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(ACC Mentioned) Plastics Chemical Tied to Changes in Boys' Reproductive Development
Feb 19, 2015 | HeathDay News
By Steven Reinberg
When expectant mothers are exposed to plastics chemicals called phthalates during the first trimester, their male offspring may have a greater risk of infertility later in life, a new study suggests. -
(ACC Mentioned) Study Links Phthalates, Problems with Infant Genitalia
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Sam Pearson
Pregnant women exposed to a plasticizer that was banned from children's toys and child care articles in 2008 are more likely to give birth to infant boys with permanently altered genitals, according to new research. -
What Are We Doing to Our Children’s Brains?
Feb 19, 2015 | Safer Chemicals Healthy Families
By Elizabeth Grossman
The numbers are startling. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 1.8 million more children in the U.S. were diagnosed with developmental disabilities between 2006 and 2008 than a decade earlier. -
Senators Push for Oil Exports to Mexico
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Twenty-one senators signed on to a letter Wednesday asking the Commerce Department to allow crude oil to be exported to Mexico. -
Regional Coordination on EPA's Clean Power Plan Struggles Through its 'Awkward' Phase
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Emily Holden
EPA chief Gina McCarthy said it best this week when she told a room full of state electric regulators that the Clean Power Plan is in its "awkward," "teenage stage." -
U.S. Energy Independence is on the Way -- BP
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
By Jenny Mandel
Energy demand will grow about 40 percent over the next 20 years, and not even a sharp rise in natural gas use and decline in the market share for coal will prevent damaging climate change without the sort of wide-ranging world response that can come from a price on carbon. -
Derailment Reignites Oil Transport Debate
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Manuel Quiñones
It didn't take long for some supporters of TransCanada Corp.'s Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to highlight this week's train derailment in West Virginia as evidence of the need for the project. -
White House Report: Fracking Impacts Best Regulated Locally, Not Federally
Feb 19, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Elana Schor
The White House Council of Economic Advisors today portrayed concerns over fracking’s land and water impact as best addressed locally, a possible signal that federal regulations may be limited to current efforts to rein in methane leaks from the oil and gas production method. -
States Not Working on EPA Climate Rule Compliance Yet, Official Says
Feb 19, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen
State environmental officials are not yet working on plans to implement EPA’s Clean Power Plan because of uncertainty over what will be in the final rule, the head of the Environmental Council of the States told FERC on Thursday. -
Industry, States Call for FERC Activism on Clean Power Plan
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Hannah Northey
Federal grid overseers today began the complex process of wading through technical and legal solutions for what some states and system operators have flagged as concerns with U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan. -
Ga. PSC's Echols Says State Taking Wait-and-See Approach on Power Plan Compliance Mechanism
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - TV
U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan proposes a 44 percent reduction in emissions for Georgia. How is the state preparing for the rollout of EPA's final plan later this year? -
Offer 'Concrete Ideas' for Electric Reliability Safety Valve -- EPA's McCabe
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
By Rod Kuckro
If states want U.S. EPA to build into its proposed Clean Power Plan a mechanism to protect against power outages and ensure reliable electricity service -- a so-called safety valve -- then regulators and power industry officials need to draw that out in detail, the agency's top air quality official said this week. -
White House Sees Wide-Ranging Benefits in Energy Boom
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Increased oil and gas production and use of renewable energy means the United States economy is stronger, greenhouse gases are down and security is better, the White House said Thursday. -
Legal Concerns Prompt EPA To Scale Back Flexibilities In Ozone SIP Rule
Feb 19, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA's final rule detailing requirements for state implementation plans (SIPs) for meeting the agency's 2008 ozone air standard scales back regulatory flexibilities the agency floated in the proposed version of the rule, due to EPA's fears that the provisions could have been vulnerable to lawsuits claiming that they violated the Clean Air Act. -
D.C. Circuit Sets Arguments In State’s Suit Over EPA Air ‘Increments’ Rule
Feb 19, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has scheduled oral arguments for April 14 in North Carolina’s suit over EPA’s air rule on “increments” -- the available allowance of air emissions for industry in a given area -- in which the state wants credit for past emissions cuts so it can potentially ease industry’s access to permits. -
The Term That Actually Makes Climate Change Less Political
Feb 19, 2015 | The Washington Post
By Puneet Kollipara
As we’ve told you in recent weeks, a growing body of psychological research in political science is starting to show us why the debate over climate change is so politically polarized. People’s politics and worldviews seem to affect how they perceive climate change’s existence and severity. -
The President’s Climate Plan: Cleaner, Reliable Electricity
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By By John Moore
Not so long ago, folks in Des Moines, Iowa, got their electricity the old-fashioned way, from a combination of coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear. -
Fire Smolders a 3rd Day from W.Va. Oil Train Derailment
Feb 19, 2015 | AP (In The Washington Post)
A fire sparked by a train derailment in southern West Virginia smoldered for a third day Wednesday, keeping federal and state investigators at bay and leading residents near the site worrying about the long-term water quality of a nearby river.
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(ACC Mentioned) Plastics Chemical Tied to Changes in Boys' Reproductive Development
Feb 19, 2015 | HeathDay News
By Steven Reinberg
When expectant mothers are exposed to plastics chemicals called phthalates during the first trimester, their male offspring may have a greater risk of infertility later in life, a new study suggests.
Boys exposed to the chemical diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) may be born with a significantly shorter anogenital distance than those not exposed to these chemicals. Anogenital distance is the distance between the anus and the genitals. A shorter anogenital distance has been linked to infertility and low sperm count, the researchers explained.
"We saw these changes even though moms' exposure to DEHP has dropped 50 percent in the past 10 years," said lead researcher Shanna Swan, a professor of preventive medicine and obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City.
"Therefore, we have not found a safe level of phthalate exposure for pregnant women," she contended.
Swan said that this study cannot prove that these boys will have fertility problems as adults or that DEHP causes these problems. However, animal studies have implicated the chemical in male reproductive problems. Based on the data from this study, Swan believes there is a strong association between exposure to DEHP and fertility in human males.
DEHP is used to soften plastics. Most exposure results from eating foods that pick up the chemical during processing, Swan said.
"Since food is the largest source of DEHP for consumers, it is difficult for pregnant women to minimize exposure," she said. "Eating unprocessed food will likely help. However, eliminating DEHP from food really has to be done by food producers."
The chemical is also found in medical tubing and in a variety of products, including flooring, wallpaper, lacquers and personal care products, Swan said.
The report was published Feb. 19 in the journal Human Reproduction.
For the study, Swan's team collected data on almost 800 pregnant women and their infants.
Specifically, the researchers found that exposure in the womb to three types of DEHP was associated with a significantly shorter anogenital distance in boys, but not in girls.
A group representing the chemical industry took issue with the study, however.
In a statement, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) stressed that the study only examined one type of phthalate, not all versions of the chemical. And it said that phthalates are "one of the most widely studied family of chemicals in use today."
The ACC added that DEHP "is known to break down into its metabolites within minutes after it enters the body. Information collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over the last 10 years indicates that, despite the fact that phthalates are used in many products, exposure from all sources combined is extremely low -- much lower than the levels established as safe by scientists at regulatory agencies."
But another expert says phthalate exposure may not be benign. Dr. Kenneth Spaeth, director of the Occupational and Environmental Medicine Center at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y., said, "virtually everyone in the U.S. experiences continual exposure to phthalates."
And, a number of studies have tied the chemicals with changes in developing fetuses. "Phthalates, in particular, have been shown in both human and animal studies to interfere with normal fetal development," he said.
This study supports what has been demonstrated before, that phthalate exposure in the first trimester is linked to male reproductive development, Spaeth said. "This study is an important step forward in establishing this effect because the study included a much larger number of individuals than prior studies and helps identify one particular agent, DEHP, as an important contributor to this effect," he said.
Additionally, this study shows the importance of exposure in the first trimester as a critical window for the effect of phthalates on the male reproductive system. "On the whole, given these features, the authors have contributed important information about the public health risk posed by phthalates," Spaeth suggested.
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(ACC Mentioned) Study Links Phthalates, Problems with Infant Genitalia
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Sam Pearson
Pregnant women exposed to a plasticizer that was banned from children's toys and child care articles in 2008 are more likely to give birth to infant boys with permanently altered genitals, according to new research.
The findings by scientists at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; University of Washington; Seattle Children's Research Institute; University of Rochester; University of California, San Francisco; and University of Minnesota are the largest study yet on how pregnant women's exposure to diethylhexyl phthalate, or DEHP, can influence an infant's development.
The findings "suggest that even at current low levels, environmental exposure to DEHP may affect male genital development resulting in reproductive tract changes with potentially significant health consequences for these boys as they mature," the study said. "These findings have important implications for public policy since virtually all pregnant women and infants are exposed to this ubiquitous chemical."
The research was published in the journal Human Reproduction and was funded by the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences.
Shanna Swan, a professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and the study's lead author, noted that the study's large sample size -- 753 infants were examined -- and enhanced procedures and statistical tools provided far more precision than past findings.
Swan and other researchers have spent the last decade researching whether "phthalate syndrome," observed in rats, can also occur in humans. Previous rat studies had found that exposure to some phthalates inhibits the male hormone testosterone, which impairs the rats' reproductive development. In humans, Swan and other scientists have found that lower measurements of the distance between the anus and the base of the penis -- known as the anogenital distance -- in infant boys are considered a sign of testosterone disruption (Greenwire, Oct. 3, 2008).
Though exposures to DEHP have declined by around half since Swan's earlier research was conducted between 2000 and 2002, and the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act banned the chemical from children's toys and child care articles in 2008, lawmakers have done little to reduce pregnant women's exposure to DEHP.
Previous studies have found that exposure to DEHP comes primarily from food -- not from children's products. A 2013 NIEHS study found DEHP concentrations were the highest of all phthalates identified in foods other than beef. The study noted that while levels of individual phthalates were much lower than U.S. EPA limits, cumulative exposures were "of concern."
Smaller studies of women in monasteries, Mennonite communities or other secluded settings suggest the communities' cloistered lifestyles can help women avoid DEHP, but that's not realistic for more people, Swan said.
By using urine samples taken from pregnant women at the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, when the fetus's genital development is thought to occur, the researchers found infants born to women with higher levels of DEHP had shorter measurements at birth. This is more accurate than previous studies, when researchers did not understand the importance of timing the samples, Swan said.
Regulatory changes also would require significant investments from chemical manufacturers and businesses, which have defended the safety of many phthalates even as they have removed DEHP from children's toys.
American Chemistry Council spokeswoman Liz Bowman noted that the study's findings pertained only to DEHP and didn't establish that other phthalates caused similar problems. Phthalates are "one of the most widely-studied family of chemicals in use today," Bowman said in a statement.
Earlier research "shows that DEHP is known to break down into its metabolites within minutes after it enters the body," Bowman said, noting that Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data showed exposure levels were below limits set by regulatory agencies.
Swan said research has found animals born with symptoms of "phthalate syndrome" exhibit problems later in life and are at higher risk for infertility and low sperm count, and that this can be an indicator of the same problems in humans.
"What we can't say for sure is that a boy at birth with a short AGD will grow up to have a short AGD," Swan said, explaining that it would be "invasive" to design an experiment involving older children, and as a result, not as much data exists about that point in their development.
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What Are We Doing to Our Children’s Brains?
Feb 19, 2015 | Safer Chemicals Healthy Families
By Elizabeth Grossman
Environmental chemicals are wreaking havoc to last a lifetime
February 16, 2015/ensia.com — The numbers are startling. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 1.8 million more children in the U.S. were diagnosed with developmental disabilities between 2006 and 2008 than a decade earlier. During this time, the prevalence of autism climbed nearly 300 percent, while that of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder increased 33 percent. CDC figures also show that10 to 15 percent of all babies born in the U.S. have some type of neurobehavorial development disorder. Still more are affected by neurological disorders that don’t rise to the level of clinical diagnosis.
And it’s not just the U.S. Such impairments affect millions of children worldwide. The numbers are so large that Philippe Grandjean of the University of Southern Denmark and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Philip Landrigan of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York — both physicians and preeminent researchers in this field — describe the situation as a “pandemic.”
While earlier and more assiduous diagnosis accounts for some of the documented increase, it doesn’t explain all of it, says Irva Hertz-Piccioto, professor of environmental and occupational health and chief of the University of California, Davis, MIND Institute. Grandjean and Landrigan credit genetic factors for 30 to 40 percent of the cases. But a significant and growing body of research suggests that exposure to environmental pollutants is implicated in the disturbing rise in children’s neurological disorders.
What, exactly is going on? And what can we do about it?
Chemicals and the Brain
Some chemicals — lead, mercury and organophosphate pesticides, for example — have long been recognized as toxic substances that can have lasting effects on children’s neurological health, says Bruce Lanphear, health sciences professor at Simon Fraser University. While leaded paint is now banned in the U.S., it is still present in many homes and remains in use elsewhere around the world. Children can also be exposed to lead from paints, colorings and metals used in toys, even though these uses are prohibited by U.S. law (remember Thomas the Tank Engine), and through contaminated soil or other environmental exposure as well as from plastics in which lead is used as a softener. Mercury exposure sources include some fish, air pollution and old mercury-containing thermometers and thermostats. While a great many efforts have gone into reducing and eliminating these exposures, concerns continue, particularly because we now recognize that adverse effects can occur at exceptionally low levels.
But scientists are also now discovering that chemical compounds common in outdoor air — including components of vehicle exhaust and fine particulate matter — as well as in indoor air and consumer products can also adversely affect brain development, including prenatally.
Chemicals in flame retardants, plastics, and personal care and other household products are among those Lanphear lists as targets of concern for their neurodevelopment effects.
Chemicals that prompt hormonal changes are increasingly suspected to have neurological effects, says Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and National Toxicology Program. Among the chemicals now being examined for neurological impacts that occur early in life are flame retardants known as PBDEs that have been used extensively in upholstery foams, electronics and other products; phthalates, widely used as plasticizers and in synthetic fragrances; the polycarbonate plastic ingredient bisphenol A, known commonly as BPA; perfluorinated compounds, whose applications include stain-, water- and grease-resistant coatings; and various pesticides.
Precise Choreography
As Grandjean and Landrigan explain, the fetus is not well protected against environmental chemicals that can easily pass through the placenta. There’s evidence from in vitro studies, they say, that neural stem cells are very sensitive to neurotoxic In the past 30 to 40 years, scientists have begun to recognize that children and infants are far more vulnerable to chemical exposures than are adults.substances. An infant’s brain is also vulnerable to such contaminants. At early stages of development — prenatally and during infancy — brain cells are easily damaged by industrial chemicals and other neurotoxicants. Such interference can affect how the brain develops structurally and functionally — effects that lead to lasting adverse outcomes.
“The brain is so extremely sensitive to external stimulation,” says Grandjean.
Historically, chemical neurotoxicity was examined in adults — often through cases of high levels of occupational exposure. In the past 30 to 40 years, however, scientists have begun to recognize that children and infants are far more vulnerable to chemical exposures than are adults. It has also been discovered that very low levels of exposure early in life can have profound and lasting effects. Another important discovery is that understanding how an infant or child is affected by a chemical exposure involves far more than simply calculating potential effects on a physically smaller person. Stage of development — and timing of exposure — must also be considered. Early stages of brain development involve “a very precise choreography,” explains Frederica Perera, professor of Environmental Health Sciences at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. “Any chemical that can disrupt [brain] chemistry at this stage can be very damaging,” she says.
For example, explains Deborah Kurrasch, an assistant professor at the University of Calgary’s Cumming School of Medicine who specializes in neurological research, during the early stages of brain development — when cells are becoming neurons — “timing determines destination.”
Results of Kurrasch’s latest study investigating neurodevelopmental effects of BPA illustrate what she means. In a study published in January 2015, Kurrasch and colleagues examined the effects on neurodevelopment of BPA and a common BPA substitute, bisphenol S. Specifically, they investigated how exposure to BPA and BPS — at levels comparable to those present in her community’s local drinking water supply — might affect neuron development in zebrafish at a stage comparable to the second trimester of human pregnancy, when neurons are forming and moving to the correct location in the brain.
Many of the chemicals under scrutiny for their effects on brain development appear to act by interfering with the function of hormones essential for healthy brain development.“It’s as if they’re getting on a bus to where they need to be,” Kurrasch says. After exposure to BPA and BPS it was as if, explains Kurrasch, “twice as many neurons got on an early bus and half as many got on a late bus.” The researchers found that these exposures appeared to alter nerve development — neurogenesis — in a way that caused the fish to become hyperactive. Such an alteration, produced in this case by a “very little bit of BPA,” can cause permanent effects, Kurrasch says.
Many of the chemicals under scrutiny for their effects on brain development — BPA, phthalates, perfluorinated compounds, brominated flame retardants and various pesticides among them — appear to act by interfering with the function of hormones essential for healthy brain development. Among these are thyroid hormones, which regulate the part of the brain involved in a variety of vital functions, including reproduction, sleep, thirst, eating and puberty.
During the first trimester of pregnancy, the fetus is not making its own thyroid hormone, says Thomas Zoeller, director of the Laboratory of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Endocrinology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. If an environmental exposure to a substance such as a polychlorinated biphenyl or perchlorate interferes with the mother’s thyroid hormones in this period — as could happen through water pollution, for example — that could in turn affect her child at a critical stage of brain development.
Another thing to consider in the context of endocrine-disrupting chemical exposures, says Zoeller, is that a substantial portion of women of childbearing age in the U.S. have some iodine deficiency that may be suppressing their thyroid hormones. While these deficiencies may not be prompting clinically adverse effects, they may be sufficient to impair fetal neurodevelopment. “Impacts can happen at levels far below safety standards,” says Zoeller. And there are a great many chemicals to which such women may be exposed environmentally with the potential to affect thyroid hormones, among them PBDEs, PCBs, BPA, various pesticides, perfluorinated compounds and certain phthalates.
Something in the Air
One particularly concerning source of exposure to chemicals that are suspected to harm children’s brain development is air pollution, which is a complex mixture of various chemicals and particulate matter.
Research increasingly suggests that airborne contaminants can have subtle but significant effects on early neurological development and behavior.Perera and colleagues recently investigated the links between exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, a fossil fuel–related component of air pollution, and incidence of ADHD in 9-year-olds. Their study found that mothers who were exposed to high levels of PAH during pregnancy were five times more likely to have children with ADHD and to have children with more severe ADHD symptoms than those who did not have such exposure. While this study is the first to make such a connection, it joins a growing body of research pointing to links between outdoor air pollutants, including PAHs, and adverse impacts on children’s brain health and development.
Looking at air pollution’s effects on brain health is relatively new, explains Kimberly Gray, health science administrator at the National Institutes of Health. Research increasingly suggests that airborne contaminants can have subtle but significant effects on early neurological development and behavior, she says. In addition to links between prenatal PAH exposure and impaired brain function, researchers are also now investigating potential connections between black carbon, volatile organic compounds and fine particulate matter — among other components of air pollution — and impairments such as autism and lowered IQ.
In a study published in December 2014, Marc Weisskopf, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health associate professor of environmental and occupational epidemiology, and colleagues looked at children whose mothers were exposed to high levels of fine particulate matter (PM2.5, particles 2.5 microns in diameter or smaller), particularly during the third trimester of pregnancy. The study, which involved more than 1,000 participants living all across the U.S., found that these children appeared to be twice as likely to be diagnosed with autism as children whose mothers had only low levels of such exposures. Exposure to larger particles — between 2.5 and 10 microns (what’s known as PM10) — did not appear to be associated with increasing risk for autism.
One of the disturbing recent realizations concerning environmental exposure to developmental neurotoxicants is how widespread exposure appears to be and the ubiquity of such compounds.“This is very important from an epidemiological point of view” because it “places a spotlight on the mother’s exposure,” says Weisskopf. It also highlights the importance of timing and neurodevelopmental effects. Although many other factors may contribute to autism, Weisskopf explains, this study strengthens the suggestion that environmental exposures can play a role. That it appears it is the very small particles that are associated with these effects adds to what other research is finding: What might seem quantitatively small can “be quite important” when it comes to affecting brain development, Weisskopf explains.
Widespread Exposure
As Grandjean and Landrigan point out, one of the disturbing recent realizations concerning environmental exposure to developmental neurotoxicants is how widespread exposure appears to be and the ubiquity of such compounds. “More neurotoxic chemicals are getting into products,” says Landrigan.
Phthalates, which are used as plasticizers — including in polyvinyl chloride plastics — and in synthetic fragrances and numerous personal care products, comprise one category of widely used chemicals that appear to have adverse impacts on brain development. Researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health recently found that children exposed prenatally to elevated levels of certain phthalates had IQ scores that were, on average, between 6 and 8 points lower than children with lower prenatal exposures. Children with reduced IQ scores also appeared to have trouble with working memory, perceptional reasoning and information processing speeds.
“Pretty much everybody in the U.S. is exposed.” — Robin WhyattThe phthalates examined in this study, known as DnBP and DiBP, are used in numerous household products, including toiletries and cosmetics, among them shampoo, nail polish, lipstick, hair styling products and soap, as well as vinyl fabrics and dryer sheets. Exposure levels associated with reduced IQ in the study are within the range that the CDC reports finding in itsNational Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, a nationwide ongoing biomonitoring assessment of chemical exposures. “Pretty much everybody in the U.S. is exposed,” says study co-author Robin Whyatt, professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University Medical Center.
While such a drop in IQ may sound small, Pam Factor-Litvak, the study’s lead author and associate professor of epidemiology at the Mailman School, notes that at the population — or classroom — level, this means fewer children at the high end of the intelligence scale and more at the less capable end. “The whole curve shifts downward,” she explains.
“Five or six IQ points may not sound like much, but it means more children requiring special education programs and fewer that are gifted,” says Maureen Swanson, Learning Disabilities Association of America’s Healthy Children Project director. “The potential economic impact is huge,” says NIEHS’s Birnbaum.
The Stress Factor
What prompts neurological disorders in children is “very complex,” notes Frederica Perera. Adding to the challenge of disentangling the various contributing factors is that while research on — and regulation of — chemicals typically looks at one substance at a time, people are exposed to multiple chemicals concurrently. Further adding to this complexity when it comes to brain development are social stresses that “act on the same part of the brain region,” explains University of Rochester professor of environmental medicine Deborah Cory-Slechta. She and others are finding increasing evidence that nonchemical stressors such as maternal, domestic and community distress can prompt adverse effects on early brain development, either on their own or in combination with neurotoxic chemicals.
Birnbaum says this apparent interaction between chemicals and nonchemical stressors is “very concerning and very important.”
Epidemiological studies, Cory-Slechta explains, typically correct for what are called confounding factors — other conditions that might influence the condition being measured. Many studies, she says, “are clearly not modeling what is going on in the human environment.” What she and her colleagues hope to do is “reproduce in animal studies what goes on in human communities,” particularly in communities that are most vulnerable to adverse social stressors and most exposed to chemical contaminants, including lead, pesticides and air pollution.
Lead and stress affect the same part of the brain, she says, and so can act synergistically very early in life to produce permanent changes in brain structure. These changes can result in lowered IQ, learning and behavioral problems.Assuming we want to stop harming our children’s brains, how do we proceed?
Cory-Slechta’s lab is now working on replicating conditions of stress and chronic deprivation in animal models that would mirror those experienced by communities of poverty. The aim is to better understand how these effects cross the placenta and become the fetal basis of lifelong disorders. She and her colleagues are investigating, not only associations between exposures and neurodevelopment, but also the mechanisms by which effects occur.
What to Do?
Assuming we want to stop harming our children’s brains, how do we proceed?
An important step is to improve our ability to determine which chemicals have neurodevelopmental effects. A rapid screening system would be ideal, says Birnbaum, because there are so many chemicals — including newly invented ones — to which people are exposed. While such a program to test large numbers of chemicals quickly using robotics has been launched by NIH, EPA and other federal agencies, there are tens of thousands that may be in use, most of which have not been fully tested for these effects.
When it comes to reducing existing exposures, some chemicals can be avoided through consumer choice. But it’s often difficult, given that many of these substances are used — like BPA on receipts — in products that don’t carry ingredient labels. Others, including air pollutants, are much harder given their ubiquity or lack of available alternatives. And, as Maureen Swanson notes, such choices are not necessarily feasible for people at all economic levels, which raises environmental justice issues.
Grandjean and Landrigan point out that the U.S. system of chemical regulation, which lacks requirements for full premarket toxicity testing, does not do a very good job when it comes to proactive chemical safety. “Untested chemicals should not be presumed to be safe to brain development, and chemicals in existing use and all new chemicals must therefore be tested for developmental neurotoxicity,” they wrote in an article published in The Lancet.
While some sources of neurotoxicity might appear to have been adequately addressed, they have not. For example, considerable progress has been made in curtailing lead exposure through policy and public health education in the U.S. and elsewhere. However, current understanding is that virtually any amount of lead exposure can cause damage, and harmful exposures continue — especially in countries where leaded paints and gasoline are still used . And in the U.S., CDC funding for lead prevention programs was dramatically reduced in 2012.
When it comes to protecting the exquisitely sensitive developing brain, the measures currently used to assess chemical risk and set safety standards fall short, says Cory-Slechta.Meanwhile, children around the world —especially in less well-off countries — continue to be exposed to dangerous neurotoxicants released in industrial emissions, from waste sites and through child labor. Examples abound, and include exposures to chemicals released in electronics recycling in various locations in Asia and Africa, to lead and mercury from mining activity, to agricultural pesticides, to products contaminated with heavy metals, including food andcandy.
When it comes to protecting the exquisitely sensitive developing brain, the measures currently used to assess chemical risk and set safety standards fall short, says Cory-Slechta. “It should be about primary prevention, but it’s not,” she says.
In the absence of what many environmental health advocates feel is adequate U.S. federal regulation of chemicals, many individual U.S. states have recentlypassed their own laws to protect children from harmful chemical exposures. Many address chemicals with neurotoxic effects, particularly those of heavy metals such as cadmium, lead and mercury. And even though some states are beginning to include language in their legislation to protect pregnant women from chemical hazards, this timing of exposure is left largely unaddressed.
While we now know a great deal about developmental neurotoxicants, more such exposures appear to be occurring than ever before. And there appears to be wide agreement among researchers that these exposures are taking a toll on the world’s children.
“To me it is very clear we have to set up a different system to better protect the brains of the future,” says Grandjean.
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Senators Push for Oil Exports to Mexico
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Twenty-one senators signed on to a letter Wednesday asking the Commerce Department to allow crude oil to be exported to Mexico.
The bipartisan group led by Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) said Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker should allow exports to Mexico in the same way Canadian exports have been allowed since the 1980s.
They asked Pritzker to allow an oil swap that Mexican state-owned oil company Pemex recently requested, and to go further. The swap would exchange heavy crude from Mexico for light crude from the United States.
“In fact, we believe it would be appropriate to further liberalize energy trading with Mexico,” theywrote.
“President Reagan issued a national interest finding in 1985 stating that oil exports to Canada (for consumption in that country) were in accord with existing statutes and would not threaten U.S. supply,” they said.
“As a result of the expressed interest from Mexico in obtaining U.S. crude oil, we encourage the current administration to follow President Reagan’s example by issuing a similar finding that United States oil exports to Mexico, for consumption in Mexico, are in the national interest.”
Crude oil exports have been all but banned for 40 years, thanks to a law passed after the 1973 oil crisis. Some lawmakers have advocated recently for Congress to loosen the ban, and for the Obama administration to use whatever authority it has to allow some exports.
Last year, Commerce started to allow condensate, a lightly processed form of oil, to be exported.
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Regional Coordination on EPA's Clean Power Plan Struggles Through its 'Awkward' Phase
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Climatewire
By Emily Holden
EPA chief Gina McCarthy said it best this week when she told a room full of state electric regulators that the Clean Power Plan is in its "awkward," "teenage stage."
"Nobody likes to look at everybody and work with them," McCarthy told a conference of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, many of whom nodded in agreement and laughed nervously.
McCarthy's words ring especially true for states considering whether to work together to reach their individual greenhouse gas reduction target. Combined, the cuts would decrease power sector emissions 30 percent below 2005 levels over the next 15 years.
Until the rule is finished, some state officials tasked with writing or implementing compliance plans are having a hard time wrapping their heads around how to make regional coordination fair to all of the participating states.
The draft rule doesn't spell out how to address power plants and programs that affect more than one state, said Ted Thomas, a regulator for the Arkansas Public Service Commission.
E&E's Power Plan Hub keeps you up to date on the latest national and state-level developments on EPA's greenhouse gas regulations for the power sector. Go to E&E's Power Plan Hub.
In one commonly cited example, it's unclear which state would get credit for incentivizing a new renewable power plant that sends electricity to other states. Both the state that builds the plant and a neighboring state that consumes the power might try to claim responsibility for the reduced emissions, but EPA will not allow that kind of double-counting.
States with easier targets also worry that buddying up with states that have more stringent goals will make compliance harder.
On the other hand, the biggest advocates of regional coordination -- the country's multi-state grid operators -- told regulators this week that they might be thinking about the rule all wrong (EnergyWire, Feb. 17).
"It's really important that, as we think about regional, we don't assume that regional means socializing the burden or socializing the cost of carrying that burden. That's dead on arrival," said Jim Robb, CEO of the Western Electricity Coordinating Council, on a panel with executives of the PJM Interconnection and the Midcontinent Independent System Operator.
Together, the three organizations coordinate power flows over a huge swath of the nation. They say regional solutions would allow states to share lower cost resources and will be key to evaluating potential electric reliability problems.Navigating around political bounds
From Wyoming's stance, Public Service Commission Chairman Alan Minier said regional planning may sound great, but it's more difficult when you start trying to work out the details.
Minier described a conversation he had with a colleague in Iowa about the two states joining together. "Are you going to take responsibility for my carbon? Are you going to give me some of your hydro? The answer is no," Minier said. "Particularly during this period, I think most states that have learned how to count should be like cats on a hot tin roof about what's actually going to happen."
In addition to navigating fairness issues, electric regulators are also struggling with the political implications of starting to talk openly about compliance while fighting the rule on its face.
On Monday, Georgia Public Service Commissioner Tim Echols told ClimateWire, "I don't want to start talking about compliance yet because I'm still hoping that the thing will go down in flames. ... It's too early, and it sends the wrong signal for us to wave the white flag and say we're going to comply."
But by Tuesday morning, Echols said presentations at NARUC had changed his mind. Specifically, he mentioned an event where the consulting firm Brattle Group discussed regional coordination as a way to keep the grid reliable.
"There could be a scenario where our ratepayers might benefit from regional cooperation if the rule becomes the rule," Echols said. Echols thinks utility Southern Co. might have the best grasp on how that would work in Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. Utilities with a multi-state footprint could be a driving force behind regional cooperation in other parts of the country.Too many cooks in the kitchen?
Electric regulators in many states will evaluate the economic and reliability impacts of compliance plans, but they aren't ultimately responsible for writing them. Environmental protection agencies, governor's offices and legislatures all could have a hand in how plans turn out.
In some states, that makes for some tricky timing.
The Texas Legislature meets every other year, unless it's called back for a special session. After the final rule comes out this summer, Texas won't be back in session until 2017.
"If you try to bring them back in a special session if there's a deal with this issue ... the results would not likely be pretty," said Kenneth Anderson, a Texas Public Utility Commission member.
Maine Public Utilities Commissioner David Littell said in a panel on state compliance options that most regulators wouldn't go into "secret negotiations" with other states but that they also don't need a legislative mandate to start testing the waters.
Still, politics could hold up regional talks, Littell said.
"I know there's efforts in different states to draw a line in the sand and pass rules on both sides -- for states that don't want to do anything and states that want to do things in a particular way that benefits them," Littell said. "Those are very unhelpful because those tie the arms of the people that are going in."'We're not inclined to give up our jurisdiction'
State leaders that are philosophically opposed to the rule -- like in Texas -- say multi-state plans further complicate concerns about ceding authority to the federal government. Regional pacts on the rule might have to be overseen by a federal entity.
"We're not inclined to give up our jurisdiction over ... [the Electric Reliability Council of Texas] or over energy efficiency or over electric reliability to federal judges," Anderson said.
The nine states in the Northeast cap-and-trade program, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, have asked EPA to clarify if its multi-state plans to cap emissions would be evaluated only on whether they were overall targets and not on the merits of individual carbon-reducing measures. Others are awaiting that answer and many other details on the final proposal, too.
States have good reason to expect the final rule to be different than the proposed version.
This week, McCarthy gave her biggest hint yet that the interim goals most states and industry interests have complained about will be changed. Air chief Janet McCabe added that the interim goals are the pre-eminent issue EPA is hearing about and the issue is "very much on the table." Many expect EPA to change the way it credits states for having nuclear power plants (Greenwire, Feb. 18).
"We really won't know at this point how we're going to comply or what we have to comply with until the final rule comes out," Anderson said.
In this phase after the December comment deadline for the rule and before its finalization this summer, McCarthy said she doesn't expect states to take a breather.
"We know that you're talking to each other and starting to think about what really makes the most sense," McCarthy said, noting ongoing conversations among states in the Northeast, West and Midwest. "If there is work we can do together today, we will not stop while we wait and work on the final [rule]."
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U.S. Energy Independence is on the Way -- BP
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
By Jenny Mandel
Energy demand will grow about 40 percent over the next 20 years, and not even a sharp rise in natural gas use and decline in the market share for coal will prevent damaging climate change without the sort of wide-ranging world response that can come from a price on carbon.
So says energy giant BP in the release of its annual long-term energy outlook, which projects trends over a 20-year time horizon to gauge the direction of world supply and demand.
"After three years of high and deceptively steady oil prices, the fall of recent months is a stark reminder that the norm in energy markets is one of continuous change," said Spencer Dale, BP's chief economist, in presenting the report in London on Tuesday.
BP said the market forces behind a global oversupply of crude that have halved prices over the past six months "will slowly fade over time," and longer-term trends will kick in.
Dale said it could take several years for oil prices to recover as energy demand from Asian economies, in particular, picks up and the spike of U.S. crude production growth slows.
Over the next two decades, he said, fossil fuels will meet about two-thirds of new energy demand, projected to rise about 40 percent from where it stands today. But BP sees a shift in sources as gas takes its place as the fastest-growing fossil fuel while coal becomes the slowest, dragged down by slower industrialization in key markets as well as by environmental policies that penalize carbon pollution.
The company highlighted shifting world trade patterns as a key takeaway of its forecasting exercise. Historically, energy has been traded from east to west, Dale said, with Middle Eastern suppliers serving big western energy buyers. But U.S. tight oil production and demand growth in China and India are changing that picture, he said.
BP pointed to a growing trade in liquified natural gas as contributing to that geographic shift, with tanker trade overtaking pipeline trade by volume and contributing to a more integrated global market with closer-knit pricing.
BP sees LNG supplies growing at nearly 8 percent per year through 2020, in a shift that will increase diversity of natural gas supply for European and Chinese buyers.U.S. consumption tumbles
In a country-by-country analysis of world markets, BP said it expects the United States will become a net exporter of natural gas next year and a net exporter of oil in 2031.
Growing oil and gas production will tip the country into energy self-sufficiency in 2021, with the nation becoming the largest producer of both natural gas and liquids, BP said.
It sees domestic energy production growing by 32 percent by 2035, even as consumption expands by only 1 percent by that year -- with per-capita energy use in the United States falling to its lowest recorded levels by 2035.
Coal use in the United States will fall nearly 50 percent, the company predicted, while oil and nuclear energy consumption will each fall 12 percent. A 30 percent increase in natural gas use and doubling of renewables will take up the slack, the company predicted.
The energy company underlined in its presentation that its best guess as to the direction of future energy policies and market changes puts the world on course to have 25 percent higher carbon emissions in 2035. "Such a path would be materially higher than one which would be generally regarded as consistent with limiting the rise in global mean temperatures to two degrees," officials said.
Considering a range of responses, BP said no one change would be likely to set the world on a sustainable climate path. "This underpins the importance of policymakers taking steps that lead to a meaningful global price for carbon," the company said, noting that market forces can provide incentives for many parties to act simultaneously.
Click here for BP's energy outlook report.
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Derailment Reignites Oil Transport Debate
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Manuel Quiñones
It didn't take long for some supporters of TransCanada Corp.'s Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to highlight this week's train derailment in West Virginia as evidence of the need for the project.
"This is what happens when we don't build pipelines," wrote Houston Chronicle business columnist Chris Tomlinson in an article titled, "109 reasons why we need pipelines, including Keystone." That's the number of CSX Corp. rail cars involved in the incident.
KXL supporters have long said the project is a safer and more climate-friendly alternative to shipping the oil by rail.
"Environmentalists and pipeline opponents of all stripes need to explain how they justify forcing crude oil onto the rails with full knowledge that it is much more dangerous than transporting it by pipeline," Tomlinson wrote.
Critics, however, dispute that conclusion. And even some pipeline supporters are hesitant to trash one mode of transporting crude to boost another.
TransCanada Corp. spokesman Shawn Howard didn't want to draw a connection between KXL and the incident in West Virginia, where the train caught fire and forced the evacuation of nearby residents.
"On the broader issue," Howard said, "what we have said before is that pipelines and rail are complementary in transporting crude oil to market. However, pipelines are the safest and most efficient way to move large volumes of products like oil over longer distances."
More pipelines would also help resolve ongoing congestion issues because of increased oil production, supporters say.
Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), author of legislation to approve the pipeline, said in a recent statement, "It takes 1,400 rail cars moving through the region every day to carry the same amount of oil that the Keystone XL pipeline will move. They could be carrying wheat or soybeans or fertilizer."
On the other end of the KXL debate, Anthony Swift, Natural Resources Defense Council pipelines watcher, penned a blog post looking to debunk any claims by project supporters that the West Virginia incident -- and other like it in recent years -- are reasons to support the pipeline.
"Their argument is that we can build the pipeline OR we will have more fiery infernos along the nation's rail lines," he wrote. "It's a scare tactic. And it's wrong." He added that, "Building Keystone XL will do little or nothing to reduce the risk of fiery disasters like we have seen."
Swift argues that oil from shale deposits in places like North Dakota extracted through hydraulic fracturing contain high levels of flammable gases. And more pipelines are unlikely to get all the oil off the rails. For one, he says, rail is too expensive for Canadian oil sands producers.
Plus, wrote Swift, "The simple fact is that for a variety of reasons, North Dakota's producers prefer shipping their crude by rail to the East and West Coasts than to the Gulf Coast by pipeline."
The Association of American Railroads said last year that freight railroads transported more than 200,000 carloads of crude oil in 2012, up from roughly 9,500 in 2008.
And the Energy Information Administration said last year that crude-by-rail infrastructure had increased to meet the need for shipments from shale plays to refineries on the East and West coasts.
An oft-cited report by the International Energy Agency said trains were six times more likely to spill crude between 2004 and 2012, but the total amount of oil released by pipelines was three times higher over that same period.
International Energy Agency analyst Charles Esser wrote last year that while more expensive, railroads have some distinct advantages.
"In North America, it is easier to obtain regulatory approval for regional or cross-border rail links than for a pipeline," he wrote. "Other advantages include flexibility and the relative speed of rail infrastructure deployment."
Of pipelines, he wrote, "After the initial investment, operating costs are about one-third on average of rail, and pipelines are more energy-efficient and emit less carbon."
Swift, like other environmental advocates, is calling for the Obama administration to finalize new rules to govern crude by rail. Pointing to concern from rail and oil companies to the proposal, Swift wrote, "Disingenuous efforts to tie rail safety to tar sands pipeline construction is a bait and switch that hide the industry's desire for more pipelines AND unregulated rail access."
AAR CEO Edward Hamberger said last year, "As we develop these new energy resources, policymakers are asking, which mode is best for transporting crude oil -- freight rail or pipelines? The answer is both."
He added, "Railroads and pipelines both transport crude oil safely and reliably, and each has a role to play enhancing our energy security and delivering energy to American families and business. There is, and will be, plenty of crude for all modes to move."
Sabrina Fang, spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute, echoed Hamberger's perspective. "Every method of transportation that we use has an important role to play in the safe, reliable and efficient movement of oil and natural gas from the wellhead to consumers."
Beyond the debate over the safety of rail versus pipelines, sharp differences remain over KXL's impact. TransCanada's Howard pointed out that the proposed pipeline would carry some oil from the Bakken Shale aside from Canadian crude.
The State Department's environmental review for KXL, which said that with high-enough oil prices, Canadian oil sands producers would send their product to market whether by rail or pipeline. So KXL could provide a safer, less carbon emitting alternative.
Tribune News Service commentator Martin Schram similarly wrote, "In the end, I'm persuaded by the experts who say rail shipments pose a far greater danger to the environment than transporting the oil through a state-of-the-art pipeline."
But environmentalists disagree. They insist, particularly amid currently low oil prices, that rail is not really a viable alternative for shipping oil sands crude. Killing KXL would stop at least some production, and that's their goal.
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White House Report: Fracking Impacts Best Regulated Locally, Not Federally
Feb 19, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Elana Schor
The White House Council of Economic Advisors today portrayed concerns over fracking’s land and water impact as best addressed locally, a possible signal that federal regulations may be limited to current efforts to rein in methane leaks from the oil and gas production method.
In a wide-ranging report, the CEA homed in on natural gas after lauding the economic and energy security benefits of the record-setting recent growth in U.S. oil production.
”The Administration is taking steps to ensure that the expansion of natural gas and oil production be done responsibly and with environmental safeguards,” the CEA wrote, noting the “climate impacts of fugitive methane emissions and flaring, as well as local environmental issues associated with water and land use for hydraulic fracturing operations.”
The White House last month announced an aspirational strategy to reduce oil and gas-related methane emissions by as much as 45 percent by 2025, relative to 2012 levels, though that plan relies largely on voluntary moves by the industry. Environmentalists have long pushed for broader federal action on fracking, but the CEA report appeared to indicate that steps beyond the federal methane plan would have to happen locally.
“The regulatory structure for addressing local environmental concerns, especially around land and water use, exists primarily at the state and local level,” the White House economic report stated. “Research that is actively under way will inform prudent local environmental regulation of hydraulic fracturing." -
States Not Working on EPA Climate Rule Compliance Yet, Official Says
Feb 19, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillen
State environmental officials are not yet working on plans to implement EPA’s Clean Power Plan because of uncertainty over what will be in the final rule, the head of the Environmental Council of the States told FERC on Thursday.
“The time and the resources to begin working on a plan now for something for a final rule that comes out in the late summer is something that states don't have the capacity to do,” ECS executive director and general counsel Alexandra Dunn said at a technical conference on EPA’s climate rules.
Dunn also told the commissioners that state officials feel they will have very little time to write compliance plans.
“I’ve had states say, ‘I don’t have time to work across state lines, I’m going to have to write a plan that’s just about my state,’” she said.
FERC can help "juice things along" with conversations and education, Dunn added.
“People are going put pen to paper sometime this summer, and it’s going to be done quick, and it’s got to be done well,” she said. -
Industry, States Call for FERC Activism on Clean Power Plan
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Hannah Northey
Federal grid overseers today began the complex process of wading through technical and legal solutions for what some states and system operators have flagged as concerns with U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission at a high-profile technical conference in Washington, D.C., heard from attendees that states are not yet crafting plans to comply with EPA's proposal, which is slated to be finalized this summer, and that EPA needs the agency's continual advice on how to proceed.
"We are sibling agencies with different responsibilities, we want to be able to look to FERC for advice and counsel on the issues which you are expert and we are not," acting EPA air chief Janet McCabe told FERC members. "As states begin to really put together the plans, that's when we really can zero in for potential for reliability problems."
But exactly how and when FERC could provide that advice so early in the process without a final rule or state plans remains unclear. Alexandra Dapolito Dunn, executive director and general counsel of the Environmental Council of the States, told FERC commissioners that states have not yet started crafting their plans because they are facing limited resources and sparse details on what the final rule will look like. EPA's timeline, she said, is "intense," and the commission should help states facing tight deadlines and uncertainties about electric reliability.
"The time and the resources to be working on a plan now that might change is something states don't have the capacity to do," Dunn said. "What states are truly doing are awaiting the final rule. That doesn't mean they're sitting on their hands."
FERC Commissioner Colette Honorable said she didn't see the commission "negotiating" with EPA over the final climate rule but instead advising the agency on the effects -- something EPA has said it would welcome.
Central to the discussion was the creation of a "safety reliability valve," a mechanism that would ensure the U.S. electric grid remains reliable should states run into unforeseen situations -- perhaps if a power plant closes or transmission or natural gas pipelines cannot be built on time. Some clean energy advocates have said such a mechanism is unnecessary, and McCabe at an energy conference this week called on regulators and power industry officials to provide details.
Discussion today touched on a proposal that the ISO/RTO Council laid out in comments to FERC in December. In that proposal, grid operators asked the EPA to require states to spell out the grid reliability impacts of their plans -- not just to themselves but also to neighboring states and regions (Energywire, Feb. 17).
Grid operators said such a valve could be needed as states implement interim goals between 2020 and 2029; later in the compliance period, should they not be able to meet the final 2030 target; or if the state's plan might jeopardize reliability in neighboring areas.
E&E's Power Plan Hub keeps you up to date on the latest national and state-level developments on EPA's greenhouse gas regulations for the power sector. Go to E&E's Power Plan Hub.
Craig Glazer, vice president for federal government policy for the Mid-Atlantic grid operator, PJM Interconnection, said any "safety valve" has got to be narrow to provide certainty for infrastructure investments, noting that PJM in comments to FERC laid out specific scenarios in which it could be applied.
"It can't be a free pass," he said.
Gerry Cauley, CEO of the North American Electric Reliability Corp., the federally certified grid monitor, said such a mechanism would need to be included in EPA's final rule and be tapped into through 2030 and possibly beyond. But he said such a step would require much negotiation between FERC, the Energy Department and EPA.
The hearing today is part of FERC's ongoing process of exploring how to balance the needs of the industry with helping EPA. Attendees implored the commission not to be "chopped liver" or a "sitting plant" and to take quick action before the final rule is firmed up to ensure that enough infrastructure is in place and that the grid will be safeguarded.
Commissioner Tony Clark questioned McCabe about the fear states have expressed about the potential for lawsuits by bringing mechanisms like efficiency into a federal rule. Clark said EPA appears to be geared toward getting as many states as possible on board, but states fear third-party lawsuits or "sue and settle" agreements from tapping into tools that EPA has touted as flexible means of compliance, including building codes and efficiency.
"They feel like there's a target on their chest," Clark said.
Dunn agreed that states are wary of bringing programs that are now voluntary into their implementation plans.
McCabe said EPA is "extremely sensitive" to the matter, and the proposal lays out a traditional approach that allows states to shift their energy portfolio, but that other options also are under consideration.
"We're not at the final rule yet; I can't lay it all out, but there are options," she said.
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Ga. PSC's Echols Says State Taking Wait-and-See Approach on Power Plan Compliance Mechanism
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - TV
U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan proposes a 44 percent reduction in emissions for Georgia. How is the state preparing for the rollout of EPA's final plan later this year? During today's OnPoint, from the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners' winter meetings, Tim Echols, commissioner on the Georgia Public Service Commission, explains why he believes a regional compliance plan would amount to a transfer of wealth for his state. He also talks about the role he believes new nuclear should play in EPA's final plan.Transcript
Monica Trauzzi: Hello and welcome to OnPoint from the NARUC winter meetings in Washington, D.C. I'm Monica Trauzzi. With me today is Tim Echols, commissioner with the Georgia Public Service Commission. Commissioner, thank you for joining me.
Tim Echols: Yes, it's been a great conference here, learned a lot.
Monica Trauzzi: Fantastic. So EPA's Clean Power Plan, clearly one of the key talking points and issues here at the NARUC winter meetings. In Georgia, EPA has proposed a 44 percent reduction in emissions. Georgia is one of those states at the higher end of the emissions reduction scale. What have your state's biggest challenges been in reducing emissions on your own?
Tim Echols: You know, these nuclear reactors that we're building at Plant Vogtle, they're a big part of our compliance. So certainly with Georgia and South Carolina leading the way in new nuclear power, we want to see these projects to the end and see them successfully online. That's going to be an important part of our baseload power. But we also have become the fastest-growing solar state in the U.S. We're the fastest and largest market for the Nissan Leaf, for the electric cars, and of course their storage ability that they have. We already have 10,000 Nissan Leafs in Georgia and adding probably 1,000 every month. We've also secured some Oklahoma wind power from EDF, 250 megawatts, and I think we're going to probably get some more of that. So Georgia's really making a lot of progress in a number of areas with clean energy.
Monica Trauzzi: So then why do all five commissioners on your commission then oppose the steps that EPA is taking?
Tim Echols: Well, we oppose the rule on its face because we feel like that we're elected by our voters to regulate energy policy, and we believe this rule encroaches on our constitutional duty to regulate energy. So, yes, we oppose it on its face; we're not really talking about any compliance measures yet because the rule is not officially the rule yet. So we'll wait, let the rule harden, and then we'll get to work on what we need to do to comply with it.
Monica Trauzzi: Is that going to leave you enough time to come up with a compliance mechanism for the plan?
Tim Echols: I think so, given that the interim targets now are possibly being moved, I think we've got time to do that, and our EPD is quarterbacking this, our Environmental Protection Division is quarterbacking this with the PSC giving advice as well as Southern Co., GEFA, our Environmental Finance Authority, our cities, our EMCs. I think we've got everybody engaged. We're ready but we don't want to raise the white flag yet and say we're accepting the rule as it is on its face, because we think there's still a lot wrong with this rule.
Monica Trauzzi: What types of discussions are happening in your state in terms of a regional plan and linking up with other states?
Tim Echols: Well, as I said to some folks today, any kind of plan to work with another state, way beyond Georgia, which the rule allows, to me is more or less a wealth transfer from the state of Georgia. If we've got a 44 percent number on our CO2 diet and we're working with a state that doesn't really have to do anything, they're going to be getting part of our money. And as an elected official in Georgia, I'm not excited about transferring any of my ratepayers' or my voters' wealth to any other state. So we're not really thinking about that at this point. We're looking at our solar portfolio, adding more to that, the wind that we're importing. Of course we've got a lot of great natural gas combined-cycle units going, we want to keep as many of these coal units going as possible. We probably would wind up closing all the units that aren't scrubbed. And of course we've got to finish this nuclear power plant because it's going to be an important part of our base load.
Monica Trauzzi: We're going to talk about that a little later. So here at the NARUC meetings we are seeing a wide range of perspectives on the Clean Power Plan and whether it's workable or not. Are you speaking with commissioners from other states who support the plan? And has your opinion been swayed at all during some of these discussions?
Tim Echols: You know, the good thing, I guess, about what's happened with the reaction to the rule is that both red states and blue states have complained. Not everybody's complained, but it hasn't just been Southern states. There've been states like North Carolina, they've complained, and they've got an RPS, or renewable portfolio standard. Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, we don't. So we've gotten a lot of pushback from a number of states, especially when it comes to measures already implemented to curb CO2. So I think that the president and the EPA, I think they're listening, I think there will be some reprieve. I don't know exactly what that's going to be, but with Gina McCarthy here today and her hinting about that again, I'm optimistic. I'm in fact very encouraged after leaving this meeting.
Monica Trauzzi: And EPA has suggested that there might be changes to some of the state targets as well as the building blocks. What types of changes would you like to see to the building blocks?
Tim Echols: Well, certainly the formula they used for counting our new nuclear, we would like that sweetened up a bit in the plan. There's only two states that it really impacts, three if you count Tennessee with the finishing of their project. So we would like to see some change in the way that that is counted toward our compliance number. I've complained to the EPA about the behind-the-meter solar, because we don't have an RPS, we don't have what the EPA calls a regulatory trigger, that they're not going to count some of that solar that we have behind the meter like with Ikea and Purina and other good corporate citizens in Georgia. And I've also complained about the 21 million acres of pine forest that we have that eat CO2 for breakfast, lunch and dinner that we aren't getting any credit for that towards compliance.
So I feel like the big pushback though has been on this nuclear power, and I'm very optimistic that there's going to be a change on that. I just don't know what it's going to be, but I am optimistic that our united voices, especially in Southern states, has been heard -- not to mention the fact that the president is really behind nuclear power. He knows, and I've been told by his climate czars in the White House, that he has to have -- in order to reach 80 percent clean energy by 2050 -- he has to have a substantial amount of nuclear power. So he gave us the loan guarantees. He's not against nuclear power. We just need him influencing the EPA just a bit to sweeten up that formula so that it causes other states to want to follow the lead of Georgia and South Carolina.
Monica Trauzzi: So in your state you're waiting on the construction of two reactors. How important is the completion of that facility to the reduction of emissions in your state?
Tim Echols: If we didn't have Plant Vogtle 3 and 4, that number of 44 percent would go up close to 60, and imagine trying to cut your CO2 by 60 percent. I think it would be almost impossible for us to meet that number without some serious collaboration and having to pay a lot of other states in however this collaboration is going to work, so we need to finish this project.
Monica Trauzzi: There have been construction delays though. Is the failure to adhere to the original construction and deployment schedule evidence that nuclear is too costly in the United States and too risky as part of the U.S.'s overall energy strategy?
Tim Echols: I think you could only conclude that if you say that the Atlanta Falcon stadium delays and overruns means that we can't really play football, or that our streetcar delay means that we really shouldn't have a streetcar. This plant was certified with zero contingency, zero, and we can't build a gas plant or anything else on budget because of labor problems that we've had. We knew, the commission knew there would be added costs; we just didn't know how much. And we will have the mother of all prudency here in 2019 by order, which we set, and when Unit 3 comes online. And we'll look at every single added cost that we've had and we'll determine yes this is prudent, no it's not prudent, but we'll take it then. I don't want to nickel and dime our ratepayers at every single semiannual hearing with, "Oh, we've got a cost overrun for cybersecurity or for taxes or for this" -- I don't want to wear them out. I want to keep public opinion strong behind nuclear power, because one day we might want to build some more.
Monica Trauzzi: All right, one final question on reliability. The Brattle Group has presented a report here at the winter meetings contending that the power plan would not pose sort of an overall threat to reliability. Do you think that the power sector is transforming quickly enough to ensure reliability under the Clean Power Plan?
Tim Echols: Well, I sat in on that breakfast with the Brattle Group, and it's quite a smart Harvard Ph.D. that presented that report. That's not what I heard him say. I heard him say that there's a cost associated with compliance, and then there's a cost associated with compliance with reliability. There's two levels of cost here. And if you're going to be able to keep the power reliable, which is what your residents in Georgia, that's what they're used to, they're used to no blackouts, no brownouts. We're not a Texas or a California -- we have incredibly reliable power. That's why Georgia's the No. 1 site selection for new businesses in the U.S., because our power is cheap and it's reliable. So I don't think folks are going to be able to comply with this with reliability without spending a fortune.
Monica Trauzzi: All right, we're going to end it there. Thank you for joining me, very interesting discussion.
Tim Echols: Great, thanks.
Monica Trauzzi: And thanks for watching, we'll see you back here tomorrow.
[End of Audio]
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Offer 'Concrete Ideas' for Electric Reliability Safety Valve -- EPA's McCabe
Feb 19, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
By Rod Kuckro
If states want U.S. EPA to build into its proposed Clean Power Plan a mechanism to protect against power outages and ensure reliable electricity service -- a so-called safety valve -- then regulators and power industry officials need to draw that out in detail, the agency's top air quality official said this week.
"Let's put some concrete ideas around that. How does time help with the reliability issue?" said acting EPA air chief Janet McCabe, speaking in Washington, D.C., at the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners' winter meetings. "The more specific people can be about those issues that are fully in front of us, that's information that we can use."
Her comments were the latest indication that even though the formal comment period for EPA's proposed regulations for cutting power plant carbon emissions closed Dec. 1, the agency wants to continue the conversation over the rule.
They were also a response to fierce complaints by some state electricity regulators this week that the targets set by EPA for emissions reductions are unworkable (E&ENews PM, Feb. 17). EPA's overall goal is to reduce power plant carbon emissions by 30 percent from 2005 levels by 2030.
The idea of a safety valve, which would protect the continued operation of a power plant for a period of time if it were deemed essential to keep the lights on, is not new. But it has gained prominence among critics of the Clean Power Plan as a way to respond to a local or regional inability to build new generation, a gas pipeline or a transmission line in time to meet EPA's deadlines under the final rule to be issued later this summer.
One of those commissioner critics, Kenneth Anderson of the Public Utility Commission of Texas, suggested that maybe regional grid operators, such as the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, should be allowed to grant critical power plants a waiver to operate for a time, even if only seasonally to meet peak demand.
Philip Moeller, a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, spoke up in support, as well. "That's why I like the concept of a safety valve -- somewhat like we did with [the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards rule] if a [generation] unit is really needed."
But there would need to be an "open, transparent debate among the engineers as to where it's needed, how long it's needed and why."
E&E's Power Plan Hub keeps you up to date on the latest national and state-level developments on EPA's greenhouse gas regulations for the power sector. Go to E&E's Power Plan Hub.
Moeller didn't say where that open, transparent debate might occur if EPA were to provide for a safety valve. But that might become clearer today when FERC hosts an all-day technical conference on electric reliability and other aspects of the Clean Power Plan.
Nearly 30 panelists will present their views, and one of the questions posed by FERC asks them for feedback on available tools for addressing operational issues that could arise as coal plants are powered down, more gas is brought online and intermittent sources of electricity are integrated into the grid.
Also, the agency wants stakeholders to weigh in on what its role might be. Both Moeller and FERC Commissioner Tony Clark favor a formal role for the agency, such as having it review state or regional compliance plans filed with EPA (EnergyWire, Dec. 5, 2014).
McCabe told the NARUC audience that she's been "floored" by the "factually rich" nature of the comments that were filed.
"Clearly, timing and the interim goals are maybe the pre-eminent issue that we're hearing about," McCabe said. The interim targets in the proposed rule were developed "based on our understanding at the time of the proposal about what was workable."
"We've gotten a tremendous amount of input -- very fact-based -- from people who know what they're doing, who are in this business, who are pointing out ways in which we didn't get that right," he said.
So the concerns about timing "is very, very much on the table," McCabe said, echoing sentiments expressed earlier Tuesday by her boss, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy.
"This is all very important and rich fodder for us to look at before we finalize the rule. This is not a final rule -- it is a proposal," she said.
McCabe also telegraphed that EPA is dialed in on comments regarding the need to preserve and maybe expand the nation's nuclear generation fleet.
"We've heard significantly that the approach we took in the proposal with respect to existing nuclear is not one that people find to be workable or appropriate," she said.
"We got a lot of very specific input on that, which we're looking at very seriously. I'm not in a position to let you know how we're going to sort through all that, but we are looking at it very, very carefully," she said.
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White House Sees Wide-Ranging Benefits in Energy Boom
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
Increased oil and gas production and use of renewable energy means the United States economy is stronger, greenhouse gases are down and security is better, the White House said Thursday.
Those are some of the benefits of the energy boom of recent months that the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers outlined in a major report on the economy.
And while lower oil and natural gas prices — caused largely by increased domestic production — could boost consumption, the White House concluded that the price drops are not going to harm its goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“On balance, the energy revolution lays the foundation for U.S. leadership in global efforts to address climate change and paves the way toward a low-carbon energy future,” the report said.
The White House used the report to celebrate various energy and environmental achievements, like a 50 percent cut in petroleum imports, record installation of renewable energy infrastructure like solar and wind power and reduced consumption of oil and coal.
It also touted the impact that lower energy prices have on households and businesses.
“Since 2006, natural gas prices have fallen well below crude oil prices on an energy-equivalent basis, providing a cheaper source of energy to consumers and businesses in the United States,” it said. “This price decrease has created widespread benefits and opportunities for the U.S. economy.”
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Legal Concerns Prompt EPA To Scale Back Flexibilities In Ozone SIP Rule
Feb 19, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
EPA's final rule detailing requirements for state implementation plans (SIPs) for meeting the agency's 2008 ozone air standard scales back regulatory flexibilities the agency floated in the proposed version of the rule, due to EPA's fears that the provisions could have been vulnerable to lawsuits claiming that they violated the Clean Air Act.
For example, the final ozone national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) implementation rule abandons the proposed version's approach to consolidating various SIP deadlines together. The suggested approach was designed to reduce states' burdens by allowing them to submit all elements of an ozone compliance SIP at once, but EPA in the final rule drops that plan and notes that commenters warned that the approach might not be lawful.
EPA has also clarified in the rule that states will not be able to have several additional months to attain the ozone standard. The agency in a 2012 “classifications” rule intended to provide the extra time by allowing states until the end of a calendar year to come into compliance with a NAAQS. Previously, states were given a prescribed number of years to meet the NAAQS after designation of areas as either “attainment” or “nonattainment” for a NAAQS, with deadlines not corresponding to the end of calendar years -- but an appellate court scrapped that approach.
The change of course on SIP deadlines follows a Dec. 23 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that found EPA's initial approach to attainment deadlines illegal. The ruling cast further doubt on whether EPA could alter SIP submission deadlines from those prescribed under the air law.
“The EPA believes that the recent ruling by the D.C. Circuit Court on the Classifications Rule impacts the level of flexibility EPA is able to provide regarding SIP due dates,” the agency says in the new rule.
EPA's decision to retreat from various flexibilities it planned to offer states in the implementation rule will likely be a disappointment for states, who have long complained about burdens in writing SIPs. Under the NAAQS process, EPA sets a limit on criteria air pollutants to protect public health. The agency then writes implementation rules detailing how states should write SIPs detailing the pollution controls they will impose to meet the NAAQS.
The implementation rule for the 2008 ozone standard of 75 parts per billion (ppb) outlines a host of important provisions including deadlines for the plans; allowable emissions control strategies; and various other elements including criteria for states to show “reasonable further progress” (RFP) in reducing ozone-forming emissions.
The agency also regards the rule as an example that it may follow for the implementation rule for its pending update to its ozone NAAQS that it is due to issue by Oct. 1 under a legally binding deadline. EPA has proposed tightening the standard to within a 65-70 ppb range. EPA in the new final rule says that if it chooses to tighten the ozone NAAQS again, it “expects that this rule will help facilitate implementation of any new standards.”
Compliance Measures
In the final implementation rule, EPA says that it is not finalizing various measures it floated for states in the proposed version of the rule to ease compliance. For instance, EPA had proposed to in certain circumstances allow states to cut emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx), an ozone precursor, in lieu to mandated cuts of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) -- chemicals that also lead to ozone formation. But the agency will not now allow this in the final rule.
Under the NAAQS program, states are required to submit rate of progress plans showing they are meeting requisite targets to reduce ozone precursors. EPA had proposed that a mandatory 15 percent cut in VOCs could be met instead with NOx reductions in areas where states believe that to be more effective at reducing ozone, given different mixtures of sources and differing atmospheric chemistry.
States include in their SIPs plans for reasonably available control technology (RACT) -- a standard of emissions control required in areas classified nonattainment for the ozone NAAQS. Some stakeholders had pushed for EPA to allow for the right not to make mandatory VOC cuts in “NOx-limited areas” where reducing VOCs, such as those emissions from oil and gas drilling, has little beneficial effect on ozone. EPA, however, says legal support for modifying its existing guidance on RACT needs to be “further explored” before such a change can be made.
EPA also proposed “alternative” approaches for states to meet the RFP requirement, such as allowing states to win credit toward RFP for reductions in different chemical types, or “species,” of VOCs based on their ozone-forming potential. Another option was for states to use an approach to RFP based on percentage reductions in ambient pollutant concentrations, as opposed to more specific, fixed annual reductions in VOCs and NOx.
But in the final version of the implementation rule, the agency says it “is not taking final action now” on these aspects of the proposal, citing uncertainties over the approaches. “The EPA believes that more time is needed to better understand the scientific and legal issues involved in allowing and implementing these approaches. In the meantime, use of these approaches may be considered on a case-by-case basis,” EPA says in the rule.
Revoking Standard
Meanwhile, the final rule revokes for all purposes the 1997 ozone NAAQS, expressed at 84 ppb and subsequently tightened in 2008 to the current 75 ppb limit. This action follows the D.C. Circuit’s Dec. 23 ruling, in which the court also found illegal EPA's partial revocation of the 1997 ozone NAAQS for the purposes of “transportation conformity,” a requirement that state transportation projects do not result in ozone violations.
The court held that EPA cannot partially revoke a NAAQS, but can fully revoke one subject to certain restrictions imposed by the Clean Air Act to prevent “backsliding.” Some states with problems attaining ozone NAAQS, such as Delaware, have opposed any relaxation of transportation conformity requirements.
In order to comply with earlier appeals court rulings, EPA is adding to the list of “anti-backsliding” measures that must remain in place for areas that have violated the 1997 standard. Such measures aim to ensure that abolishing the old standard does not result in relaxation of certain controls to limit ozone.
For example, EPA is adding to the list “contingency measures” that states must take in case they miss regulatory emissions reduction targets, and “section 185 fees” levied on industry in the event that NAAQS are not attained. A lengthy list of other anti-backsliding measures, such as vehicle inspection and maintenance measures and clean fuels programs, are also required as they were under previous EPA policy.
States' Flexibilities
However, EPA in the final rule has not scaled back all flexible compliance options offered to states in the proposal. The agency is finalizing an option for states to use a baseline year other than 2011 from which to measure RFP. States must select a baseline year between 2008 and 2012, and justify it as appropriate. In the event that a pre-2011 baseline year is selected, states must make additional annual 3 percent emission reductions after the initial 6-year period for which RFP must be demonstrated, which EPA says ensures that sufficient progress is made.
EPA is also finalizing a “re-designation substitute” that would serve to end anti-backsliding measures in areas that have violated the 1997 NAAQS. This would take the place of a formal re-designation to attainment status for the old standard. Environmentalists were critical of the measure, but EPA insists that the end result is the same and the concept is legal.
Critics argued that the idea runs counter to the D.C. Circuit’s 2011 ruling in Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) v. EPA that found EPA cannot lift anti-backsliding measures on the introduction of a new NAAQS standard.
“The court ruled in NRDC v. EPA that it would be improper for the EPA to relieve an area that has not attained a standard from requirements imposed for failure to attain that standard. The EPA’s ‘redesignation substitute’ proposal does not do that,” EPA says in the final rule.
The approach “relieves areas that demonstrate that they are in fact attaining a standard from obligations arising from failure to attain that standard as well as all anti-backsliding requirements applicable for any prior revoked standard without the need for a formal redesignation. Nothing in the 2011 NRDC v. EPA decision forecloses that approach,” EPA adds.
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D.C. Circuit Sets Arguments In State’s Suit Over EPA Air ‘Increments’ Rule
Feb 19, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has scheduled oral arguments for April 14 in North Carolina’s suit over EPA’s air rule on “increments” -- the available allowance of air emissions for industry in a given area -- in which the state wants credit for past emissions cuts so it can potentially ease industry’s access to permits.
In State of North Carolina v. EPA, the state is seeking to overturn EPA’s October 2010 rule setting increments, for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) regulated under the prevention of significant deterioration (PSD) permit program, which sets permit mandates in areas attaining EPA’s air standards. In the same suit, the state is also challenging EPA’s Sept. 16, 2014, rejection of North Carolina’s petition seeking administrative reconsideration of the rule.
The state says EPA erred when it revised from 1975 to 2010 the baseline year for setting the maximum allowable emissions increases, or increments, in their PSD permits. The state has argued in legal briefings and its petition for reconsideration that because the agency set the baseline year after North Carolina took steps to cut air pollution, it would lower the available PSD increment, making it harder for industry to build or expand facilities.
Should North Carolina win the case, the state would likely win increased increments, or pollution allowances, that could enable industrial sources to obtain air permits required for industrial expansion.
Such a decision might also have similar implications for other areas that are currently in attainment with federal ambient air standards and which reduced their pollution substantially between 1975 and 2010, as those areas could potentially get credit for those pollution cuts and ease future air permitting requirements.
The D.C. Circuit in a Jan. 27 order announced the arguments data in the suit, in which North Carolina cites a 2013 ruling by the same court in Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) v. EPA to bolster its challenge. The D.C. Circuit in NRDC said EPA had applied incorrect, insufficiently stringent air law requirements to regulation of PM2.5, which North Carolina in the pending suit says “changed the legal landscape,” making the increments policy unlawful.
In NRDC, the court unanimously agreed with environmentalists that PM2.5 is a subset of the larger coarse particulate, PM10, and therefore EPA should have applied more-stringent provisions under the air act that apply to PM under the law’s “subpart 4” provisions, rather than the laxer, more general “subpart 1.” EPA had argued that PM2.5 was a “new” pollutant and therefore not subject to subpart 4, but the court rejected this.
The court in another 2013 ruling in Sierra Club v. EPA, found unlawful significant impact levels (SILs) and significant monitoring concentrations (SMCs) -- de minimis pollution thresholds that industry could previously use to avoid certain permit requirements. SMCs and SILs were established under the increments rule, and EPA in 2013 modified the rule in line with the court’s opinion -- however, it left increment unchanged.
Baseline Date
In the pending suit, North Carolina argues that because PM2.5 is a subset of PM10 under NRDC, EPA must retain the “baseline” date year from the air law for particulate -- for “major” sources, Jan. 6, 1975 -- for the purposes, of calculating increment, and was wrong to re-set the baseline at Oct. 20, 2010. The baseline date is the date at which “baseline concentration” of pollutants is established, which is used to calculate the maximum allowable pollution increase, or increment. The increment serves to ensure that areas subject to PSD, designated as either attainment or “unclassifiable” for national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS), do not exceed the NAAQS.
North Carolina similarly says that EPA’s allegedly incorrect choice of baseline date adversely impacts other important procedural deadlines for establishment of increment under the PSD program.
The practical effect of using a more recent baseline year is to give North Carolina less increment to use, making industrial expansion and plant modification more difficult, according to the state. New and modified industrial pollution sources must obtain sufficient increment to operate under their air permits.
“Under EPA’s rule setting the baseline dates at 2010 and 2011, areas that experienced reductions in PM2.5 emissions between 1975 and 2010 would have a lower baseline concentration to which the increment would be added, resulting in a lower ceiling for emissions from new or modified sources,” North Carolina said in an Oct. 15 brief.
“The more onerous the baseline date, the more difficult North Carolina’s task in issuing permits that comply with the increment requirements in the future,” the state argued, claiming injury that gives it legal standing to sue. Also, “North Carolina may be subject to remedial and proprietary consequences due to North Carolina’s submission of a state implementation plan using the baseline date dictated by this Court’s decision in [NRDC].”
The Department of Justice (DOJ), however, in its Dec. 16 response brief on EPA’s behalf says the court should reject North Carolina’s challenge primarily because the state missed a series of legal filing deadlines.
The state never challenged the 2010 increments rule within a 60-day filing window, DOJ argued, nor provided comments on the baseline date issue, despite that fact that several other commenters did.
Nor does North Carolina’s claim that the NRDC ruling provided “after-arising grounds” that would allow judicial review of the 2010 rule bear scrutiny, the administration claimed, because North Carolina failed to file a suit within 60 days of the court’s decision in NRDC. North Carolina and DOJ differ over when and how subsequent events “ripened’ the state’s claim for judicial review, an important argument as an “unripe” suit could be rejected.
Should the court reach the merits of the case, DOJ says, EPA’s interpretation of the PSD rules was reasonable because of statutory ambiguity, and is due deference under the Chevron doctrine, where courts defer to federal agencies in the absence of clear Congressional statements on a question.
North Carolina says that EPA must set the baseline dates for increment under air law section 166(f), but DOJ says EPA was “eminently reasonable” to set them under 166(a), in which case the D.C. Circuit’s ruling in NRDC does not compel using the old deadlines.
Contradictory Ruling
In a Jan. 20 intervenor brief supporting EPA, environmental groups Sierra Club, Clean Air Carolina, North Carolina Coastal Federation and Mountain True say the D.C. Circuit’s ruling in NRDC -- which resulted in tougher requirements for particulate pollution control -- contradicts rather than supports North Carolina’s position.
“NRDC in no way ‘changed the legal landscape’ with respect to EPA’s selection of the baseline, and North Carolina’s claim was fully available in 2010,” the groups say.
While they argue that North Carolina’s case fails on procedural grounds, should the court reach the merits, “Nothing in the statute or in NRDC requires EPA to act under [section 166(f)] in this circumstance: EPA acted properly under [section 166(a)],” they argue. Section 166(a) applies to all pollutants, not just “new” pollutants, they say.
North Carolina advocates a “nonsensical result,” because “the baseline date it contends is required would allow more PM2.5 emissions -- and thus more health harms -- than the baseline date EPA established,” the groups argue.
In a Feb. 10 reply brief, North Carolina refutes EPA’s arguments and restates its case, rebuffing EPA’s procedural criticisms about its claim. The state claims that EPA wrongly focuses on the agency’s denial of the state’s petition for administrative review as a “ripening” event that would allow the court to re-open the PM rule to judicial review.
Instead, North Carolina says that EPA’s Oct. 25, 2013, approval of an unrelated state implementation plan (SIP) change by Utah in fact “crystallized” EPA’s final position on the NRDC ruling. SIPs are emissions control plans that states craft, outlining how the will attain NAAQS.
“North Carolina’s claim was not ripe until EPA expressed its final, crystallized position that it refused to revise the Increment Rule in compliance with NRDC,” the state says. “EPA’s response to North Carolina’s comment in the Utah SIP rulemaking has all the salient characteristics of EPA’s admittedly crystallized final agency position in response to North Carolina’s administrative petition. North Carolina’s petition . . . is therefore timely,” the state adds.
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The Term That Actually Makes Climate Change Less Political
Feb 19, 2015 | The Washington Post
By Puneet Kollipara
As we’ve told you in recent weeks, a growing body of psychological research in political science is starting to show us why the debate over climate change is so politically polarized. People’s politics and worldviews seem to affect how they perceive climate change’s existence and severity.
This “cultural cognition” model is giving us new insights into how we should talk about climate change, vaccines and other hot-button issues where risk is involved. The moral of the story: More information doesn’t always help, and in some cases it can hurt by polarizing people ideologically on these issues.
A new study, published recently in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, confirms what we knew — that government proposals to cut greenhouse-gas emissions polarize us over climate change. But it also tells us of a potential policy that actually somewhat depolarizes people, while still getting them to care about climate change: geoengineering.
Geoengineering has been in the news a lot lately. Broadly speaking, it’s the idea of using technologies to manipulate the Earth’s climate. Think things like reflecting sunlight to space with large mirrors or reflective aerosols or reducing carbon-dioxide levels in the atmosphere by sucking it out of the air with machines or planting a lot of trees.
[Related: Short-term fixes for long-term climate problems? Not so fast]
But geoengineering has environmental groups and many scientists concerned, as they argue that it’s akin to playing God with the climate and that some specific techniques could have nasty side effects. The National Academy of Sciences, meanwhile, suggests that we need to do more research into geoengineering before it’s ready for prime time.
Dan Kahan at Yale University and colleagues wanted to know how geoengineering, alongside more traditional climate solutions, would affect people’s views of climate change. The researchers divided 3,000 people into three groups. Kahan and colleagues presented all three groups with the same information on the science behind climate change — namely that “irreversible climate changes” have already occurred because of human emissions and that society would face climate risks for 1,000 years even if we were to halt emissions today.
But each group received different information on the policy implications of climate change:One group was told that scientists recommended anti-pollution measures to address climate change.A second group was told that scientists recommended investing more in geoengineering, which could potentially work better than emissions cuts.A third, control group wasn’t given any specific policy recommendation.Then, all participants were surveyed on their views about the scientific information they read, on their worldviews and on their general perception of climate change’s risks to society.
Conventional wisdom might hold that telling people about geoengineering would make them less concerned about climate change’s risks by making them complacent about it; if geoengineering works, then maybe climate change isn’t such a big deal. But that’s not what the researchers found. The geoengineering group viewed climate change as posing a slightly higher risk than did the control group and a similar level of risk as did the anti-pollution group.
But that finding doesn’t get at another equally crucial issue: polarization. Not surprisingly, the anti-pollution group was more polarized (i.e., the gap between liberals and conservatives was larger) than the control group was, both on the scientific information they read and on climate change’s risks more generally.
With the geoengineering group, however, something different happened. The anti-pollution and geoengineering groups were still roughly equally polarized over how risky they think climate change is, relative to the control group. But when it came to the scientific information on climate change that the researchers made all participants read, the anti-pollution group was actually less polarized on whether the science is solid than the control group was.
What’s going on here? Not only was it a matter of conservative skepticism of climate science shrinking in the geoengineering group, but liberals in the geoengineering group became more likely to question the science. The researchers wonder whether many liberals’ concerns about geoengineering’s potential pitfalls made them more likely to question the science. Meanwhile, more conservatives in the geoengineering group could have accepted the information because geoengineering wouldn’t entail the emissions-cutting policies they oppose.
Those findings confirm that people’s views on a problem like climate change are shaped not only by what we know about the problem, but also by the problem’s societal implications. More surprisingly, however, geoengineering might not make people complacent about climate change at all. Also, at least superficially, geoengineering appears to have a depolarizing effect on the climate debate — and not simply by quelling conservative rejection of climate science.
I’m not saying we should all hop on board the geoengineering train. But the broader point here is that getting people concerned about climate change isn’t a matter of giving them more information about it. Rather, it may all be in the framing.
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The President’s Climate Plan: Cleaner, Reliable Electricity
Feb 19, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By By John Moore
Not so long ago, folks in Des Moines, Iowa, got their electricity the old-fashioned way, from a combination of coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear. In 2004 the state’s main utility, MidAmerican Energy Co., installed a wind farm among the corn fields in the northwest part of the state-- 107 turbines, each about 260 feet high.
The company calculated that so abundant are the winds blowing across the verdant landscape that the Hawkeye State had enough wind energy potential to meet its entire electricity demand—44 times over. So they built another wind farm north of Des Moines, with 100 turbines. And they kept building.
Today, MidAmerican Energy has some 1,200 wind turbines at 14 locations throughout the central and western parts of Iowa, which account for nearly 30 percent of its generating capacity, some 2,285 megawatts, enough to power more than 600,000 homes.
When a current $1.9 billion investment in additional wind power installations is completed, the folks in Des Moines and other Iowa cities and towns will have seen a major shift in their energy mix—wind will account for nearly as much capacity (39 percent) as coal. What’s remarkable about this transition is that for homeowners and businessmen, it has been largely unremarkable. The lights have stayed on, the air conditioners have continued to churn in the summer, and there have been no outages or blackouts because of growing wind capacity.
The only thing locals may have noticed is that their electric rates haven’t gone up in a decade and their air is cleaner—the state’s wind energy plants will avoid more than 8.7 million tons of dangerous carbon dioxide pollution every year, according to the American Wind Energy Association, the equivalent of taking 1.55 million cars off the road.
It’s an important lesson from Iowa, and from other states that have shifted toward cleaner electricity with wind, solar, and other renewable energy —our nation’s robust and flexible electric grid can adjust to changes in the mix of energy sources with no loss in the reliability of supply.
In the coming days and months you’ll hear opponents of President Obama’s Clean Power Plan say just the opposite: that the country would suffer debilitating blackouts and electricity shortages if we proceed with the plan’s modest and achievable cuts in carbon pollution from power plants. The government is now holding a series of public meetings on the issue.
The plan, proposed last year and now being finalized by the EPA, is the most important step we can take now to cut the dangerous carbon pollution that is contributing to climate change. Under the plan, utilities would cut back on using power from the dirtiest coal-fired power plants and make up the difference with cleaner energy sources, like wind and solar, and also cut energy waste.
It promises to reduce carbon pollution from electric power plants, the nation’s single biggest source, by 26 percent by 2020 and 30 percent by 2030. We’ll have cleaner air, a healthier planet, lower electricity bills, and hundreds of thousands of new clean-energy jobs.
Contrary to the doomsayers, renewable energy has a proven track record for reliability. To date, including Iowa we’ve added 75,000 megawatts of wind and solar to the system—that’s the equivalent of about 135 conventional coal plants, enough to supply 17.9 million homes—from California to Texas to New York with no reliability issues. Wind power has contributed up to 25 percent of total electricity demand in the Midwest with no reliability problems. Solar power also is reliable – it now routinely contributes 10 to 15 percent of California’s mid-day electricity demand.
The critics, which include coal and some utility executives and those who deny climate change science and oppose all efforts to reduce carbon pollution, ignore the success that utilities and grid operators have already shown in adopting to these and other changes, such as the influx of large nuclear power plants in the 1970s and 1980s and the recent wave of coal plant closures due to competition from cheap natural gas.
In other words, we can do this, especially considering the EPA’s long timetable and the flexibility it has given states to meet carbon reduction targets with whatever combination of measures makes sense. Of course, it won’t happen by accident, utilities and grid operators will have to conduct thorough planning and coordination—just as they’ve been doing for years.
The fact is, environmental policy changes have never caused a blackout or power outage. The Clean Power Plan will maintain that record.
Moore is a senior attorney with the Natural Resource Defense Council’s Sustainable FERC Project.
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Fire Smolders a 3rd Day from W.Va. Oil Train Derailment
Feb 19, 2015 | AP (In The Washington Post)
A fire sparked by a train derailment in southern West Virginia smoldered for a third day Wednesday, keeping federal and state investigators at bay and leading residents near the site worrying about the long-term water quality of a nearby river.
The fire — sparked when a CSX train carrying 3 million gallons of North Dakota crude jumped the tracks Monday in the unincorporated town of Mount Carbon — was 85 percent contained, said state public safety division spokesman Larry Messina.
“There’s a few small fires,” Messina said. “Until those fires are out and they make sure that site is safe, they’re going to keep folks away from that vicinity.”
CSX and multiple state and federal agencies are investigating. Federal Railroad Administration spokesman Kevin Thompson said some preliminary work has been done, including the retrieval of the train’s data recorder.
But due to the fire, “we haven’t been able to do our physical investigation on site,” he said Wednesday.
All but two of the train’s 109 cars were tank cars, and 27 of them left the tracks. Nineteen tank cars were involved in the fire, said CSX regional vice president Randy Cheetham.
A road running parallel to the train tracks along one side of the Kanawha River remained closed Wednesday.
The derailment shot fireballs into the sky, leaked oil into a Kanawha River tributary, burned down a house nearby and forced nearby water treatment plans to temporarily shut down.
As of Wednesday evening, crews had removed cars that did not derail and have started to remove derailed cars that were not involved in the fire, according to a joint statement from several agencies that have responded to the derailment. CSX will begin transferring oil from damaged cars to other tanks for removal from the site when conditions become safe, the statement said.
About 500 feet of containment boom have been deployed to lessen the potential environmental impact, the statement said.
Containment trenches also are being dug, said State Environmental Protection spokeswoman Kelley Gillenwater.
“We need to make sure no crude oil gets into the Kanawha River,” Gillenwater said in an email.
Once the rail cars and other debris are removed, soil testing and excavation can begin, she said.
Water treatment systems were brought back online after initial tests showed no oil in them. Residents remain under a boil-water advisory, while bottled water was being distributed at a high school.
Classes at West Virginia University Institute of Technology were canceled for the rest of the week. Students in two residence halls were bused 40 miles to facilities in Beckley.
People living away from the wreckage were allowed to return to their homes Tuesday after damaged electrical lines were repaired.
“We weathered the storm,” said retired Montgomery police chief Lawrence Washington. “Every storm in your life isn’t in the forecast.”
Nancy Holcomb, who lives in Boomer directly across the river from the derailment, was concerned about the possibility of the oil getting into the river.
“We swim in this river,” she said. “I don’t want to get out in this river now.”
West Virginia has seen other fuel disasters in recent years.
On Jan. 23, an overturned tanker truck spilled nearly 4,000 gallons of diesel fuel into a tributary of the Greenbrier River near Lewisburg.
In December 2012, a natural gas transmission pipe ruptured and exploded in Sissonville about 40 miles to the northwest, destroying four homes and melting the asphalt on a section of Interstate 77. No one was killed.
The tap water concerns that followed the derailment brought reminders of a January 2014 chemical spill along the Elk River in Charleston 30 miles to the north. That spill got into West Virginia American Water’s Charleston filtration plant, prompting a tap water ban for 300,000 residents for several days until the system was flushed out.
“Obvious we’ve had experiences with water in the past,” said Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin.
West Virginia’s rail system contains 2,401 miles of track, including 1,113 miles of CSX track and 801 miles of Norfolk Southern track, according to the state Department of Transportation.
Chances are, state residents live close enough to hear a train’s whistle.
“Why do people stay after things like this happen?” Washington said. “This is home. There’s a lot that goes into this community. I know a lot of people say it’s bad, but there’s good people here.”
Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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