Preview Newsletter
AM ACC 11/1/2018
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Chemours Co. Loses Bid for Duties on Chemical Imports
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Brian Flood
Imports of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) resin fom China and India are not seriously hurting or threatening U.S. industry, the International Trade Commission announced Oct. 31. -
Ryan Zinke, Trump’s Interior Secretary, Faces Increased Ethics Scrutiny
Nov 1, 2018 | New York Times
By Coral Davenport and Steve Eder
Ryan Zinke, the secretary of the Interior Department and a key figure in President Trump’s push to roll back environmental regulations and ramp up oil drilling, is facing increased scrutiny amid federal investigations into allegations that he abused travel spending... -
EWG's Guide To A Healthy Thanksgiving
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Dawn Undurraga
Roughly a third of the meat on every turkey goes straight into the garbage. If you tend not to finish your leftovers, buy a smaller bird this year. -
(ACC Mentioned) Need More Evidence of the Chemical Industry’s Bad Faith on TSCA? Read This.
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Richard Denison
This story is about chemicals known as chlorinated paraffins. They are used as flame retardants, plasticizers and lubricants, among other things. -
US NGOs Notify EPA of Intent to Sue over Methylene Chloride
Nov 1, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Caroline Byrne
A group of NGOs, along with two women whose sons' deaths have been linked to exposure to methylene chloride, have filed a notice of intent that they will sue the US EPA if a ban on the substance is not finalised within the next 60 days. -
Deaths From Paint, Bathtub Strippers Prompt Threat to Sue EPA
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
A chemical found in some paint strippers and other coating removers has killed or seriously injured dozens of people and should be banned, advocacy groups told the EPA in a letter announcing their intention to sue. -
Environmentalists Threaten Suit to Force Methylene Chloride Ban
Nov 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
Labor and safer chemicals groups are threatening to sue EPA within 60 days in a bid to compel the agency to finalize an Obama-era proposed rule banning use of methylene chloride (MC) in paint strippers, noting that former Administrator Scott Pruitt committed to the rule. -
News EPA’s Science Advisers to Focus on Lead in Blood
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
A model for lead’s effects on the human body is the latest focus for EPA acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler’s scientific advisers. -
REACH Registrations Pending Due to 160 Data Disputes
Nov 1, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
Echa has confirmed that around 160 REACH substance registrations are still pending due to ongoing data disputes. These follow the third and final registration deadline which was on 31 May. -
Echa's SVHC Database Requirements to Be 'Within the Law'
Oct 31, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
Echa intends to keep requirements for companies submitting information to its proposed substances in articles database within "the strict limits of the law". -
Texas Asks Trump EPA to Delay Emissions Reduction Program
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
Texas' three environmental regulators agree with parts of the Trump administration substitute for the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, but they want the administration to delay any action until court challenges to the plan are resolved. -
Texas Projects Come with Some Space Baggage
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Jenny Mandel
Two proposed terminals to ship liquefied natural gas from the South Texas coast would contribute to potentially significant impacts on threatened or endangered species and to views from recreation and tourism areas, according to federal regulators... -
Commentary: Expanding Petrochemical Manufacturing from New Hub
Oct 31, 2018 | Houston Chronicle
By Jerry James
Cell phones. Tires. Medical equipment. Food packaging. Clothes. Fertilizer. Detergents. Plastics. Can any of us live without these items? Perhaps some of us can sacrifice one or two, but it's safe to say these products play an integral role in our lives. -
Invenergy’s Rhode Island Plant Proposal Dealt Another Blow
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Adrianne Appel
A Rhode Island energy board has cast more doubt on the future of Invenergy’s proposed $1 billion natural gas power plant in the state. -
Chemical Safety Board Delays Closed-Door Meeting
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
Leaders at a small federal agency that probes major industrial disasters Oct. 31 scrapped an unusual closed-door meeting that had been announced with little notice. -
Energy Industry Is Well Prepared to Defend Itself, Consumers Against Cyber Threats
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Aaron Padilla
The natural gas and oil industry agrees that cybersecurity is one of the most significant challenges of our time. It’s no secret that we face cyber threats from nation-states, international cyber criminals and other malicious actors threatening U.S. energy infrastructure... -
Battle Lines Emerge In Future Lawsuits Over Trump EPA's Utility GHG Rule
Oct 31, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Lee Logan
Battle lines are emerging for expected future lawsuits over EPA's proposal to replace the Obama-era Clean Power Plan (CPP) utility greenhouse gas standards with a much narrower policy, with industry groups praising the new rule as a valid use of Clean Air Act -
Obama Furnace, Water Heater Rules Should Be Yanked: Gas Industry
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rebecca Kern
Natural gas industry groups want the Energy Department to withdraw Obama-era proposed energy efficiency standards for certain gas furnaces and water heaters. -
This Stereotype Is Holding Back the Environmental Movement
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Rainer Romero-Canyas
Minority groups are expected to make up a majority of young Americans in just two years, and become the nation’s new majority by 2045. -
Pelosi Wants to Resurrect Select Climate Panel
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Geof Koss
If Democrats retake the House, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) plans to revive the select committee on climate change that she created — and Republicans later abandoned — when she was named speaker in 2007. -
Whom Would Brown's Successor Turn to for Advice on Climate?
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Debra Kahn
Newsom has said he'll pursue a goal of 100 percent renewable electricity — a target that Brown then echoed in signing a law in September to achieve zero-carbon electricity and economywide "carbon neutrality" by 2045. -
EPA Quietly Telling States They Can Pollute More
Oct 31, 2018 | CNN
By Rene Marsh, Gregory Wallace and Ellie Kaufman
The Environmental Protection Agency has quietly signaled it may allow states to release more ozone air pollution, commonly known as smog, dirtying the air in those states and neighboring ones, but the agency did not review the health impact of such a move.
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Chemours Co. Loses Bid for Duties on Chemical Imports
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Brian Flood
Imports of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) resin fom China and India are not seriously hurting or threatening U.S. industry, the International Trade Commission announced Oct. 31.
The ruling means that these imports won’t be hit with antidumping duties.
PTFE is most commonly used as a non-stick coating for cookware.
The duties were requested by The Chemours Co., a spinoff of Dupont Co., which bills itself as a $6 billion global chemicals company. The company produces Teflon, a PTFE-based formula.
The Commerce Department previously found that PTFE resin from the two countries were sold in the U.S. at less than fair value, with imports from China sold at dumping margins of between 54.41 percent and 218.88 percent, and imports from India were sold at a dumping margin of 22.78 percent.
If the ITC had found serious injury, imports would have been subject to anti-dumping duties in line with these margins.
The U.S. imported an estimated $27.5 million and $24.9 million worth of PTFE resin from China and India, respectively, in 2017, Commerce said.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/chemours-co-loses-bid-for-duties-on-chemical-imports
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Ryan Zinke, Trump’s Interior Secretary, Faces Increased Ethics Scrutiny
Nov 1, 2018 | New York Times
By Coral Davenport and Steve Eder
Ryan Zinke, the secretary of the Interior Department and a key figure in President Trump’s push to roll back environmental regulations and ramp up oil drilling, is facing increased scrutiny amid federal investigations into allegations that he abused travel spending and maintained close ties with industries he oversees.
The criticism escalated sharply following reports this week that the Interior Department’s Inspector General had referred one of the inquiries to the Justice Department, a potential prelude to a criminal investigation.
The investigations have raised questions about Mr. Zinke’s oversight of the Interior Department, where he is essentially the largest land manager in the United States. He has authority over the nation’s 300 million acres of public lands as well as vast waters off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the Gulf of Mexico.
Mr. Zinke faces at least a half-dozen ethics investigations. At least nine other inquiries into alleged ethics violations have been closed, in some cases because Mr. Zinke was cleared, in others because of a lack of cooperation with investigators.
While it is not known which inquiry has been referred to the Justice Department, a person familiar with the matter, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said it was most likely one examining a Montana land deal that involved an organization run by Mr. Zinke’s wife and a development group backed by the chairman of Halliburton, which is one of the nation’s largest companies involved in drilling for oil and gas on public lands.
The inquiries, and the appearance of a financial relationship with a Halliburton executive, “raise the questions of whether you can trust the judgment of someone who appears to be looking to benefit from his public positions,” said Patrick A. Parenteau, a professor of environmental law at Vermont Law School.
Several of the investigations have focused on allegations that Mr. Zinke took steps to either assist his wife, Lolita Zinke, or spent inappropriately on her travel with him. Two weeks ago, a report by the Interior Department’s watchdog office concluded that Mr. Zinke violated agency policy by having his wife travel with him in government vehicles. That report also found that Mr. Zinke considered requesting that his wife become an Interior Department volunteer in order to legitimize her travel.
“He goes everywhere with her,” said Thomas J. Pyle, a Trump campaign adviser who helped the administration develop its energy policy.
Other investigations have delved into policy matters, such as Mr. Zinke’s decision to dramatically shrink the boundaries of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah. The inspector general’s office is looking into whether the review was conducted in a way that improperly benefited a Republican state representative whose land was removed from the boundaries of the monument.EDITORS’ PICKSA Tragedy in the Tattoo ParlorStone Mountain: The Largest Confederate Monument Problem in the WorldHow Trump Really Got Rich
Mr. Zinke, through his lawyer, has denied any wrongdoing.
Mr. Zinke has emerged as a favorite of President Trump, who has praised his rugged “central casting” persona as well as his role in cutting federal regulations, a centerpiece of the Trump administration’s political agenda. Mr. Zinke has helped lead that charge, wiping out conservation measures, opening up millions of acres of land and water to energy exploration and in the process remaking the landscape of the American West.
Mr. Zinke has promoted policies aimed at opening the east coast to offshore oil and gas drilling for the first time, loosening the standards of the Endangered Species Act, weakening safety regulations for offshore drilling equipment and shrinking the boundaries of national monuments to open the land to mining and drilling.
Moves such as these have brought Mr. Zinke into Mr. Trump’s favor. In an administration noted for its policy swings and turnover — numerous campaign and administration officials have been convicted or pleaded guilty to crimes, while others have resigned amid allegations of ethics violations — Mr. Zinke has delivered a steady string of substantive policy accomplishments.
Mr. Zinke was a one-term congressman from Montana when Mr. Trump tapped him to run the Interior Department. He was considered a surprise choice but had reportedly gained favor with Donald Trump Jr., because, like the President’s son, he is an avid game hunter.
Over the past decade or so, Mr. Zinke has pursued dual careers as a politician and businessman. Some of his business dealings in that time formed relationships with individuals and industries that would become relevant in later years in his role as secretary of the interior. For instance, he was a director of a nonprofit group that pushed to develop Montana’s drone industry by using the state’s big open spaces as a testing ground.
At the Department of Interior, under Mr. Zinke’s leadership the agency has planned to increase its use of drones, particularly for fighting wildfires. Mr. Zinke’s personal experience with the drone industry and ties to a number of stakeholders in the business come from having co-founded the Center for Remote Integration, the nonprofit organization that promoted their use.
In August 2017, Mr. Zinke wrote to his chief of staff expressing interest in his agency’s plans for drone use. “I want to see the drone contract before the award,” he wrote, according to emails released in response to public records requests and highlighted by Center for Western Priorities, a conservation organization.
Richard W. Painter, a White house ethics lawyer under George W. Bush who has been critical of the Trump administration, said it struck him as unusual that such a contract would be significant enough to reach Mr. Zinke. “It better be a really important contract to rise to the level of a cabinet secretary,” he said.
From the partly redacted email, it is unclear which contract Mr. Zinke had sought.
Heather Swift, a spokeswoman for the Interior Department, said Mr. Zinke “asked to see the requirements of the request to ensure the description of services and capabilities met the highly-specialized needs of the Department.” She said that use of the technology “is supported by both parties in Congress” and that Mr. Zinke “had no role in awarding contracts.”
In May 2018, Mr. Zinke announced a round of contracts for drone services to assist in fighting wildfires. One of the contracts was awarded to a company called Insitu, a Boeing subsidiary with past ties to Mr. Zinke’s efforts on behalf of the industry.
Aaron Weiss, the spokesman for the Center for Western Priorities, the conservation organization, said Mr. Zinke’s interest in drones is an example where “he has not drawn a bright line with his career prior to Interior.”
In an email, Monica Golden, a spokeswoman for Insitu, said the company had won hundreds of contracts since the early 2000s, and “anyone who has had significant interest in this space over that time period almost certainly would have found us through one avenue or another.” She said the company’s services had been used in two huge fires this year in Oregon and California.
In April 2017, Mr. Zinke and several members of his staff at the Interior Department participated in a meeting that included executives from Proof Research, a Montana-based firearms company, according to Mr. Zinke’s calendars, a meeting reported by Huffington Post. About six years ago, Mr. Zinke reported income from the company, which used a different name at the time, a 2014 disclosure showed. He did not disclose in financial filings that he retained a small stake in it.
Mr. Zinke, in his 2018 financial disclosure, noted his interest, valuing it at less than $1,000. Ms. Swift of the Interior Department said the amount fell “well under the threshold” for reporting, but Mr. Zinke added it to demonstrate “he has nothing to hide.”
In another role, Mr. Zinke served as a board member for a Santa Barbara company called Save the World Air, now known as QS Energy, which develops technology for oil and fuel delivery systems. In 2012, Mr. Zinke traveled with the company’s president, where they worked to introduce the company’s oil pipeline efficiency technology to “various members of the North American energy industry,” according to a news release announcing his appointment.
Ms. Swift said Mr. Zinke “has had no contact with anyone from the organization to his knowledge” in his current job.
The episode that has garnered the most criticism was Mr. Zinke’s discussions about a land deal involving an organization run by his wife, Lolita Zinke, and the Halliburton chairman.
In June, the Interior Department’s Inspector General opened an investigation into whether conversations Mr. Zinke had with David J. Lesar, the chairman of Halliburton, about a Montana land deal constituted a conflict of interest.
Politico first reported the deal, in Mr. Zinke’s hometown, Whitefish, Mont., which involved a development group backed by Mr. Lesar and a charitable foundation established by Mr. Zinke and headed by his wife. It included a hotel, retail shops and a microbrewery.
The examination of “involvement in and use of taxpayer resources to advance land developments” focuses on whether taxpayer money was improperly spent on Mr. Zinke’s travel when he met with Halliburton representatives.
Ms. Swift has said the secretary did nothing improper and that he had resigned from his foundation’s board of directors before the deal was made.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/31/climate/zinke-investigations.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fscience
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EWG's Guide To A Healthy Thanksgiving
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Working Group
By Dawn Undurraga
You can download EWG's Guide to a Healthy Thanksgiving here.
1) Roughly a third of the meat on every turkey goes straight into the garbage. If you tend not to finish your leftovers, buy a smaller bird this year. Try an organic, local or heritage turkey, or one raised without antibiotics. Or embrace a seasonal centerpiece of stuffed winter squash.
2) Cranberry sauce is delicious, but most store-bought varieties are more than 30 percent sugar. Make your sauce from scratch for great flavor and a nutritional boost. Use less than two-thirds of a cup of sugar per 12 ounces of cranberries, and opt for organic cranberries if you can. Conventional berries are heavily treated with pesticides.
3) Pumpkin pie is a Thanksgiving tradition, with good reason. Pumpkin is packed with nutrition, widely available and generally low in pesticides.
4) White potatoes make EWG’s Dirty DozenTM list because of high pesticide loads. Try opting for organic to reduce your exposure to potentially hazardous pesticide residues.
5) Homemade gravy is a delicious way to get the most out of your turkey, but packs in the empty calories. Store-bought gravy can contain heart-damaging trans fats and too much sodium. Enjoy gravy in small doses or try a light, flavorful mushroom ragout instead.
6) Stuff your stuffing with low-pesticide produce. Organic apples, celery, pears and carrots perk up stuffing and add nutritional punch. Walnuts and pecans work nicely in place of sausage.
7) Green beans are a Thanksgiving staple, but canned options can be high in bisphenol A, a toxic chemical in the epoxy that lines most metal food cans. Go for fresh or frozen organic green beans or other nutritious veggies like peas, broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Check out our Five Fabulous Finds in the Frozen Food Aisle for some great tips on shopping in the frozen aisle.
https://www.edf.org/blog/2018/10/31/stereotype-holding-back-environmental-movement
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(ACC Mentioned) Need More Evidence of the Chemical Industry’s Bad Faith on TSCA? Read This.
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Richard Denison
This story is about chemicals known as chlorinated paraffins. They are used as flame retardants, plasticizers and lubricants, among other things. They come in three main versions: short, medium, and long-chain. Short-chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs) have been banned or are set to be banned in a number of jurisdictions and are listed for elimination under the Stockholm Convention. The U.S. is not a party to Stockholm and has not banned SCCPs. However, in 2012 EPA secured agreement from their leading domestic manufacturer, Dover Chemical Corporation, and their leading importer, INOVYN (formerly INEOS Chlor Americas, Inc.), to phase them out in consent decrees issued to settle enforcement actions EPA had brought against the companies (more on that later).
Concern over the medium and long-chain variants (MCCPs and LCCPs) has been significant and growing, however. This is because they, like SCCPs, are expected to be very persistent and very bioaccumulative (vPvB) and, given evidence of systemic toxicity as well as toxicity to aquatic and terrestrial organisms, are also expected to be PBTs (persistent, bioaccumulative, and toxic chemicals).
The regulatory history of chlorinated paraffins under TSCA has been long and taken numerous, often troubling, turns. We’ll only touch on some highlights here.
Regulatory history in brief
In 2009, EPA brought enforcement actions against Dover and INEOS for violating section 5 of TSCA, which bars companies from manufacturing chemicals not listed on the TSCA Inventory. EPA said the companies had been making or importing the chemicals for many years despite their absence from the Inventory. While the companies disputed EPA’s findings, in 2012 consent decrees were issued by the courts hearing the cases, the main elements of which were as follows:
· The companies would cease production and import of SCCPs.
· The companies would file TSCA section 5 premanufacture notices (PMNs) for each of their MCCPs and LCCPs within 30 days of the consent decrees, or cease their production and import as well.
· While the companies continued to deny EPA’s claims that they violated TSCA, Dover paid a fine of $1.4 million and INOVYN a fine of $175,000.
The companies promptly filed the PMNs and EPA initiated its review of the chemicals under its section 5 new chemicals program. That took quite a while to play out; in fact it is still ongoing.
By 2017, EPA had determined that the PMN chemicals “may present an unreasonable risk.” Where EPA makes such a determination, TSCA requires that EPA issue a “section 5(e) order” sufficient to address the identified risk. EPA typically negotiates the terms of these orders with the companies, and where both parties agree to the terms, the result is a “consent order.” This is what happened in these cases: Dover’s consent order is here and INOVYN’s consent order is here.
During the intervening five years between the consent decrees and the consent orders, a third company – Qualice, LLC – filed PMNs for additional MCCPs it intended to make. EPA conducted risk assessments of Dover’s, INOVYN’s, and Qualice’s chlorinated paraffins for which they had submitted PMNs. Based on those risk assessments, EPA confirmed the expected vPvB and PBT characteristics of these chemicals and in late 2015 stated the following:
Given EPA’s preliminary risk determinations, under section 5(e) of TSCA, EPA has informed the PMN submitters that it does not believe that manufacture of these PMN substances should commence (Qualice, LLC,) or continue (Dover Chemical and INOVYN Americas, Inc.) absent the development of sufficient information to permit a reasoned evaluation of the environmental effects of the substances, as described in a testing strategy shared with the PMN submitters.
In other words, EPA said it intended to ban new or ongoing production and import of these chemicals absent receipt of additional testing information and further EPA review and potential further regulatory action.
The industry decides to fight the section 5 review process it had agreed to
The chemical industry mounted a full-court press to stop EPA. Its main line of attack? EPA should review these chemicals under section 6 of TSCA, not section 5. At least one of the trade associations representing all three companies sent a letter to EPA, and they got their allies in the House to send a letter to then-EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy demanding EPA abandon the approach those same companies had already agreed to follow in the Consent Decrees they had signed in 2012.
The full-court press partly worked. While EPA did still negotiate final section 5 Consent Orders with the three companies (Qualice’s is here), it backed entirely off of its ban-pending-testing approach. Each of the consent orders state (emphases added):
Beginning five years following the date of submission of a Notice of Commencement of Manufacture ("NOC"), the Company isprohibited from manufacturing (which under TSCA includes importing), processing, distributing in commerce, using, or disposing of the PMN substances in the United States, for any nonexempt commercial purpose, unless the Company conducts the following studies on the PMN substances and submits all final reports and underlying data in accordance with the conditions specified in this Testing section. This information is necessary for a reasoned evaluation of the environmental effects of the substances. After that period, the activities described in this paragraph may not resume until EPA has completed review of, and taken any regulatory action deemed appropriate by EPA based on, that information, except in accordance with the conditions described in this Order.
Industry tries again, this time by fighting EPA’s proposed SNURs
That brings us almost up to the present. In August of this year EPA proposed Significant New Use Rules (SNURs) for the chlorinated paraffins that are subject to section 5 consent orders. Under TSCA section 5(f)(2), whenever EPA has finalized a consent order, it is required either to follow that up with a SNUR or explain why it has not done so. Hence, the SNURs EPA proposed are fully in keeping with the requirements of TSCA section 5.
EDF filed comments on those proposed SNURs on September 17, the day the comment period closed. Several industry commenters asked for more time to comment, however, so EPA reopened the comment period, which then closed yesterday.
EDF decided to file additional comments, available here. We did so because we read other comments that had been submitted by industry interests, most notably the American Chemistry Council (ACC). Bear in mind that the leading domestic manufacturer of chlorinated paraffins, Dover Chemical, is an ACC member.
In its comments, ACC resurrected yet again the industry’s earlier demand that EPA abandon the proposed SNURs – a direct outgrowth of the TSCA section 5 process to which the chemicals’ manufacturers agreed six years ago – and instead address these chemicals as existing chemicals under section 6 of TSCA.
The final (?) twist
There’s one more twist to this story that demonstrates just how much gall ACC has to demand EPA now address these chemicals under section 6. The 2016 amendments to TSCA have a provision (section 6(h)) addressing certain PBT chemicals. It provides that certain PBTs be subject to “expedited” risk management action to directly and promptly limit exposures without having to go through the prioritization and risk evaluation processes under TSCA, which can take years.
The MCCPs and LCCPs meet all the technical criteria in section 6(h) for being designated for expedited action. However, industry interests led by ACC negotiated a carve-out from section 6(h) for existing chemicals for which EPA has “initiated a review under section 5.” The only otherwise eligible PBT chemicals to which that carve-out applied were … wait for it … the very MCCPs and LCCPs described in this post.
Having succeeded in getting these chlorinated paraffins removed from expedited action under section 6 of TSCA on the basis that they were already subject to section 5, ACC now has the nerve to claim EPA’s only acceptable course is to start over and review the chemicals all over again under the decidedly un-expedited procedures of TSCA section 6.
Any wonder we say the industry has squandered any basis for claiming it is acting in good faith in TSCA implementation? We can only say we hope this EPA shows at least a modicum of resolve here and squarely rejects ACC’s immodest demands.
http://blogs.edf.org/health/2018/10/31/need-more-evidence-of-the-chemical-industrys-bad-faith-on-tsca-read-this/
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US NGOs Notify EPA of Intent to Sue over Methylene Chloride
Nov 1, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Caroline Byrne
A group of NGOs, along with two women whose sons' deaths have been linked to exposure to methylene chloride, have filed a notice of intent that they will sue the US EPA if a ban on the substance is not finalised within the next 60 days.
A proposal to ban or restrict the substance, found in some consumer and commercial paint strippers, has stalled under the Trump administration.Three organisations are involved in the action:
· the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA);
· Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families (SCHF); and
· the Vermont Public Interest Research Group (VPIRG).
They claim the EPA has breached its statutory obligation by failing to finalise a proposed ban on the substance, which has been linked to cancer, heart failure and sudden death.
Earthjustice attorney Jonathan Kalmuss-Katz, counsel for the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, told Chemical Watch the claim is not about money: "The only relief we are seeking is for EPA to comply with the law by finalising the proposed ban on methylene chloride, a step the agency should have taken long ago."The EPA responded to questions from Chemical Watch saying: The "EPA has historically been the subject of a number of lawsuits and we will review this one as well, but in the meantime the agency will continue to work towards a solution. EPA is currently evaluating the proposal and regulation of this substance and its uses to determine the appropriate regulation – and its legal defensibility."
The EPA proposed prohibitions or restrictions on the use of methylene chloride (dichloromethane) in paint removal applications towards the end of the Obama presidency, but plans have not been carried through.
The agency announced in May, after a meeting with campaigners, that it would finalise a rule addressing methylene chloride "shortly". It has scheduled a December release for the final rule, according to its autumn semi-annual regulatory agenda update.
Meanwhile, major North American companies including Walmart, Home Depot, Autozone, Kelly-Moore and PPG have committed to phasing out products containing methylene chloride and NMP.
https://chemicalwatch.com/71511/us-ngos-notify-epa-of-intent-to-sue-over-methylene-chloride
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Deaths From Paint, Bathtub Strippers Prompt Threat to Sue EPA
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto
A chemical found in some paint strippers and other coating removers has killed or seriously injured dozens of people and should be banned, advocacy groups told the EPA in a letter announcing their intention to sue.
The Environmental Protection Agency hasn’t acted to finalize a ban it proposed in January 2017 on the use of methylene chloride in paint and coatings removers, the groups wrote.
“Since then, at least four more people have died from exposure to MC paint removers,” the letter said.
The Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, Vermont Public Interest Research Group, and Safer Chemicals Healthy Families, a coalition of environmental, health, consumer, and labor groups, sent acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler a letter Oct. 31 giving the agency 60 days’ notice required before filing their lawsuit.“EPA has historically been the subject of a number of lawsuits and we will review this one as well, but in the meantime the agency will continue to work towards a solution. EPA is currently evaluating the proposal and regulation of this substance and its uses to determine the appropriate regulation—and its legal defensibility,” the agency said in an emailed statement provided Bloomberg Environment.
The Toxic Substances Control Act, the primary U.S. chemicals law, requires the EPA to regulate chemicals that present an unreasonable risk to human health or the environment, the groups said. The EPA’s failure to regulate methylene chloride despite the dozens of deaths it has caused constitutes a breach of the agency’s duties under that law, they said.
Chemical Causes Asphyxiation
Methylene chloride can kill when used in small, unventilated spaces. It displaces oxygen, causing a person to asphyxiate.
Former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt told a Senate Appropriations panel in May that the agency had already sent a final rule prohibiting some consumer and commercial paint stripping uses for methylene chloride to the White House office that reviews planned regulations. That final rule would follow up on one the agency proposed in 2017 under the Obama administration.
No rule, however, had been sent to the Office of Management and Budget as of Oct. 31.
Some retailers plan to stop sales of methylene chloride-containing strippers, but others haven’t done so, the groups wrote.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/deaths-from-paint-bathtub-strippers-prompt-threat-to-sue-epa
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Environmentalists Threaten Suit to Force Methylene Chloride Ban
Nov 1, 2018 | Inside EPA
Labor and safer chemicals groups are threatening to sue EPA within 60 days in a bid to compel the agency to finalize an Obama-era proposed rule banning use of methylene chloride (MC) in paint strippers, noting that former Administrator Scott Pruitt committed to the rule.
In an Oct. 31 Notice of Intent (NOI) to sue, groups including Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, Safer Chemicals Healthy Families, and two mothers whose sons died while working with methylene chloride paint strippers, urge acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler to finalize the ban, arguing that failure to do so would violate the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
“Since EPA has affirmed that MC paint removers present an unreasonable risk of injury and must be banned, EPA’s failure to finalize the proposed rule violates EPA’s non-discretionary duty under TSCA section 6(a) to take regulatory action on chemicals for which it has made an unreasonable risk determination,” the NOI says.
“Further delay will unnecessarily leave users of paint removal products at serious risk and could result in additional deaths. You must therefore direct EPA staff to publish the final rule immediately and to abate the imminent hazards posed by MC,” the groups add.
While EPA has said in its fall update to its rulemaking agenda that it plans to finalize the rule by December, an environmentalist attorney says that the Trump administration has repeatedly waffled on finalizing the Obama-era rule, and that advocates are seeking to ensure that EPA finalizes the ban.
EPA has not sent a final version of the rule for White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB) review, a procedural step that often takes 90 days but can take more or less time.
If and when EPA finalizes a ban, it would mark the fist time since Congress amended TSCA in 2016 that the agency has exercised its authority to prohibit uses of existing chemicals.
The NOI follows significant pressure from labor and environmental groups that in May won a commitment from Pruitt to finalize the January 2017 proposed rule banning methylene chloride, despite the Trump administration's previously delaying proposals to ban certain uses of methylene chloride, as well as trichloroethylene (TCE) and N-methylpyrrolidone (NMP).
The Obama EPA in January 2017 proposed the three rules under TSCA section 6(a) authority, little used since EPA's attempt to ban most uses of asbestos in the 1980s. That rule was struck down by a federal court decision in 1991 in a decision that prompted critics of TSCA to seek reform of the statute, eventually enacted in June 2016.
Environmental groups have been urging the Trump administration to finalize the rules, while the chemicals' producers have opposed Obama-era risk reviews underlying the measures in comments to EPA and meetings with OMB.
In December 2017, the Trump administration formalized indications that it would delay the three proposed TSCA bans. But in May Pruitt reversed course after meeting with mothers of workers who died from exposure to methylene chloride.
In a May 10 statement, EPA said that it intended to finalize the proposed rule banning use of methylene chloride in paint-strippers, and that it planned to send a final rule for OMB review soon. The agency also said it would rely on previous assessments, including a 2014 Obama-era review used to support the proposed ban, rather than reviewing risks.
In the NOI, the groups argue that EPA's 2014 risk assessment for the substance shows methylene chloride in paint strippers poses unreasonable risks, and that the revised June 2016 TSCA requires EPA to act to address those risks.
They argue that use of methylene chloride in paint strippers is responsible for more than 60 deaths, at least four of those deaths have occurred since EPA proposed the ban in the waning days of the Obama administration.
And they point to Pruitt's commitment to finalizing the proposed rule after meeting with workers who died as further evidence of the agency's determination that the use poses risks and should be banned.
https://insideepa.com/daily-feed/environmentalists-threaten-suit-force-methylene-chloride-ban
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News EPA’s Science Advisers to Focus on Lead in Blood
Nov 1, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
A model for lead’s effects on the human body is the latest focus for EPA acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler’s scientific advisers.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board is seeking experts for a new panel, to be announced in the Federal Register Nov. 1.
The panel will evaluate the EPA’s updated tool for quickly determining the impact an amount of lead will have on blood and tissues in people of all ages.
The tool, known as the All-Ages Lead Model, predicts lead concentration in body tissues and organs based on a lifetime of lead exposure.
There is no known safe level of lead in children’s blood, according to the EPA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Reducing lead exposure, particularly among children, is a top priority for EPA,” Wheeler said in an agency press release about National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week Oct. 22.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/epas-science-advisers-to-focus-on-lead-in-blood
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REACH Registrations Pending Due to 160 Data Disputes
Nov 1, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
Echa has confirmed that around 160 REACH substance registrations are still pending due to ongoing data disputes. These follow the third and final registration deadline which was on 31 May.
The agency said most of the pending registrations belong to a group of similar substances. However, the agency said it could not give out specific information on the substances and companies involved in the disputes.
In some cases, Echa has given the potential registrant permission to refer to the requested data which is owned by another organisation. However, they have not yet submitted the registration dossier as companies have up to 10 months following the agency’s decision.
There are also some dispute cases still under appeal. These cannot be finalised until Echa’s Board of Appeal (BoA) makes a decision.
"Most of the remaining cases will be resolved in the coming weeks, and we expect [more] to be withdrawn as companies come to a mutual agreement," the agency told Chemical Watch.More disputes
The number of disputes for the 2018 deadline is much higher than for the previous ones. The total number of cases submitted before 2016, including both registration deadlines, was less than 60. Since January 2016, the agency has received 290.
For the 2013 registration deadline, Echa received nine data sharing dispute claims.
REACH requires registrants and potential registrants to make "every effort to ensure that the costs of sharing the information required for registration are determined in a fair, transparent and non-discriminatory way".
However, companies may fail to come to an agreement on the data sharing conditions. This could happen when deciding who will be responsible for carrying out a necessary study or the costs of sharing existing information. The agency can then step in to make an "informed and balanced" assessment of such efforts.Final deadline
Speaking at a conference on European and international chemicals management last week, Echa’s head of risk management implementation, Matti Vainio, said that following the 31 August completeness check deadline, non-confidential data of 99.7% of all completed registrations had been published on Echa’s website.
During his presentation at the conference in Vienna, he added that since the May deadline, Echa has received around 2,000 registrations.
Some of these could be from companies that missed the deadline, the agency told Chemical Watch. Others, however, could be new market entrants.
"We are, unfortunately, unable to see, through our submission process, if a registrant has missed the deadline or are, for example, just entering the market and registering as they should."
However, this will become clearer in 2019 when the agency receives the results of an EU-wide enforcement project, where "a whole army of inspectors" will check compliance with REACH registration obligations and dossier updates.
Echa also stressed that the deadlines are not the end of REACH registrations. "New companies enter the market all the time and have to register before that and so registrations continue in this way."
By the deadline, Echa received 33,363 registration dossiers for 11,114 substances manufactured or imported in quantities of between 1 to 100 tonnes/year.
As of early September, almost 850 REACH dossiers submitted to Echa by the 31 May had yet to be granted registration numbers.
https://chemicalwatch.com/71477/reach-registrations-pending-due-to-160-data-disputes
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Echa's SVHC Database Requirements to Be 'Within the Law'
Oct 31, 2018 | Chemical Watch
By Leigh Stringer
Echa intends to keep requirements for companies submitting information to its proposed substances in articles database within "the strict limits of the law".
European industry groups raised concerns with the proposal, which came out of the revised waste framework Directive (WFD) that entered into force in July. A consultation on the plan closed on 9 October.
The proposed database would contain information provided by companies producing, importing or supplying articles that contain candidate list substances. They will need to submit this information for articles placed on the market from 5 January 2021.
The aim is to strengthen supply chain communication as foreseen under REACH and contribute to the EU's circular economy package, with waste treatment operators and consumers being the primary users of the resource.
EU trade associations had particular issue with Echa’s ‘draft scenario’ document, which proposes companies submit extra information beyond what the WFD revision and REACH require.
The draft includes calls for unique identifiers for each article and more detailed information, such as the concentration limits of SVHCs. The scenario document was discussed at last week's workshop hosted by the agency in Helsinki.
However, Echa confirmed that this extra information would be on a voluntary basis and the database will only legally require:
· administrative/company data;
· data about the article/complex object and the candidate list substances; and
· safe use information.
This would include a description of the article, such as characteristics, composition and uses to be helpful in future targeted searches, such as according to material or item category or brand name.
The agency says the aim is to enable informed purchasing decisions by consumers and suppliers and the safe collection, separation and treatment of waste by waste operators.
Safe use information would refer to the whole lifecycle of an article, including the waste stage.Information already required
In a statement to Chemical Watch, the agency stressed that because these information requirements will be in line with European law, companies will not have to generate new sets of information. Collecting information about candidate list substances in articles has been a requirement under REACH for ten years, it says. Submitting this information is the only additional task for companies. The agency can then make this available to waste operators.
Companies have been required to communicate this information down supply chains under REACH Article 33, which came into force in 2008. Manufacturers have to respond to a consumer’s request for information on whether a product contains any SVHCs above a concentration of 0.1%. They must provide the information free of charge and within 45 days.
In addition, under REACH Article 7(2), companies must notify Echa about the placing on the market of some candidate list substances.
Communication of this information does not often reach waste operators, it says. "Because of this, they did not have the required knowledge to better separate and recycle such hazardous substances."‘Overwhelming data’
Trade associations, including those in the recycling sector, have said that the level of information Echa is asking for would be "overwhelming" for waste operators.
However, the agency says the main objective is not that waste operators would "immediately start manually separating item by item after consulting the database".
Instead, it says, they would be able to improve their waste separation and recycling techniques and processes over time – moving away from the current bulk processing – based on the increased knowledge of which substances are present in which articles.
Echa is considering all comments submitted during the consultation period.
https://chemicalwatch.com/71491/echas-svhc-database-requirements-to-be-within-the-law
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Texas Asks Trump EPA to Delay Emissions Reduction Program
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Mike Lee
Texas' three environmental regulators agree with parts of the Trump administration substitute for the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, but they want the administration to delay any action until court challenges to the plan are resolved.
The Clean Power Plan, proposed by EPA in 2014, was aimed at addressing climate change by limiting greenhouse gas emissions from existing electric power plants. The Supreme Court stayed a court challenge to the plan's legal basis in early 2016, and the case is still pending in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (E&E News PM, Sept. 21).
A separate challenge to EPA's regulations on emissions from new or modified plants is also pending.
"[A]ny replacement of the CPP is premature" until those issues are resolved, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality wrote in comments submitted to EPA. The state Public Utility Commission and the state Railroad Commission, which oversees the oil and gas industry, endorsed the comments in an accompanying letter.
At the same time, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) is also arguing that the appeals court case should be frozen (Energywire, May 16, 2017).
The Obama-era plan would have set a cap on greenhouse gas emissions in each state and required regulators and power generators to meet the goal by making systemwide changes in the way power is generated and dispatched.
The Trump plan seeks to reduce emissions by improving the heat rate efficiency of existing power plants (Greenwire, Oct. 1).
The Texas agencies agreed with that approach, saying, "The EPA's previous stance ... in the CPP rule extended beyond what a source itself could implement and beyond EPA's authority by evaluating the electric grid and states' energy policies as a whole."
However, the Texas agencies said, the Affordable Clean Energy plan would still create a burden on state regulators because they'd have to take an inventory of the generating plants and develop standards to meet the efficiency guidelines.
EPA "severely mistakes" the cost of complying with the plan and the amount of time it'll take for states to comply, the Texas agencies said.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/11/01/stories/1060104869
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Texas Projects Come with Some Space Baggage
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Jenny Mandel
Two proposed terminals to ship liquefied natural gas from the South Texas coast would contribute to potentially significant impacts on threatened or endangered species and to views from recreation and tourism areas, according to federal regulators who also weighed their safety in the case of an accident at a nearby SpaceX launch facility.
Two native wildcats, the federally listed ocelot and jaguarundi, would be among the species most threatened by the cumulative effect of the three proposals currently under review by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to ship LNG from new facilities proposed for development by the Port of Brownsville, near the southern tip of Texas.
Privately owned Texas LNG and Rio Grande LNG, owned by Woodlands, Texas-based LNG developer NextDecade LLC, were recently issued draft environmental impact statements that assess those and other impacts of the projects.
FERC generally found that the projects individually would have limited impacts across a range of environmental and safety fields. But together with Annova LNG LLC, a project backed by the utility company Exelon Corp., and other industrial projects likely to be built in the area in the same time frame, there could be a range of significant negative impacts.
Rio Grande LNG proposes to build a large terminal capable of exporting up to 27 million metric tons per year of LNG for up to 50 years, beginning in late 2021.
Texas LNG's plan is for a more modest 4 million metric tons per year of LNG exports, built in two stages as demand allows.
Construction on either project would entail extensive work resulting in spikes of noise, air pollution, traffic and other impacts in the area, FERC said.
The Rio Grande project could have significant impacts of the recovery of ocelots, which live and breed in several areas touched by the terminal and a pipeline that would feed gas to it.
More broadly, an area characterized by open, grassy land near major bird-watching and other wildlife tourism attractions would be significantly altered.
"Permanent changes to the visual character of the area would result from operation of the aboveground structures, most notably the LNG terminal, which would modify the viewshed," FERC said of the Rio Grande project, while also noting that the site is in an area currently zoned for commercial and industrial use.
Most public landmarks in the area are far enough away from the Rio Grande LNG site that its visual impacts would be negligible to minor, FERC found, but the adjacent Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge would be affected, as would boating, dolphin-watching and some other activities.
The smaller Texas LNG project would similarly come with short- and long-term local impacts to air and water quality, wildlife, and other resources. As with Rio Grande LNG, residents of nearby Port Isabel and South Padre Island expressed concern about industrialization of the landscape, according to FERC.
Exploding liability
One unusual evaluation that came before FERC, for which the agency tapped Federal Aviation Administration expertise, is the location of the three proposed facilities just a few miles from the spot where the private space transport company SpaceX plans to run a launch platform.
The company, owned by Elon Musk, has so far relied on federal facilities to launch rockets and satellites. But plans are underway for a new private launch site. The SpaceX site is about 5 miles away from the proposed LNG terminals.
After SpaceX saw a rocket explode after takeoff at Cape Canaveral in 2016, FERC asked the three LNG developers to evaluate how a failed rocket launch in Boca Chica, Texas, would affect their own facilities.
FERC tasked the developers with considering possible impacts to LNG ships, liquefaction facilities, storage tanks, piping and other elements of the terminal's infrastructure, as well as "cascading failure" scenarios.
In the draft environmental impact statements for Rio Grande LNG and Texas LNG, FERC identified potential problems related to rocket launch failures.
"Our review determined that rocket launch failures could impact onsite construction workers and plant personnel," FERC wrote, so construction crews should be positioned away from "higher risk areas" during launch activities. On an ongoing basis, the agency recommended that plant personnel "monitor the rocket launches and shut down operating equipment in the event of a rocket launch failure."
It was not clear from the document how the timing for such a shutdown response would unfold.
FERC also identified an issue with liability stemming from a rocket launch incident. It noted that the federal government indemnifies commercial space licensees from liability over $3 million "for each casualty from direct and indirect effects from a failed launch."
"Since the LNG facilities would be valued up to approximately $25 billion, conventional LNG ships would be valued at $200 [million]-250 million, and a peak construction workforce would total over 5,000 workers, a potential exists for the federal government to be liable for a large sum of money that could exceed the current indemnification levels by a large margin," FERC wrote.
The result could be an increase in insurance premiums to SpaceX for its facility, potentially limiting its use, FERC said.
"The extent of these impacts would be not be fully known until SpaceX submits an application requesting to launch with the FAA and [would depend on] whether the LNG plant is under construction or in operation," FERC added.
SpaceX aims to begin running test flights from Boca Chica next year.
Comments on the Rio Grande LNG draft assessment are due to FERC by Dec. 3; comments on the Texas LNG draft assessment are due to FERC by Dec. 17.
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2018/11/01/stories/1060104873
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Commentary: Expanding Petrochemical Manufacturing from New Hub
Oct 31, 2018 | Houston Chronicle
By Jerry James
Cell phones. Tires. Medical equipment. Food packaging. Clothes. Fertilizer. Detergents. Plastics. Can any of us live without these items? Perhaps some of us can sacrifice one or two, but it's safe to say these products play an integral role in our lives.
The common thread through all of these everyday products (and countless more) are petrochemicals. Beyond their role in creating the products we rely on, petrochemicals also provide critical components to renewable energy sources; they're used to manufacture wind turbine blades, solar panels, batteries, electric vehicle parts and more. This explains why petrochemicals are projected to surpass the transportation sector as the largest driver of crude oil demand worldwide.
This month, the International Energy Agency (IEA) examined the growing demand for plastics, highlighting the massive potential for future growth. Its report, "The Future of Petrochemicals," finds petrochemicals will comprise more than one-third of global oil demand growth by 2030, due to demand for plastics, and nearly half by 2050 – ahead of powerhouse industries like trucking, aviation and shipping. The report shows plastics demand has nearly doubled since 2000, outpacing every other bulk material, including cement, steel, and aluminum.
But despite all of this, as Dr. Fatih Birol, Executive Director of IEA notes, petrochemicals remain one of the "key 'blind spots' in the global energy debate" – an issue critical to the energy sector. While the trend of an increasing demand for their product is exciting for the industry, it brings a dilemma: How is the industry preparing to meet this growing demand?
The Gulf Coast continues to provide a natural primary hub for crude oil production and exports, as well as liquefied natural gas exports. With its proximity to the oil-rich Permian Basin and maritime access, it's a logical option for the petrochemical industry.
But the transformation of the U.S. energy landscape provides an opportunity to expand petrochemical manufacturing beyond the shoreline in order to meet the growing demand – both domestically and overseas. Over the past decade, the shale boom to the northeast, specifically the Shale Crescent USA region of West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania, has skyrocketed natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGL) production.
Importantly, both the Marcellus and Utica shale plays are producing prolific amounts of NGLs, including ethane and propane – the "building blocks" of petrochemicals that are integral to plastics manufacturing.
Beyond the resource supply, projects in the Shale Crescent have easy access to water for transportation and processing via the Ohio River and its tributaries, proximity to 50 percent of high-demand North American markets and over 70 percent of polyethylene demand is within a day's drive. There is also an unmatched labor force, combining a storied manufacturing history with a world-renowned plastics industry.
Another advantage in expanding petrochemical manufacturing in the Shale Crescent region is the cost benefit to the investor and project owner. In fact, IHS Markit has found it to be the most profitable place in the United States to build a petrochemical plant.
The global petrochemical industry is taking notice, with Royal Dutch Shell currently building a $6-billion ethane cracker plant in Beaver County, Pa., and Thailand-based PTT Global Chemical eying a multi-billion-dollar cracker plant in Belmont County, Ohio.
The U.S. stands to benefit from adding geographical diversity in expansion of the petrochemical industry, both from a security and reliability standpoint - especially during extreme weather events that have disrupted operations and supply. Increasing production capability so close to the majority of North American demand would ease the pressure on our neighbors to the south as we continue to watch demand rise.
It's clear petrochemicals play a key role in the future of oil demand growth and new manufacturing projects. The Shale Crescent USA has the natural gas supply, the geography, the access and the workforce to fulfill growing demand – it is a matter of reliability and security.
Jerry James is President of Artex Oil Company. He is a co-founder of the Shale Crescent USA economic development initiative
https://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/Commentary-Expanding-petrochemical-manufacturing-13352875.php
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Invenergy’s Rhode Island Plant Proposal Dealt Another Blow
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Adrianne Appel
A Rhode Island energy board has cast more doubt on the future of Invenergy’s proposed $1 billion natural gas power plant in the state.
The Energy Facilities Siting Board—a subpanel of the Rhode Island Public Utilities Commission—voted 2-0 on Oct. 31 to reject a decision by the PUC that Rhode Island needs the 1,000-megawatt Clear River Energy Center natural gas-to-steam plant.
The energy board debated for less than 10 minutes before rejecting an earlier advisory opinion of the PUC.
“Things have changed considerably in the last two years,” Janet Coit, director of the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, said before she voted. She did not elaborate but may have been referring to a request in September by the regional grid operator to end its power-supply agreements with Invenergy.
The rural town of Burrillville, where the Invenergy Thermal Development LLC plant would be located, opposes the plant and sought the vote.
More Hearings
The energy board made the decision as it continues to hold hearings on the larger issue of whether to grant a permit to Invenergy to build the plant. Hearings are expected to continue into February, with the board ruling on the permit slated for later in 2019. Calls to the board by Bloomberg Environment were not returned Oct. 31.
“This not a setback. The permit process is proceeding as scheduled,” Beth Conley, spokeswoman for Invenergy, told Bloomberg Environment Oct. 31 in an email.
The region needs the plant, Conley said. “Rhode Island faces some of the nation’s highest electric rates and thousands of megawatts of capacity will come off the grid in the coming years,” she said.
Grid Operator Opposes
In September, Invenergy was dealt a blow by the region’s wholesale grid operator, which sought permission from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to end the energy contracts it has with the company.
In a Sept. 20 letter to FERC, the wholesale grid operator, Independent System Operator New England, cited delays in the project as the reason for its request to terminate the contracts. Invenergy expects FERC to rule on the matter in November, Conley said.
Invenergy has said it will continue to move ahead with the project even without Independent System Operator New England contracts and sell the energy to the region on an as-needed basis.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/invenergys-rhode-island-plant-proposal-dealt-another-blow
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Chemical Safety Board Delays Closed-Door Meeting
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sam Pearson
Leaders at a small federal agency that probes major industrial disasters Oct. 31 scrapped an unusual closed-door meeting that had been announced with little notice.
The closed meeting—thought to be the first in the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board’s 20-year history—was to take place Nov. 1 at the agency’s Washington headquarters. In a notice released Oct. 31 and scheduled for publication in the Federal Register Nov. 2, the board said the closed session was needed to discuss legal matters. It had to be scheduled with less than a customary week’s notice “based on business necessity,” the document said.
The notice indicated that two of the board’s three members—Kristen Kulinowski and Rick Engler—approved of the action. Kulinowski is serving as the board’s interim leader until the White House nominates, and the Senate confirms, a new chairperson.
The closed session would allow the board “to confer with, and receive advice from, its legal counsel regarding pending litigation” and to vote on approving agency funds to a legal services support contract.
About an hour after the meeting was announced, CSB spokeswoman Hillary Cohen said in an email to Bloomberg Law that it had been canceled.
Long-Term Dispute
The agency hasn’t revealed the amount of the contract to be approved or its recipient. But the board is involved in a years-long legal dispute with its former managing director, Daniel Horowitz, a federal employee who spent 36 months on paid administrative leave before being issued a formal termination June 21. That decision is now under appeal before the Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent agency that adjudicates employment disputes involving federal workers.
According to federal contracting records, the agency has agreed to pay more than $137,000 to the employment law firm Shaw Bransford & Roth PC in Washington since 2015, which records show is representing the board at the MSPB.
Jeff Ruch, the director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a Silver Spring, Md., advocacy group whose attorneys are representing Horowitz, told Bloomberg Law he believes the closed meeting was to approve additional board funds for the law firm. The firm’s previous contracts were approved through a process that didn’t require a closed meeting.
It seems appropriate to discuss the matter behind closed doors, Ruch said, but he wished the board had been able to settle the Horowitz matter to save on its legal costs.
“It’s a big chunk of their budget,” Ruch said.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/chemical-safety-board-delays-closed-door-meeting
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Energy Industry Is Well Prepared to Defend Itself, Consumers Against Cyber Threats
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Energywire
By Aaron Padilla
The natural gas and oil industry agrees that cybersecurity is one of the most significant challenges of our time. It’s no secret that we face cyber threats from nation-states, international cyber criminals and other malicious actors threatening U.S. energy infrastructure – it’s all documented in a July report from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). What you may not know, however, is that industry is tackling the cybersecurity challenge head on.
Americans deserve to know what industries are doing to protect them from cyber threats. That’s the basis for a new report: “Defense-in-Depth: Cybersecurity in the Natural Gas and Oil Industry,” focused particularly on cybersecurity for the hardware and software that manage, control and monitor systems in energy infrastructure. A joint project of the American Petroleum Institute and the Oil and Natural Gas Subsector Coordinating Council, the report chronicles industry efforts to secure energy infrastructure and shows how America’s natural gas and oil industry makes cybersecurity a priority.
The natural gas and oil industry shares the same cybersecurity goals as policymakers and the public: protect energy infrastructure from cyberattacks and maintain the reliable availability of energy for homes, businesses and vehicles. Everything our industry does on cybersecurity is aligned with this objective.
Natural gas and oil companies orient their cybersecurity programs around best-in-class standards and proven frameworks, resulting in programs that can be adapted to their specific needs and are flexible and agile enough to respond to a constantly-changing threat landscape. Most, if not all, companies in our industry treat cybersecurity as an enterprise risk – the highest level of prioritization. boards of directors and senior executives take ultimate responsibility and accountability for cybersecurity, and they oversee the cybersecurity programs that the new report describes.
There is no evidence to suggest that the natural gas and oil industry is more vulnerable than others to cyberattacks. Cyber threats are not new or unique to pipelines; they are present across the energy system, including at coal and nuclear plants. How do we know? Because our industry maintains a close collaboration with the U.S. government in sharing cyber threat indicators.
Information sharing is key – both within the industry and with the U.S. intelligence community. To be forewarned is to be forearmed, and industry-wide defenses are strengthened when individual companies share threats with each other and with the government. In 2014 we formed the Oil and Natural Gas Information Sharing and Analysis Center(ONG-ISAC) for this exact purpose. Today, through the ONG-ISAC, natural gas and oil companies engage in bi-directional sharing of actionable cyber intelligence with each other and with cybersecurity units within DHS, the Department of Energy and law enforcement agencies.
For simplicity, let’s focus on natural gas. This clean and abundant fuel is now the nation’s leading source of electricity generation, powering nearly one in three U.S. homes and helping to bring carbon emissions to 25-year lows. In addition to our industry’s defense-in-depth cybersecurity programs, the very ubiquity that’s made natural gas so dependable and affordable is also a security asset. The production, distribution and storage components of the natural gas system are geographically diverse and flexible, creating resiliency that is further reinforced by multiple fail-safes, redundancies and backups.
A Natural Gas Council study earlier this year showcased the industry’s performance during extreme weather conditions. Focusing on three historic weather events between 2017 and 2018 – Hurricanes Harvey and Irma and the Northeast winter storm dubbed the “Bomb Cyclone” – the study uncovered no meaningful service disruptions.
Whether physical threats from Mother Nature or manmade cyber threats, the natural gas and oil industry’s preparation and multi-dimensional structure show that we are up to the cybersecurity challenge. That reality should factor heavily in the ongoing debate about the government’s role in cybersecurity. The threat landscape changes constantly and staying nimble is essential to responding effectively. That’s why the current public-private collaboration is proving effective in the natural gas industry’s cybersecurity response. It balances the necessity of government/industry information sharing with the imperative to stay flexible and agile.
America’s natural gas industry is deploying these tools to guard against cyber threats because delivering the energy that Americans rely on is our priority. Let’s take stock of everything that our industry is doing on cybersecurity – much of it in collaboration with the U.S. government – before we consider changing the regulatory regime or jurisdiction for natural gas pipelines or any other assets that our industry operates.
Aaron Padilla is a Senior Policy Advisor at the American Petroleum Institute.
https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-environment/414185-energy-industry-is-well-prepared-to-defend-itself
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Battle Lines Emerge In Future Lawsuits Over Trump EPA's Utility GHG Rule
Oct 31, 2018 | Inside EPA
By Lee Logan
Battle lines are emerging for expected future lawsuits over EPA's proposal to replace the Obama-era Clean Power Plan (CPP) utility greenhouse gas standards with a much narrower policy, with industry groups praising the new rule as a valid use of Clean Air Act powers while environmentalists blast it as doing little to cut GHGs.
The arguments come in detailed comments submitted ahead of an Oct. 31 deadline on EPA's proposed Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) rule to replace the CPP, with the comments previewing near-certain litigation over the measure after it is finalized next spring.
Many comments were unavailable by press time due to the fact that groups had until the end of the day to file them. However, early submissions from key groups underscore many of the major issues that will be in play as EPA finalizes its rule and prepares for litigation.
Perhaps the most prominent issue is Trump officials' view that section 111(d) of the air law does not allow it to set GHG standards based on actions taken “beyond the fenceline” of regulated power plants. As such, the ACE plan is limited to efficiency improvements within the boundaries of coal plants that would achieve marginal GHG cuts beyond business-as-usual scenarios.
The CPP relied on a broader legal interpretation to set standards premised on shifting generation to lower-carbon natural gas plants and renewable facilities, while also creating a credit trading system to enable compliance.
“EPA’s replacement rule is a welcome return to the lawful framework that was the hallmark for regulation of power plant emissions for decades prior to the promulgation of the unlawful CPP,” according to Oct. 31 comments from the National Mining Association (NMA), whose members include many coal mining companies.
The group adds that in a “stark contrast” to the CPP, “the ACE proposal recognizes that section 111 is not a tool for restructuring the entire electric grid by forcing adoption of politically preferred sources of power.”
Other industry support for the proposal comes from Oct. 31 comments from the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA), which represents a portion of the power sector that most strongly opposed the CPP.
While the CPP “would have required many of these [coal] units to significantly reduce generation or shut down, this proposal appropriately confines the requirements to what can be achieved 'inside the fence line,'” the co-ops say.
However, the environmental group Clean Air Task Force (CATF) in its Oct. 31 comments says the ACE proposal fails to meet the air law's mandate to set a “best system of emission reduction” (BSER), arguing the rule “omits better systems, fails to sufficiently reduce emissions from affected sources, and provides no standard at all by which to measure a satisfactory implementation plan.”
The group argues that reduced generation, co-firing and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology all would fit within BSER, and EPA failed to offer a “reasoned” explanation for rejecting those measures.
Further, relying only on efficiency improvements is improper because “they lead to emission increases at affected sources.” This occurs when a more-efficient coal plant is called on to run more often in power markets. The group says that even if the rule were to justify delaying the retirement of a few coal plants, the resulting additional GHGs would “quickly undo projected nationwide emissions reductions” from the rule.
NMA rejects the argument that EPA took a too narrow view when when setting targets, saying measures such as those cited by CATF “cannot qualify as standards of performance as they necessitate nonperformance.”
The BSER and “fenceline” issues are so critical because the Trump EPA's interpretation could block future administrations from pursuing broad GHG controls.
However, the plan stops short of an outright prohibition on issuing “beyond the fence” standards, and instead the agency frequently argues that its legal interpretations are “reasonable.” The agency hopes any court ruling upholding its regulation would create a precedent preventing such tougher rules, and experts say it is a safer position compared to arguing the air law unambiguously precludes more expansive targets.
Flood of Comments
CATF's submission is just part of a flood of critical comments from environmental groups. The group notes that it is joining six other comment letters -- which were not immediately available at press time -- focusing on the proposed “framework regulations”; the proposal's regulatory impact analysis; issues related to BSER; changes to the new source review (NSR) permitting program the treatment of biomass; and CCS issues.
EPA is required to review and respond to all substantive comments on its proposed rules before finalizing a measure, and groups must first raise concerns about a plan in comments before including such claims in any litigation.
As such, the massive volume of comments on the ACE proposal could require a large amount of resources to process at EPA, while also signaling an array of legal claims that could be raised once the rule goes final.
NMA also supports EPA's proposed NSR changes, which would change an emissions threshold “test” from an annual to hourly measure for coal plants that deploy efficiency projects to comply with ACE.
“Without NSR reform, the full benefits of ACE will not be realized,” the group says. “The ACE proposal to adopt an hourly emission rate test is a necessary step to avoiding a regulatory 'catch-22' whereby investments in beneficial efficiency improvements resulting in lower emission rates are thwarted simply because the improvements will also allow a power plant to generate and dispatch electricity more economically.”
Environmentalists strongly criticize the NSR changes, saying they would allow plants to avoid NSR permitting -- which requires installation of state-of-the-art pollution controls when facilities make major modifications -- even though their overall emissions of criteria pollutants will increase because they can run more often.
In addition, the mining group also supports EPA's proposal to give states wide discretion when crafting compliance plans for the ACE rule, including its decision to not to set a minimum stringency level in the ACE proposal.
“NMA does not read ACE as requiring any predetermined level of stringency for any particular source. Instead, states, in applying the BSER factors and considering remaining useful life and other relevant factors, must determine an appropriate standard of performance on a source-by-source basis,” the group says.
https://insideepa.com/daily-news/battle-lines-emerge-future-lawsuits-over-trump-epas-utility-ghg-rule
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Obama Furnace, Water Heater Rules Should Be Yanked: Gas Industry
Oct 31, 2018 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Rebecca Kern
Natural gas industry groups want the Energy Department to withdraw Obama-era proposed energy efficiency standards for certain gas furnaces and water heaters.
The department is seeking public comments on a petition from the American Public Gas Association and the American Gas Association to withdraw proposed rules issued in the fall of 2016 on residential gas furnaces and commercial water heaters, according to a notice to be published Nov. 1 in the Federal Register.
The Public Gas Association and American Gas Association represent publicly owned and investor owned gas companies, respectively.
The groups say the 2016 proposed rules violate the Energy Policy and Conservation Act because the law prohibits an energy efficiency standard that would have the effect of eliminating a currently available technology—in this case less-efficient noncondensing gas residential furnace and commercial water heaters from the market.
To replace the Obama-era proposals, the groups want the department to issue an “interpretive” rule confirming their position—that the proposed rules would phase out these less-efficient technologies, which the gas groups want to remain on the market.
Less energy-efficient gas furnace and commercial water heaters consume more gas than more efficient technologies.
“We’re hopeful DOE will be receptive on the arguments we’ve raised,” Dave Schryver, executive vice president of APGA, told Bloomberg Environment.
The move drew criticism from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.
“The gas industry is opposed to standards that save gas, and that’s a shame,” Andrew deLaski, executive director of the council’s Appliance Awareness Standards Project, which advocates for stronger efficiency appliance standards, told Bloomberg Environment.
‘Interpretative’ Rule Sought
The Obama-era proposed rules seek to make residential furnaces and commercial water heaters subject to higher energy efficiency standards, directing companies toward technologies that condense water out of flue gases to recoup heat.
The Obama standards would save consumers billions of dollars over a 30-year time frame—$22 billion in savings for consumers buying such furnaces and $6.3 billion in savings for businesses buying such commercial water heaters, deLaski said.
“These are cost-effective standards that save a lot of money for consumers and businesses and it makes sense for DOE to forward with final rules that would be similar to the proposed rules rather than withdraw them,” he said.
The Energy Department said it takes no position regarding the merits of the suggested rulemaking or the assertions made by the gas groups.
Public comments on the petition are due Jan. 31.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/obama-furnace-water-heater-rules-should-be-yanked-gas-industry
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This Stereotype Is Holding Back the Environmental Movement
Oct 31, 2018 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Rainer Romero-Canyas
Minority groups are expected to make up a majority of young Americans in just two years, and become the nation’s new majority by 2045. That’s good news for the environmental movement – because these groups actually care more about clean air and water than your average middle-class white American does. So do low-income groups.
Surprised? So were we when we recently compiled results for a just-published study on the topic. It showed that all of us – including low-income Americans or people of color – have long stereotyped “environmentalists” as white people with a college education while overlooking the attitudes of groups that ultimately suffer the most from pollution.
Within days of a critical midterm election, this paradox suggests that more people than we thought may bring climate change and other environmental concerns to the ballot box. Importantly, our study points to a huge and untapped opportunity to reach and engage people in the fight for strong clean air and water policies – assuming we do it right.
This is what an environmentalist looks like
More than half of Latinos – 54 percent – indicated in our survey that they were “very” or “extremely’ concerned about the environment, while 39 percent of African-Americans did. The same level of concern among Whites was just 32 percent. Asians, at 37 percent, also scored higher than Whites.
Not only that: Americans earning less than $15,000 a year are more concerned than Americans with incomes above $150,000.
And still, all surveyed groups seemed to agree that minorities and poor Americans are actually less focused on the environment than their White middle-class counterparts. This belief paradox reflects deep-seated and inaccurate stereotypes that explain, at least in part, why environmental advocacy outreach to minority and low-income groups has historically fallen short.
Lack of diversity perpetuates problem
As many businesses understood a long time ago, to reach an increasingly diverse market you must employ people of different backgrounds. Advocacy groups and government agencies in the environmental space have not yet cracked that nut; to this day, minorities comprise just 12 percent of their staff. Similar disparities exist within the environmental sciences.
Meanwhile, local groups that serve communities of color do great work to protect their natural spaces are often not seen as representative of environmentalism.
The lack of visible diversity in the mainstream movement helped shape and perpetuate the image of the typical American environmentalist as a white, well-educated, middle-class person – because it reflected the people inside these organizations.
We need to adjust our message
To raise public engagement and bring millions of new people into the environmental movement, we must – as we continue to diversify our ranks – break down that stereotype and adjust our message for the people we’re trying to reach.
Opinion polls and studies, including ours, have shown that rather than trying to increase awareness about environmental threats, of which these groups are already well aware, we need to start from a different vantage point.
It goes like this: We know they know, and we know there are environmental inequalities – a situation we’re working to address. We get that climate change and extreme weather affect low-income people more than the rich, as has been the case with Hurricane Harvey and Florence. And that African-Americans are exposed to more pollution than White Americans, regardless of wealth. It’s an American problem we can solve together.
Communities of color must share spotlight
All people, including minority groups, need to voice our beliefs and invite conversation that normalizes environmental interests and action. A wide range of research in social, behavioral and health sciences shows us that humans act in accordance with the behaviors and beliefs seen as valued by their communities.
We think it’s time to talk more openly about our concerns and take a rightful place in an environmental movement that has room for people from different racial, ethnic and economic backgrounds. Likewise, it’s important for those who have been fighting for environmental change to know they may have more support than they think.
It’s time for Americans to fight together for a cleaner and more just environment for all. We all stand to win.
https://www.edf.org/blog/2018/10/31/stereotype-holding-back-environmental-movement
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Pelosi Wants to Resurrect Select Climate Panel
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E News PM
By Geof Koss
If Democrats retake the House, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) plans to revive the select committee on climate change that she created — and Republicans later abandoned — when she was named speaker in 2007.
Pelosi told The New York Times this week that she will ask her caucus to bring back the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which existed under Democratic control from 2007 through 2011, when the new GOP majority decided not to renew the panel.
According to the Times, the committee would be structured similarly to the earlier panel, which was chaired by then-Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and held extensive hearings into climate science and clean energy policies. The now-defunct panel's work is archived on the website of now-Sen. Markey.
The would-be speaker's comments come amid questions of how hard a Democratic-led House would push climate change when Republicans hold the White House and, likely, the Senate.
As speaker, Pelosi made climate change a top priority, establishing the select committee and pushing a sweeping cap-and-trade bill through the House by a slim margin in the summer of 2009. The Senate never acted on the measure, and Republicans wielded the House vote as a cudgel against Democrats during the 2010 elections, helping elect a tea party wave of hard conservatives.
Pelosi's plan for the committee was mentioned only briefly in the Times' story, and her office did not respond to a request for comment on whether the panel would have legislative authority. The early incarnation famously did not, as onetime Energy and Commerce Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) once noted when he said the panel would be "as relevant and useful as feathers on a fish."
She told the Times the new panel would "prepare the way with evidence" for energy efficiency measures and legislation to reduce emissions. She signaled that the committee would help "educate the public" on the risks of extreme weather events.
Former Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who with Pelosi's backing took the Energy and Commerce gavel from Dingell in 2008 and ultimately led House passage of the Waxman-Markey climate bill, says a new Democratic majority is unlikely to pursue a major climate bill given the odds. But, he added, narrow provisions to boost climate resilience in the wake of more intense storms is one area that could yield bipartisan success.
"When you have legislators who are looking for opportunities, you don't stop trying to do things because you don't have a complete majority all the way through," Waxman told E&E News last week.
Pelosi's remarks also come as Democrats on multiple House panels are preparing to ramp up oversight of EPA, the Interior Department and the Energy Department if they reclaim the majority next week.
At least one member for the select panel — Oregon Democrat Earl Blumenauer — said earlier this summer that he was skeptical the committee would come back.
"I think at this point it's probably better to see if the committees can do their job," Blumenauer said in July.
However, a select climate panel could also ease pressure on other committees that have jurisdiction over other top Democratic issues, including health care, which Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) has said will also be a priority of the Energy and Commerce Committee that he is expected to chair if the chamber flips.
In a Democratic-led House, Pelosi signaled the first month would be used to draw a contrast to the ethics scandals of the Trump administration, including by passing broad ethics and campaign finance legislation.
However, Pelosi and current Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told the Times that Democrats would look for opportunities to work with Trump, including infrastructure.
Building roads and bridges is a legislative endeavor that Democrats have been eager to legislate on, while Republicans largely shied away from Trump's pledge to enact a $1 trillion package.
Democrats also see infrastructure as an opportunity to enact climate-friendly policies while avoiding a climate showdown with Republicans, who largely agree with the notion that rebuilding from hurricanes and other disasters should be done with an eye on reducing "future risks."
Reporter Nick Sobczyk contributed.
https://www.eenews.net/eenewspm/2018/10/31/stories/1060104843
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Whom Would Brown's Successor Turn to for Advice on Climate?
Nov 1, 2018 | E&E Climatewire
By Debra Kahn
California's Democratic lieutenant governor, Gavin Newsom, is expected to handily win next week's election to succeed Gov. Jerry Brown (D).
If Newsom wins, it will be the first time since 1887 that California has had two consecutive Democratic governors. Newsom is running on a platform of strong environmental protection and climate policy, but he's avoided getting into the weeds thanks to a relatively easy campaign season. He's stayed ahead of Republican challenger John Cox in all polls.
Newsom has said he'll pursue a goal of 100 percent renewable electricity — a target that Brown then echoed in signing a law in September to achieve zero-carbon electricity and economywide "carbon neutrality" by 2045. Brown also enacted greenhouse gas targets of 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030, as well as reauthorized the state's cap-and-trade program through then.
That sets a strong direction for Newsom to follow.
"I think the lack of strong competition in the Democratic primary definitely deprived us of a more fulsome conversation about energy policy in the state, but I also think that Gov. Brown has done an excellent job of charting out at least some major objectives for the next decade," said Michael Wara, director of the climate and energy program at Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment. "I expect there to be a fair amount of continuity across the transition."
But Newsom is also expected to chart his own course, perhaps veering away from or reshaping the physical infrastructure projects, like high-speed rail and water-delivery tunnels, that Brown has championed.
"I would just think that anybody who follows the Brown governorship is going to have their own agenda," said Darry Sragow, a former Democratic strategist who now publishes a political reference compendium called the "California Target Book" and who serves as a political science professor at the University of Southern California. "That's absolutely inevitable."
Newsom has signaled at least some desire for continuity by asking Mary Nichols, the long-serving chairwoman of the California Air Resources Board, to stay on through the transition (Climatewire, Sept. 26). Other than that, observers are looking to his tenure in San Francisco, where he served as mayor from 2004 to 2010, for clues as to whom he may seek counsel from on environmental issues as governor.
"The lieutenant governor doesn't get very much staff and doesn't have very many official duties and really only one that touches the environment, which is the State Lands Commission," said David Lewis, executive director of the Oakland-based nonprofit Save the Bay. "I think the place to look would be people who worked with him in San Francisco."
Here are some names Newsom could tap for advice on climate and environmental policy:
· Jared Blumenfeld, the former EPA Region 9 administrator under President Obama, served as head of San Francisco's Environment Department from 2001 to 2009. He now advises clean-tech companies and hosts a podcast on environmental issues.
· Melanie Nutter, Blumenfeld's successor as Environment Department head from 2010 to 2014, also works as an adviser to cities, foundations and companies on sustainability. She was deputy district director for Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) from 2005 to 2010 and is currently running for the board of the Bay Area Rapid Transit system.
· Wade Crowfoot, Newsom's former director of climate protection and director of governmental affairs, is currently the CEO of the Water Foundation, which works on California water issues. He was previously an adviser to Brown on water and energy issues.
· David Hochschild, a current commissioner at the California Energy Commission, was a member of San Francisco's Public Utilities Commission from 2007 to 2008 under Newsom. He co-founded the Vote Solar Initiative after serving as a special assistant on solar to Newsom's predecessor, former Mayor Willie Brown (D).
· Francesca Vietor, a current member of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission who started under Newsom, also served as chairwoman of Newsom's environmental transition team when he took office in 2004. She also works as a senior adviser at the San Francisco Foundation, which focuses on racial and economic issues.
· Spreck Rosekrans, executive director of Restore Hetch Hetchy, a group working to take down the dam in Yosemite National Park that stores the majority of San Francisco's water. He first became acquainted with Newsom on a rafting trip in the Grand Canyon in the 1990s organized by the Environmental Defense Fund.
All either declined to comment or didn't respond to requests for comment, except Rosekrans, who said he was advising the campaign on water issues as part of a bigger environmental advisory group. He stressed that the advising work was separate from his job advocating for the reform of San Francisco's water infrastructure.
"More it's been a summary of what is going on, what the big issues are, rather than policy recommendations," he said. "I'd say we're talking about all the obvious things, and maybe a few other things, too."
Observers highlighted transportation emissions, climate adaptation and water as key areas where Newsom will have an opportunity to make his mark. While greenhouse gas emissions from California's power sector have been falling, emissions from the state's transportation sector — the largest individual contributor — have been rising slowly but steadily since 2013 (Climatewire, July 12).
"The big challenge for Newsom that I see, and I think this is one that everyone is pretty cognizant of, is what to do about transportation in the state," Wara said. "I think it's intimately tied to issues around housing, which are front and center in everyone's mind. ... The question is going to be whether California can be as innovative in the transportation and housing space as it has been in the power sector over the last 10-15 years."
For that, Newsom will have to continue wrestling with the Trump administration, which is moving to roll back the joint state-federal fuel economy standards put in place by California and former President Obama.
"It's true that Gavin Newsom cannot control all those external forces, but when it comes to fighting with the feds, we're used to that," Sragow said. "We create our own political climate; we set our own standards."
Lewis cited climate adaptation and water as the top two environmental issues.
"Most of the focus for the state and the advocacy community has been on climate mitigation," he said. "In adaptation there's a lot more work to do."
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2018/11/01/stories/1060104885
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EPA Quietly Telling States They Can Pollute More
Oct 31, 2018 | CNN
By Rene Marsh, Gregory Wallace and Ellie Kaufman
The Environmental Protection Agency has quietly signaled it may allow states to release more ozone air pollution, commonly known as smog, dirtying the air in those states and neighboring ones, but the agency did not review the health impact of such a move.
The Trump administration's position is outlined in a highly technical guidance memo about plans states must create and submit for EPA approval under the Clean Air Act's good neighbor requirements. It was sent in August to EPA regional offices and posted on the agency's website, but not announced to the public.
The memo introduces the idea of increasing the threshold for how much smog a state can dump on its neighbors -- known as cross-state pollution -- before taking action to reduce emissions.
Under the Trump administration's new guidance, states that are currently finalizing their plans can consider adopting a looser standard than would have been allowed under the Obama administration. The new one part per billion standard means a state can emit 43% more pollution across state lines than before.
Smog is a byproduct of air pollutants including greenhouse gases, which contribute to climate change. It can originate from sources including power plants, refineries and factories. Smog can reduce the ability of the lungs to function, and especially impacts children, people who are active outside, or those who have respiratory diseases. It is linked to breathing issues and conditions such as asthma.
The guidance memo is just the latest move by the Trump administration to loosen restrictions surrounding air pollution. The administration has moved towards replacing the Clean Power Plan, moved towards freezing vehicle emission standards, and pulled out of the international Paris climate agreement. The EPA also recently overhauled the committees of scientists who advise it on clean air.
The Clean Air Act mandates that the EPA works to make sure smog from certain states doesn't jeopardize air quality in downwind states. If there's pollution above the threshold, then the states would need to reduce emissions to come into compliance.
Maryland is an example of a state struggling with this issue. According to an estimate from the Maryland Department of the Environment, 70% of smog in Baltimore on bad ozone days comes from out-of-state cars, trucks and power plants. Maryland has asked the EPA for help curbing the smog coming from upwind states. The EPA has denied the request and Maryland has filed a suit asking for a judicial review of the EPA's decision.
The Obama-era EPA supported a tighter 0.7 part per billion threshold for smog. The 0.7 part per billion cross-state threshold was rooted in a 2015 rule that tightened the standards to "provide increased public health protection against health effects associated with long- and short-term exposures" to smog.
The new memo is influential, because it guides decision making, but is not legally binding. It is guidance, rather than a regulation, so it did not go through the rigorous review process used to craft new rules. That also leaves it vulnerable to being reviewed or overturned by courts or a future administration.
EPA spokesman John Konkus disputed that the EPA was raising the pollution threshold. Instead, he said the agency is giving states the option to raise the threshold themselves through the memo.
"The memo identifies potential technical approaches that a state may wish to choose in drafting their implementation plans' approach to its good neighbor obligations," he said.
Konkus also said that the memo has "no health impacts," but the agency admits they have not yet performed any health-related analysis.
Several public health advocates say EPA isn't playing it straight with the public.
"EPA is allowing more harmful air pollution to be sent from big polluters in one state to neighboring states, refusing to control the pollution, then lying about what is an obvious rollback," said John Walke, the director of clean air at the Natural Resources Defense Council and a former agency attorney during the Clinton administration.
"It's absurd to pretend this so-called 'guidance' doesn't change what's acceptable: the purpose of the rollback memo is to let upwind states pollute more and refuse to control harmful smog and soot they emit into neighboring states," he added.
Kyla Bennett, science director at Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, told CNN the agency is allowing some states, "under the guise of 'flexibility' and cooperative federalism, to emit more pollution."
"With a flick of the pen, this EPA guidance condemns hundreds of unlucky downwinders to early deaths every year," Bennett said.
The EPA memo claimed the nationwide overall pollution impact will likely be small -- the difference of 7 percentage points out of 100.
Some parts of the country, such as Western states like Arizona, will see virtually no impact, the memo said.
But other states, like Maryland and parts of Colorado, could see pollution levels spike.
The agency argues major gains have been made in reducing this sort of pollution. From 2007 to 2017, nitrogen oxides emissions, the key precursor for ground-level ozone pollution, has dropped by more than 40% nationwide, the agency said.
Bill Wehrum, a former energy industry attorney who fought to weaken air pollution rules, critics say, now oversees air pollution regulations at the EPA.
The EPA under then-Administrator Scott Pruitt initially tried to delay implementation of the Obama-era air quality rule, but now the Trump administration has decided to defend it in court, and recently argued in a federal appeals court against fossil fuel interests and five states supporting those interests. It is not clear why the administration changed course.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/10/31/politics/epa-air-pollution/index.html
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