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AM ACC Clips Report - August 9, 2018

Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) China Tariffs Targeting Three US Polyethylene Grades: ACC
Aug 9, 2018 | S&P Global Platts
By Kristen Hays

China has more than 9.2 million mt/year of new US polyethylene capacity in the crosshairs of escalating trade tensions with the US, the American Chemistry Council said Wednesday, making all grades subject to tariffs when most or all are bound for export
EDF Sues EPA To Obtain Science Rule Documents
Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) is suing EPA for its alleged failure to release documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) regarding the agency's controversial proposal to bar the use of any research in decision-making where the underlying data and models are not publicly available.
NGO Lawsuit Seeks Documents Behind EPA 'Science Transparency' Proposal
Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch

The NGO the Environmental Defense Fund has sued the US EPA over its failure to release requested documents related to its proposed 'science transparency rule'.

LCSA News

EPA Issues Two TSCA 'Not Likely To Present Unreasonable Risk' Findings
Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Kelly Franklin

The US EPA has published TSCA section 5(a)(3)(C) determinations for two substances that were the subject of pre-manufacture notices (PMNs), including one which presents potential human health concerns.
EPA Disputes 'Rubber Stamping' New Chemicals Under TSCA
Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Kelly Franklin

The US EPA has dismissed concerns that it will allow new chemicals to enter the marketplace without sufficient scrutiny.
EPA Officials Echo Wide-Ranging Concerns With Science Transparency Rule
Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Maria Hegstad

Former EPA staff and officials are urging the agency to withdraw its controversial proposed science transparency rule, charging it will hobble implementation of existing and new programs, such as the agency's new toxics program, "bias" rules in favor of industry, and is at odds with existing laws and the rule-writing process.

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) EPA Pushes Back On Asbestos Criticisms
Aug 8, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

The Trump administration is pushing back against a rash of criticism that new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) policies could lead to the import or manufacturing of asbestos.
Asbestos in a Crayon, Benzene in a Marker: A School Supply Study’s Toxic Results
Aug 9, 2018 | The New York Times
By Niraj Chokshi

A public interest group said this week that it had found toxic substances in a number of school supplies, including asbestos in a Playskool crayon and another carcinogen, benzene, in a dry-erase marker.
Asbestos, Lead And Other Dangerous Chemicals Found In Children's School Supplies, Report Says
Aug 8, 2018 | CNN
By Ursula Perano and Amanda Watts

Parents may want to take a second look at their children's school supplies this season.
Coloradans Ask EPA to Protect Well Water From Chemicals
Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tripp Baltz

Colorado environmentalists and homeowners, many of them with drinking water wells contaminated with fluorinated chemicals from a nearby Air Force facility, urged the EPA Aug. 8 to issue regulations to protect drinking water.
US NTP Releases Toxicology And Carcinogenesis Findings For Solvent
Aug 8, 2018 | Chemical Watch

The US National Toxicology Program (NTP) has released a technical report on its genetic toxicology and carcinogenesis studies of the solvent p-chloro-α,α,α-trifluorotoluene.

Energy News

(ACC Mentioned) Led by Sempra Energy, ‘Global Natural Gas Coalition’ Launched With Trump Admin And Labor Union In Fold
Aug 9, 2018 | Nation of Change
By Steve Horn

San Diego-based Sempra Energy has spearheaded the launch of a group called the Global Natural Gas Coalition to promote exports of gas obtained via fracking (hydraulic fracturing) to the global market.
China Tariffs Create Headache For Next Wave Of US Natural Gas Export Projects
Aug 9, 2018 | CNBC
By Tom DiChristopher

China's threat to slap tariffs on U.S. natural gas exports is injecting uncertainty into a construction boom for the multi-billion dollar facilities that ship American shale gas around the world.
Aging LNG Fleet Spurs Need for New Ships Amid Global Trade Boom
Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Ryan Collins

Father Time is catching up with the world’s fleet of natural gas tankers, and that could spell trouble for buyers and sellers of the fuel.
Tellurian Plans To Start Building Louisiana LNG Export Plant In 2019
Aug 9, 2018 | Reuters
By Scott DiSavino

U.S. liquefied natural gas company Tellurian Inc said on Wednesday it remains on track to begin construction of its Driftwood LNG export terminal in Louisiana in the first half of 2019 and begin operations in 2023.
$28B Gas Export Project Could Break Ground Next Year
Aug 9, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Jenny Mandel

One of the largest liquefied natural gas export projects currently under development is on schedule to reach a final investment decision next year and put LNG on the water in 2023, according to filings by Houston-based Tellurian Inc.
‘Several Hurdles’ Ahead For U.S. Natural Gas Firms in Mexico
Aug 9, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence
By Andrew Baker

Although much remains unclear about the energy policies of Mexico’s next government, “several hurdles will likely appear for U.S. based natural gas entities” looking to expand their footprint in the neighboring country, according to a new report.
KKR-Backed Frack-Sand Miner Preferred Looks to Go Public by 2019
Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By David Wethe

Preferred Sands Inc. is looking to become the latest sand miner to cash in on the U.S. fracking boom by going public.
Trump Officials Open Door To Fracking In California
Aug 8, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Miranda Green

The Trump administration is starting the process of opening up large swaths of land in California to hydraulic fracturing.

Chemical Security News

Local Officials Need More Info On Chemical Plants — GAO
Aug 9, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Corbin Hiar

A congressional watchdog agency is urging the Department of Homeland Security to share more information about chemical facilities with local officials and to better measure the effectiveness of a soon-to-expire program created to protect those facilities from terrorist attacks.
Control System Hacking Goes Mainstream
Aug 9, 2018 | E&E Engerywire
By Blake Sobczak

The digital devices powering the electric grid and other critical infrastructure tend to be costly, complicated and hard to find.
$120M Settlement Reached In Huge 2015 Los Angeles Gas Leak
Aug 9, 2018 | Associated Press (In The Washington Post)
By Brian Melley

A nearly $120 million settlement has been reached in litigation stemming from a blowout at a Southern California storage field where a massive methane release forced thousands from their homes three years ago, a utility announced Wednesday.

Transportation and Infrastructure News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Environment News

Megabucks Pouring into Washington State Carbon Tax Initiative
Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Paul Shukovsky

A political slugfest is brewing in Washington over a ballot measure that would impose fees on the largest carbon emitters, with big oil companies in one corner and environmental groups, organized labor, tribes, and social-justice activists in the other.
Five Things to Know Before Global Climate Conference Season Starts
Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Bobby Magill

International buzz about the urgency of preventing climate change from spiraling out of control is about to heat up.
EPA Eases Limits On 'Climate-Friendly' Refrigerants
Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA

EPA is easing current restrictions on certain “climate-friendly” refrigerants for household refrigerators and freezers, even as the agency's broader policy in this area remains murky due to a prior adverse court ruling and inaction by the Trump administration on an international deal to limit chemicals that are potent greenhouse gases.

Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) China Tariffs Targeting Three US Polyethylene Grades: ACC

Aug 9, 2018 | S&P Global Platts

By Kristen Hays

Houston — China has more than 9.2 million mt/year of new US polyethylene capacity in the crosshairs of escalating trade tensions with the US, the American Chemistry Council said Wednesday, making all grades subject to tariffs when most or all are bound for export -- largely to Asia.
well as naphtha, gasoline, diesel and liquefied propane and methanol. "If you're shipping anything to China you'd better stop," a trader source said.
Officials have yet to specify whether cargoes already in transit could be affected. And some products, like PVC, already face anti-dumping duties and already are routinely re-exported, so market sources in the US expect little impact.
Eight new US ethane-fed steam crackers and 13 new PE plants opening in 2017-2019 are among nearly $200 billion in new US chemical infrastructure stemming from cheap feedstocks unearthed by the domestic natural gas boom.
When China's initial chemical-heavy retaliatory tariffs included LDPE, sources were not overly concerned, saying it made up one-fifth of the new capacity.
Inclusion of the other two grades increases those concerns as they make up the vast majority of new output targeted for exports because North America is already oversupplied. According to S&P Global Platts analytics, Asian demand is expected to grow faster than any other region, with China and India in the lead.
"This is worse than a hurricane," said a market source harking back to Hurricane Harvey's unprecedented assault on Texas petrochemical infrastructure nearly a year ago.
Another source noted that some producers will be able to work around any fallout. For example, DowDuPont's new Sadara complex in Saudi Arabia can supply China while its US operations can ship cargoes to other regions.
Sources said trade flows will shift as well. But at least some US producers are likely to feel the pinch after building plants that saw Asia's largest countries as their main export targets, and prices will most likely rise globally.
"What all this will do is make prices go up," a second trader source said, noting that depreciating currency in other countries -- including China -- has helped boost domestic prices, which typically leads to higher export prices as well.
https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/petrochemicals/080818-china-tariffs-targeting-three-us-polyethylene-grades-acc

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EDF Sues EPA To Obtain Science Rule Documents

Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) is suing EPA for its alleged failure to release documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) regarding the agency's controversial proposal to bar the use of any research in decision-making where the underlying data and models are not publicly available.
“Americans have a right to know about proposals like these that could put their families at greater risk, and about any special interests those proposals may serve,” said EDF attorney Ben Levitan in an Aug. 7 press statement. “EPA has a legal obligation to release this information to the public.”
The group's complaint, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District Of New York, seeks to enforce FOIA requests filed earlier this year following initial reports that then-Administrator Scott Pruitt would propose a rule barring agency decision-makers' use of any scientific information where the underlying data was unavailable -- similar to 'secret science' legislation long championed by the retiring chairman of the House Science Committee, Lamar Smith (R-TX).
In its FOIA requests, EDF asked EPA to provide internal correspondence “related to EPA’s consideration and implementation of ideas derived from or similar to unsuccessful House Committee on Science, Space, & Technology legislation concerning EPA’s use of science,” specifying search terms, dates and EPA officials to be included in the search, according to the complaint.
“The statutory deadlines for EPA to respond to EDF’s FOIA Requests have come and gone, but EPA has thus far failed to release any responsive records,” the complaint states. The group asks the court to find EPA violated FOIA and order the agency to release the documents.
The group's suit comes as comments on the proposed rule continue to pour in to EPA's electronic docket in advance of the Aug. 16 deadline, with more than 222,000 comments received so far.
Among them, Harvard University submitted rare comments Aug. 7 signed by its president and scores of individual faculty members at many of its medical, public health and other schools.
The Harvard comments' authors urge Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler to withdraw his predecessor's proposal, arguing that it is unnecessary, would prevent EPA from using the best available science in its decision-making -- as is required in many environmental statutes -- and flies in the face of EPA's longstanding practice.
“Transparency is valuable and important. As used in the draft rule, however, transparency is a guise for excluding large bodies of valid -- and best available -- science,” the comments state. “In the professional scientific and medical research community, 'transparency' means clear and detailed disclosure of all methods, data, assumptions, and uncertainties. … Having the raw data associated with the original study is not usually necessary to validate a study.”
The authors say one of their concerns is that many studies conducted by Harvard researchers and their colleagues will be discounted from consideration by EPA if the underlying data are not publicly released -- which the authors say often cannot be done with personal medical information or with historic studies.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/edf-sues-epa-obtain-science-rule-documents

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NGO Lawsuit Seeks Documents Behind EPA 'Science Transparency' Proposal

Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch

The NGO the Environmental Defense Fund has sued the US EPA over its failure to release requested documents related to its proposed 'science transparency rule'.
The lawsuit relates to the EPA’s proposed rule: Strengthening transparency in regulatory science. The controversial plan is intended to ensure that science underpinning regulatory decisions is available for public validation. But its detractors say it will limit the types of data the EPA can consider in rulemakings.
Earlier this year, the EDF filed two Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests related to the proposal. It reports, however, that the EPA did not furnish the requested documents by the statutory deadline, and it is now asking a court to compel their release.
Earthjustice is representing the EDF in the suit, filed in federal court in New York.
https://chemicalwatch.com/69453/ngo-lawsuit-seeks-documents-behind-epa-science-transparency-proposal

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LCSA News

EPA Issues Two TSCA 'Not Likely To Present Unreasonable Risk' Findings

Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch

By Kelly Franklin

The US EPA has published TSCA section 5(a)(3)(C) determinations for two substances that were the subject of pre-manufacture notices (PMNs), including one which presents potential human health concerns.
Both "not likely to present an unreasonable risk" findings – which will allow the new substances to come to market without restriction – cite a risk assessment in support of the decision.PMN P-16-0510
One of the evaluated new substances is fragrance ingredient oxirane, 2-methyl-, polymer with oxirane, bis[2-[(1-oxo-2-propen-1-yl)amino]propyl] ether.
Its intended use is as "a deodoriser in industrial, commercial and household consumer products such as floor cleaners, cat litters, fabric refresher sprays, etc", with a maximum concentration of 2% by weight in the final product. The PMN says it is expected to be imported in solution, at a concentration of approximately 50%, for processing and use.
The 5(a)(3)(c) finding includes no known or reasonably foreseen conditions of use.
The vast majority of "not likely" findings the EPA has issued since the passage of the Lautenberg Act have found low human health and low environmental hazards. However, the risk assessment in this case cites "low to moderate" environmental hazard and the potential for several human health concerns. These include:irritation;mutagenicity;developmental/reproductive toxicity;neurotoxicity; andcarcinogenicity.
These findings were based on test data for analogous substances in the acrylates and acrylamides chemical categories.
However, the agency says the intended conditions of use – including its import in solution at 50% or less, and its use a deodoriser at a maximum concentration of 2% by weight – "would not produce these potential unreasonable risks".
It has therefore determined the substance is not likely to present an unreasonable risk.PMN P-18-0142
The second substance – alkanoic acid, alkyl-, alkyl ester, polymer with substituted alkenoates, alkenoic acid, alkyl peroxoate-initiated – must be manufactured in accordance with polymer exemption criteria.
Its intended use is as a binder for topcoat coating with an acid content less than 20% by weight of the polymer. As with the fragrance ingredient, the agency lists no known or reasonably foreseen uses.
The EPA's risk assessment found that under the evaluated conditions of use, the substance is unlikely to present an unreasonable risk due to low human health hazard and low environmental hazard, "when manufactured to meet the polymer exemption criteria and with an acid content less than 20% by weight of the polymer."
https://chemicalwatch.com/69431/epa-issues-two-tsca-not-likely-to-present-unreasonable-risk-findings

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EPA Disputes 'Rubber Stamping' New Chemicals Under TSCA

Aug 9, 2018 | Chemical Watch

By Kelly Franklin

The US EPA has dismissed concerns that it will allow new chemicals to enter the marketplace without sufficient scrutiny.
The TSCA new chemicals programme has come under fire in recent weeks, after reports surfaced that the agency was quietly making moves to further limit the number of substances subject to orders and restrictions under the recently reformed law.
And Senate Democrats pressed the agency for more information on the "sweeping, weakening changes to its review of new chemicals".
But an EPA spokesperson told Chemical Watch that it is "simply incorrect" that the agency will be 'rubber stamping' chemical approvals. And its "substantial risk assessment and management efforts" are consistent with section 5 of the law.
With regard to its pre-manufacture notice (PMN) approvals process, the EPA said it reviews submitted data and information from analogues, together with exposure and predictive hazard models to evaluate the potential risks of PMN substances.
"Each of these evaluations involves data and information that are specific to the PMN substance and the facts provided with the PMN. Hence, each PMN evaluation is unique and based on a specific set of information and data," the spokesperson said.
"When risks are identified, the EPA works with submitters to address such risks. This process involves data review and analysis by professional scientists and engineers as well as communication between EPA programme managers and chemical companies."Reasonably foreseen uses
A question that has come to the fore concerns the issue of "reasonably foreseen" conditions of use. According to Richard Denison, lead senior scientist at NGO Environmental Defense Fund, the EPA is defining these so narrowly that they essentially collapse into 'intended uses'.
Dr Denison has pointed to a recent TSCA "not likely to present an unreasonable risk" finding for a fragrance ingredient as an example of where this narrowed definition has resulted in the agency naming no known or reasonably foreseen uses.
He said the failure to identify these – coupled with reports from sources familiar with the issue – indicated the EPA does not plan to impose a significant new use rule (Snur) on the substance to protect against future potentially concerning activities.
And in the absence of a Snur, the agency thereby allows for the substance's "unfettered use", because the intended uses described in the PMN are not legally binding.
But an EPA spokesperson told Chemical Watch that it will protect against uses of concern, as necessary, in individual cases. And there are circumstances where it "may make 'not likely' determinations for submissions for which EPA has not identified any reasonably foreseen uses, but still issues a Snur to ensure that EPA receives notice of intent to initiate a significant new use of the chemical substance."
The EPA had not confirmed whether it intends to issue a Snur for the recently approved fragrance ingredient by the time this story went to press.
The agency did, however, elaborate on its thinking regarding the definition of a "reasonably foreseen" use, consistent with a footnote in its most recent "not likely" findings. Namely, that it will "necessarily be a case-by-case determination and will be highly fact-specific".
"Reasonably foreseen conditions of use will not be based on hypotheticals or conjecture. Accordingly, EPA will apply its professional judgment, experience, and discretion when considering whether there are reasonably foreseen uses," it said.
And, it added, since the enactment of the Lautenberg Act, it has issued 425 section 5 consent orders that included testing requirements. It will "continue to do so when the requisite determination is made".Conditions of use
According to a footnote that appeared in two recent 5(a)(3)(c) determinations, the EPA is defining the conditions of use that must be considered in a new substance review as follows:intended conditions of use are those identified in a section 5(a) notification, such as a PMN;known conditions of use include activities, within the US, "that result from manufacture that is exempt from PMN submission requirements"; andreasonably foreseen conditions of use are "future circumstances, distinct from known or intended conditions of use, under which the administrator expects the chemical substance to be manufactured, processed, distributed, used, or disposed of." These will not be based on hypotheticals or conjecture. Factors to be considered include a substance's current uses outside the US, evidence that the new substance is "sufficiently likely" to be used for the same purposes as existing analogues, and conditions of use identified in an initial PMN submission that the submitter omits in a revised PMN. Sources for identifying such uses include US government public sources, REACH dossiers and internet searches.
https://chemicalwatch.com/69452/epa-disputes-rubber-stamping-new-chemicals-under-tsca

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EPA Officials Echo Wide-Ranging Concerns With Science Transparency Rule

Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA

By Maria Hegstad

Former EPA staff and officials are urging the agency to withdraw its controversial proposed science transparency rule, charging it will hobble implementation of existing and new programs, such as the agency's new toxics program, "bias" rules in favor of industry, and is at odds with existing laws and the rule-writing process.
The proposed rule, issued by former Administrator Scott Pruitt, generally requires the agency to base major regulatory decisions on publicly available scientific data. But the plan has drawn strong push-back from a wide range of interests, including EPA's Science Advisory Board, which has requested to formally review it. The agency is poised to close the public comment period on the rule Aug. 16.
As former officials familiar with the agency's processes, their concerns lend weight to similar fears expressed by environmentalists, Democrats, and even some Republican state officials, who have similarly urged the agency to withdraw the proposal because they charge it is unlawful, unscientific and/or unworkable.
For example, Gary Timm, who retired from EPA's toxics office in 2011 after 38 years, outlines a series of concernsabout how he expects the proposal will adversely affect EPA's ability to implement its new Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) program as required by Congress' 2016 reform of the law.
In July 17 comments distributed by the Environmental Protection Network, a group of former agency alumni who oppose the Trump administration's deregulatory agenda, Timm raises concerns about EPA's ability to implement TSCA section 6, which provided the agency with authority to assess and possibly regulate existing chemicals.
"The proposed policy would affect assessments that will soon be carried out under TSCA Section 6," writes Timm.
He pointed to the first 10 chemical evaluations EPA is undertaking as a result of the TSCA reform, writing, "[h]ow these chemicals are assessed will be the model for future assessments."
But he says the proposed policy "would in fact make it impossible for EPA to consider the full array of well conducted and peer reviewed scientific studies of the health and environmental effects of pollution."
He adds that if the rule were adopted in its final form, it would "bias the body of information in favor of industry supplied studies since they would have the means to provide the underlying data. Assessment of all relevant scientific information is essential in making sound judgments about protecting public health and the environment and is a legal requirement in all major environmental legislation."
TSCA Authority
Timm, who served as chief of EPA's Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program and chief of the Chemical Testing Branch during his career, also raises concerns about how the proposal will affect EPA's ability to require chemical testing under TSCA section 4.
EPA's limited authority to require companies to generate information on the toxicity of their chemicals was one of the drivers for TSCA reform -- which strengthened EPA's ability to do so.
"To require industry to test chemicals under Section 4, EPA must make a set of legal findings," Timm explains, adding that to do so, EPA's toxics office gathers the "bulk" of its information from peer-reviewed scientific journals, usually without access to the underlying data."
"Despite being accepted by the scientific community, these studies do not meet the proposed transparency requirements of the proposed rule, since it requires that all raw underlying data and the models used to analyze data supporting the study are available for public review. Thus, if the transparency rule were in effect, EPA would have to judge studies from peer reviewed journals as inadequate," Timm argues.
"Ignoring this large category of information would cost industry hundreds of millions of dollars to repeat perfectly good, scientifically acceptable studies, which the public would ultimately pay for through higher prices. And it would significantly delay or, in some cases, preclude assessment and regulation of risks to human health and the environment."
Timm also notes that the rule runs counter to U.S. agreement to participate in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Mutual Acceptance of Data treaty. Under this agreement, the U.S. is obligated to "accept data generated in accordance with the [OECD] Test Guidelines and Good Laboratory Practice Standards [GLP]" -- an issue Timm stresses is not addressed in the proposed rule.
"The US and other OECD member countries realized that differences in testing requirements among countries meant that companies would in some cases have to retest a chemical in order to market it in other areas. This was needlessly costly and resulted in a delay in obtaining information needed for regulatory assessment," Timm explains. "As a result, the OECD member nations agreed to accept for regulatory purposes data generated in accordance with the OECD test guidelines, GLPs and quality assurance program. The GLPs specify the information that must be reported; underlying data is not one of them."
'Downstream Consequences'
Lynn Goldman, EPA toxics chief during the Clinton administration, raised related concerns in her comments on the proposal, which she argued does not consider or address its "downstream consequences, including: risking disclosure of personal information of volunteer human subjects; delaying EPA decision-making; exacting unknown but probably considerable costs to EPA and the research community; and making best available science unavailable to the EPA."
Goldman also charges that the proposal has implementation issues, noting that it "creates no regulatory authority or any other mechanism for the EPA to compel submission of data from academic scientists and industry, other than those that already are accessible under the Information Quality Act of 2001, nor a mechanism for access to industry data claimed as Confidential Business Information."
She also warns of the "considerable" burden the proposed rule would impose on EPA, which is required by statute to conduct hundreds of risk analyses each year. The proposal does not address how EPA could compel "the submission of such data in the context of weak regulatory authority for research conducted in the past; studies not funded by the U.S. government; and/or research conducted abroad. It seems unaware of the Paperwork Reduction Act that tilts against information gathering from private parties," Goldman says.
Goldman adds that EPA is "further constrained by industry confidential business information (CBI) claims for regulatory testing data under U.S. chemical and pesticide laws."
She acknowledges that the proposal contains significant latitude, allowing the administrator to determine exceptions that can be made to the policy. But she argues that this, too, is inappropriately handled in the proposal. "While the [notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM)] includes a provision for the EPA to waive this requirement, it provides no clear criteria for such waivers and appears to be a process that would allow arbitrary and capricious application of the proposed rule," she argues.
Dose-Response Analyses
Goldman, an epidemiologist and pediatrician who serves as dean of George Washington University's public health school, also raises concerns about technical language in the proposal that she argues would fundamentally alter EPA's approach to dose-response analyses of chemicals -- often the basis for regulatory decisions on environmental contaminants.
The proposal contains language which appears to counter EPA's 2005 cancer risk assessment guidelines, by requiring that EPA consider approaches other than its long-standing default approach of using linear cancer dose-response modeling in the event of insufficient information of the biological mechanism by which a particular chemical causes cancer in the human body. Linear modeling is considered a health-protective default because it assumes that there is some level of risk associated with any exposure, rather than assuming there is a threshold below which there is no risk. But the approach is also attacked for the strict risk estimates it produces.
"The proposal seems to attempt, via a single rulemaking, to overturn years of well-thought EPA science policy guidelines and precedents in the selection and application of dose-response models for toxicity assessment," Goldman protests.
She goes on to argue that the proposal "misrepresents the recommendations of prior expert reviews" such as the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the Bi-Partisan Commission review. "It is oblivious to NAS conclusions that thresholds of chemical exposure for chemical effects are the exception rather than the rule. The NPRM seems to naively assume that single studies are used to inform risk assessors of the possible shape of dose response curves. That was true at one time, but today, the first step of the dose-response modeling process is to evaluate all of the scientific information to gain a biological understanding of how each type of toxicity or response (adverse effect) occurs, the 'mode of action.' This is not done via modeling of raw data from a single study."
Goldman worries that the proposal "for the first time opens the door to EPA's scientific practices being determined by regulators, and not scientists. . . . This is a breach of the fundamental notion of separating risk assessment from risk management."
'An Embarrassment To The Agency'
John Bachmann, who retired after 33 years with EPA, joins his former colleagues' calls for Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler to quickly withdraw the proposal. Bachmann, who was an associate director for EPA's Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards, argues that the Trump EPA did not follow necessary rule-making procedures to craft a legitimate proposal -- calling it "an embarrassment to the Agency."
Bachmann points to numerous procedural flaws in the Trump appointees' development of the proposed rule. "The rushed and mostly secret process EPA followed in developing this proposal displays a complete disinterest in transparency in public policy, much less in science." As examples, Bachmann notes that agency leaders "Did not provide a role for its own career scientific and science/policy experts in crafting the proposal or in assessing its potential impacts"; "Never included the rule in its regulatory agenda"; "Did not notify or consult with the SAB, much less request a review of the draft proposal as required by law," and "Did not solicit the advice of the National Academy of Sciences on provisions that would change dose-response models used in risk assessment from those previously recommended by the NAS" among other concerns.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-officials-echo-wide-ranging-concerns-science-transparency-rule

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Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) EPA Pushes Back On Asbestos Criticisms

Aug 8, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

The Trump administration is pushing back against a rash of criticism that new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) policies could lead to the import or manufacturing of asbestos.
The controversy stems from a June 1 proposal that sought to require companies to notify the EPA if they planned to import or manufacture various out-of-date uses of asbestos, like roofing felt and floor tile.
It led this week to a firestorm, with news stories, denunciations and well-known figures like Chelsea Clinton and Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) charging that the EPA is opening the door to asbestos — something the agency strongly refutes.
The EPA is pushing back with a PR blitz through interviews, social media and a fact sheet.
Nancy Beck, a deputy associate administrator in the EPA’s chemical safety office, characterized the proposal, dubbed a significant new use rule (SNUR), as a ban, since the EPA would evaluate the risk before any manufacturing or imports are allowed and stop it if needed.
“By doing the SNUR, if someone wants to start the manufacturing and processing, if we find risk, we can prevent it,” said Beck, who worked at the American Chemistry Council, an industry group, before then-EPA head Scott Pruitt hired her last year.
Nonetheless, health advocates are concerned.
While they don’t agree with news reports that have characterized the EPA as opening the floodgates to asbestos, they say that the agency’s actions aren’t as protective as they should be.
Alongside the June 1 proposal, the EPA proposed a list of uses for asbestos that would go through the risk evaluation process, which can lead to total bans. Advocates want the EPA to include the outdated uses in the risk evaluations, so that they could be banned as well — not just subject to the SNUR process that gives the EPA significant discretion.
“It’s reasonably foreseen that a longstanding or significant use of a chemical that has been phased out could re-enter commerce if there’s no legal bar against it,” said Liz Hitchcock, acting executive director of Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, a coalition of groups advocating for stronger chemical regulation.
EPA’s proposal to require notifications for reviving outdated uses is a “decent stopgap tool,” Hitchcock said, but “it’s not the permanent ban that we need to protect public health.”
At the root of the issue is a deep distrust by environmentalists, health advocates and the left of the Trump administration's environmental policies. Former EPA head Scott Pruitt repeatedly sought to ease rules for regulated companies, and Andrew Wheeler, his successor, has pledged to continue the agenda.
It’s possible past remarks by President Trump also fueled skepticism about the EPA’s intentions.
“If we didn't remove incredibly powerful fire retardant asbestos & replace it with junk that doesn't work, the World Trade Center would never have burned down,” he tweeted in 2012. In his 1997 book “Art of the Comeback,” he speculated that the mob had led efforts to stop its use.
Asbestos is currently not banned by the federal government, although it is almost never used in ways that would expose people to it. Officials have known for decades that asbestos causes illnesses like lung cancer, mesothelioma and asbestosis.
The EPA tried to implement a sweeping ban in 1989 under the Toxic Substances Control Act. But the industry sued and a court overturned most of the ban.
Asbestos then became the poster child for federal inaction on dangerous chemicals, leading to the near-unanimous passage in 2016 of the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act, which, among other things, sought to make it easier for the EPA to ban known harmful chemicals.
Recent stories in Fast Company and The Architects Newspaper claimed that the EPA’s SNUR rule effectively approved the use of the carcinogenic mineral in manufacturing and imports.
“Experts who have looked at [the document] have said that in the end, it pretty much gives EPA discretion to do whatever it wants,” Bill Walsh, board president of the Healthy Building Network, told Fast Company.
The reports went viral, spurring the commentary from Clinton, Schatz and others.
That’s led the EPA to push back.
The agency says what it’s doing on asbestos is the most aggressive federal action against the chemical in decades, carrying out Congress’s instructions to significantly reduce exposure to it and ban its uses.
“I’m completely confused by the press that thinks that there’s something wrong here. But in many ways, this is a very good news story,” said Beck.
As for the calls for more aggressive actions against out-of-date applications of asbestos such as roofing and pipeline wrap, EPA argues that it doesn’t have the authority to regulate legacy uses of chemicals like asbestos before it knows that they are coming back into use.
“If nobody is manufacturing asbestos for building materials, we have no authority to prohibit it,” Beck said, as an example.
Environmental and health groups, led largely by the Environmental Defense Fund, have already filed lawsuits against the EPA over two regulations it wrote to implement the 2016 chemical rule, and they’re likely to file more.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/400966-epa-pushes-back-on-asbestos-criticisms

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Asbestos in a Crayon, Benzene in a Marker: A School Supply Study’s Toxic Results

Aug 9, 2018 | The New York Times

By Niraj Chokshi

A public interest group said this week that it had found toxic substances in a number of school supplies, including asbestos in a Playskool crayon and another carcinogen, benzene, in a dry-erase marker.
The findings were detailed in a report published Tuesday by the group, the United States Public Interest Research Group Education Fund, which had an independent laboratory test 27 back-to-school products. Four tested positive for dangerous chemicals.
“It’s insane for us to be finding asbestos in kids’ products, whether it’s technically legal or not, and parents shouldn’t have to worry about this in 2018,” said Dev Gowda, an author of the report who also directs the group’s campaign to persuade manufacturers to drop toxic substances from personal care products.
“We wish that we didn’t have to do a study like this, but the reality is that corporations — from manufacturers, distributors and retailers — aren’t doing this for us,” he said.
The group tested crayons, markers, binders, water bottles, lunchboxes, notebooks, rulers and glue. The products were purchased nationwide at a variety of businesses, including box stores, dollar stores, pharmacies, arts and crafts stores, and online.
The group, which has been surveying toys for more than three decades, recommended that the companies that make or offer the products stop selling them and start notifying consumers about the chemicals they appear to contain.
It also called on policymakers to continue to support the Consumer Product Safety Commission, a federal agency, and urged the commission itself to test more school supplies for dangerous chemicals.
Here’s a look at what the public interest group found:Asbestos
Of the crayons tested, one, a green Playskool crayon, tested positive for trace amounts of tremolite, a form of asbestos. The crayon was part of a set of 36 manufactured by Leap Year Publishing and purchased at a Dollar Tree store.
Julie Duffy, a spokeswoman for Hasbro, which owns the Playskool brand, said that “product and children’s safety are top priorities” for the company.
“We are conducting a thorough investigation into these claims, including working with Leap Year, the licensee of the product,” she said in a statement.
In an email, John Sorenson, a spokesman for Leap Year Publishing, said that all of its products, including the green crayon mentioned in the report, “are thoroughly tested by independent labs” to meet or exceed federal standards.
“We are currently re-verifying that they are safe and free of any asbestos, as well as requesting a review of P.I.R.G.’s testing methods,” he said.
Tremolite is responsible for many cases of asbestos-related cancer and asbestos diseases, according to the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania.
In a statement, Dollar Tree said it was aware of the report and had “since reverified that each of the listed products successfully passed inspection and testing.”
Crayons sold under five other brands — Crayola, Up & Up, Cra-Z-Art, Disney Junior Mickey and the Roadster Racers, and RoseArt — tested negative for asbestos.Benzene and related compounds
Four markers were sent to the laboratory, and two dry-erase ones tested positive for a group of compounds often found in petroleum products and known as B.T.E.X.: benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene.
One of those compounds, benzene, is a known carcinogen and was found in a package of six magnetic markers purchased on Amazon and produced by The Board Dudes, a brand owned by Mattel.
In a statement, Mattel said it took such reports seriously, “aggressively” tests its products and was reviewing the claims. The markers, the statement added, “contain substance levels that fall within the permissible limits.”
Benzene disrupts the normal functioning of cells, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Long-term exposure can have harmful effects on bone marrow and lead to a decrease in red blood cells.
An Expo dry-erase scented marker, also purchased on Amazon, tested positive for some of the B.T.E.X. compounds, though not benzene and none at levels considered worrying by toxicologists, according to the report.
In a statement, Expo said that it was aware of the report and that its products “meet all applicable regulatory and safety standards.”
Washable markers, from Crayola and Jot, tested negative.Phthalates
In another set of tests, the public interest organization examined three three-ring binders for phthalates, a group of chemicals added to plastics to make them flexible, some of which may affect human reproduction or development.
Only one, a Jot-brand, 1-inch blue binder from Dollar Tree, tested positive. Binders sold under the Avery and Yoobi brands did not.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/08/education/asbestos-crayons-school-supplies.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur

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Asbestos, Lead And Other Dangerous Chemicals Found In Children's School Supplies, Report Says

Aug 8, 2018 | CNN

By Ursula Perano and Amanda Watts

Parents may want to take a second look at their children's school supplies this season.
The results of lab tests detailed in a report released Tuesday found traces of asbestos, lead and other dangerous chemicals in a number of popular school supplies.
The US Public Interest Research Group Education Fund tested dozens of typical classroom materials for toxins. While most were nontoxic, some crayons, markers and binders received a failing grade.
Here are some of the products that tested positive for toxic substances:
layskool crayons (36 count)
This box set, purchased at Dollar Tree, has traces of asbestos, the report found. The chemical can appear in the talc that is used in crayon manufacturing, according to the report.
If ingested or inhaled, asbestos can cause severe damage to a person's health, including lung cancer and mesothelioma.

Playskool crayons.
It is unclear if other versions of the crayons have been affected.
"Product and children's safety are top priorities for Hasbro," the toy company said in a statement to CNN. Hasbro owns the license to the product. "We are conducting a thorough investigation into these claims."
Dollar Tree spokesperson Randy Guiler said the retail chain is "aware of the report and have since reverified that each of the listed products successfully passed inspection and testing."
EXPO dry erase markers with scented ink
The markers, purchased on Amazon, were found to have traces of BTEX, which refers to four chemicals that have been linked to liver, kidney and immune system damage. One of the four chemicals, benzene, is a carcinogen.

EXPO dry erase markers.
It is unclear if unscented versions of the markers also contain traces of BTEX.
CNN has not yet heard back from EXPO or Amazon for comment.
The Board Dudes six magnetic dry erase markers
The Board Dudes, another brand of dry erase markers that were also purchased on Amazon, tested positive for traces of BTEX chemicals.

The Board Dudes magnetic dry erase markers.
Amazon and Mattel, which owns The Board Dudes' parent company, have not responded to CNN's request for comment.
Jot 1-inch 3-ring binder in blue
This Dollar Tree binder tested positive for traces of phthalates, a group of chemicals used to soften plastics.

Jot 1-inch 3-ring binder.
According to the report, research suggests the chemicals can cause problems for children, including issues with development, asthma and childhood obesity.
It is unclear if other versions of the binder also contain phthalates.
'Need for constant vigilance'
The organization urged parents to be mindful of the potential presence of toxins when buying school supplies.
"The presence of toxic hazards in school supplies highlights the need for constant vigilance on the part of government agencies and the public to ensure that school supplies containing toxic chemicals are removed from store shelves," the report says.
The report is accompanied by a shopping guide for parents that lists products that tested safe for use.
"We want to give parents and teachers the option to choose school supplies that do not contain toxic chemicals."
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/08/08/health/dangerous-chemicals-school-supplies-trnd/index.html

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Coloradans Ask EPA to Protect Well Water From Chemicals

Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Tripp Baltz

Regulatory guidance needed to protect public health, residents tell EPA
State, local agencies worry about cost concerns
Colorado environmentalists and homeowners, many of them with drinking water wells contaminated with fluorinated chemicals from a nearby Air Force facility, urged the EPA Aug. 8 to issue regulations to protect drinking water.
The EPA’s hearing in Colorado Springs was the Environmental Protection Agency’s latest in a series of community engagement sessions around the country on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Comments at the hearing echoed many of the same concerns raised at earlier sessions in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.
PFAS contamination—the result of making products such as nonstick pans, firefighting foam, and stain-resistant sprays—has been linked to a number of health problems, from liver and thyroid dysfunction to high blood pressure.
The EPA has set health advisory limits for two PFAS chemicals—perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS)—of 70 parts per trillion, but they are not legally enforceable.
“What we’re asking for is regulatory guidance, and not in the form of unenforceable health advisories from EPA,” Fran Silva-Blayney of the Fountain Creek Water Sentinels, a Sierra Club chapter, said at the Colorado Springs hearing.
The Sierra Club has received funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charitable organization founded by Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg Environment is operated by entities controlled by Michael Bloomberg.
Illnesses, Ailments
Air Force officials reported the discharge of about 150,000 gallons of wastewater laced with the compounds at Peterson Air Force Base in October 2016.
During the Colorado Springs session, residents told federal, state, and local officials about numerous illnesses and ailments, including cancer, among neighbors in the affected communities. However, they acknowledged no causal link has been made between health problems and the contamination.
Mark Favors, a member of the Fountain Valley Clean Water Coalition, tearfully related that several of his family members have died of kidney cancer. During the hearing he read aloud the obituary of his cousin, a Vietnam veteran who died of kidney cancer in 2012 after moving into the area.
Doug Benevento, administrator of EPA’s Region 8 office in Denver, told Bloomberg Environment after the meeting that officials got the message residents “want us to work faster” to “develop regulations to provide more security about their drinking water.”
Benevento said EPA also appreciated hearing from state and local agencies about working more closely together to avoid being surprised when EPA develops health standards.
Still on Track
Jennifer McLain, deputy director in the EPA Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water, told Bloomberg Environment the agency was still on track to taking actions to address PFAS that it had committed to after a summit in Washington, D.C., in May. Those actions included developing groundwater cleanup recommendations for PFOA and PFOS at contaminated sites this fall.
In June, a new Colorado site-specific standard (Regulation 42) of 70 parts per trillion for perfluorinated chemicals in groundwater took effect in the vicinity of Fountain Creek, the main waterway affected by the Air Force spill. The state also listed PFOA and PFOS as hazardous constituents in its hazardous waste regulation, but stopped short of establishing a statewide standard for PFAS.
Granular activated carbon and ion exchange are proven methods for removing PFAS from water, said Kristy Richardson, an environmental toxicologist in the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment.
But the chemicals don’t break down easily in the environment, and testing is very expensive, she said.
“Regulatory limits are not always the correct solution,” she said. “They are burdensome, and blunt instruments to address a problem. It may be there are some smarter approaches that are not regulatory.”
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/coloradans-ask-epa-to-protect-well-water-from-chemicals

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US NTP Releases Toxicology And Carcinogenesis Findings For Solvent

Aug 8, 2018 | Chemical Watch

The US National Toxicology Program (NTP) has released a technical report on its genetic toxicology and carcinogenesis studies of the solvent p-chloro-α,α,α-trifluorotoluene.
The substance – used in paints and coatings, for automotive parts and body cleaning, and as an industrial intermediate in the production of other chemicals – was nominated for study by the National Cancer Institute and chemical manufacturer, Kowa American Corporation, because of its high import volume and lack of occupational exposure limit.
The NTP's review included three-month and two-year inhalation studies on male and female Hsd:Sprague Dawley SD rats and B6C3F1/N mice. These identified evidence of carcinogenic activity.
https://chemicalwatch.com/69454/us-ntp-releases-toxicology-and-carcinogenesis-findings-for-solvent

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Energy News

(ACC Mentioned) Led by Sempra Energy, ‘Global Natural Gas Coalition’ Launched With Trump Admin And Labor Union In Fold

Aug 9, 2018 | Nation of Change

By Steve Horn

San Diego-based Sempra Energy has spearheaded the launch of a group called the Global Natural Gas Coalition to promote exports of gas obtained via fracking (hydraulic fracturing) to the global market. Sempra is a natural gas utility giant and liquefied natural gas (LNG) export and import company.
Announced at a June 25 gathering at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., the Global Natural Gas Coalition features other participants such as the American Petroleum Institute (API), LNG Allies, the American Gas Association, American Chemistry Council, and others, according to its event page on the website Eventbrite. The RSVP information for the Press Club event features the contact information for Paty Mitchell, a spokeswoman for Sempra, and the company’s representatives consisted of eight out of the 78 attendees of that event, according to the Eventbrite page.
Also attending the event were officials from several agencies in the Trump administration. They included Mark Menezes, Elise Atkins, Christine Harbin, Jessica Szymanski, and Sara Kinney of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE); Deaver Alexander, William Thompson, and Stephen Morel of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (a federal agency focused on helping “American businesses invest in emerging markets”); Scott Condren of the U.S. Export-Import Bank; and John McCarrick of the U.S. Department of State.
Harbin, before beginning her job as senior advisor for external affairs in the DOE‘s Office of Electricity, worked as vice president of external affairs for Americans for Prosperity, a front group created and run by the petrochemical billionaire Koch brothers and funded by Koch Industries.
The labor union Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) also has voiced support of the coalition, sending its lobbyists Yvette Pena O’Sullivan and Ryan Sandmann to the kick-off event in D.C.
“LIUNA’s half-million members – who have worked over 80 million hours in the pipeline industry in the last five years – are proud to join the Global Natural Gas Coalition to promote the use of natural gas as a safe and affordable fuel to meet the world’s energy needs,” Pena-O’Sullivan stated in a June 25 press release.
Also attending were diplomats from the European Parliament, Mexico, Croatia, Latvia, and an energy official from Brazil.
“Natural gas is expected to become the fastest-growing major fuel globally by 2040,” the coalition explains in a blog post about its launch. “To articulate the essential role of natural gas in this transformation and as part of a true global energy strategy, gas producers, infrastructure developers, operators, manufacturers, and consumers have joined together in a universal pursuit to build a platform that supports natural gas as a foundational fuel now and into the future.”
It is not clear who created the Global Natural Gas Coalition, which had its website first published on June 18, one week before the Press Club event. According to the domain name search tool CentralOps.net, the coalition registered its website on the whoisprivacyprotect.com web domain, which is run by the company Enom.
“We know that you want your information to be private and protected,” says Enomof its web domain concealing skills on its website. “Even if you don’t mind this type of information being public, anyone – including mail, email, and telephone marketers – can use WHOIS records to pester domain registrants with unwanted solicitations.”
The address for the pro-LNG export advocacy group LNG Allies is listed on the contact portion of the coalition’s website.
This may be Sempra’s first foray into leading a major coalition promoting the extraction of natural gas via fracking, but it’s not the only example in the industry.
The company Cheniere – which has a proposed export terminal in the Gulf of Mexico called Corpus Christi LNG and another Gulf-based one currently open for business called Sabine Pass LNG – helped back a different front group called Our Energy Moment and Sempra is still listed as a member of that coalition. But that coalition, whose public relations efforts were led by Democratic Party operatives as DeSmog revealed in an investigation, appears to have fallen by the wayside in the Donald Trump era. The group has not issued a press release or had any social media activity since prior to his inauguration
Dennis Arriola, chief strategy officer and executive vice president for Sempra, is listed as a founding member of the coalition on a press release disseminated by the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America. Arriola was scheduled to give opening remarks at the Press Club event, according to the RSVP page.
“The world is in the midst of a fundamental energy transformation where natural gas will be the foundational fuel for economic prosperity throughout the world,” Arriola said in the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America press release. “Our Global Natural Gas Coalition brought together groups and individuals to show our strength and provide a voice for natural gas and the many benefits it provides.”
LIUNA did not respond to a request for comment for this story. Sempra responded to questions about the new coalition by pointing to the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America press release. A spokesman for the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America deferred comment on the Global Natural Gas Coalition to the other member groups.TransCanada’s Cameron Access Pipeline
Sempra has two major proposed LNG export terminals, one in the Gulf of Mexico named Cameron LNG and another in Baja California, Mexico, named Costa Azul LNG.
The company is also a tour de force in Southern California’s electricity market and in Mexico through its utility sector subsidiaries SoCalGas, San Diego Gas and Electric (SDGE), and IEnova. In the San Diego-area, SDGE has actively used its political and business clout in an attempt to fend off community choice policy proposals, which would allow residents to pick the company where they get electricity, including from competing renewable energy sector companies.
For its Cameron LNG facility, which would be a competitor to Cheniere’s Sabine Pass facility in Sabine Pass, Louisiana, pipeline giant TransCanada plans to build a $300 million pipeline which would connect to the terminal called — appropriately enough — the Cameron Access pipeline. TransCanada is best known for the Keystone XL pipeline proposal, which would ship tar sands extracted from Alberta, Canada, to Nebraska, but through other projects, the company has become an increasingly sizeable carrier of fracked gas to the Gulf Coast export market and across the U.S. border into Mexico.
Cameron LNG is expected to open for business in 2019 after receiving final approval from the Obama administration in 2016. The Cameron Access pipeline, too, is expected to open at about the same time and received the permit it needed from the Obama administration in 2015.
Cameron Access will create “significant value for our customers by providing additional connectivity for their domestically produced natural gas to the high-value U.S. Gulf Coast LNG export market,” Stanley Chapman III, TransCanada’s President for U.S. Natural Gas Pipelines, stated in a March 2018 press release. “Additionally, LNG export projects such as Cameron Access will help reduce global carbon emissions by allowing emerging markets to displace coal-fired power generation with clean-burning natural gas.”
Scientific reports have found that leaks of the powerful greenhouse gas, methane, during natural gas operations are higher than previously thought and may make gas worse for the climate than coal power.Sempra lobbying, political spending
Beyond its business plans, Sempra has remained politically active through both its federal lobbying activities and campaign donations for the 2018 midterm elections, donating an almost equal amount to members of both the Democratic and Republican parties in Congressional races, according to campaign finance data reviewed by DeSmog. Major recipients of the company’s money have included Democratic House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, Republican House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, U.S. Rep. Scott Peters (D-CA), U.S. Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-CA), U.S. Rep. Devin Dunes (R-CA), among others.
To date in 2018, Sempra has spent over $1 million on federal lobbying, with two teams (one in-house and one contracted team) lobbying in support of LNG exports. It has also spent over $63,000 on the midterm elections.
One of the attendees at the Press Club event, Sempra lobbyist Maryam Sabbaghian Brown, formerly served as the top energy adviser for Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan. From 2006-2008, Brown served as staff director of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy & Mineral Resources.
Environmental organizations, including Food & Water Watch, Oil Change International, 350.org, the Center for Biological Diversity, and dozens more, recently critiqued the Department of Energy for a draft study it commissioned, which they say did not account for the climate change impacts and future costs associated with a global LNG export boom fueled by U.S.-produced fracked gas. As Lorne Stockman, Senior Research Analyst with Oil Change International and lead author of the comments, said in a statement:
“The draft study is deeply flawed, as the authors chose to ignore both climate science and climate action in favor of what appears to be a political imperative over any objective analysis … In my experience, this would not stand up to peer review in any academic institution.”
With the Energy Department involved in this new coalition, however, those critiques appear to have fallen on deaf ears.
https://www.nationofchange.org/2018/08/08/led-by-sempra-energy-global-natural-gas-coalition-launched-with-trump-admin-and-labor-union-in-fold/

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China Tariffs Create Headache For Next Wave Of US Natural Gas Export Projects

Aug 9, 2018 | CNBC

By Tom DiChristopher

·       A second wave of U.S. liquefied natural gas projects is awaiting investment decisions that hinge on lining up long-term contracts with gas importers.
·       China's threat to slap a 25 percent tariff on U.S. LNG could complicate financing for some of the projects.
·       Beijing is taking aim at President Donald Trump's energy dominance agenda to bring his administration back to the negotiating table, one analyst says

China's threat to slap tariffs on U.S. natural gas exports is injecting uncertainty into a construction boom for the multi-billion dollar facilities that ship American shale gas around the world.
By the end of next year, six facilities in the United States are expected to be exporting liquefied natural gas, or LNG. During that same period, several companies are slated to decide whether they'll move forward with another wave of American LNG export terminals.
Many of those projects are looking to line up buyers in China, which is poised to surpass Japan as the world's largest consumer of LNG, a form of natural gas super-chilled to its liquid form for export by sea.
But Beijing cast doubt on the prospect of inking deals with the developers last week when it threatened to slap a 25-percent tariffon U.S. goods including LNG, firing back as the Trump administration mulled hiking tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods.
To be sure, tariffs would have to remain in place for months or years to spoil the dealmaking, according to analysts. But the threat comes at a time when industry-watchers say some of the terminals are already at risk of being shelved because there's too little capital available to finance too many projects.
"Even ignoring the politics with China, there are too many of these early stage projects," said Pavel Molchanov, energy analyst at Raymond James. "The vast majority of them will never get built no matter what happens with China because the scale of the demand is disconnected from the excessive, absurd number of early stage players that want to build an LNG plant."
The U.S. projects chasing capital include a slate of brand new terminals, most of which would be built on the U.S. Gulf Coast.
It also encompasses expansions of first wave terminals operated by LNG pioneer Cheniere Energy, which signed the first long-term contract with a Chinese company earlier this year. At the time, Cheniere CEO Jack Fusco said the contract to sell LNG to China National Petroleum Corporation would support future expansion at its terminal in Corpus Christi.
A spokesman for Cheniere said the company does not comment on confidential commercial agreements when asked how tariffs could impact the contract.
Lining up long-term contracts is critical to securing financing to construct LNG terminals, which typically take about four years to build. The contracts show lenders that the builder has a steady source of income to pay off its debt.
The Trump administration recently made inroads into the Chinese market, which is forecast to account for more than a third of the world's growing appetite for LNG over the next five years. Last year, after meeting with U.S. officials, China gave permission to its state-owned energy giants to negotiate long-term contracts with U.S. LNG exporters.
The United States has an opportunity to gobble up much of China's growing LNG demand because Beijing has historically sought to diversify its gas supply, and American exporters currently account for a small share of the country's imports, said Hugo Brennan, Asia analyst at risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft.
Beijing can't go toe-to-toe with Washington on tariffs, but China can target President Donald Trump's political agenda in a bid to revive trade talks, Brennan said.
"China is targeting Trump's energy dominance agenda," he said. "They want to bring the U.S. back to the negotiating table."
That does not mean negotiations between U.S. LNG exporters and potential Chinese buyers are grinding to a halt. Texas LNG, which aims to open a mid-size export terminal in 2023, told CNBC it continues to have "constructive discussions with Chinese investors and LNG consumers" and still expects to decide on whether to move forward with its project in the coming months.
Meanwhile, Daniel Rogers, an attorney at King & Spalding who specializes in energy infrastructure, said potential Chinese buyers negotiating deals with his LNG clients remain engaged despite the tariff threats.
Rogers cautions against placing too much emphasis on the role of Chinese contracts in assuring U.S. projects move forward. While there's huge growth potential in the Chinese market, it's still relatively young and dominated by just a handful of buyers with enough experience managing LNG imports to be considered credit-worthy by banks.
"If you're a U.S. producer and you're smart, you're talking to everybody and you're not so focused on China that any tariffs would get in the way" of securing financing, he said.
Those other buyers include large utilities in Japan, South Korea and Europe with a track record of successfully managing LNG shipments, as well as big trading firms like Trafigura that purchase from U.S. terminal operators and sell the LNG to overseas buyers.
Ultimately, the Chinese tariffs would likely have a limited impact on U.S. projects, with one or two viable developments potentially getting delayed or shelved, according to Giles Farrer, research director for global gas and LNG supply at energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie. Still, that could open opportunities for new projects proposed in places like Qatar, Australia and Mozambique.
"If you look long term, we see demand for a lot of new LNG projects," he said. "But there is also quite a lot of competition. The U.S. is not the only game in town."
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/09/china-tariffs-create-headache-for-next-wave-of-us-lng-export-projects.html

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Aging LNG Fleet Spurs Need for New Ships Amid Global Trade Boom

Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Ryan Collins

Average worldwide age of vessel has reached 21 years
Rates for carriers hit 4-year high in second quarter
Father Time is catching up with the world’s fleet of natural gas tankers, and that could spell trouble for buyers and sellers of the fuel.
The average age of a liquefied natural gas carrier has reached 21, signaling more than half will need to be replaced in the few years following 2020, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Mark Rossano and Michael Filatov said in a research note.
That year marks the start of stricter international bunker fuel regulations, which will probably drive vessel owners to replace older ships rather than make environmental upgrades that can cost $10 million.
Global demand for LNG is surging as fast-growing economies such as China and India look to cut pollution by shutting coal plants. As developers from the U.S. to Australia build export terminals to meet the surge in consumption, the world’s tanker fleet has failed to keep pace, pushing shipping rates to the highest since 2014 for the time of year.
Unless new vessels are built at a breakneck pace, transportation costs are poised to go even higher.
“With a 2 1/2-year lead time and LNG supply accelerating as a result of robust global demand, the need for additional vessels and a tightness in the LNG shipping market over the coming years is evident,” Rossano and Filatov said in the note.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/aging-lng-fleet-spurs-need-for-new-ships-amid-global-trade-boom

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Tellurian Plans To Start Building Louisiana LNG Export Plant In 2019

Aug 9, 2018 | Reuters

By Scott DiSavino

(Reuters) - U.S. liquefied natural gas company Tellurian Inc said on Wednesday it remains on track to begin construction of its Driftwood LNG export terminal in Louisiana in the first half of 2019 and begin operations in 2023.
Tellurian is on schedule to announce its partners in the $27.5 billion project in the third or fourth quarter, Tellurian President and CEO Meg Gentle said in the company’s second-quarter earnings release.
Driftwood is one of more than two dozen LNG export projects under development in the United States and seeking customers so they can start construction and enter service in the next decade.
U.S. LNG exports have almost quadrupled from 183.9 billion cubic feet (bcf) of natural gas in 2016 to 706.4 bcf in 2017, worth about $3.3 billion, and are on track to rise to over 1,000 bcf in 2018, making the country one of the world’s biggest exporters of the super-cooled form of natural gas.
One billion cubic feet of gas is enough to fuel about five million U.S. homes for a day.
Tellurian said it has about 25 customers interested in partnering with and buying gas from the project.
The company estimated the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) will approve construction of Driftwood in January 2019, enabling Tellurian to make a final investment decision to build the project in the first half of 2019.
Tellurian also said it closed open seasons on two proposed pipelines - Permian Global Access and Haynesville Global Access - that are designed to transport gas from shale formations in Texas and Louisiana to LNG terminals and other Gulf Coast customers.
Interest in both pipelines exceeded available capacity, the company said.
Unlike most other proposed U.S. LNG export projects that will liquefy gas for a fee, Tellurian is offering customers the opportunity to meet their gas needs by investing in a full range of services from production to pipelines and liquefaction.
Current partners include Total SA, General Electric Co and Bechtel, which has a $15.2 billion contract to build the liquefaction facility at the center of the project. Pipelines, reserves and other costs make up the rest of the $27.5 billion price tag of the project.
Driftwood will have capacity to produce 27.6 million tonnes per annum of LNG or about 4 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) of gas.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-tellurian-driftwood-lng/tellurian-plans-to-start-building-louisiana-lng-export-plant-in-2019-idUSKBN1KT1RL

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$28B Gas Export Project Could Break Ground Next Year

Aug 9, 2018 | E&E Energywire

By Jenny Mandel

One of the largest liquefied natural gas export projects currently under development is on schedule to reach a final investment decision next year and put LNG on the water in 2023, according to filings by Houston-based Tellurian Inc.
The company's Driftwood project has its sights on a new business model for U.S. LNG, integrating ownership in upstream natural gas assets, new pipeline infrastructure and a natural gas export terminal that could ship as much as 3.6 billion cubic feet per day of LNG. That vertically integrated approach has been used in several projects in Australia but is novel for the U.S., where LNG export proposals have largely centered on terminals that link to the existing natural gas grid.
In an earnings release yesterday, company President and CEO Meg Gentle said the next year will be crucial for Tellurian, as it moves to finalize equity partnerships in the second half of this year and to obtain key permits and formally greenlight construction in the first half of next year.
"All the pieces of the integrated project are coming together as planned," Gentle said. "Over the next 12 months, we're putting together all of the pieces of the puzzle."
If shovels hit the ground in the first half of next year, the company's plans call for first exports in 2023; the project is budgeted at $27.5 billion.
Tellurian was founded by BG Group veteran Martin Houston and Cheniere Energy Inc. founder Charif Souki, and it promises to manage supply and transportation risks in a new way to compete with a slew of LNG export capacity recently added or expected to come online in Australia, Qatar, Mozambique and Russia.
The U.S. has two new export terminals in operation and four under construction in what is described as a first wave of projects that received early federal approvals. Global investment in LNG has ebbed since those projects went into construction as market-watchers anticipated a glut of supply. The market has remained tighter than many analysts anticipated as heavy demand in China and lighter demand at import terminals around the world have kept up with increasing availability, though, and the industry is now anticipating another wave of investment targeting a lull in completed projects that should hit in the mid-2020s.
Some market-watchers worry that the Trump administration's trade war with China could throw a wrench into those expansion plans, and the Chinese government recently announced that it might put tariffs on U.S. LNG imports in the escalating spat. Industry boosters, though, largely see the short-term dynamics of a White House trade war as incidental to the demand-driven growth in global LNG trade.
Whether the dispute with China limits LNG investments in the U.S. may not be clear for many years, Alan Stevens, who leads natural resources analysis at the industry consultancy BDO USA LLP, told E&E News. "There are always going to be other users of the product. The question is will they use as much as China did" (Energywire, Aug. 6).
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/08/09/stories/1060093705

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‘Several Hurdles’ Ahead For U.S. Natural Gas Firms in Mexico

Aug 9, 2018 | Natural Gas Intelligence

By Andrew Baker

Although much remains unclear about the energy policies of Mexico’s next government, “several hurdles will likely appear for U.S. based natural gas entities” looking to expand their footprint in the neighboring country, according to a new report.
Access to full text unavailable – subscription required. For full story: http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/115362-several-hurdles-ahead-for-us-natural-gas-firms-in-mexico

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KKR-Backed Frack-Sand Miner Preferred Looks to Go Public by 2019

Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By David Wethe

One year after $100 million IPO filing, CEO says time to strike
Company looks to be latest to cash in on Permian fracking boom
Preferred Sands Inc. is looking to become the latest sand miner to cash in on the U.S. fracking boom by going public.
The KKR & Co.-backed company wants to complete its initial public offering by the end of this year or in the first three months of 2019, Chief Executive Officer Mike O’Neill said. The owner of five U.S. mines, including a new one in West Texas’ Permian shale basin, Preferred is following an industry trend of locating operations as close as possible to drilling rigs to cut back on transportation costs.
So-called northern white sand, mined primarily in Wisconsin and shipped by train to U.S. oilfields, has long been king in the market for sand used in hydraulic fracturing. That has changed during the past year with more than 10 mines opening in the Permian, home to the nation’s busiest drilling region.
Preferred, based in Radnor, Pa., declared plans for a $100 million IPO in a federal filing one year ago. O’Neill, in a phone interview Aug. 7, said he has been looking for the right time to strike.
“Companies are migrating in big numbers toward regional sand and away from northern white,” said the CEO, a former Philadelphia-based real estate developer. “When you start to see a divergence in earnings between those who are largely reliant on in-basin and those who are largely reliant on white, that’s the perfect time to go public.“
Fears of falling sand prices have sent shares of most publicly traded sand miners down by more than 15 percent this year. Covia Holdings Corp., formed in a merger of two sand powerhouses, has slumped more than 30 percent since it began trading in June. The lone exception has been Hi-Crush Partners LP, which opened the first mine in the Permian in July 2017 and is up about 20 percent this year.
“The market’s very unsure about what’s going to happen with all these different companies, which is why stock prices have been all over the place,” O’Neill said.
Preferred owns or is constructing mines in Oklahoma, Texas, Arizona, and Nebraska, with the capacity for 12.8 million tons of sand a year, according to its regulatory filings. KKR committed more than $680 million in debt and equity to the business in 2014, although O’Neill said its investment is now about half of that.
After updating its IPO filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission at the end of March, O’Neill said Preferred plans to post information on third-quarter results in the coming months “and then be open to the market.“
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/kkr-backed-frack-sand-miner-preferred-looks-to-go-public-by-2019

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Trump Officials Open Door To Fracking In California

Aug 8, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Miranda Green

The Trump administration is starting the process of opening up large swaths of land in California to hydraulic fracturing.
In a notice issued Wednesday to the Federal Register, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) said it intends to analyze the impact of hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, on publicly owned land throughout the state.
The area in question spans 400,000 acres of public land and 1.2 million acres of federal mineral estates throughout a number of California counties including Fresno, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara.
The notice of intent says BLM will begin the scoping process for a supplemental Environmental Impact Statement, which will determine the effects of fracking on the environment. Fracking is a technology used to release oil and gas from land. The administration's intent is to eventually open up public land to new lease sales.
The announcement follows a 2017 lawsuit brought by the Center for Biological Diversity. That lawsuit challenged a 2015 attempt by the federal government to finalize a resource management plan that acknowledged fracking. In its settlement, BLM promised that it would first provide an environmental impact statement before considering fracking.
The agency's notice of intent to conduct an environmental impact statement is open for public comment.
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on multiple occasions has highlighted an interest in expanding drilling on public land to generate funds from lease sales.
Clare Lakewood, an attorney for the Center of Biological Diversity, said her organization will be waiting to see how the administration justifies fracking in their analysis.
"You can't justify drilling for fossil fuels anymore, there is no way to come out with an environmental analysis and find out this is OK," she said.
Lakewood said the timing on the notice of intent was also particularly striking. At the end of July, the administration announced it would be weakening Obama-era standards on vehicle emissions standards, a move that would take away California's ability to set its own heightened regulations.
"It's a coordinated attack on California by the Trump administration," Lakewood said.
Recently, President Trump has criticized the Golden State over environmental standards he has deemed too strict. This week, he sent a series of tweets blaming the state's policies on water and logging for the number of wildfires raging within its borders.
The Interior Department did not respond to a request for comment.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/400939-trump-administration-opens-door-to-fracking-in-california

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Chemical Security News

Local Officials Need More Info On Chemical Plants — GAO

Aug 9, 2018 | E&E News PM

By Corbin Hiar

A congressional watchdog agency is urging the Department of Homeland Security to share more information about chemical facilities with local officials and to better measure the effectiveness of a soon-to-expire program created to protect those facilities from terrorist attacks.
The Government Accountability Office recommendations for DHS's Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards program were unveiled in a report requested by the leaders of the Senate and House homeland security committees. They are currently considering revisions to CFATS as part of a long-term reauthorization for the program, which is set to end after Dec. 31.
Since 2007, CFATS has required facilities that produce or possess some 300 "chemicals of interest" to provide DHS with information about the types and quantities of chemicals they contain as well as the conditions in which they are stored. Facilities that the agency determines are "high risk" are then sorted into tiers based on the potential danger they pose to the public and are required to submit and comply with site security plans.
After a troubled start to CFATS, the light-touch regulatory program has become broadly popular with industry, environmental groups and lawmakers.
The main problem GAO identified with CFATS today is that its "performance measure methodology ... does not measure the program's impact on reducing a facility's vulnerability to an attack."
The watchdog agency suggested that the agency "establish a vulnerability baseline score when it evaluates a facility's security measures during its initial review of the facility's plan. [DHS] could then use this baseline score as the starting point for assessing any reduction in vulnerability that [DHS] can document that has occurred as a result of security measures implemented by the facility during the compliance inspection process."
GAO also found that local officials who would be called on in the event of a terrorist attack often don't have the information they need to safely respond to one.
That's not for lack of effort by DHS. In recent years, the agency created an online "Infrastructure Protection Gateway" to share confidential information with officials who have "an established need-to-know," the report said.
The issue is "it is not widely used by officials at the local level," GAO found.
As a result, GAO recommended that DHS "take actions to encourage access to and wider use of the ... Gateway and explore other opportunities to improve information-sharing with first responders and emergency planners."
DHS agreed with both recommendations and told GAO that it already had efforts underway to address them.
Overall, the watchdog agency found DHS "has strengthened" CFATS since GAO last reviewed it five years ago. At that point, DHS was facing a massive backlog of site security plans to review and got only mixed views from trade groups about its outreach efforts (E&E Daily, Aug. 2,
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2018/08/08/stories/1060093133

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Control System Hacking Goes Mainstream

Aug 9, 2018 | E&E Engerywire

By Blake Sobczak

LAS VEGAS — The digital devices powering the electric grid and other critical infrastructure tend to be costly, complicated and hard to find.
That hasn't stopped a growing cadre of hackers from pushing industrial control systems (ICS) into the limelight, according to researchers at the annual Black Hat cybersecurity conference here.
"The barriers for advanced ICS hacking have been, surprisingly, lowered," said Andrea Carcano, co-founder of cybersecurity firm Nozomi Networks.
ICS security has become "fashionable," he said, in both attack and defense.
Carcano was presenting about one of the most sophisticated ICS cyberattacks yet discovered: the Triton malware, reported to have hit a Saudi petrochemical facility last summer.
The attack tool was built to overwrite Schneider Electric safety systems at the targeted facility, leaving it vulnerable to a catastrophic attack.
The hackers made a mistake, inadvertently triggering the Triconex safety instrumented system installed at the plant, shutting it down and tipping off workers there to the intrusion.
Carcano joined security researchers Marina Krotofil and Younes Dragoni to retrace the hackers' footsteps, learning about how they might have gamed out their target and studied proprietary Schneider Electric devices.
Laying the groundwork for such an advanced attack proved to be fairly easy for anyone with a few dollars to spare and the patience to comb through dry product documentation.
"If you go on this Chinese website Alibaba, for $3, they send you the complete tool set" for Triconex-line software, Carcano pointed out.
The spread of accessible data on industrial equipment has empowered hacking groups seeking to infiltrate U.S. energy systems and other critical infrastructure, according to Krotofil.
"I'm pretty confident that governments will continue developing their tool sets," she said on the sidelines of the conference. "Whether they will necessarily deploy them is the question."Worth it?
The same conditions helping spies have also put esoteric industrial computers, routers and other gadgets within reach for friendly hackers.
In a presentation about "Breaking the Industrial Internet of Things," security researcher Thomas Roth laid out how he was able to get his hands on various Moxa, Lantronix, PowerLogic and Schneider Electric devices that are frequently used in real-world power grid environments.
Most of the equipment could be found quickly, and relatively cheaply, on eBay.
"If you do this for a couple weeks, you'll eventually have a collection of random industrial hardware," he warned. "You can get this very easily."
Roth demonstrated several techniques for bypassing the devices' defenses, noting that he coordinated with the manufacturers ahead of time to give them a chance to roll out fixes.
While the barriers to such tinkering are lower, experts caution that causing disruption is no simple task.
In many of the few confirmed cases of industrial cyber sabotage, hackers have lurked in victims' networks for months or even years, learning the ins and outs of their target facilities.
Most hackers with an appetite for industrial control systems tend to be affiliated with foreign intelligence agencies rather than criminal gangs or "hacktivist" groups, experts say.
"Quite rarely would people come forward and say, 'Hey, I have access to a power plant — I'm willing to sell it,'" said Andrei Barysevich, director of advanced collection at the cyberthreat intelligence firm Recorded Future and a former consultant for the FBI's cybercrime unit. "Those kinds of victims bring a lot of attention from law enforcement, and the upside is very minimal. What do you do with this; how do you monetize it? For bad guys, it's all about money."
He pointed out that some of the most devastating cases of "ransomware" — malware that locks up victims' computer networks and demands online payments to bring them back — have later been tied to nation-states rather than criminals. The U.S. government has linked last year's WannaCry ransomware outbreak to North Korea and the even more damaging NotPetya attack to the Russian government in recent alerts.
"If you inflict damage on critical infrastructure, all hell will break loose," he said. "For a lot of [hackers], it's off-limits."Probing 'honey pots'
Researchers at cybersecurity firm Cybereason set out this year to learn more about the kinds of hackers who would dare to prod critical infrastructure networks.
They replicated a computer network for a transmission-level electric substation and left it exposed to the public internet as a "honey pot" for would-be attackers.
Within two days, a hacker had managed to breach the simulated network, according to Israel Barak, Cybereason's chief information security officer.
Five days later, another hacking team appeared hellbent on breaking into the industrial control systems in the fake power facility.
"From the second they got in, all they cared about was the ICS," Barak said.
He said the often clumsy way the hackers navigated the honey pot did not fit the mold of skilled, nation-state-backed cyberspies.
"For us, this entire scenario really showcased the more complex landscape of attackers — the much more diverse spectrum of who has interest [in ICS]," Barak said.
The democratization of control system hacking could pose new dangers for power utilities, he said.
"If you don't know what you're doing there," he said, "the risk is that there's going to be some unintentional damage."
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/08/09/stories/1060093723

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$120M Settlement Reached In Huge 2015 Los Angeles Gas Leak

Aug 9, 2018 | Associated Press (In The Washington Post)

By Brian Melley

LOS ANGELES — A nearly $120 million settlement has been reached in litigation stemming from a blowout at a Southern California storage field where a massive methane release forced thousands from their homes three years ago, a utility announced Wednesday.
Southern California Gas Co. said the settlement delivers on its commitment to the state following the October 2015 well leak at Aliso Canyon in Los Angeles.
The leak lasted nearly four months and prompted many health complaints. It was the largest single release of methane in U.S. history.
Under the settlement, SoCalGas will reimburse local, county and state governments for costs associated with the blowout. In addition the utility will fund local environmental benefit projects and establish a program with the California Air Resources Board to mitigate the methane emissions from the leak.
Attorney General Xavier Becerra, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and other officials planned to discuss the agreement at a Wednesday press conference.
“There is no excuse for what happened,” Becerra said in a statement. “For over four months, this leak exposed our communities to natural gas emissions that resulted in adverse health impacts and disrupted the lives of tens of thousands of Californians — displacing two area schools and driving residents from their homes.”
He added that the leak undermined California’s crucial work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The agreement, which must be approved by a court, will resolve all claims alleged in lawsuits.
“If approved, this settlement will go a long way in addressing the short and long-term harms attributable to the leak,” Becerra said.
SoCalGas said “comprehensive safety enhancements” have been introduced at Aliso Canyon. The utility also agreed to continue a new methane monitoring program and hire an independent ombudsman to monitor and report on safety at the facility.
Operations at the facility resumed in July 2017. SoCal Gas said it had met and sometimes exceeded the state’s safety requirements, and it needed to increase its inventory at the storage field to avoid an energy shortage.
Los Angeles County unsuccessfully tried to keep the facility closed until it showed it could safely withstand an earthquake. A judge ruled he did not have authority to override a reopen order from the California Public Utilities Commission. Appeals court judges shot down efforts to halt the restart.
State officials said the facility was safe and that the earthquake fears were overblown.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/settlement-reached-over-methane-leak-at-california-complex/2018/08/08/2d888e88-9b1c-11e8-a8d8-9b4c13286d6b_story.html?utm_term=.2d36e16947e5

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Transportation and Infrastructure News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Environment News

Megabucks Pouring into Washington State Carbon Tax Initiative

Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Paul Shukovsky

Oil companies vs. environmentalists, unions, tribes, social-justice groups
First direct fee/tax on carbon emitters in nation in play
A political slugfest is brewing in Washington over a ballot measure that would impose fees on the largest carbon emitters, with big oil companies in one corner and environmental groups, organized labor, tribes, and social-justice activists in the other.
Initiative 1631 would be the first direct fee or tax on carbon emitters in the nation. It would be imposed on the carbon content of fossil fuels sold or used in the state and electricity generated in or imported into Washington. It would levy a fee of $15 per metric ton of carbon content beginning in 2020 that increases $2 per year plus inflation. Several sectors that are energy intensive and exposed to international competition are exempted.
A defining difference between this measure and I-732—a carbon tax defeated in 2016—is that the broad coalition supporting the current measure wrote it to ensure that its various constituencies benefit from the revenue. That means the unions get help with job creation, the tribes with conservation of forests and fish, and social justice groups get funding to help offset regressive impacts of the fees on low-income communities.
The upshot is that instead of facing off against a splintered environmental community that failed to unite behind I-732, big oil companies like Andeavor are confronting a unified coalition that has already collected $3.7 million in contributions to fund the Yes on 1631 campaign.
Oil Opening Its Wallet
But oil companies are opening up their wallets, too. Andeavor, the oil company formerly known as Tesoro Corp., is the largest donor to the No campaign with a $1.7 million cash contribution. The Phillips 66 Co. chipped in $201,000, and U.S. Oil & Refining Co. gave $59,000. All three have refinery operations in Washington that would be paying carbon fees if the measure passes.
“I-1631 does not reflect our Principles of Public Policy, specifically by creating an unlevel-playing field within our industry, raising energy prices and failing to provide adequate transparency and accountability,” Andeavor spokesperson Destin Singleton told Bloomberg Tax in a Aug. 8 email. “We believe major policy decisions should be addressed in the legislature and not by passing ballot initiatives. We recognize and applaud the desire by legislators and voters to find meaningful ways to address environmental issues including climate change, but I-1631—as designed—is an unfair energy tax that will increase energy costs for consumers and small businesses.”
The Nature Conservancy was the largest donor to the Yes campaign, giving $775,000 cash and $140,000 of in-kind support, according to an Aug. 7 check of the state Public Disclosure Commission campaign finance website. The website showed Aug. 8 that Yes campaign donations had jumped up from $3.3 million from the previous day. But it wasn’t possible to access the source of the new money because the site was bogged down Aug. 8—perhaps because of traffic generated by results from the state’s primary election Aug. 7.
The Yes campaign is pointing to sweeping gains by Democrats in the primary as one of many reasons they believe the measure will prevail in November. “Democrats are coming out in droves,” Yes on 1631 Communications Director Nick Abraham told Bloomberg Tax Aug. 8.
Powerful ‘Ground Game’
Abraham said he anticipates that Western States Petroleum Association, which sponsors the No campaign, will come up with “20 or 25 million dollars,” while the Yes campaign has “a ground game that they will never match.” His assertion is predicated on volunteers generated by dozens of coalition members, including the Service Employees International Union and the Teamsters, allied with tribes like the Quinault Indian Nation and the Tulalip Tribes as well as a wide range of environmental groups.
Among those groups are the Washington Environmental Council, which as of Aug. 7 had donated $202,000, and Washington Conservation Voters, which put up $113,000. Smaller donations came in from Audubon Washington, Climate Solutions, the Sierra Club, and Earthjustice. The Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO contributed $125,000.
Western States Petroleum Association didn’t respond to a question about whether it would match or exceed the contributions gathered by its opponents in the yes campaign.
But association spokeswoman Kara Siepmann told Bloomberg Tax in an Aug. 8 email: “The petroleum industry in Washington supports well designed, market-based programs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Unfortunately, the program I-1631 would impose in Washington will not meet the intended carbon reduction goals.”
She said “the better path to decreasing greenhouse gas emissions in the state is to reject this ill-conceived initiative and for interested parties to work together on a market-based program that provides real GHG reductions with cost certainty.”
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/megabucks-pouring-into-washington-state-carbon-tax-initiative

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Five Things to Know Before Global Climate Conference Season Starts

Aug 9, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Bobby Magill

Three major climate conferences in September, global warming report in October lead to Poland negotiations
Companies, local governments expected to jockey for influence on nations’ long-term climate commitments
International buzz about the urgency of preventing climate change from spiraling out of control is about to heat up.
Three global climate conferences in September—and a major scientific report due in October highlighting the urgency of slashing climate pollution—are expected to influence international climate negotiations in Poland in December. The talks are poised to finalize rules for implementing the Paris Agreement, making them the most consequential climate conference since the Paris accord was struck in 2015.
The stakes are high: The Paris pact is the world’s only coordinated international attempt to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to prevent warming temperatures, extreme weather, rising seas, food insecurity, and other climate change-related crises from becoming more catastrophic worldwide.
Calling the Paris agreement “draconian,” President Donald Trump declared in 2017 that the U.S.—the globe’s second-largest greenhouse gas emitter—intends to exit the pact as part of his efforts to reverse environmental regulations and a renewed embrace of climate change-causing fossil fuels.
The Paris Agreement’s goal is to stop global warming at no more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial temperatures—the point at which scientists say climate change becomes dangerous for most people on earth.
“The Paris agreement is about getting the world together around a common framework to propel action forward to avoid the worst consequences of climate change and to deal with the impacts we’re already facing,” David Waskow, director of the International Climate Initiative at the World Resources Institute, told Bloomberg Environment.
Here are five things to know before a season of climate conferences and activism kicks off in September:
1. Three big climate issues will be on the table in Poland
The Poland talks, known officially as the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or COP24, in Katowice, Poland, kick off Dec. 3, and mark the culmination of three years of negotiations since the Paris pact was struck.
Three overriding issues are expected to be on the table in Poland: The rules and procedures for how countries will meet their commitments, how climate action will be financed, and “ambition"—what countries may be willing to do to exceed their Paris emissions-cutting commitments when they’re updated in 2020.
The countries in 2015 committed to a three-year process culminating in Poland to hammer out the rules and procedures for implementing the Paris accord. Those rules, known as the “Paris rulebook,” address international emissions trading, how each country will report their greenhouse gas emissions, how that data will be verified, and how global progress towards emissions cuts will be accounted for, and much more.
Countries are expected to continue discussions called the Talanoa Dialogue at COP24 to iron out ways they can go above and beyond the climate action they committed to in Paris. The pact calls for countries to update their pledges for emissions cuts and other climate mitigation measures every five years. As part of the dialogue, a global effort from advocacy groups, corporations, and local governments is underway to push countries to do more to shrink their climate footprints.
Discussions in Poland about climate finance are expected to answer questions about how much information developed countries should be providing about their plans to help developing countries pay for climate action, Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy for the Union of Concerned Scienists, told Bloomberg Environment.
Negotiations will also focus on the whether developed countries will follow through on their 2009 commitment to contribute $100 billion in climate mitigation funding annually by 2020, he said.
2. The U.S. steps back from Paris, but it may still have a voice
Despite Trump’s pledge to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris agreement, embrace fossil fuels, and roll back regulations controlling greenhouse gas emissions, the rest of the world is expected forge ahead with the agreement.
“Countries understand how important it is to maintain the momentum of Paris,” Waskow said, adding that companies, organizations, and local governments making their own commitments to emissions cuts have encouraged some countries not to flee from the pact.
The U.S. is expected to retain its seat at the table and its negotiators are likely to participate in discussions about greenhouse gas accounting rules and transparency, Meyer said.
But U.S. “pullback has really adversely affected their negotiating capacity and impact,” he said.
Ultimately, U.S. participation and the impact of its weakened negotiation position is a wild card.
“Up to this point, the U.S. has continued to actively negotiate on the rule book and play a constructive role. How it will approach COP24 is something we’ll have to wait and see,” Elliot Diringer, executive vice president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, told Bloomberg Environment.
3. Three September climate conferences are expected to set the stage for Poland
The rules on Paris, greater strides toward emissions cuts, and climate adaptation will be highlights of the three September global climate conferences.
The final negotiations on the technical aspects of the Paris rule book will occur at the U.N.-sponsored Bangkok Climate Change Conference beginning Sept. 4.
The Global Climate Action Summit, beginning Sept. 12 in San Francisco, will bring together companies, local governments, nonprofit organizations, and other global leaders to push countries to boost their ambition for greater emissions cuts and other climate action.
The summit’s co-chairman is Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg Environment is operated by entities controlled by Michael Bloomberg.
Climate Week will follow on Sept. 24 in New York City. The event is an international summit coinciding with the U.N. General Assembly.
The Bangkok conference will help narrow the options for finalizing the Paris rule book, while the Global Climate Action Summit will be a “global expression of will and action and commitment,” Diringer said, adding that Climate Week may be overshadowed by the earlier two conferences.
The biggest event at Climate Week is expected to be the One Planet Summit hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron, Waskow said.
The summit, organized by the U.N., the World Bank Group, and Bloomberg Philanthropies, is expected to bring together heads of state, business leaders, and others to discuss ways countries can boost their Paris commitments and work together with private industry to avoid the worst effects of climate change.
Macron in April urged the U.S. to remain in the Paris pact. “We’re killing our planet. Let us face it. There is no planet B,” he said in a speech to a joint session of Congress.
4. Corporations, local governments and others are trying to fill leadership voids—especially in the U.S.
Climate activism by companies, U.S. states, and nonprofit groups, or “nonstate actors,” who are urging countries to do more to cut their climate pollution, may be inspiring some nations to remain a part of the pact after the U.S. declared its intent to walk away.
Such nonstate actors “are very much focused on making sure that the U.S. comes as close as possible to actually hitting its climate target, but also to make sure that is translated internationally to discourage others from backsliding and to inspire them to take further steps to address climate change,” Julie Cerqueria, executive director of the U.S. Climate Alliance, a coalition of state governors committed to the Paris agreement, told Bloomberg Environment.
These efforts, which will be on display at the Global Climate Action Summit, are providing countries with specific steps and political permission to make deeper emissions cuts and embrace alternative energy sources, Waskow said.
“If you have companies indicating that they’re going to move to 100 percent renewables, then that provides the energy and sort of the policy space for the national governments to move in those kind of directions as well,” Waskow said.
5. A U.N. report will detail why drastic climate action is more urgent than ever
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will release a report in October that is expected to heavily influence the Poland climate talks by showing that humanity will have to act fast to slash its emissions and avoid catastrophic consequences of climate change and meet the Paris pact’s most ambitious goal—to keep global warming from exceeding 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit).
The report is expected to spell out what the world will look like and what will happen in terms of extreme weather, rising seas, food insecurity, poverty, and other impacts of climate change if the atmosphere warms that much, and how that scenario can be avoided.
“I think it’s going to be a spur to a wide array of actors and governments to take even stronger action,” Waskow said. “What I think it’ll show is that keeping temperature change to 1.5 degrees is feasible but it’s going to take significant accelerated action across a wide array of sectors and arenas to get there, and it’s going to require not only addressing CO2, but also short-lived climate pollutants like methane.”
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/five-things-to-know-before-global-climate-conference-season-starts

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EPA Eases Limits On 'Climate-Friendly' Refrigerants

Aug 9, 2018 | Inside EPA

EPA is easing current restrictions on certain “climate-friendly” refrigerants for household refrigerators and freezers, even as the agency's broader policy in this area remains murky due to a prior adverse court ruling and inaction by the Trump administration on an international deal to limit chemicals that are potent greenhouse gases.
The agency published a final rule in the Aug. 8 Federal Register to ease use conditions for three refrigerants under its Significant New Alternatives Policy (SNAP) program.
The chemicals, isobutane, propane and R-441A, have a much lower global warming potential than hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) that were originally introduced under SNAP to replace refrigerants that depleted the ozone layer.
However, HFCs were later found to be potent short-term GHGs, and the Obama administration began using SNAP to limit the allowable uses for HFCs and to replace them with “climate-friendly” chemicals.
However, some alternatives to HFCs are mildly flammable, meaning that EPA must approve “use conditions” for them, including that they should only be used in equipment specifically designed for the chemicals and be limited to a certain “charge size,” among other restrictions.
While the latest rule would remove barriers to wider adoption of the HFC alternatives in household equipment, EPA's broader SNAP policy for HFCs remains uncertain.
Environmentalists and states have launched litigation against an EPA “guidance” responding to an adverse appellate ruling that partially vacated a 2015 SNAP rule, finding that the agency unlawfully required operators that have already switched from ozone-depleting substances to HFCs to make another replacement.
Critics of the guidance say it goes beyond the court vacatur. Environmentalists and some industry groups are also asking the Supreme Court to overturn the underlying court ruling.
In addition, the Trump administration has not signaled whether it will fully embrace a 2016 international deal to limit HFCs -- known as the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol -- despite lobbying efforts by industry, Republican senators and some conservative groups to send the deal to the Senate for ratification.
While much of the refrigeration and chemical sectors back Kigali, opponents of climate policy have opposed the deal, arguing it will lead to higher consumer costs.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/epa-eases-limits-climate-friendly-refrigerants

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