Preview Newsletter
ACC AM 7/2/2018
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(ACC Mentioned) SAB Urges EPA to Await Comments Before Advancing Science Rule
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
EPA's Science Advisory Board (SAB) is formally asking the agency to “request, receive, and review” advice from the SAB before making any changes to its controversial proposal that requires use of publicly available research to justify regulations. -
(ACC Mentioned) E.P.A. Dismisses Members of Major Scientific Review Board
Jul 2, 2018 | Zloto News
Both boards, which until now have been composed almost entirely of academic research scientists, have long been targets of political attacks. -
(ACC Mentioned) New Pilot to Demonstrate Curbside Recycling of Flexible Plastic Packaging
Jun 29, 2018 | Plastics Technology
By Heather Caliendo
The Materials Recovery for the Future (MRFF), Washington, D.C., research program announced a new partnership with J.P. Mascaro & Sons Inc., Audubon, Pa., to pilot single-stream curbside recycling of flexible plastic packaging (FPP) at its TotalRecycle materials recovery facility (MRF) in Berks County, Pa. -
(ACC Mentioned) Trash as Value: Turning Ocean Waste Into Viable Products
Jul 1, 2018 | Plastics Technology
By Heather Caliendo
Plastic pollution in the ocean is an international crisis. Estimates are that more than million tons ( billion lb) of plastics enter the ocean each year, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (EMF). -
(ACC Mentioned) Can We Achieve Global Standards for Composites?
Jul 1, 2018 | Composited World
By Dale Brosius
During JEC World, this past March, the leadership of seven composites-focused research consortia, or clusters, met to explore creation of a communications network between them and the potential for international collaboration. -
(ACC Mentioned) Blackstone‘s Byron Wien: Recession Won‘t Strike US Until 2021
Jun 30, 2018 | Richland Standard
By Nicholas Russell
Investment guru Byron Wien warns market players that there are a few years left before the seemingly endless bull-run stock rally ends and the nation plunges back into another recession. -
Pruitt’s Science Advisers Left in the Dark on Transparency Proposal
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
Leaving the scientific community out of the EPA’s rulemaking process could spell failure for the agency’s effort to open data up to public scrutiny, the agency’s scientific advisers said June 29. -
The E.P.A.’s Ethics Officer Once Defended Pruitt. Then He Urged Investigations.
Jun 30, 2018 | The New York Times
By Eric Lipton
The chief ethics officer of the Environmental Protection Agency — the official whose main job is to help agency staffers obey government ethics laws — has been working behind the scenes to push for a series of independent investigations into possible improprieties by Scott Pruitt, the agency’s administrator, a letter sent this week says. -
EPA's Chief Ethics Officer Recommends Investigations into Pruitt Allegations: Reports
Jun 30, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Max Greenwood
The top ethics official at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is calling for a series of independent investigations into possible ethics violations by the agency's administrator, Scott Pruitt, according to multiple media reports. -
Trump’s Supreme Court Candidates Leave Environmental Paper Trail
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Fatima Hussein, Sam McQuillan, David Schultz, Ayanna Alexander
Speculation about who could replace retired Justice Anthony Kennedy began seconds after the 30-year U.S. Supreme Court veteran announced his departure June 27. -
EPA Weakens Oversight of Toxic Chemicals
Jun 30, 2018 | PRI
By Adam Wernick
In 2016, Congress strengthened the Toxic Substances Control Act to give the EPA power to review thousands of chemicals for safety. -
FDA-Approved PFAS and Drinking Water – Q & A on Analytical Measurements
Jun 29, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Tom Neltner
On May 2018, we released a blog highlighting paper mills as a potentially significant source of drinking water contamination from 14 Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved poly- and per-fluorinated alkyl substances (PFASs) used to greaseproof paper. -
Honeywell and Chemours Ask U.S. Supreme Court to Hear Appeal in HFC Case
Jul 2, 2018 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Cheryl Hogue
Hydrofluoroolefin (HFO) makers Honeywell and Chemours are jointly asking the U.S. Supreme Court to consider their arguments in favor of an EPA hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) regulation. -
(ACC Mentioned) Canada Becomes Competitor to Gulf Coast Petrochemical Industry
Jul 2, 2018 | Houston Chronicle
By Katherine Blunt
Even a short drive east from Houston toward Baytown shows how the U.S. shale boom is transforming the Gulf Coast. -
As Industry Pushes Billion-Dollar Fracked Petrochemical Projects, State Regulators Struggle To Keep Up
Jul 1, 2018 | DeSmog Blog
By Sharon Kelly
Fueled by fracking in the region, petrochemical and plastics projects in the Ohio River Valley are attracting tens of billions of dollars in investment, but as plans for this build-out hit the drawing boards, signs already are emerging that state regulators are unprepared for this next wave of industrialization. -
Clean Fuel? Methane Leaks Threaten Natural Gas' Climate-Friendly Image
Jun 29, 2018 | Reuters
By Julie Gordon
Executives from natural gas companies call their increasingly cheap and plentiful fuel the world’s best answer to climate change: it produces about half the carbon dioxide of coal when burned in a power plant and it can fuel trucks, trains and ships. -
BP, Chevron Pushing Gas as Fossil Fuel Answer to Global Warming
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Kevin Crowley, Rachel Adams-Heard and Naureen S. Malik
To reduce emissions and provide affordable electricity, the world needs to burn more fossil fuels, not less. -
Powelson's Departure Means Fallout for Pipelines, Policies
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer, Rod Kuckro and Sam Mintz
Robert Powelson's decision to exit the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission less than a year into his term could leave natural gas pipeline developers in the lurch and policy critics scrambling for how to approach the commission's coming 2-2 partisan split. -
EPA Says No Need to Require Upwind States to Control Emissions
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
The EPA said June 29 it has no obligation to require additional controls at power plants in five upwind states to reduce smog-forming pollutants hindering downwind states from meeting federal air quality standards. -
Alaska Solicits Funds to Advance LNG Megaproject
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
Alaska is looking for money to advance preliminary work on its proposed $43 billion natural gas export project designed to commercialize the state's 34 trillion cubic feet of stranded North Slope gas. -
Enbridge's Controversial Oil Pipeline Replacement Approved by Minnesota Regulators
Jun 29, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Gordon Jaremko
Enbridge Inc. set a second half 2019 target for completing the replacement of its aging Line 3 oil export pipeline after winning a hotly contested approval on Thursday from the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission. -
(ACC Mentioned) Avoid Safety Pitfalls During Plant Expansion and Modification
Jul 1, 2018 | ChemEngOnline
By Bill Wasilewski
In 2015, construction in the chemical process industries (CPI) soared. Capital spending surged 18.4% and 255 new chemical production projects were announced, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC) [1]. -
(ACC Mentioned) Proposed Bans on Plastic Straws Run into Resistance in Hawaii and Dozens of U.S. Cities
Jul 1, 2018 | Honolulu Star-Advertiser
By Elaine S. Povich
Hard on the heels of banning plastic bags, states and cities are being pressed by environmentalists to eliminate another consumer convenience — plastic straws. -
EPA Proposes Using CSAPR to Meet 'Good Neighbor' Obligations
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Sean Reilly
EPA is proposing to rely on the latest version of its interstate air pollution rule to satisfy "good neighbor" requirements for its 2008 ground-level ozone standard, under a draft determinationreleased this afternoon. -
EPA Interstate Finding Prompts Questions On Meeting 2015 Ozone NAAQS
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA's proposed finding that its existing Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) satisfies states' Clean Air Act “good neighbor” mandate to cut interstate transport of air pollution for the 2008 ozone standard is prompting questions on what steps the agency might take to help states meet the stricter mandate for the 2015 ozone standard. -
Study Finds GHGs 'Far' From Obama's Paris Target
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
A new analysis shows the United States is on track to significantly miss the Obama administration's Paris Agreement target of reducing greenhouse gases by at least 26 percent by 2025, and that emissions could begin rising again late in the next decade after years of declines. -
Trump Administration Looks to Boost Case to Repeal Obama Water Rule
Jun 29, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The Trump administration acted Friday to try to bolster its case to repeal the Obama administration’s controversial water pollution regulation. -
Seattle Plastic Straw, Utensil Ban Takes Effect
Jul 2, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Avery Anapol
Seattle on Sunday became the first major U.S. city to ban plastic straws and utensils. -
'Climate Change' Axed from Sustainability Report
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Benjamin Hulac
The Treasury Department listed "climate change resilience" as one of its sustainability goals in a 2016 report to the White House. That goal was jettisoned in a draft version completed under the Trump administration.
Congressional Hearings - There are no hearings to report at this time.
Industry and Association News
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Transportation and Infrastructure News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) SAB Urges EPA to Await Comments Before Advancing Science Rule
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
EPA's Science Advisory Board (SAB) is formally asking the agency to “request, receive, and review” advice from the SAB before making any changes to its controversial proposal that requires use of publicly available research to justify regulations.
The language stops short of a proposal discussed by some SAB members during its May 31- June 1 meeting that would have called for EPA to defer adopting its rules until SAB “and other authoritative bodies” have been able to review the proposal.
But the language in a June 28 letter to EPA codifies SAB's vote in favor of reviewing the rule and puts SAB on record as wanting to review it prior to any changes that would presumably be required to finalize the controversial plan.
“The SAB recognizes that the EPA has already received thousands of public comments in addition to the large number of comments from grassroots write-in campaigns. The SAB urges the Agency to fully consider those comments and request, receive, and review scientific advice from the SAB before revising the proposed rule.”
The language comes after a debate during SAB's June 1 meeting over the precise language that the Board should use to seek review of the regulation.
During that debate, some SAB members, including Environmental Defense Funds' Steven Hamburg, expressed particular concern that EPA's issuance of the proposal before receiving input from SAB was an improper process and urged that SAB clearly call on EPA to defer adopting the rule until SAB and other “authoritative bodies” had a chance to weigh in.
But pushback on the issue included remarks from American Chemistry Council's Kimberly White, who objected to any SAB letter that urged EPA to “defer adopting” its rule. “While I think there are things in the current rulemaking that could be improved or modified, there are aspects currently in there that I think things should be implemented by the agency,” she said.
The final language appears to be something of a compromise in its call for EPA to “fully consider” public comments and SAB's yet to be determined input before “revising” the proposal.
“It is the best we could have hoped for,” says another critic of EPA's science proposal, in that it indicates EPA should wait for SAB review “before” further action.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/sab-urges-epa-await-comments-advancing-science-rule
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(ACC Mentioned) E.P.A. Dismisses Members of Major Scientific Review Board
Jul 2, 2018 | Zloto News
Both boards, which until now have been composed almost entirely of academic research scientists, have long been targets of political attacks. Congressional Republicans and industry groups have sought to either change their composition or weaken their influence on the environmental regulatory process.
Representative Lamar Smith, the Texas Republican who is the chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, wrote the House-passed bill intended to restock the Science Advisory Board with more members from the business world.
“In recent years, S.A.B. experts have become nothing more than rubber stamps who approve all of the E.P.A.’s regulations,” Mr. Smith said at a House hearing in February. “The E.P.A. routinely stacks this board with friendly scientists who receive millions of dollars in grants from the federal government. The conflict of interest here is clear.”
As a witness, Mr. Smith brought in Kimberly White, senior director of chemical products and technology at the American Chemistry Council, which lobbies for chemical corporations and, like other industry groups, has pushed for more representation on the E.P.A.’s science boards.
“We have also seen situations where peer reviewers have suggested discounting a study solely based on the funding source, without any considerations being given to the quality of the study,” Ms. White said. “Also, E.P.A. staff often comment throughout peer review meetings, essentially participating as peers, while industry experts are typically excluded from the dialogue.”
Several members of the Scientific Advisory Board contacted by The New York Times said that they had not received dismissal notices, but that they were aware their board was a political target.
“I see the dismissal of the scientists from the Board of Scientific Counselors as a test balloon,” said Joseph Arvai, an environmental scientist at the University of Michigan who is on the Scientific Advisory Board. “This is clearly very political, and we should be very concerned if it goes further.”
http://zlotonews.com/e-p-a-dismisses-members-of-major-scientific-review-board/
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(ACC Mentioned) New Pilot to Demonstrate Curbside Recycling of Flexible Plastic Packaging
Jun 29, 2018 | Plastics Technology
By Heather Caliendo
The Materials Recovery for the Future (MRFF), Washington, D.C., research program announced a new partnership with J.P. Mascaro & Sons Inc., Audubon, Pa., to pilot single-stream curbside recycling of flexible plastic packaging (FPP) at its TotalRecycle materials recovery facility (MRF) in Berks County, Pa. This will be the first pilot to demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of recycling household FPP from municipal residential single-stream recycling programs.
“Our MRFF collaborative is excited to partner with J.P. Mascaro and demonstrate the recyclability of flexible plastic packaging. We are all committed to the success of this program and look forward to adding recycled flexible packaging into the circular economy. As a side benefit, we expect to see the quality of J.P.’s other recycling streams improve as the flexible plastics are processed,” says Steve Sikra, MRFF chairperson and associate director of global research and development for Procter & Gamble, Cincinnati.
FPP—which includes films, wraps, bags and pouches—is not widely recycled today. As it becomes a larger part of the packaging waste stream, the need for scalable recycling collection strategies is critical to its sustainability. The pilot is expected to generate data to help inform municipalities and the recycling industry on the most efficient and economical ways to recycle FPP. This will turn used FPP materials, typically destined for disposal, into a bale that can be sold to a variety of end markets.
FPP is becoming a more commonly used form of packaging, thanks to its lightweight properties and enhanced product performance and protection. According to Resource Recycling Systems (RRS), Ann Arbor, the recycling system consultancy which conducts the MRFF research program, 12 billion pounds of the material is introduced into the market for consumer use every year, and it is the fastest growing form of packaging. RRS estimates TotalRecycle will produce 3,100 tons/year of high-quality post-consumer FPP feedstock for various end market uses that are being tested.
Van Dyk Recycling Solutions, Stamford, CT, will add sorting equipment to Mascaro’s TotalRecycle facility that will target FPP out of the single stream flow. The FPP will be identified and separated by advanced optical sorters, resulting in a new generation bale of FPP.
The pilot program will begin in late 2018 with the installation of the sorting equipment. After an internal testing period, TotalRecycle will begin accepting FPP for recycling from the municipal residents it serves. From equipment order to acceptance of FPP in curbside carts, the pilot program is expected to last two years time.
Materials Recovery for the Future is an initiative of the Foundation for Chemistry Research and Initiatives, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization established by the American Chemistry Council, Washington, DC.
https://www.ptonline.com/articles/new-pilot-to-demonstrate-curbside-recycling-of-flexible-plastic-packaging
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(ACC Mentioned) Trash as Value: Turning Ocean Waste Into Viable Products
Jul 1, 2018 | Plastics Technology
By Heather Caliendo
Plastic pollution in the ocean is an international crisis. Estimates are that more than million tons ( billion lb) of plastics enter the ocean each year, according to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (EMF). On the current track, there could be more plastics than fish (by weight) in the ocean by 2050.
If there’s one thing we all can agree on it is that no one wants plastics in the ocean. The world’s attention is on this issue and everyone has a role to play. According to Steve Russell, v.p. of the plastics division for the American Chemistry Council (ACC) in Washington, D.C., to x plastic pollution, we need to solve the right problem. Most of the plastics currently in the ocean are from poorly managed municipal solid waste on land, with about 50% coming from growing economies that do not have systems in place to collect and manage the waste.
There are many companies partnering with governments and nonprofits to prevent waste from reaching the ocean. One big initiative looking to tackle plastic debris specifically from Southeast Asia is Closed Loop Ocean, of which ACC is a partner.
Closed Loop Ocean, an initiative of Closed Loop Partners, N.Y.C., in partnership with Ocean Conservancy of Washington, D.C., is designed to fund waste infrastructure solutions in Southeast Asia, with a focus on investments to improve collection, sorting and recycling markets, particularly across the plastics value chain. At the Our Ocean 2017 conference, Ocean Conservancy and its partners—including the Trash Free Seas Alliance, Closed Loop Partners, ACC, PepsiCo (Purchase, N.Y.), 3M (Maplewood, Minn.), Procter & Gamble (Cincinnati), and the World Plastics Council—announced an initiative to raise more than $150 million for a new funding mechanism to prevent plastic waste from leaking in to the ocean.
“It’s an exciting time in this space, as there is a lot of interest and motivation to do something,” Russell says. “Folks are looking to address this urgent need.”
And there is plenty of movement happening in this area—most particularly, efforts that seek to extract value from the waste plastic. You might have seen the terms “ocean-bound plastic” or “recycled beach plastic,” which are general terms to describe the processes to make a new product out of plastic that was captured before it reached the ocean.
It’s not just a feel-good initiative—though there is that component—or a question of impressive technological breakthroughs, which have indeed been achieved; these companies are also seizing a business opportunity on the sustainability front. The concept is proven but the demand needs to follow for this to become a sustainable business.CAPTURING OCEAN-BOUND PLASTIC
In 2011, Method, a San Francisco cleaning-products maker, joined forces with HDPE recycler Envision Plastics, Atlanta, to produce prototype bottles out of a novel and new plastic material, ocean PCR (post-consumer recycle). A year later, Method launched its liquid-soap bottles made from 100% post-consumer HDPE, 10% of which was collected from the beaches of Hawaii.
The package captured the imagination of the world. Sandra Lewis, director of business development with Envision Plastics, says the company received all kinds of outreach from people wanting to produce their own ocean-plastic product. “How sad is it that everyone is so excited and wanting to participate, and I had to keep telling them no, over and over again,” she says.
But while the Method package was a proof of concept that the material from the beach could be repurposed into a package, there’s a host of obstacles that come with it. The Method process was limited by collection, processing and degradation issues from the plastic that was gathered on the beach itself. In addition, because of the different types of plastic mixed together, ocean plastic is a gray resin, which can be limiting in the packaging market that often seeks colors. It seemed like this might be a one-off project for Envision.
But then Envision considered a study by the University of Georgia that researched how much mismanaged plastic waste is making its way from land to the ocean. The study found between 4.8 and 12.7 million metric tons (10.6 to 28 billion lb) of plastic entered the ocean in 2010 from people living within about 31 miles of the coastline.
In addition, it emerged that the mismanaged waste and solid-waste disposal was the biggest contributor. For instance, developing nations like Haiti don’t have trash disposal. So, any plastic disposed of within 30 miles or so of the coastline will probably end up in the ocean.
Suddenly Envision had a “light-bulb moment.” Says Lewis, “If we can go into communities and intercept plastic before it reaches the beach or shorelines, we can overcome all those obstacles that were preventing us from helping people who want to use ocean plastic. Getting it before means we don’t have quality problems.”
Envision chose to go straight to at-risk areas around the world to recover the plastics before they enter the ocean. At-risk areas are defined as places where there’s no formal waste system in place for a population living around 30 miles from the coastline. The key is to intercept the plastic before it reaches the beach or enters a waterway.
The company partnered with those on the ground in the at-risk communities to gather HDPE packaging. Envision created a proprietary scorecard to qualify the on-the-ground partners. For example, the partners must abide by set environmental, safety, social and human-rights standards. Envision goes on-site to make sure they know how to properly sort the plastic and load it into containers.
Haiti is one of the countries Envision is working with and there are about 9000 registered collectors who are paid to gather the HDPE material. This showcases that the ocean-bound plastic initiative benefits more than just the ocean, Lewis says. Envision also has a third-party auditor that goes in every country to verify that the collectors are complying with its standards.THE PROCESS
Envision tracks the material all the way through and immediately inspects the bale when it is received, with no compromise on bale specifications that Envision requires for PCR material gathered from the U.S. Envision keeps the ocean-bound plastic separate from its domestic PCR supply to continue to trace it. After that, it is handled just like standard PCR reprocessing: After bale breaking and hand sorting to ensure there aren’t contaminants, the material is ground into flake, which then passes through an extensive washing process. From there, the material is extruded, filtered and pelletized to eliminate all contaminants. The final step is putting the material through Envision’s patented devolatilization process to remove odor and absorbed chemicals. The ocean-bound material comes out a very high quality and doesn’t have an odor, Lewis says. The material even has a new name: OceanBound Plastic.
“All the obstacles we had before—the bad quality, gray color—are eliminated with this process,” Lewis says. One recent development for Envision is a bottle produced from 100% ocean-bound content, a reported world’s first. The bottle is made entirely from Envision’s OceanBound Plastic and features a silver metallic, pearlescent-effect finish. Envision collaborated with materials designer and colorant supplier Techmer PM, Clinton, Tenn., and blow molder Classic Containers, Ontario, Calif., make such a product possible.
Steve Loney, director of market development for Techmer PM, said that Primal Group, a brand that provides natural personal-care products, was launching a new product range and wanted the bottles to convey a message of sustainability by repurposing waste material. “They basically wanted to create a 100% ocean-bound plastic bottle,” Loney says. “In the past, it hadn’t been 100% ocean-bound, but we were able to overcome some challenges to produce this beautiful silver metallic bottle.”
Techmer PM faced several obstacles, as Primal Group wanted a specific color and reflective finish on the bottle, designed for their new plant-science-inspired personal-care range, ViTA. Typically, an extrusion grade of polyethylene would be needed in the masterbatch as a carrier for the colorant. “But that wasn’t an option in this case because of wanting a truly 100% ocean-bound package,” Loney says. “We made some design changes and manufacturing changes for us to overcome it.”
The high-viscosity OceanBound Plastic supplied by Envision Plastics is a fractional-melt resin that makes it difficult to incorporate the colorant’s metallic particles without shearing them and ruining the ultimate visual effect. Working with officials at Envision’s Chino, Calif., facility, Savvas Roubanis, a sales engineer at Techmer’s Rancho Dominguez, Calif., plant, led the efforts to devise a solution using Techmer PM’s proprietary dispersion technology.
“Compounding of the recipe required additional process design to assure the metallic and pearlescent-effect pigments could be smoothly compounded into Envision’s OceanBound Plastic,” Roubanis says. “In the end, we were able to fully disperse and develop the color and its appearance to the approval of the Primal Group.”OCEAN-BOUND PLASTICS SUPPLY CHAIN
Envision Plastics also worked with Dell Technologies, Round Rock, Texas, on its first ocean-bound plastic packaging pilot in 2017 using the material as part of a new global packaging system for the Dell XPS 13 2-In-1 laptop. For this project, 25% ocean plastic gathered from Haiti was mixed with other recycled HDPE from sources like bottles and food-storage containers.
In 2017, Dell pledged to increase the annual use of ocean-bound plastic 10-fold by 2025. The company also committed to open-source its supply chain to encourage and enable broad usage of ocean-bound plastics.
During the 2018 Re-focus Sustainability & Recycling Summit at NPE2018, Oliver Campbell, Dell’s director of worldwide procurement & packaging, detailed the ocean-bound plastic supply chain and emphasized that it could be applied to other industries. “I really want to stress that this is not a novelty or a vanity-type project,” Campbell told Plastics Technology. “We took a cold business eye to it about how to solve multiple problems—how to use ocean plastic, intercepting plastic before it goes into the oceans, and how to make it economically feasible. We believe we’ve done that.”
Campbell says that Dell will expand use of ocean-bound plastics to the rest of its XPS NB line this year. And in 2019, Dell plans to use the material in additional products. While the initial project focused on Haiti, the company is shifting to Southeast Asia, specifically Indonesia and India, due to how much marine debris is accumulated there, as well as a cost benefit. “Many people believe that sustainability costs more, and we are here to say that if it’s done correctly, it costs less and can also be a brand advantage,” Campbell says. “This is something customers love and a big win for planet.”
To expand on the ocean plastic project, Dell and Lonely Whale, an ocean conservation group based in N.Y.C. and Seattle, have formed a collaborative and open-source initiative called NextWave, together with General Motors, Detroit; Trek Bicycle, Waterloo, Wis.; flooring company Interface, Atlanta; sustainable furniture company Van de Sant in The Netherlands; office-furniture design company Humanscale, N.Y.C.; skateboard company Bureo, Ventura, Calif.; and furniture company Herman Miller, Zeeland, Mich. NextWave convenes leading technology and consumer-focused companies to develop a commercial-scale ocean-bound plastics supply chain.NEEDING A HOME FOR THE MATERIAL
Envision felt so sure of the potential for ocean-bound plastics that the company committed to collecting 10 million lb of HDPE from at-risk zones over the next two years. “Instead of just little one-offs and one-time runs with a little bit of ocean plastic, we decided that we’re making this commitment in an effort to bring comfort to brands, so they can commit too,” Lewis says. “We’re approaching the one-year mark and we are right on track, close to having to collect and recycle 5 million lb, but we have sold only about 10% of that.”
Ocean-bound plastic costs more than both virgin and domestic PCR. But Lewis says if more companies expand use of the material, it will eventually get cheaper. “There’s definitely interest out there, but it takes time for companies to make changes and adopt it. We do have a lot in works and are optimistic,” she says. “But we also have a little bit of anxiety about it as we have stuck our necks out there and made the commitment.
We have put a lot of money in it, but more importantly, this program has created jobs. I can’t even think about it not being successful come a year from now when our two-year commitment is over when we have done 10 million lb. If the world doesn’t value that, we can’t keep doing it.”P&G INITIATIVE IN EUROPE
TerraCycle, Trenton, N.J., specializes in reprocessing hard-to-recycle waste such as coffee capsules, cigarette butts, and industrial waste. TerraCycle collects, converts and sells more than 100 waste streams in over 20 countries around the world that were originally destined for landfills. It was only natural for the company to venture in the beach waste space. Sarah Teeter, the company’s global project manager of beach plastic, says TerraCycle offers unique recycling solutions to give these waste streams a second life. TerraCycle engages with organizations that are already conducting beach cleanups. Previously, material gathered by these groups would be landfilled because of contamination of the material through exposure of the elements.
“We’re working with NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), municipalities and other beach cleanup efforts, and instead of sending material to landfill we are offering a free recycling solution for a more circular option,” she says.
The recovered material is shipped to one of TerraCycle’s warehouses where the staff manually sorts non-compliant items that are considered contaminants, such as organic matter, flexible plastic bags and films, rope, and fishing nets. Once that work is complete, the rigid plastic waste is sent to another processing facility where it is separated by type, cleaned and converted into a usable new format.
Teeter says that P&G came to TerraCycle in late 2016 with the intention to raise awareness of the marine debris epidemic. The company hoped to recycle plastic that came from beaches into a limited-edition Head & Shoulders shampoo bottle offered in France.
“We thought it was doable to collect beach plastic to convert the material into viable resin that could be used for the Head & Shoulders bottle,” Teeter says. “Since then we have been able to build up a global network of collectors and a successful supply chain to produce a viable resin with this material. There were a lot of technical challenges along the way that we were able to overcome thanks to our in-house R&D group and the technical teams within P&G and their their bottle molders.”
For this project, TerraCycle and P&G worked with Paris-based waste-management company Suez for the different stages of processing, including mechanically sorting the material to separate HDPE, PET, etc. The plastics are shredded, washed and dried to produce a clean regrind. The beach-plastic HDPE regrind is then blended with virgin HDPE and additives. The result is a shampoo bottle made from 25% beach plastic, which was launched in 2017. The Head & Shoulders bottle was awarded the United Nations Momentum for Change Lighthouse award in 2017 for its efforts in tackling the global issue of beach plastic waste.
That beach-plastic bottle is just the start. Since then, P&G announced it will introduce 25% recycled plastic across 500 million bottles sold annually for its hair-care brands. P&G also launched its second ocean-plastic package, the “Fairy Ocean Plastic” bottle made completely from ocean plastic and other PCR. The company again partnered with TerraCycle on that project.
Virginie Helias, v.p. of global sustainability at P&G, says that one of the reasons the consumer-products company launched such an ambitious plan was to increase the awareness of recycling. She also said the extra cost associated with producing this material is not passed on to the consumer.
“There’s no cost to pass on to consumers because we want to do something for the environment and it’s very important to appeal to the mainstream audience,” she says. “It’s the number-one shampoo bottle and it’s not a niche initiative. There is an increased cost in collection and a very manual process with extra cleaning and processing cost, but we are taking it on.”
As this initiative is launching in Europe, P&G wants to bring the beach-plastic packaging to North America as well, but there needs to be more supply. “As supply comes available, we will be able to do it in regions such as North America, Western Europe and Asia,” Helias says.
TerraCycle’s Teeter says Unilever of the U.K. is also interested in bringing the ocean-plastic story to its REN Skincare brand. The company’s new 100% recycled bottle contains 20% reclaimed ocean plastic, which Teeter says is a “natural fit” as the product’s ingredients are from the ocean. This package is also easily recyclable.
Additional products in the range, including hand and body lotions, in the new hybrid recycled/ocean-plastic packaging will be phased in across REN Clean Skincare’s full global distribution by early 2019.
“We hope to see this incorporated in many different products at different scales,” Teeter says. “There is a lot of material out there, so while this might seem like a drop in the bucket, it is one solution to the large problem of marine debris.”
https://www.ptonline.com/articles/trash-as-value-turning-ocean-waste-into-viable-products
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(ACC Mentioned) Can We Achieve Global Standards for Composites?
Jul 1, 2018 | Composited World
By Dale Brosius
During JEC World, this past March, the leadership of seven composites-focused research consortia, or clusters, met to explore creation of a communications network between them and the potential for international collaboration. The meeting, representing countries in European, North American, Asian and Australian regions, was organized by the Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI, Knoxville, TN, US). The plan is to grow, adding clusters from other countries and, perhaps, pursue a global composites “roadmap” to drive research into critical industry needs.
The industries we serve are global, and our industrial members operate in multiple countries. Many have asked if such coordination between clusters can help them leverage their industrial contributions to achieve greater results. A significant focus of our discussion, therefore, was to identify pre-competitive areas of research where international coordination can have a major impact on composites adoption. Every cluster is attacking the issue of increasing production speed and reducing the cost of composite structures, but looming issues tabbed for collaboration included composites recycling, improved modeling and simulation tools, and drafting international standards for the composite properties necessary for effective part design.
It is the relative lack of such standards that presents one of the highest hurdles to composites adoption, and also is incredibly difficult to address. The problem is variables: Compared to metals, our endless permutations of resin and fiber types, combinations, properties and varieties of manufacturing processes create an almost impossible-to-fathom range of possibilities. With near unlimited options, it’s easy to throw up your hands and surrender.
Yes, several segments of the composites industry have developed ways to address this situation. Aerospace OEMs, for example, have for decades, used a building block approach that goes from physical testing of coupons to subelements to substructures to full structures. However, the development of design allowables, based upon molding and testing thousandsof coupons, is so costly that it creates large barriers to entry for new materials and processes. Hence, materials and processes qualified more than 20 years ago are used to build current commercial and military aircraft primary structures. These databases are privately held, for the most part, by aircraft OEMs, so they are not generally available for use by others. The Composite Materials Handbook (CMH-17), does have some publicly available systems characterized, and Wichita State University’s (Wichita, KS, US) National Center for Advanced Materials Performance (NCAMP) program, headed by the Wichita-based National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR), has established additional allowables data, mainly for secondary structures and general aviation.
The wind energy industry is working with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) to develop and adopt standards for wind blade construction. Certification bodies for wind turbines, such as DNV GL, have published their own standards as an interim measure until the new IEC standards are adopted. The infrastructure landscape is very fragmented, yet the American Composite Manufacturers Assn. (ACMA, Washington, DC, US) is making steady progress, helping sectors adopt standards for composite rebar, FRP grating, architectural elements and utility poles.
Developing standards for automotive composites, however, appears to be the greatest challenge. Of the markets noted so far, automotive presents the largest set of material and process variables and a very wide range of performance requirements. In the US, the American Chemistry Council (ACC, Washington, DC) has launched a project with IACMI to develop performance standards for carbon fiber composites based on four categories: crashcritical, strength critical, stiffness critical and appearance critical. The plan is to identify what properties are needed for each category to effectively model performance, agree on the test protocols to generate such properties, and allow suppliers and third parties to certify to these standards. It sounds like a simple task, but securing agreement from all parties in the value chain is anything but easy. In Europe, the German trade association AVK is working with industry and the Institut für Verbundwerkstoffe (IVW) in Kaiserslautern to develop test standards for characterizing continuous-fiber thermoplastic composites. ACC and IVW are discussing the possibility of coordinating efforts between these two projects. It’s a start.
These projects will need to resolve which of the various international test methods are best suited for a given property, or if several methods can be used. In my February 2016 column, I envisioned an idealized future where virtual allowables could be incorporated to reduce the number of physical specimens that must be tested. For these efforts to ultimately succeed — and it will take years, so patience is essential — the global automotive supply chain will need to come together and participate. The world’s composites research clusters, working in unison, can provide the leadership to achieve such an ambitious goal. It won’t be easy, but it is something we can all agree needs to be done.
https://www.compositesworld.com/articles/can-we-achieve-global-standards-for-composites
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(ACC Mentioned) Blackstone‘s Byron Wien: Recession Won‘t Strike US Until 2021
Jun 30, 2018 | Richland Standard
By Nicholas Russell
Investment guru Byron Wien warns market players that there are a few years left before the seemingly endless bull-run stock rally ends and the nation plunges back into another recession.
"My view is the earliest we're going to have a recession is 2021," He doesn’t expect anything more severe than a 10 percent stock correction before recession hits.
Typical recession omens such as poor corporate earnings and employment data, "just aren't in place," said Wien, a vice chairman at Blackstone.
"Maybe they'll develop very quickly. But usually, they take a while," he continued. "Right now I see this cycle going on for a couple more years. And as long as that is the case, I think volatility will remain low," he said.
The current recovery, which began in mid-2009, is the second longest expansion in U.S. history, and would become the longest if it lasts past June 2019, CNBC explained.
Wien isn't alone in warning about economic troubles on America's horizon.
Earlier this week, a group of top business economists believes the major tax cuts President Donald Trump pushed through Congress will give a significant boost to economic growth this year and next year. But they worry that by 2020, the country could be entering a new recession,
The that its panel of 45 economists expects the economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, to expand 2.8 percent this year. That is down slightly from the panel's March forecast, which put GDP growth this year at 2.9 percent.
The NABE economists are "slightly less optimistic about the U.S. economy in 2018 than they were three months ago," says NABE vice president Kevin Swift, chief economist at the American Chemistry Council.
Part of the drop-off in optimism reflects growing worries about what Trump's get-tough approach on trade might do to U.S. growth prospects.
Meanwhile, Trump's chief economic adviser argues that last week's blockbuster unemployment report is a sign of the robust economic growth awaiting America.
“I believe we've entered into the longest largest prosperity in a couple of decades. I know it's early in the game,”
To be sure, U.S. job growth accelerated in May and the unemployment rate dropped to an 18-year low of 3.8 percent, pointing to rapidly tightening labor market conditions, which could stir concerns about inflation,
Nonfarm payrolls increased by 223,000 jobs last month as warm weather boosted hiring at construction sites. There were also big gains in retail and leisure and hospitality payrolls. The economy created 15,000 more jobs than previously reported in March and April.
“This is a prosperity era. It's a strong economy. What you've got here is continued job growth, low unemployment, and participation rates pretty good,” said Kudlow, who served as the Trump campaign's senior economic adviser.
Theadded to a string of recent upbeat economic data, including consumer spending and industrial production, that have suggested economic growth was regaining speed early in the second quarter after slowing at the beginning of the year.
The strength comes even as the stimulus from a $1.5 trillion income tax cut package and increased government spending is yet to filter through the economy.
https://richlandstandard.com/blackstones-byron-wien-recession-wont-strike-us-until-2021/
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Pruitt’s Science Advisers Left in the Dark on Transparency Proposal
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
Leaving the scientific community out of the EPA’s rulemaking process could spell failure for the agency’s effort to open data up to public scrutiny, the agency’s scientific advisers said June 29.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board—whose members advise the administrator on the technical underpinnings of agency actions including regulations—was left in the dark when the agency developed and released its proposal for increasing transparency in the science used for regulations, the board told Administrator Scott Pruitt in a letter posted online June 29.
The proposed rule (RIN:2080-AA14) would determine which scientific studies the agency could consider while drafting new regulations. It would have multiple parts, including provisions encouraging research to be as transparent as possible to allow independent validation and protecting sensitive data that the agency may review, such as confidential business information, intellectual property, and patient records.
The board learned of the rule through an April 25 press event, the letter said. The board’s chair, Michael Honeycutt, pointed out that the agency is required to make proposed regulations available to the Science Advisory Board for formal review and comment.
The board’s input can strengthen agency rules, science documents, and other technical materials EPA initiatives rely on. This makes them more legally defensible and robust in public debate over policy options.
It’s important to have the board weigh in early in the rulemaking process so that it can have an influence on the science the agency considers, Genna Reed, lead science and policy analyst for the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington, told Bloomberg Environment.
Policy vs. Science IssueS. Stanley Young, a statistician based in Raleigh, N.C., and member of the EPA’s Science Advisory Board, told Bloomberg Environment he thinks the agency’s proposal is a policy issue, not a technical or scientific one. As such, Pruitt should be making those decisions, Young said.
Some board members already have concerns about the provisions of the proposal.
“For studies published many years ago, it may not be feasible to deliver public access to data and analytic methods,” the letter said. “There are also sensitive situations where public access may infringe on legitimate confidentiality and privacy interests, and where exceptions from complete public access may be appropriate.”
The agency also should consider the costs and effort associated with making large and complex existing datasets available within the requirements set by Institutional Review Boards, the letter said. Those boards, organized by each research institution, are responsible for reviewing research proposals to ensure scientists are conducting them ethically.
“I think it’s a really strong letter that shows why we need the Science Advisory Board in the first place: as an independent voice and a source of accountability in the agency,” Reed said.
The Science Advisory Board told the administrator it wants to provide advice and comment on the scientific and technical basis for the agency’s proposals, according to the EPA.
The agency has not yet provided an estimate on when it may complete the scientific integrity regulation. If the agency delays the board’s review past the end of September, when a handful of the members’ terms are expiring, “the composition of the committee could change drastically, resulting in weaker recommendations, more aligned with industry’s agenda than the public’s best interest,” Reed said.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/pruitts-science-advisers-left-in-the-dark-on-transparency-proposal-2
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The E.P.A.’s Ethics Officer Once Defended Pruitt. Then He Urged Investigations.
Jun 30, 2018 | The New York Times
By Eric Lipton
The chief ethics officer of the Environmental Protection Agency — the official whose main job is to help agency staffers obey government ethics laws — has been working behind the scenes to push for a series of independent investigations into possible improprieties by Scott Pruitt, the agency’s administrator, a letter sent this week says.
The letter is the first public acknowledgment that Kevin S. Minoli, who has frequently defended Mr. Pruitt’s actions since he took over the agency in February 2017, is now openly questioning whether Mr. Pruitt violated federal ethics rules.
The investigations recommended by Mr. Minoli include an examination of how Mr. Pruitt rented a $50-a-night condominium on Capitol Hill last year while he was being lobbied by J. Steven Hart, the spouse of the condo’s owner, according to a federal official with firsthand knowledge of the inquiries, who asked not to be named since the details of the investigation are intended to remain confidential.
In March, Mr. Minoli defended Mr. Pruitt’s lease for the condo, saying that Mr. Pruitt paid what appeared to be fair market value. He subsequently learned that Mr. Hart, who at the time was chairman of the lobbying firm Williams & Jensen, had repeatedly intervened with the E.P.A., and with Mr. Pruitt directly, on behalf of the lobbying clients that included Smithfield Foods and Coca-Cola.
Mr. Minoli also asked the E.P.A.’s inspector general, the agency’s independent investigative office, to examine evidence that an aide to Mr. Pruitt helped him search for housing and handled other personal matters during work hours last year. And a request was also forwarded to the inspector general related to a $2,000 payment Mr. Pruitt’s wife, Marlyn, received from Concordia, a Manhattan-based nonprofit group that had invited Mr. Pruitt to speak at an event last year in New York.
Mr. Pruitt is facing 13 federal inquiries into his spending and management practices as E.P.A. administrator, including the condo arrangement and the use of staff members for personal errands, as well as his first-class travel expenses and the installation of a $43,000 soundproof phone booth in his office.
The E.P.A. on Saturday declined to comment on the allegations related to Mr. Pruitt. In the past, the agency has said that Mr. Pruitt paid rent on the condominium, so there was nothing inappropriate about the arrangement, and that the former aide, Millan Hupp, is a friend of Mr. Pruitt’s family and provided personal help on her own time.
Matters like the ones Mr. Minoli raised with investigators have the potential to represent a violation of federal ethics rules because, for example, staff members are not allowed to use agency resources for personal benefit.
“Consistent with my obligations under Office of Government Ethics regulations, I have referred a number of those matters to EPA’s Inspector General and have provided ‘ready and active assistance’ to the Inspector General and his office,” said the letter, which was sent Wednesday by Mr. Minoli. A copy of the letter was obtained by The New York Times through a Freedom of Information request. “To the best of my knowledge, all of the matters that I have referred are either under consideration for acceptance or under active investigation.”
The letter does not mention the specific matters or the total number of referrals related to Mr. Pruitt.
The push to investigate Mr. Pruitt came as the ethics office at the E.P.A., which is a part of the agency’s Office of General Counsel, suffered a severe staff shortage because of an agency hiring freeze last year, Mr. Minoli’s letter says. At one point last summer, after retirements and other temporary departures, the office had only one full-time employee.
Mr. Minoli has since moved to rebuild the office and expects to soon have six staff members and a manager to help handle the surge in requests it has received, the letter says.
John Konkus, an E.P.A. public-affairs official, in a statement on Saturday afternoon said that before Mr. Minoli drafted his letter the agency had moved to authorize the hiring of two staff members for his office to allow it to expand its work and enhance “ongoing ethics training and retraining for E.P.A. staff.” He also said that “the entire E.P.A. is always responsive to the O.I.G.,” referring to the agency’s Office of Inspector General. His statement did not address the allegations against Mr. Pruitt.
Mr. Minoli sent the five-page memo to David J. Apol, the acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, which oversees ethics programs at all federal agencies. Mr. Minoli’s memo came in part in response to two letters Mr. Apol sent to the E.P.A. raising his own ethics concerns about the agency.
“Public trust demands that all employees act in the public’s interest, and free from any actual or perceived conflicts, when fulfilling the governmental responsibilities entrusted to them,” Mr. Apol wrote to Mr. Minoli in April. “Agency heads in particular bear a heightened responsibility,” he added, before detailing some of the same ethics allegations that Mr. Minoli has apparently also asked the agency’s inspector general to investigate.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/30/climate/pruitt-epa-ethics.html
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EPA's Chief Ethics Officer Recommends Investigations into Pruitt Allegations: Reports
Jun 30, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Max Greenwood
The top ethics official at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is calling for a series of independent investigations into possible ethics violations by the agency's administrator, Scott Pruitt, according to multiple media reports.
In his letter to the Office of Government Ethics, the official, Kevin Minoli, wrote that "additional potential issues regarding Mr. Pruitt have come to my attention through sources within the EPA and media reports," according to The Washington Post.
The New York Times first reported the letter on Saturday, after it obtained a copy through a Freedom of Information Act request.
Among the issues into which Minoli has requested investigations is Pruitt's rental of a Capitol Hill condo owned by the wife of an influential lobbyist, the Times reported. Media reports have indicated that Pruitt paid far below market rate at just $50 per night.
Minoli had initially approved the request, among other decisions, the Post reported.
Minoli has also asked for an examination of allegations that Pruitt had an aide help him with personal matters, including searching for housing during work hours, according to the Times.
Pruitt has faced mounting scrutiny in recent months for questionable behavior, including the condominium rental and his use of first- and business-class travel that costs thousands of dollars.
According to the Times, there are currently 13 separate inquiries into Pruitt's spending and management practices while at the EPA.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/395039-epas-chief-ethics-officer-recommends-investigations-into-pruitt
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Trump’s Supreme Court Candidates Leave Environmental Paper Trail
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Fatima Hussein, Sam McQuillan, David Schultz, Ayanna Alexander
Speculation about who could replace retired Justice Anthony Kennedy began seconds after the 30-year U.S. Supreme Court veteran announced his departure June 27.
Of President Donald Trump’s 25 judicial candidates that could replace Kennedy, several have extensive environmental records, and many interpret the law to limit federal environmental policy.
“Obviously we know that the president liked Justice [Neil] Gorsuch, so we have that as a model of what to expect,” John C. Cruden, principal at Beveridge & Diamond PC in Washington, told Bloomberg Environment. “However, the president has been exceedingly unpredictable,” Cruden said.
“Any new justice on the court that’s confirmed prior to the midterms will affect environmental cases,” said Justin Pidot, an environmental law professor at University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law.
Here are the environmental records of the candidates that legal and environmental experts say are most notable:
Brett Kavanaugh, U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit judge
During his time on the D.C. Circuit, the former clerk for Kennedy and President George W. Bush staff secretary earned the reputation for thwarting the Obama administration on climate change.Kavanaugh wrote the opinion in a 2017 case ruling that the EPA has no authority to require that companies replace refrigerant chemicals that are also greenhouse gasses with more sustainable alternatives.
He wrote the opinion that struck down portions of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Cross-State Air Pollution Rule in EME Homer City Generation, LP v. EPA.
Even his dissents in clean air cases have impact. The Supreme Court has relied on them multiple times in ruling against the agency.
Kavanaugh in a partial dissent had said the EPA should have considered the cost to the power industry before regulating toxic air pollution in the 2014 case White Stallion Energy Ctr. LLC v. EPA. That dissent was cited by the Supreme Court in Michigan v. EPA when it reversed the D.C. Circuit’s decision upholding the standards.
“In administrative law cases, he generally takes a very strict reading of the” Administrative Procedure Act, Kathryn Kovacs, a law professor at Rutgers University, said. “He could have a big influence in administrative law.”
William Pryor, 11th Circuit judge
Pryor, nominated to the appeals court in 2003 by President George W. Bush, has questioned the constitutionality of significant portions of the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act. He previously served as Alabama attorney general from 1997 to 2004.In 2000, Pryor was the lone state attorney general to file an amicus brief in Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County v. Army Corps of Engineers, arguing that the Constitution doesn’t give the federal government power to regulate intrastate waters that serve as a habitat for migratory birds.
“I don’t perceive it as anti-environment at all,” Pryor said during his 11th Circuit confirmation hearing.
“Making sure that there’s the proper balance of federal and state power allows state authorities and federal authorities to know where the lines are so that state environmental protectors can do their jobs as well,” he said.
Pryor has asserted that land use and wildlife protection should be “traditional areas of state environmental primacy” and should be free of federal regulation.
Mike Lee, U.S. senator from Utah
Lee clerked for Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and served as an assistant U.S. attorney. He became a senator for Utah in 2011.In 2016, Lee blocked the Senate from taking on a bipartisan $220 million contaminated drinking water aid package for Flint, Mich., and other affected cities.
The Tea Party sweetheart, cited for assisting Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (R) in the 2013 government shutdown, also opposed an energy overhaul bill that was expected to move in tandem with the aid.
Lee is “incredibly skeptical of the federal government role in regulating industry,” Pidot said.
Pidot said Lee “staked out positions on public lands issues over and over again that local people should be able to do whatever they want on public lands with no restrictions whatsoever.”
“If he’s sincere about all the things he’s said about public lands, he would be radically more conservative on those issues than anyone else.”
Patrick Wyrick, Oklahoma Supreme Court justice
Wyrick is a long-time Oklahoma protege of EPA head Scott Pruitt. He has drawn opposition from environmental groups for his work in tandem with Pruitt in Oklahoma that included filing lawsuits targeting Obama-era carbon dioxide pollution limits for power plants and various Clean Air Act efforts, including an EPA plan to reduce haze from scenic vistas in national parks.Environmental groups including the League of Conservation Voters urged senators to vote against Wyrick in his current path to be a judge for U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma.
“It’s tough math for sure for us to stop these nominees” with nearly lockstep Republican support, Craig Auster, PAC and advocacy partnerships director at the League of Conservation Voters, told Bloomberg Environment June 13.
The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee approved Wyrick’s nomination on party lines, June 14.
Timothy Tymkovich, 10th Circuit judge
The former Colorado solicitor general assumed the role of chief judge of the circuit in 2015.He wrote the dissenting opinion for Impact Energy Resources v. Salazar, case that struck a blow to drilling companies. He said that a 2009 cancellation of 77 land leases was invalid because the announcement wasn’t specific enough to be final agency action.
Allison Eid, 10th Circuit judge
While on the Colorado Supreme Court, Eid wrote a decision in 2012 that rejected a community group’s request for a hearing about oil and gas drilling permits near a site where a nuclear bomb exploded underground in 1969.Thomas Hardiman, 3rd Circuit judge
The Georgetown University grad concurred on a court decision that ordered Citgo to reimburse the federal government and a shipping company $143 million for a 2004 oil spill in the Delaware River.https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/trumps-supreme-court-candidates-leave-environmental-paper-trail
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EPA Weakens Oversight of Toxic Chemicals
Jun 30, 2018 | PRI
By Adam Wernick
In 2016, Congress strengthened the Toxic Substances Control Act to give the EPA power to review thousands of chemicals for safety. Now the agency has decided to narrow that mandate — and will begin disregarding the potential effects of exposure caused by the presence of chemicals in the air, soil and water.
The bipartisan overhaul of the law provided uniform federal review standards for thousands of everyday chemicals. When it passed, the Obama-era EPA began reviewing more than 40,000 chemicals, with a particular focus on 10 chemicals already on the market.
But with EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s recent decision, "it’s like the law had never been revised," says Britt Erickson, senior editor at Chemical and Engineering News.
In passing the law, Congress required the EPA to start with the aforementioned 10 chemicals. The agency is required to complete its evaluation of these chemicals by December 2019 — and if it finds any risks with those 10 chemicals, to take an additional two years to do something about those risks. “So, we're looking at 2021, at the earliest, to see some sort of action on those 10 chemicals,” Erickson says.
The controversy stems from a narrowed scope of study surrounding these chemicals Under the EPA's new standard, the agency will mostly ignore potential exposure caused by those chemicals' presence in the air, ground or water and instead focus only on the potential harm caused by direct contact in a work setting or other location. The result of this policy change is that any potential harm stemming from the improper disposal of those chemicals will factor little in deciding whether to restrict a chemical.
Seven of these 10 chemicals are solvents, like trichloroethylene, which is found in some adhesives and spot removers; tetrachloroethylene (or PERC), which is used in dry cleaning; and methylene chloride, which is found in paint strippers. All of these chemicals are known to have adverse health effects and some, including, methylene chloride, can be fatal at high exposures. So, EPA’s decision to focus only on direct contact with these chemicals and to exclude from their safety calculations exposure through the air, ground and water has caused great concern among environmental scientists and public health advocates.
According to an Environmental Defense Fund analysis, the new approach will not take into account 68 million pounds of chemicals that will be released into the atmosphere, water or soil by just seven of the 10 chemicals currently under review.
"I think it's a shame for the subpopulations, the vulnerable subpopulations — the pregnant women, the children, the elderly, the immunocompromised," Erickson says. "They're the ones who are really going to be hit by the weakened rules."
Most of these solvents are carcinogens and are “extremely hard to get rid of once they're in the environment,” Erickson says.
The good news: Unless they contact these chemicals in their work environment, consumers do not often experience direct exposure to them and can take safety precautions if they believe they might be exposed.
“You have to be exposed to a chemical to actually be harmed by it, even if it is a dangerous chemical,” Erickson says. “So, if you're using these methylene chloride paint strippers and you wear the proper safety gear, you'll be OK.”
Consumers can also check the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry website, which is part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The agency creates toxicity profiles for every chemical and consumers can use them to determine whether a chemical is hazardous.
https://www.pri.org/stories/2018-06-30/epa-weakens-oversight-toxic-chemicals
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FDA-Approved PFAS and Drinking Water – Q & A on Analytical Measurements
Jun 29, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Tom Neltner
On May 2018, we released a blog highlighting paper mills as a potentially significant source of drinking water contamination from 14 Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved poly- and per-fluorinated alkyl substances (PFASs) used to greaseproof paper. We showed that wastewater discharge could result in PFAS concentrations in rivers in excess of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s 70 parts per trillion (ppt) health advisory level for drinking water contamination for PFOA and PFOS, the most studied of the PFASs. Readers of the blog have asked some important questions highlighted below. We provide our best answers based on EDF’s FOIA request to FDA. See also our Q & A blog on textile mills and environmental permitting.
http://blogs.edf.org/health/2018/06/29/pfas-and-drinking-water-analytical-measurements/
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Honeywell and Chemours Ask U.S. Supreme Court to Hear Appeal in HFC Case
Jul 2, 2018 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Cheryl Hogue
Hydrofluoroolefin (HFO) makers Honeywell and Chemours are jointly asking the U.S. Supreme Court to consider their arguments in favor of an EPA hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) regulation. They are contesting a federal appeals court decision last August in a case lodged by Mexifluor Chem and Arkema, which make the refrigerant HFC-134a. That ruling overturned a 2015 EPA rule requiring manufacturers to replace HFCs with chemicals that are less-potent greenhouse gases, such as HFOs. Now, Honeywell and Chemours are telling the nation’s high court that the appellate decision creates uncertainty in the marketplace that will last for years until EPA can issue a new regulation restricting HFCs. The HFO makers and the environmental group Natural Resources Defense Council, which filed a separate petition to the high court, contend the 2017 ruling illegally prevents EPA from regulating manufacturers that replace ozone layer-depleting compunds with HFCs or other substitutes that are toxic, flammable, or environmentally harmful. The Supreme Court will decide in the coming months whether to hear the case.
https://cen.acs.org/policy/litigation/Honeywell-Chemours-ask-US-Supreme/96/i27
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(ACC Mentioned) Canada Becomes Competitor to Gulf Coast Petrochemical Industry
Jul 2, 2018 | Houston Chronicle
By Katherine Blunt
Even a short drive east from Houston toward Baytown shows how the U.S. shale boom is transforming the Gulf Coast.
Dense clusters of petrochemical plants, with their towering chemical reactors and mazes of pipes, line roads busy with semi-trucks hauling the goods needed to keep the industry running. Construction cranes promise more development to come.
Not so in Canada, where petrochemicals investments have slowed in recent years despite the country’s vast reserves of low-cost natural gas feedstock for plastics and other products. The reason is obvious: Compared to the Gulf Coast, Canada has limited port access, higher costs of building and carbon taxes in its four most populous provinces.
But Canada is pushing to change that dynamic, vying to become more competitive with its neighbor at a time when U.S. trade policy and tariffs threaten to increase the cost of building and expanding Gulf Coast petrochemical plants.
In June, the provincial government of Alberta offered petrochemical companies the chance to apply for a range of multi-million-dollar incentives to develop reserves of natural gas-derived chemical feedstocks — namely ethane, methane and propane — and process them into plastics and other materials. It was the latest in a series of incentive packages Alberta has offered to offset the higher costs of operating there.
A recent analysis by research firm WoodMackenzie showed the push has already created new development opportunities in Canada, pitting it against the U.S., the Middle East and China in the race to build new plants. Last year, during an Alberta’s first incentive push, companies applied for assistance with 16 projects worth $20 billion.
Outside of Alberta, other companies have boosted operations to take advantage of natural gas feedstocks from the United States. Canada’s Nova Chemicals recently expanded its plant in the Ontario city of Sarnia, near the Michigan border, to process more ethane from the Marcellus and Utica shale fields in Ohio, West Virginia, New York and Pennsylvania.
American companies have already capitalized on the shift. Kinder Morgan recently completed its Utopia pipeline to feed ethane to Nova’s expanded plant.
Canada’s push comes as U.S. petrochemical manufacturers are calculating how newly imposed tariffs on steel will affect the cost of building and operating domestic manufacturing plants. The Trump administration in March levied a 25 percent import tax on steel on most countries and extended it earlier this month to include Mexico, Canada and the European Union. He has also threaten to pull out of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which would curtail U.S. exports to Mexico and Canada.
The American Chemistry Council, a national trade group, has come out in opposition to the tariffs, arguing they could delay upcoming petrochemicals projects after nearly a decade of Gulf Coast expansion. It anticipates that the tariff regime, which also affects aluminum, would affect more than $3.2 billion of U.S. chemicals exports.
DowDuPont CEO James Fitterling earlier this year told Bloomberg that the tariffs could prompt his company to turn to Canada — or even shale rich Argentina — when deciding where to build its next major facility. The company completed a $6 billion expansion along the Gulf Coast last year, and Fitterling said the tariffs on steel would have added $300 million to the cost of construction.
Those added costs, combined with Canada’s latest incentives, will likely give our northern neighbor a leg up in a highly competitive industry.
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Canada-becomes-competitor-to-Gulf-Coast-13038607.php
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Jul 1, 2018 | DeSmog Blog
By Sharon Kelly
Fueled by fracking in the region, petrochemical and plastics projects in the Ohio River Valley are attracting tens of billions of dollars in investment, but as plans for this build-out hit the drawing boards, signs already are emerging that state regulators are unprepared for this next wave of industrialization. And the implications of their inexperience could mean major threats to the region's health and environment.
https://www.desmogblog.com/2018/07/01/state-regulators-struggle-keep-industry-pushes-multi-billion-dollar-fracked-petrochemical-projects
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Clean Fuel? Methane Leaks Threaten Natural Gas' Climate-Friendly Image
Jun 29, 2018 | Reuters
By Julie Gordon
Executives from natural gas companies call their increasingly cheap and plentiful fuel the world’s best answer to climate change: it produces about half the carbon dioxide of coal when burned in a power plant and it can fuel trucks, trains and ships.
While some outside the industry see natural gas as but a stepping stone to a future when all energy will be provided by wind, solar and other renewable sources, “This idea of natural gas as a transition fuel to renewables is strange,” Total SA chief executive Patrick Pouyanne said.
“Natural gas is a solution,” he said this week at the World Gas Conference in Washington, the industry’s biggest global summit.
But environmentalists, regulators, and many in the industry itself warn of a dirty underbelly to natural gas, or methane. Before it is burned, it is one of the most potent greenhouse gases and can reach the atmosphere through leaks in wellheads, compressor stations and chemicals plants.
A study published in the scientific journal Nature last week put methane emissions from the U.S. oil and gas industry at about 13 million metric tonnes per year, 60 percent higher than the official U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimate. Carbon dioxide emissions from U.S. energy sources, meanwhile, are around 5 billion tonnes.
The United States is the world’s top natural gas producer, one of its biggest crude oil producers, and a growing exporter of both thanks to improved drilling technology that has vastly increased output.
While methane emissions are relatively small compared to carbon dioxide, they are a major force in short-term global warming. Scientists say methane can trap more than 80 times more heat than carbon in the first 20 years after escaping into the atmosphere.
“Man-made methane emissions are responsible for 25 percent of the warming our planet is experiencing right now,” Mark Brownstein of the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) told Reuters. He added that the United States, as a top producer, has a responsibility to properly track emissions and reduce them.
President Donald Trump, however, has been seeking to roll back environmental rules to allow companies to rapidly boost output. Last year, his administration halted an Obama-era regulation that would have required drillers on federal land to curb methane leaks, calling it redundant.
The administration is “taking the industry backwards, and feeding into the narrative that fossil fuels are bad for the world,” said Fred Krupp, president of the EDF.
While some have challenged the methane study’s conclusions, energy executives at the triennial summit said industry should instead review them and learn.
“I do believe that we have to acknowledge this is an issue,” said Bernard Looney, chief executive of Upstream with BP Plc. “Gas will not win the argument that it needs to win if we don’t all put methane as an issue on the table.”
The stakes are high for the fast-growing industry. Global demand for liquefied natural gas (LNG) – a form of the fuel that can be transported globally by ship - has jumped 26.6 percent in the last five years, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
LNG demand is projected to rise another 6.6 percent this year and keep growing thanks to a rapid uptick in imports by China and other nations seeking to offset coal-fired power plants to reduce pollution.
“I see that there’s a very important role for gas in cleaning the energy mix,” said Rachel Kyte, chief executive of Sustainable Energy for All.
“But let’s not leave the room with the elephant still here, untouched. You have to plug that methane leak.”“NOT ROCKET SCIENCE”
The bulk of global methane leakage comes from flaring, where gas produced as a byproduct of crude oil drilling is burned off because there are no pipelines yet available to take it to market. A lot also leaks from old, inefficient facilities that need to be upgraded or replaced.
As a result of the leaks, about $2 billion worth of fuel vanishes into the air annually, according to the EDF.
Those financial losses are a spur for major oil and gas players to voluntarily take steps to reduce leaks.
Greg Guidry, Shell’s EVP of unconventionals, called voluntary action critical because: “If you just wait for regulation, there will be a hell of a lot more methane emitted in the meantime.”
Sara Ortwein, president of XTO Energy Inc, a natural gas subsidiary of Exxon Mobil, said work still must be done to make solutions more cost effective, and requirements for leak detection could be a “reasonable part of a sound regulation.”
Pratima Rangarajan, chief executive of OGCI Climate Investments, said global standards are needed in the longer term.
“What we need for scale is for everybody to do it because you have to, across the world and in every country,” she said.
For Brownstein, of the EDF, the solution is simple. Inexpensive monitoring equipment like infrared cameras and drones can slash methane emissions, along with operation changes.
“A lot of this is not rocket science,” he said.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-gas-conference-methane/clean-fuel-methane-leaks-threaten-natural-gas-climate-friendly-image-idUSKBN1JP27E
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BP, Chevron Pushing Gas as Fossil Fuel Answer to Global Warming
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Kevin Crowley, Rachel Adams-Heard and Naureen S. Malik
To reduce emissions and provide affordable electricity, the world needs to burn more fossil fuels, not less.
That’s the message being delivered by the world’s biggest energy companies at the World Gas Conference in Washington this week, where they championed natural gas as the fuel of the future, rather than one that simply bridges the gap toward renewables.
The world is facing the twin challenge of growing power supply—which Royal Dutch Shell Plc says needs to increase five times over the next 50 years—and reducing carbon dioxide emissions to meet climate change targets. Energy companies see gas doing double duty: It has half the carbon emissions of coal when used in power generation, is abundant and relatively cheap.
The “big challenge for us in the industry is helping people recognize gas as a destination fuel, not just a transition fuel,” BP Plc Chief Executive Officer Bob Dudley said during a panel discussion. “There’s another camp, a surprising camp, that is intent on discrediting gas as an option.”
It’s an argument that’s difficult to win with policy makers and the public, many of whom say that fossil fuels, including gas production facilities, are causing climate change and should be phased out, especially with wind, solar and battery technology making great strides in recent years. For all their product’s relatively lower carbon dioxide emissions, gas producers leak methane, a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
“Gas will not be a solution for poverty in a world where climate change is driving more people into poverty” if methane emissions continue, said Rachel Kyte, CEO of Sustainable Energy for All and a special representative of the United Nations secretary-general. “Let’s not leave the room with the elephant still untouched.”
Weak LinkEnergy companies recognize methane as the weak link in the argument that gas lowers greenhouse gas emissions and are participating in a number of technology-sharing and target-driven programs to address it.
“We face, because natural gas is part of fossil fuels, a sort of pushback from some groups,” said Patrick Pouyanne, CEO of Total SA. Fighting methane leaks “would be good for the whole industry to take that seriously if we want natural gas to find space for the future.”
Pouyanne criticized ConocoPhillips CEO Ryan Lance for not joining an industry coalition formed to fight methane leaks. “It’s important, we need to do it together,” he said. Lance responded by saying Conoco didn’t need to sign an agreement to fight something it had already been doing for a decade.
“I’m glad you’re reducing routine flaring Patrick because our company did a couple of years ago,” Lance said. “Hurry up and catch up.”
Emission LevelsU.S. emission levels are down to levels not seen since 1990 while those in the U.K. are at the lowest since the late 19th century due to gas replacing coal in power generation, according to BP’s Dudley.
The fuel also should be seen as a complement to renewable energy for when weather detracts from wind and solar power production, according to Shell Executive Vice President for Integrated Gas Ventures De la Rey Venter, echoing a widely-held view in the industry.
“If you really want to have a lot of renewables in your energy mix, you need to have a substantive gas backbone in the energy mix to enable that,” he said. “This notion of gas as the ultimate enabler of deep renewable penetration in an energy mix is very powerful.”
Chevron CEO Mike Wirth warned that a focus purely on renewables risks ignoring the needs of the developing world, where 1 billion people have no access to electricity. “Each of these people deserves access to reliable and affordable energy,” he said. Energy demand will rise 30 percent to 2040, boosted by rising populations, he said.
It’s a view shared by B.C. Tripathi, chairman of GAIL India Ltd., the biggest gas utility in India, where demand for energy is growing at almost 5 percent a year.
‘A Mainstay’“In the recent past we have seen people were sort of shying off the fossil fuel,” he said. “In spite of all the push and effort in renewables, gas is going to remain a mainstay, not only a transition fuel.”
Oil and gas producers clearly have a vested interest in championing their own products as the answer to the world’s energy needs. But their views and policies define how billions of people around the world live.
Rising renewable technologies potentially pose a threat to their businesses if they succeed in replacing fossil fuels, the mainstay of their earnings.
Investing in RenewablesPushed by consumers, governments and some shareholders, big energy companies, especially those in Europe, have been investing in renewables. BP said it plans to acquire the U.K.’s largest electric vehicle charging company, while Shell and Total have bought utilities.
Norway’s Equinor ASA links employee pay to cleaner energy production from the executive level down, among other metrics.
While Equinor will “remain an oil and gas company for the foreseeable future,” the company is “always pursuing new and tougher emissions targets” alongside profitability, Tor Martin Anfinnsen, executive vice president for marketing, midstream, and processing, said in an interview.
American giants Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron have said investments in renewable technology must compete, or at least grow to compete, commercially with their primary oil and gas businesses.
As policy makers grapple with the future of energy, companies are busy pushing the next big gas frontier.
Anadarko Petroleum Corp. announced at the conference it will make a final investment decision on its mega-project in Mozambique in the first half of next year, while Exxon and Eni SpA are pushing ahead with their plans nearby, showing that fossil fuels have a long future.
“While the future of energy will be cleaner, it won’t be simple,” Chevron’s Wirth said.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/bp-chevron-pushing-gas-as-fossil-fuel-answer-to-global-warming-1
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Powelson's Departure Means Fallout for Pipelines, Policies
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Ellen M. Gilmer, Rod Kuckro and Sam Mintz
Robert Powelson's decision to exit the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission less than a year into his term could leave natural gas pipeline developers in the lurch and policy critics scrambling for how to approach the commission's coming 2-2 partisan split.
That's the consensus among energy watchers weighing the impacts of Powelson's surprise announcement last week that he will depart FERC in mid-August. Chosen by President Trump in May 2017 to fill a Republican vacancy, Powelson will move on to become the top executive of the National Association of Water Companies, the lobby for private water utilities.
His departure will leave FERC with two Republicans — Chairman Kevin McIntyre and Commissioner Neil Chatterjee — and two Democrats — Commissioners Cheryl LaFleur and Richard Glick.
The two camps have been on opposite sides of several recent 3-2 decisions on pipelines. Powelson voted with his party.
A 2-2 split on issues could leave FERC powerless to move projects forward.
The split could influence how the commission handles an ongoing review of its pipeline permitting process, electric reliability issues, power pricing reforms and the White House's push for a federal fix to the decline of coal in electricity generation across the country.
Any schism may be exacerbated by the partisan 3-2 FERC decision issued late Friday that said state policies in PJM Interconnection — the nation's largest electricity market — are unjust. The majority's order for a fast-track overhaul of PJM's capacity market was met with stinging dissents by LaFleur and Glick (see related story).Pipeline permits
While Powelson's departure is expected to complicate the fate of gas pipelines, it remains unclear exactly how individual projects will fare.
Democrats Glick and LaFleur have made waves recently by issuing dissents and other criticisms of the Republican majority's failure to grapple with certain climate impacts associated with pipelines. The Democrats think FERC should analyze the greenhouse gas emissions associated with burning gas transported by approved projects; the Republicans think that's outside their jurisdiction (Energywire, June 5).
If the commission splits 2-2 on a pipeline application, it can't issue a final order.
"When you move to a four-member commission, any two commissioners can effectively block new pipelines from being certificated," said former FERC Commissioner Tony Clark, a Republican.
"So that's the clearest near-term impact," he added. "But how that plays out will depend on how the four that are still there respond to that. If everybody just digs in their heels and votes just as they have been, it's going to block pipeline certifications for some period of time."
But the votes won't necessarily split along those lines. While Glick has consistently dissented from major gas pipeline orders since he joined the commission, LaFleur's position is more complicated (Energywire, June 20).
She noted in a recent concurrence that although she disagrees with the majority's approach to greenhouse gas calculations, she will continue to vote in favor of projects she broadly considers to be in the public interest.
"Going forward, I intend to the best of my ability, to move beyond our disagreement on the Commission's approach, however important it may be, to consider whether a particular project is in the public interest," she wrote in a June order approving a compressor station expansion. "I will base this determination on the facts in the record — even ones overlooked by the majority — and the governing law as I read it."
One upcoming order LaFleur is expected to dissent on is FERC's rehearing decision on the Atlantic Coast pipeline.
She dissented from the certificate last October, questioning the route and market need. Opponents have since asked FERC to reconsider its approval of the Dominion Energy Inc. project.
But Powelson's departure might not mean much for the request's fate. FERC issued what's known as a tolling order in December, essentially buying itself more time to respond. That allows construction to move forward while keeping legal challenges at bay.
Carolyn Elefant, a lawyer who frequently represents pipeline challengers, noted that FERC might move to issue a final decision on any contentious rehearing requests like Atlantic Coast before Powelson leaves. But once FERC finalizes those decisions, it opens the door to inevitable legal challenges to the certificates.
Once FERC is down to four commissioners, it could simply sit on a request until it has the votes to issue a final order — delaying legal challenges.
"All we're waiting for on PennEast, for example, is for FERC to deny our rehearing request so that we can go to court and challenge that project," the Delaware Riverkeeper Network's Maya van Rossum said, referring to a proposed Pennsylvania-New Jersey pipeline. "FERC's strategy is not to respond to rehearing requests, to leave tolling orders in place."
On the other hand, Clark said, an extended vacancy could help FERC's Democrats push for compromise and get the commission to include expanded climate analysis in some pipeline reviews.
"Either the two dissenting commissioners decide to make their point but allow certifications to go through, because their point is really a fairly narrow one on that [greenhouse gas] issue," he said. "Or maybe the two Republicans compromise a little and say, 'We'll make some changes,' because of the bigger issue of the pipeline."
ClearView Energy Partners analyst Christi Tezak said it's unlikely an open seat on the commission will freeze big pipeline decisions. She noted that when a federal court required additional climate review for the Sabal Trail pipeline in the Southeast, FERC simply conducted straightforward supplemental analysis and reapproved the project in a matter of months.
"It puts [the climate positions] more in play, but I don't think it necessarily hits full stop," she said. "So we'll just have to see."Pipeline policy, DOE proposals
Powelson's departure could scramble the ongoing review of FERC's pipeline certificate policy statement, a 1999 document that governs FERC's approval of natural gas projects.
ClearView said in a research note that Powelson's departure would likely "complicate but not halt" FERC's review.
"If Powelson's seat remains vacant for an extended period of time, the absence of a third Republican vote could delay potential changes," the firm said.
For the comprehensive effort, FERC has been taking public comment on a variety of factors, including greenhouse gas emissions, need for projects and eminent domain.
Environmental groups and activists, many of whom are critical of FERC and its regular approval of pipelines, said they would be paying close attention.
"Given that we have this potentially important shift in the balance of power, we now need to refocus on the Senate," van Rossum, of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, said in an interview.
"The determining factor is going to be whether or not the Senate this time around gets a backbone and does not just crumble and automatically appoint whatever nominee Trump puts up," she said.
Mary Anne Hitt, senior director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal campaign, said her group "stands ready to fight for a better replacement that will help fix FERC by showing a real commitment to public participation and protecting the public interest."
Any extended vacancy could also weigh heavily on the Trump administration's various proposals to use national security as a rationale for taking measures to keep open struggling coal and nuclear plants.
If the Department of Energy uses emergency authority under the Federal Power Act to order grid operators to pay certain power plants to keep operating, FERC could have a role in setting prices if the operators aren't able to agree on rates with the generators.
A split majority could complicate that effort, with two Democrats on the commission who are steadfastly opposed to subsidizing those plants out of market.Who will replace Powelson?
Attention will now turn to the White House and then the Senate, which will have to squeeze consideration of a new nominee into an already-packed summer and fall, if possible.
Senate Democrats' concerns about the confirmation process for a nominee to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy on the Supreme Court could stymie consideration of other administration nominees.
Powelson is the only member of FERC with experience as a state regulator. He was a member of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, where he was chairman for more than four years. He was also president of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.
Since 1990, 12 of the 23 FERC members have had experience as a state regulator.
One was Clark, who served on FERC for more than four years from 2012 to 2016 after serving for 11 years as a member of the North Dakota Public Service Commission.
"I think there's probably going to be a pretty strong push to have a state commissioner nominated. That doesn't mean the White House has to take advice," he said.
"In recent memory FERC has almost always had a state commissioner or two on it," he continued. "And the reason for it is that in the electricity space the jurisdictional issues are so intertwined between state and federal. There's still a very strong state jurisdictional presence in the electricity industry."
Brandon Presley, chairman of the Mississippi Public Service Commission, said he would encourage the White House and Mississippi's senators to appoint someone from a state-level position. "States get trampled on at every level of federal government," he said. "The only ways states have a voice at times is that if they have one of their own sitting there with state experience, real live experience."
He added, "We don't need any more Washington bureaucrats in these jobs."
But Lauren "Bubba" McDonald, chairman of Georgia Public Service Commission, differs.
"The issues that come before FERC are very technical," he said. "I think the [state] utility experience is certainly valuable, but I don't think that it's an absolute necessity. Business experience is valuable. If you have business experience before you become a utility regulator, you gain more in the regulatory environment."
Any choice to replace Powelson could take a while. Nominees are vetted by the White House and go through a slew of background checks and consultations with Congress.
Powelson — who was viewed as eminently qualified — still took three months between nomination by Trump and Senate confirmation.
A complicating factor, said Joseph Hall, a partner with Eversheds Sutherland, is the November elections.
"FERC was always a sleepy little rate agency," he said. "It is interesting to see how FERC has become politicized. That's a natural consequence of what it's doing now.
"Unless they get somebody in there fast, which I suspect is unlikely, it will really depend on what happens in November," Hall said, referring to midterm congressional elections.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/07/02/stories/1060087469
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EPA Says No Need to Require Upwind States to Control Emissions
Jun 29, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
The EPA said June 29 it has no obligation to require additional controls at power plants in five upwind states to reduce smog-forming pollutants hindering downwind states from meeting federal air quality standards.
The Environmental Protection Agency said its latest data and modeling show that all areas of the eastern U.S. will meet federal air quality requirements by by 2023.
As a result, the EPA is proposing that the 20 states covered by its Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, an air pollution trading program designed to address interstate transport of pollution, won’t need to submit plans setting additional controls to meet 2008 standards to address problems with transported ozone-forming pollution, such as nitrogen oxides.
The agency was ordered by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York to respond to petitions by Connecticut and New York by June 29. The EPA was required by the court to come up with a proposed federal plan to address the transport of ozone-forming pollutants that blow into downwind states from power plants in Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia. A final action is due Dec. 6.Both Connecticut and New York haven’t been able to meet the 2008 national ozone standards because of out-of-state emissions.
Power plants are the largest sources of nitrogen oxides, a precursor to ozone. Ozone causes a variety of health problems, especially for children, the elderly, and people with asthma.
The EPA’s proposal is backed by the power utility sector, particularly First Energy Corp. and Ohio Valley Electric Corp.
Maryland singled out Ohio Valley Electric Co.'s Kyger Creek Generating Station as well as First Energy’s Pleasants Power Station in West Virginia and Bruce Mansfield Power Station in Pennsylvania as examples of the many power plants preventing the state from meeting the 2008 ozone standards of 75 parts per billion.
Both Ohio Valley Electric and First Energy told Bloomberg Environment their plants are fully compliant with all applicable federal and state requirements for nitrogen oxides, which react with volatile organic compounds in sunlight to form ground-level ozone.
“First Energy has long held the belief that additional limitations on nitrogen oxides are unnecessary, and the company’s power plants are not significantly impacting the air quality of states like Maryland,” Jennifer Young, the utility’s spokeswoman told Bloomberg Environment, adding, “The EPA’s findings confirm that belief.”
Likewise, Ohio Valley Electric is supportive of the EPA’s proposed rule, Michael Brown, the utility’s environmental safety and health director, told Bloomberg Environment.
Connecticut DisappointedConnecticut, which asked the EPA to tackle power plant emissions from Talen Energy’s Brunner Island power plant in Pennsylvania, was disappointed with the proposal, but not surprised, Richard Pirolli, planning and standards director at the Connecticut Bureau of Air Management, told Bloomberg Environment.
Pirolli noted that the federal agency had to rely on modeling from October 2017 because the court-mandated timelines didn’t allow it to do additional analysis,
.
“We are disappointed with the outcome because it further delays clean air in Connecticut, and puts the burden squarely for local reductions on the state, and whatever we can do won’t be good enough to bring us into attainment with the 2008 standard,” Pirolli said.Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection is still reviewing the proposal.
Summer Ozone Season Heats UpPaul Miller, deputy director and chief scientist for the Northeast States for Coordinated Air Use Management—a nonprofit association of air-quality agencies that includes New York and Connecticut—said he wasn’t surprised by the EPA’s proposal.
“It appears to be what I had speculated—no additional requirements beyond” the last Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, Miller told Bloomberg Environment.
Miller said the timing of the rule couldn’t be any worse as the region is expecting high ozone level days this weekend into next week with concentrations on the Connecticut shoreline of the Long Island Sound exceeding 85 parts per billion.
“Ozone trends in the New York City region and downwind are not trending downwards in recent years, despite what EPA’s modeling projects, and there aren’t any major control programs coming into place that one would expect to push down that flat trajectory,” Miller said.
A number of northeast states, which experience high ozone level days in the summer, petitioned the EPA to address pollution transport from upwind states. The EPA already has denied Connecticut’s petition, and is proposing to do the same with Maryland’s petition and those filed by Delaware.
Sen. Thomas Carper (D-Del.) decried the EPA’s action, saying it is contrary to EPA’s mission to protect public health.
“Once again, Administrator [Scott] Pruitt turns his back on downwind states like Delaware by denying them the ability to reduce air pollution from power plants in upwind states,” Carper told Bloomberg Environment. “Once again, Mr. Pruitt proves that his talk of ‘cooperative federalism’ means absolutely nothing.”
The EPA has said it will hold a public hearing Aug. 1 on its proposal. Pirolli said Connecticut plans to provide the comment that, “We have been left holding the bag on attainment.”
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/epa-says-no-need-to-require-upwind-states-to-control-emissions-2-3
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Alaska Solicits Funds to Advance LNG Megaproject
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Margaret Kriz Hobson
Alaska is looking for money to advance preliminary work on its proposed $43 billion natural gas export project designed to commercialize the state's 34 trillion cubic feet of stranded North Slope gas.
The Alaska Gasline Development Corp., a state-owned company that's managing the Alaska LNG project, anticipates raising $600 million to $800 million through an initial equity offering, which is expected to be released before the end of the year.
Those funds would be used in part to pay for advanced engineering and other planning work prior to AGDC's final investment decision next year on the massive infrastructure project. The money would also be earmarked for securing the necessary pipe, compressors and other long-lead equipment needed to build the project.
The first round of equity offerings is expected to target institutional investors and private equity sources. Beyond that, AGDC is planning additional equity offerings to help fund full-scale development of the Alaska LNG project.
However, AGDC won't be able to accept any funds from investors until the Alaska Legislature grants the state corporation the legal right to raise outside cash, known as "receipt authority."
During this year's legislative session, Alaska Gov. Bill Walker (I) lobbied state lawmakers to give the gas line agency that authority for fiscal 2018 and 2019. But in May, the language was dropped from the final budget bill.
AGDC didn't seek additional state funding in the last session for the megaproject. As a result, the agency had roughly $50 million to start the 2019 state fiscal year, which began yesterday. That's enough to move forward with its commercial and financial plans, and to work with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to develop an environmental impact statement on the project, according to agency officials.
The Alaska LNG venture, one of the nation's largest energy projects ever, would include a gas processing plant on the North Slope, an 800-mile, 42-inch diameter gas pipeline running down the center of the state, off-take points for Alaska communities, and a liquefaction plant and export terminal designed to produce up to 20 million metric tons of LNG each year.
AGDC plans to begin construction on the megaproject in 2019 and to ship gas beginning in the 2024-25 time frame.
The upcoming equity offering is being developed by Bank of China Ltd. and Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC, which were hired by AGDC in March to serve as global capital coordinators for the gas project.
The offering comes as AGDC is accelerating negotiations with three Chinese companies that have tentatively agreed to fund 75 percent of the $43 billion project in return for access to much of the state's gas.
That nonbinding joint development agreement gives Alaska and the Chinese companies until the end of this year to reach a final pact on the project. But Alaska officials say the two sides are fast-tracking work on the project (Energywire, June 28).
While negotiating the funding plans with the Chinese companies, AGDC has also negotiated nonbinding memorandums of understanding to sell natural gas to energy companies in Japan, South Korea and Vietnam, as well as 10 other interested parties that have asked AGDC not to disclose their names.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/07/02/stories/1060087471
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Enbridge's Controversial Oil Pipeline Replacement Approved by Minnesota Regulators
Jun 29, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Gordon Jaremko
Enbridge Inc. set a second half 2019 target for completing the replacement of its aging Line 3 oil export pipeline after winning a hotly contested approval on Thursday from the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission.
The construction budget survived “materially unchanged” at C$5.3 billion in Canada and US$2.9 billion in the United States because the commission only ordered minor modifications to the preferred route, Enbridge said.
Replacing the line’s 50-year-old pipe will restore deliveries to the original level of 760,000 b/d, after running at about half capacity since 2010 due to safety restrictions.
Construction is well advanced everywhere along the 1,660-kilometer (1,031-mile) route across western Canada and the northern U.S. except in Minnesota, where the project aroused a storm of native and environmental protest. The approval triggered immediate threats of lawsuits and protest demonstrations.
The Line 3 replacement is a 370,000 b/d gain in export capacity for the widely vilified Alberta oilsands, where thermal extraction projects stand out as Canada’s biggest and fastest-growing natural gas user.
“Replacing Line 3 is first and foremost about the safety and integrity of this critical energy infrastructure,” Enbridge president Al Monaco said. “This project will also help ensure Minnesota and area refineries reliably receive the crude oil supply they need for the benefit of all Minnesotans and the surrounding region.”
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/114892-enbridges-controversial-oil-pipeline-replacement-approved-by-minnesota-regulators
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(ACC Mentioned) Avoid Safety Pitfalls During Plant Expansion and Modification
Jul 1, 2018 | ChemEngOnline
By Bill Wasilewski
In 2015, construction in the chemical process industries (CPI) soared. Capital spending surged 18.4% and 255 new chemical production projects were announced, according to the American Chemistry Council (ACC) [1]. Since that year, the market has backtracked due, in part, to falling natural gas prices. However, capital spending still increased by 6% in 2017 according to the ACC [2]. That means some projects are moving forward. As CPI plant operators consider how to proceed in the coming years, many may opt to increase capacity or yield, or to add new product streams through the use of more modest expansions or upgrades to existing plants, rather than new construction. Plant expansions and renovations can be an effective way to increase capacity without incurring the higher costs associated with grassroots construction.
To make such site improvements as successful and cost-effective as possible, they must be executed carefully, with special attention paid to process engineering and plant safety considerations. Even seemingly minor upgrades can create safety issues if not executed properly. Meanwhile, larger projects may require significant changes to plant layouts and complex engineering adjustments that can make them as challenging from a safety standpoint as greenfield construction.
One of the most famous and unfortunate examples of a plant modification leading to a safety disaster happened in 1974 at a chemical processing plant in Flixborough, U.K. Twenty-eight workers were killed and 36 others were injured in an explosion that was traced back to a modification made two months prior. A leak in one of the plant’s reactors had been discovered. To avoid a plant shutdown, engineers installed a temporary pipe intended to bypass the leaking reactor until it was repaired.
A later investigation found that both the pipe that was used and the installation process were substandard. The project was hastily executed without proper consideration for the overall engineering implications. The incident sent shockwaves through the international chemical engineering community, and it led to significant regulatory reforms across Europe, and broader initiatives around the world, focused on improving process safety.
Some of the underlying factors that led to the Flixborough disaster are still a risk today. There will always be pressures on plants to remain efficient and profitable. Communication between contractors and plant operators must always be managed carefully. Despite the numerous process improvements that have been made in the 40 years since this disaster, human error is possible in any complex process.
The engineering upgrade that led to the Flixborough disaster was not a massive expansion of a plant with many moving parts. Rather, the project involved just a single, specific change to one aspect of operations. Today, larger, more complex modifications carry even more risks. To mitigate risk and reduce the incidence of serious hazards, it is critical to examine and understand some of the most common pitfalls that can lead to major accidents at chemical process plants.
KEY SYSTEMS
While managing risk in a plant is complex and involves many moving parts, the equipment systems discussed below are key areas that should be considered most carefully during expansion and modification projects.
Relief-valve systems. Relief valves are essential to maintaining plant safety and avoiding potentially devastating accidents. Unfortunately, proper implementation, and the safe use and functionality of safety valves are sometimes misunderstood or overlooked by plant operators.
When plants expand, the additional throughput capacity that must be handled by the relief valves in the facility usually pushes the limits of the original design. To compensate, plant operators may need to change out old valves for new ones. In some cases, a valve change is not enough. If a new valve is installed within the same inlet or outlet piping size and configuration, it can create a bottleneck around the new device. Additionally, the relief-collection header system may be inadequate for the new higher pressure levels likely to be encountered. A thorough review of the entire plant is necessary to determine exactly what needs to be replaced and how it should be done.
Some firms may overlook specific relief-valve systems that are not in the immediate vicinity of the new construction. In reality, relief-valve systems in one area of a plant may be impacted by a new piece of equipment hundreds of yards away. If any single relief valve is not adequate or does not meet proper specifications it could lead to a complete disaster.
On occasion, plant operators also overestimate the capabilities of a particular piece of equipment. For instance, a boiler might be capable of handling an increased amount of pressure as the result of a new project. But there may be piping or valves attached to that boiler that are not able to handle the increased pressure.
A complete audit of relief-valve systems should be a part of any plant modification, expansion or update. It is critical that plant operators partner with contractors to ensure that no part of this process is overlooked or rushed. Problems with relief valves can be one of the most devastating and dangerous problems a chemical process plant can face.
Piping and pipe racks. In addition to relief valves, piping should be thoroughly assessed and reviewed during any type of plant modification or expansion. In a mature plant, pipe racks often have little or no space for expansion. These limitations should be identified early in the planning process so that there are no unexpected costs for rack expansions. It’s also not uncommon during modifications to discover that pipe racks are overloaded beyond their design rating. This poses serious safety risks that could lead to potential explosions. That’s why it is always more prudent to add additional pipes to increase flow.
Another potential hazard is the presence of “dead-leg” pipes. These pipes are disconnected from the plant’s process and are left behind from previous maintenance work or plant fixes. Dead-leg pipes take up unnecessary space on a pipe rack, but more importantly, they pose a safety risk. Stagnant liquids left in dead-leg pipes can lead to pipe corrosion or rupture if the liquid freezes.
Many plants have dead-leg pipes that have not been part of the active process for years. As dead legs increase in number, the risk to the plant multiplies with them. When dealing with hazardous chemicals, small amounts of pooling liquid in dead legs can lead to major ruptures or leaks. Plants should have regular programs in place to inspect piping. While there are scenarios where it may make sense for a dead-leg to remain, unnecessary dead-legs should be removed during plant expansions and modifications.
If there is a change in plant processes during construction, it could require further changes in the piping. For instance, new chemicals may require different piping materials. A process change may also require new gaskets or elastomers.
Piping and pipe racks are everywhere in chemical process plants. It only takes a problem arising in one of those pipes for a safety incident to occur. That’s why a thorough inspection of pipes and pipe racks is necessary as part of any expansion or modification.
Access and confined-space issues. Adding new pieces of equipment or building new areas onto an existing plant can have a significant impact on plant layout. Large vessels installed to increase output, can also create new hazards. Placement of new equipment may create unsafe confined spaces or limit access to critical infrastructure. While a certain number of confined spaces in a CPI plant may be unavoidable, designs should try to minimize them as much as possible.
During construction, there are often temporary installations that restrict access to certain areas of the plant. Any additional equipment that is necessary to complete a project — such as scaffolding — should be placed carefully to ensure that it does not restrict key access areas.
Even under the best of circumstances, confined spaces are extremely dangerous. Potential safety hazards associated with confined spaces include the ignition of flammable liquids or gases, asphyxiation and exposure to hazardous chemicals [ 3].
The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Admin. (OSHA) has strict standards for confined-space safety. Workers are not allowed to enter confined spaces unless they have proper training and specific equipment. But despite these safety standards, accidents happen with troubling regularity. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that on average there are 92 fatal injuries in confined spaces every year.
Appropriate labeling (especially for chemicals and piping). Having proper equipment labeling and documentation is the easiest and the least costly way to improve safety. It is also one of the most overlooked. According to OSHA, hazard communication is the second-most-cited safety violation for businesses, behind fall protection [ 4]. Last year, OSHA began requiring all chemical-hazard labels to adhere to the Globally Harmonized System established by the United Nations. This system was designed to be universally understandable.
While OSHA has made great strides in the area of chemical labeling, it does not mandate every type of labeling in a plant. Particularly when it comes to piping, the responsibility for labeling falls solely on the plant operator. While there are no specific OSHA requirements for pipe labeling, OSHA does recommend the ANSI/ASME A13.1 pipe-marking standard [ 5].
Even though OSHA does not have strict requirements, plants should follow a prudent approach — those that don’t label pipes do so at their own peril. New construction ofen changes equipment processes and therefore labels should always be updated to reflect changes, so there is no confusion.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
When a plant adds new features, installs new capital-intensive equipment or expands production capacity, it is an exciting time for plant operators, workers and the community. It means increased revenue for the company, jobs for workers, and economic development for local communities. While plant operators want to be efficient with their capital spending, many of the potential pitfalls discussed here are not costly to investigate and correct. Plant operators should find engineering, design and construction partners that are committed to thoroughly evaluating all of these areas to ensure that their investments are protected and are not put in peril. n
http://www.chemengonline.com/avoid-safety-pitfalls-plant-expansion-modification/
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Jul 1, 2018 | Honolulu Star-Advertiser
By Elaine S. Povich
Hard on the heels of banning plastic bags, states and cities are being pressed by environmentalists to eliminate another consumer convenience — plastic straws. But objections from the plastics industry, restaurants and disability advocates have derailed or delayed some proposed straw bans.
And experts say cutting down on single-use plastic may be more about changing habits than changing laws.
Three states — California, Hawaii and New York — have considered plastic straw legislation in 2018. Hawaii’s died, and the other two are still pending.
Seattle, Miami Beach, Oakland and more than a dozen other cities, about half of them in California, have either banned plastic straws altogether or required customers who want a straw to ask for it. New York City is also considering a ban.
The bans are not frivolous, as plastic has been found in fish, in the bellies of seabirds and in fresh drinking water as well. A viral video of scientists removing a straw from a sea turtle’s nostril has inflamed passions too. But at least one expert in the field of “marine plastic” suggests plastic straw bans may not make much of a dent in the problem.
Straws are an easy target for environmental change, though, because they’re considered nonessential. Kara Lavender Law, a research professor of oceanography at the Sea Education Association in Woods Hole, Mass., said there’s plenty of evidence that throwaway plastics are getting into the ocean, as cleanup efforts find lots of straws, bottles, bags and food wrappers.
The world’s largest accumulation of trash, dubbed the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” is now more than 600,000 square miles, according to a study in the journal Nature.
“Bans on straws are perceived as sort of low-hanging fruit, unnecessary items,” Law said. “Whether a ban is the right way to approach it is arguable. I’m not sure it’s the way we are going to solve the problem, but it’s an indication of the public will and the political will.”
Law and several others wrote a 2017 research paper on plastics for the journal Science Advances, estimating that since the 1960s when consumer plastics started being widely used, approximately 6,300 million metric tons of plastic waste has been generated worldwide. Only 9 percent of that has been recycled, 12 percent incinerated, and the rest of it dumped in landfills or directly into the environment.
Hawaii seemed like a logical target for plastic straw bans this year. The state depends on beaches and tourism and touts its pristine coasts, hardly a place where anyone would want to see discarded straws scattered about.
A bill to ban distribution and sale of plastic straws was introduced in January by state Sen. Mike Gabbard, a Democrat, and the legislation sailed through the Agriculture and Environment Committee, which he chairs. It failed to clear the Judiciary and Ways and Means committees, where it was cross-referred.
Objections came from the Hawaii Food Industry Association, the Hawaii Restaurant Association, the Retail Merchants Association and the American Chemistry Council, all of which presented testimony in hearings about the bill.
“We all need to get better at reducing waste and educating the general public in proper disposal of trash, but this bill is not the solution,” the restaurant group’s statement read. “The alternate for plastic straws whether it’s paper or reusable is really not that available. Is the next step banning all disposable utensils?”
Environmental groups such as StrawFree, a Southern California group that is pushing reusable straws made from bamboo, say yes. They note that reusable water bottles are becoming a popular alternative to plastic and suggest that reusable utensils could become popular as well.
The American Chemistry Council also opposes plastic straw bans and recently suggested that an “opt-in” plan, under which diners must ask for a straw, is a better solution.
“Recycling, source reduction, recovery, and conservation are all tools to help reduce litter/disposal,” senior director Tim Shestek said in an email. “In this particular instance, we think an ‘on demand’ approach makes the most sense.”
Private companies are getting into the act, too. Bon Appetit, a chain of a thousand eateries, recently announced it would ban plastic straws. But McDonald’s stockholders voted down a proposal backed by the consumer watchdog group SumOfUs calling for the company to make efforts to “develop and implement substitutes for plastic straws.”
McDonald’s uses 95 million straws a day in the United States, according to the watchdog group. In opposing the proposal, McDonald’s said it continues to look for “sustainable alternatives for plastic straws globally.” In fact, it is phasing in paper straws in the United Kingdom after the U.K. banned plastic straws.
But McDonald’s urged a “no” vote in the United States, saying in a statement that the proposal was “unnecessary, redundant as to the Company’s current practices and initiatives, and has the potential for a diversion of resources with no corresponding benefit to the Company, our customers and our shareholders.”
Gabbard, the sponsor of the Hawaii plastic straw ban, said he intends to bring the bill up again in 2019. He thinks strong environmental support may help build more momentum this time. “Opt-in could be considered as a compromise, but my goal at this point would be to go for the ban,” he said. “Although we may have the opt-in as a last resort.”
The New York City plastic straw ban bill, introduced by Democratic Councilman Rafael Espinal of Brooklyn, had its first hearing in June, picking up support from Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration. In an op-ed for the New York Daily News, Espinal and colleagues noted that at least 65 restaurants in the city have signed on to a campaign to do away with plastic straws.
“As New Yorkers, we see the impact of our fast-paced lifestyle in the plastic waste that litters the avenues and subway tracks that crisscross our great city, making its way into waterways and the bellies of turtles, fish and birds in our local seascape,” Espinal wrote. “Plastic straws are a great place to begin turning that trend around.”
Many disability advocates oppose straw bans, noting that alternatives such as paper straws and reusable straws may not work as well for disabled people.
Jessica Denise Grono, of Phoenixville, Pa., who has cerebral palsy and who blogs as “CP Mommy,” said in an email interview that without a straw, “I’d be forced to have someone pour a drink in my mouth. Only half would go in. A straw gives me a less messy and independent way to drink.” She said she’s not opposed to the opt-in proposals.
In California, the opt-in already has become the fallback position for advocates of a statewide plastic straw ban. Unlike some of the city ordinances, the bill in the Legislature would provide for straws only on request in sit-down restaurants. It would not apply to takeout-only restaurants, meaning those eateries could continue to hand out straws to all customers.
The bill passed the Assembly in May and was headed for the Senate. It follows in the wake of California banning plastic retail bags in 2014, which was upheld by statewide referendum in 2016.
“I’m not trying to get rid of plastic straws,” insisted Majority Leader Ian Calderon, a Democrat and sponsor of the bill who said he grew up surfing in the Pacific and saw plastic debris there every day.
“I want to help us be a little more responsible with single-use plastics. I want to raise awareness to make sure people are aware of the detrimental effects on our environment.”
http://www.staradvertiser.com/2018/07/01/breaking-news/proposed-bans-on-plastic-straws-run-into-resistance-in-hawaii-dozens-of-u-s-cities/
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EPA Proposes Using CSAPR to Meet 'Good Neighbor' Obligations
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Sean Reilly
EPA is proposing to rely on the latest version of its interstate air pollution rule to satisfy "good neighbor" requirements for its 2008 ground-level ozone standard, under a draft determinationreleased this afternoon.
Instead of imposing additional "top-down" regulations, the agency would use the 2016 Cross-State Air Pollution Rule update, which is geared to reducing emissions of nitrogen oxides from coal-fired power plants in 22 states mainly in the eastern United States, according to a news release.
"Starting this year, we expect states to step up to address these interstate obligations and EPA has identified technical tools and flexibilities to facilitate these plans," agency air chief Bill Wehrum said in the release.
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt signed the draft determination today in accordance with a court-ordered deadline. The order came in response to a lawsuit brought by Connecticut and New York alleging that federal regulators were illegally overdue in addressing ozone-forming emissions from other states (E&E News PM, June 13).
That upwind pollution was undercutting efforts to bring the New York City metropolitan area into compliance with the 2008 standard of 75 parts per billion, the suit alleged.
Ozone, the main ingredient in smog, is formed by the reaction of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds in sunlight. The proposed determination will be the subject of an Aug. 1 public hearing, accompanied by an Aug. 31 deadline for written comments. Under the court order, EPA must make a final determination by early December.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2018/06/29/stories/1060087447
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EPA Interstate Finding Prompts Questions On Meeting 2015 Ozone NAAQS
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA's proposed finding that its existing Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) satisfies states' Clean Air Act “good neighbor” mandate to cut interstate transport of air pollution for the 2008 ozone standard is prompting questions on what steps the agency might take to help states meet the stricter mandate for the 2015 ozone standard.
While the June 29 finding applies only to the 2008 national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) of 75 parts per billion (ppb), it has implications for the more-stringent 2015 NAAQS of 70 ppb because the agency is signaling it will not pursue another sweeping federal program like CSAPR, which ultimately created a cap-and-trade ozone reduction program for 22 states. Instead, the agency is indicating that the onus will be on states to curb interstate pollution.
The finding is a set-back for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states in the Ozone Transport Commission (OTC) that had been looking to EPA to craft a broad federal ozone reduction program in order to help them reduce ozone levels in upwind states, which the OTC states say is vital for them to attain the 2015 NAAQS.
And it follows the agency's recent decision to propose rejecting Clean Air Act petitions from two OTC states seeking direct EPA regulation of specific ozone industrial sources in upwind states.
EPA air policy chief William Wehrum has previously said his preference is for states to craft their own state implementation plans (SIPs) to mitigate interstate ozone problems, rather than for EPA to issue another trading rule. Those SIPs, required under the air law, are due this October for the 2015 ozone NAAQS.
In a June 29 statement on the proposed good neighbor finding, Wehrum said, “Starting this year, we expect states to step up to address these interstate obligations and EPA has identified technical tools and flexibilities to facilitate these plans.”
The agency's determination, issued under a court-ordered deadline, finds that 20 eastern states covered by the CSAPR nitrogen oxides (NOx) trading program for power plants will attain EPA's 2008 ozone NAAQS of 75 parts per billion (ppb) by 2023. States to which the finding applies are: Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
Therefore, no additional emissions reductions are required by the 20 states in order to meet the good neighbor obligation, which requires upwind states to mitigate their air emissions that “significantly” contribute to problems attaining or maintaining NAAQS in their downwind neighbors, EPA concludes. The agency will take comment on the determination until Aug. 31, and plans a public hearing in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 1.
EPA says it will address the interstate emissions obligations of Kentucky in an imminent separate forthcoming action. EPA has already found that CSAPR has eliminated interstate air pollution contribution by Tennessee.
Emissions Modeling
For the good neighbor finding, EPA's computer modeling suggests several states within the CSAPR trading program will have areas in “nonattainment” of the 2015 NAAQS in 2023. States with areas just exceeding the standard are classified as “marginal” nonattainment and have three years to attain. EPA designated most such areas earlier this year and will complete designations this summer. Attainment deadlines will therefore fall in 2021.
The New York nonattainment area, which includes counties in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, is classified in more-serious “moderate” nonattainment, with an attainment deadline of 2024. New York and Connecticut would have counties in nonattainment of the 2015 standard in 2023, along with Maryland and upwind states Wisconsin and Texas, according to EPA's modeling.
It is unclear if all states required to submit good neighbor SIPs in October will do so. Should they fail to submit, or if they submit inadequate plans, EPA must issue findings to determine this and ultimately issue its own federal implementation plans (FIPs), should the states not produce their own plans of sufficient quality.
But without a trading program like the Obama administration's CSAPR, EPA would be forced to write individual plans for each state to tackle the highly complex interstate transport problem.
The 2011 CSAPR, as updated in 2016, seeks to help states meet the 2008 standard, while the original sought to ensure compliance with the weaker 1997 limit expressed as 84 ppb. But the 2016 update rule never ensured full attainment of the 2008 NAAQS, a key flaw that states led by New York have used in litigation to force EPA action on missing or inadequate SIPs from upwind states to fully address interstate emissions.
Also, several East Coast states including Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland and New York have filed petitions for direct EPA regulation of NOx-emitting sources in multiple upwind states under air law section 126. The petitions rely, in part, on EPA's own prior assessment that CSAPR was only a partial remedy to interstate air pollution. EPA has denied or proposed to deny several of these petitions.
By concluding that the CSAPR-area states have met their good neighbor obligations, EPA removes its own obligation to issue FIPs for those states to ensure full compliance with the 2008 ozone NAAQS. That would seem to satisfy the June 12 order of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in State of New York. et al. v. Pruitt, et al., which directed EPA to propose FIPs by June 29 for Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. The court ordered EPA to issue final FIPs by Dec. 6.
East Coast states have previously expressed skepticism over EPA's projections of attainment by 2023, with some air regulators warning they are too optimistic.
But even if EPA's projections are correct, there appears to be an obvious flaw in the agency's reasoning that critics might test in court. Nonattainment zones in the CSAPR area have attainment dates in advance of 2023, some in July this year, EPA says. Therefore, East Coast states could argue that EPA's determination does not absolve upwind states or EPA of the duty to mitigate ozone pollution with respect to the 2008 standard.
EPA justifies the reliance on attainment by 2023 based on how long it estimates states would need to introduce new pollution controls under good neighbor SIPs. “Considering the EPA’s conclusion that four years is an expeditious timeframe for implementation of any of the control strategies considered herein, compliance is likely not feasible until the 2023 ozone season,” the agency says.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-interstate-finding-prompts-questions-meeting-2015-ozone-naaqs
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Study Finds GHGs 'Far' From Obama's Paris Target
Jun 29, 2018 | Inside EPA
A new analysis shows the United States is on track to significantly miss the Obama administration's Paris Agreement target of reducing greenhouse gases by at least 26 percent by 2025, and that emissions could begin rising again late in the next decade after years of declines.
The June 28 analysis by the Rhodium Group is the latest effort to track how the Trump administration's efforts to roll back virtually all Obama-era climate rules will effect GHG levels.
While Trump officials have had “mixed success” in weakening climate policies for the power and transportation sectors, the report finds that market forces such as cheap natural gas and falling prices for renewables could -- paradoxically -- lead to GHG increases if they force closures of zero-carbon nuclear plants.
Overall, the analysis finds that national emissions could fall between 12-20 percent below 2005 levels in 2025, a “far cry” from Obama's Paris pledge of a 26-28 percent cut in that same timeframe.
Further, it finds that emissions could begin to edge higher closer to 2030, which would be even further from what is “required to be on track to meeting long-term U.S. emission reduction objectives.”
The wide range of estimates reflects uncertainty regarding national climate policies, how much emissions would be sequestered in forests and the land sector, and the “long-term viability of today's low-carbon energy trends.”
One interesting finding is that while 11 gigawatts (GW) of nuclear plants have announced retirement through 2030, the actual closures could total 23 GW by 2025, stemming from many of the same forces that have driven out coal plants -- low power demand, falling renewables prices and consistently cheap natural gas.
“After 2025, emissions begin to rebound due to additional nuclear retirements,” the report says, while adding that if federal or state regulators act to prevent some or all of the nuclear retirements, emissions could be lower than the projections.
Of note, Rhodium finds that power sector GHGs will be 37 percent below 2005 levels in 2025, which is substantially lower than what was required by the Obama EPA's Clean Power Plan utility GHG rule, which the Trump EPA is trying to replace with a far weaker version. The original regulation would have required a 32 percent cut by 2030.
Regarding transportation, Rhodium's baseline scenario assumes a 14 percent cut in emissions in 2025, though the sector would still be the largest emitting sector.
However, if EPA and Transportation Department officials implement a “full freeze” of vehicle fuel economy and GHG standards -- as they are reportedly preparing to propose -- emissions would fall only 13.3 percent. That figure also assumes that California and an allied group of a dozen other states continue to implement the current standards.
Even so, Rhodium finds decreasing battery costs will result in plug-in vehicles being 6 percent of the fleet in 2030.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/study-finds-ghgs-far-obamas-paris-target
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Trump Administration Looks to Boost Case to Repeal Obama Water Rule
Jun 29, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The Trump administration acted Friday to try to bolster its case to repeal the Obama administration’s controversial water pollution regulation.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers, which administer the Clean Water Act together, first proposed in July 2017 to repeal former President Obama’s Clean Water Rule.
Those agencies put out a “supplemental” notice Friday in which they double down on their previous assertions that the 2015 regulation created significant “uncertainty” and is incompatible with the law and Supreme Court precedent.
The Friday notice also seeks to clarify that the EPA and Army Corps are proposing to repeal the rule in its entirety, despite a separate action they later took to delay the implementation date of the rule.
The rule at issue, also dubbed Waters of the United States (WOTUS) was written by the Obama administration to clarify that the federal government has the power to protect small waterways like ponds and wetlands from pollution. Opponents, like EPA head Scott Pruitt, argue that it gives the government power over too much land.
“By issuing today’s supplemental proposal, we are responding to public feedback, expanding opportunities for comment, and providing clarity and transparency in the rulemaking process,” Pruitt said in a statement.
“We are making it clear that we are proposing to permanently and completely repeal the 2015 WOTUS rule and keep the pre-2015 regulatory framework in place as we work on a new, improved WOTUS definition.”
The July 2017 proposal asserted that repealing the Obama rule “will provide continuity and certainty for regulated entities, the states, agency staff, and the public,” but provided little rationale for that argument.
In Friday’s notice, the EPA and Army Corps try to boost the rationale, taking into account the various federal courts that have blocked the rule from taking effect, the administration’s argument that it doesn’t align with Supreme Court precedent and other factors.
“The agencies are concerned that rather than achieving their stated objectives of increasing regulatory predictability and consistency under the [Clean Water Act], retaining the 2015 rule creates significant uncertainty for agency staff, regulated entities, and the public, which is compounded by court decisions that have increased litigation risk and cast doubt on the legal viability of the rule,” they wrote.
“Considering the substantial uncertainty associated with the 2015 rule resulting from its legal challenges, and the substantial experience the agencies and others possess with the longstanding regulatory framework currently being administered by the agencies, the agencies conclude that clarity, predictability, and consistency may be best served by repealing the 2015 rule and thus are proposing to do so.”
Supporters of the Obama rule say the new repeal proposal is still flawed.
“Our nation needs clear rules on how to protect lakes, streams, and wetlands from pollution. We will keep fighting Scott Pruitt's senseless attacks on these protections and work to ensure these important safeguards go into place,” Jon Devine, federal water policy director at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in a statement.
“He tried and failed to rescind the Clean Water Rule once before, and he’s got no better reason to do it now.”
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/394911-trump-administration-looks-to-boost-case-to-repeal-obama-water-rule
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Seattle Plastic Straw, Utensil Ban Takes Effect
Jul 2, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Avery Anapol
Seattle on Sunday became the first major U.S. city to ban plastic straws and utensils.
The full ban went into effect on July 1, a decade after the city first introduced a measure requiring restaurants to use only recyclable and compostable materials. Plastic straws and utensils were originally exempted because of a lack of viable compostable alternatives.
Restaurants and businesses like food trucks and grocery stores may provide compostable plastic or paper straws on request, and flexible plastic straws will still be available for customers with a medical necessity, according to the Seattle Times.
Any of Seattle’s 5,000 restaurants found to be violating the ban could face a fine of up to $250.
More than 200 restaurants in the city voluntarily adopted the ban last year, stopping millions of straws from entering the waste stream, according to the Lonely Whale Foundation, an environmental group running the “Strawless in Seattle” campaign.
Seattle is believed to be the largest U.S. city to pass such a ban, though businesses and smaller municipalities have passed similar measures in an effort to cut down on ocean pollution. Other major cities, including San Francisco and New York, are considering similar bans.UK Prime Minister Theresa May announced earlier this year that the UK would institute the first-ever nationwide ban on plastic straws.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/395118-seattle-plastic-straw-utensil-ban-takes-effect
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'Climate Change' Axed from Sustainability Report
Jul 2, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Benjamin Hulac
The Treasury Department listed "climate change resilience" as one of its sustainability goals in a 2016 report to the White House. That goal was jettisoned in a draft version completed under the Trump administration.
A draft copy of a sustainability report from Treasury dated July 2017, obtained by E&E News under the Freedom of Information Act, shows that the agency scaled back its references to climate change during President Trump's first year in office. Under an Obama-era executive order, federal agencies were required to file reports annually on how they would meet 10 environmental goals, such as greenhouse gas reductions, renewable energy investment, water use at their buildings and conservation.
In its 2016 report, the Treasury Department addressed all 10 goals, including "Goal No. 10: Climate Change Resilience."
The 2017 report — which has not been published by the agency — copies, often verbatim, from the earlier document. But the term "climate change" does not appear in its 34 pages, and the section where "Goal No. 10" is supposed to be does not exist. The file itself is several pages shorter than the 2016 document.
Agency programs to protect "vulnerable populations" from climate change risks, guard department buildings against flooding and "incentivize planning" outside Treasury for climate effects weren't included in the latest version. Descriptions of how Treasury complied with three executive orders on climate change also weren't included.
The unpublished 2017 report from Treasury does still list "greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction" among its goals, and includes language about makings its buildings "climate resilient." The latest Treasury file also shows the agency is running bike-to-work programs in its "more urban locations," where bike racks, lockers and showers are available.
The Treasury Department did not respond to questions about changes to its report.
Under Trump, federal agencies have removed climate change information from their websites, often emphasizing fossil fuels — like coal and natural gas exports — instead.
Other agencies' 2017 reports, the latest batch available, include discussion of how they will address climate change.
In May, Trump rescinded the Obama executive order that required agencies to write these reports (Climatewire, May 18).
That action came after the White House budget office, which was required to approve the sustainability plans before the public saw them, had kept private reports from at least seven agencies that had cleared their reports for public viewing (Climatewire, April 23).
Watchdog groups are scrambling to document what information federal agencies have removed or changed. That includes the Environmental Data & Governance Initiative, which says it has monitored tens of thousands of federal websites for environmental information since Trump's inauguration.
In a recent summary of its work, EDGI said it hasn't detected the "removal or deletion of climate" data sets from government sites.
"Instead, we have found substantial shifts in whether and how the topic of climate change and efforts to mitigate and adapt to its consequences are discussed," the group said. "Perhaps most importantly, we have found significant loss of public access to information about climate change."
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2018/07/02/stories/1060087457
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