Preview Newsletter
AM ACC 10/2/2018
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(ACC Mentioned) New NAFTA Draws Cautious Early Praise from Manufacturers
Oct 1, 2018 | Plastics News
By Steve Toloken
Manufacturing and business groups welcomed the Sept. 30 announcement that Canada will join Mexico and the United States in a revised North American Free Trade Agreement, although they cautioned they wanted to assess the full details. -
(ACC Mentioned) St. Paul City Council May Vote on Banning Take-Out Food Containers That Can’t Be Recycled
Oct 1, 2018 | St. Paul Pioneer Press
By Frederick Melo
St. Paul’s restaurants and convenience stores may soon have to ditch their foam and plastic-lined take-out containers. -
Wheeler Seeks to Affirm Commitment to Children's Health
Oct 2, 2018 | Inside EPA
Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler sought to reaffirm his commitment to protecting children's health at an event intended to celebrate National Child Health Day Oct. 1, though his efforts failed to assuage criticism from environmentalists over the agency's decision... -
Agency Follows EPA Lead on 'Open Science'
Oct 1, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Michael Doyle
The Interior Department has adopted an "open science" policy that officials say will boost public confidence in the agency's decisionmaking. -
EPA Taps Koch Industries' Chemical Engineer to Lead Research Office
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Maria Hegstad
EPA has appointed David Dunlap, a chemical engineer with Koch Industries, as the deputy chief of its research office, a move that will provide the office with political leadership at the deputy level, which does not require Senate confirmation... -
(ACC Mentioned) EDF, Auto Industry Clash over EPA Plan to Address PBT Chemicals
Oct 2, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Maria Hegstad
Some environmentalists are urging EPA to ban five chemicals the agency has designated as persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT), though auto industry groups say that any regulation of the substances will be difficult to implement... -
(ACC Mentioned) UN Expert Committee Recommends Global Action on Three PFas
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
A UN expert committee has recommended global action on three fluorinated substances, PFOA, PFOS and PFHxS. -
(ACC Mentioned) California Bans Fire Retardants in Children’s Home Products
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Emily C. Dooley
Retailers will be barred from selling children’s home furnishings, foam mattresses, and furniture with elevated concentrations of flame retardants by 2020, under a bill that Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed Sept. 29. -
(ACC Mentioned) Illinois Medical Sterilizer Plays Lab for EPA Pollution Tests
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
An Illinois company that sterilizes medical supplies is the test bed for new pollution control techniques after the EPA learned the chemical being used is 60 times more toxic than previously thought. -
Deal Would Allow Airports to Stop Using PFAs-Containing Foams
Oct 2, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Courtney Columbus
A provision in legislation to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration would allow airports to use firefighting foams that don't contain fluorinated chemicals. -
Pentagon on a Mission To See if Enviro-Friendly Fire Foam Works
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The Department of Defense will soon pick researchers to help it decide whether fluorine-free firefighting foams can meet the military’s performance requirements. -
California Proposes Prop 65 Safe Harbour Levels for N-Hexane
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (Oehha) has proposed Proposition 65 maximum allowable dose levels (MADLs) for oral and inhalation exposures to n-hexane. -
Saint-Gobain Must Control Emissions, New Hampshire Says
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Adrianne Appel
A global plastics manufacturer must install equipment to control air emissions of fluorochemicals, New Hampshire regulators said. -
EU Agency Heads Raise Idea of Human Biomonitoring Legislation
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Andrew Turley
The heads of two EU agencies have raised the prospect of creating or changing legislation to require human biomonitoring (HBM) across the region. -
Big Oil Backs New NAFTA Deal
Oct 1, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Miranda Green
The American Petroleum Institute (API) is backing the Trump administration's latest iteration of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), calling the proposal "critical." -
Backers, Critics of EPA's Ace Plan Spar over Role of Low-GHG Market Shift
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Lee Logan
Supporters and opponents of EPA's newly proposed power sector greenhouse gas rule are sparring over how any new measure should interact with market trends toward lower-carbon generation, with environmentalists arguing EPA should strengthen its rule... -
Industries Query EPA On States' 'Beyond The Fenceline' Flexibility In ACE
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
Utility and other industry groups are querying EPA on whether states will have flexibility to rely on greenhouse gas reduction strategies “beyond the fenceline” of power plants when crafting compliance plans for the agency's Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) utility GHG plan... -
Environmentalists Sue Over Methane Waste Rule
Oct 2, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tripp Baltz
Environmental groups have joined California and New Mexico in suing the Trump administration for trying to ditch Obama-era rules aimed at reducing waste from natural gas operations on public lands. -
Shell, Partners Said to Approve $31 Billion LNG Canada Project
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Elffie Chew, Stephen Stapczynski and Natalie Obiko Pearson
Royal Dutch Shell Plc and its four partners have agreed to invest in a multibillion-dollar liquefied natural gas project in western Canada—the largest new one of its kind in years that would carve out the fastest route to Asia for North American gas. -
House Following Senate on Anti-Terror Chemical Program Measure
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
House lawmakers are following the Senate’s lead on a federal chemical security program set to expire this year. -
DOE Set to Back $28m in Cyber Projects
Oct 1, 2018 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Darius Dixon
The Energy Department announced today it planned to dole out up to $28 million to 11 projects focused on improving the cyber defenses of U.S. energy infrastructure, a frequent target of attempted digital attacks. -
Amtrak Makes Financial Gains but Safety Issues Persist
Oct 1, 2018 | Washington Post
By Ashley Hasley III
Amtrak cut its annual operating losses by nearly half last year while improving customer service — cleaner restrooms and better training for those who deal with passengers — but the company still has a weak safety culture that has cost 20 passengers... -
Safety Rolls on Archaic Rail Brakes
Oct 2, 2018 | Port Huron Times Herald
By Editorial Board
If you live south of the Black River in Port Huron, you probably do not want to look at the map the environmental organization Stand.earth keeps on its website. Likewise, it might give you chills if you live in Goodells, Emmett or Capac. -
Toxic Mercury Limits for Power Plants Won’t Be Changed: Wheeler
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
The EPA doesn’t plan to change the amount of mercury power plants emit in its upcoming proposal re-examining the economic rationale for setting those limits, acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said Oct. 1. -
In Rollback of Mercury Rule, Trump Could Revamp How Government Values Human Health
Oct 2, 2018 | Washington Post
By Juliet Eilperin and Brady Dennis
The Trump administration wants to change federal rulemaking in a way that could make it easier to allow the release of harmful substances into the atmosphere. -
A New Cost-Benefit Regulation Test
Oct 1, 2018 | Wall Street Journal
By Editorial Board
The Obama Environmental Protection Agency forced dozens of coal plants into premature retirement with its mercury rule that was belatedly struck down by the Supreme Court -
Solutions Caucus Gets New Members, Total Now at 90
Oct 2, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Nick Sobczyk
The bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus has again added a pair of new members, bringing the group's total to 90. -
Scott Pruitt and Brett Kavanaugh Have Something in Common
Oct 2, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Scott Faber
Scott Pruitt and Brett Kavanaugh have something in common.
Industry and Association News
LCSA News
Chemical Management News
Energy News
Chemical Security News
Transportation and Infrastructure News
Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) New NAFTA Draws Cautious Early Praise from Manufacturers
Oct 1, 2018 | Plastics News
By Steve Toloken
Manufacturing and business groups welcomed the Sept. 30 announcement that Canada will join Mexico and the United States in a revised North American Free Trade Agreement, although they cautioned they wanted to assess the full details.
Manufacturing groups, including plastics and chemicals trade associations, had been pushing for Canada to be included, after the U.S. and Mexico reached a tentative deal Aug. 27 but it had been unclear if Canada would join.
Bill Carteaux, president and CEO of the Plastics Industry Association, welcomed Canada’s joining the final, modernized agreement and said the group wanted to review the new pact in more detail.
The Washington-based American Chemistry Council said it too wanted to study the deal, which is being called the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, but called it a step in the right direction. ACC noted that the deal appears to include some enhancements long sought by the chemical industry, including adopting regulatory principles jointly pushed by the North American chemical sector.
ACC said that duty-free exports to Mexico and Canada support 46,000 chemical sector jobs, and it said that U.S. chemical exports have more than tripled within NAFTA from 1994, rising from $13 billion then to $44 billion this year.
The National Association of Manufacturers said it’s a positive move.
“Manufacturers are extremely encouraged that our call for a trilateral agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico has been answered,” said NAM President and CEO Jay Timmons. “Today, there’s a massive amount of goods flowing across North America, meaning our countries’ economies are inextricably linked.”
Washington-based NAM said a united trade bloc in North America would help the three countries better address China’s “cheating and unfair trade practices,” although it cautioned it wanted to review details of the pact.
“As we review the agreement text, we will be looking to ensure that this deal opens markets, raises standards, provides enforcement and modernizes trade rules so that manufacturers across the United States can grow our economy,” NAM said.
Similarly, the Washington-based Business Roundtable said having all three countries would be “critical for North American supply chains,” and it noted that it would assess the full text of the agreement.
The agreement must still be ratified by the governments of the three countries. A statement from the U.S. Trade Representative noted NAFTA remains in effect until that happens.
The U.S. statement said the agreement will “create a more level playing field for American workers” with improved rules of origin on automobiles, trucks and other products, modernize agricultural trade and better protect intellectual property. It said the agreement contains new chapters on digital trade, anticorruption, regulatory practices and provisions for small and medium-sized companies.
“When finalized and implemented, the agreement will create more balanced, reciprocal trade that supports high-paying jobs for Americans and grows the North American economy,” the USTR said.
In a White House news conference, President Trump defended his trade negotiation strategy and said tariff threats are bringing other countries to the negotiating table.
“Just for those babies that keep talking about tariffs, that includes Congress, oh please don’t charge tariffs, without tariffs we wouldn’t be standing here,” Trump said.
U.S. Trade Representatives Robert Lighthizer said he believed the agreement would “bring back jobs to America.”
“The USMCA will accelerate the manufacturing renaissance our country has enjoyed under President Trump,” he said.
http://www.plasticsnews.com/article/20181001/NEWS/181009992/new-nafta-draws-cautious-early-praise-from-manufacturers
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Oct 1, 2018 | St. Paul Pioneer Press
By Frederick Melo
St. Paul’s restaurants and convenience stores may soon have to ditch their foam and plastic-lined take-out containers.
Worried about the impact on small businesses, the St. Paul City Council shot down a proposed ban on non-recyclable to-go containers in October 2017, while promising to revisit the issue in a year.
The year is up.
On Wednesday, the city council is scheduled to once again consider the “Sustainable To-Go Food Packaging Ordinance” — a proposal that would require all restaurants and convenience stores to offer to-go foods in take-out containers that can be recycled or composted.
That means the polystyrene foam take-out packaging could soon be a thing of the past in St. Paul.
The proposal’s chances of passing, however, are unclear. The city council held lengthy public hearings a year ago, after which council members voted 5-2 last October against the ban, with only council members Russ Stark and Amy Brendmoen in support.
Stark stepped down from his seat in February to work for the mayor’s office. In August, Mitra Nelson won a special election to replace him on the council.
Among the issues raised in 2017, council members noted that the ban does not extend to nursing homes, hospitals and big box stores. Several council members said the city was already asking a lot of its small businesses, from a new paid sick leave requirement to the ongoing debate over a possible citywide increase to the minimum wage.
At the same time the ban on non-recyclable containers was being discussed, St. Paul officials had proposed restricting the sale of menthol cigarettes to liquor and tobacco stores. The council approved the partial ban on menthol sales a month later, in November 2017. For St. Paul convenience stores, a ban on flavored tobacco products went into effect in 2016.
A LEAN TOWARD OUTREACH?
Last October, the council voted by resolution to ask the city’s Department of Safety and Inspections to conduct an outreach effort to small businesses educating them about their options and potential programs that could reduce the cost of recyclable products. The resolution was effectively blocked by then-Mayor Chris Coleman, who did not sign it.
Instead, Coleman’s administration sent the council a letter expressing concern about diverting DSI resources for another year, when some of that outreach had already been done over the previous 12 months through a city work group. The mayor felt the major issues had already been laid out.
More recently, Nelson and council member Jane Prince have been working on proposing a possible new approach to small-business outreach, which could take several months. If supported by the rest of the council, that could delay a vote for another two weeks or more, and full implementation to the year 2020.
“We’re talking to the mayor’s office about the business outreach part of it,” Prince said. “We haven’t figured out the timeline. We’re not going to surprise anybody. Implementation would likely be in 2020, so there’s ample time for voluntary compliance.”
“In the meantime,” Prince added, “the prices (for recyclable containers) have been coming down. We’re seeing some businesses move there on their own.”STRONG FEELINGS ON ALL SIDES
In 2017, the ban on non-compostable to-go containers won the support of the Macalester-Groveland Community Council, the Union Park District Council, the West Side Community Organization and the District 1 Community Council on Old Hudson Road, as well as several environmental groups.
The ban drew letters of opposition from the CEO of the Hmong Village Shopping Center, the Minnesota Hmong Chamber of Commerce, the Minnesota Retailers Association and several restaurant and business owners.
Some organizations had asked the council to tweak rather than abandon the ban. The American Forest and Paper Association asked the council in October 2017 to add more paper-based hot food and beverage cups to the list of accepted products. Under the proposed ban, many of those products would be rejected because of their plastic lining.
Products lined with polyethylene are not currently included in the city’s contract with its recycling provider, Eureka Recycling, but the general manager of the WestRock paper mill in St. Paul indicated in a letter that the mill was able to recycle such products in trial runs.
The American Chemistry Council noted in a letter that the polystyrene foam packaging could be recycled under the right conditions. However, few recycling companies in Minnesota currently accept it.
https://www.twincities.com/2018/10/01/st-paul-city-council-may-vote-on-banning-take-out-food-containers-that-cant-be-recycled/
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Wheeler Seeks to Affirm Commitment to Children's Health
Oct 2, 2018 | Inside EPA
Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler sought to reaffirm his commitment to protecting children's health at an event intended to celebrate National Child Health Day Oct. 1, though his efforts failed to assuage criticism from environmentalists over the agency's decision last week to remove the head of its children's health office.
“Children's health is a top priority at EPA, and we have made tremendous progress improving air and water quality and helping kids and families lead healthier lives,” Wheeler said. “There are 74 million children under 18 in the U.S. They all deserve the chance to achieve their full potential.”
But coming as the agency advances a broad deregulatory agenda, including a pending plan to reconsider an Obama-era rule limiting mercury emissions from power plants, Wheeler's statements got little support from environmentalists.
“The Trump administration is celebrating National Child Health Day by moving forward with a proposal to attack limits on lead, mercury and other dangerous air pollution from the nation’s coal-fired power plants, putting children at risk from known brain poisons and toxic pollutants,” the Natural Resources Defense Council said in a statement.
And John Walke, the group's clean air director, said EPA's plan to target the mercury rule “is a sweeping attack on considering the benefits of cutting hazardous pollution from coal plants. . . . What the Trump EPA is pursuing -- the fraudulent denial of real-world benefits from clean air and climate safeguards -- is the unholy grail of the polluting industry and its lobbyists for decades.”
At a press event at EPA's Washington, DC, headquarters, Wheeler announced a new $20 million grant program to support voluntary testing of lead in drinking water in schools and childcare facilities, according to an Oct. 1 release. He also announced the availability of $9 million under the agency's existing rebate program to upgrade school buses' diesel engines to reduce their emissions and improve air quality.
Wheeler's photo-op with a new diesel school bus comes hard on the heels of the agency's removal last week of Ruth Etzel, director of Office of Children's Health Protection (OCHP).
And officials are also expected later this week to transmit to the White House for review its plan to roll back the rule aimed at reducing mercury emissions, which has significant adverse effects on children.
In response to reporters' questions, Wheeler sought to downplay any significance in the juxtaposition of his remarks with the rollback of the mercury rule, a reversal of a ban on chlorpyrifos, which poses particular harms for children's neurodevelopmental heath, and the gutting of the Clean Power Plan, which also sought to address power plant greenhouse gases.
“The Clean Power Plan never took effect, it was stayed by the Supreme Court,” Wheeler replied. “I don't consider that a rollback."
He also reiterated a long-standing agency argument that the deregulatory agenda has left ambient air quality standards intact. “We haven't changed any of the health-based air quality standards,” he said.
On Obama EPA's decision to ban use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos, which former administrator Scott Pruitt halted for review, Wheeler said, “we are certainly looking into that one. There's a process for each pesticide. There's no decision on that.”
Asked about Etzel's suspension and the status of OCHP, Wheeler reiterated a Sept. 28 statement from his chief of staff, Ryan Jackson, that while “we don't typically comment on personnel issues, we did put out a short statement [last] Friday saying she's suspended while we investigate some allegations.”
Sources say Etzel, a pediatrician and epidemiologist with a lengthy career in the U.S. Public Health Service and at the World Health Organization before joining EPA in 2015, was not placed on administrative leave for disciplinary reasons. Wheeler and an agency spokesman declined to discuss her status further.
The ongoing investigation “has nothing to do with the good work of [OCHP],” Wheeler said. “The reason we put that statement out is because of some misinformation saying we were doing away with the office … nothing could be further from the truth. … I appreciate the dedication of the employees who have been performing outstandingly. That was just one personnel action, while we pause with that person to investigate those allegations.”
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/wheeler-seeks-affirm-commitment-childrens-health
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Agency Follows EPA Lead on 'Open Science'
Oct 1, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Michael Doyle
The Interior Department has adopted an "open science" policy that officials say will boost public confidence in the agency's decisionmaking.
While intense controversy has surrounded a similar move made by EPA, Interior casts the new policy simply as an effort to increase transparency and accountability.
"The department has an obligation to the American people to ensure that decisions are based on the best available science," the secretarial order declares, adding it will "ensure that the American people have sufficient information about what their government is doing to assess where it is coming from and correct us when we err."
Practically speaking, the four-page order signed by Deputy Secretary David Bernhardt could make it harder for the Fish and Wildlife Service and other Interior agencies to use certain research. It also will set new data disclosure requirements for recipients of Interior funding.
"Any decision that is based on scientific conclusions that are not supported by publicly available raw data, analysis, or methodology, have not been peer reviewed, or are not readily reproducible should include an explanation of why such science is the best available information," the order states.
In some cases, such as the precise location of Native American sacred spaces, Interior traditionally has sought to maintain confidentiality.
Tina Swanson, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council's Science Center, blasted the policy as "removing science from the governmental agencies deemed to protect our health and environment."
"The 'Promoting Open Science' order signed on Friday should be named the 'Removing Science from DOI' order, as it simply slashes agencies' ability to rely on, conduct and analyze science under a pretense of increased transparency," Swanson said in a statement today.
The new "open science" policy appears to be a variation on an EPA proposal aired last April, titled "Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science" by administration officials and cast as the "secret science" directive by others.
The EPA proposal would effectively bar EPA from using specific studies for developing new regulations unless the underlying data "are publicly available in a manner sufficient for independent validation," according to the text (Greenwire, July 17).
Critics called the proposal a ruse meant to impede EPA from using research that could justify stricter environmental regulations, and a similar argument could recur concerning the new Interior order.
"The data underlying many scientific studies are not publicly available and cannot be made publicly available," Jennifer McPartland, a senior scientist with the Environmental Defense Fund, testified earlier this year at a hearing on the EPA proposal.
Research involving human subjects relies on medical information that cannot be made public, McPartland noted.
The EPA proposal was made as a formal rule open to public opinion. More than 597,000 comments were received during the comment period that ended last month.
Interior will undertake its own rulemaking, which will likewise entail a public comment period.
The EPA proposal appears somewhat stricter than Interior's order, as it states that "for the science pivotal to its significant regulatory actions, EPA will ensure that the data and models underlying the science is publicly available in a manner sufficient for validation and analysis."
The Interior order states the department "should utilize and prioritize publicly available, reproducible, peer reviewed science to the extent possible."
The Interior order also declares that all the department's contracts, grants and cooperative agreements will permit the agency to publicly release associated data, analysis, methodology and other related information.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2018/10/01/stories/1060100223
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EPA Taps Koch Industries' Chemical Engineer to Lead Research Office
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Maria Hegstad
EPA has appointed David Dunlap, a chemical engineer with Koch Industries, as the deputy chief of its research office, a move that will provide the office with political leadership at the deputy level, which does not require Senate confirmation, while allowing the agency to avoid another bruising battle over an industry nominee for the office.
While Dunlap will not require Senate approval, his appointment will almost certainly draw criticism from environmentalists and Democrats, who have long been concerned about Koch's political network and its strong deregulatory agenda.
Dunlap is also likely to face strong criticism for his participation in an industry meeting with EPA officials regarding the agency's long-stalled assessment of the risks of formaldehyde.
Because the deputy administrator for the Office of Research and Development (ORD) does not require Senate confirmation, Dunlap's appointment will allow the administration to sidestep a Senate confirmation battle, a process that has already killed the administration's nomination of Michael Dourson, a toxicologist and consultant viewed as too closely tied to industry, as ORD's assistant administrator.
Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta, ORD's acting chief and a longtime career scientist at the agency, sent an email to ORD staff Oct. 1, welcoming Dunlap to the agency.
Dunlap will replace Richard Yamada, the first Trump ORD deputy, who left the agency abruptly three weeks ago.
Orme-Zavaleta writes that Dunlap “brings more than 30 years of environmental engineering and policy experience to his new role,” including municipal and industrial wastewater treatment plant operations, maintenance, permitting and compliance, managing waste cleanups for state and federal clients, and serving as a contractor to the Office of Water's science technology office, where he helped develop effluent guidelines.
Her announcement describes Dunlap as a chemical engineer, adding that “[m]ost recently David’s roles have been focused on critical policy and science questions in the areas of chemicals in commerce and point and non-point source water discharges.”
Dunlap's “hands-on field and regulatory policy experience ... will help him bridge the gap between science and policy and allow ORD to produce practical, high quality, and objective science that supports the Agency’s program and regional offices as they implement the statutes and regulations for which each is responsible,” Orme-Zavaleta writes.
Ryan Jackson, EPA's chief of staff, also welcomed Dunlap to the agency. “As a chemical engineer, Mr. Dunlap has worked on environmental issues for nearly 30 years with a focus on assessing risk. His extensive experience on regulatory issues will be pivotal in our mission to protect human health and the environment.”
Neither statement mentions Dunlap's most recent previous employer, Koch Industries. Dunlap's LinkedIn page indicates he has worked at Koch Industries since May 2010, where he holds the title of director of environmental regulatory affairs.
Koch Industries
Dunlap describes his role at Koch as a “[l]ead and subject matter expert with a primary focus on water and wastewater ([Safe Drinking Water Act] and [Clean Water Act]) and chemicals and chemical management ([Toxic Substances Control Act]) for Koch Industries, Inc."
He adds that he “provides technical, regulatory, policy and legislative leadership and support to the entire suite of Koch Companies, including refining, petrochemicals, building products and paper, nylon/intermediates/polymers, glass, automotive products, electrical components and even cattle.”
It was also in his role at Koch Industries that Dunlap was among the industry representatives who met with EPA officials regarding the agency's long-running Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) assessment of the human health risks of exposure to formaldehyde.
Democratic senators say a draft version of the document has been stalled because of industry and political appointees' concerns over its finding that exposure to the substance causes leukemia.
Since then, Acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler has said that the formaldehyde assessment will be released once he has completed a review of its accuracy.
“I'm sure that we will release it, but I need to make sure that the science in the report is still accurate, and what I've asked, not just for that report but for everything that we're doing on the IRIS program, [is] to make sure that we know the purpose of the assessment,” Wheeler said during an Aug. 1 hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
In addition to their concerns about the formaldehyde assessment, Democrats and their allies have long raised concerns about ties between Trump administration officials at EPA and other agencies and the conservative Koch brothers, who fund many GOP candidates and conservative groups.
Last spring, Democratic senators sent letters seeking information about the network, after one of its groups claimed credit for various EPA deregulatory efforts. Their April 18 letter to EPA requested by May 15 documentation of any communications between EPA employees and Koch Industries and related organizations.
“Long-standing members of the Koch network fill the ranks of the federal government, raising concerns about the network's access to and influence over federal decision-making. Americans have a right to know if special interests are unduly influencing public policy decisions that have profound implications for public health, the environment, and the economy,” the senators write in the letter.
Dunlap's LinkedIn page also notes his involvement as a steering committee member of the Agricultural Nutrient Policy Council (ANPC), starting in January 2015. According to congressional testimony, the council was formed by several agriculture industry groups in September 2010, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, the Fertilizer Institute, the National Pork Producers Council, the National Corn Growers Association, and the Agribusiness Retailers.
One of ANPC's early efforts was “examining agriculture’s contributions of nutrients and sediments to the Chesapeake Bay,” according to testimony the group's senior advisor, Tom Hebert, gave to a House agriculture subcommittee in March 2011.
“This is of course a critical issue for water quality in the Bay and in the context of the Chesapeake Bay [total maximum daily load (TMDL)] rulemaking and the associated state watershed implementation plans. Many in the agricultural community have been deeply concerned that the process and speed with which EPA was moving to conclude the TMDL rulemaking was going to encumber sound and accurate supporting analysis.”
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/epa-taps-koch-industries-chemical-engineer-lead-research-office
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(ACC Mentioned) EDF, Auto Industry Clash over EPA Plan to Address PBT Chemicals
Oct 2, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Maria Hegstad
Some environmentalists are urging EPA to ban five chemicals the agency has designated as persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic (PBT), though auto industry groups say that any regulation of the substances will be difficult to implement because it will require them to track ingredients in hundreds of parts used in vehicles' manufacturing.
Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) called for the bans in comments posted to EPA's regulatory docket earlier this month, while joining industry groups, academics, and others in critiquing EPA's approach to performing the exposure analysis required by the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
"EDF strongly urges EPA to promulgate a section 6(a) ban on all uses, including past uses, of each of the five PBT chemicals," EDF's comments, posted Sept. 12, state. "The alternative approach -- detailing out separate restrictions for each use and exposure pathway -- would be cumbersome and highly unlikely to achieve the law's requirements..."
But the Global Automakers, a group that represents Honda, Nissan, Subaru, Toyota and other vehicle manufacturers, is raising concerns about their members' abilities to determine the presence of PBT chemicals in many car parts.
Global Automakers in their comments, posted Sept. 12, note that "[a]rticles and components of complex durable goods are identified in a number of the PBT Use Documents as 'conditions of use,'" the conditions under which EPA must regulate chemicals under TSCA. The statutory definition of conditions of use requires the manufacturer to "intend, know or reasonably foresee" that a particular chemical was used or is present in a component.
"For automobile manufacturers ... it is unlikely that they will have intended, known or reasonably foreseen that any of these PBTs are present in the articles that they import or use to assemble their vehicles," the trade group says, and it urges EPA to "clarify how it will interpret and implement 'intend, know or reasonably foresee,' especially for minimal amounts of these chemicals in articles or components of complex durable goods."
The car makers add that "Absent testing of every article or component, it is impractical to expect that manufacturers of complex durable goods will have access to product formulations."
EPA is working to meet a July 2019 statutory deadline to propose rules reducing human and environmental exposures to five chemicals "to the extent practicable."
The agency in 2016 announced plans to review five chemicals it identified as PBT: Decabromodiphenyl ethers (DecaBDE), used as a flame retardant in textiles, plastics and polyurethane foam; Hexachlorobutadiene (HCBD), used in the manufacture of rubber compounds and lubricants and as a solvent; Pentachlorothio-phenol (PCTP), used as an agent to make rubber more pliable in industrial uses; Tris (4-isopropylphenyl) phosphate, used as a flame retardant in consumer products and other industrial uses; and 2,4,6-Tris(tert-butyl)phenol, used as a fuel, oil, gasoline or lubricant additive.
The 2019 deadline stems from language in the revised TSCA, which directs EPA in section 6(h) to identify PBT chemicals and, after conducting a streamlined evaluation of only use and exposure, rather than a full risk assessment, impose risk management actions in an expedited time frame.
Rather than conducting full risk evaluations of whether the PBT chemicals present an unreasonable risk to human health or the environment as EPA must do for existing chemicals under section 6 of the new law, EPA is directed to conduct an abbreviated assessment under section 6(h) identifying where each chemical may be used and how exposures may occur.
The assessments are used by EPA to determine whether the exposure to the PBT is likely, because the statute directs EPA to restrict PBT substances where exposure is likely under the conditions of use to the general population or susceptible subpopulations or the environment.
Draft Assessments
Last month, a panel of peer reviewers submitted their comments to EPA on the draft assessments, which the agency released last June for letter peer review and public comment.
EDF is arguing that EPA needs to advance an aggressive approach to addressing PBTs.
"While EPA can consider cost and other non-risk factors (e.g., availability of alternatives) in its selection of risk management options, the risk management option the agency selects must both achieve the required exposure reduction and eliminate unreasonable risk," EDF's comments state.
"EDF strongly believes that complying with the law's requirements necessitates a full ban on each of these chemicals, subject to exemptions for specific uses only where EPA can convincingly demonstrate that the specific use meets" one of the exemption criteria of being a "critical use" as identified in section 6(g); an ongoing use that presents no unreasonable risk; or if EPA determines that a ban is not "practicable" nor necessary to eliminate unreasonable risk.
Other environmental groups focus on the details of the draft exposure assessments, and ways in which they believe EPA has not been clear in its directions to the peers reviewing them. They also raise concerns about EPA's use of a new systematic review approach, developed by the toxics office, to craft the draft documents.
As in comments on EPA's draft assessments of the first 10 existing chemicals it is assessing at TSCA's direction, environmentalists, academics and others criticize the approach EPA has developed, noting that the agency has yet to review public comments on it and has not sought peer review of the approach.
"Our principal concern is that neither the two documents nor EPA's remarks at the meeting provide a clear explanation of the role the documents will play in restricting the 5 PBTs under TSCA section 6(h). This lack of clarity may have confused the peer reviewers and could point to uncertainty regarding EPA's plans to use the documents for regulatory decision-making," write a number of environmental groups in comments led by the Safer Chemicals Healthy Families coalition.
"EPA should have a sufficient understanding of the PBT's pathways of exposure and release and its associated risks of harm so it can show that the requirements it imposes are likely to provide meaningful long-term protection against known or suspected adverse effects to people, animals and plant species. EPA cannot do this unless it has identified all the plausible risk scenarios involving the PBT's conditions of use. However, the two documents are incomplete in this regard."
The comments argue that EPA removed hundreds of studies from consideration because they did not contain data in text or tables, or contained fewer than 10 observations, and scores more over other concerns that the environmental groups question. And they question EPA's decision to limit discussion of susceptible populations to workers or consumers, ignore food contamination issues and the possibility for accidental releases from facilities.
Industry groups also vary in their reactions to the PBT assessments, with the Global Automakers raising concerns about their members' abilities to determine the presence of PBT chemicals in many car parts, while the comments of the chemical industry association American Chemistry Council (ACC) focus on details in the assessments.
In addition to raising concerns about chemicals in parts, the auto industry group also questions how EPA will treat replacement parts, which it explains are often created while a particular car model is in production. The automakers ask if these parts will "be considered 'legacy uses' and therefore out of scope for conditions of use" as the Trump EPA has generally indicated will be the case.
The automakers are particularly concerned about the flame retardants among the group of PBT chemicals, noting that none of the draft assessments includes "discussion of the key role that these flame retardants play in meeting other federal, state and local flammability standards," such as the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards developed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), though they acknowledge that a number of flame retardants once used in the industry are being phased out.
The group asks EPA to "identify, with more specificity, the conditions of use to be addressed, the exposure of concern associated with that use and the alternative(s) that EPA would recommend to meet the same functionality and application requirements. This would require EPA working closely with the NHTSA and others to ensure that any identified alternative(s) meet all appropriate standards."
ACC's Comments
ACC, meanwhile, raises a number of technical points with EPA's draft documents, calling for better justification for its use of read-across to strengthen its ability to assess two of the more data-poor PBTs, and urging EPA to ensure that exposure information is applicable to the American population. ACC also recommends that EPA "establish the human health and ecological health thresholds for each chemical in order to be able to determine what level of exposure represents an unreasonable risk in order to ascertain what exposure reduction is practicable," while environmentalists have stressed that reformed TSCA does not require EPA to conduct risk analyses of PBT chemicals.
ACC is also recommending that EPA "consider the application of New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) particularly in those cases where the available data is limited. For example, at least two of the PBTs had limited hazard data. The use of NAMs may help establish a threshold for risk management that could be appropriate."
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/edf-auto-industry-clash-over-epa-plan-address-pbt-chemicals
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(ACC Mentioned) UN Expert Committee Recommends Global Action on Three PFas
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
A UN expert committee has recommended global action on three fluorinated substances, PFOA, PFOS and PFHxS.
The review committee for the Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants (POPs) met at the end of September with the aim of agreeing recommendations for the substances, ahead of next year's meeting when decisions are expected.
The three chemicals, used in industrial applications and manufacturing processes for their water and oil resistance, are at different stages of the treaty process. They have been identified as persistent, bioaccumulative and reprotoxic.Inclusion and exemptions
At the meeting in Rome, the POPs Review Committee (POPRC) recommended listing PFOA in Annex A of the treaty, which calls for global elimination. With this, ten time-limited exemptions were recommended (see box).
For PFOS, which was added to the convention in 2009, the committee recommended removing exemptions for the following applications:
· photo-imaging, photo-resist and anti-reflective coatings for semiconductors;
· etching agent for compound semiconductors and ceramic filters;
· aviation hydraulic fluid;
· certain medical devices;
· photo masks in semiconductor and LCD industries;
· hard and decorative metal plating;
· electric and electronic parts for some colour printers and colour copy machines;
· insecticides for control of red imported fire ants and termites; and
· chemically driven oil production.
A five-year phase out has been proposed on exemptions for fire fighting foams and metal plating uses, which are controlled through a closed loop system. The only time-unlimited exemption without a recommended change is for insect bait for the control of leaf-cutting ants. This use refers to a pesticide called sulfluramid that degrades to PFOS.
In addition, the committee agreed to take the substance perfluorohexane sulfonic acid (PFHxS), its salts and related compounds forward to the next review stage, which requires a risk management evaluation. At its next meeting, and following the evaluation, it will make further recommendations on whether the substance should be listed and how it should be controlled, as well as any exemptions to be applied.Chemical group
Dr Sara Brosché, science adviser for the global network of public interest organisations, Ipen, welcomed the recommendations but said: "The fluorine industry replaced one bad chemical, PFOS, with another bad chemical, PFHxS. That’s cynical self-interest that damages human health."
"This entire class of fluorinated chemicals is too dangerous to deal with one at a time and countries should take action to address them as a class and remove all of them," she added.
In response, industry group the Fluorocouncil, an arm of the American Chemistry Council (ACC), said: "The broad assertions made by a few parties at POPRC relative to PFAS as a class are not founded in science and not supported by the multiple reviews and approvals of the newer PFAS alternatives by many regulatory authorities."
However, according to Ipen, the committee recommended avoiding fluorinated alternatives to PFOA and PFOS. It said this was because of their "persistency and mobility as well as potential negative environmental, health and socioeconomic impacts."
A committee of the UN's Rotterdam Convention, which governs the prior informed consent (Pic) of the importation and exportation of hazardous chemicals, also recommended listing PFOA last month.
PFAS substances have come under fire amid mounting public concern and political controversy surrounding them. Subcommittees for the US Senate and House committees have both held hearings on the chemical group.
And according to a recent statement by over 30 regulators and academics, the high persistence of the chemicals in the environment may not be adequately reflected in their current regulation around the world.Recommended phase out times for PFOA exemptions:
Five years:
· three exemptions for semiconductor manufacturing (equipment or plant infrastructure, legacy equipment, photo-lithography or etch process);
· photographic coatings applied to films;
· textiles for oil and water repellency to protect workers;
· invasive medical devices;
· implantable medical devices; and
· firefighting foams.
Ten years:
· for manufacture of semiconductor or related electronic devices; refurbishment parts containing fluoropolymers and/or fluoroelastomers with PFOA for legacy equipment or legacy refurbishment parts.
By 2036:
· the use of PFOI (a PFOA-related substance) to make PFOB for producing pharmaceutical products "with a review of continued need for exemptions".
https://chemicalwatch.com/70655/un-expert-committee-recommends-global-action-on-three-pfass
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(ACC Mentioned) California Bans Fire Retardants in Children’s Home Products
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Emily C. Dooley
Retailers will be barred from selling children’s home furnishings, foam mattresses, and furniture with elevated concentrations of flame retardants by 2020, under a bill that Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed Sept. 29.
The bill, AB 2998, also forbids custom upholsterers from using components that contain flame-retardant chemicals.
Flame retardants are added to plastic, foam, textiles, and other products to prevent fires from starting or growing. The chemicals pose a more severe health hazard when on fire or inhaled, particularly by firefighters, advocates said.
“This new law represents a landmark victory for public health and a testament to what is possible when lawmakers follow sound science over chemical industry propaganda,” Alvaro Casanova, California policy manager for the Center for Environmental Health, said in a news release.
No Meaningful BenefitThe bill was backed by the Center for Environmental Health, Natural Resources Defense Council, and California Professional Firefighters Association. It was authored by Assemblyman Richard Bloom (D).
“These chemicals cause a variety of adverse health effects, ranging from endocrine disruption to cancer,” Bloom said in a Senate analysis of the bill. “It is senseless to allow these toxic chemicals to continue being used when they do not provide a meaningful fire safety benefit.”
In a news release, California Professional Firefighters President Brian Rice said the bill represents a step forward for protecting firefighters and communities.
“It has long been known that flame-retardant chemicals offer little added safety benefit, but exposure to smoke that carries these toxins substantially increases the risk our firefighters face from job-related cancer,” Rice said.
The California Retailers Association, California Manufacturers & Technology Association, Chemical Industry Council of California, and other business groups opposed the bill, which targets products with flame-retardant chemicals at concentrations of more than 1,000 parts per million. Their members include DowDuPont Inc., Costco Wholesale Corp., and the Home Depot Inc. Reached out to CEA and CICC
Those groups, also including the American Chemistry Council, sent a letter to Bloom saying the bill relies on politics rather than science, creates a confusing patchwork of laws, overlooks fire safety, and undermines product safety.
“Flame retardants are one fire safety tool that can help save lives, reduce fires, and limit property damage,” said the letter obtained by Bloomberg Environment. “As the legislature consideres other policies to improve fire prevention strategies, is now the time to pass legislation that arguably increases fire risk?”
In 2017, San Francisco passed a ban on sales of upholstered furniture and children’s products treated with the chemicals. That bill also applies to products with electrical components. Maine has banned upholstered furniture with more than 0.1 percent of a flame-retardant chemicals.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/california-bans-fire-retardants-in-childrens-home-products
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(ACC Mentioned) Illinois Medical Sterilizer Plays Lab for EPA Pollution Tests
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
An Illinois company that sterilizes medical supplies is the test bed for new pollution control techniques after the EPA learned the chemical being used is 60 times more toxic than previously thought.
The Environmental Protection Agency is beginning to review the toxic air pollution standards for facilities that use the chemical ethylene oxide to sterilize medical and pharmaceutical equipment. It is the first review since the standards were last examined in 2006. It is also the first review since the EPA this year updated the National Air Toxics Assessment, finding the chemical poses elevated cancer risks areas near sterilization facilities.
Ethylene oxide is a flammable, colorless gas and long-term exposure to ethylene oxide can irritate the eyes, skin, nose, throat, and lungs. It can also harm the brain and nervous system, causing headaches, memory loss, and numbness. The EPA in 2005 as part of the prior review had estimated that there are 76 ethylene oxide sterilization facilities in the U.S.
Any EPA proposal to update or retain toxic pollution standards for sterilization facilities using ethylene oxide is still months out, but the agency is already considering what additional controls might be effective, Bill Wehrum, EPA assistant administrator for air and radiation, told Bloomberg Environment in a Sept. 28 interview after meeting with local officials.
A Sterigenics International LLC facility in Willowbrook, Ill., was thrust into the spotlight after the Agency of Toxic Substances and Disease Registry concluded Aug. 21 that EPA data showed airborne ethylene oxide around sterilization facilities posed a public health hazard to workers and nearby residents. The findings drew the attention of local, state and federal elected officials representing Illinois including Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.).
“We quickly concluded there were things to do to improve their emissions controls,” Wehrum said.
Sterigenics voluntarily agreed to change its emissions controls, which they say have removed about 99.6 percent of pollution, according to preliminary results released Sept. 27.
The company said it was working with state and environmental officials to address the problems highlighted by the study.
“We take this matter very seriously and also note that our Willowbrook facility achieves and exceeds all compliance requirements set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Illinois EPA,” spokeswoman Kristin Gibbs told Bloomberg Environment.
Study Called FlawedThe Washington, D.C.-based Ethylene Oxide Sterilization Association, a national trade organization, and the American Chemistry Council both said the EPA’s latest assessment of the chemical’s toxicity is flawed.
The Ethylene Oxide Sterilizers Association claims the cancer risk posed by airborne levels of the chemical is lower than the levels found naturally in the environment and human bodies. The American Chemistry Council has asked the EPA to correct its assessment of ethylene oxide’s health risks as well.
However, Willowbrook residents are pushing the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and their local elected officials to shut down the Sterigenic’s two facilities based on the EPA’s latest assessment of the chemical. Sterigenic had received its necessary permits prior to those findings.
State Sen. John Curran (R) told Bloomberg Environment he is contemplating a bill to effectively reopen the facility’s operating permit, which would force the company to suspend operations. A hearing on the legislation is scheduled for Oct. 2 in Chicago. Curran said he’s asked Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan (D) to consider legal action to shut down the facility at least temporarily.
Madigan’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment on the matter.
Durbin and Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) also wrote to the company in September asking it to conduct ambient air testing for ethylene oxide at its Willowbrook facility and at nearby public places. They also urge the company to provide personal exposure tests to any resident of Willowbrook who requests it.
—With assistance from Andrew Childers
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/illinois-medical-sterilizer-plays-lab-for-epa-pollution-tests
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Deal Would Allow Airports to Stop Using PFAs-Containing Foams
Oct 2, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Courtney Columbus
A provision in legislation to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration would allow airports to use firefighting foams that don't contain fluorinated chemicals.
Commercial airports are currently required to follow standards outlined in military specifications, which call for fluorinated foams to be used.
Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, known as PFAS, are a subset of fluorinated chemicals, explained Tom Bruton, a scientist with the Green Science Policy Institute.
PFAS have contaminated the drinking water of millions of Americans. The chemicals have been widely used for decades in everything from firefighting foam to carpeting.
"This provision, it gives airports the freedom to choose firefighting foams that don't contain PFAS. It lets them use fluorine-free foams that are used safely and effectively in other countries," Bruton said.
"Unlike the foams that are currently being used in the U.S. at airports and by the military, the fluorine-free foams don't contain persistent and toxic chemicals that will contaminate water supplies, so this should reduce the amount of expensive cleanup that airports are on the hook for," he added.
The one-paragraph section is tucked into a bill that would also provide $1.68 billion in supplemental disaster aid for victims of Hurricane Florence. The measure similarly includes reforms to federal disaster aid (E&E Daily, Oct. 1).
It passed the House 398-23 last week (E&E Daily, Sept. 27). The Senate advanced the bill 90-7 on a procedural vote last night, setting it up for final passage this week.
Michigan Democratic Rep. Dan Kildee worked to have the provision included in the House version of the FAA bill and in the final bicameral deal.
"PFAS chemicals are linked to harmful health effects and we must do more to reduce exposure and clean up contamination in our communities," he said in a news release. "Allowing airports to find alternatives to firefighting foam containing PFAS will help to ensure clean drinking water and better protect public health."
Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, also of Michigan, wanted the language included in the legislation so the use of PFAS-containing foams could be reduced, an aide said.
"Slowly, airports are likely to transition based on liability and environmental concerns and particularly not wanting to contaminate drinking water in communities, which can happen with the fluorinated foams," said Arlene Blum, a research associate in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, and executive director of the Green Science Policy Institute.
Last month, the House and Senate each held a hearing on PFAS, and lawmakers have introduced several bills to address the chemicals and their health effects (E&E Daily, Sept. 27).
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) last week introduced two bills — S. 3528 and S. 3529 — on disability payments and health care for veterans exposed to PFAS and trichloroethylene.
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/10/02/stories/1060100251
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Pentagon on a Mission To See if Enviro-Friendly Fire Foam Works
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
The Department of Defense will soon pick researchers to help it decide whether fluorine-free firefighting foams can meet the military’s performance requirements.
“DOD expects to be making final selections in the coming weeks,” department spokeswoman Heather Babb told Bloomberg Environment.
The Defense Department is spending $10 million to identify more environmentally sustainable fluorine-free aqueous film forming foams (AFFFs) for fighting fires, according to Babb and the department’s January solicitation. The research will be conducted by universities, private companies, or federal agencies.
Aqueous film-forming foams are used to quickly extinguish petroleum-based fires to protect lives and property in situations such as airplane crashes or in nuclear submarines.
The Defense Department is searching for new foams because traditional foams contained two fluorine-based toxic chemicals called perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS). Those chemicals persist for a long time in the environment and in the human body, and they are contaminating drinking water supplies across the country.
If the Defense Department decides the fluorine-free foams are effective, that would expand the market for foam makers such as Angus Fire Ltd., Dafo Fomtec AB, and Solberg Scandinavian AS.
Other AFFF users, such as airports, gas and oil companies, and local fire departments also could be more willing to use the fluorine-free foams.
FAA Legislation Opens DoorThe Federal Aviation Administration requires most airports to use firefighting foams that meet military specifications, although an FAA authorization the House approved Sept. 26 would open the door to airports using fluorine-free foams if proven effective.
The bill included an amendment that would exempt airports from military specifications that mandate the use of fluorine-based, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS in foams. The Senate passed a short-term FAA bill Sept. 28, which would give the Senate more time to consider the House-passed bill. The House and Senate have already agreed on the amendment in conference.
Worldwide regulation and effective bans of PFOA and PFOS prompted the Defense Department to start working several years ago to find alternatives that still meet the diverse requirements of its different branches. The department is using new firefighting foams that contain a related group of chemicals—short-chain fluorosurfactants—that appear to have fewer adverse health or environmental characteristics. Yet, those chemicals may still persist in the environment, or the newer foams may still contain PFOS or PFOA, its solicitation said.
Maureen Sullivan, deputy assistant secretary of defense for environment, describedthe department’s foam research efforts and other actions it is taking to reduce the health and environmental risks of PFOA and PFOS to a Senate subcommittee Sept. 26.
The Senate Homeland Security Subcommittee on Federal Spending Oversight and Emergency Management held a hearing to discuss what federal agencies are doing to address not only PFOA and PFOS but the entire group of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/pentagon-on-a-mission-to-see-if-enviro-friendly-fire-foam-works
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California Proposes Prop 65 Safe Harbour Levels for N-Hexane
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
California’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (Oehha) has proposed Proposition 65 maximum allowable dose levels (MADLs) for oral and inhalation exposures to n-hexane.
The substance – used as a degreaser, a solvent component and a low-temperature thermometer filling – was listed as a reproductive toxicant under Prop 65, effective from 19 December 2017.
Oehha has proposed to set the MADLs at:
· 28,000 micrograms per day for oral exposure; and
· 20,000 micrograms per day for inhalation exposure.
An MADL represents the safe harbour exposure limit below which there is no requirement to provide a warning, and assists businesses in determining if they are complying with the law.
Comments on the proposal will be accepted until 19 November.
https://chemicalwatch.com/70662/california-proposes-prop-65-safe-harbour-levels-for-n-hexane
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Saint-Gobain Must Control Emissions, New Hampshire Says
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Adrianne Appel
A global plastics manufacturer must install equipment to control air emissions of fluorochemicals, New Hampshire regulators said.
The Merrimack, N.H., plant of Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics SA is releasing small amounts of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid (PFOS) chemicals into the air that could be contributing to nearby groundwater contamination, the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services said Oct. 1.
The PFOA, PFOS, and related chemicals were widely used in manufacturing, including making fire-retardant materials and nonstick cookware. Studies have linked the chemicals to thyroid and immune system harm and higher cancer risk.
The Department of Environmental Services is taking action against the Saint-Gobain plant under the authority of a new law that took effect Sept. 8 aimed at controlling air emissions of PFOA and PFOS.
Clamping Down on ChemicalsNew Hampshire has taken an aggressive stance against fluorochemical contamination in drinking water and groundwater since the 2016 discovery that the wells of 500 households in southwestern New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York were contaminated with PFOA from a former CHEMFAB manufacturing plant in Bennington, Vt., now owned by Saint-Gobain. Many people in the rural state rely on well water for their drinking water.
Saint-Gobain’s Merrimack plant in central New Hampshire is about 100 miles from the Bennington contamination.
According to the Department of Environmental Services, within six months, Saint-Gobain must apply for a permit to install air emissions equipment at its Merrimack plant that will control PFOA and PFOS emissions. The application must show that it is for “the best available” technology to control the emissions.
State environmental officials said they have been working with Saint-Gobain for two years while the company tests the effectiveness of pilot technology to reduce air emissions of PFOS compounds.
PFOA and PFOS are among the group of chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl (PFAS) chemicals, of which there are about 3,500 in the class.
“The facility continues to have small emissions of PFAS compounds, which could contribute to” levels of PFAS in nearby groundwater that exceed the state’s enforceable standard of 70 parts per trillion of PFOA and PFOS individually and combined, the department said.
The department hasn’t posted the tests of the nearby groundwater it referred to in its announcement but said it planned to do so soon.
Most states focus their investigations and enforcement of PFAS compounds on drinking water because “it is a primary pathway of exposure,” said David Bond, a researcher who who has studied PFAS compounds.
His research shows that “emissions are the primary route by which PFAS contamination has occurred,” Bond told Bloomberg Environment in an Oct. 1 interview.
Saint-Gobain didn’t respond to a Bloomberg Environment request for comment Oct. 1.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/saint-gobain-must-control-emissions-new-hampshire-says
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EU Agency Heads Raise Idea of Human Biomonitoring Legislation
Oct 2, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Andrew Turley
The heads of two EU agencies have raised the prospect of creating or changing legislation to require human biomonitoring (HBM) across the region.
The suggestion came during a conference organised by the Austrian EU presidency and the European Commission in Vienna on 28 September. Echa's Bjorn Hansen and Hans Bruyninckx from the European Environment Agency (EEA) were speaking at the event, called to highlight the benefits of HBM to policy making and present the first results of the HBM4EU project.
During a panel session, they were asked to consider how to continue the work beyond its scheduled end in 2021.
The HBM4EU project was launched in 2016 with the aim of improving the collective understanding of human exposure to hazardous chemicals and developing HBM as an exposure assessment method. The project has €74m in funding and support from 28 participating countries – 24 EU member states plus Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and Israel. One of its aims is to ensure the sustainability of HBM in the EU beyond 2021.
Dr Hansen said that Echa uses the data for regulatory risk assessment when available: "We use it, if it’s there, and we’d love to use more of it." But the agency would need a clear mandate and sufficient funding to be involved in the activity on an ongoing basis. This would mean regulation, he said, with political support from the Commission and the member states.
When asked by the moderator whether he could envisage HBM being mandatory, Dr Hansen said he could.
And Dr Bruyninckx agreed, saying that creating or changing regulations to require it across the region was an option that should be considered. There were already examples of legislation like this, for example the water framework and air quality Directives, he added.
Dr Bruyninckx also said to transition the work of the HBM4EU project into sustainable HBM, policy makers would have to "anchor" the activity in an institution. Furthermore, its outputs would need to be clearly relevant to policy, a point that was echoed by another panel member Hans Verhagen from the European Food Safety Authority (Efsa).
https://chemicalwatch.com/70666/eu-agency-heads-raise-idea-of-human-biomonitoring-legislation
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Oct 1, 2018 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Miranda Green
The American Petroleum Institute (API) is backing the Trump administration's latest iteration of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), calling the proposal "critical."
Following the announcement that Trump had helped the U.S. come to a trilateral agreement with Mexico and Canada on Sunday, API on Monday urged Congress to approve the measure that the administration is calling the United States, Mexico, and Canada Agreement (USMCA).
“Having Canada as a trading partner and a party to this agreement is critical for North American energy security and U.S. consumers,” API said in a statement on the deal.
“Retaining a trade agreement for North America will help ensure the U.S. energy revolution continues into the future.”
The group pointed to the continued need for zero tariffs on the import and export of American oil products and proposals, allowing U.S. oil companies to continue to invest in Mexico.
In August, API called Trump's bilateral trade agreement with Mexico "encouraging," despite Canada having yet to sign on board.
“America’s natural gas and oil industry depends on trade to continue to grow U.S. jobs and our economy, and deliver for consumers,” API said at the time.
Mexico was the leading importer of American oil and petroleum products in 2017, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Negotiations between the U.S. and Mexico have largely focused on crafting a deal on auto trade, but the talks have been bogged down by some Mexican officials who are skeptical of foreign oil companies entering the Mexican oil industry.
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/409299-big-oil-backs-latest-nafta-agreement
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Backers, Critics of EPA's Ace Plan Spar over Role of Low-GHG Market Shift
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Lee Logan
Supporters and opponents of EPA's newly proposed power sector greenhouse gas rule are sparring over how any new measure should interact with market trends toward lower-carbon generation, with environmentalists arguing EPA should strengthen its rule to bolster such trends while industry is praising the plan for largely relying on such shifts.
The competing views were aired during EPA's Oct. 1 hearing in Chicago on its proposed Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) rule, a narrow measure that would replace the Obama-era Clean Power Plan (CPP). EPA's Chicago hearing is the sole public hearing on the plan.
Power industry supporters of the measure tout Trump EPA projections that ACE -- when combined with market trends toward more gas-fired electricity and renewables and less coal power -- would lead to a similar sector-wide GHG reduction in 2030 as the Obama administration projected in its 2015 CPP.
“Altogether, ACE will lead to power sector carbon dioxide emissions in 2030 that are 33 percent below 2005 levels,” the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says in its testimony for the Oct. 1 hearing, adding that the rule would cause both GHGs and conventional pollutants to “decline more rapidly than if the CPP was withdrawn without replacement.”
The Obama administration projected that implementing the CPP would lead to a 32 percent GHG cut by 2030.
However, environmentalists say the ACE plan would achieve negligible GHG cuts beyond shifts away from coal that are driven by cheap gas and renewables.
“We are fortunate that market trends are moving the power sector away from dirty coal plants and towards cleaner generation and energy services faster than EPA anticipated in 2015,” the Natural Resources Defense Council's David Doniger says in his testimony.
“But that is no basis for complacency, because we need to move even faster towards a clean electric power grid. The reason for having a Clean Air Act is to curb dangerous pollution that market forces alone do not capture.”
Doniger argues that updated standards could achieve a 60 percent GHG reduction by 2030, or nearly twice as much as the CPP's original projection, if EPA stuck with the same methodology as the CPP -- namely, a reliance on “beyond the fence” strategies such as generation shifting that are the chief source of legal friction over both the CPP and ACE -- and applied it to the latest data.
Other environmental groups reprise their arguments that the ACE proposal is unlawful because it does not impose a federal GHG standard but instead outlines a series of “candidate” technologies to improve coal plant efficiency that states can consider when crafting compliance plans.
The plan is “dead on arrival as it does not require any emission reductions -- let alone represent the best system of emission reduction,” says testimony from Clean Air Task Force (CATF), citing language in Clean Air Act section 111(d) that guides the stringency of EPA's rules under that section.
“The proposal, which has no standard at all, fails entirely to fulfill the Administrator’s duties under section 111. The failure to set a national standard opens the floodgates to gaming and a race to the bottom, which the Clean Air Act was designed precisely to avoid,” the group adds.
CATF charges that the ACE plan is an “unlawful life extension program for old, dirty, coal plants masquerading as a climate rule” because it would justify efficiency projects at coal plants that would allow coal plants to run more often and retire later.
State Discretion
However, a group of coal-heavy utilities known as the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council says the ACE plan's wide discretion to states is sound. “States are in the best position to judge the inventory of measures available to reduce carbon emissions within their power sectors,” the group's comments say, arguing the approach is consistent with state-level utility planning and the air law's cooperative federalism framework.
Also, the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) in its comments notes that co-ops are shifting toward gas plants and renewables but that the ACE rule provides “crucial flexibility so electric co-ops can respond to market conditions.”
Of note, NRECA touts the fact that the proposal allows states to consider the “remaining useful life” of a plant when setting GHG standards, a provision that critics fear could exempt a range of plants from any limits.
The group also touts EPA's overall GHG emission projection, noting that the ACE rule “will achieve almost identical emission reductions as [the CPP], but at a much lower cost. That is good for the environment and for energy consumers.”
Another power sector group that supports ACE, the Utility Air Regulatory Group is urging EPA to further broaden states' compliance options by allowing intrastate emission averaging, which the group says “can be structured to avoid generation shifting as a compliance method.”
The group also urges EPA to allow states to choose various ways to express standards, including “flexible (multi-year) compliance timelines.”
'Absurd' NSR Changes
Opponents of the ACE rule, though, are attacking another aspect of the proposal that would largely exempt coal plants from new source review (NSR) permitting if they undertake efficiency improvement projects. EPA's approach would set an NSR permitting threshold based on an hourly emission rate instead of annual emissions.
The American Lung Association's Paul Billings says in his testimony that the approach would lead to increases of a range of conventional air pollutants in nearby communities and downwind areas. “Polluting power plants could operate more often and for more years into the future without having to install and run pollution controls,” he says. “This is absurd. In fact, it is so absurd that when it was tried more than a decade ago, the courts rejected it.”
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan (D) also testified at the event that she is “particularly troubled” by the rule's NSR changes, noting it is “one of the few regulatory tools available to reach existing, dirty power plants” and yet EPA proposes to exempt plants from NSR even as they seek to extend their lives and increase overall emissions.
Madigan notes that in 2006 she joined multi-state comments opposing the policy, “and I still oppose it now.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/backers-critics-epas-ace-plan-spar-over-role-low-ghg-market-shift
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Industries Query EPA On States' 'Beyond The Fenceline' Flexibility In ACE
Oct 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Stuart Parker
Utility and other industry groups are querying EPA on whether states will have flexibility to rely on greenhouse gas reduction strategies “beyond the fenceline” of power plants when crafting compliance plans for the agency's Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) utility GHG plan, seeking credit for steps such as off-site renewable power projects.
“States should have the authority to use those kinds” of strategies, which could also include energy efficiency, said Frank Prager, vice president of policy and strategy at utility Xcel Energy, at a Sept. 26 meeting of EPA's Clean Air Act Advisory Committee (CAAAC) in Arlington, VA. “To us, you should really address the scope of state authority” when the agency writes the final version of the ACE rule, he said.
Attorney Robert Wyman, representing the National Climate Coalition (NCC) industry coalition, also urged EPA to allow states maximum flexibility in implementing ACE, which would replace the Obama-era Clean Power Plan (CPP) GHG rule for utilities that was broader in scope.
At the time of the CPP's development, NCC opposed any regulation that based the stringency of emissions limits on beyond the fenceline measures. But Wyman said that the flexibility suggested by Prager “is absolutely within the purview of the states” as they look for options to achieve ACE's emissions limits.
Wyman queried EPA on how Northeastern states in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative emissions trading program, and also California with its own climate policies, can demonstrate compliance with ACE, given their investment in broad climate policies including emissions trading.
EPA's Aug. 21 proposed ACE rule is crafted to rely on inside the fenceline heat-rate efficiency improvements at power plants that reduce the GHG intensity of plants. It is a narrow replacement for the CPP, which also was a state-led GHG reduction program requiring states to craft the “best system of emission reduction” (BSER) to reduce GHGs. The agency held an Oct. 1 public hearing in Chicago to seek input on the proposal.
Unlike the CPP, ACE does not rely on states making emissions reductions through actions outside of a power plant's fenceline, such as energy efficiency measures, and it is not intended to promote fuel switching the way CPP did -- although the Obama-era rule never took effect after the Supreme Court stayed it.
But many states have broad climate policies that employ a raft of techniques to reduce GHGs well beyond making energy efficiency improvements to power plants. California and Northeastern states employ emissions trading to curb GHGs, among other methods, and industry stakeholders now want to understand how states can reconcile their broader climate policies with the narrow ACE proposal.
For example, Prager urged EPA to consider the very broad authorities that states enjoy in setting BSER and implementing it under the Clean Air Act's section 111(d).
If EPA takes a broader approach to state authority in the rule, states could get bigger emissions reductions at lower cost, Prager said, for example through renewable energy projects.
But Kevin Culligan, of EPA's Office of Air and Radiation, said, “we have kind of rejected as BSER” reducing generation. ACE is based on reducing GHG emissions rates, not power generation, he said.
EPA has to act “within the four corners” of the Clean Air Act, Culligan said. States have many options to reduce GHGs “however they want,” but states must consider how these actions fit within the confines of air law section 111(d), Culligan said. He urged stakeholders, when they submit written comments on the rule, to focus on legal analysis, not policy arguments. “Focus on that part of the question,” Culligan said.
Speaking at the same event, Robert Moorehouse, representing the Air Permitting Forum, a broad industry group, praised EPA's proposed exemption from new source review permitting under ACE for power plants making energy efficiency upgrades, and called on the agency to broaden the exemption to other industry sectors.
Vehicle GHGs
Meanwhile, several CAAAC members at the meeting were critical of EPA's proposal to freeze auto fuel economy standards and GHG limits at 2020 levels and to abandon the Obama EPA's rule demanding tougher fuel economy and GHG standards in the future. EPA issued the proposed rule Aug. 2 jointly with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
Committee members representing the National Association Of Clean Air Agencies, United Steelworkers Union, New York State and others pressed EPA on the cost-benefit analysis supporting the rule. The analysis predicts that the benefits outstrip any additional air pollution produced because the rule will encourage purchase of newer, safer vehicles that result in fewer road deaths. Wyman called the modeling behind EPA and NHTSA's auto rule “extremely flawed."
EPA air policy chief William Wehrum defended NHTSA's analysis of safety benefits, and also the agency's process for writing the rule, which did not involve the high level of collaboration with the auto industry seen under the Obama administration.
“What we are doing is rulemaking the good old fashioned way,” Wehrum said. He called the safety concerns “a highly relevant consideration to understand,” and added that the avoided road deaths “dwarfs” the small increase in air pollution that will likely result from the weaker fuel economy standards.
Wehrum defended EPA's decision to revoke California's waiver with respect to auto GHG standards, which he said is justified because GHGs do not cause local pollution problems in the Golden State of the type that prompted Congress to include California waiver authority in the Clean Air Act. There is “nothing unique or extraordinary” about California's GHG problem, unlike its issues with conventional pollutants, Wehrum said.
He further said the broad preemption of states crafting their own fuel economy regulations under the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) is significant. “I would encourage you to think very carefully” about EPCA preemption, Wehrum said.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/industries-query-epa-states-beyond-fenceline-flexibility-ace
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Environmentalists Sue Over Methane Waste Rule
Oct 2, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Tripp Baltz
Environmental groups have joined California and New Mexico in suing the Trump administration for trying to ditch Obama-era rules aimed at reducing waste from natural gas operations on public lands.
The lawsuit challenges the Bureau of Land Management’s decision to rescind nearly all provisions of the 2016 Waste Prevention Rule, which was designed to reduce intentional venting, flaring and leaks of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, by oil and gas companies operating on federal public and Indian lands.
The suit, filed Sept. 28, asks the court to find the BLM violated the Administrative Procedure Act, the Mineral Leasing Act and other federal laws by rescinding the waste prevention rule. Getting rid of the rule will allow substantial waste of natural gas, lost money for taxpayers, and additional air pollution, the groups said in an Oct. 1 statement.
California and New Mexico earlier filed a separate suit that also seeks to block the administration from rescinding the rule.
Gas WastedMore than $2 billion of natural gas has been wasted through leaks or intentional venting or flaring, the environmental groups said in their statement, adding that this was money that could have gone to schools, health care or other public policy programs across western states.
The Interior Department, of which BLM is a part, referred Bloomberg Environment’s request for comment to the Justice Department, which didn’t immediately respond.
The 18 environmental groups that filed the suit included the Environmental Defense Fund, the Center for Biological Diversity, and the Sierra Club. 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.
The case is Sierra Club v. Zinke, N.D. Cal., No. 3:18-cv-5984, 9/28/18.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/environmentalists-sue-over-methane-waste-rule
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Shell, Partners Said to Approve $31 Billion LNG Canada Project
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Elffie Chew, Stephen Stapczynski and Natalie Obiko Pearson
Royal Dutch Shell Plc and its four partners have agreed to invest in a multibillion-dollar liquefied natural gas project in western Canada—the largest new one of its kind in years that would carve out the fastest route to Asia for North American gas.
LNG Canada—comprised of Shell, Malaysia’s Petroliam Nasional Bhd, Mitsubishi Corp., PetroChina Co. and Korea Gas Corp.—is set to announce a final investment decision on the C$40 billion ($31 billion) project as early as Oct. 1, said people with direct knowledge of the plans, who asked not to be identified because the matter isn’t public.
The exact timing still hasn’t been decided. PetroChina and Korea Gas announced approvals of their share of the investment on Sept. 28. The others partners declined to comment.
The project marks a turning point for Canada and the gas industry. Set to be the nation’s largest infrastructure project ever, LNG Canada augurs a new wave of investments for major gas export projects after a three-year hiatus forced by a global supply glut. LNG Canada will be able to send cargoes from Kitimat, British Columbia to Tokyo in about eight days versus 20 days from the U.S. Gulf.
It’s also a welcome boost for Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. LNG Canada promises better prices for the country, whose energy exports are sold almost exclusively to the U.S. at depressed prices for lack of a coastal facility.
It also helps reaffirm Canada’s investment climate, battered by the bungled Trans Mountain oil pipeline expansion that was sold by Kinder Morgan Inc. to the government for C$4.5 billion before its approval was quashed by a federal court.
LNG Canada proposes to eventually export as much as 26 million tons per year. The investment approval is only for an initial two LNG trains of 13 million tons per year. Yet if built, the chances that LNG Canada will double capacity in a second phase “is all but an inevitability” due to the economies of scale, National Bank of Canada analysts led by Greg Colman said in a May report.
The green light marks the end of a seven-year effort, including two postponements in 2016 at the depths of the downturn. The outlook for LNG has since brightened. The market, oversupplied for the last few years, is seen flipping to a deficit as soon as 2022 absent new projects, according to Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. LNG imports will set a new record this year of 308 million metric tons per year thanks to growth from Asia, Bloomberg NEF forecast on Sept. 12.
Shell holds 40 percent of LNG Canada, with Petronas at 25 percent, 15 percent each for PetroChina and Mitsubishi, and Kogas with 5 percent.
—With assistance from Kelly Gilblom.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/shell-partners-said-to-approve-31-billion-lng-canada-project
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House Following Senate on Anti-Terror Chemical Program Measure
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
House lawmakers are following the Senate’s lead on a federal chemical security program set to expire this year.
Legislation introduced by Rep. John Katko (R-N.Y.) on Sept. 28 would extend the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards program, which needs to be reauthorized before January 2019.
The House is on recess through Nov. 13, but lawmakers could consider the proposal when they return to Washington.
The Department of Homeland Security’s anti-terrorism program sets requirements for at-risk facilities to operate with appropriate security measures to prevent chemical releases, theft, diversion, or sabotage.
The House bill (H.R. 6992) comes after lawmakers on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee approved Sept. 26 a related bill—the Protecting and Security Chemical Facilities from Terrorist Attacks Act (S. 3405).
A spokeswoman for Katko—the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee’s Subcommittee on Transportation and Protective Security—provided a copy of the legislation Oct. 1 but declined to comment further.
Along Similar LinesKatko’s proposal is “very similar” to the Senate legislation, Matthew McKinney, a spokesman for the National Association of Chemical Distributors in Arlington, Va., said in an email to Bloomberg Environment.
The program, launched in 2007, requires facilities holding any one of the 300 chemicals above specified quantities to submit information to Homeland Security officials. They use the information to place facilities in four categories based on risk. Facilities then must submit site security plans to show the risk is addressed.
Both bills exempt the explosive industry from the requirements, and let lower-risk facilities avoid submitting employee information to be screened for terrorist ties.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/house-following-senate-on-anti-terror-chemical-program-measure
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DOE Set to Back $28m in Cyber Projects
Oct 1, 2018 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Darius Dixon
The Energy Department announced today it planned to dole out up to $28 million to 11 projects focused on improving the cyber defenses of U.S. energy infrastructure, a frequent target of attempted digital attacks.
DOE is deploying the funds from its new Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response, but the specific project-by-project award amounts are still a matter of negotiation.
Almost all of the projects involve a collaboration between a DOE national lab, a university and/or a power company, including FirstEnergy, Exelon, Southern Co. and Vistra.
The projects, according to DOE, aim to address five overarching areas, such as redesigning the computer architecture for the electric, oil and natural gas sectors, and improving the security of cloud-based services.
DOE is also promoting October as National Cybersecurity Awareness Month.
https://subscriber.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard
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Amtrak Makes Financial Gains but Safety Issues Persist
Oct 1, 2018 | Washington Post
By Ashley Hasley III
Amtrak cut its annual operating losses by nearly half last year while improving customer service — cleaner restrooms and better training for those who deal with passengers — but the company still has a weak safety culture that has cost 20 passengers and employees their lives since 2012, according to a report by the railroad’s inspector general.
The nation’s passenger rail corporation cut its operating losses to $194 million last year, a 46 percent drop, and expects to reduce that loss by an additional $14 million in fiscal 2018. The railroad plans to eliminate its losses by 2021, the report said.
Amtrak’s inspector general said the savings were made by culling the ranks of management and identifying other cost-cutting measures, even as the railroad spruced up passenger car interiors, did a better job with restrooms, provided more training for “customer-facing” workers and upgraded its train engines.
But the inspector general cites the National Transportation Safety Board in saying that a “weak safety culture” has contributed to crashes, derailments and other issues that have killed 11 passengers and nine Amtrak workers since October 2012.
After two crashes in December and February that killed five people, Amtrak’s customer satisfaction index and its bookings for long-distance trips plummeted. Between the two incidents, Amtrak named a former airline executive as its chief safety officer.
“As recommended in the report, we have made significant steps to become America’s safest passenger railroad,” Amtrak said in a response to the inspector general’s report.
Primary among those steps is implementation of what is known as positive train control (PTC), a system designed to remove human error from train movement, preventing crashes. Preliminary reports suggest that PTC could have prevented both crashes last winter, as well as crashes on freight and passenger railroads that the NTSB says have killed 141 and injured 2,426 since 1988.
The challenge for Amtrak is that in regions other than the Northeast Corridor — from Washington to New England — and about 230 miles in Michigan, most of the track on which it operates is owned by other railroads.
Some of the host railroads have made more progress in implementing a congressional mandate that they install PTC, while others have not.
Amtrak “is dependent on those railroads to install their own PTC systems and then synchronize them with Amtrak’s onboard systems,” the report said. “The company predicts that 13 [of 19] of these host railroads will not be able to fully synchronize their systems or operate their PTC by the end of 2018.”
Congress initially required railroads to install PTC by the end of 2015. But as the deadline approached, the industry argued successfully that the technology was too complicated and not fully developed. Railroads argued that the nearly $15 billion required to educate rail workers and install onboard computers in engines and communication towers along more than 40 percent of the nation’s 134,000 miles of freight and commuter lines was prohibitive.
Congress extended the deadline until the end of this year but allowed an extension to 2020 for qualified railroads.
The inspector general’s report also said Amtrak’s long-distance train routes will continue to be a drag on the bottom line.
“While the company has made significant progress in reducing its operating loss, it will face difficulties in eliminating the loss without addressing the historically high costs incurred on its long-distance routes,” the inspector general’s report said.
Those losses have averaged $517 million over the past five years, the report says, “enough to significantly offset the company’s net earnings from other routes.”
A key element in the decision to fly or to take the train is customer satisfaction. In July, on-time arrivals had dropped to just above 30 percent for long-distance Amtrak trains.
Though federal law requires that Amtrak be given priority over freight rail traffic, freight rail dispatchers govern much of the track on which Amtrak trains run and, the report says that “this right is seldom enforced.”
One result: Amtrak’s Crescent route between New York and New Orleans arrives on schedule about 13 percent of the time.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/amtrak-makes-financial-gains-but-safety-issues-persist/2018/10/01/888a0ade-c590-11e8-b1ed-1d2d65b86d0c_story.html?utm_term=.fda1fd9306c7
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Safety Rolls on Archaic Rail Brakes
Oct 2, 2018 | Port Huron Times Herald
By Editorial Board
If you live south of the Black River in Port Huron, you probably do not want to look at the map the environmental organization Stand.earth keeps on its website. Likewise, it might give you chills if you live in Goodells, Emmett or Capac.
The map shows the potential extent of the damage if a train hauling tank cars full of petroleum products derails, catches fire or explodes. The CN tracks are one of two rail corridors in Michigan that carry petroleum products, including crude oil and explosive, toxic and flammable distillates.
In Port Huron, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s blast radius reaches from Lapeer Avenue in the north down to Grant Place in the south. The same ominous yellow line covers all of Goodells, Emmett and Capac — and lots of neighborhoods in between.
Last week, while everyone was watching the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Trump administration reversed another Obama-era regulation intended to protect the people who live along the nation’s rail corridors and the environment.
https://www.thetimesherald.com/story/opinion/editorials/2018/10/01/safety-rolls-archaic-rail-brakes/38010545/
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Toxic Mercury Limits for Power Plants Won’t Be Changed: Wheeler
Oct 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Amena H. Saiyid
The EPA doesn’t plan to change the amount of mercury power plants emit in its upcoming proposal re-examining the economic rationale for setting those limits, acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said Oct. 1.
“We’re not changing the mercury standard,” Wheeler told a group of news reporters, refuting claims that the agency was planning to revisit the limits the Obama administration set in 2012.
Most power plants have already invested in complying with those controls for mercury—which affects the nervous system—and other toxic air pollution.
“The [U.S.] Supreme Court asked us to take a look at the benefits, the cost-benefit calculations, and that’s what we’re doing,” Wheeler added.
The Supreme Court in 2015 required the EPA in Michigan v. EPA to take the power industry’s compliance costs into account when determining whether it was necessary to regulate the toxic pollution. The agency put out a subsequent determination supporting regulation after taking costs into account that slashed the benefits of implementing this rule.
Wheeler said they disagreed with the way the Obama administration estimated compliance costs of $9.6 billion, while the benefits totaled only $4 million. The EPA confirmed Oct. 1 that it has sent its draft mercury proposal to the White House Office of Management and Budget for review.
Specifically, “the agency intends to meaningfully address fundamental legal problems raised by the Supreme Court regarding the previous administration’s lack of cost considerations and over reliance on benefits associated with the reduction of co-pollutants that were used to justify the rule’s otherwise exorbitant compliance costs,” EPA spokesman John Konkus clarified, after Wheeler’s remarks.
In 2012, the EPA estimated that the rule would yield between $37 billion and $90 billion in annual benefits. The great majority of the quantified benefits, however, would arise from installing technology that also would reduce airborne particle pollution, resulting in 4,200 to 11,000 fewer related premature deaths. These “co-benefits” figured largely in the Obama-era economic estimates.
Upcoming ReviewThe mercury standards are up for review in 2020, and the current reconsideration may eliminate health benefits from reducing pollutants not directly covered by the rule, making it much more difficult for the EPA to justify the costs of requiring further emissions reductions.
The draft proposal is aimed at re-doing the agency’s approach to weighing the costs and benefits of the proposal in the 2012 mercury and air toxics rule, which Konkus said was “an egregious example of the Obama administration’s indifference toward required cost-benefit analysis and dismissive attitude towards Supreme Court decisions that interfered with its political agenda to shut down coal.”
The new proposal will address how the standards have been met by electricity generating utilities—which claim they already have met the toxic emissions limits—and have urged the EPA to leave the standards alone. The EPA said it is aware that the power sector already has spent $18 billion in complying with this rule.
—with assistance from Sylvia Carignan
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/toxic-mercury-limits-for-power-plants-wont-be-changed-wheeler
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In Rollback of Mercury Rule, Trump Could Revamp How Government Values Human Health
Oct 2, 2018 | Washington Post
By Juliet Eilperin and Brady Dennis
The Trump administration wants to change federal rulemaking in a way that could make it easier to allow the release of harmful substances into the atmosphere.
It’s making the case with mercury, a powerful neurotoxin that can damage the brains of infants and young children. In a proposal sent to the White House on Friday, the Environmental Protection Agency suggested recalculating the costs and benefits of a 2011 rule to limit mercury from coal plants, in part by questioning whether it was justified in the first place.
The shift is part of a broader effort to narrow what the government counts as benefits when crafting air rules. If adopted, the change would prevent the office from calculating positive health effects -- known as “co-benefits” -- that come from reducing pollutants other than those being targeted.
Under President Barack Obama, the EPA estimated that it would cost utilities $9.6 billion a year to comply with the new standards, while limiting mercury would translate into merely $6 million in public health benefits. But the EPA estimated at the time that the soot and nitrogen oxide reductions that would accompany cuts to mercury pollution would save between $37 billion to $90 billion in annual health costs and lost workdays by preventing as many as 11,000 premature deaths and 4,700 heart attacks.
But under President Trump, the EPA has published proposals to loosen carbon dioxide limits on power plants, arguing that it was inappropriate to count “co-benefits” such as having less soot in the air. And in a proposed rollback last month of a rule aimed at curbing leaks of hydrofluorocarbons, a potent greenhouse gas, the administration eliminated language in its analysis saying that children, elderly and the poor “are most vulnerable to climate-related health effects.”
In an interview Monday, acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler said the EPA is focused on producing analyses that capture the specific impact of a rule -- in this case, mercury -- rather than the accompanying benefits that stem from installing new pollution controls on equipment.
“I just think it’s a little fuzzy math when you say, ‘Reduce mercury and we have all these other benefits over here,’ as the shiny object," Wheeler said, adding that the agency could still consider other benefits but should categorize them separately.
If enacted, the new approach could reverberate far beyond this single rule. Previous administrations have repeatedly incorporated the benefits of cutting fine-particulate matter and smog-forming pollutants into their calculations when imposing limits on other emissions such as carbon dioxide. Reducing soot and contributors to smog often produce much bigger health benefits than curbs on greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change, for example, because these traditional pollutants contribute to heart and lung disease.
John Walke, a clean-air lawyer at the advocacy group Natural Resources Defense Council, said in an email that Wheeler and Bill Wehrum, the head of the EPA’s air office, are seeking to exclude legitimate health benefits that stem from limiting toxins in the air.
"The fraudulent denial of real-world benefits from clean air and climate safeguards is the unholy grail of EPA haters and polluting industry lobbyists,” Walke said.
Details of the rule were first reported by the New York Times.
Jeff Holmstead, who was head of the EPA’s air and radiation office under President George W. Bush and now represents some energy firms, said the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards represented the “most egregious” example of the Obama administration relying on incidental benefits to argue that a regulation was cost effective. “Really, all they are doing is saying that EPA has to live within the statutory framework that Congress established,” Holmstead said.
Wheeler defended the administration’s approach to public health during an event at EPA headquarters Monday celebrating Children’s Health Day. “We are here to highlight the many ways the EPA is helping to protect children where they live, where they learn and where they play,” he said, standing in front of a school bus with a cleaner diesel engine funded in part through an agency grant.
When reporters questioned Wheeler about whether some of the administration’s recent proposals would harm children’s health, he responded that the EPA had not changed the nation’s overall air quality standards. “We have a criticism with the way the Obama administration tried to calculate their benefits," he said.
In a separate policy proposal last month, the EPA suggested reversing an Obama rule limiting the release of hydrofluorocarbons from large refrigerating and air-conditioning units. Documents posted in the Federal Register show that a section detailing how climate change would disproportionately hurt young people, seniors and the poor was cut from the proposed rule after undergoing a White House review.
“EPA is refusing to be transparent about the true costs of climate change, particularly to vulnerable populations like children," said Amit Narang, regulatory policy advocate at Public Citizen.
Coal-fired power plants are the single biggest emitter of mercury, which can cause brain damage in young children. Over time, these emissions also build up in fish, whose elevated levels of mercury are absorbed by people who eat them.
Congress gave the EPA the authority in the 1990s to regulate the toxic metals that are the byproduct of burning coal — a list that also includes arsenic, nickel and selenium — but it took the agency years to develop a standard.
In 2015, the Supreme Court dealt a major blow to the Obama administration’s efforts, saying U.S. officials failed to properly consider economic costs. The court, in a 5-to-4 decision, remanded the rule back to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit with instructions that it should be sent back to the EPA in light of this cost-benefit analysis. In response, the EPA in April 2016 issued a final analysis detailing how the rule’s benefits outweighed its costs. That finding became the subject of litigation.
Last spring, the EPA asked a federal court to delay a case challenging the rule brought by 15 states and several companies. Wheeler said the new rule aims to address the Supreme Court’s critique of the previous administration’s approach.
The nation’s largest utility trade association, Edison Electric Institute, urged the EPA in July to leave the mercury rule “in place and effective” because the industry had already installed the required pollution controls. EEI estimates that the industry has spent $18 billion over the past five years, an average of $3.6 billion a year, installing scrubbers to capture toxic chemicals that otherwise would have been released into the air.
Industry groups such as the National Mining Association said the rule has already caused the closure of dozens of coal-fired power plants across the country.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-environment/2018/10/01/rollback-mercury-rule-trump-could-revamp-how-government-values-human-health/?utm_term=.6b388be33689
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A New Cost-Benefit Regulation Test
Oct 1, 2018 | Wall Street Journal
By Editorial Board
The Obama Environmental Protection Agency forced dozens of coal plants into premature retirement with its mercury rule that was belatedly struck down by the Supreme Court. While those plants can’t be restored, the Trump EPA is at long last reinstating more rigorous cost-benefit analysis to its rule-making.
As is its wont, the Obama EPA bent the law to its political agenda by mandating in 2012 that coal plants apply stringent mercury emissions controls. Section 112 of the Clean Air Act provides that the EPA may regulate “hazardous air pollutants” such as mercury from power plants “if the Administrator finds such a regulation is appropriate and necessary.”
But EPA failed to consider the cost of regulating mercury to determine whether doing so would be appropriate. EPA estimated that its mercury rule would cost consumers and the electric industry $9.6 billion annually—among the most expensive rules in the Federal Register—onlyafter finalizing regulations.
The agency also calculated that the mercury rule would yield only $4 million to $6 million annually in direct benefits. But the agency puffed up the figures to $37 billion to $90 billion by claiming “co-benefits” from cutting emissions of particulate matter and sulfur dioxide, which are not regulated under Section 112’s “hazardous air pollutants” program.
In Michigan v. EPA (2015), Justice Antonin Scalia concluded that it is not “even rational, never mind ‘appropriate,’ to impose billions of dollars in economic costs in return for a few dollars in health or environmental benefits.” He added that “even if the Agency could have considered ancillary benefits when deciding whether regulation is appropriate and necessary—a point we need not address—it plainly did not do so” until later.
The Court’s decision was moot since most utilities had already decided to close or spend hundreds of millions of dollars to refurbish coal plants to comply. Amid plunging natural gas prices, the cost of emissions controls has rendered coal less competitive. Loath to admit legal defeat, the Obama EPA in 2016 reaffirmed the rule with some modest technical changes and asserted that regulating mercury was “appropriate” based on its rigged cost-benefit analysis.
Enter the Trump EPA, which is now redoing the mercury rule and reviewing how the agency calculates co-benefits. Utilities have told the agency not to bother since $18 billion has already been spent to comply with the rule, and it’s too late to restore decommissioned plants. They appear worried that state regulators will forbid them from billing customers for the “compliance costs” if the rule is rolled back.
But as utilities noted in a letter this summer to EPA, public utility commissions “still are in the process of reviewing the cost of these controls for inclusion in rates.” This means utilities could plead their case to regulators. And EPA’s cost-benefit shenanigans deserve to be exposed and corrected in any case.
During both the Bush and Obama Administrations, the EPA used “co-benefits” to justify costly rules, many of which otherwise wouldn’t pass a basic cost-benefit test. This has appeared to cause co-benefits to be double- or even triple-counted in rule-makings.
Cost-benefit analyses are intended to help agencies prioritize and rationalize regulation, but including puffed up co-benefits negates this purpose and is neither rational nor appropriate.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-new-cost-benefit-regulation-test-1538436507
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Solutions Caucus Gets New Members, Total Now at 90
Oct 2, 2018 | E&E Daily
By Nick Sobczyk
The bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus has again added a pair of new members, bringing the group's total to 90.
Rep. Francis Rooney (R-Fla.) joined the Noah's Ark caucus — which adds Republicans and Democrats in pairs — alongside Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) last week.
The pair is the second bipartisan addition in two weeks. The caucus has steadily grown its ranks over the course of this Congress, though it could face setbacks if its moderate Republican members are unseated in a Democratic wave (Climatewire, Sept. 18).
"As the increasingly common and destructive natural disaster of the last decade have shown, we must be committed to passing federal bipartisan legislation to protect our environment and combat climate change," Khanna said in a statement.
"Hurricanes like Maria and Florence, wildfires in California, and other disasters require serious action, and I'm excited to be a part of the solution."
Rooney and Khanna, as with many of the caucus's additions, are somewhat of an odd couple.
Khanna has made his name as a freshman member as a vice chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and by pledging to refuse donations from fossil fuel companies. He has a 97 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters.
Rooney, meanwhile, is a backer of President Trump who last year made waves by calling for a "purge" of anti-Trump officials at the Department of Justice and the FBI.
LCV scores his voting record at zero, an unusual rating, even for a Republican, though the group notes he missed votes last year before and after Hurricane Irma hit Florida.
Still, Rooney, also a freshman, has made an issue of the environment, particularly when it comes to Florida's coasts.
He introduced a bill earlier this year to permanently extend the moratorium on offshore drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico after the Trump administration suggested it would seek to expand operations there.
He's is also a co-sponsor of the carbon tax bill, H.R. 6463, introduced by Solutions Caucus co-chairman Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.).
And Rooney has been outspoken on sea-level rise and Florida's red ongoing red tide, two issues he said were key to his decision to join the caucus.
"I joined the Climate Solutions Caucus because environmental issues are critical for our Southwest Florida community. Southwest Florida's well-being depends on a healthy environment; one just needs to look at the algal blooms currently ravaging our community to understand the negative effects of environmental disasters," Rooney said in a statement.
"To safeguard our future, proactive planning is necessary to mitigate effects of rising sea levels and increased intensity of flooding."
https://www.eenews.net/eedaily/2018/10/02/stories/1060100255
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Scott Pruitt and Brett Kavanaugh Have Something in Common
Oct 2, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Scott Faber
Scott Pruitt and Brett Kavanaugh have something in common.
It’s not just that they both believe that the Environmental Protection Agency lacks the power to regulate greenhouse gases. Or that the EPA lacks the power to regulate air pollution that starts in one state and ends in another. Or that EPA can ignore the “co-benefits” of regulating mercury pollution from coal plants. Or even that both think it’s just fine to dump mine waste into streams.
It’s that they both lied about their environmental records when seeking Senate confirmation.
Pruitt, the infamous former EPA administrator forced in July to resign by multiple scandals, lied over and over again to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. He lied about everything from his efforts to weaken Illinois River water quality standards to his role in an Oklahoma egg farm. He even lied about whether or not he had weighed in on mercury pollution regulations. He said he had not, but two filings bore his name. Pruitt’s lies were so bold, EWG asked the Department of Justice to investigate.
Brett Kavanaugh’s lies to the Senate Judiciary Committee, during hearings on his Supreme Court nomination, are even bolder.
Kavanaugh testified that as a federal appeals court judge he ruled for the environment in “many” cases. The truth is that in 16 out of 18 cases he ruled for more air and water pollution, and in 17 out of 18 cases he ruled for less protection for endangered species.
Kavanaugh ruled that it’s OK for factory farms to pollute the air of their neighbors and that it’s OK to dump hazardous waste. When Pruitt sought to delay rules to reduce methane emissions, Kavanaugh sided with polluters. When the EPA sought to replace fluorinated chemicals known as HFCs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Kavanaugh complained that the proposed rule pulled the rug out from under polluters – even though replacement chemicals are readily available.
In fact, few judges have as consistently ruled for polluters and against public health. But when asked about his environmental record, Kavanaugh told the Judiciary Committee that he had ruled in favor of the environment in a “large number” of cases.
In particular, Kavanaugh cited a case related to air emissions from cement plants. In reality, Kavanaugh ruled against cleaner air in the case.
A lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council, who represented environmental groups in that case, said Kavanaugh not only ruled for more air pollution from cement plants. He also set a dangerous precedent by ruling that the federal Clean Air Act did not include an important “anti-backsliding” provision.
The other cases Kavanaugh cited were decided on procedural, not substantive, matters. Though he once ruled that a case challenging climate rules was premature, he has since repeatedly ruled that EPA lacks the legal authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
Kavanaugh’s penchant for lying before the Senate is not limited to his record on the environment.
It also seems clear that he lied to the Senate about his roles, during his time in the George W. Bush administration, that he played in the judicial nominations of William Pryor and William Pickering, in the warrantless wiretapping program and in the detainee program.
He also misled the Senate about his role in the Starr investigation of President Clinton. His testimony last week was also filled with misleading statements.
An editorial in The Boston Globe put it bluntly: “Brett Kavanaugh’s a liar. He lies about little things. He lies about big things. He lies under oath.”
That may not matter to President Trump, who The Washington Post says has made “more than 5,000 false or misleading claims.” But it matters to the American people, and it should matter to the senators whose vote could put him on the Supreme Court.
https://www.ewg.org/news-and-analysis/2018/10/scott-pruitt-and-brett-kavanaugh-have-something-common#.W7MzUWgzZ3g
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