 2017 | The Wall Street Journal

By Sam Ori

Sam Ori is the executive director of the Energy Policy Institute at University of Chicago.
Energy-efficiency programs are a kind of darling of energy policy experts. They claim to reduce carbon emissions and save money at the same time. Who could argue with that? And to date, market forces have identified plenty of attractive opportunities to reduce the amount of energy consumed per unit of GDP. That’s a big part of why energy demand growth has slowed in many developed markets.
But to reach global climate goals, most forecasters say we need to do much more than pick the low-hanging fruit. In fact, the International Energy Agency is betting on additional efficiency gains to account for one-third of needed carbon reductions through 2040. Yet, governments increasingly seem unwilling to place the same bets. In the U.S., governments and utilities spend just $3 billion annually on residential efficiency programs—a drop in the bucket compared with the $250 billion households spend on fuels like electricity and natural gas every year.
High expectations on the one hand, but few resources funneling into a limited number of programs on the other. Why the disconnect?
Here’s one possible answer: A mounting body of evidence suggests that many government-backed programs fail to deliver on the promise of a win-win—spelling big problems for efforts to confront climate change.
In one landmark field study of more than 30,000 households in Michigan, efficiency upgrades made through the federal weatherization assistance program reduced households’ energy consumption by just 40% of what the initial engineering estimates promised. Another study of more than 100,000 households that participated in a large, federally funded stimulus program in Wisconsinfound the investments saved only about 58% of what was promised.
These kinds of shortfalls are not limited to the residential sector. Another recent study of a program designed to increase building efficiency in K-12 schools in California found energy-efficiency investments there saved the schools just 3% on their energy bills—less than a quarter of what the investments were expected to save.
The failure of energy-efficiency programs to deliver has real consequences for our wallets and our carbon budget. For example, if a school in the California program spent $400,000 on energy-efficiency upgrades, they would have expected to make up for their investment in the form of lower energy bills after 4 years. Instead, many would be disappointed to find they might never fully recoup their investment. Households in the Michigan program were given $5,000 to spend on upgrades, expecting to save $6,000 on their electricity bills. Instead, the typical household will likely recoup just $2,400 over the life of those investments.
One might argue that instead of focusing strictly on individual returns, we should consider the environmental gains. But the truth is that these investments are often very expensive climate policy. In fact, carbon reductions in some programs can cost as much as $200 per ton—or about four times the best estimates of the social damages from those emissions.
This is a big problem. But it doesn’t necessarily mean we should throw up our hands and abandon government investments in efficiency programs. Instead, there is an opportunity for policymakers to rethink the ways they choose, design, implement and evaluate energy-efficiency programs.
One important step would be to revisit the engineering models most programs use to predict savings in the first place and better calibrate them to the real world. Even then, these models need to stop being the primary means of approving energy-efficiency programs. Before hedging all bets on model predictions, lawmakers and regulators should require programs to start off with trial periods that allow them to collect real-world data on the performance of efficiency upgrades. These kinds of evaluations should be led by independent evaluators and deploy best-in-class evaluation methods using real-world data, not predictions.
Along with revealing important information on the actual savings from investments, trial periods can also help improve program design. For instance, in the Wisconsin study, the researchers found that subsidizing home-energy audits—a common practice—may be particularly ineffective, because this draws in a meaningful number of households that accept the subsidy but ultimately don’t make any efficiency investments. Further, the subsidies for specific energy upgrades didn’t target the ones that ultimately delivered the greatest cuts in pollution. The authors estimated that doing so would have yielded $2.50 in social benefits for every subsidy dollar spent. Instead, the program actually reduced social well-being by $0.18 for every subsidy dollar spent.
More comprehensive reforms are of course more politically difficult, but would deliver bigger results. A price on carbon would allocate capital to the most attractive opportunities economywide, something policy experts should embrace. But even within efficiency programs, there may be opportunities to harness market forces. In a proposal I co-wrote with Michael Greenstone and Harvard professor Cass Sunstein, we look at the ongoing shortfalls in U.S. fuel economy performance, and argue that a market for vehicle emissions could offer a more flexible and cost-effective approach to fuel-economy standards.
Energy efficiency offers significant potential as part of a portfolio of climate policies. But that potential will only be realized if we crack the code to get programs structured to deliver results. If we don’t, dealing with climate change will be much more expensive than we realize.
https://blogs.wsj.com/experts/2017/11/13/why-government-energy-efficiency-programs-sound-great-but-often-dont-work/

Return to headline | Return to top

Chemical Security News

Dover Chemical Agrees to $7.4M Cleanup of Ohio Dioxin Plume

Nov 14, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Alex Ebert

The public has less than a month to comment on a proposed consent order between the EPA and Dover Chemical Corp. directing the company to clean up, at an estimated cost of $7.4 million, a dioxin plume from its Dover, Ohio, chemical plant.
The proposed agreement, filed by the EPA along with a civil complaint in a federal court in Ohio Nov. 7, seeks to address contaminated groundwater at the Dover, Ohio-based chemical plant's 60-acre Superfund site. Since the 1980s, environmental investigations found that spills, leaks, and disposal practices at the chemical plant since the 1940s led to a plume of dioxins invading the groundwater of a neighboring residential community (United States v. Dover Chem. Corp., N.D. Ohio, No. 5:17-cv-02335, Consent Decree filed 11/7/17).
The company makes flame retardants and additives for fluids used in metalworking and drilling.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, dioxins are carcinogenic and lead to changes in hormone systems, in the development of the fetus, decrease the ability to reproduce, and suppress the immune system.
This proposed agreement covers parts of the Superfund site separate from land owned by Dover. Under the agreement, Dover would carry out a cleanup plan approved by the U.S. and Ohio EPAs in 2015. That agreement includes chemical treatment of the area's groundwater and monitoring, according to information on the EPA's Superfund website.
Dover signed the agreement in August. The company didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123789214&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123789214&jd=123789214

Return to headline | Return to top
Agency May Decline To Enact Whistleblower Protections After Deepwater Horizon Tragedy

Nov 13, 2017 | Houston Chronicle

By Jordan Blum

A federal agency may decide Tuesday to withdraw its recommendations to extend whistleblower protections for offshore oil workers made in the aftermath of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico.
The U.S. Interior Department's offshore bureau is refusing to enact the protections, arguing that they're not a priority and possibly outside of the bureau's authority. So the recommending agency, the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, called the CSB, is considering canceling some of the 2016 proposals entirely.
The April 2016 recommendations under debate would require more participation from oil rig employees who could order the stoppage of work in the event of safety concerns and provide them legal whistleblower protections against retaliation.
Withdrawing these recommendations could prove disastrous, especially when it comes to the failure to protect whistleblowers and identify the root causes of these incidents, said Jordan Barab, a former CSB investigator and deputy assistant secretary at the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
"You're just inviting these kinds of accidents to happen over and over again," Barab said, arguing that the Interior Department's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement has the authority to act.
The 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion killed 11 workers and resulted in a three-month discharge of nearly 4 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico off Louisiana. The resulting investigations determined that BP and the other companies involved cut corners and ignored warning signs.
The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement was created in 2011 because of the regulatory failings identified after the Deepwater Horizon tragedy.
CSB Chairwoman Vanessa Sutherland said her independent agency doesn't have regulatory authority and cannot force BSEE to adopt its recommendations. So the CSB may instead ask Congress to resolve conflicting or ambiguous jurisdictions, she said, and spell out what authorities fall under BSEE, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration or the Coast Guard.
For now, the BSEE is focused instead on relieving the offshore energy sector of any unnecessary regulations without jeopardizing safety, the BSEE's Gregory Julian said.
Under President Donald Trump, the Interior Department has switched its focus to promoting the expansion of oil and gas production both onshore and off. Trump's interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, has said the stars have lined up for the oil and gas sector and that the U.S. will dominate in the energy sector.
BSEE didn't object to the 2016 CSB recommendations until March of this year.
Douglas Morris, chief of the BSEE's offshore regulatory program, told the CSB that it should instead work with industry groups like the American Petroleum Institute and the International Association of Drilling Contractors to develop voluntary worker participation and whistleblower guidelines for companies.
Legislation died in Congress in 2010 that would have created offshore whistleblower protections.
"There is currently no federal law adequately protecting offshore workers who blow the whistle on worker health and safety hazards," according to a statement from the White House under former President Barack Obama, which endorsed the legislation.
One CSB board member, Rick Engler, is adamantly arguing against withdrawing the recommendations. He spoke up at the CSB's last meeting in October.
Engler pointed out that the BSEE's own Safety and Environmental Management Systems rule clearly addresses worker participation, although not adequately. So the recommendations should definitely fall within the BSEE's purview, he said.
"Safety cannot be achieved without the meaningful engagement of workers," Engler said last month. "There is evidence of retaliation against whistleblowers in the Gulf of Mexico, but no effective measures for workers to seek out."
Engler cited the case of Deepwater Horizon victim Jason Anderson, whose wife testified that Anderson had expressed fears for his safety shortly before the explosion, but told her: "I can't talk about it now. The walls are too thin."
Engler reiterated the massive human and environmental toll taken in the tragedy.
"We are entrusted by the American people to do all that we can do to prevent such catastrophes," he said. "I hope that we will not fall short."
http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Agency-may-decline-to-enact-whistleblower-12354789.php

Return to headline | Return to top

Transportation and Infrastructure News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Environment News

Do States Have a Role in Making Climate Policy?

Nov 14, 2017 | The Wall Steet Journal

By Arthur van Benthem and Oren Cass

Proponents say state action is needed to offset the effects of federal policy reversals. Critics say it won’t be effective—and is an overreach.
When scientists from 13 U.S. federal agencies issued a report on climate change earlier this month that drew a direct connection between human activity and global warming, it was a reminder of the turmoil that has surrounded environmental issues since President Donald Trump took office.
The Trump administration has rejected the international Paris climate accord, calling it a job-killing pact that impinges on U.S. sovereignty. It also has moved to repeal the domestic Clean Power Plan, following up on the president’s pledge to boost the energy industry by cutting regulation.
In response, several state governors have pledged to take the initiative on climate change by crafting their own strict emissions standards and pursuing the development of renewable energy with renewed vigor.
Supporters say such actions not only will benefit the environment but also will spur the development of the green-technology industry.
But critics say that such state initiatives have a record of being ill conceived and ineffective, and that policies that run counter to the federal government’s stand on the climate in international talks are beyond the rightful scope of state governments.
Arthur van Benthem, an energy economist at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, argues for state action. Oren Cass, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, makes the contrary case.YES: States Can Mitigate Damage Done by the Federal Government
Given the state of affairs in Washington, D.C., states should adopt their own policies to promote renewable energy and limit the emissions of greenhouse gases.
Ambitious governments in China, Europe and elsewhere are ramping up pressure on their companies to become world leaders in green energy, electric vehicles and low-carbon technologies, in an effort to seize the golden opportunity that comes with the rise of the global green-tech market.
Meanwhile, the U.S. federal government is backing away from those same policies, rejecting the Paris accord and hitting the brakes on fuel-economy rules and efforts to reduce carbon emissions under the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan.
Several states, spearheaded by the governors of California, New York and Washington, have pledged to fill the void in leadership by adopting their own strict climate policies. In principle, having a single federal policy is cheaper for industry and less prone to unintended consequences. But an unwieldy patchwork of 50 different state policies is an extremely unlikely outcome of state initiatives.
Much more likely, state efforts will eventually spur demand for strict federal policies, and operate at a regional level in the meantime. But they also could be short-circuited if the Clean Power Plan is replaced with weak federal regulation of carbon emissions that would preclude stricter state rules, or if the waiver that allows California to set vehicle standards that are tougher than federal regulations isn’t extended.
It is imperative that states be allowed to proceed unhindered. If they are, here are the highlights of what is likely to happen: two sets of vehicle regulations, as we have now for electric vehicles and local air pollution, and broad regional cap-and-trade systems to reduce emissions from electricity generation and heavy industry, like the ones already in place among the nine states in the Northeast or the California-Quebec-Ontario market.
There would likely be two vehicle standards because under the Clean Air Act, California was granted a unique federal waiver to adopt stricter-than-federal vehicle policies, an acknowledgment of the state’s severe smog problems. Other states have a choice—follow California or stick with the federal standard. About a dozen states, representing some 40% of the U.S. population, have followed California’s lead on tailpipe emissions and electric-car regulations that exceed federal standards.
On fuel economy, when California set a tougher standard and 14 states followed, it led to an agreement among the Obama administration, states and auto makers on stricter federal standards. In exchange, California abandoned its own rule. The same could happen with regional cap-and-trade systems, which could be linked or subsumed under a federal trading system if they spur demand for a uniform approach. The governors of California and New York recently floated the idea of linking the two existing carbon markets.
Those who criticize states for overreaching and moving contrary to federal policy should consider that state climate initiatives seem to fit seamlessly with the Environmental Protection Agency’s stated goal to return power to the states under Administrator Scott Pruitt. The EPA has applied that philosophy selectively, aiming to relieve states that have a limited appetite for environmental action from federal regulations, by backing out of the Clean Power Plan, but explicitly leaving open the possibility of denying California future requests for waivers on vehicle standards.
Then there is the criticism that states’ efforts to promote renewable energy sources are far more expensive than continued reliance on nonrenewable sources for affordable, reliable power. That, too, doesn’t hold water. The costs of renewables are falling spectacularly, and setting goals for their adoption will foster further innovation in battery storage technologies. The move to renewables is inevitable, and other countries have already proven they can run their power grids with far more solar and wind than the U.S.
Finally, letting the states drive policy is the only serious option to put the U.S. back on track in the global green-tech race.
The U.S. is at serious risk of losing its dominant position in this multitrillion-dollar and fast-growing market. For China and Europe, this is an unprecedented opportunity to run away with valuable patents, jobs and export markets.
Just like our competitors, we need a supportive government that is willing to enforce policies to keep us at the cutting edge of green innovation. Now that the federal government has given up American leadership on climate, it is time to pass the baton to the states and let them pressure Washington into correcting a costly economic mistake.
Mr. van Benthem is an energy economist at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Email reports@wsj.com.NO: It Won’t Work—and This Isn’t the States’ Role Anyway
Most state-level efforts to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions cannot help being incoherent and ineffective. Consider Vermont, which has established a so-called renewable portfolio standard requiring the use of 75% renewable energy by 2032. That may be a laudable aspiration, but it ignores how energy markets work.
Vermont recently shut its emissions-free nuclear power plant, which accounted for the majority of the state’s electricity generation. Without renewable capacity to fill the resulting hole, the state began importing more electricity from other states, generated primarily with emissions-producing natural gas. Ironically, it had already banned fracking, the technology that extracts the natural gas that now keeps its lights on.
Meanwhile, rather than rapidly developing its own renewable resources, the state is leading a nationwide backlash against wind power: Vermont added no wind capacity during 2013-16. The issue featured prominently in last November’s gubernatorial race, which saw an anti-wind Republican beat a pro-wind Democrat by almost 10 points. And, just last month, state legislators approved strict noise limits that will further limit development.
Vermonters can confidently reject nuclear, coal, gas and wind from the comfort of their warm and well-lit homes because shirking responsibility for their energy supply has few consequences. They can draw electricity from a regional power grid and import energy-intensive goods by exhaust-belching truck. Their 75%-renewable goal presumes the availability of someone else’s nonrenewable plants to keep the lights on when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining. Those plants will be operating affordably only if other states remain committed to a conventional grid.
But Vermont is not alone. Twenty-nine states have renewable portfolio standards, and lawmakers in both Massachusetts and California have recently proposed 100%-renewable mandates. If everyone tries to reach their goals, and more states feel compelled to join and out-green each other, the grid will fall apart.
This is not only irresponsible, but also fails to address climate change. Since nationwide carbon-dioxide emissions peaked in 2007, states with renewable portfolio standards have achieved smaller reductions, on average, than states without them. And even significant state-level achievements would mean little. The Obama administration acknowledged that its Clean Power Plan for cutting emissions in every state would not have meaningfully affected global temperatures.
The reality of climate change is that the overwhelming majority of future greenhouse-gas emissions will come from the developing world. American emissions cuts are justified primarily as a means of showing leadership. But the symbolic actions of former Vermont Gov. Pete Shumlin and his colleagues are not going to lead developing nations away from their pursuit of economic progress.
Nor is it the role of state leaders, no matter how displeased with President Trump’s rejection of the Paris climate accord, to offset or undermine our national government’s negotiating position on the international stage. California Gov. Jerry Brown is plainly incorrect when he defends his climate talks with China by saying California is a “separate nation.” No one, presumably, would countenance governors opposed to the Iran nuclear agreement traveling to Qatar to coordinate continued sanctions against the Iranian regime.
States will sometimes advance an economic, rather than environmental, rationale for their renewable-energy policies—boosting a promising industry. That strategy makes no more sense here than in any other industry, where politically motivated efforts at market distortion would be rightly recognized as foolhardy.
If renewables are as economically attractive as their proponents claim, then government mandates should not be necessary to spur investment and deployment. Conversely, state policy makers do neither their consumers nor their fledgling industries any favors when they mandate the purchase of things that the market doesn’t want. A strong case exists for funding precommercial research and development in a variety of speculative technologies, renewable energy included. But that already exists and has bipartisan support at the federal level.
States can supplement such efforts in their own universities. If they are looking for other ways to act on climate, they can encourage responsible urban planning and build infrastructure that will be resilient against stronger storms and higher seas. But they should limit their empty political gestures to ones that damage neither the nation’s energy markets nor its foreign policy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/do-states-have-a-role-in-making-climate-policy-1510628581

Return to headline | Return to top
Singing, Stomping Protesters Roil White House Event

Nov 13, 2017 | E&E News PM

By Jean Chemnick

BONN, Germany — Protesters disrupted an event today hosted by the Trump administration at the international climate talks as environmentalists channeled American country singer Lee Greenwood in an effort to shame fossil fuel boosters.
White House energy adviser George David Banks had just made an opening plea for a "rational" policy combining conventional and renewable power sources when about 140 people out of 200 or so in the audience stood to sing a parody of Greenwood's "God Bless the USA."
Stomping and unfurling a banner declaring "We the People," the protesters sang, "You claim to be an American, but we see right through your greed. It's killing all across the world for that coal money."
The protest was organized by the group SustainUS, whose members had waited in line for an hour or so to get a seat in the conference room.
Members of the group who failed to get into the room chanted from outside: "What do we want? Climate justice! When do we want it? Now!"
The protesters interrupted a panel of oil, gas, coal and nuclear advocates coordinated by Banks, who had backed continued U.S. involvement in the Paris climate agreement before President Trump announced a withdrawal in June.
Banks began his remarks by promising the U.S. would remain active in United Nations climate negotiations until the withdrawal from the Paris pact is accomplished in three years — unless more favorable terms can be "identified" that would keep the United States in the agreement.
Among the panelists was Amos Hochstein, an Obama-era State Department special coordinator for international energy who works now at natural gas company Tellurian Inc. He said he still supports the Paris Agreement and climate action.
"If you really care about clean air, if we really care about climate change, then we have to stop siloing ourselves into communities where we only talk to ourselves," he said. "We can actually listen to somebody without agreeing with them. It is possible."
The White House event was widely panned for days before it occurred, with climate advocates and some delegates dismissing it as offensive to the other 196 members of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change. The U.S. is the only member not committed to the Paris deal.
Govs. Jay Inslee of Washington and Kate Brown of Oregon, Democratic members of the 15-state U.S. Climate Alliance, made a cameo appearance in the room right before the event to label it "climate denial."
The SustainUS protest was the largest one so far at this conference, but it wasn't the first.
While touting continued U.S. ambition at the state level this weekend, California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) faced a loud and persistent protest by opponents of the oil and gas extraction technique hydraulic fracturing, who urged him to "keep it in the ground."
Brown used skills he said he honed as a college cheerleader to counter the protesters.
"Let's put you in the ground so we can get on with the show here," he said. Attempting to soften that sharp edge, he added that he was glad the protesters had made the trip to Bonn.
By contrast, Banks' response was gentler. He invited protesters to karaoke.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2017/11/13/stories/1060066377

Return to headline | Return to top
Subcommittee To Vote On 4 Rule-Busting Bills

Nov 14, 2017 | E&E Daily

By Sean Reilly

A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee is set to approve four bills tomorrow that would carve out exceptions, exemptions and extensions to compliance with air pollution regulations for a handful of industries.
There's almost no doubt about the outcome of the morning markup; the Environment Subcommittee approved previous versions of two of the four measures last year during the 114th Congress; the other two, which would give wood stove manufacturers three more years to meet new emissions standards and codify a long-standing loophole for converted race cars, also appear to enjoy the support of majority Republicans.
"Cumulatively, these four bills would alleviate the burden many small businesses and manufacturers face when it comes to implementing costly EPA rules and policies," Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.), the subcommittee's chairman, said in a news release yesterday.
The package also has the backing of U.S. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt; in a statement released by the same panel after a September hearing, Pruitt said he was very supportive of its efforts "to provide additional flexibilities, extensions and clarifications for industries complying with various Clean Air Act regulations."
In their previous incarnations last year, the two bills approved by the subcommittee later drew Obama administration veto threats. Congressional Democrats have also denounced the new versions.
"The so-called relief from regulation comes at the expense of the public's health," Rep. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, the ranking member on the full Energy and Commerce Committee, said at the hearing. As a result, Pallone said, "costs are not reduced."
First up on the subcommittee's agenda tomorrow is H.R. 350, sponsored by Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), which would codify an exemption for converted race cars from the Clean Air Act's ban on tampering with any part of a vehicle's emissions control system, as long as the change is needed to outfit the car for competition.
McHenry had originally introduced the legislation last year after the Specialty Equipment Market Association, which represents spare parts manufacturers, raised alarms about language in a draft version of fuel efficiency standards for buses, vans and heavy-duty trucks.
EPA officials, who insisted the provision was not aimed at amateur hot-rodders, nonetheless dropped it from the final version of the rule after a public uproar. Last year's bill never got out of committee. McHenry maintains that a permanent legislative fix is still needed (Greenwire, April 18, 2016).
Next up is H.R. 453, sponsored by Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), which would push back the deadline for compliance with the second and final phase of 2015 emission standards for new wood stoves, home hydronic heaters and forced air furnaces from May 2020 to May 2023. At the September hearing, the owner of one wood heater manufacturing company labeled the current deadline unworkable.
Last year's versions of the remaining two measures ultimately passed the House but later died in the Senate in the face of Democratic opposition and the Obama administration's veto threats.
H.R. 1119, sponsored by Rep. Keith Rothfus (R-Pa.), would ease emission standards from two major sets of EPA regulations — the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule and the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards — for power plants that burn waste coal for fuel.
Those plants are mostly found in Pennsylvania. Rothfus argues that the legislation is needed to help some stay in business; at the September hearing, a Sierra Club attorney said the bill would result in added smog and more releases of fine particulates and airborne toxics.
Lastly, the panel will vote on H.R. 1917, by Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio), to give brick and tile manufacturers a break on compliance with 2015 emissions limits until all litigation surrounding those rules is resolved.
Johnson and other supporters say a previous set of standards was struck down in 2007 by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit only after manufacturers had already invested heavily in new pollution controls. Opponents say the bill would offer an incentive to string out litigation as long as possible.
The Trump administration has already unsuccessfully sought to put all legal challenges — brought by both industry organizations and environmental groups — on hold as it revisits some provisions.
The expected completion date for that review is August 2019. Under the Clean Air Act, the standards were originally supposed to be in place by 2000; at oral arguments last week, EPA attorneys were unable to explain to a three-judge panel for the D.C. Circuit why the agency now needs two more years to finish the job (Greenwire, Nov. 9).
The Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety is holding a hearing on companion versions of H.R. 350, H.R. 453 and H.R. 1917 this morning (E&E Daily, Nov. 13).
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2017/11/14/stories/1060066427

Return to headline | Return to top
EPA Poised To Defend Rule Allowing Air Trading As Regional Haze Control

Nov 14, 2017 | Inside EPA

By Stuart Parker

EPA later this week will defend at oral argument an Obama-era rule that allows power plants to rely on participation in the agency's interstate emissions trading program as an alternative to imposing source-specific regional haze air pollution controls, with the rule facing challenges from environmentalists, utilities, and some states.
In consolidated litigation over the rule, Utility Air Regulatory Group (UARG), et al. v. EPA, et al, pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, environmentalists argue the interstate trading program is too weak to satisfy the best available retrofit technology (BART) controls under the haze program, while industry and states claim the rule wrongly invalidated state air plans reliant on a now-defunct earlier trading system.
A three-judge panel will hear argument Nov. 16 in the case that challenges the agency's June 7, 2012, rule finding that participation by states in the agency's Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) emissions trading program is an acceptable alternative to BART controls otherwise required under the separate haze program. EPA's haze program aims to cut air pollution to improve visibility in “Class I” national parks and wilderness areas.
The agency maintains that participation in CSAPR -- which sets emissions reduction targets that utilities can meet either by installing controls or buying credits -- still serves as a valid alternative to source-specific BART after changes made in 2016 to the trading program that responded in part to the D.C. Circuit's earlier remand of CSAPR for “overcontrol” of some upwind sources. The agency's 2016 “update” rule responded to that remand and also toughened the rule to help states meet the 2008 ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) of 75 parts per billion (ppb). The original CSAPR was aimed at meeting the weaker 1997 ozone NAAQS, expressed as 84 ppb.
In an Oct. 13 letter advising the court of additional authorities, the Department of Justice (DOJ) says that EPA analysis shows CSAPR still serves as an acceptable alternative to BART. In its “final analysis EPA determined that the changes made to CSAPR in response to the remand do not require EPA to alter that determination,” DOJ says.
Environmentalists are in general opposed to reliance on emissions trading as a compliance mechanism for regional haze requirements, because power plants can purchase emissions credits rather than actually cutting their emissions that pollute a specific Class I area.
In the lawsuit, the National Parks Conservation Association and Sierra Club allege that CSAPR is too weak to ensure haze reduction requirements are met, and say the program cannot substitute for the case-specific, five-step analysis under BART that can require installation of emissions controls on sources. The groups in part rely on the D.C. Circuit's 2015 ruling remanding multiple emissions “budgets,” or emissions caps, for states, which the groups say invalidated EPA's assumptions about CSAPR being “better than BART.” But DOJ insists that CSAPR still serves as an alternative, relying on “presumptive BART” rather than case-by-case analysis.
In their final brief to the court, environmentalists said EPA cannot sidestep the full BART analysis for each qualifying source. The Clean Air Act “does not give EPA discretion to waive that analysis or disregard the statutory factors in the interest of taking cheaper and hastier shortcuts,” they wrote.
Emissions Trading
Meanwhile, industry groups and the states of Texas, Indiana and Louisiana in the case argue that the Obama EPA unlawfully invalidated state implementation plans (SIPs) -- emissions-reduction strategies crafted by states detailing how they will attain NAAQS -- which relied on an earlier emissions trading program.
The SIPs in question relied on the George W. Bush- era Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR), a forerunner of CSAPR. The industry groups and states seek the reinstatement of the CAIR-based plans.
EPA crafted CSAPR as a replacement for CAIR, which the D.C. Circuit remanded to the agency pending a new trading rule. DOJ therefore argues that industry's case is moot, as the trading rule states relied on by these SIPs is no longer in effect. The SIPs cannot be valid when based on a non-existent trading rule, DOJ argues.
“There is no effective remedy the Court can grant to State/Industry petitioners. Therefore, their claims are moot and must be dismissed,” DOJ wrote in its March 17 final brief.
Environmentalists also argue that EPA should have evaluated the combined impacts of both CSAPR and CAIR in determining the impact of CSAPR versus source-specific BART, a position DOJ says is illogical and unreasonable.
But states and industry argue the fact that CAIR would soon terminate when EPA disapproved the SIPs is irrelevant, because the agency acknowledges that the replacement trading program was tougher than CAIR.
In 2015, EPA issued a tougher-still ozone NAAQS, set at 70 ppb. Since issuing the CSAPR update, however, the agency has shown no sign of crafting another CSAPR-type trading rule aimed at meeting states' interstate trading obligations, either under the Obama or Trump administrations.
It will be incumbent on states to craft “good neighbor” SIPs to mitigate their “significant contribution” to other states' problems meeting the 2015 NAAQS, however. This process is now being delayed by EPA's failure to issue by an Oct. 1 statutory deadline the list of areas in “nonattainment” with the new standard.
Also, EPA has issued a haze plan for Texas, strongly contested by environmentalists, that relies in part on CSAPR to satisfy BART control requirements for nitrogen oxides, which are ozone precursors.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-poised-defend-rule-allowing-air-trading-regional-haze-control

Return to headline | Return to top
Carbon Emissions On Track To Rise This Year

Nov 14, 2017 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

Global carbon dioxide emissions are on track to rise slightly this year after three years of staying flat, new research shows.
The annual report released Monday by the Global Carbon Project provides fuel to environmentalists to argue that the slowdown in emissions growth was more of a fluke than the start of a pattern.
The group, which helped organize three research groups in concert to come to the conclusions, attributed the carbon growth — likely to be 2 percent year-over-year — to increasing emissions in China and developing nations from burning fossil fuels, aligning with economic growth.
“The slowdown in emissions growth from 2014 to 2016 was always a delicate balance, and the likely 2 percent increase in 2017 clearly demonstrates that we can’t take the recent slowdown for granted,” Robbie Andrew, a co-author of the study and a senior researcher at Norway’s CICERO Center for International Climate Research, said in a statement.
It also serves as fodder for supporters of the 2015 Paris Agreement, who say it shows that countries need to stick to their pledges and continue to ratchet up their commitments.
“Global commitments made in Paris in 2015 to reduce emissions are still not being matched by actions,” said CICERO’s Glen Peters. “It is far too early to proclaim that we have turned a corner and started the journey towards zero emissions.”
The research came out as representatives of nearly 200 countries meet in Bonn, Germany, to hash out rules for complying with the accord.
Every nation in the world has signed the agreement. But President Trump said in June that he would pull the United States out of the pact as soon as he can, which is 2020.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/360088-carbon-emissions-on-track-to-rise-this-year

Return to headline | Return to top
Bill Wehrum Is Sworn In As Air Chief

Nov 13, 2017 | E&E News PM

By Sean Reilly

Four days after narrowly winning Senate confirmation, Bill Wehrum was sworn in today as U.S. EPA air chief.
The private swearing-in by Administrator Scott Pruitt was announced in an internal email by EPA Chief of Staff Ryan Jackson.
"Bill comes to the agency with years of institutional knowledge that will help guide him through administering air quality issues for all Americans, and his experience will be vital to the agency's mission to bring about regulatory reforms," Jackson said in the message to EPA employees.
Wehrum will oversee the Office of Air and Radiation, which as of December had almost 1,100 employees, according to figures recently released by EPA in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.
But while no one questions his expertise in Clean Air Act issues, Wehrum also carries baggage from his work in private practice representing companies and industry trade groups that regularly challenge EPA regulations.
As recently as this morning, his profile page was still posted on the website of his former firm, Hunton & Williams LLP, although it has since been taken down. Wehrum had previously told EPA he would avoid participating in matters involving former clients for a year after last providing a service.
Also trained as an environmental engineer, Wehrum previously worked in the Office of Air and Radiation as counsel from 2001 to 2005 during the George W. Bush administration. He then served as acting chief for two years, but Senate Democrats at the time blocked his bid to get the job permanently.
In this round, President Trump nominated Wehrum to head the air office in early September. He won Senate confirmation Thursday by a 49-47 vote that fell almost exactly along party lines. With Pruitt, he is now one of two Senate-confirmed appointees at EPA.
In the interim, Sarah Dunham, a career employee, had been serving as acting head of the air office.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2017/11/13/stories/1060066391

Return to headline | Return to top

Add recipients

Suggested