Preview Newsletter
AM ACC 6/4/2018
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(ACC Mentioned) US Economic Expansion Set to Become Longest in History - ACC
Jun 5, 2018 | ICIS
By Joseph Chang
The US economic expansion is poised to continue through 2019, becoming the longest in recorded history, the chief economist of the American Chemistry Council (ACC) said on Monday. -
(ACC Mentioned) US Trade Wars Would Be a Big Blow to Chemical Investment - CEOs
Jun 5, 2018 | ICIS
By Joseph Chang
Escalating trade tensions between the US and its main trading partners are causing concern and ratcheting up risk. If actual trade wars break out, investment in the US chemical industry would take a big hit, company CEOs said on Tuesday. -
(ACC Mentioned) Howland Capital Management Upped Its Cimarex Energy Co (XEC) Position; Norfolk Southern (NSC)’s Sentiment Is 0.75
Jun 5, 2018 | Norman Weekly
By Clifton Ray
Howland Capital Management Llc increased Cimarex Energy Co (XEC) stake by 35.15% reported in 2018Q1 SEC filing. -
With GOP Wary of Defying Trump, Kochs Step into Tariff Fight
Jun 6, 2018 |
The political network affiliated with the billionaire Koch brothers is launching an effort to shore up support for free-trade policies, as congressional Republicans and business interests are growing increasingly uneasy over the direction of the Trump administration's trade agenda. -
‘We Got Lazy’: U.S. Recyclers Try Cleaning Up Their Scrap
Jun 6, 2018 | Wall Street Journal
By Bob Tita
American trash haulers and recyclers are becoming more prudent about how they collect and sort scrap after China stopped accepting most U.S. scrap exports earlier this year. -
The Fight for Paper Straws Is Getting Fierce in New York Bars
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Kate Krader and Chris Rovzar
Last week, Bon Appetit Management Co., a food service company with more than 1,000 locations across the country from ball parks to museums, announced that it would phase out the eco-unfriendly straws, effective immediately. -
EPA Accuses ‘Fixer Upper’ Stars of Violating Lead Paint Rules
Jun 5, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The stars of the hit HGTV renovation show “Fixer Upper” violated federal regulations for mishandling lead-based paint, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said. -
Dow, Shell Sued Over Water Contamination in Central California
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pamela MacLean
A Bakersfield school district and a water company accused Dow Chemical Co., Shell Oil Co. and six other firms of polluting water supplies in central California with highly toxic TCP, a byproduct of soil fumigant pesticides. -
EU Takes Second Look at Phthalates Rule for Medical Products
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Stephen Gardner
Johnson & Johnson Inc., BD Co., and other medical product manufacturers are among the companies that could be affected by revisions to European Union exemptions that allow them to use banned phthalates. -
EU Commission: Exempted Uses of Phthalates ‘May Require Authorisation’
Jun 6, 2018 | Chemical Watch
The European Commission is preparing to amend the REACH authorisation list entries of four phthalates, following their identification as SVHCs due to endocrine disrupting effects on humans and the environment. -
Bipartisan Bill Would Make Mid-Atlantic Off-Limits
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Jennifer Yachnin
A bipartisan pair of House lawmakers will attempt to block new offshore activity along the Mid-Atlantic coast, a rejection of the Interior Department's draft plan to open more than 90 percent of federal waters to potential oil and gas drilling. -
Federal Groups Push BOEM to Dial Back Arctic Leasing Plans
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
NOAA Fisheries, the federal Marine Mammal Commission and an Alaska whaling group are urging the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to scale back its plans to sell oil and gas leases next year in the Arctic's Beaufort Sea. -
Motions Denied to Stay, Dismiss Appeal of Natural Gas Venting/Flaring Rule
Jun 5, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Legal wrangling over an Obama-era rule governing associated natural gas flaring and venting on public and tribal lands will continue, for now, after a divided federal appeals court denied two motions by the rule's supporters for a stay, and two motions by its opponents for a dismissal. -
Cove Point LNG Facility in U.S. Set for Planned Outage in Autumn
Jun 6, 2018 | Reuters
By Osamu Tsukimori
Dominion Energy Inc’s Cove Point liquefied natural gas production facility in the eastern United States will undergo a brief maintenance shutdown in the autumn, the company’s top executive said on Wednesday. -
Some Pennsylvania Shale Regs Still on Hold After State Supreme Court Ruling
Jun 5, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Jamison Cocklin
The Marcellus Shale Coalition’s (MSC) lawsuit against Pennsylvania’s regulatory overhaul for unconventional natural gas producers will advance with most of the rules that the industry challenged still on hold after the state Supreme Court last week affirmed an order issued more than a year ago to stay some of them. -
DNR: Wisconsin Frack Sand Sludge Spill Nontoxic
Jun 5, 2018 | AP (In The Washington Post)
Wisconsin officials say early tests have found no harmful chemicals after a spill near a frack sand mine sent millions of gallons of sludge into waterways. -
Grid's Cyber Watchdog Wants Round-The-Clock Staffing
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
Grid officials at the North American Electric Reliability Corp. want a cyberthreat information-sharing hub to stay open 24 hours a day amid mounting risks for U.S. utilities, according to a draft business plan. -
Bennet Floats Grid, CCS Bills
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Christa Marshall
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) introduced multiple bills yesterday to finance grid, energy storage and carbon capture projects with billions of dollars from the Department of Agriculture. -
Chemical, Coal Companies Ramp Up Lobbying on Water Projects Bill
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jorge Uquillas
Water resources legislation could be one of the last opportunities to fund infrastructure projects during the 115th Congress. -
(ACC Mentioned) Epa, Industry Groups Oppose D.C. Circuit Rehearing of Boiler MACT Ruling
Jun 5, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA and industry groups are urging a federal appeals court to reject environmentalists' petition for rehearing of a ruling that partially upheld the agency's maximum achievable control technology (MACT) rule for industrial, commercial and institutional boilers... -
U.S. Withdrawal From Paris Deal Doesn’t Change Climate for G-7
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By James Munson
World leaders don’t need U.S. support on climate change to pursue the aims of the Paris agreement, Canada’s environment minister said ahead of this week’s meeting of the major industrial nations in Quebec. -
Don’t Laugh, We’re Closer to a Bipartisan Solution on Climate Change Than You Realize
Jun 6, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Mark Reynolds
Ask a typical person concerned about global warming if they think Congress will enact a bipartisan solution to climate change, and the response is likely to be a derisive laugh. -
House Republicans Attack Environmental Group over Its Climate Work in China
Jun 5, 2018 | Washington Post
By Steven Mufson and Chris Mooney
The chairman and a senior member of the House Natural Resources Committee have written a letter to the Natural Resources Defense Council suggesting that the environmental organization register as a foreign agent because of its climate and environment activities in China... -
Shell to Pay EPA for Air, Water, Waste Violations in California
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
A Shell Oil Co. subsidiary will pay more than $400,000 for penalties, emergency response equipment, and facility improvements to resolve multiple violations at a California refinery.
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation and Infrastructure News
Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) US Economic Expansion Set to Become Longest in History - ACC
Jun 5, 2018 | ICIS
By Joseph Chang
The US economic expansion is poised to continue through 2019, becoming the longest in recorded history, the chief economist of the American Chemistry Council (ACC) said on Monday.
“The risks for a recession are low. We’re in the 8th inning of a baseball game which doesn’t necessarily end in the 9th inning,” said Kevin Swift, chief economist of the ACC, in a press briefing at the trade group’s annual meeting.
“Another year at the end of June 2019 it will be the longest expansion in history, and all signs point to it happening,” he added.
The ACC’s Chemical Activity Barometer (CAB), which is a leading indicator for the US economy, and a number of other leading indicators all point to continuing expansion, the economist said.
The biggest risk is US tariff announcements leading to a full blown trade war, he noted.
“Everyone wants to know: Where are we in the cycle? But there wasn’t a lot of investment [in the chemical industry] in the last 15 years [until recently],” said Mark Vergnano, president and CEO of Chemours.
“Many of us are now seeing high demand and limited capacity – we’re sort of hitting a wall in terms of supply and demand, and need to invest more. That should be positive,” he added.
And Polymers demand in particular is outpacing global economic growth, noted the ACC’s Swift.
“Mature industries tend to lag GDP which is around 2.5-3%, but plastic resins and rubberare growing at 5-7%. That’s a growth industry by any definition,” said Swift.
https://www.icis.com/resources/news/2018/06/05/10228290/us-economic-expansion-set-to-become-longest-in-history-acc/
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(ACC Mentioned) US Trade Wars Would Be a Big Blow to Chemical Investment - CEOs
Jun 5, 2018 | ICIS
By Joseph Chang
Escalating trade tensions between the US and its main trading partners are causing concern and ratcheting up risk. If actual trade wars break out, investment in the US chemical industry would take a big hit, company CEOs said on Tuesday.
“In the near term, demand is fixed and will be met somehow. We could see a shift in US and global trade patterns. But long term, this has implications on investment and where that will be made,” said Bob Patel, chairman and CEO of LyondellBasell, at the American Chemistry Council (ACC) press briefing during the trade group’s annual meeting.
“Unfavourable trade outcomes and tariffs erode our feedstock advantage. We are more concerned about the long-term implications. When you build a plant, it’s a 50-60 year investment – you can’t reverse that,” he added.
Since the US shale gas boom, 325 new chemical projects valued at over $194bn have been announced through late May 2018, with 63% of them representing foreign direct investment or including a foreign partner, according to the ACC.
“We are very concerned with the US administration’s actions to date. The new investment is not coming in for the domestic market but to build a platform to serve global markets,” said Cal Dooley, president and CEO of the ACC.
In large part because of the big investments in US chemical projects, the ACC expects the US trade surplus in industrial chemicals to surge from around $33bn in 2017 to $72bn by 2023, Dooley noted.
“We are concerned with the unilateral approach to dealing with trade deficits in parts of the economy. If we are not collaborating with our allies, this exposes our industry and other sectors to retaliation,” said Dooley.
“Retaliation is always targeted to sectors that have a global competitive advantage,” he added, noting that chemicals comprised about 40% of the US products China has targeted for retaliatory tariffs.
“In the short term, we’ll work through [the potential tariffs]. Long term, there would be a huge impact on US investment, as this is meant to serve growth in the world,” said Mark Vergnano, president and CEO of Chemours.
If the US can avoid a trade war, the US chemical industry is “incredibly poised” for growth through the next decade, riding the wave of tax reform, he said.
“The tax law changes give us the ability to put capital in the ground and depreciate the cash side quickly. This is a huge incentive to invest. And more of the cash generated can be funneled to R&D [research and development],” said Vergnano.
“As you look at the US chemical industry, there is a decade of high growth ahead of us. We just have to do it sustainably,” he added.
Vergnano sees Chemours’ Opteon next generation class of refrigerants as a “blockbuster product that will generate billions of dollars in revenue in the next several years” as it “drives down global warming potential in the world”.
https://www.icis.com/resources/news/2018/06/05/10228286/us-trade-wars-would-be-a-big-blow-to-chemical-investment-ceos/
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Jun 5, 2018 | Norman Weekly
By Clifton Ray
Howland Capital Management Llc increased Cimarex Energy Co (XEC) stake by 35.15% reported in 2018Q1 SEC filing. Howland Capital Management Llc acquired 30,012 shares as Cimarex Energy Co (XEC)’s stock declined 6.37%. The Howland Capital Management Llc holds 115,384 shares with $10.79 million value, up from 85,372 last quarter. Cimarex Energy Co now has $8.10 billion valuation. The stock decreased 0.53% or $0.455 during the last trading session, reaching $84.845. About 1.58 million shares traded or 12.53% up from the average. Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) has declined 17.03% since June 5, 2017 and is downtrending. It has underperformed by 29.60% the S&P500. Some Historical XEC News: ; 08/05/2018 – CIMAREX 1Q ADJ EPS $1.82, EST. $1.75; 08/05/2018 – Cimarex 1Q Adj EPS $1.82; 24/05/2018 – CALLON UNIT TO BUY ACREAGE FOR $570M FROM CIMAREX ENERGY; 19/04/2018 – DJ Cimarex Energy Co, Inst Holders, 1Q 2018 (XEC); 08/05/2018 – Cimarex Conference Set By Tudor Pickering & Co for May. 15-16; 24/05/2018 – CIMAREX TO SELL WARD COUNTY ASSETS FOR $570M; 30/04/2018 – Williston Basin Adds WPX Energy, Exits Cimarex; 24/05/2018 – CALLON PETROLEUM – CO INTENDS TO FUND CASH PURCHASE PRICE WITH PROCEEDS OF EQUITY OFFERING, CASH ON HAND AND/OR INCURRENCE OF LONG-TERM INDEBTEDNESS; 16/05/2018 – Cimarex at Bernstein Strategic Decisions CEO Conference May 31; 08/05/2018 – Cimarex 1Q EPS $1.96
Norfolk Southern Corp (NSC) investors sentiment decreased to 0.75 in Q1 2018. It’s down -0.08, from 0.83 in 2017Q4. The ratio dropped, as 322 funds increased or started new positions, while 428 decreased and sold stakes in Norfolk Southern Corp. The funds in our database now possess: 198.67 million shares, up from 197.25 million shares in 2017Q4. Also, the number of funds holding Norfolk Southern Corp in top ten positions was flat from 16 to 16 for the same number . Sold All: 53 Reduced: 375 Increased: 228 New Position: 94.
Another recent and important Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) news was published by Gurufocus.com which published an article titled: “US Markets Green Monday” on June 04, 2018.
Among 35 analysts covering Cimarex Energy (NYSE:XEC), 23 have Buy rating, 0 Sell and 12 Hold. Therefore 66% are positive. Cimarex Energy had 146 analyst reports since July 21, 2015 according to SRatingsIntel. The firm earned “Neutral” rating on Wednesday, June 7 by Piper Jaffray. Susquehanna maintained the stock with “Hold” rating in Thursday, April 19 report. As per Tuesday, February 13, the company rating was maintained by Robert W. Baird. The company was initiated on Tuesday, December 19 by Robert W. Baird. The rating was maintained by Jefferies on Monday, August 14 with “Hold”. Jefferies maintained the stock with “Hold” rating in Wednesday, December 20 report. On Tuesday, February 6 the stock rating was upgraded by SunTrust to “Buy”. Topeka Capital Markets maintained Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) rating on Tuesday, October 6. Topeka Capital Markets has “Hold” rating and $115 target. The rating was upgraded by JP Morgan on Thursday, December 8 to “Overweight”. The rating was maintained by Topeka Capital Markets with “Hold” on Wednesday, November 4.
Investors sentiment decreased to 1.2 in 2018 Q1. Its down 0.01, from 1.21 in 2017Q4. It dropped, as 44 investors sold XEC shares while 122 reduced holdings. 52 funds opened positions while 148 raised stakes. 88.51 million shares or 3.41% more from 85.60 million shares in 2017Q4 were reported. Rothschild Partners, a Maryland-based fund reported 32,005 shares. Bnp Paribas Asset Management Holdings reported 130,908 shares. 1.17M were reported by Van Eck Associate Corp. Principal Financial holds 0.16% or 1.74 million shares. Dnb Asset Mgmt As invested in 0% or 15,859 shares. Morgan Stanley holds 0.01% or 386,120 shares in its portfolio. Victory Capital Management Inc has 0.36% invested in Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC). Ftb Advsrs holds 0% or 151 shares in its portfolio. New Mexico Educational Retirement Board invested in 0.03% or 9,100 shares. Moreover, Ent Financial Services Corporation has 0% invested in Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) for 23 shares. Two Sigma Securities Ltd holds 4,044 shares. Vr Advisory Services holds 6,200 shares or 0.3% of its portfolio. Greenleaf Tru stated it has 0% of its portfolio in Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC). Clarivest Asset owns 4 shares. Cypress Asset Management Inc Tx has invested 0.09% of its portfolio in Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC).
Howland Capital Management Llc decreased Idexx Labs Inc (NASDAQ:IDXX) stake by 3,243 shares to 188,016 valued at $35.98M in 2018Q1. It also reduced Vanguard Bd Index Fd Inc (BSV) stake by 6,432 shares and now owns 141,894 shares. Aspen Technology Inc (NASDAQ:AZPN) was reduced too.
Since December 12, 2017, it had 0 insider purchases, and 8 insider sales for $3.41 million activity. Lambuth John also sold $1.48 million worth of Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) on Wednesday, December 13. $113,750 worth of stock was sold by ALBI JOSEPH R on Tuesday, December 12. The insider JORDEN THOMAS E sold $250,000. $250,763 worth of Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) was sold by Johnson Krista L. Barron Francis Brian sold 3,000 shares worth $337,769. On Wednesday, February 28 LOGAN HAROLD R JR sold $185,853 worth of Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE:XEC) or 1,900 shares.
Analysts await Norfolk Southern Corporation (NYSE:NSC) to report earnings on July, 25. They expect $2.24 EPS, up 30.99% or $0.53 from last year’s $1.71 per share. NSC’s profit will be $632.89M for 16.84 P/E if the $2.24 EPS becomes a reality. After $1.93 actual EPS reported by Norfolk Southern Corporation for the previous quarter, Wall Street now forecasts 16.06% EPS growth.
Since January 1, 0001, it had 0 buys, and 8 selling transactions for $4.08 million activity.
The stock decreased 0.60% or $0.91 during the last trading session, reaching $150.85. About 892,902 shares traded. Norfolk Southern Corporation (NSC) has risen 27.76% since June 5, 2017 and is uptrending. It has outperformed by 15.19% the S&P500. Some Historical NSC News: ; 24/05/2018 – Norfolk Southern and New York State usher in a modern era for freight rail with dedication of new railroad bridge – the Genesee Arch Bridge; 25/04/2018 – Higher volumes, lower tax rate lifts Norfolk Southern quarterly profit; 27/04/2018 – Norfolk Southern Uses Analytics to Keep Trains on Track; 30/04/2018 – Norfolk Southern receives American Chemistry Council award as industry-leading partner in responsible chemical transport; 26/04/2018 – NORFOLK SOUTHERN CORP NSC.N : DEUTSCHE BANK RAISES TARGET PRICE TO $151 FROM $146; 25/04/2018 – NORFOLK SOUTHERN 1Q RAILWAY OPER REV $2.7B, EST. $2.68B; 24/04/2018 – Norfolk Southern declares quarterly dividend; 05/04/2018 – DOT STB: Case Title: NORFOLK SOUTHERN RAILWAY COMPANY–ABANDONMENT EXEMPTION– IN PRINCE EDWARD COUNTY, VA; 09/05/2018 – Norfolk Southern partners with Plug and Play to drive innovation in supply chain logistics; 09/05/2018 – NORFOLK SOUTHERN ANNOUNCES PARTNERSHIP WITH PLUG AND PLAY
Norfolk Southern Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the rail transportation of raw materials, intermediate products, and finished goods in the United States. The company has market cap of $42.62 billion. It also transports overseas freight through various Atlantic and Gulf Coast ports. It has a 8.11 P/E ratio. In addition, the firm is involved in the operation of scheduled passenger trains; leasing or sale of rail property and equipment; development of commercial real estate; telecommunications; and the acquisition, leasing, and management of coal, oil, gas, and minerals, as well as the transport of automotive and industrial products.
Another recent and important Norfolk Southern Corporation (NYSE:NSC) news was published by Seekingalpha.comwhich published an article titled: “Is Norfolk Southern’s Q1 Performance Sustainable?” on May 14, 2018.
https://normanweekly.com/howland-capital-management-upped-its-cimarex-energy-co-xec-position-norfolk-southern-nscs-sentiment-is-0-75/
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With GOP Wary of Defying Trump, Kochs Step into Tariff Fight
Jun 6, 2018 |
The political network affiliated with the billionaire Koch brothers is launching an effort to shore up support for free-trade policies, as congressional Republicans and business interests are growing increasingly uneasy over the direction of the Trump administration's trade agenda.
The groups, which include the Freedom Partners Chamber of Commerce, Americans for Prosperity and the LIBRE Initiative, announced plans yesterday for a multiyear, multimillion-dollar campaign "to champion the far-reaching benefits of trade and oppose tariffs and other barriers."
"This campaign makes a clear statement," Freedom Partners Executive Vice President James Davis said in a statement. "Trade is a major priority for our network.
"We will work aggressively to educate policymakers and others about the facts," he said. "Trade lifts people out of poverty and improves lives. It is critical to America's future prosperity and our consumers, workers and companies."
A position paper by the groups talks up the benefits of trade while calling on President Trump to scrap an assortment of tariffs recently imposed or under consideration.
The effort comes amid growing fears among companies and Republican lawmakers over the administration's hard-line positions in ongoing simultaneous trade negotiations with multiple regions on trade, including China, Mexico, Canada and the European Union.
While free trade has long been a central tenet of the Grand Old Party, the president has moved aggressively to reorient U.S. trade policies to the "America First" philosophy he espoused on the campaign trail.
Yesterday, high-profile talks with China intended to halt a possible trade war ended without an agreement. Over the weekend, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described Trump's attitude toward trade with his country as "insulting."
GOP lawmakers have registered their opposition to Trump's flirtation with broad tariffs, as well as the administration's hard-line positions in talks to rewrite the North American Free Trade Agreement.
But so far they have largely held back from threatening legislative action to limit the president's ability to unilaterally set trade policy.
Instead, senior Republicans have vowed to continue working with the administration to soften the impact of trade policies they normally would oppose (E&E Daily, March 14).
GOP wary of challenging Trump
Both House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) signaled last week they would continue to try to influence, rather than confront, the administration after Trump shocked the world by allowing steel and aluminum tariffs to take effect against imported products from Canada, Mexico and the European Union — all long-standing U.S. allies (E&E News PM, May 31).
"There are better ways to help American workers and consumers," Ryan responded in a statement. "I intend to keep working with the president on those better options."
Hatch, who likened the tariffs to "tax hikes," responded that he will "continue to push the administration to change course" despite "mounting evidence that these tariffs will harm Americans."
Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) told reporters yesterday he was surprised by Trump's decision to apply the tariffs to U.S. allies.
"I kind of was because I thought we'd been having a good conversation back and forth," Cornyn said. He described the tariffs as an "unguided missile" that can spark retaliatory tariffs across multiple sectors.
Yet Cornyn also urged continued outreach to the administration.
"I know the president's getting different advice based on different views in the White House itself, and I would hate this great booming economy as a result of the policies of this administration be squandered by a trade war," he said.
Normally, trade-loving Republicans have had mixed success with the approach. The administration initially scaled back the steel and aluminum tariffs, only to lift earlier exemptions for allies (Greenwire, March 28).
Energy angle
That decision continues to rankle energy interests.
"Steel tariffs in our view are unjust," Greg Armstrong, CEO of Plains All American Pipeline LP and chairman of the National Petroleum Council, said in remarks at the U.S. Energy Information Administration conference in Washington, D.C., yesterday. "A lot of the steel pipe we're buying right now is not made in the U.S."
But with the risks of a trade war escalating on several fronts, there's new signs that congressional Republicans may be willing to insert themselves into the fight.
Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who is retiring and has had several high-profile public clashes with the president, took to Twitter over the weekend to criticize recent administration moves.
"These two stories feel like something I could have read in a local Caracas newspaper last week, not in America. Venezuela, here WE come!" Corker wrote, referencing stories on Trump's decision on steel tariffs and his order that aims to prop up coal and nuclear plants.
In a later tweet, Corker announced that he was "working with like-minded Republican senators on ways to push back on the president using authorities in ways never intended and that are damaging to our country and our allies. Will Democrats join us?"
Legislation
A Corker spokeswoman said yesterday the senators were working on legislation "that would address the administration's recent actions to intervene in markets by abusing the president's national security authorities."
However, similar legislative pushback, S. 2538, to the steel tariffs by Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) — who like Corker is also retiring — has barely registered on Capitol Hill, gaining just one co-sponsor since its introduction in March.
Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who served as U.S. trade representative during the George W. Bush administration, noted at the time that finding agreement among 60 senators on trade policy made such legislative gambits an uphill fight.
However, the Koch brothers' campaign could help shore up congressional resolve on tariffs and other policies related to trade.
In addition to calling for Trump to permanently lift the steel, aluminum and solar barriers, and scrapping similar tariffs aimed at China, the groups' policy paper urges Congress to hew to traditional free-trade principles by abolishing agricultural quotas, commodity subsidies, the Export-Import Bank and the Jones Act, which imposes requirements on goods shipped by vessels within the United States.
Cornyn left the door open to Corker's forthcoming legislation. "I look forward to seeing what he's working on," he said.
Reporters Sam Mintz and George Cahlink contributed.
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/06/05/stories/1060083455
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‘We Got Lazy’: U.S. Recyclers Try Cleaning Up Their Scrap
Jun 6, 2018 | Wall Street Journal
By Bob Tita
American trash haulers and recyclers are becoming more prudent about how they collect and sort scrap after China stopped accepting most U.S. scrap exports earlier this year.
The move has upended the U.S. recycling industry: Prices for recyclables are plunging, a glut of paper and plastic is accumulating in warehouses and some material is being sent to landfills.
As a result, some recyclers have focused on producing cleaner loads of paper, plastic and corrugated cardboard, which can fetch higher prices. And cities and trash haulers are seeking alternative ways to manage such waste, while an abundance of hard-to-recycle plastics has revived some companies’ use of the stuff to produce fuel.
“We got lazy,” said Robert Render, commercial manager for Orlando, Fla.-based Ravago Recycling Group. “That mentality has to change.”
Residential recyclables are typically harvested in single pick-ups and separated at processing centers. The practice can lead to contamination during collection and sorting, especially for paper—something recyclers are trying to reduce.
Oakland, N.J., in February began collecting paper and cardboard one week and plastic, cans and other materials the next. Now the town is earning $10 a ton for its cleaner loads of paper and paying $3.50 a ton to have other mixed recyclables sorted. The strategy reduced Oakland’s recycling costs from the $30 a ton it had been paying to a processing company before changing its collection system.
“It took a little while for people to get used to it,” Oakland’s recycling coordinator Eugene MacMahon said of the dual-sort system. “The garbage men had to leave a lot of stuff on the curb.”
China, the biggest customer of U.S. scrap material, for years accepted loads of recyclables with as much as a fifth spoiled or trash. China’s willingness to buy low-quality scrap provided little incentive for U.S. processors and collectors to weed out trash and other contaminants from the recyclable paper, plastic and cans.
Now, China is rejecting shipments with contaminants above 0.5%, a level that most U.S. recyclers have difficulty meeting with conventional recycling and sorting methods. A month-long moratorium has been lifted, but other issues with inspections are effectively keeping U.S. recyclable shipments from leaving for Chinese shores.
Some processors are trying to win back Chinese buyers or attract new customers with cleaner, segregated loads of paper and plastic that can fetch higher prices.
Cal-Waste Recovery Systems, near Sacramento, is processing 30% less scrap each hour to give its machinery and workers more time to separate paper and catch contaminants. At the lower speed, the company can separate newsprint and office paper that is fetching $70 a ton overseas from less-valuable paper such as magazines and catalogs. But about 35% of the paper the company collects is being diverted to residual piles that have no value in the current market for recycled paper. The company is paying paper processors as much as $16 a ton to have it hauled away.
“We’re not necessarily finding homes for everything like we did before,” Cal-Waste President Dave Vaccarezza said.
Allan Co., a trash hauler and recycler near Los Angeles, slowed its sorting equipment by 20% and hired more people to manually pick waste from conveyor lines. Chief Executive Jason Young said the process produces cleaner loads of cardboard that can be sold to China, albeit at a greater expense. Mixed paper isn’t profitable to sort meticulously, he said.
Processors also are looking for new buyers for mixed plastic, an amalgam of discarded packaging of different plastic grades that is difficult to recycle and often contaminated with food waste. China ended up disposing of much of the mixed plastic it used to accept, prompting officials there to ban its import.
Some companies see an opportunity in converting mixed plastics, which they can buy cheaply or get at no cost, into diesel, gasoline and industrial chemicals in airless reactors. Nina Bellucci Butler, chief executive of recycling consultancy More Recycling in North Carolina, said converting plastic to oil is profitable again, with oil prices around $70 a barrel.
The market glut is providing a windfall of mixed plastic for Renewlogy, a Salt Lake City company that converts scrap plastic to diesel and petrochemicals by melting it in reactors without air, said founder Priyanka Bakaya. Lower production costs from continuous operations, coupled with growing production volumes, mean that a $5-million Renewlogy reactor can make money even if oil prices fall as low as $30 a barrel, Ms. Bakaya said. She wants to build dozens of reactors in coming years near recyclable-processing centers with abundant supplies of low-value mixed plastic.
Ohio-based RES Polyflow LLC expects to convert 100,000 tons of mixed plastic annually into 16 million gallons of diesel and naphtha—a petrochemical used to make new plastic—at a plant opening next year in Ashley, Ind. Oil company BP PLC in March agreed to buy products from the plant.
“We see ourselves as a new market for the recycling industry,” said Michael Dungan, RES Polyflow’s director of sales and marketing.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/we-got-lazy-u-s-recyclers-try-cleaning-up-their-scrap-1528286401?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=1
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The Fight for Paper Straws Is Getting Fierce in New York Bars
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Kate Krader and Chris Rovzar
Last week, Bon Appetit Management Co., a food service company with more than 1,000 locations across the country from ball parks to museums, announced that it would phase out the eco-unfriendly straws, effective immediately.
(Bon Appetit bought 16.8 million straws for the fiscal year that ended August 2017, according to USA Today.)
The week before, Alaska Airlines said that it was banning plastic ones, following an initiative by a Girl Scout. (The airline used 22 million of them in 2017.)
Cities like Vancouver have banned them; so have Scotland and Taiwan. There are proposed bans for all of the U.K., the state of Hawaii, and New York City. Manufacturers of plastic straws, dreading the economic impact, have responded that the problem is not the straws but their disposal. “The problem is waste collection and the lack of recycling,” Caroline Wiggins, chief executive officer of U.K.-based Plastico told Money.
Before you can say the words “plastic straw,” another major company will have ditched them.
It’s hard to combat the apocalyptic sound bites, including an estimate that, by 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish, according to a 2016 report from the World Economic Forum.
Some people date the start of the movement to the 2015 YouTube video of a turtle whose head was impaled by a plastic straw, which has accumulated more than 25 million views. Others credit the 2017 “Strawless in Seattle” campaign with empowering major cities to take action. The unnerving visuals of polluted beaches, as well as such figures as the 5 million plastic straws Americans use and discard each day, piled up in the public eye.
Tiki Drinks Demand Straws
Now those plastic straws are being dumped so speedily that eco-friendly replacements have grown hard to come by.
Bans are already affecting top New York cocktail spots. One of the city’s splashiest new drinking establishments is the Polynesian, from the Major Food Group that’s better known for such restaurants as the Grill, the Pool, and Carbone.
Since the bar’s menu features colorful, ambitious drinks like the rum-infused Exotica Bowl, served in a giant clam shell, the staff faced an unexpected challenge. “Straws have been the hardest task at the Polynesian,” says General Manager Emily Collins. She nixed plastic straws because of the environmental impact. “Have you seen the turtle video?” she asks.
But when the team attempted to source custom-made paper replacements, the ones Collins wanted were already back -ordered for three months.
Tiki drinks almost require straws—the cocktails tend to come in large, unwieldy cups that are otherwise challenging to drink from. If they’re frozen or covered in crushed ice, a bare mouth is just not a good approach. Because she couldn’t get paper straws in time, Collins went with a version fabricated from cornstarch, one of myriad eco-friendly options out there, including bamboo, metal, glass, and hay.
She doesn’t see the shortage ending soon. “With all the requests for non-plastic straws right now, it will constantly be an issue to support the demand,” she says.
Another new bar eschewing plastic straws is the 18th Room. It highlights a “no impact” cocktail program; spent citrus rinds, for instance, are later incorporated into shrub drinks. Co-owner Dave Oz sources gold-plated stainless steel straws that match the bar’s art deco-style interior. He estimates they cost up to $2 each.
But Oz sees them as cost effective: The hundreds he requires each night can largely be re-used after thorough washing by hand. “It’s more of an upfront cost, since the metal straws are more expensive—but it saves money in the long run, since you don’t need to resupply so often,” he says.
The Paper-Straw Test
One of the relatively early adopters to the plastic straw movement is Porchlight, the Southern-inspired bar in Hudson Yards, from the Union Square Hospitality Group. Director Mark Maynard-Parisi was inspired by Trash Tiki, a no-waste drinks movement that stages pop-ups around the world, mixing cocktails with such products as cordials distilled with discarded watermelon rinds.
“I realized we were giving out straws, even for short drinks served on the rocks,” says Maynard-Parisi. In the second half of 2017, Porchlight introduced a “straws on request” program, driving demand down 95 percent.
Porchlight also began testing paper straws. “We got 20 different samples, put them in water glasses and let them sit,” Maynard-Parisi explains. Disintegrating papers straws are a common complaint about the eco-friendly trend. “The one that lasted the longest—which was by far the most expensive—was Aardvark,” he adds.
Maynard-Parisi estimates that plastic straws cost about half a penny, corn-based cost 2 cents, and paper straws cost around 4 cents. “Because of straws on demand, our straw usage has decreased so dramatically, we can absorb the cost,” he says. But he notes the impact of that price differential on a bigger company. “If you have to pay 3 cents for a straw and you’re Starbucks, that adds up each day.”
The Three-Month WaitWhen James Murphy, director of purchasing for Union Square Hospitality Group, reached out to Aardvark, a unit of Precision Products Group Inc., he was told of a three-month wait.
The email response also contained an automated signature: “These are very exciting times at Aardvark as our products are in very high demand from all over the world. During this period of extreme growth, our lead times to ship have increased as follows: 11 or fewer cases 2-3+ weeks and for 12 or more cases 10-12 weeks. We thank you for your understanding and advanced planning as we go through these ‘growing pains.’ New capacity is being added as quickly as possible and we hope to return to shorter lead times in the coming months.”
Danny Meyer, USHG’s CEO, might have added to the frenzy for alternative straws in mid-May when he tweeted: “One small step. Planning to roll out biodegradable straws for all of @USHGNY restaurants in next weeks.”
Meyer hasn’t tried different straws for his company’s disparate restaurants (“I delegate,” he says), but he knows that when he does, it isn’t going to save the company money. “My team has been asking me to do this, and you want to express that you hear them.” Meyer says he is “pushing and pushing” Shake Shack to change from plastic straws, which would represent an exponentially higher volume than the roughly 1 million straws USHG goes through annually.
“I can’t even give you a good reason why they haven’t changed it yet, except inventory and perhaps the milkshake question,” adds Meyer, who founded the publicly traded company.
Another popular U.S.-based paper straw supplier is Imperial Dade, which supplies 40,000 customers. “We have seen 100 percent increase in demand for paper straws in the last quarter,” says Laura Craven, director of communications for the company. “We are on a two-month wait list as a distributor. Demand is far outpacing supply.”
Craven expects demand to skyrocket as more cities pass legislation. Its paper straws cost five times the price of similarly sized plastic straws. She sees the major drivers of the trend as cities in coastal areas and the cruise industry.
The Coffee ConnectionAn even bigger consumer of plastic straws is the coffee industry. (It’s estimated that Starbucks Corp. goes through 2 billion plastic straws each year.) New York-based Joe’s coffee, which has 19 branches, announced to Bloomberg that it will switch to PLA—bio-plastic, 100 percent compostable—straws this year; it uses more than 1 million annually.
“The cost to us will be four times higher—a 25 percent cost of goods increase for Joe’s,” confirms owner Jonathan Rubinstein. He says there will not be a corresponding increase in the price of Joe’s coffee.
“We see it as our responsibility to help lead in this space … Alternative straws have come down to a more manageable cost,” he says. Additionally, for the month of July, Joe’s will donate 20 percent of all proceeds from its specialty instant coffee boxes to the Ocean Cleanup, which is developing technologies to rid the oceans of plastic.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/the-fight-for-paper-straws-is-getting-fierce-in-new-york-bars
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EPA Accuses ‘Fixer Upper’ Stars of Violating Lead Paint Rules
Jun 5, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The stars of the hit HGTV renovation show “Fixer Upper” violated federal regulations for mishandling lead-based paint, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said.
Magnolia Homes, owned by “Fixer Upper” stars Chip and Joanna Gaines, agreed Tuesday to pay a $40,000 fine to the EPA and complete $160,000 of lead abatement work around their hometown of Waco, Texas, among other measures, as part of the settlement with the federal government.
“Fixer Upper” follows the Gaines family as they work to renovate and style the homes of local families in the Texas town. The show has hosted former first lady Laura Bush as a guest. The series is currently airing its final season.
The EPA says the program didn't show the Gaineses and others taking proper precautions to avoid lead exposure to workers and residents when working on buildings built before 1978 that could have lead-based paint.
Officials accused the couple of mishandling paint that could have contained lead in 33 of the properties they renovated — a violation of the Residential Property Renovation Rule, implemented under the Toxic Substances Control Act, the EPA says.
Magnolia could have faced up to $556,000 in fines for the violation.
“It’s important that consumers and contractors understand that improper home renovation can expose residents and workers to hazardous lead dust,” Susan Bodine, head of enforcement at the EPA, said in a statement.
“Through this settlement, Magnolia is putting in place safeguards to ensure the safety of its renovation work and making meaningful contributions toward the protection of children and vulnerable communities from exposure to lead-based paint.”
The conditions for the settlement dictate that Magnolia must adopt new record-keeping processes and must make a video featuring Chip Gaines discussing lead paint and the importance of complying with the federal rules. Gaines already mentioned lead paint testing and precautions in a March episode.
Inhalation and ingestion of lead can cause kidney and nervous system damage, especially in young children.
Magnolia didn’t admit to any of the allegations the EPA made.
— Miranda Green contributed.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/390833-epa-accuses-fixer-upper-stars-of-violating-lead-paint-rules
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Dow, Shell Sued Over Water Contamination in Central California
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pamela MacLean
A Bakersfield school district and a water company accused Dow Chemical Co., Shell Oil Co. and six other firms of polluting water supplies in central California with highly toxic TCP, a byproduct of soil fumigant pesticides.
The two separate lawsuits seek damages for product liability, failure to warn, and negligence, and were filed by the Rio Bravo-Greeley Union School District and the Superior Mutual Water Co.
The suits accuses the companies of discharging and disposing TCP, or 1,2,3-trichloropropane, into the drinking water supplies and wells of the plaintiffs. The U.S. EPA has classified the chemical as “likely to be carcinogenic to humans” based on research studies.
Defendants along with Dow and Shell include Occidental Chemical Corp., Wilbur-Ellis Co., J.R. Simplot Co., FMC Corp., Puregro Co. and Crop Production Services Inc.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/dow-shellsued-over-water-contamination-in-central-california
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EU Takes Second Look at Phthalates Rule for Medical Products
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Stephen Gardner
Johnson & Johnson Inc., BD Co., and other medical product manufacturers are among the companies that could be affected by revisions to European Union exemptions that allow them to use banned phthalates.
Phthalates are plasticizers used in polyvinyl chloride that make products such as intravenous tubes, catheters, and blood bags.
The European Chemicals Agency June 5 opened a call for information through Aug. 6 on the possible consequences for some companies of a tightening up of EU rules on four phthalates: bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP), dibutyl phthalate (DBP), benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP) and diisobutyl phthalate (DIBP). The chemicals are commonly used to make plastic tubes and other medical equipment flexible.
Under the EU’s REACH law (Regulation No. 1907/2006 on the registration, evaluation, and authorization of chemicals) the substances are considered to be of “very high concern” because they interfere in some way with normal reproduction, and are banned from use in the EU unless use-specific authorizations are granted by regulators.
However, some medical products are exempt from the requirement to obtain authorizations to use the substances.
Alternatives Are AvailableIn mid-2017, the EU formally identified the four phthalates as endocrine disruptors, in addition to being reprotoxic.
The new designation means uses of the substances in medical devices and some other products “might no longer be covered by generic exemptions from the authorization requirement,” the European Chemicals Agency said in a June 5 statement.
The European Commission—the EU’s executive arm—asked the chemicals agency to gather information on the likely impact of the changes, so the commission could decide on “transitional arrangements, exemptions, and review periods,” ahead of the new designation of the phthalates taking formal effect, it said.
“Apart from blood bags, there are alternatives available” to phthalates in medical equipment, according to Anja Leetz, Europe director for nonprofit Health Care Without Harm, whose members include public hospitals and organizations representing health care professionals.
EU rules already require labeling of medical products containing phthalates, and companies are aware of the potential for tighter restrictions going forward, Leetz said.
Representatives from Johnson & Johnson and BD didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment from Bloomberg Environment.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/eu-takes-second-look-at-phthalates-rule-for-medical-products
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EU Commission: Exempted Uses of Phthalates ‘May Require Authorisation’
Jun 6, 2018 | Chemical Watch
The European Commission is preparing to amend the REACH authorisation list entries of four phthalates, following their identification as SVHCs due to endocrine disrupting effects on humans and the environment.
The four phthlates are:
· bis(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP);
· benzyl butyl phthalate (BBP);
· diisobutyl phthalate (DIBP); and
· dibutyl phthalate (DBP).
The Commission has also said that some uses that were previously exempted "may require authorisation".
On its behalf, Echa is launching a public consultation targeting affected sectors that will in particular seek information on the uses "that might no longer be covered by generic exemptions from the authorisation requirement". These include those in food contact materials, medical devices, as well as transitional arrangements, exemptions and review periods.
It will examine uses that are already subject to authorisation separately. The deadline for comments is 6 August.
The phthalates have been on the authorisation list since 2012 due to their reprotoxic qualities.
Their endocrine disrupting effects on human health – and in the case of DEHP also on the environment – were added to their SVHC classification in 2014 and 2017.
The phthalates' addition to the candidate list of SVHCs for their endocrine disrupting properties followed a proposal from Denmark. A majority of member states backed the proposal last year, although the vote was delayed due to opposition from some countries.
https://chemicalwatch.com/67423/eu-commission-exempted-uses-of-phthalates-may-require-authorisation
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Bipartisan Bill Would Make Mid-Atlantic Off-Limits
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Jennifer Yachnin
A bipartisan pair of House lawmakers will attempt to block new offshore activity along the Mid-Atlantic coast, a rejection of the Interior Department's draft plan to open more than 90 percent of federal waters to potential oil and gas drilling.
Virginia Rep. Donald McEachin (D) and North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones (R) yesterday introduced the "Defend Our Coast Act."
"The 'Defend Our Coast Act' will protect coastal communities in my district and all along the Mid-Atlantic coastline from the negative impacts of offshore drilling," McEachin said at the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation's annual conference. "Accidents can be dangerous and expensive and leave us with years of negative ramifications."
The bill would bar Interior from issuing new leases for exploration, development or production of oil and gas on the outer continental shelf adjacent to Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina and Virginia.
In a statement, McEachin derided the Trump administration's review of new offshore drilling as a "gift to oil and gas companies."
"If we open our oceans to drilling — oil and gas companies, lobbyists and corporate executives stand to gain at the expense of American citizens," he added. "My constituents are eager for renewable energy sources, and they do not want to destroy our pristine coasts, risk accidents and hinder critical military exercises."
In testimony before the Senate Interior, Environment and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee last month, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke told lawmakers that all coastal states remain under consideration for potential offshore drilling.
He rejected attempts from Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D) to remove his state from consideration for offshore extraction, despite acknowledging that "there are no known resources off the coast of Maryland" (Greenwire, May 10).
The Trump administration is expected to unveil a detailed offshore drilling proposal this fall, followed by a 90-day comment period and public meetings.
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/06/06/stories/1060083593
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Federal Groups Push BOEM to Dial Back Arctic Leasing Plans
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
NOAA Fisheries, the federal Marine Mammal Commission and an Alaska whaling group are urging the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to scale back its plans to sell oil and gas leases next year in the Arctic's Beaufort Sea.
In comments on BOEM's preliminary proposal to sell leases in the Beaufort, the federal and state groups recommended that the government exclude leases in several of the region's biologically important waters and within subsistence hunting areas. They also want regulators to block oil and gas activities during seasonal marine mammal migration and hunting seasons.
Specifically, NOAA Fisheries recommended that the Interior Department eliminate oil exploration in the Barrow Canyon bowhead whale feeding area, the Barrow and Kaktovik subsistence use areas, and the Cross Island subsistence use area. The fish and wildlife agency also identified bowhead and beluga whale habitat and bearded seal habitat that should be protected.
"In comparison to other regions, there are vast data gaps with regard to marine habitats in Alaska, particularly in the High Arctic," NOAA Fisheries said in a letter to BOEM.
The Interior Department, which houses BOEM, issued the Beaufort Sea leasing plan in March, two months after the Trump administration unveiled its draft 2019-24 offshore leasing plan. That plan would allow oil and gas drilling in much of the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic oceans (Energywire, March 29).
President Trump's revised five-year schedule would replace the Obama administration's leasing plan for 2017-22, which allowed oil development only in Alaska's Cook Inlet and the Gulf of Mexico.
Under the current draft five-year leasing plan, Interior would auction leases in the Beaufort Sea in 2019, 2021 and 2023 and in the Chukchi Sea, located in western U.S. Arctic waters, in 2020, 2022 and 2024.
Interior plans to release a proposed version of its outer continental shelf leasing blueprint this fall, with the final five-year plan expected in early 2019.
The Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission argued that the Interior Department's call for information on Beaufort Sea lease sales is "premature" because the federal government has yet to issue the final five-year lease program. The group also said BOEM's request for comments on Beaufort Sea drilling undercuts the communities' ability to influence the terms of the five-year plan.
Voice of the Arctic Iñupiat, an organization that represents more than a dozen Alaska North Slope Native groups, recommended that BOEM not finalize its leasing plans without first consulting with local hunters and issuing protections for the region's important subsistence areas.
But ConocoPhillips Alaska supported BOEM's "creation of frequent, predictable lease sales that include all available tracts previously identified by BOEM in the Beaufort Sea Planning Area as having high hydrocarbon potential," the company stated in a letter to the Interior Department.
"Discretionary sale deferrals and arbitrary exclusion of lands do not afford industry an opportunity to evaluate and consolidate leasehold positions and effectively plan and budget for major, capital-intensive programs," said John Schell Jr., land and business development manager for ConocoPhillips.
"The greater the foreseeable leasing area, the greater incentive companies will have to acquire seismic information and invest in long-lead exploratory activities outside of known commercial areas."
Form letters dominate comments
BOEM received more than 37,600 comments on its call for information on the government's plans to sell leases in the Beaufort Sea. Most of the comments were form letters from opponents of the Trump administration's Arctic leasing plan.
Thirty-one environmental and Alaska Native groups signed a joint letter calling for BOEM to drop its plans to allow oil and gas development in the Beaufort Sea. The organizations argued that seismic studies could harm thousands of marine mammals by "blanketing the ocean with deafening blasts."
The groups also observed that the Arctic region is vulnerable to oil spills because of the region's remote location, icy waters and the lack of critical infrastructure needed to respond to such emergencies. "The head of the U.S. Coast Guard reiterated just last summer that there are no effective means to respond to or clean up an oil spill in the Arctic's harsh and remote conditions," the letter said.
Among the groups backing the letter were the Alaska Wilderness League, Earthjustice, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, the Wilderness Society and Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous Lands.
The environmental groups also argued that selling oil and gas leases in the Beaufort Sea would be illegal due to former President Obama's 2016 action barring energy development in nearly all of the Beaufort and Chukchi seas and in parts of the Atlantic Ocean.
Since then, Trump has issued an executive order aimed at overturning Obama's decision. But a group of environmentalists filed suit against the White House, claiming that Obama's protections are permanent under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act.
In March, the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska dismissed a Justice Department request that the court dismiss the environmentalists' lawsuit. Now the court is expected to schedule arguments on the merits of the case.
Margaret Williams, managing director of the World Wildlife Fund's U.S. Arctic program, sent separate comments opposing BOEM's proposed Beaufort Sea lease sale.
"Oil spill response technology and infrastructure are grossly inadequate to respond to a well blowout or other major oil spills in the Arctic," Williams said.
"Moreover, given the massive physical and biological impacts already being recorded in the Arctic, the adverse effects of potential oil spills on communities and wildlife, and the anticipated social costs of increasing carbon emissions, there is no justification for allowing risky and destructive oil drilling activities in the Arctic."
On the other hand, oil industry groups cheered BOEM's leasing proposal. The American Petroleum Institute said that "oil and gas development in the Alaska OCS, including the Beaufort Sea, could ultimately prove indispensable given forecasts that predict this nation's energy demands increasing over 10 percent in the next quarter-century."
API also noted that "the opportunity for Arctic residents to develop ports, search and rescue operations, and infrastructure is much more difficult without the massive investment [that] would accompany development of Arctic resources."
The Alaska Resource Development Council also urged BOEM to move forward with lease sales. The group argued that leasing in the Beaufort Sea should be held in the early stages of the government's 2019-24 OCS leasing plan because the region "is relatively close to existing [oil] infrastructure on the North Slope and the area has been extensively studied."
But the council encouraged BOEM to work closely with Alaskans and subsistence hunters to ensure a balanced approach to the lease sale.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/06/06/stories/1060083613
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Motions Denied to Stay, Dismiss Appeal of Natural Gas Venting/Flaring Rule
Jun 5, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Charlie Passut
Legal wrangling over an Obama-era rule governing associated natural gas flaring and venting on public and tribal lands will continue, for now, after a divided federal appeals court denied two motions by the rule's supporters for a stay, and two motions by its opponents for a dismissal.
A three-judge panel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver on Monday denied motions for a stay of the Interior Department's Waste Prevention, Production Subject to Royalties, and Resource Conservation Rule, aka the venting and flaring rule.
The motions were filed last April by California, New Mexico and a coalition of 16 environmental groups following a ruling by Wyoming District Court Judge Scott Skavdahl. Skavdahl ruled that the phase-in provisions of the rule should be placed on hold to give Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) more time to ultimately revise or rescind the rule.
"The appellants have failed to demonstrate that the stay factors weigh in their favor, and we are not convinced that the circumstances justify an exercise of this court's discretion," Chief Judge Timothy Tymkovich and Judge Jerome Holmes wrote for the majority. Judge Scott Matheson Jr. dissented, saying he favored remanding the case back to Skavdahl "to explicitly analyze...whether the rule should be stayed before this court decides the motions for stay pending appeal."
However, the three appellate judges dismissed motions by Wyoming, Montana, the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) and Western Energy Alliance (WEA) to dismiss appeals by the rule's supporters. They had argued that Skavdahl's ruling is not reviewable by the appellate court because it is not an injunction.
The Skavdahl ruling “has the practical effect of granting an injunction," the judges wrote. "It results in a serious, perhaps irreparable, consequence in that the environmental benefits of the rule will not be realized; and it can be challenged only by an immediate appeal."
Both sides in the case now have until June 19 to file a proposed briefing schedule. The appellate court case is State of Wyoming et al v. DOI et al, No. 18-8029.
WEA President Kathleen Sgamma told NGI's Shale Daily that the organization was pleased with the ruling, but conceded "we weren’t really sweating this one. The environmental groups and liberal AGs [attorneys general] had a high bar to hurdle convincing the Tenth Circuit to reinstate a rule that will be substantially rewritten in a few months.
"Time is on our side. Having ruled on these motions, the appeal now moves to the merits, but briefing will take about as long as BLM will take finalizing the rule. We could have a situation of briefing being done just as the new rule is published, making the entire case moot. As with the hydraulic fracturing rule, the circuit court doesn’t want to waste its time hearing the merits of a case for a rule that’s being completely changed."
Last February, environmental groups had prevailed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District when Judge William Orrick rejected a proposed rule by the BLM to delay enforcement of parts of the venting and flaring rule until next January. AGs for California and New Mexico were parties to that lawsuit.
IPAA and WEA filed a lawsuit against the rule in Wyoming district court in November 2016. Montana and Wyoming filed a separate lawsuit, and North Dakota and Texas subsequently joined as petitioners. The two lawsuits were combined at the end of November.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/114612-motions-denied-to-stay-dismiss-appeal-of-natural-gas-ventingflaring-rule
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Cove Point LNG Facility in U.S. Set for Planned Outage in Autumn
Jun 6, 2018 | Reuters
By Osamu Tsukimori
Dominion Energy Inc’s Cove Point liquefied natural gas production facility in the eastern United States will undergo a brief maintenance shutdown in the autumn, the company’s top executive said on Wednesday.
“It’s not very long,” Dominion’s Chief Executive Officer Thomas Farrell said in an interview, adding the outage could be for less than a few weeks.
Asked whether there would be any interruption in LNG exports from the site on the coast of the state of Maryland, Farrell said that would depend on whether gas storage tanks with capacity to hold nearly 15 billion cubic feet of the commodity were exhausted.
Farrell was in Yokohama to attend a ceremony to celebrate last month’s start of Japanese imports of Cove Point LNG and the arrival of a second Cove Point LNG vessel at a Tokyo Gas terminal on Wednesday morning.
The imports, via a long-term contract, mark a shift in global energy flows as the United States boosts oil and gas exports from shale formations.
A ramp-up of U.S. goods purchases by Japan may draw some of the sting from President Donald Trump’s criticisms of the Asian nation’s trade imbalance with the United States.
The Cove Point facility, with a nameplate annual capacity of 5.25 million tonnes of LNG, has been at full production of LNG from natural gas since April, Farrell said.
“You’ll see a very significant increase in U.S. natural gas coming to Asia and in particular Japan,” he said. “Shale drilling techniques have unlocked probably 200 years ... of natural gas that we will be exporting toward our allies across the world for decades and decades.”
Dominion sold the project’s capacity for 20 years to a subsidiary of GAIL (India) and to ST Cove Point, a joint venture between units of Japanese trading company Sumitomo Corp and Tokyo Gas.
Tokyo Gas has a contract to buy 1.4 million tonnes a year of Cove Point LNG for 20 years, while Kansai Electric Power has contracted to take 800,000 tonnes a year.
There are no plans to build additional trains at the Cove Point terminal because there is no land available, Farrell added.
Asked whether there are any plans for similar LNG export projects elsewhere, he said: “That’s possible, but that would be in the future. We don’t have any present plans to do that”.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-tokyo-gas/cove-point-lng-facility-in-u-s-set-for-planned-outage-in-autumn-idUSKCN1J20R7
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Some Pennsylvania Shale Regs Still on Hold After State Supreme Court Ruling
Jun 5, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Jamison Cocklin
The Marcellus Shale Coalition’s (MSC) lawsuit against Pennsylvania’s regulatory overhaul for unconventional natural gas producers will advance with most of the rules that the industry challenged still on hold after the state Supreme Court last week affirmed an order issued more than a year ago to stay some of them.
MSC filed its lawsuit less than a week after the regulations went into effect in October 2016. While the organization was involved in crafting some of the new rules, it targeted the regulatory packages’ core provisions, arguing that they were a burdensome overreach, unenforceable and contradictory to other applicable regulations and statutes. The state Commonwealth Court agreed in an order issued a month after the lawsuit was filed that enjoined the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) from implementing some of the regulations so it could consider the merits of MSC’s complaint.
The DEP appealed the order with limited success. The state Supreme Court affirmed the Commonwealth Court’s decision to enjoin part of the regulations’ public resources protection provision that would require operators to conduct a review of the impacts drilling would have on schools, playgrounds and species of special concern. The high court also affirmed injunctive relief for the rule requiring operators to monitor and remediate orphaned or abandoned wells.
The DEP, however, can now enforce standards for existing impoundments after the justices reversed a stay on part of the regulatory package that requires operators to register existing impoundments and upgrade them with a synthetic, impervious liner. The high court also reversed the lower court’s stay on more stringent well site restoration standards that would require operators to develop an erosion and sediment control plan that complies with the Clean Streams Law.
MSC had argued that the requirement is excessive and not even mandated by the Clean Streams Law.
The DEP began drafting the regulations about six years ago in response to Act 13, which was passed to update the state’s aging oil and gas laws. The agency split the rulemaking process for the conventional and unconventional industries, but lawmakers eventually passed legislation to scrap the conventional rules and ordered DEP to start those over.
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/114611-some-pennsylvania-shale-regs-still-on-hold-after-state-supreme-court-ruling
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DNR: Wisconsin Frack Sand Sludge Spill Nontoxic
Jun 5, 2018 | AP (In The Washington Post)
Wisconsin officials say early tests have found no harmful chemicals after a spill near a frack sand mine sent millions of gallons of sludge into waterways.
A contactor’s bulldozer slid into a pond last month, leading to an hourslong rescue at the Hi-Crush mine in the western Wisconsin town of Whitehall. Rescuers emptied 10 million gallons (38 million liters) of water to reach the driver. The spill sent thick sludge into a Trempealeau River tributary, tinting waterways orange as the thick plume traveled downstream and into the Mississippi River.
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has yet to release samples from metal and chemical tests Tuesday. Department spokesman Jim Dick tells the La Crosse Tribune that preliminary results show “no immediate toxicity.”
Hi-Crush is cleaning up the area.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/dnr-wisconsin-frack-sand-sludge-spill-nontoxic/2018/06/05/5b0c3072-68ee-11e8-a335-c4503d041eaf_story.html?utm_term=.ca37d87cd0b8
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Grid's Cyber Watchdog Wants Round-The-Clock Staffing
Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Blake Sobczak
Grid officials at the North American Electric Reliability Corp. want a cyberthreat information-sharing hub to stay open 24 hours a day amid mounting risks for U.S. utilities, according to a draft business plan.
NERC is pushing for round-the-clock staffing at its Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center in Washington, D.C., where cyber analysts currently keep a finger on the pulse of the bulk power grid from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.
The E-ISAC is recommending expanding those hours over the next three years to thwart any rare but urgent hacking threats that crop up at odd times in the United States.
"Business hours in many of the nation states that pose the greatest cyber threats to U.S. interests — e.g., Russia, China, Iran, and Democratic People's Republic of Korea — are generally opposite those in North America," NERC said in a draft 2019 business plan dated May 18.
NERC noted that hackers may also choose to target utilities during weekends and holidays, when there might not be as many workers available to respond.
"With an onsite 24/7 staffing presence, the E-ISAC would improve its ability to timely analyze and respond to potential events that occur outside of normal business hours," the nonprofit grid overseer concluded.
Such constant oversight would put the E-ISAC on par with its peer in the banking industry, the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which currently operates a round-the-clock security operations center with direct links to the National Security Agency, CIA and FBI.
Under the latest plan, the E-ISAC would hire 10 additional workers over the next three years at a total cost of $1.1 million. By 2020, there would be enough "watch officers" for 24/7 coverage.
The program is part of a multimillion-dollar, longer-term NERC strategy to expand E-ISAC's reach and cement its position as the primary conduit for getting the word out to member utilities on the latest threats to the grid (Energywire, Feb. 7).
However, skeptics of the plan point out that the E-ISAC's parent organization, NERC, sets and enforces mandatory cybersecurity standards. While NERC officials say they maintain a strict separation between the E-ISAC's activities and any cybersecurity penalties, uncertainty could reduce the amount of valuable data U.S. utilities choose to volunteer.
"They are still part of the regulator, despite the fire hose of messages and marketing about the internal separations," said Patrick Miller, managing partner at Archer Energy Solutions. "The only thing that will move the needle for [the E-ISAC] is splitting out from NERC entirely."
NERC has said that any final decision on round-the-clock staffing "should be based on changing situations and activity levels," and the value of the operation hinges "in large part" on increasing data flows coming in from utilities and intelligence agencies.
In its business plan, the grid overseer acknowledged "the reality that very little data is submitted to the E-ISAC for analysis outside of normal business hours," but suggested that analysts working overnight shifts could examine threats that surfaced during the day.
NERC also pointed to two major cyberattacks last year that swept the globe while most businesses in the United States were still closed: the WannaCry ransomware attack and the NotPetya worm.
Homeland security officials have said that the few hours of lead time during the NotPetya ransomware epidemic allowed many North American organizations to prepare, heading off more devastation (Energywire, June 30, 2017).
"To date, there have been only a few events that have occurred outside of normal business hours that required substantive analysis and immediate communication with stakeholders," NERC said. "Such events, however, could become more common as the risk to the nation's critical infrastructure increases."
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/06/06/stories/1060083619
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Jun 6, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Christa Marshall
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) introduced multiple bills yesterday to finance grid, energy storage and carbon capture projects with billions of dollars from the Department of Agriculture.
The "Promoting Cybersecurity for Rural Electric Utilities Act," co-sponsored by Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.), would clarify that cybersecurity projects and electric grid security improvements are eligible for $5 billion in funding from USDA's Rural Utilities Service, a program designed to improve infrastructure in rural communities.
The "Energy Storage for Rural America Act," co-sponsored by Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), would make energy storage technologies eligible for financial support under USDA's Rural Energy for America Program. The Energy Storage Association said the bill would help rural cooperatives and agricultural businesses tap storage systems.
Bennet also introduced the "Carbon Utilization Act" with Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) to grant carbon utilization projects access to USDA loan guarantees and research grants. The goal is to expand the capture, use and geological storage of carbon dioxide in the production of renewable fuels, chemicals and bio-based products.
The legislation would also create education programs and encourage interagency collaboration to advance those CCUS technologies. The Algae Biomass Organization and the Carbon Capture Coalition, a group of more than 50 companies and organizations, is supporting the proposal.
Bennet said he was hoping to push for the measures in the upcoming Senate debate on the farm bill, which could emerge in the coming days.
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/06/06/stories/1060083599
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Chemical, Coal Companies Ramp Up Lobbying on Water Projects Bill
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jorge Uquillas
Water resources legislation could be one of the last opportunities to fund infrastructure projects during the 115th Congress.
The Water Resources Development Act, generally referred to as WRDA, authorizes funds for Army Corps of Engineers ports, levees, and inland waterway projects on a biennial basis. The House is scheduled to take up its version (H.R. 8) as soon as June 6, while the Senate measure (S. 2800) is also ready for floor action.
Texas would stand to benefit the most from the new projects authorized by the bill.
The House version of the measure, introduced by House Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.), would authorize $2.5 billion in federal funding for seven Army Corps projects, including $2.16 billion for a hurricane and storm risk reduction project in Texas between Sabine Pass and Galveston Bay, and $10 million for a channel extension project of the Houston-Galveston navigation channel.
The Senate version includes both Texas projects. A seventh project, with a favorable Chief of Engineers’ report dated May 11, was added to the House bill and was omitted from the committee-approved Senate bill. The Senate measure, introduced by Environment and Public Works Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), goes beyond the House measure and deals with water infrastructure programs at other agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency.
Chemicals, Coal, and TexasAt least 235 organizations listed WRDA and associated terms on their filings during the first quarter of 2018, a 14 percent increase from the fourth quarter of 2017.
The number of companies reporting activity on WRDA increased by more than a third since the previous quarter. Chemical manufacturers—Lyondell Chemical Co., Arkema Inc. and Covestro LLC—were among the organizations that reported WRDA-lobbying activity for the first time in the current reauthorization cycle. The companies have production facilities in Texas that could stand to benefit from navigation and storm protection improvements.
Covestro listed the 2016 water resources infrastructure legislation on previous years’ lobbying disclosures. The biennial reauthorization process leads to ebbs and flows in lobbying activity.
Coal suppliers and consumers were among the organizations listing disclosing activity for the first time. Electricity generation companies with significant coal fleet—American Electric Power Co., Berkshire Hathaway Energy Co., and East Kentucky Power Cooperative Inc.—disclosed activity on the water infrastructure bill in the first quarter, as did coal suppliers Arch Coal Inc. and Contura Energy Inc.
All of Rick Maldonado & Associates’ lobbying clients included the water resources bill on their first-quarter filings, including three Texas entities that listed the issue for the first time: Port of Texas City, Calhoun Port Authority, and Port of Beaumont.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/chemical-coal-companies-ramp-up-lobbying-on-water-projects-bill
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(ACC Mentioned) Epa, Industry Groups Oppose D.C. Circuit Rehearing of Boiler MACT Ruling
Jun 5, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA and industry groups are urging a federal appeals court to reject environmentalists' petition for rehearing of a ruling that partially upheld the agency's maximum achievable control technology (MACT) rule for industrial, commercial and institutional boilers, saying the ruling definitively resolved the legal fight over the rule.
In responses filed June 5 in Sierra Club, et al. v. EPA, et al., EPA and industry groups urge the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit against rehearing the case, decided March 16. The suit tested aspects of the Obama EPA's 2011 boiler MACT rule not already decided in earlier litigation.
The suit challenged as arbitrary and unlawful EPA's use of a 130 parts per million (ppm) threshold for carbon monoxide (CO) as a “surrogate” indicator of when air toxics cannot be further reduced. Environmentalists say EPA is wrong to assume that hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) cannot be further reduced below this level, and seek individual air toxics limits for HAPs instead.
Environmentalists further challenged EPA's “work practice standards” used to minimize toxic emissions during boiler startup and shutdown, and sought instead to force EPA to apply tougher numeric emissions limits for some boilers more of the time and to use more “clean fuel” -- natural gas -- during startup.
Judge Nina Pillard on behalf of Judges Judith Rogers and Sri Srinivasan in the March ruling remanded the CO limit to EPA for further justification.
But the judges left the startup and shutdown work practices intact, accepting that EPA could not “subcategorize” boilers to reduce reliance on work practice standards. Environmentalists sought panel rehearing April 30.
In its response opposing rehearing, EPA says, “All of the issues raised in the Petition were squarely addressed in the Court’s March 16 Opinion” and the petition should be denied.
“Contrary to the assertions in the Petition, EPA made a determination for all boilers subject to the startup provisions that a work practice was appropriate because emissions could not be measured accurately during startup,” EPA says. Environmentalists' claims that EPA identified some boilers that could meet numeric standards during startup, and should subcategorize them, are false, EPA says.
“The Court also properly rejected Petitioners’ claim that clean fuels are a panacea because that claim is inconsistent with the physical reality that the purpose of startup is to commence combustion of a boiler’s operating fuel (e.g., coal, biomass, or residual oil) in a controlled fashion while gradually bringing the boiler up to its operating temperature,” EPA says.
Industry groups in their filing, including the Utility Air Regulatory Group, American Chemistry Council, Council of Industrial Boiler Owners, and others, also urge the court against rehearing. They make similar points to EPA's, adding, “Petitioners have not shown that the panel 'over-looked or misapprehended' points of law or fact” that would warrant rehearing.
“Rather, their claims are based on continued mischaracterization of both EPA’s actions and the administrative record, which fully support the panel’s decision on the issues raised by the petition,” industry groups say.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-industry-groups-oppose-dc-circuit-rehearing-boiler-mact-ruling
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U.S. Withdrawal From Paris Deal Doesn’t Change Climate for G-7
Jun 5, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By James Munson
World leaders don’t need U.S. support on climate change to pursue the aims of the Paris agreement, Canada’s environment minister said ahead of this week’s meeting of the major industrial nations in Quebec.
Environment Minister Catherine McKenna called U.S. plans to withdraw from the Paris deal “challenging” June 5 but downplayed the notion that the U.S. action would obstruct other G-7 leaders from finding common ground when they meet in the Charlevoix region June 8-9. Canada holds the G-7 presidency until Dec. 31.
“The U.S. administration has taken a different position and that’s really unfortunate, but the world has to move forward,” McKenna said to reporters during a World Environment Day event in Ottawa. “There will be a discussion about that in the context of the G-7 and we’ll see what happens when it comes to the communique.”
Repeat of Last Year?
The final brief from last year’s G-7 meeting in Taormina, Italy, had every country except the U.S. express support for the Paris accord, a deal designed to help countries coordinate a reduction in climate change.
Canada has made climate change, ocean health, and clean energy the themes of this year’s G-7, which may repeat Taormina’s ‘G6+1' scenario for environmental issues.
The U.S. decision to increase steel and aluminum tariffs on some G-7 allies announced last week has increased the risk of disagreement by the meeting’s end. The U.S. Embassy in Ottawa directed G-7-related questions to the White House Press Office, which did not reply to a request for comment.
U.S. President Donald Trump announced on June 2, 2017, that his administration would seek to exit the Paris accord, though a formal withdrawal won’t be possible until 2021.
Charting Plastics and Fishing
Canada’s pursuit of a zero plastic-waste charter—which seeks to eventually keep all plastic out of landfills—will be discussed at the G-7, but more significant action may happen later in the year, McKenna said June 5. The charter needs to include developing countries, which are often the source of much of the ocean’s plastics pollution, McKenna said.
Canada will host G-7 ministers overseeing environment and oceans issues in September where the charter will be discussed again, she said. Canada is holding a public consultation on reducing plastics, and two industry groups unveiled new aspirational targets June 4.
The Canadian Plastics Industry Association and the Chemical Industry Association of Canada are aiming to ensure that all plastic packaging by 2030 is either recyclable or recoverable. Further, their goal is that all plastic used in packaging will be re-used, recycled, or recovered by 2040.
“Industry has a role to play in designing materials and applications for greater recovery, reuse, and recyclability, but addressing the issue of plastic waste will require actions from society as a whole and from all of us as individuals,” the chemical association’s President and CEO Bob Masterson said in a statement.
Illegal fishing also remains a priority during Canada’s G-7 presidency and this week’s meetings, Canada’s oceans ministry spokesman Vincent Hughes wrote in an email to Bloomberg Environment.
But Hughes didn’t confirm or deny whether the oceans and fisheries minister will pursue a naming-and-shaming campaign for countries found to be sheltering illegal fishing vessels.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/us-withdrawal-from-paris-deal-doesnt-change-climate-for-g-7
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Don’t Laugh, We’re Closer to a Bipartisan Solution on Climate Change Than You Realize
Jun 6, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Mark Reynolds
Ask a typical person concerned about global warming if they think Congress will enact a bipartisan solution to climate change, and the response is likely to be a derisive laugh.
For millions of Americans who watch cable news shows or read the papers, such cynicism is easy to come by. Democrats and Republicans can barely get together on keeping the government from shutting down. How in the world could they ever come together on an issue as politically divisive as climate change?
Even before the Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court, which gave big-monied interests the power to bend national policy to their will on issues like climate change, the divide between the parties was widening — Democrats seeing climate change as an issue needing to be addressed; Republicans questioning the urgency and need for action and whether a problem existed at all.
But in the past decade, the findings and predictions of climate scientists have been validated by real-world evidence: ice vanishing from poles and glaciers, sea levels rising, storms and wildfires becoming more destructive, and temperatures moving inexorably in one direction — up.
In the face of such evidence, many Republicans have started to accept the reality that climate change is happening and that something should be done about it.
Until a few years ago, however, few of those Republicans were sitting members of Congress. That’s because those special interests unleashed by Citizens United had the power to punish — and unseat — Republicans who dared to suggest that we should curtail carbon pollution, the primary cause of climate change. Unless something happened to change that dynamic, little progress could be expected.
But something has indeed happened. Something called democracy.
In cities and small towns across the country, citizens worried about the future world their grandchildren will inherit started sharing those concerns with federal lawmakers. They met with them face-to-face and wrote to them. They published letters to the editor and opinion pieces calling for action. They mobilized support in their communities for a national climate policy.
And when they met with Republicans, those citizens did something totally unexpected: They thanked them. It might not have been for something they did about climate change, but it was something they genuinely appreciated, and it was an acknowledgement that those who represent us have a difficult, if not thankless job. That simple gesture opened the door to meaningful conversations, discussions that led more than a few Republicans to join the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus in the House. That caucus now has 78 members, 39 of them Republicans.
Let that sink in for a moment. A little over two years ago, you could count on one hand the number of Republicans in the House who publicly acknowledged that human-caused climate change is occurring and that Congress needs to come up with solutions. There are currently 39 who share that conviction, and they’re willing to talk to colleagues across the aisle about it.
Now that we have Republicans and Democrats talking to one another about one of the great challenges our civilization faces, where does that conversation go? What is the solution that finds common ground between two parties that have fundamental differences about the role of government?
Given that Republicans are the party of less government, it’s safe to assume that additional regulation falls outside the Venn diagram sweet spot of common ground. The solution most likely to find favor in both camps has to be market-based and revenue-neutral, and a fee on carbonwith proceeds returned to households meets those requirements. Such a fee will provide the economic incentive to speed the transition to clean energy and reduce carbon emissions.
A study from Regional Economic Models, Inc., examined such an approach with a fee on the carbon dioxide content of fuels that increases each year by $10 per ton. The REMI study concluded that after 20 years, emissions would drop 50 percent below 1990 levels and that 2.8 million jobs would be added, dispelling the notion that any price on carbon would be bad for the economy.
Conservative voices like George Shultz and James Baker at the Climate Leadership Council and Jerry Taylor at the libertarian think tank Niskanen Center endorse this approach, which also enjoys support from young Republicans concerned about climate change. As Alex Posner from Students for Carbon Dividends told Fox News, “Instead of the government picking winners and losers, we want to hand the ball over to American entrepreneurs and innovators so they can lead the way. This is a solution that shrinks the size of government and yields greater emissions reductions at the same time.”
On June 12, 1,200 citizens from around our nation, many of them the people who convinced Republicans to join the Climate Solutions Caucus, will be on Capitol Hill with a mission to narrow the political divide on climate change. Based on past achievements, I’m confident they will succeed, because I’m confident our democracy will eventually overcome any obstacle that stands in the way of doing the right thing.
A bipartisan solution to climate change? We’re not laughing. We’re smiling.
Mark Reynolds is executive director of Citizens’ Climate Lobby.
http://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/390785-dont-laugh-were-closer-to-a-bipartisan-solution-on-climate-change
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House Republicans Attack Environmental Group over Its Climate Work in China
Jun 5, 2018 | Washington Post
By Steven Mufson and Chris Mooney
The chairman and a senior member of the House Natural Resources Committee have written a letter to the Natural Resources Defense Council suggesting that the environmental organization register as a foreign agent because of its climate and environment activities in China and public statements the lawmakers alleged served China’s interests.
In the letter, committee Chairman Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah) and Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-Ark.), chairman of the subcommittee on oversight and investigations, demand that NRDC President Rhea Suh produce documents about the nonprofit group’s relationship with the Chinese government, its transactions in China and any effort to register as foreign agents of China.
The NRDC has worked for years in China urging the government to slow the growth of coal use, improve building efficiency, track and limit mercury emissions, clean up diesel leaks in Chinese ports and help develop environmental laws.
The lawmakers said the NRDC’s meetings with Chinese officials, its criticism of the U.S. Navy’s use of long-range sonar (which could affect marine life) and its praise of Beijing’s efforts to comply with the Paris climate accord all served Chinese government interests. They said NRDC had held back on criticism to protect its relations with China.
“The Committee is concerned about NRDC’s role in aiding China’s perception management efforts with respect to pollution control and its international standing on environmental issues in a way that may be detrimental to the United States,” the letter said. “The NRDC’s relationship with China has many of the criteria identified by U.S. intelligence agencies and law enforcement as putting an entity at risk of being influenced or coerced by foreign interests.”
The Foreign Agent Registration Act of 1938 requires people acting as agents of foreign nations in a political capacity to periodically disclose their relationship as well as activities, receipts and disbursements in support of those activities.
But just taking positions that happen to be consistent with those of a foreign country in some cases is not enough to trigger a FARA registration requirement, countered Joe Sandler, an attorney with Sandler Reiff Lamb Rosenstein & Birkenstock.
“For an organization, for whatever reason, to say positive things about a foreign government or foreign government’s policies that happen to coincide with the government’s interests doesn’t result in the need to register under FARA, unless you did it at the request or direction of the foreign government,” Sandler said. “There’s no indication, at least in the text of the letter, that that’s the case here.”
Sandler, who has served as general counsel of the Democratic National Committee, is an expert on foreign registration.
“NRDC may adopt a positive tone in its public positioning on China to encourage the Chinese government to do more, but it is a hardheaded, relentless, and fearless American NGO that operates in a very difficult political environment to foster the best environmental standards and practices globally,” added Elizabeth Economy, who directs Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Despite that, the committee insisted there were grounds for an investigation. “Even this morning they were talking about how great China is, despite China being one of the top polluters in the world,” House Natural Resources Committee spokeswoman Katie Schoettler said in an email. “There is a clear disconnect between how they conduct their advocacy in our system versus their actions in China.”
The NRDC rejected the notion it was working on behalf of the Chinese government.
Spokesman Bob Deans said in a statement that “as the most populous country on Earth, China has much to do with the kind of world the next generation will inherit, in our country and around the world. We’re proud of our work, in China and elsewhere, helping to create a more sustainable future for everyone, and we look forward to discussing that work with Chairman Bishop and the committee.”
Deans also said the NRDC “seeks environmental solutions that are grounded in sound science, U.S. law and the public interest. We work on behalf of every American to protect our people against dangerous pollution and leave our children a livable world. Those are American values, American goals, and advancing them is manifestly in our national interest, as we have consistently demonstrated for nearly 50 years.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/06/05/house-republicans-attack-environmental-group-for-its-climate-work-in-china/?utm_term=.4a248b8f5be0
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Shell to Pay EPA for Air, Water, Waste Violations in California
Jun 6, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
A Shell Oil Co. subsidiary will pay more than $400,000 for penalties, emergency response equipment, and facility improvements to resolve multiple violations at a California refinery.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s inspections of the Martinez, Calif., refinery, owned and operated by Shell Oil Products U.S., revealed violations of federal air, water, risk management, environmental cleanup, and hazardous waste laws. The agency ordered Shell, in a settlement announced June 4, to address those violations.
The company failed to include a worst-case scenario in its risk management plan, according to the EPA. Shell Oil also didn’t immediately notify local, state, and federal authorities about a sulfuric acid spill, failed to determine whether its discharged stormwater contained hazardous material, and didn’t manage hazardous waste containers appropriately, among other violations.
The EPA inspected the refinery in 2014, 2015, and 2016. The company has agreed to provide county emergency responders with protective gear, air quality monitors, and equipment designed to stop leaks from sulfur dioxide containers.
Though the EPA’s findings “did not result in significant impacts to our community or the environment,” the company is working to prevent the violations from happening again, the refinery’s general manager, Tom Rizzo, said in a statement emailed to Bloomberg Environment.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/shell-to-pay-epa-for-air-water-waste-violations-in-california
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