Preview Newsletter
ACC AM 11/20/17
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Hearing On Modernizing NAFTA
Nov 20, 2017 | Senate Finance Committee, International Trade, Customs and Global Competitiveness Subcommittee
Location: 555 S. Alamo St., San Antonio, TX 78205 / 10:30 AM EST -
(ACC Mentioned) Corporations Run The Show
Nov 18, 2017 | Las Vegas
By Evan Blythin
There is a strong movement toward transparency in governmental decision-making. -
(ACC Mentioned) No Sign Yet Of Agreement On Moving Senate PRIA Bill
Nov 19, 2017 | Agri-Pulse
By Steve Davies
Democratic senators led by New Mexico's Tom Udall want answers from EPA on chlorpyrifos and farmworker protections from pesticides before they'll agree to let a bill move forward reauthorizing the fee-based pesticide registration system that provides about a third of the funding for EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs. -
What EPA Chief Scott Pruitt Promised — And What He’s Done
Nov 19, 2017 | Politico
By Alex Guillén And Emily Holden
The Environmental Protection Agency administrator came into office promising to discard his predecessor’s “overreaching” focus on climate change and concentrate on what he called the agency’s real mission: cleaning up the air, water and land. -
Walmart’s Chemical Footprint
Nov 17, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Vanessa Zainzinger
Huge and furtively powerful, Walmart remains untouched as the world’s biggest retailer. Lesser known than its pledge to bring "everyday low prices" to its customers is its ambitious commitment to managing hazardous chemicals. -
State Farm Groups, Monsanto Sue To Halt California Listing Of Glyphosate
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
Pesticide manufacturer Monsanto Co. and a host of agricultural industry groups and state business organizations have filed a federal lawsuit to rescind California's listing of glyphosate as a carcinogen under the state's Proposition 65 warning-label law, charging it violates several sections of the U.S. Constitution and could disrupt the nation's food production and processing supply chains. -
WHO Agency Isolated In Glyphosate Fight
Nov 20, 2017 | Euractiv
By Sarantis Michalopoulos
The WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is standing firmly by its opinion that glyphosate, the world’s most commonly used weedkiller, is probably carcinogenic to humans despite a new large-scale study suggesting the opposite. -
Chemical Company’s Unreported Spill May Lead To Waste Ban
Nov 20, 2017 | AP (In The Washington Post)
North Carolina regulators say they’re suspending and may revoke a Delaware-based chemical company’s key permit after it didn’t report the spill of an unregulated compound. -
PFAS Record May Sink Trump EPA Chemical Safety Nominee
Nov 19, 2017 | MLive.com
By Garret Ellison
A track record of defending weak safety standards for the type of unregulated chemicals polluting Michigan drinking water is being cited by some U.S. Senate Republicans as cause for opposing the Trump administration's nominee for chief regulator of toxic chemicals at the Environmental Protection Agency. -
The Hidden Reason American Minorities Are So Much More Likely To Have Diabetes
Nov 20, 2017 | Quartz
By Zoë Schlanger
In 1982, in the little town of Afton, North Carolina, residents sat down in the street, blocking trucks filled with toxic soil from heading to a local dump. -
California Enacts Cleaning Product Right to Know Act
Nov 16, 2017 | Lexology
By Kelly McTigue, Eric Rothenberg, Dawn Sestito and Bob Nicksin
California Governor Brown has signed the Cleaning Product Right to Know Act of 2017 (“Act”), requiring companies to furnish online ingredient listings for cleaning products by January 1, 2020, and on package disclosure by January 1, 2021. -
Can The UK Remain Part Of The European Regulatory System For Chemicals After Leaving The EU?
Nov 20, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Julie Girling
Brexit can be a divisive topic but, regardless of how they voted, I believe the vast majority of the British public would agree that it represents the greatest political challenge the UK has faced for many years. It impacts on almost every aspect of our society and businesses, which will be heavily affected by leaving the EU. -
Echa’s Priorities In The Next Five Years
Nov 20, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Riku Rinta-Jouppi
Walking past Echa’s offices in the seasonal slush in Helsinki, an introductory REACH presentation is running on a screen. It proclaims that by June 2018, all the main chemicals will be registered with the agency. Without the usual caveats, ifs and buts, this strikes me as a profound statement. There is no other chemicals agency in the world with such a comprehensive database as a foundation for further work. -
Sweden to Alter Some Exemptions Under Mercury Use Ban
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Marcus Hoy
Sweden's mercury ban will soon apply to certain metal welding and to dental amalgams, while exemptions for the use of the chemical in medical research and development will be extended. -
U.S. Trade and Development Agency Launches LNG Exports Initiative
Nov 17, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By David Bradley
Looking to spur increased liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) on Friday announced an initiative to connect American companies to new export opportunities in emerging economies. -
Keystone Pipeline Springs a Leak as Extension Decision Nears
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Robert Tuttle, Meenal Vamburkar, and Sheela Tobben
Days before Nebraska regulators are set to rule on TransCanada Corp.’s XL extension to its Keystone pipeline, the existing conduit has sprung a major leak. It spilled about 5,000 barrels of oil early Nov. 16 in South Dakota, handing new fodder to environmentalists opposed to the XL project. -
Neb. Official: Keystone Leak Won't Affect State's KXL Decision
Nov 17, 2017 | AP (In E&E News PM)
A 210,000-gallon oil spill from the Keystone pipeline won't affect a critical decision from Nebraska regulators on whether to allow an expansion of the pipeline, a state official said today. -
U.S. Forest Service OKs Atlantic Coast Pipeline
Nov 17, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Final approval of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) took one step closer to reality on Friday, after the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) gave its approval for the natural gas project, concluding that two national forests and other assets to be traversed by the pipeline would face minimal environmental impacts. -
OECA Weighs 'Refresh' For Policies On Facilities' Self-Audits Of Violations
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
EPA's Office of Enforcement & Compliance Assurance (OECA) is weighing a “refreshing” of its self-audit policies that gives facilities incentives to report violations to the agency, says OECA's top political deputy Patrick Traylor, but he is strongly backing an existing policy that expands incentives for new facility owners to report past violations. -
Chemical Plants Urged To Revise Emergency Plans
Nov 17, 2017 | Chemistry World
By Rebecca Trager
US chemical safety agency says the Arkema disaster caused by Hurricane Harvey should serve as a warning to other companies -
Trump's ‘America First’ Foreign Policy Erodes Work on Climate
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jessica Shankleman
Donald Trump's “America first” foreign policy is starting to undercut progress at the annual talks on fighting global warming. -
States Welcome Pruitt's Air Emphasis, But Seek Further Clarity
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Abby Smith and Sylvia Carignan
The EPA has labored for years to clear out its backlog of state implementation plans for federal air quality standards, and state regulators generally welcome Administrator Scott Pruitt's focus on the issue—a stand he reiterated Nov. 17. -
House Energy Panel Approves Bills To Ease EPA Air Rules
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
The House Energy & Commerce Committee's environment panel has approved several bills easing compliance with EPA Clean Air Act regulations for brick manufacturers, wood stove makers and utilities burning coal waste, along with a measure to ensure modification of cars for racing does not violate air regulations. -
Pennsylvania Faults EPA's FY18-22 Strategic Plan For 'Neglecting' Climate
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
Pennsylvania environment regulators and public health groups are faulting EPA's omission of climate change from its recent draft strategic plan for fiscal years 2018-2022, calling it a “glaring oversight” that shirks the agency's responsibility to help tackle a global challenge and will harm efforts to achieve the plan's other goals. -
How The Bonn Climate Talks Survived Trump
Nov 17, 2017 | PoliticoPro
By Emily Holden
The White House goaded activists at the international climate talks by pushing coal and other fossil fuels. But behind closed doors, U.S. negotiators stuck to their Obama-era principles on the 2015 Paris deal — despite President Donald Trump's disavowal of the pact. -
Bonn Climate Deal Within Reach, Punts Many Decisions to 2018
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Dean Scott
International negotiators are on the verge of taking the first concrete steps toward a rule book to implement a global climate accord, including big strides on how to verify the greenhouse gas emissions and the effectiveness of actions nations take. -
Treaty to Phase Out ‘Greenhouse Gasses on Steroids’ to Enter Force
Nov 20, 2017 | The New York Times
By Somini Sengupta
Hydrofluorocarbons. It’s a mouthful of a name for a chemical that keeps the turkey frozen in our refrigerators and also heats up the planet
Congressional Hearings
Industry and Association News
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Environment News
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Nov 20, 2017 | Senate Finance Committee, International Trade, Customs and Global Competitiveness Subcommittee
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(ACC Mentioned) Corporations Run The Show
Nov 18, 2017 | Las Vegas
By Evan Blythin
There is a strong movement toward transparency in governmental decision-making.
Webster notes that something transparent is “easily detected or seen through.” Such transparency is apparent in Environmental Protection Agency director Scott Pruitt’s recent meeting with the American Chemistry Council, which, according to news reports before the meeting, said it was scheduled to occur on Nov. 9.
Those reports indicated that Pruitt’s address to the council would not be open to the public or to news agencies. Only members of the Chemistry Council were allowed to attend the meeting, paying up to $7,500 for the privilege.
Mr. Pruitt has often railed against regulation of chemical industries and faced a friendly audience composed of such corporate giants as Dow Chemical, DuPont, ExxonMobil and Chevron.
His secrecy in attending the meeting is easily detected and seen through. U.S. governance, therefore, is increasingly transparent.
The meeting makes it transparently clear that America is now run by political and corporate interests.
Everyone in America has a vested interest in the environment, but the American public is being kept in a transparent darkness.
https://lasvegassun.com/news/2017/nov/18/corporations-run-the-show/
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(ACC Mentioned) No Sign Yet Of Agreement On Moving Senate PRIA Bill
Nov 19, 2017 | Agri-Pulse
By Steve Davies
Democratic senators led by New Mexico's Tom Udall want answers from EPA on chlorpyrifos and farmworker protections from pesticides before they'll agree to let a bill move forward reauthorizing the fee-based pesticide registration system that provides about a third of the funding for EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs.
The House passed its version of a bill to reauthorize the Pesticide Registration Improvement Act (PRIA) in March, and the Senate Agriculture Committee followed suit June 29. But about three weeks later, Udall put a hold on that bill, preventing its consideration by the full Senate.
In a July 18 letter, Udall (pictured above) and three other Democratic senators sent a letter to Pat Roberts, R-Kan., chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, and Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., the panel's ranking member, saying they were concerned EPA was delaying rules to protect farmworkers from pesticide exposure and strengthen certification and training requirements for pesticide applicators.
The senators – including Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Cory Booker of New Jersey, and Ben Cardin of Maryland – also said they wanted EPA to reverse its March decision to deny a petition seeking a ban on the use of chlorpyrifos (Lorsban) and instead decide to wait until 2022 to finish the insecticide’s registration review.
More recently, in an Oct. 20 letter to Roberts and Stabenow, the group of senators – minus Cardin – amended their stance. Instead of requesting a reversal of the chlorpyrifos decision, they asked EPA to issue a “final decision” by Monday, Nov. 20 on environmental groups’ objections to the denial of the petition, which sought the revocation of food tolerances and cancellation of registrations for chlorpyrifos. They also asked the agency to respond to any other objections filed in the online docket within 90 days.
There are a “small number of reasonable actions” that EPA “must take to ensure a minimum level of public confidence in EPA’s pesticide regulatory program before Congress should reauthorize it on a long-term basis,” Udall, Booker and Blumenthal said.
EPA did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
Although the senators wanted an answer from EPA by Nov. 20, no consequences will flow if the agency doesn't get back to Udall by today. The real deadline for action is Dec. 8, when the latest Continuing Resolution funding the government runs out, and Speaker Paul Ryan said he expects Congress to extend the resolution beyond that date as both houses work on appropriations bills.
Nonetheless, as the work of Congress winds down, there's a sense of urgency among PRIA advocates. "Hopefully the agency will be able to respond to the Udall letter in a fashion that will allow the senator to remove the hold," Croplife Executive Vice President Beau Greenwood said.
Udall “is discussing the path forward with his colleagues in the Senate and at the EPA, along with relevant stakeholders,” Udall spokesperson Jennifer Talhelm said in an email. “If these actions are taken, he will release his hold immediately and recommend to others that they do so as well.”
The Pesticide Action Network and Natural Resources Defense Council, joined by 10 farmworker groups, filed 46 pages of objections to the petition denial, arguing that EPA’s decision to leave chlorpyrifos tolerances in place until 2022 violates the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act because EPA has not found chlorpyrifos to be safe.
The states of New York, Washington, California, Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont and Maryland also filed objections in June, requesting a response by Aug. 5. When they didn’t get one, they wrote another letter to EPA, pointedly noting they were not waiving their rights to file a lawsuit over chlorpyrifos.
EPA had proposed to revoke tolerances in 2015 because “multiple chlorpyrifos uses exceed EPA’s drinking water level of concern with considerable frequency and present a risk of concern, with infants most at risk,” the groups said in their objections.
EPA also said there was enough evidence to conclude that exposure to chlorpyrifos “results in adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes in humans, at least under some conditions,” according to the proposal.
Chlorpyrifos isn’t the only thing the senators are concerned about. In their Oct. 20 letter, they said they want EPA not to weaken the Farmworker Protection Standard (FPS), which will be completely phased in by Jan. 1, or the Certification of Pesticide Applicators rule, which is now scheduled to go into effect in May. A lawsuit challenging that delay is proceeding in federal court in San Francisco; briefing appears to be complete and a hearing is scheduled for Dec. 8.
Talhelm said “Senator Udall feels the worker safety rules are so critical to health and safety that he wanted to push for an agreement that ensures the public has confidence in the law and that ensures workers’ safety isn’t eroded, especially for children working in agriculture.”
“The worker protection rule ensures that no child under age 18 could apply pesticides, including chlorpyrifos, which scientists believe damages children’s brains. Additionally, in other non-agricultural industrial settings, workers who may be exposed to chemicals have the right to access safety information directly, or through their designated representatives. This right should apply to workers in the agricultural sector as well. Given how sensible the rules are, he feels EPA should commit to preserving them in conjunction with PRIA moving forward.”
Another Senate aide familiar with the process said Friday that although there are ongoing discussions between EPA and Udall, there hasn’t been enough progress to cause him to release the hold, despite concerted efforts to get it lifted by a coalition that includes both the pesticide industry and environmental and farmworker groups.
Meanwhile, CropLife America and other members of the PRIA coalition are pushing for the hold to be lifted. “The Dec. 8 deadline is looming,” Greenwood said.
Another member of that coalition, NRDC “remains united with the coalition on passing PRIA,” said Natural Resources Defense Council senior attorney Mae Wu. ”The coalition has met with Senate offices to discuss our support. NRDC supports PRIA because stable funding to EPA to review old pesticides can help reduce the use of pesticides that are more toxic to human health or the environment than previously understood by EPA.”
Greenwood said he thought the recent Pesticide Program Dialogue Committee meeting, where both the farmworker protection and pesticide applicator rules were discussed, helped advance the cause.
At the meeting, there was agreement on the 18-year-old minimum age requirements in both rules. The applicator rule has a waiver for family members, who can be as young as 16. And CropLife America President Jay Vroom committed to working with a small groups to iron out any concerns about the designated representative provision.
“It’s in everybody’s interests that this be reauthorized,” Greenwood said of PRIA, noting that the revenue it generates from fees charged to companies seeking registration, tolerance or numerous other decisions on pesticides provides close to 34 percent of the $120 million budget of the Office of Pesticide Programs.
He said the number of full-time employees in OPP has declined significantly in recent years and that because of the uncertainty placed by the hold, “OPP is hemorrhaging staff.”
Virginia Ruiz, director of Occupational & Environmental Health at Farmworker Justice, said she heard a lot of consensus at the PPDC meeting on issues of concern to Udall and the other senators. But she also wants to ensure that EPA follow through on the farmworker protection and certified applicator rules.
The House version of the PRIA legislation provides reauthorization for seven years but the Senate’s is three years. Ruiz said that was the result of a compromise in the PRIA coalition. Farmworker Justice “agreed to a shorter reauthorization period with the understanding we will be watching the agency’s actions very closely and if we get to 2020 and (the rules’) protections have been undermined or removed, we won’t support” the next PRIA authorization, Ruiz said.
In addition to Croplife and Farmworker Justice, coalition members include the American Chemistry Council’s Biocides Panel, the Biotechnology Innovation Organization, Biopesticide Industry Alliance, Consumer Specialty Products Association, ISSA‐The Worldwide Cleaning Industry Association, National Association of State Departments of Agriculture, and Responsible Industry for a Sound Environment.
https://www.agri-pulse.com/articles/10228-no-sign-yet-of-agreement-on-moving-senate-pria-bill
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What EPA Chief Scott Pruitt Promised — And What He’s Done
Nov 19, 2017 | Politico
By Alex Guillén And Emily Holden
For Scott Pruitt, “back to basics” has translated to “back off.”
The Environmental Protection Agency administrator came into office promising to discard his predecessor’s “overreaching” focus on climate change and concentrate on what he called the agency’s real mission: cleaning up the air, water and land.
But instead, Pruitt has rolled back or stalled environmental protections, given the fossil fuel and chemistry industries more sway over public health decisions and taken steps that critics fear will undermine work on pollution cleanups, according to a POLITICO analysis of what he’s accomplished to date. He says he will be tough on environmental crimes, but his agency is also easing up on enforcement and collecting far less in penalties than previous administrations, according to agency watchdogs.
Pruitt is the most unorthodox EPA administrator in decades, an avowed critic of the agency who has alienated much of his career staff. He’s spent heavily on travel to meet with business executives and GOP leaders, who want to see a much weaker EPA and could back Pruitt in a future political campaign. He has declined to disclose his daily schedule, employs a large entourage of bodyguards and built a “privacy booth” for communications in his office. He has questioned manmade climate change and kicked respected scientists off his advisory boards, replacing them with representatives from the businesses and the states he regulates.Obama and Trump's EPAs compared
Actions the Environmental Protection Agency took during the first eight months of the Obama and Trump administrations reflect the differing priorities of each presidency.
Still, Pruitt, who regularly references his Christian faith, says God wants people to be stewards of the earth. And an agency spokesman said that so far, Pruitt has visited more than 25 states, taken action on major Obama-era regulations and the nation’s most-polluted sites, and increased the number of EPA enforcement agents, which had declined under the previous administration.
“We’re only 10 months on the job and eight years from today, Americans will be impressed with how President Trump and Administrator Pruitt were able to protect the environment and American jobs,” said EPA spokesman Jahan Wilcox.
But Judith Enck, a New York-based regional EPA administrator under former President Barack Obama, said Pruitt’s rhetoric doesn’t match his record.
“You can’t have clean air and you can’t have clean water if you’re going to roll back crucial environmental rules and not enforce the rules we have on the book,” said Enck, who recently returned from seeing hurricane damage in the Virgin Islands. “We’ll see the effects very soon.”
To get beyond the rhetoric and competing claims, POLITICO compared EPA’s Federal Register filings for the first eight months of the Trump administration with the same period for Obama’s presidency in 2009. They show a significant increase in how often the agency has withdrawn or delayed regulations this year, along with a decrease in new regulations. The data also show that Pruitt has sped up approvals of state plans to battle air pollution — a fact that his allies consider a sign of progress, but which environmentalists cite as evidence that he is rubber-stamping lax plans.Enforcing years-old air pollution standards
Congress has instructed EPA to periodically consider tightening standards for pollutants like smog-forming ozone and lung-damaging soot, based on the latest science about their effects on human health. EPA is in charge of setting national standards and evaluating states’ plans to reach them.
But Pruitt said he wants to meet older air quality rules, like the George W. Bush administration’s weaker 2008 ozone standard, before focusing on more recent ones. He has not announced which regions have failed to meet the 2015 standard, delaying a years-long process for enforcing those limits.PROMISEClean up air pollution
Pruitt often praises the improvements in U.S. air quality since the Clean Air Act was passed in the early 1970s. But he also says Obama should have done more to meet existing standards before issuing newer, tighter limits on pollutants, such as a 2015 ozone standard that drew opposition from business groups.IN PRUITT'S OWN WORDS“One-hundred-twenty million people in this country live in areas that don’t meet air quality standards. That’s what the previous administration left us with,” Pruitt told a Heritage Foundation event in October.
He has also criticized Obama’s EPA for rejecting state implementation plans that the agency deemed to be too lax, complaining that it demonstrated a “we know best” attitude in Washington.
Pruitt’s EPA has signed off on 378 actions related to state plans as of Sept. 25, compared with 213 during the same period under Obama.
But Natural Resources Defense Council lawyer John Walke said those numbers may show that EPA is rushing to sign off on weak plans, rather than ensuring that the states are putting in place sufficient protections. For example, environmentalists complained after EPA released a plan in October to reduce haze-forming emissions from Texas power plants that they said was “drastically” weaker than the Obama administration’s initial proposal.
State and local regulators want to comply with current air standards, said Miles Keogh, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, but they also need federal money to do so. The White House has suggested slashing those funds, although Congress is likely to keep them at or near last year’s level.Supercharging Superfund?
Pruitt’s actions could be seen as speeding up the cleanup at polluted sites, but environmental advocates say they are toothless and could actually hurt the overall effort.
“The top 10 list, which he claimed would accelerate cleanups, actually entails taking money from some cleanups and putting it in other cleanups,” said Elgie Holstein, senior director for strategic planning at the Environmental Defense Fund.
PROMISEClean up Superfund sites
EPA has logged more than 1,300 hazardous waste sites into its Superfund program, many of them decades old. Polluters typically pay for cleanup as part of legal agreements with EPA. When they don’t, taxpayers are on the hook.IN PRUITT'S OWN WORDS“The American people deserve, in my view, leadership on how to remediate those sites. That’s some of the most tangible benefits we can provide folks environmentally,” Pruitt said at the Heritage event. “We have more sites now than when President Obama came into office.”
That “opens the door to lobbyists trying to push for attention for one site versus another,” Holstein said.
The Superfund program is famously problematic, largely because it lacks money for cleanups. Congress has been reluctant to hand over more money for the cases when EPA can’t force polluters to pay. Trump’s proposed budget cuts would worsen that situation.
Pruitt frequently criticizes Obama’s EPA for adding more sites to the Superfund list than it cleaned up. He also points out that past administrations from both parties have been slow to act on some sites, such as the West Lake landfill near St. Louis, which holds thousands of tons of radioactive waste from the Manhattan Project. It was added to the Superfund list in 1990, but EPA has yet to determine how to clean it up.
The Obama administration cleaned up and delisted 60 Superfund sites and added 142 sites over eight years. So far under Pruitt, EPA has deleted two sites and added seven.Cleaning up drinking water — but where’s the money?
Adam Krantz, CEO of the National Association of Clean Water Agencies, which oversee wastewater and stormwater systems, said he hasn’t seen Pruitt or his agency have a “rapid or deep desire to change or roll back major regulations that really affect our members.”PROMISEUpgrade water infrastructure and promote clean water
Pruitt has highlighted the lead contamination in the drinking water in Flint, Michigan, as the type of disaster his agency aims to prevent.IN PRUITT'S OWN WORDS“We have a water infrastructure issue right now across this country. It’s not just roads and bridges,” Pruitt told a meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in March.
Trump has pushed a $1 trillion plan to revamp the nation’s infrastructure over a decade that could funnel funds to water infrastructure, although the White House has offered few details on how it intends to pay for that package and get it through Congress. Based on suggestions the administration has released so far, about 80 percent of the money would come from private parties or state or local governments.Undoing Obama’s climate agenda
Pruitt has discounted the science showing that manmade emissions are the primary cause of climate change and argued that EPA overstepped its authority with Obama’s Clean Power Plan. He has long been a backer of fossil fuels, and the oil and gas industry supported his campaigns in Oklahoma.
“God has blessed us with natural resources,” Pruitt toldPOLITICO in July. “Let’s use them to feed the world. Let’s use them to power the world. Let’s use them to protect the world.”PROMISEHalt climate regulations and challenge the scientific research behind global warming
As attorney general of Oklahoma, Pruitt fought EPA’s climate regulations for the power sector. Now, he’s proposed withdrawing the standards, saying the Obama EPA overreached its legal authority. He disagrees with the accepted science that human activities, mainly burning fossil fuels, are the main cause of the planet’s warming, increased extreme weather and sea-level rise.IN PRUITT'S OWN WORDSOn climate change: “I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact,” Pruitt told CNBC. “So no, I would not agree that [carbon dioxide is] a primary contributor to the global warming that we see. But we don’t know that yet, we need to continue to debate, continue the review and analysis.”
Pruitt hasn’t committed to replacing the Clean Power Plan or ruled out the possibility of trying to overturn a years-old legal finding that requires EPA to curb greenhouse gas emissions. He wants to publicly debate the science, which many industry supporters fear would be a losing and embarrassing effort.
Meanwhile, Pruitt’s Clean Power Plan repeal is facing lawsuits from states and environmental groups, which say he won’t have the final word.
“The second step here is a final [withdrawal] that survives legal challenges,” Walke, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said of the effort to eliminate the Clean Power Plan. “Scott Pruitt has not had any of those yet. Let’s wait and see how successful he is.”
The power sector’s greenhouse gas emissions have been declining even without Obama’s climate rule. But those emissions represent less than one third of total U.S. carbon pollution, and Pruitt has not taken steps to curb greenhouse gases from other industries.Pledging more ‘respect’ for states and businesses
Pruitt has touted his outreach to businesses and states, which he says bear the brunt of EPA regulations but were shut out of the process under Obama. He’s gotten mixed reviews from the states themselves, whose responses are largely divided along party lines.
Dan Byers, vice president of policy for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Global Energy Institute, lauded Pruitt’s approach but said it’s too early to tell whether his moves to relax regulations will succeed.PROMISEPut more responsibility for environmental protection in the hands of states and businesses
Pruitt has described EPA’s past efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and water pollution as overreaching, “arrogant” and “paternalistic.” He has called for states to have a bigger role in carrying out federal environment laws, although his agency’s budget proposal would cut much of the federal money they rely on.IN PRUITT'S OWN WORDSOn states: “Where the past administration missed it is they didn’t respect the role of states. … They saw them as adversaries as opposed to partners. That’s just wrongheaded,” Pruitt said in anOctober interview. On regulating companies: “There aren’t enough people that this agency can hire to stand on every corner in this country to look over the shoulder of all these companies and say ‘do this’ or ‘do that.’ What we have to have are people who are committed to care about outcomes. … Most of those folks do,” Pruitt said in an interview with Time.
Under Obama, there was “at least a sense that we would have a nice polite meeting, but that feedback was moot because the path had already been decided,” Byers said. “Now there’s a feeling of a true partnership.”
Similarly, Julia Anastasio, executive director of the Association of Clean Water Administrators, said Pruitt’s approach with states is “refreshing.” Her members thought previous administrations treated the EPA-state dynamic like a “parent-child relationship,” rather than a “co-partnership or collaboration of equals,” she said.
But Pruitt’s outreach has been selective: He has almost exclusively visited Republican states, making media appearances with GOP governors, including Nebraska’s Pete Ricketts, who said his state was “ecstatic” about the withdrawal of the Waters of the U.S. rule.
Sen. Tom Carper also noted in an August letter to Pruitt that EPA’s grant database showed awards to Democratic-leaning states — including Delaware, Massachusetts and California — had declined compared with 2016. EPA has not yet responded to that letter, according to a Carper spokeswoman.
Democratic-led states, meanwhile, plan to go to court to fight many of Pruitt’s anti-regulatory plans.
Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) said he’s concerned Pruitt’s actions are already causing real damage.
“I think it’s having a really major impact and it’s really discouraging,” Beyer said in an interview. “I just can’t wait for these next three years and three months to be up.”
https://www.politico.com/interactives/2017/scott-pruitt-promises/
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Nov 17, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Vanessa Zainzinger
Huge and furtively powerful, Walmart remains untouched as the world’s biggest retailer. Lesser known than its pledge to bring "everyday low prices" to its customers is its ambitious commitment to managing hazardous chemicals. This year, Walmart pioneered a 10% reduction goal for chemicals it defines as ‘of concern’ in the products it sells by 2022 and also became the first retailer to participate in the Chemical Footprint Project (CFP).
The CFP, an initiative by NGO Clean Production Action, helps corporations measure their progress on transitioning to safer chemicals. Its founders say that they hope it provides a framework for companies to go beyond what they are legally required to do in chemicals management.
Walmart was the first retailer to respond to the project’s annual survey, which benchmarks how effectively respondents are managing substances in their products and supply chains. It is also a signatory to the CFP, alongside NGOs, investors and purchasers aiming to encourage manufacturers in the supply chain to take action on chemicals of concern.
According to Ashley Hall, senior manager of sustainability at Walmart, the company sees the CFP as "a way to benchmark and do a gap analysis of our work to date. It is very important to be able to measure [our progress] so we can better manage our sustainable chemistry work," she explained during a CFPorganised webinar last month.
Three pillars
The company initially launched its public commitment to sustainable chemistry in 2013. It pledged to base this on three pillars: transparency of ingredients, advancing safer formulations and a safer choice in private brands. "Our work on sustainable chemistry is a way to help build trust and confidence with our customers," said Ms Hall.
Earlier this year, Walmart released a report on the progress it has subsequently made. In the past two years, it has reduced the volume by weight of eight ‘high priority chemicals’ (HPCs) by 96% in the more than 90,000 cleaning, personal care, paper, pet and baby products covered by the programme – representing some 10,400 tonnes.
The HPCs were selected based on such criteria as appearing on authoritative hazard lists, high volume of use and exposure, and consideration of emerging regulations and stakeholder concern. Clearly the focus has been on high volume uses as the number of products containing HPCs fell by only 5% and the number of suppliers using them by 1.5%.
The volume of a broader group of ‘priority chemicals’ (PCs) identified by Walmart based on authoritative and regulatory lists, has nearly halved since 2014. The numbers of products containing priority chemicals and suppliers using them during the same timeframe fell by only 0.2% and 0.1% respectively.
In September, Walmart raised the stakes when it publicised a new commitment to reduce HPCs and PCs in the products it sells by 10% by 2022. The goal applies to "consumables", meaning products that are used repeatedly, such as household cleaners and cosmetics. Based on the company’s 2016 chemical footprint, this reduction translates to over 25,000 tonnes. It is the first retailer to set such a time-bound reduction goal.
Data reporting
To calculate how successfully it has reduced chemicals of concern, Walmart uses a supply chain reporting and compliance tool called UL Wercs, which aggregates data on substances in the products it buys. This dataset is married with Walmart’s retail and sales data, Ms Hall said, providing an overview over a calendar year of who the suppliers are and what and how many products it sells.
Analysing the data shows what percentage of suppliers use any of Walmart’s HPC or PC chemicals and whether these numbers are going up or down. Several factors can affect the outcome of this analysis, such as sales, assortment or new ingredients being added to regulatory and authoritative lists.
"We leverage that data to have conversations with our suppliers about their own chemicals policies and the work that they are intending to do to advance their formulations," Ms Hall said. The store believes suppliers should be working to reduce, remove and restrict the use of PCs and its goal would allow suppliers to come to the company with unique plans to reformulate and innovate.
Meanwhile, Walmart is making progress on transparency as well. It already encourages full online public disclosure on ingredients, such as allergens, known residuals, contaminants and byproducts, as well as those that are typically protected under trade secrets, such as fragrances.
The company will now ask suppliers to verify the purity of ingredients where contaminants of concern may exist. And by 2018 it will also require them to disclose at least PCs, or all ingredients, on packaging.
https://chemicalwatch.com/61161/walmarts-chemical-footprint
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State Farm Groups, Monsanto Sue To Halt California Listing Of Glyphosate
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
Pesticide manufacturer Monsanto Co. and a host of agricultural industry groups and state business organizations have filed a federal lawsuit to rescind California's listing of glyphosate as a carcinogen under the state's Proposition 65 warning-label law, charging it violates several sections of the U.S. Constitution and could disrupt the nation's food production and processing supply chains.
Glyphosate is the active ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup product and many other herbicides. If the Prop. 65 listing is upheld by the courts, companies would be subject to providing warning requirements for glyphosate in products beginning July 7, 2018.
As Inside Cal/EPA's Curt Barry reports, the suit -- filed Nov. 15 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California -- in part alleges that the glyphosate listing by California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) will violate the company's First Amendment rights by "compelling Plaintiffs and other entities to make false, misleading, and highly controversial statements about their products."
The listing and warning requirement "also conflict with, and are preempted by, the [Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA)], and violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment," the complaint says. In addition, the groups charge that the listing violates the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution, which establishes that state laws that conflict with federal law are preempted.
The plaintiff agricultural and business organizations include the National Association of Wheat Growers; National Corn Growers Association; United States Durum Growers Association; Western Plant Health Association; Missouri Farm Bureau; Iowa Soybean Association; South Dakota Agri-Business Association; North Dakota Grain Growers Association; and Missouri Chamber of Commerce.
EPA is one of many governmental bodies around the world that has "repeatedly concluded . . . that use of glyphosate in accordance with federal label instructions does not present any unreasonable adverse effects on human health or the environment, and specifically that glyphosate is not a carcinogen," the suit also claims.
OEHHA has automatically listed glyphosate as a carcinogen under Prop. 65 through an illegal state "Labor Code" mechanism that relies on decisions by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, the plaintiffs contend -- an argument that is the central claim of a separate pending California appellate court case filed by Monsanto.
An OEHHA spokesman says that while agency officials have not yet reviewed the suit, "we stand by the Prop. 65 listing of glyphosate and believe we followed all proper legal procedures."
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/state-farm-groups-monsanto-sue-halt-california-listing-glyphosate
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WHO Agency Isolated In Glyphosate Fight
Nov 20, 2017 | Euractiv
By Sarantis Michalopoulos
The WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is standing firmly by its opinion that glyphosate, the world’s most commonly used weedkiller, is probably carcinogenic to humans despite a new large-scale study suggesting the opposite.
Earlier this month, a new report was published, which made it clear that glyphosate “was not statistically significantly associated with cancer at any site”.
The Reuters news agency reported that the research was part of a large and important project known as the Agricultural Health Study (AHS), which has been tracking the health of tens of thousands of agricultural workers, farmers and their families in Iowa and North Carolina.
Published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (JNCI), the study found there was no association between glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto’s popular herbicide RoundUp, “and any solid tumors or lymphoid malignancies overall, including non-Hogkin Lymphoma (NHL) and its subtypes”.
The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) have approved the chemical, claiming it is “unlikely to pose a carcinogenic risk to humans from exposure through the diet”. The same opinion was shared by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) as well as the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA).
However, this is in contrast to an assessment by IARC, which in 2015 concluded that the herbicide solution was “probably carcinogenic to humans”.
EFSA said it had carried out a thorough analysis and taken account of the IARC’s findings. Greenpeace, for its part, called EFSA’s report “a whitewash”.
IARC insists
EURACTIV.com contacted IARC for a comment on the new scientific evidence.
In its reply, IARC pointed out that the AHS was one of the key studies evaluated in its Monograph and the updated report confirms its previous findings.
The IARC evaluation also included all other published studies of cancer in humans and glyphosate exposure in different areas of the world.
“Some of these other studies of humans exposed to glyphosate reported increases in the same type of cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The AHS did not outweigh the positive associations found in these other epidemiological studies.
“In fact, based on the IARC Working Group’s analysis, the data from all the studies combined show a statistically significant association between non-Hodgkin lymphoma and exposure to glyphosate.”
The AHS report also stressed there was “some evidence of increased risk of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) among the highest exposed group”, but highlighted this association was “not statistically significant”.
But for IARC, these are “interesting new findings”.
“The new report, however, provides interesting new findings on an association of glyphosate exposure and leukemia, a different kind of blood cancer, in the study population,” IARC said.
Asked whether the new study could affect IARC’s review, it replied, “It is important to recognize that the IARC Monograph classification reflects the consensus view of an independent expert working group, based on a systematic review of all available studies. It is therefore inappropriate for IARC to speculate about how new data from one study might change that expert opinion.”
Red meat is also ‘probably carcinogenic’
Health Commissioner Andriukaitis told EURACTIV last month that around the world today all the organisations in Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the US, present the same conclusions on glyphosate is unlikely to be carcinogenic.
He also hinted that sometimes it’s “strange” that people argue against glyphosate only by focusing on the IARC findings.
On 13 November, the EU health chief joined the European Parliament’s agriculture committee where glyphosate was discussed. He reiterated that glyphosate critics only focus on the IARC’s findings and that red meat is also ‘probably carcinogenic’.
“Why are we so silent about red meat? It’s also probably carcinogenic.”
“I spent a lot of time on empty discussions about this possibility [of carcinogenicity], sorry to say. You didn’t convince me. I based my opinion on science, and I need to see a common sense approach,” Andriukaitis explained.
Glyphosate producers like Monsanto have already sent legal notifications to the Commission and in the event it’s not re-authorised, the executive will be taken to the court.
“Sorry, but we need to understand that we are responsible. I am legally obliged to finalise the situation with glyphosate […] we have no chance to opt out. Why? Because we have no grounds for a phase-out. We have no legal ground. You can tell people what you wish, but I can’t because I am legally responsible,” he emphasised.
Commission has changed its rhetoric
The European Commission has so far failed to reach a qualified majority among member states to re-approve glyphosate.
In the last vote on 9 November, 14 member states voted in favour of Commission’s proposal for a five-year re-authorisation, while 9 voted against and 5 abstained.
EURACTIV has learned that Bulgaria, Romania and Poland abstained because they refused to vote for a re-approval of less than ten years.
So far, the Commission has been stating that the member states are hiding behind the executive on the case and urged them several times to take up their responsibilities otherwise after 15 December, a date that glyphosate expires, there will be a full ban of the substance.
However, its rhetoric has changed. It now says it’s seeking the largest possible “support” among member states to re-authorise glyphosate. In addition, it counts on the European Parliament’s recent resolution calling for a five-year phase-out period as well as the majority of the member states.
On 27 November, there is a meeting of the Appeal Committee and according to the regulation, the Commission has the possibility to move on with its proposal if, once again, no qualified majority either in favour or against is reached.
An EU source said, “Under the current EU legislation the European Commission has the legal obligation to reply to the submitted applications for approval or renewal of approval of active substances.”
The regulation also states that the authorisation of Plant Protection Products (PPPs), including ones based on glyphosate, as well as their conditions of use on the territory, remain the responsibility of member states, who have to conduct risk assessments for each product, taking into account the climatic and agricultural conditions in their territories.
Sources noted that the Commission had consistently called for full implementation of the Sustainable Use of Pesticides Directive, the introduction of low risk and bio pesticides and bans of certain co-formulants that are used in glyphosate-based products.
EURACTIV understands that the same proposal is to be sent to the Appeal Committee, while amendments are possible in the Appeal Committee if there is consensus.
https://www.euractiv.com/section/agriculture-food/news/iarc-alone-against-glyphosate-despite-new-evidence/
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Chemical Company’s Unreported Spill May Lead To Waste Ban
Nov 20, 2017 | AP (In The Washington Post)
RALEIGH, N.C. — North Carolina regulators say they’re suspending and may revoke a Delaware-based chemical company’s key permit after it didn’t report the spill of an unregulated compound.
The Department of Environmental Quality said Thursday it is moving to revoke The Chemours Co.’s permit to discharge wastewater from operations at its Fayetteville plant into a neighboring river.
Regulators say the discharge ban could come in 60 days because the company failed to report a spill last month of a precursor of the chemical GenX.
The agency said it was considering fining the Wilmington, Delaware-based company for failing to report the spill.
The company did not respond to an invitation to comment. It’s not clear how much a ban on discharging wastewater would affect production at the plant that employs about 900 workers.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/chemical-companys-unreported-spill-may-lead-to-waste-ban/2017/11/19/66f46038-cd64-11e7-a87b-47f14b73162a_story.html?utm_term=.15081014f8ec
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PFAS Record May Sink Trump EPA Chemical Safety Nominee
Nov 19, 2017 | MLive.com
By Garret Ellison
A track record of defending weak safety standards for the type of unregulated chemicals polluting Michigan drinking water is being cited by some U.S. Senate Republicans as cause for opposing the Trump administration's nominee for chief regulator of toxic chemicals at the Environmental Protection Agency.
Michael Dourson, a toxicologist nominated to lead the EPA's Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, is facing new opposition from at least two, possibly three Senate Republicans -- jeopardizing his chances of confirmation by simple majority.
Senators Richard Burr and Thom Tillis of North Carolina voiced opposition to Dourson's nomination this week based partly on his past evaluations of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances named PFAS, (also PFCs), which are plaguing a major North Carolina river.
In Michigan, PFAS from industrial and military sources have polluted drinking water supplies in Kent, Iosco, Crawford and Washtenaw counties, as well as many state lakes and rivers.
In North Carolina, a PFAS compound called GenX developed by DuPont to replace PFOA in the manufacture of Teflon nonstick cookware is polluting the Cape Fear River -- the drinking water source for Fayetteville, Wilmington and other cities.
"I will not be supporting the nomination of Michael Dourson," said Burr. "With his record and our state's history of contamination at Camp Lejeune as well as the current GenX water issues in Wilmington, I am not confident he is the best choice for our country."
If confirmed, Dourson would oversee implementation of last year's Toxic Substances Control Act overhaul, which requires the EPA to evaluate existing chemicals and set new standards. He would decide appropriate risk assessment levels and chose which toxic chemicals the agency would consider next.
His nomination is staunchly opposed by Democrats and he would be the first Trump nominee to be rejected by the Senate if another Republican opposes him.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, has voiced concern about Dourson but has yet to make a final decision, according to the Washington Post.
"I think it's safe to say that I am leaning against him," Collins said.
Dourson has close ties to the chemical industry. He worked at the EPA in the 1980s before leaving to found Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment (TERA), an industry-funded nonprofit that evaluates the health risk posed by hazardous chemicals.
In October, Dourson's nomination was approved by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in a narrow 11-to-10 vote.
Work on behalf of the chemical industry defending weakened standards and exposure guidelines for toxic chemicals like PFAS, 1,4, dioxane and trichloroethylene horrifies public health advocates and others who say Dourson is too tightly allied to the chemical industry to be the federal government's chief chemical regulator.
"His approach has not typically been for the benefit of public health," said David Andrews, a senior scientist at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization that focuses on chemicals in consumer products. "Every place where there's a decision to be made in terms of how to utilize the scientific data, he's always shifted or bended the rules toward protection of higher contamination levels."
Dourson and his work has been relied on by chemical industry clients during litigation, the Associated Press reported.
The AP reported that Dourson led a team in 2002 that found exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, was safe at levels far above what DuPont scientists had concluded were safe years prior, and orders of magnitude higher than the EPA's present health advisory level of 70 parts-per-trillion for PFOA in drinking water.
PFOA is showing up in many private wells around northern Kent County and has been detected in the Plainfield Township municipal water. It's one of numerous PFAS compounds found to be contaminating groundwater near old Wolverine World Wide tannery waste disposal sites like the former House Street NE landfill.
PFOA is also contaminating drinking water wells in Oscoda near the former Wurtsmith Air Force Base and in Grayling near the Camp Grayling airfield.
Dourson's nomination is supported by the EPA under the leadership of its new administrator, former Oklahoma attorney general Scott Pruitt. In July, the agency released a list of endorsements that included laudatory remarks from a Michigan State University professor and the director of a Christian summer camp near Frankfort.
Jay Goodman, an MSU pharmacology and toxicology professor, recommended Dourson with "my highest level of enthusiasm" in a statement distributed by the EPA.
"Dr. Dourson has pursued a very successful career track centered around advancing science-based safety/risk assessment of chemicals," Goodman wrote.
http://www.mlive.com/news/index.ssf/2017/11/michael_dourson_pfas.html
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The Hidden Reason American Minorities Are So Much More Likely To Have Diabetes
Nov 20, 2017 | Quartz
By Zoë Schlanger
In 1982, in the little town of Afton, North Carolina, residents sat down in the street, blocking trucks filled with toxic soil from heading to a local dump. The predominantly black town had been chosen as a dump site for the soil, which was contaminated with polybrominated biphenyls, or PCBs. (The soil was dug out of the shoulders of state highways, where a local trucker had illegally dumped thousands of gallons of PCB-laden oil.) In a TV news-broadcast from the protest, one young woman tells the camera, “We are marching because we do not want this to affect our future.”
Chances are, it could.
PCBs are part of a group of chemicals known as “endocrine disruptors,” meaning they can alter hormone systems, which can lead to a range of health issues from reproductive problems to certain cancers. According to a report published online Wednesday (Nov. 15) in the journal Diabetes Care, disproportionate exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals could also help explain why black, Latino, and low-income Americans are so much more likely to have diabetes than their white, wealthier counterparts.
The disparity in diabetes risk is clear: For black people in the US, the risk of developing diabetes is 77% higher than for white people in the US. Among Latinos, the risk is 66% higher. Overall, 9% of white people in the US have diabetes, compared to 18% of black people and 20% of Latino people.
One major reason black and Latino people are disproportionately exposed to toxic chemicals is also clear: Race is the single biggest indicator in the US of whether you live near toxic waste and pollution. Often that pollution includes endocrine disruptors (including PCBs, phthalates, certain pesticides. Even particulate-matter air pollution can contain endocrine-disrupting chemicals.
Those two factors—toxic exposure and diabetes risk—have rarely been connected, but the University of Illinois-Chicago and Ohio State University researchers behind the new paper say they should be. Endocrine-disrupting chemicals “can interfere with insulin secretion and action as well as with other pathways that regulate glucose,” leading to diabetes, they write. That could help explain why diabetes risk is so much higher for those populations.
That hypothesis was borne out by the team’s investigation into previous studies on endocrine-disrupting chemical exposure and diabetes risk. When information on demographics was available in those studies, the majority “reported that low-income people of color were disproportionately exposed,” Daniel Ruiz, a graduate student at the University of Illinois who coauthored the paper, said in a statement.
https://qz.com/1131781/the-hidden-reason-american-minorities-are-so-much-more-likely-to-have-diabetes/
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California Enacts Cleaning Product Right to Know Act
Nov 16, 2017 | Lexology
By Kelly McTigue, Eric Rothenberg, Dawn Sestito and Bob Nicksin
California Governor Brown has signed the Cleaning Product Right to Know Act of 2017 (“Act”), requiring companies to furnish online ingredient listings for cleaning products by January 1, 2020, and on package disclosure by January 1, 2021.
The Act is similar to the federal Hazardous Substances Act and the California Hazardous Substances Information and Training Act, both of which require that ingredient information be provided to employees regarding the properties and potential hazards of hazardous substances in the workplace. The Act applies to (a) a person or entity who manufactures the product and whose name appears on the product label, and (b) a person or entity who the product is manufactured for or distributed by, as identified on the product label pursuant to the federal Fair Packaging and Labeling Act. It requires the listing of ingredients found in a wide variety of “cleaning products,” defined as finished products such as air care, automotive, or general cleaning products, polishes or floor maintenance products, used primarily for janitorial, domestic, or institutional cleaning purposes.
Notably, the Act specifically requires the listing of ingredients that are carcinogens, reproductive or developmental toxins, mutagens, neurotoxins, or those that have persistent or bioaccumulative properties. The Act’s definition of ingredient is quite broad, and includes 22 separate references to chemical listings (each, a “Designated List”), including for California’s Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (also known as Proposition 65), which alone contains nearly 1,000 chemicals. Also included are “fragrance allergens” when such ingredients are listed in Annex III of the EU Cosmetics Regulation No. 1223/2009 and included in the cleaning product at or above certain threshold concentrations.
The law provides exclusions for personal-care products such as toothpaste, shampoo, and hand soap, trial samples of designated products that are not packaged for individual sale, resale, or retail, and industrial products specifically manufactured for, and exclusively used in, oil and gas production, steel production, heavy industry manufacturing, industrial water treatment, industrial textile maintenance and processing (other than industrial laundering), food and beverage processing and packaging, and certain other industrial manufacturing processes.
The law also provides for business confidentiality exclusions as to ingredients which have been approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency for inclusion on the Toxic Substances Control Act (“TSCA”) Confidential Inventory, or for which the manufacturer or its supplier claim protection under the Uniform Trade Secrets Act.
The regulated community has raised concerns that the codification of the Designated Lists, often referred to as the “list of lists,” is overbroad. Many of these lists are developed in other countries, such that California would not have direct control over the inclusion of specific chemicals.
Manufacturers will need to carefully scrutinize the Designated Lists; if the ingredient is included, even if it is rejected for inclusion on other lists, compliance with the Act would be required.
Once the law takes effect in 2020, it may well serve as a basis for litigation comparable to what we have seen under Proposition 65.
https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=174271b0-3821-4669-9053-12ad0723015a
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Can The UK Remain Part Of The European Regulatory System For Chemicals After Leaving The EU?
Nov 20, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Julie Girling
Brexit can be a divisive topic but, regardless of how they voted, I believe the vast majority of the British public would agree that it represents the greatest political challenge the UK has faced for many years. It impacts on almost every aspect of our society and businesses, which will be heavily affected by leaving the EU.
The UK exports 60% of chemicals to, and imports 75% of chemicals from, the EU; the chemicals industry is the second largest exporter to the EU after the automotive industry and the second biggest manufacturing industry overall, with £10bn gross value added, annual turnover of £32bn and total exports of £26bn. It’s always important to remember that the chemicals industry is a basic building block of almost all other industries: without chemicals, there is no automotive sector.
The government has made it clear that the UK will not remain a part of the single market and this presents many problems and raises many questions for sectors like the chemicals industry, who invest based on market certainty. The chemicals industry invests roughly £5bn each year on R&D.
We are still in the dark as to what will replace the single market, with trade negotiations still on hold until agreements can be reached on the status of EU citizens living in the UK, the Northern Irish border and the so-called ‘divorce bill’. This makes the already slim chances of concluding negotiations by March 2019 more difficult by the day.
The failure to conclude such a deal would result in a reversion to WTO rules, increased tariffs and delays for businesses and consumers. The withdrawal from the single market would also mean an end to freedom of movement. This in turn creates issues, with migrants accounting for around 36% of the workforce in the chemical industry and related process operations in 2015.
Role of Echa
Since June 2007, when the REACH Regulation came into force, data submitted by EU and European Economic Area (EEA) companies resulted in Echa holding the largest global database on the properties of chemical substances. If the UK does not agree to remain a part of Echa post-Brexit, our authorities will lose access to this database, the topical databases and IT tools for regulatory purposes provided by Echa.
British authorities will also no longer be involved in the use of this data, as only member states are required to cooperate with Echa as partners in applying their regulatory processes. They will only be able to benefit from the wide range of substance-centred information that Echa makes public online.
After withdrawal, the UK enforcement authorities will no longer need to ensure compliance by UK-based companies with the EU chemicals legislation. They can also cease enforcing Echa’s regulatory decisions addressed to such companies.
Investment in compliance
Besides the loss of access to the Echa databases, another problem that arises is the fact that UK companies will have spent an estimated £250m on registering chemicals under REACH by the time of the 31 May 2018 deadline. These fees will not be refunded after the UK leaves in 2019 as there is no legal basis for doing so. It is still unclear whether these registrations will remain valid after Brexit.
The House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) noted in a report earlier this year that the uncertainty over the status of REACH registrations could already be influencing companies and their decisions over long-term investments in the sector. Indeed, 20% of the 126 members of the Chemical Industries Association and the Chemical Business Association have indicated that they are in the early stages of analysing the benefits of a move to other EU countries in order to preserve their European business.
Put simply, government negotiators need to ensure that the millions UK business Guest column has invested in REACH are not thrown away, just at the point where they should be starting to reap the benefits. Given this and the potentially highly damaging speculation it has caused, there can be little doubt that a positive future relationship, whatever form it might take, would be mutually beneficial. A lack of one would probably result in companies that export mainly to the EU upping sticks and leaving, resulting in the loss of thousands of jobs.
UK equivalent of Echa?
We can only speculate as to the cost of setting up an Echa equivalent at a UK level but the likelihood is that it would be far higher than what we could reasonably estimate our membership costing as that cost is spread across 28 member states. The EU will contribute just over €75m into the Echa budget for 2017 and, with the UK having an EU population share of just over 7.5% (7.7%) we could conservatively guess that we will pay £5.625 m, based on 2017 figures.
While this figure could be seen to represent the literal cost of Echa membership to the UK, it can be viewed in the same context as the £350 m that the UK "sends to Brussels every week" in the sense that this is not the whole truth. In my opinion, the benefits British businesses enjoy as a result of Echa membership outweigh those costs.
Officials at the UK’s Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) have admitted that the cost of taking on the roles currently provided by Echa could be in the tens of millions. The EAC likewise concluded that establishing a fully stand-alone system of chemicals regulation for the UK would be expensive for both the taxpayer and industry. Even if we set aside costs issues, we must still consider the issue of regulatory harmonisation — or lack of it — for businesses.
The EAC has stated that the chemicals regulation framework, established by the EU through REACH, would be difficult to transpose directly into UK law. If Echa and the UK equivalent body come to different conclusions about the safety of a certain substance, then businesses will be forced to decide which market is most profitable.
Regulatory consistency is a possibility but is by no means guaranteed, unless full Echa membership is maintained. A separate regulatory regime would mean that any companies hoping to export to the EU would still have to adhere to Echa standards, and companies trading in both the EU and the UK would also incur costs relating to both systems.
Barriers to continuing
There are several potential barriers to the UK remaining a member of Echa and REACH. The first is the government’s insistence on a so-called hard Brexit, which would entail a clean break from the EU and an end to membership of EU organisations like Echa and funding projects such as Horizon 2020.
The second is the simple fact that something like this has never been done before. While EEA countries, such as Norway and Iceland, have access to Echa resources, they have never been EU members. The UK would be the first Echa member that was not EU or EEA member.
Companies based outside the EEA can appoint a European-based ’only representative’ (OR) to take over the tasks and responsibilities of importers for complying with REACH but the fee for transferring REACH registrations to an OR will not be waived after Brexit. All this is not to say that a future relationship is not possible. I, as the Echa liaison MEP, am naturally hopeful that the UK remains a full member of Echa and REACH.
Drive to global regulation
With the EU having the world’s largest database of chemical properties, interest in European expertise from third countries is naturally very high and there is a global desire for the sharing of best practice and harmonisation to improve regulation and increase consistency worldwide.
Potential EU candidate countries interact with Echa through the Instrument of Pre-accession Assistance (IPA) and European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) in North Africa and the Middle East. Echa also has memoranda of understanding with regulatory agencies in Australia, Canada, Japan and the US.
The OECD also has guidelines for chemical testing and draws on the expertise of thousands of experts in 35 countries, including the US, Mexico, Japan and Australia. This expertise is invaluable to those members outside of the EU and, with the UK being an OECD member, could provide an alternative source of information regarding the safety of new chemicals in the future.
More generally we have seen multilateral agreements, such as the Rotterdam Convention, that promote shared responsibilities in relation to the importing of hazardous chemicals. However, they tend to focus on one particular aspect of chemical regulation and signing up to them does not confer any trading benefits.
Conclusion
When it comes to Brexit I cannot deny that I was, and still am, saddened by the decision made by the British public. We must now disentangle ourselves from mechanisms that we have been a part of for nearly half a century and the process will not be quick. I sincerely hope that the UK and EU will come to an agreement on a soft Brexit that enables us to continue playing an active role in agreements such as REACH, for the benefit both of British businesses and of consumers.
https://chemicalwatch.com/61169/what-next-on-brexit
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Echa’s Priorities In The Next Five Years
Nov 20, 2017 | Chemical Watch
By Riku Rinta-Jouppi
Walking past Echa’s offices in the seasonal slush in Helsinki, an introductory REACH presentation is running on a screen. It proclaims that by June 2018, all the main chemicals will be registered with the agency. Without the usual caveats, ifs and buts, this strikes me as a profound statement. There is no other chemicals agency in the world with such a comprehensive database as a foundation for further work.
A new page will be turned at the beginning of 2018 when the new executive director, Bjørn Hansen, starts his five year term of office. He has a long background as the head of the chemicals unit at DG Environment and has recently been working closely in shaping the European Commission’s circular economy strategy for chemicals. His recent statements give some clues as to what Echa’s future priorities might be.
First, improving dossier quality seems to remain a top priority. As around 70% of all dossiers submitted so far have been untouched ever since, many registrants clearly consider registration to be the end of the REACH process. In fact it is just the end of the beginning. Dossiers must not only contain sufficient scientific data when submitted, they must also be updated whenever there is a material change or where new information comes to light.
Under the new executive director, Echa is likely to increase the pressure and push registrants harder to improve dossier quality. He has stated that the agency "should view dossiers with inadequate data as non-compliant rather than being of poor quality and use its legal powers to bring them into compliance."
Second, after the 2018 registration deadline, Echa’s focus will shift from collecting chemicals management data to regulatory control of chemical risks. Echa will continue to identify more chemicals of concern and work to phase out those that are dangerous.
The next major goal will be to meet the targets set by the 2020 SVHC Roadmap. The expert decision making of Echa’s scientific committees moves the processes of evaluation, authorisation and restriction forward, without necessarily having the first or final say. Mr Hansen has been very consistent in saying over the years that for Echa to be "scientifically respected", it will need to continue to make "the best sciencebased decisions".
Third, Echa is likely to assume an active role in resolving issues related to the circular economy for chemicals and recycled materials. In his inaugural address, Mr Hansen referred to Echa’s dual role of "supporting the understanding of hazardous properties of chemicals and uses of materials and on the other hand enabling the development of products and chemicals for a circular economy".
He added: "A balance will need to be found between materials that have value and need to be recycled and the hazardous substances in them that should be eliminated."
However, there is no easy solution to this balancing act. If you require recycled products to have zero impurity and zero chemical risk, a lot of materials that are in principle recyclable must remain unrecycled. Conversely, aiming for a high level of recycling inevitably means that in some cases, there will still be SVHCs present in a diluted form in the recycled product. Some sort of expert or even political-level assessment still needs to be made on acceptable levels for each specific application.
Generally, Mr Hansen’s approach seems to be rather pragmatic. He divides the raw materials on the market today into three categories. The first is harmless material that can clearly be recycled without restriction and used to produce new articles.
The second includes material so ‘dirty’ that it cannot be put back on the market, for example, persistent organic pollutants (POPs). These must be incinerated, with or without energy recovery, or landfilled.
"Material in the third category falls somewhere in between," he says. "There is a question mark over it. It can be physically recycled, but it may include harmful chemicals and, therefore, its use should be controlled and tracked."
It is the third category that causes regulatory complications, in Mr Hansen’s view. "On the one hand, you could say that there are so many unknowns in the future that precaution tells us to get rid of as many substances as possible as soon as possible, to clean up the waste stream. This means that we would not let these substances be recycled and re-enter the production process. On the other hand, you could put more weight on the importance and value of the material and less on the potential dangerousness of the chemicals it contains."
Over the next five years, it is therefore likely that Echa will make its own active contribution towards establishing clear rules and processes for a range of recycled materials to be allowed to enter the EU market. This is essential for the recyclers and related industries to be able to move forward with confidence.
The views expressed in this article are those of the expert author and are not necessarily shared by Chemical Watch
https://chemicalwatch.com/61168/echas-priorities-in-the-next-five-years
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Sweden to Alter Some Exemptions Under Mercury Use Ban
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Marcus Hoy
Sweden's mercury ban will soon apply to certain metal welding and to dental amalgams, while exemptions for the use of the chemical in medical research and development will be extended.
An exemption to its mercury ban covering seam welding of sheet metal will end on Dec. 31, 2017, while exemptions for dental amalgams will end on June 30, 2018, Sweden's Chemicals Agency announced Nov. 14.
The use of mercury in those products is “so limited that it is not justified by a general exception,” the agency said in a statement. Companies will be able to apply individually for continued exemptions, the agency said.
“It's very clear to everyone in the pharmaceutical industry that mercury is on the way out,” said Bengt Mattson, manager of environment policy at LIF, a Swedish trade association for research-based pharmaceutical companies.
Other exemptions, including those for medical research and development, will be extended by two years.
The Chemicals Agency's decisions on exemptions to the mercury ban do not need approval from Parliament, the agency's legal adviser Johan Forsberg told Bloomberg Environment Nov. 17.
Mercurial Allowances
Sweden, which has imposed a general ban on the use of mercury in products since Jan. 15, 2009, generally applies more stringent rules than elsewhere in the EU.
“There are also some exceptions due to existing EU rules on mercury, such as for electronics, and those rules take precedence over national rules,” Forsberg said. “These exceptions are not time-limited.”
Under existing EU rules, the use of mercury in certain electrical and electronic goods, vehicles, automotive parts, and certain instruments and equipment is permitted.
Time-Limited Exemptions
Sweden has granted several time-limited exceptions to the ban, Forsberg said, which are intended to end when alternatives become available. “We have now reviewed the existing exceptions and found that some need to be extended due to a lack of alternatives.”
“In the case of amalgam, the assessment is that it is used to such a small extent that there is no justification for a general exception. Amalgam has been replaced with plastics, metals or ceramics,” he said, adding that metal welding has largely been replaced and the effect on companies will be small.
Industry representatives told Bloomberg Environment Nov. 17 that they supported the phase-out of mercury and agreed with the government's exemption policy.
In a small number of cases—such as the use of mercury chloride in some electrodes—no viable substitutes are currently available, the Swedish trade organization LIF said.
Magnus Huss, director of IKEM—an organization representing innovation and chemical Industries in Sweden—told Bloomberg Environment that his organization believes the two-year extensions are too short in some cases. “We expect further extensions to follow,” he said.
In addition to the new mercury restrictions, new limits are to be introduced for three preservatives used in water-based toys, such as soap bubbles, glass paints, and glues, to comply with new EU rules.
The new rules, which implement revisions to the EU's Toy Safety Directive, take effect in Sweden and across the EU Nov. 24.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123917582&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123917582&jd=123917582
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U.S. Trade and Development Agency Launches LNG Exports Initiative
Nov 17, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By David Bradley
Looking to spur increased liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) on Friday announced an initiative to connect American companies to new export opportunities in emerging economies.
"Domestic trends in the gas sector are having a global impact, and we are now seeing even greater commercial opportunities for American firms to work in high growth economies," said USTDA Acting Director Thomas Hardy. "Now is the time to capitalize on this momentum and to take our cooperation to the next level."
The U.S. Gas Infrastructure Exports Initiative would offer domestic LNG companies the USTDA's expertise in marketing and networking in foreign markets, Hardy said. It would generate new LNG exports through the development of gas-related infrastructure in key LNG import countries.
USTDA has announced a call for gas-related project proposals for U.S. companies that have identified project sponsors in high growth emerging markets.
"Our goal is to work with U.S. industry and our partner countries to make sure that the next gas-fired power plant, the next LNG import facility, or the next gas pipeline will be built using American innovation and a 'made in the USA' label," Hardy said. "...I want to encourage American companies and their overseas partners to give us their best ideas for how we can connect U.S. expertise and technologies across the gas value chain in emerging economies."
USTDA said it would support a series of reverse trade missions to bring prospective overseas LNG buyers to the United States for site visits and meetings with U.S. industry. Planned visits would include delegations from Senegal, China and other partner countries, and it would target at least $250 million in export opportunities, Hardy said.
As a part of the Initiative, USTDA participated in the recent 17th U.S.-China Oil and Gas Industry Forum in China and the Latin America and Caribbean Gas Options Forum in Panama.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/112491-us-trade-and-development-agency-launches-lng-exports-initiative
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Keystone Pipeline Springs a Leak as Extension Decision Nears
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Robert Tuttle, Meenal Vamburkar, and Sheela Tobben
Talk about bad timing.
Days before Nebraska regulators are set to rule on TransCanada Corp.’s XL extension to its Keystone pipeline, the existing conduit has sprung a major leak. It spilled about 5,000 barrels of oil early Nov. 16 in South Dakota, handing new fodder to environmentalists opposed to the XL project. The company shut the line, and foes were quick to respond.
The spill “should be a stark reminder of the risk Nebraska would be signing up for,” said Anthony Swift, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's Canada Project, a group that opposes the pipeline. “The likelihood of spills should weigh into their decision.”
The spill occurred in Marshall County, the company said in a statement. The pipeline, which can carry about 600,000 barrels of crude a day from Alberta's oil sands to the U.S. Midwest, is expected to remain shut while the company responds to the spill. TransCanada tentatively plans to restart the line Nov. 23, a person familiar with the matter said Nov. 17.
Analysts have said a prolonged shutdown would affect distribution of heavier oil. The line will remain shut until repairs are completed and TransCanada receives approval from the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, Terry Cunha, a company spokesman, said in an emailed statement.
Difficult Signal
While a 2011 state law precludes the Nebraska regulators from factoring pipeline safety or the possibility of leaks into the decision on Keystone XL, the spill still sends a difficult signal out at a key time for the company.
“The timing of this outage is not very good from TransCanada's standpoint,” said John Auers, executive vice president at energy consultant Turner Mason & Co. in Dallas, by telephone. “Theoretically, it should not have an impact in Nebraska. I think TransCanada will handle this spill very well, and get it up and running quickly. It could be a good indication that pipes are safe, and they can handle incidents.”
The longer the pipeline stays down, the more crude will fill storage tanks. As they top out, the discount paid for heavy Canadian oil will need to widen to make shipping by rail cars affordable, according to Kevin Birn, a director at IHS Energy in Calgary. “We always thought we would see increased movements by rail,” Birn said by telephone. “This will accelerate that time line.”
Heavy Crude
The shutdown of the line also comes as falling Venezuelan production and cuts by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries have reduced the availability of heavy crude oil along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Western Canadian Select heavy crude's discount to West Texas Intermediate futures widened to $14.20 a barrel, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It was unchanged Friday.
“While it remains too early to assess the length of the outage,” differentials are expected to widen, Tudor Pickering Holt & Co. said in a research report Friday. The extent of the spill could result in a longer-term shutdown, the report said.
A significant change in pricing will negatively affect some drillers. MEG Energy Corp., Imperial Oil Ltd and Cenovus Energy Inc. would see the most impact, Tudor Pickering said.
Meanwhile, a decision by Nebraska's Public Service Commission on Keystone XL, an $8 billion, 1,179-mile conduit on the drawing boards since 2008, is scheduled for Nov. 20. The board will decide whether to allow the Calgary-based company's line to cross the state. While any ruling there will certainly face legal challenges, an approval would remove a key hurdle to construction.
The project, as planned, would send crude from Hardisty, Alberta, through Montana and South Dakota to Nebraska, where it will connect to pipelines leading to U.S. Gulf Coast refineries. The company's open season for gauging producers’ interest closed late last month, and TransCanada executives have indicated that they've secured enough shipping commitments to make the project commercially worthwhile.
Death Knell
If Nebraska denies approval, ruling it's not in the public interest, it could be the death knell for the long-stalled extension, analysts have said. While the decision can be challenged in court, uncertainty over the project's prospects has loomed over TransCanada's ability to secure oil producer commitments to use the conduit.
The line is one of three oil-sands pipeline projects that have been approved by either the Canadian or U.S. government over the past year and, with a final approval, could be built as early as this decade. New pipelines are needed to prevent a bottleneck as Canada's oil-sands production grows.
The existing Keystone system is second only to Enbridge's mainline in the volume of heavy Canadian oil-sands crude it can deliver to the U.S. Midwest. The U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration has deployed four technical experts to the site of the spill, and is investigating, a spokesman said.
The longer the outage, “the bigger the impact,” he said “I don't expect it to be down for long as it's a critical pipeline. There is every incentive for TransCanada to bring it back up.”
—With assistance from Kevin Orland.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123917572&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123917572&jd=123917572
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Neb. Official: Keystone Leak Won't Affect State's KXL Decision
Nov 17, 2017 | AP (In E&E News PM)
A 210,000-gallon oil spill from the Keystone pipeline won't affect a critical decision from Nebraska regulators on whether to allow an expansion of the pipeline, a state official said today.
TransCanada Corp. shut the pipeline down yesterday morning after the spill in South Dakota, and the company was investigating the cause (E&E News PM, Nov. 16).
On Monday, the Nebraska Public Service Commission will vote on whether to let the Keystone XL expansion — which would carry oil sands crude across Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska — run through the state. But under a 2011 state law, the commission is not allowed to consider safety or potential pipeline leaks in its decision.
Instead, the permitting decision will be based on hundreds of thousands of public comments as well as hearings that took place over the summer, said Nebraska Public Service Commission spokeswoman Deb Collins.
The Nebraska Legislature used the 2011 law to give the commission authority over oil and gas projects after widespread backlash over the Keystone XL proposal.
But the law includes a provision that says the commission cannot consider leak risks because safety is a federal responsibility. That has opponents of the pipeline expansion angry.
"There is a reason TransCanada and the Big Oil lobby did not want this information on the record," said Jane Kleeb, director of the Bold Alliance, a coalition of groups that have long opposed Keystone XL (Schulte/Nord, Associated Press, Nov. 17). — NS
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2017/11/17/stories/1060066909
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U.S. Forest Service OKs Atlantic Coast Pipeline
Nov 17, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Final approval of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) took one step closer to reality on Friday, after the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) gave its approval for the natural gas project, concluding that two national forests and other assets to be traversed by the pipeline would face minimal environmental impacts.
In a 63-page record of decision, USFS authorized a special use permit for ACP to build, operate and maintain the pipeline on land within the George Washington and Monongahela national forests. It also approved project-specific amendments to the forest plans for both areas.
"This decision supports federal policies emphasizing energy infrastructure, jobs, economic growth and our agency's efforts to provide for multiple use," USFS said. "By applying the required terms, conditions and mitigation measures outlined in the environmental impact statement, the ACP project will be implemented without impairing the long-term productivity of National Forest System lands."
USFS approval of the project comes exactly five weeks after FERC also issued a certificateapproving the project, which would transport 1.5 Bcf/d from the Marcellus and Utica shales to markets in the Southeast.
Among the 41 terms and conditions attached to the approval, ACP is prohibited from any surface-disturbing activity as part of crossing under the Appalachian National Scenic Trail. ACP is also not allowed to begin any activity on forest land that may impact the habitat of the candy darter, a rare fish currently under review for listing on the Endangered Species Act, until the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service provides the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission with a non-jeopardy determination for the species.
According to USFS, once all approvals are in place construction could begin in April and be completed in late 2019. The project is scheduled to enter service in 2019. Timber removal would occur before installing the pipeline, but the agency said that work must be completed between November 15 and March 31 to avoid impacts to threatened and endangered bats.
The 600-mile ACP is a joint venture of Dominion Energy Inc., Duke Energy, Piedmont Natural Gas and Southern Company Gas.
"We've always strived to balance the energy needs of consumers and the economy with responsible environmental stewardship," Dominion spokesman Aaron Ruby said Friday. "USFS's approval shows that through collaboration with agencies and the scientific community, we can responsibly develop infrastructure in a way that preserves the environment and protects our natural resources."
Environmental groups opposed to the pipeline accused USFS and FERC of kowtowing to the oil and gas industry. The Sierra Club said it would mount a legal challenge to the USFS decision. Last Monday, the Sierra Club and other groups filed a rehearing request with FERC over the project.
"National forests, like our communities, deserve protection, not a roughshod review and hasty approval to be cut down for an unnecessary fossil fuel project," said Sierra Club spokeswoman Kelly Martin. "The Forest Service and FERC have failed to show there is a need for a new right of way for this project -- or for this pipeline at all."
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/112490-us-forest-service-oks-atlantic-coast-pipeline
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OECA Weighs 'Refresh' For Policies On Facilities' Self-Audits Of Violations
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
EPA's Office of Enforcement & Compliance Assurance (OECA) is weighing a “refreshing” of its self-audit policies that gives facilities incentives to report violations to the agency, says OECA's top political deputy Patrick Traylor, but he is strongly backing an existing policy that expands incentives for new facility owners to report past violations.
Speaking at a Nov. 16 American Bar Association event in Washington, D.C., Traylor, deputy assistant administrator for OECA, said the agency could soon begin work on “a refreshing” of the audit policy.
“I do think we can improve EPA's own self-disclosure and audit policies. . . . I'd like to see sort of a refreshing of all our audit and self-disclosure policies, to update them,” Traylor said, saying that the regulations were last updated in 1994. “It's a little dated, and I think it could be refreshed.”
Traylor continued that such a “refresh” could lead to a federal policy that adopts elements of states' self-audit regulations, in response to an audience question about whether EPA might base its audit framework on Texas' rules.
“I don't know that we'll adopt Texas' [policy] as EPA's own, but certainly I'd be happy to look at Texas' and other states' policies and see if we can learn good lessons from them,” he said.
EPA launched the self-audit policy in 2000 with incentives for facilities that voluntarily disclose and correct environmental law violations, including penalty mitigation and dropping potential criminal prosecutions, as long as the disclosure meets certain EPA standards.
However, industry said the policy seemed to languish in the Obama administration's later years, prompting calls for the agency to work more closely with states that have adopted their own audit programs.
In 2015, the agency launched a new website to allow for digital reporting -- a move that stakeholders welcomed as showing renewed federal interest in the audit program -- but users complained of long waits for EPA to process claims submitted that way.
Traylor's comments indicate the Trump administration might be more receptive to those calls than its predecessor.
However, he also praised one element of the current program, which is the new owner policy that expands incentives available to owners who report violations from before they acquired a facility. That aspect of the program was enacted in 2008 and continued by the Obama administration.
It offers “tailored incentives” to new owners who report past violations within nine months of taking over a facility, including expanding the range of violations subject to the policy and giving the agency more discretion to mitigate penalties the site would otherwise face.
“The last administration did a nice job, I think, in putting together the new owner policy. That was a really nice thing to have done,” Traylor said.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/oeca-weighs-refresh-policies-facilities-self-audits-violations
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Chemical Plants Urged To Revise Emergency Plans
Nov 17, 2017 | Chemistry World
By Rebecca Trager
US chemical safety agency says the Arkema disaster caused by Hurricane Harvey should serve as a warning to other companies
More than two months into its investigation of the explosions that took place in at Arkema’s organic peroxides plant in Crosby, Texas in the aftermath of hurricane Harvey, the US Chemical Safety Board (CSB) is urging chemical companies in America to reassess their emergency preparedness and continuity of operations plans, and to rework their hazard and risk assessments.
The fires from the Arkema facility resulted when massive flooding from Harvey caused the Crosby plant to lose critical refrigeration of organic peroxides stored there.
‘If these types of storms are going to continue with the frequency or intensity that we are seeing, then [chemical companies] have to make sure that their worst-case scenario is really extrapolating what could possibly happen,’ the CSB’s chairperson, Vanessa Allen Sutherland, said during a 15 November press conference.
She emphasised that chemical companies must become more focused on their emergency planning and response if, as experts predict, climate change will cause more frequent and intense extreme weather events.
Since the CSB investigation is ongoing, very few details were disclosed at the press conference about the agency’s findings to date. However, the board’s lead investigator on the case, Mark Wingard, did say that the guidance Arkema used regarding the amount of elevation required for generators to be safe from flooding ‘might have been insufficient to help prevent this incident’. He also said Arkema has been ‘extremely cooperative’ with the CSB and its investigation.
The CSB plans to finalise and publish its report by next June, which is the start of hurricane season.
https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/chemical-plants-urged-to-revise-emergency-plans/3008309.article
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Trump's ‘America First’ Foreign Policy Erodes Work on Climate
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jessica Shankleman
Donald Trump's “America first” foreign policy is starting to undercut progress at the annual talks on fighting global warming.
The U.S. president's vow to walk away from the landmark Paris Agreement on climate change and spur fossil fuels has encouraged countries from India to China to wonder why they should make sacrifices at two weeks of discussions held by the United Nations, which finish Nov. 17 in Bonn.
While envoys from almost 200 nations will make progress implementing the Paris deal at this year's meeting, those involved in the process say the three-decade-old talks are in danger of drifting in the absence of leadership from rich nations and the long-promised $100 billion a year in climate finance for the developing world.
“This is the worst moment for the Americans to start behaving like a five-year old all of a sudden,” Christian Ehler, a German member of the European Parliament who speaks on EU and U.S. relations at the climate change talks, said in an interview. “The leader of the western world is stepping out of the multilateral framework used to tackle the most dramatic problem the world might be facing in the next 100 years.”
Old divisions emerged between richer and poorer nations. India, whose pollution levels are rising faster than any other industrial nation, stressed the need to include “equity” in the discussions, allowing it to keep expanding its emissions. China sought to differentiate responsibilities between developed and developing countries, a move that would expand its wiggle room in meeting commitments.
Even the leaders of France and Germany showed a split as they attempted to lead a diplomatic charge to keep the global warming fight on track. French President Emmanuel Macron called for a minimum price on carbon pollution while German Chancellor Angela Merkel defended her country's use of coal and the need to preserve jobs in industry.
There was little progress from rich nations in saying when they'd achieve the goal of advancing $100 billion a year for developing-world climate projects, a target they've promised to achieve by 2020.
“Some of these richer countries paint the U.S. as the bad boy, but privately they don't want to do much more on these issues either,’’ said Alden Meyer, director of strategy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an advocacy group.
Negotiators in Bonn this week are likely to make progress on:
• Ensuring nations transparently report their greenhouse gas pollution and actions to combat climate change which they pledged under the Paris Agreement in 2015.
• Designing a process in 2018 that will review whether countries are actually making progress on the actions they committed to in Paris.
• Allowing countries to link national carbon markets, building an international trading system for carbon credits.
• Voluntary pledges that countries made in Paris two years ago aren't enough to meet the target they set to keep global warming to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times. A degree of warming over the past century already has been blamed for making storms stronger, adding to the frequency of floods and droughts and raising sea levels.
Rising Temperatures
Faltering political will and rising emissions mean the world is on track for a temperature increase of 3.4 degrees Celsius by the end of the century, according to the UN. This year is likely to be one of the three warmest on record, with the highest ever emissions from fossil fuels, according to the UN's World Meteorological Organization.
Trump's envoys in Bonn stayed out of the limelight this week except for a single event, where, to the jeers of environmental groups, the White House climate adviser George David Banks touted the virtues of coal in expanding access to electricity.
“Our guiding principles are universal access to affordable and reliable energy, and open, competitive markets that promote efficiency and energy security, not only for the United States but around the globe,” Judith Garber, head of the U.S. delegation in Bonn and acting assistant secretary of state for oceans and the environment, said in a speech to envoys Nov. 16.
China, India and other emerging economies want developed nations like the U.S. and Germany to make more effort to curb emissions before 2020 and to scale up climate finance, which is central to the global effort to curtail pollution.
“We would definitely expect more progress because if we think that climate change is a problem, it's important that finance moves forward at the speed,’’ Arun Kumar Mehta, additional secretary for the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change at the Government of India, said in an interview in Bonn.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123917567&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123917567&jd=123917567
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States Welcome Pruitt's Air Emphasis, But Seek Further Clarity
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Abby Smith and Sylvia Carignan
The EPA has labored for years to clear out its backlog of state implementation plans for federal air quality standards, and state regulators generally welcome Administrator Scott Pruitt's focus on the issue—a stand he reiterated Nov. 17.
States want more clarity from the Environmental Protection Agency upfront as they work on plans to meet federal air pollution requirements, and regulators said that process could still be improved.
Pruitt, speaking at the Federalist Society's National Lawyers Convention, said one of the “most striking things” he's encountered since arriving at the EPA in February is “the lack of urgency in areas that you would consider most basic and fundamental.”
For example, he described more than 700 plans states had submitted to meet air quality standards “sitting on a shelf” at the agency.
“They were literally in our office waiting to be acted upon with no sense of urgency,” Pruitt said, pledging to work with states to speed the EPA's approval process.
Miles Keogh, executive director of National Association of Clean Air Agencies, said the interest from Pruitt and other top-level officials in reducing backlog “is something that's really welcome.”
He added that state groups like his and the Environmental Council of States have been working with the EPA since 2010 on approaches to more efficiently and effectively handle the state implementation plan process—an effort that he said has already helped to clear out much of the agency's backlog.
Timely and Flexible
Pruitt criticized the Obama administration, saying officials were not acting “with diligence, attention, and focus to partner with governors and [state environmental regulators] across the country to address” air quality standards. “That just wasn't happening.”
Ron Gore, air division chief of the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, said he would welcome near-immediate approval, if possible, of certain categories of implementation plans—particularly those in which a state is determining areas have moved to meet air quality standards.
“Ideally, EPA would adopt that the next day if possible,” Gore told Bloomberg Environment. “That's the only [state plan] revisions that we really care the EPA acts quickly on.”
Streamlining Superfund
Pruitt also said he hopes to speed the EPA's work on Superfund cleanup. The Obama administration did not move quickly enough to clean up the EPA's list of contaminated sites, Pruitt said. He has created a Superfund task force with plans to streamline and speed the cleanup of sites.
“We have so much opportunity to do good work for the American people, to work together with governors and citizens to achieve good outcomes. These issues don't have to be as divisive as they are,” Pruitt said to applause from the crowd of attorneys. “We can really truly achieve these things and do it in the right way.”
Pruitt, who acknowledged that some companies are unhappy about an EPA cleanup decision, said the agency needs to get polluters to pay for contamination.
In his remarks, Pruitt talked about the San Jacinto River Waste Pits Superfund site, located outside Houston. The EPA decided Oct. 11 that the dioxin-contaminated waste in the site's partially submerged pits needs to be excavated.
The potentially responsible parties at the site, which include International Paper and McGinnes Industrial Maintenance Corp., argued that the EPA's remedy is less environmentally protective than the temporary cap the parties installed over the pits.
“They're the ones that put the dioxin on site; they should be the ones that provide a permanent solution for Houston to make sure that dioxin does not get into the water,” Pruitt said.
International Paper declined to comment on Pruitt's remarks. A spokesperson for McGinnes reiterated in a statement that the company cannot support a less environmentally protective remedy.
She said the decision was made before Pruitt took office.
‘99 Percent Done’
“The [remedy decision], as I understand it, was 99 percent done before the change in administration,” according to Lois Marie Gibbs, founder of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, who has been following the site's progress.
Peter Hsiao, partner at Morrison Foerster, said he doesn't think Pruitt's comments drop any hints about future Superfund cleanup decisions.
“The lessons that are learned at that site I don't think will be broadly applicable to other sites,” Hsiao told Bloomberg Environment.
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House Energy Panel Approves Bills To Ease EPA Air Rules
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
The House Energy & Commerce Committee's environment panel has approved several bills easing compliance with EPA Clean Air Act regulations for brick manufacturers, wood stove makers and utilities burning coal waste, along with a measure to ensure modification of cars for racing does not violate air regulations.
At its markup Nov. 15, the panel voted on party lines to approve H.R. 1917, which would delay implementation of EPA regulations for the brick industry until all litigation on the issue is concluded, and H.R. 453, a bill to delay by three years the second, tougher phase of EPA regulations for wood stoves and similar devices.
The panel further passed along party lines a modified bill, H.R. 1119, which failed in the last Congress, to ease compliance with air toxics regulations for utilities -- essentially those operating in Pennsylvania -- that burn coal waste. Subcommittee Chairman Rep. John Shimkus (R-IL) successfully introduced an amendment stripping measures from the bill that would have affected emissions trading under EPA's Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, in line with Democrats' prior complaints over the issue. However, the approved version still provides eased compliance by coal-waste power plants with air toxics limits under EPA's Mercury and Air Toxics Standards.
Also, the panel approved -- with a single Democratic vote and no GOP opposition -- a measure, H.R. 350, to clarify the Clean Air Act to ensure that modification of road cars for track racing is not prohibited as illegal tampering with emissions control devices.
Of the measures considered, this solicited the warmest response from Democrats, who invited their GOP colleagues to modify the bill in order to avoid opening a loophole that could allow sales of banned emissions control “defeat devices” for road cars. But while Rep. Raul Ruiz (D-CA) voted in favor, on condition that such a modification happens, all other Democrats voted against. Otherwise, Democrats uniformly opposed the bills.
Shimkus touted the measures as “commonsense bills that will help small businesses.”
Full House Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) called the bills “commonsense adjustments” that do not repeal regulations or have a major effect on the environment.But Democrats disagreed, echoing concerns of their Senate colleagues at a Nov. 14 Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing, where senators discussed their own companion versions of the brick, wood stove and car racing bills.
Full House energy committee ranking member Frank Pallone (D-NJ) called the markup “another disappointing effort by the committee to advance bills to undermine public health protections.” He noted the potential of the brick bill, in particular, to create a precedent that could encourage “endless legal challenges” to EPA rules in order to indefinitely stall their implementation. The courts should be allowed to resolve challenges to the rules, Pallone said.
The full House Energy & Commerce committee will now consider the measures, but should they ultimately be approved on the House floor, it appears likely that Senate Democrats will block their passage in the upper chamber.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/house-energy-panel-approves-bills-ease-epa-air-rules
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Pennsylvania Faults EPA's FY18-22 Strategic Plan For 'Neglecting' Climate
Nov 17, 2017 | Inside EPA
Pennsylvania environment regulators and public health groups are faulting EPA's omission of climate change from its recent draft strategic plan for fiscal years 2018-2022, calling it a “glaring oversight” that shirks the agency's responsibility to help tackle a global challenge and will harm efforts to achieve the plan's other goals.
“By neglecting to even acknowledge climate change, the EPA is placing the livelihood of future generations in jeopardy,” says the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (PADEP) in critical Oct. 31 comments, recently posted to the docket for EPA's draft plan for FY18-22, a document outlining the agency's broad priorities.
“Now more than ever, the United States needs decisive action on this crucial issue and it is incredibly disheartening that our lead environmental agency refuses to provide leadership in the effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
PADEP says it is moving forward with reducing GHGs and implementing climate adaptation efforts, despite EPA's plans to slow or halt work on those issues.
The American Lung Association (ALA) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) also fault the plan's omission of any reference to climate change, which had been a prominent feature of the agency's prior plan issued during the Obama administration.
ALA argues that the Clean Air Act requires EPA to address carbon pollution and other GHGs that endanger public health, and that rising temperatures will hamper efforts of states, tribes, and EPA to meet the strategic plan's other objectives.
“EPA’s decision to eliminate ways to address climate change from this plan completely ignores . . . the legal responsibility that EPA has under the Clean Air Act to protect Americans from recognized air pollution threats,” including GHGs, ALA says. “EPA’s strategic plan must recognize the threats posed by greenhouse gases and take steps to aggressively reduce them in accordance with its statutory authority under the Clean Air Act.”
AAP faults EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt's proposal to roll back the Obama-era Clean Power Plan (CPP), arguing that rising temperatures disproportionately harm the health of young children.
“The Clean Power Plan would have substantially reduced carbon pollution and other emissions from power plants, and prevented an estimated 90,000 pediatric asthma attacks and 3,600 premature deaths each year once fully implemented,” it says. “Revoking this lifesaving plan denies Americans these health protections and removes crucial tools to reduce pollution that causes climate change.”
The state and public health groups' criticism adds to opposition lodged by former EPA employees who say the Trump administration plan's lack of climate change discussion “is unconscionable and goes far beyond the Administrator’s controversial statements on established science.”
EPA sought comment through Oct. 31 on the draft strategic plan for FY18-22. The draft backs states' calls for greater autonomy in limiting pollution, and establishes goals, such as reducing areas that fail to attain air law standards, increasing the percentage of EPA-funded water infrastructure projects that achieve compliance, implementing the Toxic Substances Control Act that was revised in June 2016, and accelerating permitting decisions.
State Concerns
The Environmental Council of the States (ECOS), which represents many state environment agencies including PADEP, has backed the plan's call for increased cooperative federalism, though several other state groups have questioned how the Trump EPA will meet the plan's goals, given proposed budget cuts.
ECOS officials are also holding ongoing meetings with EPA to craft metrics for reducing agency reviews of state programs, part of the EPA's plan for increasing cooperative federalism.
In its comments, PADEP argues that when the Clean Air Act and other foundational environmental statutes were established and amended, lawmakers did not anticipate that GHG “emissions would linger in the atmosphere for decades causing the Earth’s climate to change patterns,” ocean acidification, or the need for global environmental policy.
“It is vital that we retain current and relevant elements of our national regulatory framework so that we do not revert to obsolete or out-of-date concepts, scientific theory, and policy,” PADEP says. “Emissions from the United States are a significant cause of the changing climate, and EPA must not shirk its responsibility under federal law to address this critical issue.”
The Keystone State also argues that despite the draft plan's call for increased transparency, EPA has not allowed adequate public participation on the plan's development, noting that EPA provided less than the typical 30-day public comment period.
It also faults EPA's claims to address risks to susceptible populations, noting that the Trump administration has floated major budget cuts for EPA that would eliminate the agency's Office of Environmental Justice.
Other Priorities
ALA argues that failure to address climate change would harm the plan's other priorities. Increasing temperatures will complicate communities' efforts to attain national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for ozone, the group says, arguing that heat increases ozone risk, requiring greater reduction in precursor emissions.
“States and tribes need EPA to provide action and support to meet the challenges ahead, not to ignore and deny any major and fundamental threats to human health,” ALA says.
The public health group also faults the Trump EPA's claims of prioritizing transparency in the draft plan, arguing that the administration is setting up new hurdles to using sound science in policymaking that hinder public engagement.
“EPA’s recent decisions to eliminate or alter important scientific information from the website, limit EPA staff from presenting at a conference and restricting independent scientists from participating in EPA’s scientific advisory boards, while increasing the role of representatives from the regulated industry, suggest that much more work must be done to demonstrate a commitment to transparency,” ALA says. “EPA cannot credibly promise one thing and take the opposite action.”
Climate change is one of a host of issues that AAP argues EPA failed to adequately address in the FY18-22 draft strategic plan, including strengthening the agency's lead and cooper rule to reduce children's exposure to lead in drinking water, strengthening the ozone NAAQS to 60 parts per billion, banning use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos on food and preserving the CPP.
That rule, issued in 2015, “was a welcome and needed step to help make the air that Americans breathe safer and cleaner,” says the pediatrics group. “This revocation is inconsistent with EPA's core mission of protecting public health and the environment.” -- Dave Reynolds
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/pennsylvania-faults-epas-fy18-22-strategic-plan-neglecting-climate
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How The Bonn Climate Talks Survived Trump
Nov 17, 2017 | PoliticoPro
By Emily Holden
BONN, Germany — The White House goaded activists at the international climate talks by pushing coal and other fossil fuels. But behind closed doors, U.S. negotiators stuck to their Obama-era principles on the 2015 Paris deal — despite President Donald Trump's disavowal of the pact.
State Department negotiators at the U.N. conference that ended Saturday hewed to the United States' long-established positions on the details of how to carry out the Paris agreement. And that's the U.S. role that most foreign political leaders sought to highlight, despite the low expectations inspired by Trump's "America First" agenda and his dismissal of human-caused climate change as a hoax.
“You couldn’t have expected more,” said German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks, who described the U.S. delegation as constructive and neutral. “Its diplomats who are working here, they act professionally.”
White House energy adviser George David Banks portrayed the outcome in even more glowing terms, saying the U.S. had been “indispensable in thwarting efforts by some countries to get a free pass” under the Paris agreement.
The American negotiating team, Banks said, had “led across many issues, promoted U.S. national interests, and protected U.S. taxpayers and businesses.”
Among the contentious issues that arose were efforts by poorer nations to allow them to use less arduous systems than wealthier countries to ensure they are measuring their greenhouse gas emissions. China had led that push, which the European Union and U.S. have long opposed, though ultimately the issue was left largely unsettled.
Negotiations at the conference, which began Nov. 6, wrapped up Saturday morning after developing nations launched an 11th-hour campaign to require wealthier nations to outline in advance how much climate funding they will provide — a sticking point for countries like the U.S. that amend their budgets each year.
Although observers said the U.S. made no effort to disrupt the talks, former Obama administration climate diplomat Todd Stern said Washington was “not in the negotiations with the same credibility as before.”
“It’s not that the U.S. isn’t there, but it’s not the same,” said Stern, who had led the U.S. negotiators in Paris nearly two years ago. “It’s the EU, the U.K. ... New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Japan, etc. They don’t weigh as much as the U.S. did, but they can be very important.”
The State Department sent fewer than 20 staffers, a far smaller delegation than it has sent to other climate gatherings in recent years.
Some observers said a U.S.-sponsored panel discussion earlier this week that promoted coal, natural gas and nuclear power appeared designed to please Trump's political base and energy industry supporters in the U.S. At the event, which provoked a high-profile protest, Banks told the audience that the U.S. would support “universal access” to affordable and reliable energy, which for many places in the world meant coal.
Andrew Light, who was part of Obama’s delegation and is now a fellow at the World Resources Institute, said bringing that pro-fossil fuel event to the climate talks showed that the U.S. can remain a party to the international talks without substantively changing its positions.
“This administration can continue telegraphing its core beliefs, whether or not anyone one believes that with them,” Light said. “In the long run there’s everything to be gained from an environment where the United States does cooperate with other parties on whatever they want to cooperate on.”
Other U.S. representatives, from companies to a group Democratic governors and mayors led by California Gov. Jerry Brown, sought to reassure the world that many in the U.S. still want to take action to ratchet down carbon pollution, even without Trump. Microsoft Corp. announced own its goal to slash carbon emissions 75 percent by 2030 and pitched sustainable technology, including for agriculture and land-cover mapping, in meetings it held with foreign governments.
But the talks on carrying out the Paris agreement will face major hurdles before the next major gathering next year in Poland. Countries will also face a deadline to finish deciding how they achieve the deal’s goal of keeping global warming to below 2 degrees Celsius, the mark that scientists warn would cause irreversible damage.
“Parties haven’t allowed the threatened U.S. withdrawal to derail this process,” said Elliot Diringer, a former Clinton administration adviser who is executive vice president for the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. “They’ve made good progress and set themselves up for a more focused negotiation next year. At the same time, the talks here have underscored the significant political challenges ahead next year.”
But Tosi Mpanu-Mpanu, the lead climate change specialist for the environment ministry in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, said many major issues were pushed until next year. “I have a feeling that people were a little bit complacent,” he said, disappointed in what he called a “self-fulfilling prophecy” that countries wouldn’t make much progress this year.
Environmental advocates insisted they still aren’t seeing the emissions reductions or money necessary to achieve the goals of the Paris deal.
“The conference gets a grade of ‘meets expectations,’” said Andrew Deutz, director of international governmental relations for The Nature Conservancy.
Deutz said that while the U.S. didn’t blow up the process, “the absence of national U.S. leadership was evident within the negotiating process this week and for driving more ambitious climate action in the future.”
Island nations that face the most immediate threats from climate change and sea-level rise pressed their case throughout the two weeks. Allen Chastanet, the prime minister of Saint Lucia, told reporters that island nations are “paralyzed,” because they can’t stop rising temperatures alone.
Hurricane Maria demolished Barbuda and brought heavy damage to Puerto Rico, after passing just 40 miles from Saint Lucia.
"I have to say to you deep down inside of me I’m angry, I’m anxious and I’m fearful,” he told a news conference. “It can’t be that a prime minister’s only resource is to get on the side of your bed on your knees and pray, and that’s what I feel every time I’m here and a hurricane is developing over the Atlantic, is ‘Lord, please take care of our people.’”
Kalina Oroschakoff and Sara Stefanini contributed to this report.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/article/2017/11/white-house-counts-modest-wins-at-bonn-climate-conference-175842
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Bonn Climate Deal Within Reach, Punts Many Decisions to 2018
Nov 20, 2017 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Dean Scott
International negotiators are on the verge of taking the first concrete steps toward a rule book to implement a global climate accord, including big strides on how to verify the greenhouse gas emissions and the effectiveness of actions nations take.
But the two-week UN summit in Germany essentially punted on many issues, particularly climate finance, suggesting the talks here met, barely, the modest expectations negotiators set out for themselves before coming to Bonn.
Expectations were low in Bonn because one of the decisions nations made in Paris in 2015 was to give their own negotiators until 2018 to complete the various procedures to implement the deal.
Climate finance, particularly for developing nations vulnerable to climate change, got few concrete assurances of added funding beyond the $100 billion a year industrialized countries pledged beginning in 2020. That pledge, included in a side deal to the Paris Agreement, is to raise those funds from private and public funds.
Eyes Turn to Poland
While transparency procedures were largely settled earlier this week, negotiators on many other issues chose to take much of the next year to finish implementing the deal, which raises the stakes for the December 2018 Poland summit where the Paris rule book is to be completed.
Among the issues nations will have to decide a year from now: market mechanism rules that are to pave the way for voluntary international emissions trading and the process for reviewing whether nations could be more ambitious than their current pledges to reduce emissions.
On the plus side, according to developed and developing nations alike, the Bonn talks recognized the need for countries to step up their climate action before 2020, a key focus for Fiji, which presided over the talks in Bonn, known as the 23rd Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention. The COP23 president, Fijian Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama, is likely to gain negotiators’ endorsement to launch a new forum to continue to press for more ambitious near-term emissions reductions, a process known as a Talanoa dialogue.
No Commitment for Pre-2020 Action
Alden Meyer, who tracks the climate talks for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that's a bit more modest than what many environmental groups and developing nations want, which is a commitment from richer developed nations that they will, in fact, take action.
“Saying countries recognize the need for more action before 2020 is not the same as saying that there will be action before 2020,” Meyer told Bloomberg Environment.
“You can see that by the end we are going to get what we had expected in relation to this COP,” Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, who presided over the 2014 UN summit in Peru, told Bloomberg Environment. “But these [talks] are just one side of a two-sided coin, and that other side is in Katowice, Poland,” when the bulk of the implementation issues must be finalized at the COP 24 summit a year away.
Developing nations, particularly those most vulnerable to climate impacts, saw little or no progress on climate aid, including support to address the loss and damage suffered by those countries, Raijeli Nicole, Oxfam's regional director for the Pacific, told reporters Nov. 17.
“Developed countries have turned up here and have refused—refused—to commit to a legitimate process to talk about loss and damage. Rather, it's been relegated to a workshop next year in the margins of another meeting,” she said. Negotiators in Bonn essentially agreed this week to a continued discussion of the issue at the next mid-year climate summit, a set of annual technical climate talks slated to begin in late April 2018.
Climate Insurance Inches Forward
On the sidelines of the talks, there were some positive signs for nations to make good on a 2015 Group of Seven pledge to provide climate insurance to 400 million of those most vulnerable to climate impacts by 2020.
The Nature Conservancy joined an effort launched by the German government known as InsuResilience, Andrew Deutz, the group's director of international government relations, said. The partnership, with $15 million in seed money from Germany, is to help make good on the Group of Seven nations’ climate risk insurance pledge.
http://news.bna.com/deln/DELNWB/split_display.adp?fedfid=123917566&vname=dennotallissues&fn=123917566&jd=123917566
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Treaty to Phase Out ‘Greenhouse Gasses on Steroids’ to Enter Force
Nov 20, 2017 | The New York Times
By Somini Sengupta
UNITED NATIONS — Hydrofluorocarbons. It’s a mouthful of a name for a chemical that keeps the turkey frozen in our refrigerators and also heats up the planet.
Now, a landmark international agreement to eliminate HFCs, as the chemicals are better known, is poised to come into effect. On Friday, Sweden became the 20th country to ratify the treaty, joining a diverse group that includes North Korea and Norway. That meets the threshold for the agreement to enter into force at the earliest possible date, according to the treaty: January 1, 2019.
It requires every country in the world to phase out the use of HFCs, compounds that are regarded as a sort of greenhouse gas on steroids, able to trap much more heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.
The agreement was reached, after seven painstaking years of negotiations, in October 2016 in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. Known as the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, it required 20 countries to ratify it in order to go into effect — just in time for a global meeting on a broader treaty designed to protect the ozone layer, which starts next week in Montreal.
More important, its advocates say, the ratification sends a message to companies that make the compounds and to companies that use coolants in their products that they will have to come up with alternatives.Continue reading the main storyRELATED COVERAGENations, Fighting Powerful Refrigerant That Warms Planet, Reach Landmark DealOCT. 15, 2016How Bad Is Your Air-Conditioner for the Planet? AUG. 9, 2016Emerging Climate Accord Could Push A/C Out of Sweltering India’s Reach OCT. 12, 2016CLIMATE FWD:Introducing Our Newsletter, Climate Fwd:NOV. 15, 2017The Bonn Climate Conference: All Our Coverage in One Place NOV. 13, 2017
“That’s a powerful signal to the market that they better continue to adjust their investment decisions and their production to meet the standards under this amendment,” said Durwood Zaelke, president of the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development, an advocacy group in Washington.
The United States has not yet ratified the measure, nor has the Trump administration said whether it plans to. The United States is one of the world’s biggest makers of HFCs, and if it fails to ratify the agreement, it could potentially hinder the ability of American companies to sell coolants to other countries that have ratified the agreement.
“Now the question is, will the U.S. ratify the amendment so American chemical companies can gain full access to new global markets for replacement chemicals,” said Paul Bledsoe, a former Clinton White House climate adviser.
China, a leading manufacturer of household appliances that contain HFCs, hasn’t yet ratified it either, but is expected to, Mr. Zaelke said.
According to the treaty, rich countries are to start phasing out HFCs by 2019, while lower-income countries have more time.
Achim Steiner, head of the United Nations Development Program, said in a September 2017 speech that a drawdown of HFCs, according to the Kigali Amendment, “could avoid up to 0.5°C of global warming by the end of the century — making it one of the single largest opportunities to reduce emissions.”
Environment ministers from a group of countries championing the ban on HFCs applauded those that ratified the treaty to cross the 20-country threshold. They include Britain, Canada, and Pacific island nations most vulnerable to sea rise, like Palau and the Marshall Islands.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/17/climate/hfcs-montreal-protocol.html
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