Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 1/18
-
(ACC Mentioned) API President and CEO to Step Down in August
Jan 18, 2018 | Hydrocarbon Engineering
By Nicholas Woodroof
After 10 years as President and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute (API), Jack Gerard has announced he will step down when his current contract ends in August 2018. -
(ACC Mentioned) Report: Science Panels' Activity, Membership at 20-Year Low
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Greenwire
By Christa Marshall
The Trump administration is abandoning science advisory boards across the government, leaving agencies short of expertise on everything from climate change to nuclear power, according to a report released this morning. -
(ACC Mentioned) In Search of SKP at the Detroit Auto Show
Jan 18, 2018 | Plastics News
By Rhoda Miel
My first day working at Plastics News took me to the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January 2000. -
Lead Dust Ruling May Open Door to Suits Forcing EPA Rulemaking Efforts
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
Environmentalists and industry lawyers say they expect a new wave of lawsuits against EPA and other agencies seeking deadlines for rule updates based on the recent appellate decision ordering EPA to craft new hazard standards for lead dust, though industry holds out hope that the precedent it set can be limited to that circuit. -
‘Tide Pod Challenge’ Highlights Danger of Colorful Laundry Packets
Jan 18, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Samara Geller
An unbelievably dumb and extremely dangerous dare has gone viral on social media. -
FDA Scientists Voice Concerns Over Metabolites of Food Contact Substance
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Davies
Scientists from the US Food and Drug Administration are calling for more research into metabolites of a fluorotelomer alcohol (FTOH) commonly used to make greaseproofing agents for food contact materials. -
Inhaling Nano-Titanium Dioxide Could Have Epigenetic Effects in Foetus
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Davies
If pregnant women inhale engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) over a prolonged period it may cause "significant" epigenetic changes in the foetus, according to a US rodent study. -
US Grocery Chain Trader Joe's 'Pursuing Phenol-Free Receipts'
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Tammy Lovell
US grocery chain Trader Joe's has committed to sourcing receipt paper free of bisphenol A (BPA) and bisphenol S (BPS), following an NGO report. -
Commission Sets out Actions to Tackle Hazardous Substances in Waste, Products
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Luke Buxton
The European Commission has published a series of planned actions and proposed options to combat the problem of substances of concern in products and waste. -
Five Authorisation Applications Given Go Ahead
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
The European Commission has authorised the use of three sets of substances under REACH. -
Echa Round-Up
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
Echa has opened a consultation on uses of formaldehyde and formaldehyde releasers in mixtures or in articles. This would be for use by consumers in a concentration < 0.1%. -
UN Environment, WHO Agree Cooperation on Environmental Health Risks
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
UN Environment and the World Health Organization have signed an agreement to collaborate on action aimed at curbing "environmental health risks that cause an estimated 12.6 million deaths a year." -
UK Scientific Body: Brexit Negotiators Must Prioritise Chemicals Regulation
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
UK Brexit negotiators should aim to achieve a regulatory system that balances innovation, environmental and human health protection, and enables trade internationally, the Royal Society of Chemistry has said. -
Trump Team Pushes to Keep Methane Regs on Ice
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer
The Trump administration is pushing a federal court to make sure Obama-era methane standards do not come back to life this year. -
Dem Senator Puts Hold on Trump Nominees Over Offshore Drilling Plan
Jan 18, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Florida Sen. Bill Nelson (D) is blocking quick confirmation of three Trump administration nominees, saying he hasn’t gotten sufficient assurances regarding offshore drilling off Florida’s coasts. -
States Call for the Fla. Treatment in Their Case Against Drilling
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Pamela King
The Interior Department's map of its five-year offshore drilling plan for the Lower 48 could soon look dramatically different. -
Trump's Critics Say Legal Delay 'Unsubtle and Intolerable'
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Niina Heikkinen
State attorneys general and green groups are pressing a federal appeals court to reject the Trump administration's efforts to stall litigation over the Clean Power Plan. -
Cyber Rules Needed at Grid's Edge — Report
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
A thinly woven, growing web of connected grid devices has opened doors for hackers, but it's not too late to play defense, according to a new report from the Advanced Energy Economy Institute. -
Schneider Electric Describes Major Hack of Customer's Safety Systems
Jan 18, 2018 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Eric Geller
A major manufacturer of industrial control equipment revealed chilling details today about how a new kind of malware infected one of its customers’ vital safety systems. -
Rail Coalition Urges Trump to Appoint New STB Members
Jan 18, 2018 | American Shipper
By Mark Edward Nero
More than 70 chief executive officers of major companies and trade associations that belong to the Rail Customer Coalition, an organization representing a majority of the volumes of traffic shipped by freight rail, have signed a letter addressed to President Donald Trump, urging him to appoint new members and a Chair to the Surface Transportation Board (STB). -
Congressmen Press Amtrak for PTC Status Update
Jan 18, 2018 | Progressive Rail Roading
U.S. Reps. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) and Michael Capuano (D-Mass.) have asked Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer Richard Anderson for a detailed update on the railroad's safety culture and implementation of positive train control (PTC). -
New York, Connecticut Sue EPA Over Missing Ozone Plans
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
New York and Connecticut are suing EPA to force the agency to issue federal plans for several upwind states to curb their ozone pollution that drifts to the East Coast and hinders coastal states' ability to attain the agency's ozone national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS). -
Ewire: Pruitt Defends Industry Ties, Pledges Speedy Permits
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is making the rounds again with top media outlets, defending his “partnership” with industry and also pledging quick action to remake the agency in terms of providing final environmental permits. -
National Defense Strategy Won't Address Climate
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Greenwire
By Nick Sobczyk
The Pentagon tomorrow is slated to release the first National Defense Strategy in a decade, and much like the White House security document it draws on, climate change won't be featured.
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation and Infrastructure News
Environment News
-
(ACC Mentioned) API President and CEO to Step Down in August
Jan 18, 2018 | Hydrocarbon Engineering
By Nicholas Woodroof
After 10 years as President and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute (API), Jack Gerard has announced he will step down when his current contract ends in August 2018.
Until then, he will continue to direct the association’s work and assist in the search for a new CEO.
Gerard said: “Serving the oil and natural gas industry during this historic time, when an American energy renaissance has made the US the world’s leading producer and refiner of oil and natural gas, has been among the most fulfilling professional experiences of my career. We have accomplished what few would have imagined: important public policy victories at all levels of government, and a revitalised association that has expanded globally and added significant strength to its advocacy capabilities. I have served for 10 years at API, which is the longest tenure of my career. I’m ready for my next challenge and want to ensure that API will have time for an orderly transition to plan for its next decade.”
Under Gerard’s tenure, association membership grew by almost 50% and added members from every sector of the industry. The organisation tripled its growth in global markets – where it promotes safety through standard setting and best practices – including expansions to Singapore, Dubai and Rio de Janeiro. The industry’s public policy influence also improved at the local, state and federal level. During his presidency, Gerard built a grassroots network comprised of 45 million voters with representation in every congressional district who communicate with their elected officials on energy issues.
“Jack has been an extraordinary leader for the oil and natural gas industry during a time of challenge and opportunity,” said Darren Woods, API Chairman and ExxonMobil CEO. “He has unified our industry, expanded our global reach, heightened our effectiveness, and navigated a number of significant public policy challenges to a successful conclusion, including: the end of the crude oil export ban; the preservation of a pro-development and refining tax and regulatory framework; and the creation of a Center for Offshore Safety, dedicated to safety in offshore operations. Jack has built a solid foundation from which we will continue to grow. We will miss Jack tremendously because of his significant accomplishments over the years. Our focus will now be on the search for a successor who will build on Jack’s achievements.”
Gerard joined API after serving as President and CEO of two large trade associations – the National Mining Association and the American Chemistry Council. He worked for almost a decade in the US Senate and House.
https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/refining/18012018/api-president-and-ceo-to-step-down-in-august/
-
(ACC Mentioned) Report: Science Panels' Activity, Membership at 20-Year Low
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Greenwire
By Christa Marshall
The Trump administration is abandoning science advisory boards across the government, leaving agencies short of expertise on everything from climate change to nuclear power, according to a report released this morning.
The Union of Concerned Scientists said science panels that advise agencies met less often last year than in any year since government tracking began in 1997. That was true at U.S. EPA and the departments of the Interior and Energy, the group said.
The administration also hasn't convened or filled vacant seats on committees that provide scientific advice, "watered down" the panels or eliminated them in some cases.
"If we're don't have access to the best available science, we can't trust these agencies to protect and inform the public. We can't afford to let these policies be based purely on politics or lobbying by powerful industries," said Genna Reed, a science and policy analyst in the nonprofit group's Center for Science and Democracy and lead author of the report.
UCS said the lack of progress "endangers the nation," since science advisory committees can play a critical role in alerting the officials to public health threats, among other things.
UCS reviewed the membership and schedules of 73 "science and technical" advisory committees across 24 departments, agencies and subagencies, and interviewed former participants of government panels. There are more than 200 government science committees, which typically include members from industry, expert groups and universities.
Among the findings:
Two-thirds of advisory committees are meeting less than they are directed to in their own charters.
There are 14 percent fewer advisory committee members than in 2016. In comparison, membership decreased 7 percent in the first year of the Obama administration and less than 1 percent in the first year of the George W. Bush administration.
The report singles out EPA for particularly harsh criticism, mainly because of Administrator Scott Pruitt's decision last fall to bar anyone with an active agency grant from advisory panel membership. With the October directive, he also effectively ended a tradition of reappointing incumbent members to a second three-year term.
The resulting turnover gave him particularly wide latitude to reshape EPA's Science Advisory Board (SAB), which delivers outside expertise to the agency on a range of topics. Twenty-three percent of the board's members now come from industry, up from 6 percent last year, according to the report.
Asked for comment this morning, an EPA spokeswoman forwarded Pruitt's statement in the news release announcing the new policy, which also includes provisions intended to foster participation from state and local government officials and ensure more representation from all parts of the country.
"Whatever science comes out of EPA shouldn't be political science. From this day forward, EPA advisory committee members will be financially independent from the agency," Pruitt said. "Strengthening independence from EPA, increasing state, tribal and local government participation, and adding geographic diversity and fresh perspectives will improve the integrity of EPA's scientific advisory committees."
Publicly, at least, Pruitt has focused his attention on just three of EPA's advisory panels: the SAB, the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee and the Board of Scientific Counselors. But the agency has roughly 20 others, including the Science Advisory Committee on Chemicals, created by Congress in 2016 to provide advice on chemicals regulated under the Toxic Substances Control Act.
So far, however, the chemicals panel "has not met once," the report said. There is also concern about the committee's direction, the report added, because a former top official at the American Chemistry Council, an industry trade group, now heads the EPA office that oversees it.
Other agency actions cited by UCS include the disbanding of climate science committees at Interior and NOAA and the disbanding of a committee at the Food and Drug Administration.
President Trump has also taken longer than any modern president in nominating a director for the Office of Science and Technology Policy. Last September, Trump signed an executive order reapproving the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, which links the president with outside experts (Greenwire, Sept. 29, 2017). The report notes, though, that Trump did not take further action on PCAST last year to appoint advisers.
At DOE, the report highlights lack of activity on the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board, which historically has produced analyses on issues such as high-speed computing and the effectiveness of the national labs.
However, Deputy Secretary Dan Brouillette said at a hearing this month the SEAB had not been disbanded, as the report claims. "The secretary is still in the process of evaluating membership on that board," Brouillette said.
In a statement today, DOE spokeswoman Shaylyn Hynes said, "Secretary Perry is proud of the research and transformative work that DOE's world class scientists do every day. While meetings in Washington, D.C., are nice, he is more interested in getting out to the National Labs and seeing their efforts first hand. During his time in office, the Secretary has visited with DOE scientists all over the country — and the world — and continues to advocate for the fantastic work they do. It is because of them that Americans will continue to lead the world in science and technology."
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke released a video last week outlining how the department's boundaries will be based on "ecosystems, watersheds and science," although former officials are raising concerns about his plans (Climatewire, Jan. 18).
The White House didn't respond to a request for comment.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071333
-
(ACC Mentioned) In Search of SKP at the Detroit Auto Show
Jan 18, 2018 | Plastics News
By Rhoda Miel
My first day working at Plastics News took me to the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January 2000.
General Motors was introducing a pair of new vehicles, including the Pontiac Aztek. I like to joke that my future turned out to be far better than the Aztek's.
Over the past 18 years, I've seen a crazy range of both cars and press events at the Detroit show, like the bulls herded along the street in front of Cobo Center for the Dodge Ram introduction while reporters huddled next to heaters in risers set up on the sidewalk.
There was concept that was unveiled, then hidden again behind a curtain — a curtain that wasn't quite long enough to hide the feet of the stage hands who had to push the non-functioning car to another spot before the stage was officially opened to the press.
And then there were the empty spaces on the show floor in 2009 and 2010 after the Great Recession sent both Chrysler and GM into bankruptcy.
If it's one thing I've learned in that time, it's that automakers hate the word "plastic," no matter how much of it they use. and will continue to use. (The American Chemistry Council estimates that plastics now make up 50 percent of a vehicle by volume, but 10 percent by weight. And the need to cut weight and improve fuel economy is predicted to boost plastics use by another 70 percent within the decade.)
So if you want to track the shiny new plastics parts coming out on new cars introduced at Detroit each year, you have to listen for the right code words.
• Composites. Automakers may not like the word plastic, but composite must sound just techy enough to make them happy. Sure it may be a glass-filled nylon that's been on the market for years, but they'll be happy to talk about their "all new, lightweight composite" part on their 260-horsepower engine.
• Carbon fiber. If you think automakers love composites, just give them the chance to talk about carbon fiber. Never mind if the CF is just a decorative element. It looks cool. The auto show is all about what's cool.
• Soft touch. Improvements in production have made it possible to put multilayer interior parts integrating a foam beneath a PVC or thermoplastic polyolefin or urethane skin even on entry level cars. It improves the look and feel of instrument panels compared to "cheap black plastic." (Psst: soft touch plastics are still plastics.)
• LED lights or light pipes. They won't mention the polycarbonate, acrylic or LSR that goes into eye catching headlights and taillights and decorative trim that accentuates the body shape, but they will talk about how it stands out from the crowd.
• SKP. My personal favorite, courtesy of a couple of designers, is definitely SKP. I'd been with Plastics News a few years by the time an automaker showed a utility vehicle that it boasted could stand up to the "wet dog test." As in, if a wet dog shook itself dry inside your car, you could still easily clean the surfaces. I asked the designers if they knew what material was planned for their easy cleaning material.
"SKP," they replied. I went over the list of acronyms I knew in my mind. TPO, PVC, ABS, TPV ... but I didn't recall ever hearing about SKP. I confessed my ignorance and asked them what, exactly, SKP was.
"Some kind of plastic," came the reply.
Probably the most honest answer I ever heard at the auto show.
http://www.plasticsnews.com/article/20180118/BLOG08/180119909/in-search-of-skp-at-the-detroit-auto-show
-
Lead Dust Ruling May Open Door to Suits Forcing EPA Rulemaking Efforts
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
By David LaRoss
Environmentalists and industry lawyers say they expect a new wave of lawsuits against EPA and other agencies seeking deadlines for rule updates based on the recent appellate decision ordering EPA to craft new hazard standards for lead dust, though industry holds out hope that the precedent it set can be limited to that circuit.
Sources on both sides told Inside EPA that they expect environmentalists to invoke the Dec. 27 ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in A Community Voice, et al., v. EPA in other suits alleging that the agency has neglected a statutory mandate to act.
But industry attorneys voice concerns that the split 2-1 decision may have lowered the bar for winning the “extraordinary remedy” of a writ of mandamus that compels government action -- a potential boon to opponents of the Trump EPA who may use litigation to force the agency to write some rules.
“I think on its own terms, it's an extraordinary application of mandamus law. . . . The idea that this could be cited by other [non-governmental organizations (NGOs)] to create greater mischief is a rational one,” says one industry attorney of the 9th Circuit's finding that EPA had violated the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) and Administrative Procedure Act (APA) by failing to update its lead dust standards.
An environmentalist attorney says that while from NGOs' perspective the decision is not a radical use of mandamus, “an articulation like this from any court is important, and will create influence among other circuits and among people who are seeking to hold EPA accountable. I think a lot of folks are going to be looking at this."
With the Trump administration seen as downplaying enforcement in a host of areas, the environmentalist says, mandamus petitions will be one of the ways that NGOs will try to force EPA to take regulatory action. These could include efforts to force other toxic substances policies as well as Clean Water Act stormwater controls.
“These are all tools in the toolbox, and they've never been more important, from my perspective,” the source says.
The two-judge panel majority in A Community Voice held that EPA is required to update its lead standards under TSCA, and that it unreasonably delayed doing so in violation of the APA after accepting a 2009 rulemaking petition from environmental and community groups but targeting any substantive rulemaking for 2020 or later.
The decision set a 90-day deadline for EPA to propose new standards, and a one-year timeline from proposal for the agency to “promulgate the final rule."
Both the environmental and industry attorneys cited EPA's lengthy delay in crafting new lead rules as a factor in the 9th Circuit's decision forcing the issue, and the environmentalist says that element could help groups extend the precedent to other areas where they say the agency has dragged its feet. “It's certainly true with regards to stormwater pollution in particular, where we've seen a feeble and hodge-podge approach to protecting people from stormwater pollution. I can imagine a similar argument being put together.”
Appellate Precedent
Senior Circuit Judge Mary M. Schroeder and District Judge Lawrence L. Piersol, who is sitting by designation on the circuit court, rejected EPA's arguments that there is no clear mandate in TSCA for the agency to revise existing standards, and that the petition response did not include a promise to craft a new rule, but only to investigate the need for an update. However, Circuit Judge N. Randy Smith, writing in dissent, agreed with EPA on both counts -- potentially providing a roadmap for the agency to overturn the decision via en banc review or at the Supreme Court.
The industry attorney says the majority's decision is far out of the mainstream because of the lack of a clear update requirement in TSCA or a pledge to issue a new rule in EPA's letter accepting the environmentalists' 2009 petition -- which would mean that EPA should have prevailed on both claims. “I don't see a duty to act in either TSCA or the APA,” the attorney says.
And the attorney continues that since the order requires EPA to “promulgate the final rule” after proposing an update, the agency might not have the option to withdraw its proposal if needed -- a common outcome when courts force an administration to propose a rule it opposes on policy grounds. “I don't know how the court fashioned a remedy that required EPA to actually promulgate a rule,” the attorney says.
The attorney says EPA will likely ask either the 9th Circuit sitting en banc or the Supreme Court to overturn the decision, but if those attempts fail, the agency will have to “work with” the precedent it set when defending future suits filed in the 9th Circuit states.
To avoid the same result, the attorney continues, “I think you go back to mandamus basics, and start from there. You're dealing with a new three-judge panel, and you make the case to them that whatever statute you're dealing with, there's not a mandatory duty. . . . If you are arguing under this same TSCA provision, you're stuck. But if you're under a different statute,” then the A Community Voice precedent would not directly apply, the attorney says.
But while the decision is binding on other courts within the 9th Circuit, other courts are under no obligation to adopt its reasoning, and a second industry attorney says it seems unlikely they will choose to do so -- especially because Piersol is not a Senate-confirmed circuit judge.
“I don’t think other courts, or even the Ninth Circuit, will treat it as particularly authoritative. It expresses the view of only one Ninth Circuit judge, Judge Schroeder, who was joined in the majority by a senior-status district judge from North Dakota. Judge Smith dissented. That isn’t much of a precedent,” that attorney says.
The first attorney says EPA is likely to at least seek en banc review of the case, which would allow a panel of 11 9th Circuit judges to potentially overturn the 2-1 decision. But if that bid fails, the source continues, it seems unlikely that the Supreme Court would grant certiorari to review the case. “I don't think this is cert-worthy, but maybe en banc-worthy.”
TSCA Mandate
Legal observers have offered mixed views on whether the panel was right to find that EPA's duty under the TSCA lead-dust provisions goes beyond establishing a one-time standard -- which the agency issued in 2001 -- and requires it to update that limit over time. The law sets up a framework for EPA to revise the standard and a scientific task force charged with recommending updates, but never explicitly orders the agency to craft a new rule based on that input.
“A careful reader might note that, while the initial promulgation of regulations was clearly mandatory, the majority’s own citation seems to suggest that EPA does not have any obligation to amend the regulations,” Foley Hoag attorney Seth Jaffe wrote in a Jan. 3 blog post.
But both Jaffe and former White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Director Cass Sunstein, in a Jan. 4 piece for Bloomberg, say the scientific consensus that EPA's 2001 lead dust standard was inadequate bolsters the case that choosing not to update the limit until 2020 or later was unlawful, even without an explicit mandate for a rule update.
“I don’t think Judge Smith will be unique among appellate judges in his views on mandamus. To be blunt, though, if enough judges act on similar views, people will be poisoned and people will die,” Jaffe wrote.
Sunstein in his piece emphasized that neither side in the case disputed that current lead-dust limits were flawed. “Because the EPA itself acknowledged that the current standard is inadequate to protect the health of young children, any significant delay would present 'a clear threat to human welfare,' the court said. By asking for a delay of years, rather than months, the agency greatly weakened its position and claim to be acting reasonably,” Sunstein wrote.
Jaffe responded to that article in a Jan. 10 post, saying that the 9th Circuit's decision seems to have set a precedent for considering potential threats to human health as a justification for setting a deadline to act even when the law does not include one.
“There will be other cases in which agencies refuse to regulate notwithstanding that regulation would seem to be called for by the governing statute, even if the statute has no deadlines for action. In those cases, protection of public health -- consistent with the statutory goals -- seems to me a sufficient basis for the type of decision issued by the 9th Circuit,” Jaffe writes.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/lead-dust-ruling-may-open-door-suits-forcing-epa-rulemaking-efforts
-
‘Tide Pod Challenge’ Highlights Danger of Colorful Laundry Packets
Jan 18, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Samara Geller
An unbelievably dumb and extremely dangerous dare has gone viral on social media. It’s the “Tide Pod Challenge”: biting down on the small, colorful – and potentially poisonous – packets of laundry detergent until they burst in your mouth. Children, teens and young adults are posting videos of themselves taking the challenge – with the gagging, spitting and coughing that follows.
It’s unclear exactly how and when the online challenge took off. But the problem, and the danger, is not new.
Laundry pods came on the market in 2012. The American Association of Poison Control Centers says that between 2013 and 2017, there were more than 56,500 reported incidents of children 5 years old or younger ingesting, inhaling or touching the highly concentrated detergent found in single-dose laundry products. Vomiting, burns, corneal abrasions, breathing problems and at least 10 deaths have been linked to pods.
In 2015, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, or CPSC, recommended that detergent makers adopt voluntary safety standards to make pods’ packaging opaque and more child-resistant. The standards also recommended changes to the packet film, such as making them tougher to break open, or adding a bitter taste to deter children from biting down on them or swallowing.
The safety commission has also worked with companies to reduce the toxicity and strength of the detergents. Since then, reported hazardous exposures for kids 5 and younger have dropped, but still remain far too high. Crucially, the voluntary rules don’t require full disclosure of the detergents’ ingredients.
EWG recommends strong caution with these products, especially if you have kids or someone with dementia at home. If you choose to use them, pay attention to these safety tips:Keep the products in a high place, or in a locked or childproof cabinet or drawer.Avoid use while children are around.Refer to the product safety information on the package for proper handling and first aid for unintended exposure.Keep the number for your local poison control center, 1-800-222-1222, on hand.Use EWG’s Guide to Healthy Cleaning to find products with full ingredient disclosure and lower hazard concerns. Fewer poisonings and less severe injuries are reported for powder detergent pods.
https://www.ewg.org/news-and-analysis/2018/01/tide-pod-challenge-highlights-danger-colorful-laundry-packets#.WmDScK6Wa6J
-
FDA Scientists Voice Concerns Over Metabolites of Food Contact Substance
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Davies
Scientists from the US Food and Drug Administration are calling for more research into metabolites of a fluorotelomer alcohol (FTOH) commonly used to make greaseproofing agents for food contact materials.
The FDA team are focusing on a six-carbon (C6) chemical called 6:2 FTOH. Six-carbon substance have replaced longer chain per- and polyfluoroalkyls (PFAS), which were phased out because of health and environmental concerns. The worry is that residual FTOH compounds can transfer into food products from packaging.
It is not yet known exactly how C6 fluorotelomer alcohols such as 6:2 FTOH are absorbed, distributed, metabolised and excreted by the body – that is, their 'pharmacokinetic' processes are unknown – say the team, which is led by Shruti Kabadi from the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. No-one has fully evaluated their potential to persist in mammalian tissues, they add.
The researchers are looking into the biopersistence potential after chronic dietary exposure to three key metabolites of 6:2 FTOH: 5:3 fluorotelomer carboxylic acid (5:3 A); perfluorohexanoic acid (PFHxA); and perfluoroheptanoic acid (PFPpA).
They have estimated internal exposures for the FTOH metabolites by analysing existing data on C6-FTOH in rats and human occupational exposure to PFAS in fluorinated ski wax.
Their calculations show that 5:3 A has the highest internal exposure and slowest clearance across species. They suggest that the chemical could be used as a biomarker for assessing long-term 6:2 FTOH exposure.
The internal exposure estimates could be used to design additional pharmacokinetic and toxicological studies to "conclusively determine whether 6:2 FTOH leads to biopersistence and contributes to systemic toxicity in humans after long-term exposure", they say.
"Our work represents the first step towards identifying the mechanism by which 6:2 FTOH, similar C6-PFCs, and its metabolites could accumulate in the body to potentially cause adverse effects," write the researchers in the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology.Corap metabolite
The 6:2 FTOH is also a metabolite of a PFOA alternative called tridecafluorooctyl methacrylate (FTMA), currently being evaluated under the Community Rolling Action Plan (Corap).
Germany's Corap justification document points to several in vitro studies suggesting that 6:2 FTOH has oestrogenic activity. "Since no data are available on adverse endocrine effects of 6:2 FTOH but concerns on its oestrogen mode of action seems to be well founded but not yet characterised, its potential endocrine disrupting effect should be assessed in the course of the substance evaluation," it suggests.
Meanwhile, Washington-based FluoroCouncil, an organisation that represents fluoro technology companies, states that in vivo and in vitro lab studies on 6:2 FTOH "show no evidence of significant toxicity at levels expected to be encountered".
In the environment, 6:2 FTOH readily degrades to form shorter-chain compounds and is "unlikely to be persistent", it adds.
However, it also acknowledges that, since 6:2 FTOH has been found in the Arctic, it "may be subject to long-range environmental transport in the atmosphere".
https://chemicalwatch.com/63213/fda-scientists-voice-concerns-over-metabolites-of-food-contact-substance
-
Inhaling Nano-Titanium Dioxide Could Have Epigenetic Effects in Foetus
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Emma Davies
If pregnant women inhale engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) over a prolonged period it may cause "significant" epigenetic changes in the foetus, according to a US rodent study.
Epigenetics describes molecular changes that alter gene expression without changing DNA sequence.
Researchers from West Virginia University School of Medicine exposed pregnant rats to nano-sized titanium dioxide aerosols. They then found significant epigenetic changes in the heart tissue of the offspring. The changes also appear to lead to a "propensity" for liver and kidney disease, they add.
The researchers estimate that a human could have a similar lung burden to that used in the study after almost 1.5 working years. They made the estimate after referring to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health's recommended exposure limit and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (Osha) permissible exposure limit.
"Because the human gestational period is nine months, we consider our exposure paradigm highly relevant to the worker population," write the researchers in the journal Particle and Fibre Toxicology.
They suggest that the interplay between the heart, liver and kidneys is vital for understanding the pathology associated with maternal nano-titanium dioxide exposure.
What remains to be understood is if the epigenetic changes persist into adulthood, they conclude. They are also interested in developing dose-response relationships and discovering which stage of development is most sensitive to maternal ENM exposure.
The team now has funding to expose rats at different stages of pregnancy to determine when the effects manifest, says lead author Timothy Nurkiewicz.
"The first step is to identify if [the effects manifest] during embryonic or foetal development. After that is identified, we will further narrow down the window to the most sensitive periods of gestation (when maternal nanomaterial inhalation adversely impacts foetal health)."
The team chose titanium dioxide mainly because of its wide industrial uses and applications. It also serves reasonably well as a surrogate for ultrafine particulate matter, explains Professor Nurkiewicz.
Last June, Echa's Risk Assessment Committee (Rac) decided that titanium dioxide should be classified as a category 2 carcinogen via inhalation.
Industry has argued against the classification for various reasons, including because the proposed toxicity mechanisms cover size, shape and solubility of particles rather than their chemistry.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63219/inhaling-nano-titanium-dioxide-could-have-epigenetic-effects-in-foetus
-
US Grocery Chain Trader Joe's 'Pursuing Phenol-Free Receipts'
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Tammy Lovell
US grocery chain Trader Joe's has committed to sourcing receipt paper free of bisphenol A (BPA) and bisphenol S (BPS), following an NGO report.
The Ecology Center study, More than you bargained for: BPS and BPA in receipts, tested 167 paper receipts from 148 businesses including retailers, restaurants, banks and libraries.
It found BPS in 75% of the analysed receipts and BPA in 18%. Three percent of samples were inconclusive, 2% had no coating and 1% used the alternative Pergafast 201 which is free of phenol chemicals.
BPA and BPS are used as photographic developers, which are coated on thermal paper for printing receipts, but there is concern the substances are hormone-disrupting and easily absorbed into the bloodstream through skin.
According to the report, cashiers and other employees can handle up to 30 receipts an hour, causing their urinary and blood levels of these chemicals to rise "significantly higher" than in the general population.Trader Joe's
The Ecology Center wrote to Trader Joe’s before the report’s publication yesterday, to inform it that BPS had been found in receipts from its stores.
The retailer responded with an announcement on its website from its vice president of marketing, Matt Sloan. It said that: "We are now pursuing receipt paper that is free of phenol chemicals (including BPA and BPS), which we will be rolling out to all stores as soon as possible."
In the recent Mind the Store retailer report card – a campaign run by the NGO Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families (SCHF) – Trader Joe’s scored 0 out of 135 possible points on its actions to eliminate chemicals.
Mike Schade of SCHF told Chemical Watch the store's latest announcement was good news and "underscores the need for other top retailers to step up and remove BPS and BPA from receipts".Regrettable substitution
Ecology Center researchers concluded that BPS has replaced BPA as the developer chemical in many thermal paper receipts in the US, despite having a similar toxicity profile.
Senior scientist, Gillian Miller, said: "Our research shows a shift in the marketplace toward BPS as manufacturers respond to consumer pressure and move away from BPA, a hormone disruptor with negative effects on foetal development and reproductive health."
However, their chemical similarity suggests similar routes of human exposure.
Mr Schade said: "It's a classic case of regrettable substitution. This is of great concern as cashiers can handle ... hundreds of receipts during a work shift. BPA and BPS are not chemically bound to the receipt and are absorbed through the skin, entering the bloodstream in minutes."
The Ecology Center's report contrasts with a recent Echa survey, which concluded that manufacturers of thermal paper in the EU have not greatly increased their use of BPS as an alternative to BPA, which faces arestriction from January 2020.
The NGO is calling on businesses to switch to less hazardous alternatives, recommended by the US EPA. It also suggests that businesses give consumers the option of skipping paper receipts.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63218/us-grocery-chain-trader-joes-pursuing-phenol-free-receipts
-
Commission Sets out Actions to Tackle Hazardous Substances in Waste, Products
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Luke Buxton
The European Commission has published a series of planned actions and proposed options to combat the problem of substances of concern in products and waste.
The plans are included in a Communication on options to address the links between chemical, product and waste legislation, which was published earlier this week alongside its EU plastics strategy. Both form part of the EU's circular economy action plan.
Last year the Commission assessed EU rules applicable to waste management, chemicals and products and identified four main issues: insufficient information about substances of concern in products and waste; the presence of substances of concern in recycled materials; uncertainties about how materials can cease to be waste; and difficulties in applying EU waste classification methodologies and impacts on the recyclability of materials.
The Communication sets out planned actions to address each of these – as outlined below – with further details on options to tackle them laid out in an accompanying staff working document [see box].Information on presence of substances of concern
The Commission said it will launch a feasibility study, to be completed by the end of 2019, on the use of different information systems, tracing technologies and strategies which could enable relevant information to flow along article supply chains and reach recyclers. In particular, it asks how beneficial a compulsory system might be.
It will also develop "working procedures" to ensure imported articles do not contain substances which are not authorised for use in the production of articles in the EU. Simplified procedures for restricting carcinogenic, mutagenic and reprotoxic substances in consumer articles are also planned.Legacy substances
Because legacy substances – those chemicals for which restrictions were set in the past but may be present in products recycled from older materials containing them – are a barrier to recycling, the Commission will develop, by mid-2019, a specific decision-making methodology to support decisions on the recyclability of waste containing substances of concern.
It will prepare guidelines to ensure the presence of hazardous substances in recovered materials is better addressed in the early stages of proposal drafts to manage their risks. And it is "considering enacting implementing legislation to allow an effective control of the use of the existing exemption from REACH registration for recovered substances".EU rules on end-of-waste not fully harmonised
Cooperation between existing chemical and waste management expert networks will be improved, says the document, and an EU platform will be developed for all adopted national and EU end-of-waste and by-product criteria. The Commission also plans to launch a study to better understand how member states implement and verify provisions on end-of-waste. The results, it adds, could form a basis for possible guidelines.Rules on which wastes and chemicals are hazardous not well aligned
The EU executive say it is "about to publish" guidance on waste classification to assist waste operators and competent authorities in securing a common approach to waste characterisation and classification.Staff working document proposed options
Insufficient information about substances of concern in products and wasteChallenge 1: defining substances of concern
Option 1A: substances of concern are identified under REACH as SVHCs (candidate list substances) or listed in Annex VI to the CLP Regulation for classification of a chronic effect.
Option 1B: substances of concern are those identified under REACH as SVHCs, prohibited under the Stockholm Convention (POPs), specific substances restricted in articles listed in Annex XVII to REACH, as well as specific substances regulated under particular sectoral/product legislation.
Precise identification of substances of concern, either in general or sectoral substance lists is important to provide operator certainty and keep make tracking manageable.
Such tracking solutions are not suitable for addressing the risk from incidental contamination; other approaches, such as analytical methods, need to be considered.Challenge 2: tracking substances of concern
The options to be considered depend on the speed and means by which tracking of hazardous substances should be introduced.
Option 2A: all substances of concern should be tracked by a set date, for example 2030.
Option 2B: sector-specific tracking solutions: information on relevant substances of concern should be available to recyclers in a suitable format.
Option 2C: tracking of such substances should remain voluntary.
Option 2D: tracking of chemicals of concern is not necessary or suitable because information on chemicals is obtained directly by analytical means (incoming waste batches, including imported waste, and outgoing recycled or recovered materials).
Addressing substances of concern in recycled materialsChallenge 3: level playing field between secondary and primary material
Option 3A: all primary and secondary raw materials should be subject to the same rules. For example, under REACH, restrictions and authorisation conditions imposed on primary substances should apply equally to recovered materials. Materials not meeting such requirements cannot be recycled and can only be destined to energy recovery, final disposal or destructive chemical recycling (feedstock recycling).
Option 3B: rules on primary materials could be derogated from secondary materials, subject to conditions and to a time-defined review. Such decisions should be substance-specific and based on overall costs and benefits to society according to an agreed methodology. This includes considerations of risk, socioeconomic factors and overall environmental outcome based on life cycle thinking.
Such analysis could lead to derogations resulting in closed-loop or controlled loop uses or other specific use restrictions. This is also applicable to products containing legacy substances where, in some cases, a careful analysis is necessary – for example, on the trade-off between allowing reparability with spare parts containing hazardous substances versus early decommissioning or obsolescence of equipment.Challenge 4: level playing field between EU-produced and imported articles
Option 4A: ensure the timely use of restrictions in REACH and other product legislation so that EU produced and imported products are subject to the same rules.
Option 4B: promoting chemicals and product legislation enforcement at EU borders.Challenge 5: design for circularity
Option 5A: use of the Ecodesign Directive, or other dedicated product specific legislation as appropriate (for example, WEEE or RoHS), to introduce requirements for hazardous substances with the purpose of enabling recovery.
Option 5B: make use of extended producer responsibility requirements under the Waste Framework Directive to promote circular design of products. This could be implemented through guidelines on application of fees modulation.
Option 5C: make use of voluntary methods of environmental performance certification (e.g. national or EU Ecolabel of green public procurement) to introduce rules for hazardous substances.
Option 5D: promote voluntary approaches, such as value chain platforms for exchange of good practice in the substitution of materials at design phase.
Uncertainties about how materials can cease to be wasteChallenge 6: improving certainty in the implementation of end-of-waste provisions
Option 6A: take measures at EU level to bring about more harmonisation in the interpretation and implementation by member states of end-of-waste provisions laid down in the Waste Framework Directive. This option could include:radically stepping up work on the development of EU end-of-waste criteria. This would ensure more waste streams are covered by clear EU-wide rules specifying which conditions need to be met to exit the waste regime and introducing support measures that would enable member states to check compliance by recyclers with the exemption from REACH registration; orremoving the registration exemption for recovered substances provided in REACH, thus requiring that all recovered substances should be registered under REACH and thereby achieving end-of-waste status; orwhere other specific product legislation provides different instruments setting conditions that ensure the safe marketing of a substance or mixture, recognise these conditions as effective end-of-waste criteria and, where justified, introduce a specific exemption from REACH registration.
Option 6B: take measures to ensure more consistency in member state practices. This option could include:end-of-waste status can only be achieved following an ex-ante decision by a member state competent authority;a recovery operator can make the assessment of whether end-of-waste status is achieved (in combination with an ex-post checking regime by competent authorities); or a combination of these approaches, e.g. distinguishing on the basis of the nature of specific waste streams.
Discussion on these options is ongoing under ordinary legislative procedure of waste proposals.
Difficulties in applying EU waste classification methodologies and impacts on recyclability of materials (secondary raw materials)Challenge 7: approximating rules for classification of chemicals and waste
Option 7A: the rules for classifying waste as hazardous or non-hazardous in Annex III of the Waste Framework Directive should be fully aligned with those for the classification of substances and mixtures under CLP. This should enable a smooth transition and placing on the market of secondary raw materials in full knowledge of their intrinsic properties.
Option 7B: hazardousness of waste should be inspired by the classification of substances and mixtures under CLP, but not fully aligned with it. Specific considerations of each waste stream and its management may allow wastes to be considered as non-hazardous even if the recovered material will be hazardous when placed on the market as secondary raw material.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63228/commission-sets-out-actions-to-tackle-hazardous-substances-in-waste-products
-
Five Authorisation Applications Given Go Ahead
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
The European Commission has authorised the use of three sets of substances under REACH. The decisions were all for listed substances of very high concern (SVHCs) under REACH Annex XIV. The substances are:
chromium trioxide, granted to Finnish company Abloy Oy. One authorisation for use of the substance in electroplating of interior door handles, office furniture locks and plates for interior doors will expire on 31 December 2019. Another for use in the electroplating of mechanical and electromechanical cylinders, cam locks and padlocks, electromechanical lock cases and architectural hardware will expire on 21 September 2029
acids generated from chromium trioxide and their oligomers for use in hard chrome plating for gasoline and diesel injection applications. The authorisation was granted to Germany's Robert Bosch GMbH and will expire on 21 September 2029; and
1,2-dichloroethane, granted to BASF SE for two uses both expiring on 22 November 2029. They are for the industrial use as solvent and crystallisation medium in the synthesis of the plant protection active substance bentazone and the biocidal active substance flocoumafen.
The substances have been approved because the Commission has decided that the socioeconomic benefits of the substances used in these ways outweigh the risks of their use, and there are no suitable alternatives available.
The full decisions have been published in the EU's Official Journal.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63211/five-authorisation-applications-given-go-ahead
-
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
Call for evidence on formaldehyde uses
Echa has opened a consultation on uses of formaldehyde and formaldehyde releasers in mixtures or in articles. This would be for use by consumers in a concentration < 0.1%.
The call for evidence is to help the agency in preparing an Annex XV restriction dossier, as requested by the European Commission.
The substances have been added to the agency's registry of intentions.
The deadline for providing input is 11 April.SVHC intention
Sweden has notified the agency of an SVHC intention for the substance disodium octaborate. It is proposing it is toxic for reproduction and the submission is expected on 7 February.Targeted consultation on MCPA-thioethyl
Echa has launched a targeted consultation on the harmonised classification and labelling of MCPA-thioethyl.
The agency's Committee of Risk Assessment (Rac) could not conclude on the hazard classes, specific target organ toxicity-repeated exposure (Stot Re) and reproductive toxicity, during its December meeting. The purpose of the consultation is to receive information and comments on these classes based on the initial CLH report and comments received, as well as on the the seven additional studies not or only partially included in the initial CLH proposal.
Comments on the relevance of the findings and the quality of the studies are especially sought. These must be submitted using the webform by 31 January.Plastic converters use map
The use map of the Association of European Plastics Converters (EuPC) is now included in Echa's use map library. It is also available in Chesar format.
The EuPC also provides a guidance document and a tool to derive conditions of use for workers' assessment. Registrants supplying to the sector are invited to use the information to prepare their 2018 registrations or improve their existing registration dossiers, the agency says.Restriction intention
France has notified the agency of its intention to submit a restriction dossier for substances meeting the classification criteria as skin sensitisers and skin irritants.
The proposal intends to cover the placing on the market of textile and leather articles intended to come into direct and prolonged contact with the skin as defined by the agency's Risk Assessment Committee (Rac).
The dossier submitters’ starting point is skin sensitising and irritant substances that may be present in textile and leather articles, including classified substances as skin sensitisers under CLP 1/1A/1B and/or skin irritant 2 and the substances recommended to be classified as skin sensitisers by Rac.
The joint submission with Sweden is expected by 11 January 2019.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63098/echa-round-up
-
UN Environment, WHO Agree Cooperation on Environmental Health Risks
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
UN Environment and the World Health Organization have signed an agreement to collaborate on action aimed at curbing "environmental health risks that cause an estimated 12.6 million deaths a year."
The agreement, signed in Nairobi on 10 January, will see joint actions to improve coordination on waste and chemicals management, water quality and food and nutrition. It also aims to tackle air pollution, climate change and antimicrobial resistance.
In the area of waste and chemicals, it says it will be looking to promote more sustainable management, particularly in relation to:pesticides;fertilisers; andthe use of antimicrobials.
And the two organisations aim to jointly advance the goal of sound lifecycle chemicals management by 2020, a target set out at the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development.
Carolyn Vickers, team leader, chemical safety at the WHO said her organisation and UN Environment (which was formerly known as Unep) have a particularly close and productive working arrangement.
"This new memorandum of understanding reinforces the longstanding partnership of WHO and UN Environment on chemicals issues, which is so important to addressing both the health and environment dimensions of chemicals management," she told Chemical Watch.
"It also squarely places sound chemicals management among the key issues that are essential to our joint work on the global health and environment agenda."Significant joint work
In a statement, the two agencies say this "represents the most significant formal agreement on joint action across the spectrum of environment and health issues in over 15 years".
They will now develop a joint work programme and hold an annual high-level meeting to evaluate progress and make recommendations for continued work.
In December, the third UN Environment Assembly (Unea3) adopted a ministerial declaration that included a pledge to promote policies that address hazardous chemicals and work towards a pollution-free planet.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63202/un-environment-who-agree-cooperation-on-environmental-health-risks
-
UK Scientific Body: Brexit Negotiators Must Prioritise Chemicals Regulation
Jan 18, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
UK Brexit negotiators should aim to achieve a regulatory system that balances innovation, environmental and human health protection, and enables trade internationally, the Royal Society of Chemistry has said.
In a position posted recently on the society’s website, Camilla Alexander-White (pictured), senior policy adviser for environment and regulation, stressed the need for chemicals regulation to be high on the priority list in Brexit negotiations and for the UK to establish how regulatory decisions will be made.
This includes, she said, addressing how expert scientific input feeds in and what legal relationship the UK will have with EU bodies, such as Echa, that are currently key to decision-making. This point was also raised in the organisation’s response to the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee’s report The future of chemicals regulation after the EU referendum.
Previously absent from government papers, Ms Alexander-White welcomed that the issue has since been mentioned in the UK government’s Industrial Strategy White Paper. And last week, the UK said it will publish an "overarching" chemicals strategy to tackle "chemicals of national concern" for when the country leaves the EU in March 2019.
The promise is included in a 150-page document, A green future: our 25 year plan to improve the environment, which sets the government’s long-term environment goals.
"The government has clearly recognised the importance of regulation, and the need to achieve the balance we advocate," she wrote.Data access
The position goes on to say that it is critical for the UK to establish how data generated by industry, underpinning regulation, will be accessed, reviewed and interpreted.
She added that it is not clear if, and how, the UK will be able to access Echa’s extensive databases after the UK exits the EU. The UK, she said, has a strong reputation in the science underpinning chemicals regulation.
The EU scientific advisory committees, such as those at the European Food Standards Authority (EFSA), are "rich in UK talent" and regularly call for international scientific expertise, she wrote.
"I hope that such strong scientific collaborations will continue between UK, EU and international experts."International cooperation
Calling for increased international scientific cooperation and collaboration post-Brexit, Ms Alexander-White said the UK needs to understand how other potential partners regulate their chemicals, and assess regulatory alignment. This is essential if it wants to look beyond the EU and "strengthen its role as a world leader in research, innovation and new products for global trade".
In a workshop held last year, the Royal Society of Chemistry invited over 50 expert scientists and senior policymakers to discuss four hypothetical future regulatory scenarios for the UK post EU-exit.
The four scenarios ranged from strongly regulated to completely unregulated chemicals management frameworks, and complete divergence from, or alignment with, EU or other global regulations.
https://chemicalwatch.com/63217/uk-scientific-body-brexit-negotiators-must-prioritise-chemicals-regulation
-
Trump Team Pushes to Keep Methane Regs on Ice
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer
The Trump administration is pushing a federal court to make sure Obama-era methane standards do not come back to life this year.
In briefs to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Tuesday night, the Interior Department defended its decision to suspend key parts of the Bureau of Land Management's methane rule for a year.
The postponement was finalized in December, just ahead of a set of January compliance deadlines. California, New Mexico and environmental groups quickly sued over the suspension and asked the district court to reinstate the Methane and Waste Prevention Rule in full.
Government lawyers pushed back this week, arguing that freezing the standards is a "commonsense solution" in light of agency plans to substantially revise or rescind the overall rule.
"It is a temporary and common sense solution to the agency's pragmatic concerns: operators should not be required to make expensive equipment investments to meet requirements that may be rescinded or significantly revised in the near future, and it is not a good use of scarce agency resources to implement a rule that is likely to change," they said in a brief.
Interior's court filings indicated that a draft revision rule — wholesale changes to the underlying Obama rule — is expected this month. The proposal is currently at the White House Office of Management and Budget for review.
BLM economist James Tichenor said the delay of major compliance deadlines allows the oil and gas industry to hold off on spending $110 million to $114 million in costs associated with the suspended provisions — which include requirements for updating equipment, monitoring and repairing methane leaks and reducing flaring.
"These activities would require financial outlays that cannot be later recovered if the provisions of the Waste Prevention Rule are rescinded or revised," he said in a declaration to the court.
Tichenor helped prepare the original 2016 methane rule, the recent suspension and the overall revision proposal, along with associated regulatory impact analyses.
Supporters of the Obama measure have argued that the Trump administration's rollback efforts have been unfair and illegal, violating the National Environmental Policy Act, Administrative Procedure Act, Mineral Leasing Act, and Federal Land Policy and Management Act (Energywire, Dec. 20, 2017).
Critics of the Obama methane standards joined the Trump administration in urging the California court to reject the calls to reinstate the suspended provisions of the regulation. The American Petroleum Institute, Western Energy Alliance, the Independent Petroleum Association of America and the states of North Dakota and Texas have filed briefs supporting the suspension.
The Trump administration and its supporters are also pushing to have the case transferred to a potentially friendlier venue in Wyoming (Energywire, Jan. 10).
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071261
-
Dem Senator Puts Hold on Trump Nominees Over Offshore Drilling Plan
Jan 18, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Florida Sen. Bill Nelson (D) is blocking quick confirmation of three Trump administration nominees, saying he hasn’t gotten sufficient assurances regarding offshore drilling off Florida’s coasts.
Nelson spokesman Ryan Brown said the senator sent Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, a letter last week seeking details on Zinke’s pledge to remove Florida from consideration for drilling.
But Zinke hasn’t responded to that letter, prompting the hold late Wednesday on three Interior Department nominees.
Brown said Nelson “will keep the holds in place until Zinke rescinds the draft five-year drilling plan published in the Federal Register on Jan. 8 and replaces it with a new draft plan that preserves the current moratorium in the eastern Gulf of Mexico beyond 2022 and fully protects all of Florida’s coasts from the threat of both offshore drilling and seismic testing.”
After a brief meeting last week with Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R), Zinke said Florida’s waters would be taken out of the drilling plan.
Nelson has been fighting for years to stop drilling near Florida. He is suspicious of Zinke’s decision and accused him of doing it as a gift to Scott, who is likely to run for Nelson’s Senate seat, an accusation the Trump administration has denied.
A hold all but prevents the Senate from voting on the nominees. It stops Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) from getting “unanimous consent” to skip the 30 hours of debate that Senate rules technically require for each nominee, but that is waived in most cases, except some cabinet officials.
The three nominees at issue are Susan Combs for assistant secretary for policy, management and budget; Ryan Nelson for solicitor; and Steven Gardner for director of the Office of Surface Mining.
All three were approved by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year.
Due to objections by Democrats, they were not held over to 2018 and instead sent back to the White House. But President Trump re-nominated each of them this month, so the Energy and Natural Resources panel will have to vote on them again before they can proceed.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/369509-dem-senator-puts-hold-on-trump-nominees-over-offshore-drilling-plan
-
States Call for the Fla. Treatment in Their Case Against Drilling
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Pamela King
The Interior Department's map of its five-year offshore drilling plan for the Lower 48 could soon look dramatically different.
After agency chief Ryan Zinke granted an unexpected exemption to Florida's coasts, the governors of nearly every state on the Pacific and Atlantic seaboards have asked that their waters also be excluded from consideration for oil exploration and production under the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management's five-year strategy (Energywire, Jan. 10).
New York, for example, questioned the basis for the Florida decision but asked that the Empire State receive similar consideration.
"Your decision to remove Florida from consideration of any new oil and gas platforms before your Department has even concluded its public fact-finding process appears arbitrary," Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) wrote in a letter to Zinke. "Nevertheless, to the extent that states are exempted from consideration, New York should also be exempted."
Interior has declined to comment on Zinke's talks with governors, but states have shared the nature of their chief executives' discussions with the secretary. Nearly every state opposed to the BOEM program presented the administration with a plea to protect its coastal economy from oil spills and climate impacts.
Maine, the sole coastal supporter outside the Gulf of Mexico, leveraged its economic concerns as a reason to back the plan.
"The governor believes in a balanced approach that places a priority on protecting our environment and traditional industries that does not close the door on jobs and lower energy costs for Maine people," according to a statement from Gov. Paul LePage (R)'s office.
In every call he made to a governor, Zinke pledged to take a trip to assess the state's concerns. He always stopped short of granting additional exemptions.
With the exception of California, which claims full ownership of three of the 11 offshore planning areas in the continental United States, each state advocated only for protecting the waters off its own coasts. It's unclear whether, if Zinke grants the desired exemptions in the North Atlantic planning area, Maine could move forward with exploration and production in its own section of the ocean.
The Florida decision injects additional uncertainty regarding how BOEM will handle the three planning areas the peninsula touches.
Removing the state from the five-year plan could, for example, still leave room for exploration of "highly prospective" sections of the Eastern Gulf of Mexico planning area, ClearView Energy Partners LLC Managing Director Kevin Book wrote in a Jan. 11 note.
What "removing Florida" looks like may not be clear until the proposed five-year plan is published later this year, according to BOEM officials. In a public meeting to discuss the draft proposed version of the document, released Jan. 4, the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, Straits of Florida and full South Atlantic planning areas appeared to remain in play (Energywire, Jan. 17).
Speculation about what waters will and will not be included in the final BOEM plan doesn't even begin to address whether companies will actually want to drill there, if given the opportunity, said Book.
"[S]hould the agency proceed with lease sales in accordance with such a plan in the current price environment, we would anticipate relatively low bids that reflect significant operator perceptions of political risk, and we would expect limited additional drilling activity," he wrote.
What follows is a breakdown of the opposition from states on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts:
North Atlantic
Aside from Maine, every state in the North Atlantic planning area has opposed the offshore program Interior floated this month.
Zinke promised to visit Rhode Island, where Gov. Gina Raimondo (D) has advocated on behalf of the entire New England region's marine ecosystem and economy. New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu (R) also opposed the plan and is planning to speak with the administration about it during his next visit to Washington, D.C., according to a spokesman.
Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker (R) was encouraged to see Interior reference his opposition in the draft report, said spokesman Brendan Moss.
"Governor Baker made clear to Secretary Zinke over six months ago that the administration opposes offshore drilling in the North Atlantic," Moss wrote in an email to E&E News.
Connecticut's administration and New York's governor raised climate concerns in their arguments.
"This is yet another disgraceful and unnecessary action from an administration that has taken us light years backward in the fight against climate change," Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy (D) said in a statement. "It stands only to hurt Connecticut's economy, our natural resources, and our coastal communities. We need a federal government that will stand up and protect our environment.
"Sadly, this president has once again put special interests before people."
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) opposed the plan but did not call for a meeting with Zinke before leaving office this week, according to press secretary Brian Murray.
"For eight years, the Governor has been steadfastly opposed to drilling off the New Jersey coast. He remains so today," Murray said in a statement. "If exceptions are being made for other states, the Governor will certainly pursue the same type of exception for New Jersey.
"He also will consult with the Attorney General on additional steps to continue his policy of protecting New Jersey's coastline."
Mid-Atlantic
New Jersey wasn't the only state to raise the specter of potential legal action.
Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh (D) has been instructed by the governor to sue the federal government if it tries to develop oil off the state's shores.
Every state in the Mid-Atlantic planning region has called for a sit-down with the Interior secretary. At least two states have gotten their wish.
Delaware Gov. John Carney (D) touted the $7 billion in economic activity and more than 60,000 jobs generated by his state's fishing, tourism and recreation industries.
"The health of Delaware's economy and environment are directly tied to the health of our coastal areas," Carney said in a Jan. 12 statement. "Delaware simply cannot accept the risks associated with offshore drilling, and we will continue to express our concerns to the Trump Administration."
In North Carolina, Gov. Roy Cooper (D) highlighted the sensitivity of the state's 22 barrier islands and millions of acres of estuaries.
"Offshore drilling poses too many risks for North Carolina and our coastal economy," Cooper said in a statement. "I look forward to the Secretary coming to visit our coast to learn firsthand the importance of tourism and commercial fishing and the damage an oil spill would cause."
South Atlantic
Offshore exploration in the South Atlantic planning area — or parts of it — could already be off the table with the Florida exemption.
South Carolina and Georgia are still staking claims for exclusions of their own.
Georgia's governor and some lawmakers and members of the congressional delegation have raised concerns about drilling off the Peach State's coast now that Florida has been granted an exemption. The Port of Savannah serves as a key economic engine for the state and elsewhere, but the town and other coastal communities are vulnerable to sea-level rise and other environmental changes.
Business and elected officials — as well as residents — in those towns want to keep them protected and preserved so they can continue to be spots for recreation and tourism.
It's unclear what Gov. Nathan Deal's (R) wishes are and whether he will seek an exemption for all or part of the state or look for another option.
"The governor has concerns in regards to opening up Georgia's pristine coastline and will convey them to our congressional delegation," spokeswoman Jen Talaber Ryan said in an email to E&E News.
California
With 840 miles of coastline, California stands just behind Florida as the state that would be most broadly affected under BOEM's draft program.
During a 20-minute phone call with Zinke, Gov. Jerry Brown (D) made his view clear: New offshore drilling in California's northern, central and southern planning areas should be a non-starter.
Brown cited "more than 30 years of agreement between the state and federal government on this issue and the economic and environmental impacts of past oil spills in California," according to a summary of the call.
California is no stranger to legal challenges over offshore oil and gas development. State officials and environmental groups have waged multiple recent battles against the use of hydraulic fracturing in the Pacific.
Though no new leasing has occurred in the Pacific since 1984, hundreds of oil and gas wells dot California's coast. Many are clustered on platforms in the Santa Barbara Channel, the site of a catastrophic 80,000-barrel oil spill in 1969.
In recent years, critics of Pacific drilling have taken aim at how the remaining development is carried out. Environmentalists in 2014 challenged the use of fracking on the existing leases, arguing that Interior has never closely studied the impacts of that technique. The agency settled the case in early 2016 by agreeing to conduct an environmental assessment focused on fracking's impacts.
But the review wasn't good enough for environmentalists or California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D), who is representing the California Coastal Commission in a new round of litigation. They say the issue merits a deeper dive — via an environmental impact statement.
California's offshore drilling critics are now poised to fight development on two fronts: challenging the use of fracking on existing leases and fighting off the Trump administration's thirst for new leasing.
Washington, Oregon
After joining California in a denouncement of Interior's offshore proposal, Washington and Oregon set to work on their own appeals.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D) asked that Oregon's "people's coast" be given the same consideration as Florida. Zinke pledged to work with the governor and promised to visit the state.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) made a similar request.
"I spoke with Secretary Zinke today and reiterated my opposition to his offshore oil drilling proposal," the governor said in a statement. "I told him the concerns of Washingtonians and West Coast residents deserve [to] be treated with the same consideration and deliberation as those in Florida.
"Secretary Zinke did not provide that commitment, unfortunately. But this fight is far from over."
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071269
-
Trump's Critics Say Legal Delay 'Unsubtle and Intolerable'
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Niina Heikkinen
State attorneys general and green groups are pressing a federal appeals court to reject the Trump administration's efforts to stall litigation over the Clean Power Plan.
In two separate court filings yesterday, coalitions of states and environmental groups urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to issue a ruling on President Obama's signature climate change rule without delay. The case has been on ice in the federal court as EPA under Trump works out how it plans to replace President Obama's signature climate rule.
EPA last week requested that the court continue delaying a ruling on the case as the agency considers its options for regulating greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. Late last year, the agency put out a notice indicating it plans to look into implementing a much more limited regulation focused on controlling facility-level or "inside-the-fence-line" emissions.
But many state attorneys general and environmentalists are arguing that the court is obligated to act now. It's an argument they've been making continually as EPA has sought to hold off on a ruling, but critics of the Trump administration say they're getting increasingly impatient as time goes by with no replacement.
In their filing, top lawyers from 17 states and a number of cities and counties called for the judges on the case to come to a decision. Attorneys for six cities and counties also signed on to the petition.
"Neither EPA's proposed repeal of the Clean Power Plan nor its prolonged and uncertain plans to replace the rule justify additional abeyance," the states wrote. EPA plans to take comments on its proposal to repeal the Clean Power Plan until late April, which "means it is unlikely that the agency will complete repeal until late 2018 at the earliest, more than two years after en banc argument in this case," they wrote.
EPA's own calendar for its deregulatory efforts set a final repeal date for October 2018, but that was announced before EPA extended its comment period. EPA also projected finalizing a replacement rule by September 2019 (Climatewire, Dec. 15, 2017).
The states said that repealing the Clean Power Plan without a replacement rule would put EPA in "violation of its statutory duty to regulate carbon dioxide from existing power plants," and they told the court that nothing in EPA's notice announcing plans for a replacement rule "suggests that EPA is planning prompt and meaningful steps to replace the Clean Power Plan."
Environmental and public health groups — including the Center for Biological Diversity, Environmental Defense Fund and Sierra Club — echoed the states' calls for movement in the case in their filing with the court.
"Having heard extensive oral arguments en banc in this expedited case 16 months ago, the Court should issue its decision in the case," they wrote.
"The present EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, seeks to exploit the stay well beyond its intended effect, pursuing a repeal of the Clean Power Plan based on the same legal arguments that the petitioners (including Mr. Pruitt himself, as Oklahoma Attorney General) made in this fully briefed case, while indefinitely fending off this Court's decision on the merits of those legal arguments," the groups added. The Supreme Court put the rule on hold in 2016, pending the lower court's decision on its legality.
The document called Pruitt's delay "unsubtle and intolerable," and noted that the case concerns "urgent, existential threats" to public health and welfare. The groups cited recent natural disasters such as 2017 hurricanes and wildfires as examples of increasing threats to life and property.
Some close observers of the D.C. Circuit are skeptical the court will come to a decision in the case at all (Climatewire, Aug. 24, 2017). But there are backers of the Clean Power Plan that are holding out hope for a ruling.
"The Court heretofore has given him only temporary abeyances, keeping open the possibility of deciding the case," David Doniger, senior strategic director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's Climate and Clean Energy program, wrote in an email. "We're asking the Court to decide the case now because of the forecast of continued delay and inaction. Or at least to keep Pruitt on the short leash of temporary abeyance. We'll see what happens."
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071229
-
Cyber Rules Needed at Grid's Edge — Report
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
A thinly woven, growing web of connected grid devices has opened doors for hackers, but it's not too late to play defense, according to a new report from the Advanced Energy Economy Institute.
Smart meters, solar panels, batteries and other energy technologies must be built with online threats in mind, the nonprofit group concluded, and grid regulators should consider new requirements.
Current standards for the bulk power system "are not sufficient for protection from cyberattack as the grid evolves toward a more distributed and intelligent" future, the nonprofit group said in a report released this morning.
A clampdown at the "loosely regulated" edges of the U.S. power grid wouldn't have to come at a cost, according to the report, which was backed by the AEE Institute's affiliated trade group and drew on contributions from more than a dozen experts in "smart" energy consulting, manufacturing and security firms.
"You hear fears around distributed energy resources — is it going to make the grid more vulnerable?" said Lisa Frantzis, senior vice president at AEE and head of its 21st Century Electricity System initiative. "We had a lot of companies participating in this work, and it was clear many felt that the solutions are not that difficult and not that costly."
The report lays out eight "no or low cost" measures that tech-savvy utilities and suppliers can adopt now, such as encrypting communications with endpoint devices, changing easy-to-crack passwords and isolating operational networks from the public internet.
Regulators should consider making these steps mandatory, the AEE Institute recommended.
"A lot of this is basic stuff, but a lot of it hasn't really been applied to the operational technology areas of the utility space," said Todd Wiedman, director of security at the Swiss smart meter developer Landis+Gyr and a contributor to the AEE Institute's report.
While Wiedman said his firm has layered security into its smart meter products and software, he said that cyber protections haven't always been applied to older, legacy devices in the field. "We're in a situation where 101-level IT security — things that we do on our computers every day, or on our mobile devices — has not really been extended to the meters yet, or to the endpoints," he said.Embracing change
Traditional IT solutions have not always carried over to distributed energy technologies, owing partly to computing constraints and partly "because the perceived value of security has been low relative to the perceived threat, up until now," the report said.
The document warns of an "increasing number of attacks designed to disrupt or destroy physical assets," from sophisticated cyberattacks on Ukraine's power grid to viral "ransomware" attacks that lock up victims' computers and hold the key hostage.
The AEE Institute cited the Mirai botnet of hacked cameras and routers as a cautionary tale for internet-connected devices. In fall 2016, an unknown hacker marshaled the Mirai botnet to flood the networks of internet service provider Dyn, cutting off access to popular sites such as Twitter and Grubhub while highlighting the fragility of modern internet infrastructure.
Grid devices need not suffer the same fate, Frantzis said. "We really believe that distributed energy resources can make the grid much more resilient and reliable," she said. "There are steps that can be taken right away, with minimal effort, to help secure the network."
Frantzis said the goal of the new report is to raise awareness of security issues and cue some critical thinking among state and federal regulators.
The North American Electric Reliability Corp., working in tandem with regulators at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, currently sets and enforces cybersecurity standards for the bulk power grid.
But those federal standards don't extend to smaller, distribution-level electricity companies, which typically face more limited state-level oversight from public utility commissions or similar bodies.
"The challenge ahead of us now is: We have to figure out where the standards or guidelines are going to be set," said Frantzis.
The report also suggests regulators and industry coordinate efforts to secure distributed energy resources.
"It's important that people are aware of the problem: that [security] is something that has to be designed into the system," said Chris King, chief policy officer for the digital grid business unit at industrial automation giant Siemens.
King, who also contributed to the AEE report, said he is optimistic about grid security despite an onslaught of threats and challenges from "smart" technologies.
"People have been attacking the grid for years, from a cyber perspective, and we have not seen any major incidents," he said. "That doesn't mean we should lower our guard — in fact, we should raise our guard, because we're getting into new areas with distributed resources."
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071259
-
Schneider Electric Describes Major Hack of Customer's Safety Systems
Jan 18, 2018 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Eric Geller
A major manufacturer of industrial control equipment revealed chilling details today about how a new kind of malware infected one of its customers’ vital safety systems.
At a security conference in Miami, Schneider Electric said the unknown developers of the “Trisis” malware used a previously unknown flaw in its safety controller’s firmware — known as a “zero-day” exploit — to take over the unidentified facility’s emergency shutdown processes. The malware also used a remote access trojan, or RAT, a more common technique.
“It’s running in the highest privilege of the machine, and that’s going to allow an attacker to interface with that RAT to do what it wants,” Paul Forney, a cybersecurity executive at Schneider Electric, said at the S4x18 conference, according to Dark Reading.
The sophisticated malware’s discovery at an unidentified energy facility in the Middle East has stumped security researchers and the U.S. and Saudi governments since its discovery, CyberScoop reported earlier this week.
Trisis has alarmed cyber experts because it is the first malware designed to take over — and thus enable hackers to sabotage — the safety systems that prevent catastrophes at power plants.
Cyber firms FireEye and Dragos first described Trisis, also known as Triton, in research published last month.
“We believe the activity is consistent with a nation state preparing for an attack,” FireEye’s research team wrote in a blog post.
https://www.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard
-
Rail Coalition Urges Trump to Appoint New STB Members
Jan 18, 2018 | American Shipper
By Mark Edward Nero
More than 70 chief executive officers of major companies and trade associations that belong to the Rail Customer Coalition, an organization representing a majority of the volumes of traffic shipped by freight rail, have signed a letter addressed to President Donald Trump, urging him to appoint new members and a Chair to the Surface Transportation Board (STB).
The board is authorized to have five members, appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, each with a five-year term of office. However, it currently stands with just two members – Acting Chair Ann Begeman and Vice Chair Deb Miller.
In its five-page letter, dated Jan. 16, the Rail Customer Coalition says that rail customers “need a fully-staffed STB committed to moving forward on freight rail policy reforms that will streamline overly burdensome regulatory procedures and promote greater competition in the rail sector.
“We must be sure that the STB is fully staffed and comprised of members that will make decisions based on current economic realities and founded on free market solutions,” the letter reads in part. “In addition, it is imperative both for railroads and for their customers to have confidence that the STB is a fair and unbiased arbiter of disputes. Therefore, we strongly discourage naming rail industry veterans to the Board, especially as Chair."
The letter was signed by top executives with dozens of major U.S. companies, including Shell Oil Company, The Dow Chemical Company and KraftHeinz Company; as well as officials with various trade associations, including the Alliance for Rail Competition, the Grocery Manufacturers Association and the National Association of Chemical Distributors.
The STB is an independent adjudicatory and economic-regulatory agency in charge of resolving railroad rate and service disputes and reviewing proposed railroad mergers.
In addition to jurisdiction over railroad rate and service issues and rail restructuring transactions, such as mergers, line sales, line construction, and line abandonments, it has authority to investigate rail service matters deemed to be of regional and national significance.
It's membership was expanded from three to five members under the Surface Board Transportation Act of 2015, but currently has just the two sitting members and no nominations.
https://www.americanshipper.com/main/news/rail-coalition-urges-trump-to-appoint-new-stb-memb-70320.aspx
-
Congressmen Press Amtrak for PTC Status Update
Jan 18, 2018 | Progressive Rail Roading
U.S. Reps. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) and Michael Capuano (D-Mass.) have asked Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer Richard Anderson for a detailed update on the railroad's safety culture and implementation of positive train control (PTC).
In a letter sent yesterday, the congressmen said they want to know what safety culture weaknesses Amtrak has identified in its organization and the specific steps it is taking to resolve them immediately. The letter was copied to labor unions that represent Amtrak employees.
"Acknowledging that Amtrak has a weak safety culture is the first step toward fixing it, but the traveling public should not have to wait for another incident to know whether Amtrak has sufficiently addressed these issues," the congressmen wrote. "Amtrak should be the safest passenger rail service provider in the world, and we hope to help you on that trajectory."
DeFazio is ranking member of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, and Capuano is ranking member of the Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials.
Their letter was issued as the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) continues its investigation of last month's Amtrak Cascades train derailment in DuPont, Washington, which killed three passengers and injured dozens of others. NTSB investigators found that the train was traveling 79 mph into a 30-mph curve. Shortly after the incident, the NTSB confirmed that it likely would not have occurred had PTC been operational on the line.
PTC must be a top priority for Amtrak, regardless of whether it owns the infrastructure or equipment, the congressmen wrote. Amtrak operates the Cascades train, but Sound Transit owns the track.
"Since the incident, it has become increasingly clear that we have no idea what the status is for PTC implementation on equipment that Amtrak does not own but operates, such as State-supported routes, like the Point Defiance Bypass, and on routes that Amtrak does not own but where Amtrak trains operate," the letter stated. "We want and need the full picture, regardless of whether Amtrak owns it. If you operate it or operate on it, we want to know the status of PTC implementation in detail."
DeFazio and Capuano asked that by Feb. 16 Anderson provide the details that Amtrak is expected to report to the Federal Railroad Administration.
Last week, DeFazio and Capuano introduced the "Positive Train Control Implementation and Financing Act" (H.R. 4766) to speed up PTC implementation.
http://www.progressiverailroading.com/safety/news/Congressmen-press-Amtrak-for-PTC-status-update--53718
-
New York, Connecticut Sue EPA Over Missing Ozone Plans
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
New York and Connecticut are suing EPA to force the agency to issue federal plans for several upwind states to curb their ozone pollution that drifts to the East Coast and hinders coastal states' ability to attain the agency's ozone national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS).
In a lawsuit filed Jan. 17 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, the states ask the court to set a hard deadline for EPA to write and issue overdue federal implementation plans (FIPs) mandating reductions in ozone-forming pollution emitted from industrial sources in Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.
The states say EPA missed an Aug. 12 Clean Air Act deadline to issue the plans, after the states failed to submit state implementation plans (SIPs) that fully mitigate their interstate emissions that contribute to problems meeting the 2008 ozone national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS), set at 75 parts per billion (ppb).
Although the Obama EPA issued FIPs to limit ozone-forming nitrogen oxides (NOx) under its Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) power plant emissions trading rule, these plans did not entirely guarantee attainment of the 2008 NAAQS, by EPA's own admission. As a result, the agency is obligated to issue EPA-crafted plans that will meet the air law's requirements, New York and Connecticut argue.
CSAPR was originally designed to help meet the older 1997 ozone NAAQS expressed as 84 ppb, then updated in 2016 by the Obama EPA to help meet the 2008 standard. EPA in the update reduced NOx caps for states -- but some East Coast states say this is not enough. Further, EPA in 2015 tightened its ozone NAAQS again to 70 ppb, but to date has not promulgated a successor program to help states meet the tougher new standard.
“The delay caused by EPA’s failure to timely promulgate FIPs has harmed and continues to harm New York and Connecticut by delaying action to address the interstate transport of air pollution from the Upwind States,” the states say in their legal filing.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman (D) in a Jan. 17 statement said “the Trump EPA continues to ignore its responsibilities under the Clean Air Act to reduce interstate smog pollution. Since the Trump EPA refuses to follow the law, we’re suing to protect the health of New Yorkers.”
New York and Connecticut are among several East Coast states pressuring EPA to take further action to reduce ozone transport through litigation.
For example, New York is one of eight states suing EPA over its decision to decline a petition to greatly expand the 12-state Ozone Transport Commission area in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic -- where stricter requirements exist for reducing ozone -- to include another nine states.
The state is further one of several suing EPA over its delay in designating “nonattainment” areas for the 2015 ozone NAAQS, with EPA now aiming to issue final designations by April 30.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/new-york-connecticut-sue-epa-over-missing-ozone-plans
-
Ewire: Pruitt Defends Industry Ties, Pledges Speedy Permits
Jan 18, 2018 | Inside EPA
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is making the rounds again with top media outlets, defending his “partnership” with industry and also pledging quick action to remake the agency in terms of providing final environmental permits.
“We should be about stewardship and we should be about partnership," Pruitt said during a Jan. 17 interview with CBS News. “We should not start from the premise that all people are [bad actors] or that all industries are that way. That is just simply wrong-headed. And it doesn't achieve good outcomes.”
And in an interview with the Wall Street Journal published Jan. 17, Pruitt said he wants final permit decisions completed within six months.
“That’s the thing that’s been so striking to me as I’ve come into this position . . . is just the lack of focus and lack of energy and lack of commitment to actually get results,” he said. “We have permits that literally are sitting on a shelf, and just sitting there because there’s just no attention, no leadership, no direction. It’s that simple.”
However, critics say the agency's aggressive push to reduce staff through buyouts and attrition runs counter to Pruitt's stated goal of grant permits more quickly or otherwise complete the agency's work.
Pruitt also highlighted his skepticism of mainstream climate change science, criticizing EPA's prior climate rules in the Journal article. “This agency for years has speculated about harm that may be happening 100 years from now as opposed to what’s right in their own backyard,” he said.
Speaking with CBS, Pruitt also addressed a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruling ordering EPA to revise an old lead paint standard after the Trump administration had sought a six-year delay to review the rule. Pruitt said that the Justice Department would be the “decider” on whether to appeal that ruling but added, “I can tell you this: It's important for this agency to get that rule and get it done.”
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/ewire-pruitt-defends-industry-ties-pledges-speedy-permits
-
National Defense Strategy Won't Address Climate
Jan 18, 2018 | E&E Greenwire
By Nick Sobczyk
The Pentagon tomorrow is slated to release the first National Defense Strategy in a decade, and much like the White House security document it draws on, climate change won't be featured.
Most of the strategy will be classified, with only a small portion open to the public. But Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told reporters last month that the NDS will not "specifically address" climate change.
"Imagine having a limitation on how many words you can write in an article," he said. "And so that's a little bit of the way the strategy works. There's only so many priorities you can have."
The NDS is generally updated once every 10 years to lay out Pentagon policy. It's also the second in a series of documents that give the Trump administration a chance to shape the Department of Defense, with the agency expected to release nuclear posture and missile defense reviews in the coming months.
The first — the National Security Strategy, which came out last month — briefly mentioned climate but did not include global warming on its list of security threats, a major departure from the Obama administration (Greenwire, Dec. 18, 2017).
The NDS is expected to draw heavily on the security strategy, which often functions as a political guideline for the more bureaucratic documents produced by the Pentagon and other federal agencies.
"Think about the National Defense Strategy as the DOD portion of the security strategy," said Shanahan. "There are many, many priorities to the department, but we had to distill them into that critical few. So it doesn't mean that [climate change is] not a priority, or that it is a priority."
It's true that the NDS is not a comprehensive document, said John Conger, who served at DOD during the Obama administration. And even though the NDS is produced only once a decade, it still reflects the prevailing view of the administration in power.
"Similar to the National Security Strategy, I would be surprised if it focused on climate as a security issue, just because of the posture of the administration," said Conger, who is now a senior policy adviser at the Center for Climate & Security. "That doesn't necessarily mean that DOD isn't going to pay attention to climate as a mission assurance priority."
In practice, the military often has no choice but to work on mitigation and resilience projects at bases threatened by flooding, drought or receding permafrost, Conger added.
The Navy, for instance, has been gradually replacing piers, infrastructure and electrical utilities to raise them above the rising tides at Naval Station Norfolk. That work will likely go on, regardless of whether climate change is mentioned in the NDS.
At the same time, some observers are concerned about the big picture.
Climate change was addressed the last time DOD produced an NDS in 2008 during the Bush administration under Defense Secretary Robert Gates.
Emerging economic and political risks "will require managing the divergent needs of massively increasing energy demand to maintain economic development and the need to tackle climate change," the Bush-era document reads.
Though President Obama's DOD never wrote an NDS, the administration consistently addressed climate change as a security risk in its planning documents and National Security Strategies.
"Obviously, we think it's important to have it in there, because you can't determine what the entire defense posture of the United States is if you don't look at what underlies security, and we think the environment plays a big part in that," said Andrew Holland, senior fellow for energy and climate at the American Security Project.Congressional contrast
The omission of climate change will likely raise some eyebrows in Congress, where lawmakers have endorsed taking on the issue at DOD in recent months.
The fiscal 2018 National Defense Authorization Act includes an amendment, first introduced by Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.), that calls climate change "a direct threat to the national security of the U.S."
The provision also requires each branch of the military to assess bases and installations that are most vulnerable to the effects of global warming and report on their efforts to mitigate those effects.
On the House floor in July, nearly 50 Republicans joined Democrats in voting down an amendment from Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) that would have stripped the provision from the bill (E&E Daily, July 14, 2017). Trump signed it into law, climate language intact, last month.
And last week, more than 100 House lawmakers signed on to a letter — led by Langevin and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) — that called leaving climate change out of December's NSS "a significant step backwards."
Langevin said the lawmakers sent a copy of the letter to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis in hopes that climate would be included in the NDS.
Unlike in agencies such as the Department of Energy and U.S. EPA, the Pentagon's climate policies are centered on the effects of a warming climate, like sea-level rise and drought, rather than the carbon emissions that cause it.
That means DOD sometimes skirts the partisan battles that surround the issue in Congress, but the majority of Republicans remain hesitant on the issue. Most voted against keeping the Langevin provision in the NDAA, and only a handful signed on to the letter last week.
Still, congressional action over the last year highlights a growing rift between lawmakers and DOD and the rest of the Trump administration on climate change.
While other federal agencies have moved to strike climate policies started during the Obama administration, Mattis and a plethora of other Pentagon nominees have acknowledged climate change as a threat to the military.
All of that makes the omission of climate from the NDS confounding, said Langevin.
"It would be perplexing, quite frankly, why it wouldn't be in there, given their views and previous statements and what we passed in the NDAA," Langevin told E&E News yesterday. "To not have climate change in the National Defense Strategy seems a bit counterintuitive."'Foot off the accelerator'
Even without climate in the NDS, the Pentagon is poised to continue preparing for a warmer future.
DOD has quietly decided to keep climate resilience policies started in the Obama administration intact, despite an executive order from President Trump in March requiring agencies to review and revise their climate policies (Greenwire, Nov. 16, 2017).
"We've reviewed our policy, and with some minor changes, we are going to in fact keep the policy," Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Environment, Safety and Occupational Health Maureen Sullivan said in November. "This is a risk. The Department of Defense has to take a long-term view."
Leaving climate change out of the NDS doesn't preclude the Pentagon addressing climate resilience in other planning documents and at the individual service branches, Conger said.
"In my mind, it is closer to taking your foot off the accelerator than putting it onto the brake," Conger said. "Taking your foot off the accelerator is still important, but it would be more concerning if somebody put their foot on the brake."
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2018/01/18/stories/1060071317
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation and Infrastructure News
Environment News
Add recipients
Suggested