Preview Newsletter
PM ACC Clips Report - January 16, 2019
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(ACC Mentioned) SPE Announces Antec Speakers, Award Winners
Jan 16, 2019 | Plastics News
By Bill Bregar
The Society of Plastics Engineers has announced award winners and featured speakers for Antec 2019 in Detroit March 18-21. -
Menendez Blocked EPA Pick, Scuttling Policy Deal
Jan 10, 2019 | Politico
By Alex Guillen and Anthony Adragna
...Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) last week torpedoed a deal in which Democrats would have allowed an EPA nominee to be quickly confirmed in exchange for several major policy concessions from the Trump administration, according to a source familiar with the discussions. -
At Confirmation Hearing, Trump’s EPA Pick Vows to Advance a Deregulatory Agenda
Jan 16, 2019 | The Washington Post
By Brady Dennis and Juliet Eilperin
Andrew Wheeler, a former fossil fuel industry lobbyist whom President Trump nominated earlier this month to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, plans to tell a key Senate panel Wednesday that he would continue the administration’s aggressive reversal of environmental rules. -
Shutdown Politics Overshadow Wheeler's Confirmation Hearing
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
The partial government shutdown that has closed EPA loomed over acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler's confirmation hearing this morning. -
EPA Nominee Wheeler Courts Senate by Touting Eased Regulations
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jennifer A. Dlouhy
President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the EPA, Andrew Wheeler, is set to tout the agency’s efforts to ease regulations on industry and undercut Obama-era pollution curbs at his Senate confirmation hearing Jan. 16. -
Big Oil Targets Plastic Waste Scourge With $1B Pledge
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Francois De Beaupuy
U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp., France’s Total SA, and German chemicals maker BASF SE joined dozens of other companies in a $1 billion pledge to cut plastic waste pollution. -
Shutdown Threatens Further Delays to TSCA New Chemicals Reviews
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Lisa Martine Jenkins
Concerns are growing that the US EPA’s shutdown will result in further delays and a ballooning backlog of new chemical reviews under TSCA. -
(ACC Mentioned) Duckworth Alleges Political Interference with Ethylene Oxide Inspections
Jan 16, 2019 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillén
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) today alleged that political appointees at EPA’s Region 5 office in Chicago have instructed agency employees not to inspect facilities that use a certain carcinogenic chemical. -
EPA’s Strategy for Fluorinated Chemicals Caught Up in Shutdown
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
The EPA’s plan for a nationwide strategy to address widespread fluorinated chemicals is the latest action caught up in the federal government shutdown. -
Wheeler Won't Commit to Toxic Chemical Limit Within 2 Years
Jan 16, 2019 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Annie Snider
At his nomination hearing to lead EPA, acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler refused to promise the agency would swiftly set a drinking water limit for a pair of toxic chemicals that have made their way into drinking water across the country. -
2 Moms Sue EPA After Their Sons Died Of Exposure To Toxic Chemical
Jan 16, 2019 | Huffington Post
By Nick Visser
Two moms whose sons died after being exposed to a toxic chemical common in paint thinners sued the Environmental Protection Agency this week, saying the agency has dragged its feet to ban products that are harmful to human health. -
Echa Pins Down Causes of Poorly Functioning eSDSs
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Clelia Oziel
Ambiguous requirements for exposure scenarios in safety data sheets and lack of harmonised methods to adjust them to the needs of all users, are to blame for poor safety communication along chemical supply chains, Echa has said. -
Government Publishes Draft UK REACH Statutory Instrument
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Clelia Oziel and Luke Buxton
The UK government has published a draft statutory instrument (SI) to create a UK version of REACH in the event of the UK leaving the EU without a deal on 29 March. -
EU Lawmakers Call for More Transparent Pesticide Authorizations
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Stephen Gardner
Pesticide producers could face greater constraints when seeking authorization for their products in the European Union, if European Parliament recommendations go forward. -
Shutdown Leaves Oil and Gas Unscathed, but for How Long?
Jan 16, 2019 | Houston Chronicle
By James Osborne
Airport security waits mount behind absentee screeners and paycheck-less federal workers try to figure out how to pay their mortgages. But at least for now, the business of drilling for oil and gas continues to hum along during the three-week-old-and-counting partial shutdown of the federal government. -
Dems Blast Interior over Leasing Work During Shutdown
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Greenwire
By Kellie Lunney
Top House Democrats today called Interior's move allowing employees to work on the department's offshore drilling activities during the government shutdown "outrageous," demanding acting Secretary David Bernhardt reverse the decision — or come to Capitol Hill to explain it. -
Less Volatile Gas Prices Give Newest US LNG Plant Smoother Start-Up
Jan 16, 2019 | Platts
By Jason Lord
US LNG export projects, whether brownfield or greenfield, are multi-year, billion dollar projects. -
Study Sees CO2 'Rebound' Under Proposed Carbon Rule
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Climatewire
By Niina Heikkinen
EPA's proposed replacement for the Obama-era Clean Power Plan could lead to increases in carbon emissions in 2030 compared with having no climate rule in place at all, a new study has found.
Industry and Association News
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Environment News
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(ACC Mentioned) SPE Announces Antec Speakers, Award Winners
Jan 16, 2019 | Plastics News
By Bill Bregar
The Society of Plastics Engineers has announced award winners and featured speakers for Antec 2019 in Detroit March 18-21.
Sindee Simon, who chairs the chemical engineering department at Texas Tech University, has won the Society of Plastics Engineers' highest honor, the International Award.
SPE will present Simon with the International Award at Antec 2019.
Simon will give a morning plenary speech March 18, titled "Polymer Physics: Academic Research and Impacts." Her work deals with predicting and reducing residual stresses in large composite parts as well as fundamental work aimed at understanding the nature of the glass transition and nanoconfined polymerizations. Her speech will describe potential applications and implications of the research.
Simon received the SPE's Research/Engineering Technology Award at the 2014 Antec.
SPE also announced other speakers at the Detroit Antec.
Mark Spalding will give the March 18 afternoon speech on "Process Design and Troubleshooting Using a Fundamental Approach." The fellow in packaging and specialty plastics research and development at Dow Chemical Co. will win the SPE Research/Engineering Technology Award at the Detroit Antec.
Spalding, who holds bachelor's, master's and a doctorate degrees in chemical engineering, joined Dow in 1985 and has held a number of positions in corporate R&D, polystyrene R&D and plastics R&D and the company's Inclosia Solutions business. He has writing more than 130 technical publications.
His expertise is single-screw extrusion and related polymer processing technologies.
Spalding is a fellow and honored service member of SPE.
Steve Russell, vice president of the American Chemistry Council's Plastics Division, will give a keynote speech March 19. The topic: "Can We End Plastics Waste?"
Russell, who joined ACC in 1995, leads public-private partnerships and solutions-oriented programs to address sustainability of plastics. He also played a key role in creating the World Plastics Council, a group of CEOs from the world's largest chemical and plastics companies, to prioritize and fund systems to keep plastics out of the oceans.
The afternoon speaker on March 19 will be Anil K. Bhowmick, a Professor of Eminence, former head of Rubber Technology Centre and dean of postgraduate studies at IIT Kharagpur.
His speech will cover "Thermoplastic Elastomers — an Overview."
Bhowmick's main research interests include TPEs and polymer blends, nanocomposites, polymer modification, polymer technology, failure and degradation of polymers and adhesives.
He has more than 500 publications, 35 book chapters and seven co-edited books.
Deborah Mielewski, Ford Motor Co.'s senior technical leader of sustainable materials and advanced materials, will present "Advances in Automotive Plastics and Composites" on March 20.
She will cover areas such as natural fiber reinforced composites, 3D printed parts, polymeric and soft materials made from renewable feedstocks, and plastic parts made from recycled carbon dioxide.
Mielewski, a chemical engineer, has worked at Ford for 31 years. She initiated Ford's biomaterials program in 2001, and her team was the first to demonstrate soy-based foam that met the requirements for automotive seating.
Another bio-innovation: The use of wheat straw filled polypropylene for the storage bins the 2010 Ford Flex.
She holds 10 U.S. patents and has more than 60 referred journal publications.
https://www.plasticsnews.com/article/20190116/NEWS/190119924/spe-announces-antec-speakers-award-winners
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Menendez Blocked EPA Pick, Scuttling Policy Deal
Jan 10, 2019 | Politico
By Alex Guillen and Anthony Adragna
...Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) last week torpedoed a deal in which Democrats would have allowed an EPA nominee to be quickly confirmed in exchange for several major policy concessions from the Trump administration, according to a source familiar with the discussions. Under the now-shelved agreement over DowDuPont attorney Peter Wright's nomination to run the agency’s Superfund office, EPA would have resumed moving toward publication of a major report on formaldehyde risks and would have dramatically revised its controversial ‘secret science’ rule, among other concessions, an environmental lobbyist familiar with the compromise told POLITICO … First, EPA had agreed to allow a report on formaldehyde proceed through the normal scientific review process, including internal review as well as subsequent public and expert input. As POLITICO reported last year, the Trump administration was suppressing the report, which warned that most Americans breathe in enough formaldehyde to increase the risk of leukemia and other illnesses.
Access to full text unavailable – subscription required.
Story can be found here: https://subscriber.politicopro.com/states/new-jersey/story/2019/01/10/source-menendez-blocked-epa-pick-scuttling-policy-deal-784680
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At Confirmation Hearing, Trump’s EPA Pick Vows to Advance a Deregulatory Agenda
Jan 16, 2019 | The Washington Post
By Brady Dennis and Juliet Eilperin
Andrew Wheeler, a former fossil fuel industry lobbyist whom President Trump nominated earlier this month to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, plans to tell a key Senate panel Wednesday that he would continue the administration’s aggressive reversal of environmental rules.
“Through our deregulatory actions, the Trump administration has proven that burdensome federal regulations are not necessary to drive environmental progress,” Wheeler told the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee at his confirmation hearing Wednesday morning. “Certainty, and the innovation that thrives in a climate of certainty, are key to progress.”
Wheeler, who was confirmed as the agency’s top deputy last year, has served as the EPA’s acting administrator since July. An agency veteran who also worked in the Senate before becoming a lobbyist, Wheeler is more low-key than his predecessor Scott Pruitt, who was forced to resign in July amid federal ethics inquiries.
But Wheeler has drawn attention because of the policies he’s continued to advance at the helm of the EPA. Protesters began chanting as soon as he began speaking, only to be removed from the room by police. One man shouted, “Shut down Wheeler, not the EPA!” Outside, a larger group of activists continued the same chant as Wheeler resumed his remarks.
Wheeler has made clear — both through his words and actions — that he would pursue many of the regulatory rollbacks Pruitt put in motion and carry out Trump’s promises of a more efficient, less powerful EPA. Wheeler highlighted nearly three dozen significant rules that the EPA had rolled back during the past two years in his prepared testimony.
Environmental advocates and other opponents have argued that he has too many conflicts of interest to serve in the agency’s top role, and that the policies he aims to pursue threaten the public health and safety of ordinary Americans.
“The fox in the hen house analogies are endless here, but so is Wheeler’s ability to roll back vital safeguards to our air, water, and climate and put our environment and health at risk should he remain in the top spot at the EPA,” Matthew Gravatt, associate legislative director for the Sierra Club, wrote ahead of Wednesday’s confirmation hearing. “Wheeler isn’t just friendly with corporate polluters; he’s been on their team for years.”
Democrats have little hope of blocking Wheeler’s confirmation. But they used the hearing to lambaste him and the administration’s environmental record. Sen. Thomas R. Carper (Del.), the top Democrat on the panel, questioned why the EPA has worked to reverse federal rules that have broad industry support such as limits on mercury pollution from power plants and stricter fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks.
“Mr. Wheeler is certainly not the ethically bereft embarrassment that Scott Pruitt proved to be and — to be fair — he has engaged more frequently and substantively than Scott Pruitt both with Congress and EPA career staff. I knew that Mr. Wheeler and I would not always agree,” Carper said. “But I hoped he would moderate some of Scott Pruitt’s most environmentally destructive policies, specifically where industry and the environmental community are in agreement. Regrettably, my hopes have not be realized. In fact, upon examination, Mr. Wheeler’s environmental policies appear to be just as extreme as his predecessor’s.”
Carper also questioned why the Senate was taking up Wheeler’s nomination when the EPA was shuttered due to the partial government shutdown. “I do not believe that giving the acting administrator a speedy promotion is more urgent and more important than protecting the public from contamination to our air and water and lands,” he said.
But Republicans countered that Wheeler’s extensive experience made him well qualified to steer the EPA, and should be confirmed as soon as possible. Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), who served as Wheeler’s boss in the Senate, introduced him to the committee and blamed Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) for the budget impasse.
“I really do think the midst of the Schumer shutdown is a good time to confirm some of these nominees,” Inhofe said, adding that given Wheeler’s work since Pruitt’s departure, “Andrew’s ability to lead the EPA has never been clearer.”
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), a member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, said in an interview Tuesday that he hoped the process would provide greater transparency on how the agency is operating under Wheeler.
“We will try to get factual information, answers and documents out of the Trump administration and hope that the oversight faculties of the Senate will at least be somewhat revived,” he said, adding that the Democrats regaining control of the House has provided his party with some leverage.
Whitehouse said that although Wheeler has not demonstrated the sort of ethical lapses as Pruitt, he has advanced the same sort of policies as his predecessor.
“He brings less scorn and derision on his office, but in terms of the fundamental fact that this is a theoretically regulatory agency that is being run for the benefit of industry, that has not changed,” he said.
Industry leaders indeed have welcomed Wheeler’s nomination.
Jim Matheson, chief executive of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, whose group includes hundreds of electric cooperatives nationwide, said in a statement that Wheeler “has demonstrated his ability to head the agency and understands the importance of common-sense regulatory reforms that promote a healthy environment and vibrant rural communities.”
Wheeler arrived back at the EPA — where he had worked during the early 1990s — last spring after the Senate confirmed him by a vote of 53 to 45 as the top deputy to Pruitt.
It had been a long absence since his early-career work as a regulator. For nearly 15 years, Wheeler worked as a staff member on Capitol Hill, including as an adviser to Inhofe, a high-profile critic of the EPA and of climate science. He later spent nearly a decade lobbying for the sort of companies that EPA regulates, including energy and mining firms. Among his professional activities, he once listed his post as vice president of the Washington Coal Club.
In July, several months after his return to the EPA, the Ohio native became acting administrator of the agency after Pruitt was forced to resign amid federal ethics inquiries.
“The agenda for the agency was set out by President Trump,” Wheeler told The Post at the time. “I will try to work to implement the president’s agenda as well. I don’t think the overall agenda is going to change that much, because we’re implementing what the president has laid out.”
In November, during an unrelated event at the White House, Trump announced that he intended to nominate Wheeler as permanent administrator. “He’s done a fantastic job,” the president said.
In his prepared remarks Wednesday, Wheeler highlighted some of the agency’s continued rollbacks under his watch. Among them: a major overhaul of an Obama-era rule aimed at sharply reducing carbon dioxide emissions from the nation’s power plants and an effort to scale back requirements for how fuel efficient the nation’s cars and pickup trucks must be in the near future.
Wheeler’s confirmation hearing Wednesday also comes amid a partial government shutdown that has limited the EPA’s ability to conduct its most basic functions, including industrial inspections and monitoring for pollution nationwide. Only about 800 of the EPA’s roughly 14,000 employees have been deemed essential to continue working during the shutdown.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2019/01/16/confirmation-hearing-trumps-epa-pick-vows-advance-deregulatory-agenda/
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Shutdown Politics Overshadow Wheeler's Confirmation Hearing
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
The partial government shutdown that has closed EPA loomed over acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler's confirmation hearing this morning.
Wheeler appeared before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee today. Earlier this month, President Trump formally nominated Wheeler to be EPA administrator, a job he has held on an acting basis since July.
Democratic senators pressed Wheeler on the Trump EPA's deregulatory agenda, which he has continued with gusto after his predecessor, Scott Pruitt, left the agency under an ethical cloud. But members of the committee also worried that EPA is not able to complete its mission of protecting the environment while its doors remain closed.
Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), ranking member on the EPW panel, noted that EPA employees working without pay were tasked with helping Wheeler prepare for today's hearing. He also said that Wheeler's nomination had been rushed, given he can serve as acting chief for another roughly 200 days under the Vacancies Act.
Carper said a "speedy promotion" of Wheeler was not a good use of agency resources that could be applied to environmental protection instead. The Delaware senator said with the shutdown, rules have not been written, public meetings have been canceled, inspections have not happened and Superfund sites have not been cleaned up.
"To me, under these circumstances, it's not possible for EPA to do its mission," said Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.). "I want to underscore how tragic this shutdown is."
During the hearing, Wheeler made commitments that certain EPA actions would be completed but then had to offer the caveat that staff could not work on some policies because of the shutdown.
"We're still on the job for any emergency actions or any court-ordered action," Wheeler said about what EPA is doing during the funding lapse. He repeatedly said he wants staff sent home to return to work.
Wheeler said EPA employees were still on the ground for clearing hazardous waste left by the California wildfires, and the agency had responded to seven new emergencies since the shutdown began.
In addition, Wheeler said that he was reviewing court deadlines EPA has to meet, and that he had recalled furloughed EPA employees this week to work on the agency's lead dust regulation. But other moves EPA planned this year have been stalled by the shutdown.
Wheeler said EPA's per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, management plan might be delayed because of the shutdown. Asked by Carper to commit to issuing a drinking water standard for the class of chemicals, Wheeler said he could not.
"I can't make that commitment because of interagency review," Wheeler said.
Wheeler was also pressed by Sens. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) and Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) on whether EPA would issue its rule to allow the year-round sale of E15, a fuel that uses a higher blend of ethanol. Wheeler said the rule would be in place for the summer driving season but it was not being worked on at the moment.
"As of today, yes, but I caveat that we are unable to work on it during the shutdown," Wheeler said.Deregulatory actions and ethics pledge
"Through our deregulatory actions, the Trump administration has proven that burdensome federal regulations are not necessary to drive environmental progress," Wheeler said in his opening statement. He was initially interrupted by a protester, who was led out and resulted in cries of "Shut down Wheeler! Not the EPA!" outside the hearing room.
Wheeler was often pressed by Democrats on a variety of rollbacks proposed by the Trump EPA. He also cited them as accomplishments that help create certainty for states and industry regulated by the agency.
Republicans praised Wheeler for his leadership at the agency so far and pledged to support his confirmation. Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), chairman of the EPW Committee, said Wheeler had done "an outstanding job" at EPA and was "well-qualified" to run the agency.
"I'm very excited about the prospects of him taking his temporary job into a permanent one," said Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.). Wheeler had worked as a top aide to Inhofe in his personal office and when Inhofe was the top Republican on the EPW panel.
Inhofe said he was in attendance for Wheeler's first address to EPA employees after he became acting administrator. "I saw a man that respected the agency and the work that the career staffers do," Inhofe said.
Democrats admitted that Wheeler had not become the scandal-prone mess that Pruitt was before leaving EPA.
"Mr. Wheeler is certainly not the ethically bereft embarrassment that Scott Pruitt proved to be," Carper said, but added that his hopes that Wheeler would not continue Pruitt's agenda of rule rollbacks had not been realized.
After leaving Capitol Hill in 2009, Wheeler became a lobbyist for several energy interests at law firm Faegre Baker Daniels LLP. His lobbying record did come under scrutiny somewhat at today's hearing, with Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) holding up a photograph of him as a lobbyist in a meeting with Energy Secretary Rick Perry and Robert Murray, CEO of coal giant Murray Energy Corp., one of Wheeler's former clients.
Wheeler said he has worked with career ethics officials at EPA to steer clear of his former firm and clients. He also said he has not violated Trump's ethics pledge.
Carper pushed Wheeler to reach agreement with California, which has tough emission standards for cars, on fuel efficiency standards for vehicles. The so-called 50-state deal has long been a goal of the ranking Democrat. Meanwhile, the Trump EPA has proposed a pullback of Obama-era clean car standards (see related story).
"I haven't given up hope of that yet," Wheeler said about the 50-state deal.
"Your job is to be the leader for basically fighting this battle," Carper said. "I urge you, feel some sense of urgency on this stuff, OK?"
Wheeler also faced a number of skeptical Democrats, as well as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), when it came to EPA action on climate change. In response, Wheeler cited the agency's proposed regulation to reduce power plants' carbon emissions as well as rules governing cars and methane.
When asked by Sanders whether he agreed with Trump that climate change was a hoax, Wheeler did not take the bait.
"I believe climate change is real," Wheeler said.
"The president has said it is a hoax. Do you agree?" Sanders replied.
"I have not used the 'hoax' word," Wheeler said.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2019/01/16/stories/1060116267
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EPA Nominee Wheeler Courts Senate by Touting Eased Regulations
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Jennifer A. Dlouhy
President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the EPA, Andrew Wheeler, is set to tout the agency’s efforts to ease regulations on industry and undercut Obama-era pollution curbs at his Senate confirmation hearing Jan. 16.
Wheeler, a former energy lobbyist who has served as acting administrator for six months, will highlight the Environmental Protection Agency’s work to spare businesses some $1.8 billion in compliance costs by finalizing 13 “major deregulatory actions” last year, according to testimony submitted in advance of the confirmation hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
In addition, Wheeler, who also serves as the agency’s No. 2 official, defends moving to undercut vehicle efficiency standards at a time when the U.S. is marking significant reductions in air pollution.
“Through our deregulatory actions, the Trump administration has proven that burdensome federal regulations are not necessary to drive environmental progress,” Wheeler is set to say at his confirmation hearing. “Thanks to our hardworking public servants, pollution is on the decline. Our focus now is to accelerate its decline, particularly in communities where it poses the most immediate and lasting harm.”
Wheeler was appointed as the EPA’s acting administrator following the July 2018 resignation of the agency’s scandal-plagued former chief, Scott Pruitt. Although Wheeler doesn’t share Pruitt’s penchant for the limelight—nor the missteps that put Pruitt in political jeopardy—Wheeler is nonetheless similarly committed to Trump’s agenda of easing Obama administration regulations governing climate change and pollution. And he has moved methodically to pursue it.
Panel Democrats are set to grill the former energy industry lobbyist about what they cast as inadequate efforts to steer clear of former clients, including chemical manufacturer Celanese Corp., coal producer Murray Energy Corp., uranium miner Energy Fuels Resources Inc., and utility holding company Xcel Energy Inc.
Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the environment committee’s top Democrat, said Wheeler hasn’t followed his advice to “restore public trust in the agency by heeding lessons of the past and by remedying some of Scott Pruitt’s most egregious actions and proposals.”
“I’ve been very disappointed in Acting Administrator Wheeler’s performance with regard to making progress on those issues and to charting a new course for the agency’s future,” Carper said.
Carper and other critics argued the Senate should have delayed Wheeler’s hearing amid the lapse in funding that has paralyzed roughly a quarter of the federal government, including most work at the EPA. Four Senate Democrats last week wrote Wheeler questioning how the agency could prep the acting chief for his confirmation hearing, even though federal law largely limits shutdown exceptions to actions necessary to protect life and property. The lapse in federal spending has already forced the EPA to halt work to clean up Superfund sites and test toxic chemicals.
But the Office of Management and Budget said the shutdown doesn’t present legal barriers to Wheeler’s confirmation process. In an email to EPA staff, OMB said Wheeler can prepare for and participate in his confirmation hearing—and receive necessary support from staff—during the shutdown as an “excepted activity that may continue during the lapse in appropriations.” The exception is justified because Wheeler’s nomination falls under Trump’s constitutional authority to appoint federal officials and because the legislative branch has funding through September already, OMB said.
The Senate narrowly confirmed Wheeler for his current job as the EPA’s deputy administrator last April by a vote of 53-45, amid complaints from Democrats and environmentalists that his energy-heavy roster of former lobbying clients could pose conflicts at the agency.
Although Wheeler has vowed to stay out of decisions affecting former clients, the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington on Jan. 15 said he has violated that pledge. In a complaint filed with the EPA’s inspector general, the organization rapped Wheeler for being involved in regulations governing coal power plants and holding meetings with former clients Darling Ingredients Inc., Growth Energy and the Archer-Daniels-Midland Co.
A politically savvy lawyer, Wheeler’s entire professional life has been tethered to the EPA. He was hired for a non-political job at the agency focusing on toxic chemicals in 1991. After four years at the EPA under Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Wheeler shifted to Capitol Hill, where he worked for Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, including former chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.)
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/epa-nominee-wheeler-courts-senate-by-touting-eased-regulations
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Big Oil Targets Plastic Waste Scourge With $1B Pledge
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Francois De Beaupuy
U.S. oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp., France’s Total SA, and German chemicals maker BASF SE joined dozens of other companies in a $1 billion pledge to cut plastic waste pollution.
Their nonprofit Alliance to End Plastic Waste will invest in waste collection and recycling, according to a Jan. 16 statement. The coalition reflects mounting public concern over the blight of plastic waste, especially in the oceans, as the expense of recycling often outstrips the cost of producing new materials.
While plastics can improve the energy efficiency of everyday products, it’s “critical to improve the management of their end-of-life to ensure that they do not end up in the environment,” Bernard Pinatel, head of refining and chemicals at Total, a founding member of the alliance, said in the statement.
Eliminating ‘Avoidable’ WasteInternational efforts to tackle plastic pollution have gathered pace, including a U.S. ban on microbeads in cosmetics and a U.K. plan to eliminate “avoidable” waste by 2042. Research shows that almost 80 percent of the plastic in oceans begins as litter on land, with most of it traveling down rivers to the sea, according to the statement.
As well as helping to clean up some of the most polluted areas, the alliance, a group of about 30 companies, will fund awareness-raising among governments, companies, and communities. Other members include Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Henkel AG, LyondellBasell Industries NV, Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Corp., Procter & Gamble Co., Veolia Environnement SA, and Suez.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/big-oil-targets-plastic-waste-scourge-with-1b-pledge
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Shutdown Threatens Further Delays to TSCA New Chemicals Reviews
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Lisa Martine Jenkins
Concerns are growing that the US EPA’s shutdown will result in further delays and a ballooning backlog of new chemical reviews under TSCA.
Now in its fourth week, the partial shutdown of the US government – the longest in the nation’s history – has kept the EPA shuttered since 29 December. And while the agency has published no official notice suspending the new chemicals review process, the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP) has been brought down to a skeleton crew of only 11 employees.
"Until we have information from the agency, we are more or less assuming that [new chemical review processes] are all suspended, Lynn Bergeson, managing partner at Bergeson & Campbell, told Chemical Watch.
And the fear for many is that the shutdown will exacerbate an already overtaxed new chemicals review process, compromising the ability for companies to bring new substance to market.
Changes brought about by 2016 amendments to TSCA resulted in significant delays for the pre-manufacture notice (PMN) approvals process. And despite efforts to bring the caseload down to its normal size, the agency’s backlog of reviews hit an all-time high late last year.
Martha Marrapese, attorney at Wiley Rein LLP, told Chemical Watch that because PMN filings can continue during the partial shutdown while no work is being done to review them, "any progress EPA has made on processing new chemical filings is being wiped out."
Robert Helminiak, vice president of legal and governmental relations at Socma, added that the backlog of new substance reviews is "inevitably going to get worse".
The specialty chemicals industry group has long had concerns with the new chemicals programme under the reformed TSCA, he told Chemical Watch in an interview. The shutdown means it will be "more problematic going into the new year".Uncertainty ahead
With EPA work at a standstill, many businesses are wondering how to proceed.
Ms Marrapese said that the slowdown is delaying new product launches, and that companies are looking outside of the new chemicals programme for conducting business.
"An unintended consequence of all this is that some companies may have to continue to use older chemistry that is already on the TSCA inventory for a longer time instead of safer, new alternatives they have under development," she said.
There are questions, too, about whether the EPA will ‘count’ the shutdown days toward its 90-day PMN review period, though Mr Helminiak guesses that it will not. But this is "unprecedented territory", he said.
Furthermore, it could impinge on the agency’s ability to address other, more tenuous targets, like transparency commitments acting administrator Andrew Wheeler recently made.
Ms Bergeson said that once the government reopens, institutional capacity will be devoted to playing catch-up on tasks required by law. Accordingly, big-picture goals may be set aside.
"The shutdown has put a real wrinkle in the agency’s desire to do anything that isn’t required by date certain," she said.
https://chemicalwatch.com/73408/shutdown-threatens-further-delays-to-tsca-new-chemicals-reviews
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(ACC Mentioned) Duckworth Alleges Political Interference with Ethylene Oxide Inspections
Jan 16, 2019 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Alex Guillén
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) today alleged that political appointees at EPA’s Region 5 office in Chicago have instructed agency employees not to inspect facilities that use a certain carcinogenic chemical.
Ethylene oxide is used to sterilize medical equipment and is used to make products like antifreeze, plastics and detergents, according to EPA.
Duckworth said at a confirmation hearing for acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler that Region 5 Administrator Cathy Stepp and other political appointees had given the order. She also said it appears EPA had not conducted any inspections on ethylene oxide in at least the last six months.
It is “incredibly disappointing,” said Duckworth, who noted specifically concerns from residents near an ethylene oxide hearing in Willowbrook, Ill., but that facilities across the U.S. use it. She called for EPA’s Office of Inspector General to investigate.
“I’d like to talk to my staff and find out what’s going on there. This is news to me,” responded Wheeler.
The American Chemistry Council last year complained that EPA has used a "significantly flawed risk value" and asked EPA to revisit its findings.
https://subscriber.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard/2019/01/duckworth-alleges-political-interference-with-ethylene-oxide-inspections-2507569
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EPA’s Strategy for Fluorinated Chemicals Caught Up in Shutdown
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Sylvia Carignan
The EPA’s plan for a nationwide strategy to address widespread fluorinated chemicals is the latest action caught up in the federal government shutdown.
Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler told a Senate committee Jan. 16 that the agency was planning to release its national plan on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, which have contaminated drinking water systems throughout the country. The plan was supposed to come out next week, but it has been “slightly” delayed by the shutdown, he said.
The strategy had been set for release last fall and then it was pushed to the end of 2018. Wheeler didn’t provide an updated timeline at his Jan. 16 Senate Environment and Public Works Committee confirmation hearing to become administrator.
The contaminants, also known as PFAS, have been used to manufacture nonstick and stain-resistant coatings in clothing, fast-food wrappers, carpets, and other consumer and industrial products.
PFAS compounds may cause adverse health effects, including developmental effects to fetuses, testicular and kidney cancer, liver tissue damage, immune system or thyroid effects, and changes in cholesterol, according to the EPA. No consensus exists on what amounts of the compounds are safe to consume.
Michigan Reps. Dan Kildee (D), Debbie Dingell (D), and Fred Upton (R) introduced a bill (H.R. 535) Jan. 14 that would authorize the EPA to order PFAS cleanups and set a deadline to develop regulations for doing so. The EPA had been considering similar provisions as part of the national strategy.
Federal agencies partially shut down starting Dec. 22.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/epas-strategy-for-fluorinated-chemicals-caught-up-in-shutdown
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Wheeler Won't Commit to Toxic Chemical Limit Within 2 Years
Jan 16, 2019 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Annie Snider
At his nomination hearing to lead EPA, acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler refused to promise the agency would swiftly set a drinking water limit for a pair of toxic chemicals that have made their way into drinking water across the country.
“I can’t make that commitment,” Wheeler said when asked by Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) to promise to set a drinking water limit for the chemicals PFOA and PFOS within two years.
Wheeler said his agency is looking at all of its authorities as part of the PFAS Management Plan EPA has drafted and sent to the White House for interagency review. Wheeler said he was not going to “prejudge” its actions, noting that “because of the interagency review, the other agencies have to sign off on it.”
The Defense Department, which has at least 401 military bases suspected of contamination from the chemicals, has pushed back on regulators’ efforts to deal with the chemicals. POLITICO reported that the Pentagon sought to hire a scientist with a reputation for minimizing the risk of chemicals to review PFOA and PFOS.
Meanwhile, EPA’s recommendations for cleaning up contaminated groundwater have stalled at the White House amid a dispute over how stringent they should be. And last year, the Pentagon asked EPA and the White House to intervene with the CDC as it was preparing a study that found the chemicals to be dangerous at far lower levels than EPA had said were safe.
Wheeler said he had hoped to unveil the PFAS Management Plan next week, but that it has been delayed due to the shutdown.
https://subscriber.politicopro.com/energy/whiteboard
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2 Moms Sue EPA After Their Sons Died Of Exposure To Toxic Chemical
Jan 16, 2019 | Huffington Post
By Nick Visser
Two moms whose sons died after being exposed to a toxic chemical common in paint thinners sued the Environmental Protection Agency this week, saying the agency has dragged its feet to ban products that are harmful to human health.
Lauren Atkins and Wendy Hartley filed the suit on Monday alongside the Vermont Interest Research Group and Safer Chemicals Healthy Families over the chemical methylene chloride, which is used in some paint strippers, commercial adhesives and cleaning products. Atkins’ son Joshua died after inhaling fumes from the chemical while refinishing a bike part in a bathroom. Hartley’s son Kevin died after similar exposure while using paint stripper on a bathtub.
The chemical can easily be obtained by everyday consumers but has been linked to more than 50 reported deaths, according to the suit. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes exposure can result in dizziness, nausea and numbness in extremities after limited exposure, and unconsciousness or death at higher rates.
Under former President Barack Obama, the EPA first proposed banning methylene chloride in consumer products. Former agency administrator Scott Pruitt, who was appointed by President Donald Trump, pledged last May to finalize the ban after meeting with Hartley, but after Pruitt was forced to resign months later, the proposal never moved forward.
“10 months after Mr. Pruitt’s explicit vows to finalize the proposed ban, no rule has been issued and MC paint removers continue to place Americans at risk of lethal health effects,” the suit says.
Many of America’s largest retailers have already taken action against the chemical, including Lowe’s, Home Depot, Amazon and Walmart, citing the dangers of the product.
Bob Sussman, an attorney representing Atkins and Hartley, told BuzzFeed news that the longer the chemical remains on the market, the more danger it poses to Americans.
“It’s a very dangerous chemical, and since the [EPA] rule was proposed in 2017, there have been at least four deaths and there will probably be more deaths unless the EPA acts to get it off the market,” Sussman, who worked for the EPA under Presidents Bill Clinton and Obama, told BuzzFeed. “It’s disturbing that EPA is not taking action here and that even now is hedging its bets.”
The Washington Post reported that since the Obama administration first proposed banning the product, four people including Kevin Hartley have died of exposure to methylene chloride. The newspaper also reported last week that the EPA has sent out proposals to continue the use of the chemical in commercial applications while banning it publicly, a plan that prompted immediate ire from some lawmakers.
“Despite explicit assurances provided to my office that EPA would finalize a ban that protected both consumer and commercial users from this dangerous chemical, the Trump EPA appears to have failed to live up to those assurances,” Sen. Thomas R. Carper (D-Del.) told the Post. “I will do everything in my power to ensure that the final rule takes all needed steps to ban a chemical so dangerous that it has killed dozens of Americans, including trained professionals who were taking precautions on the job.”
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/methylene-chloride-epa_us_5c3eb5d4e4b0922a21d9dd72
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Echa Pins Down Causes of Poorly Functioning eSDSs
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Clelia Oziel
Ambiguous requirements for exposure scenarios in safety data sheets and lack of harmonised methods to adjust them to the needs of all users, are to blame for poor safety communication along chemical supply chains, Echa has said.
Exposure scenarios circulated through extended safety data sheets (eSDS) under REACH aim to ensure safe handling and adequate control of risks through the whole lifecycle of substances, not just those related to direct customers of the supplier.
But addressing the needs of all recipients in the supply chain and securing efficient information flow through a complex market has been challenging, Echa said in a report submitted to the meeting of the Competent Authorities for REACH and CLP (Caracal) in November.
The European Commission has set out to improve the workability and quality of eSDSs as part of its second REACH Review.
It called for harmonised formats and IT tools that would provide more user-targeted information, and said it will consider minimum requirements for the exposure scenarios in eSDSs. It also requested Echa to develop a methodology for SDSs for mixtures.
Echa's own findings came in an annex to the Commission's action plan on eSDSs presented to Caracal. The agency said safety communication through eSDSs is not functioning properly, due to:ambiguous requirements for exposure scenarios related to mixtures;absence of agreed methods to better fit the exposure scenarios to the needs of the recipient; and lack of harmonisation enabling IT support.
Echa said it identified the root causes mainly through its work with stakeholders under the umbrella of the Exchange Network on Exposure Scenarios (Enes) – a collaborative network that includes several industry associations.
Quality deficiencies in eSDSs were also highlighted in the fifth REACH enforcement project (Ref-5), which in December revealed hundreds of infringements.Poor fit
Echa's annex provides some explanation for the outcomes of Ref-5. There are a number of factors "preventing a sufficiently strong demand from the market for better quality exposure scenarios", it said.
For mixtures, the agency added, there is no common understanding of whether an SDS should have an exposure scenario annex like the substance-related SDS, and whether users of mixtures have downstream users’ duties under REACH.
And exposure scenarios "often do not fit" the needs and the information processing capacity of those receiving it, it said. The reasons for this include:the conditions of safe use in the registrant's exposure scenarios are expressed in generic terms;there is no agreed method for companies to compare the exposure scenarios with existing practices at site;no common understanding of how to use information on exposure scenarios in other contexts, for example, in workplace risk assessment; andno harmonised method for companies dealing with mixtures to combine the information on exposure scenarios for various ingredient substances.
Some formulators find it even more efficient to carry out the chemical safety report (CSR) for the mixture themselves, rather than having to process all the incoming exposure scenario information, Echa said.
The agency pointed to lack of harmonisation of the data format of eSDSs as another issue. This results in information being uploaded manually into tools for processing, "which consumes a lot of resources and is error prone". The various formats used also "create frustration and reduce efficiency".
https://chemicalwatch.com/73427/echa-pins-down-causes-of-poorly-functioning-esdss
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Government Publishes Draft UK REACH Statutory Instrument
Jan 16, 2019 | Chemical Watch
By Clelia Oziel and Luke Buxton
The UK government has published a draft statutory instrument (SI) to create a UK version of REACH in the event of the UK leaving the EU without a deal on 29 March. The plans would significantly reduce public participation in chemicals control, an NGO has said.
The SI, published on 9 January, comes amid chaos over Brexit after Prime Minister Theresa May’s EU withdrawal deal suffered a crushing defeat in Parliament on 15 January.
It sets out further details on registrations, authorisations and the UK chemicals agency, and provides for the automatic transfer of existing EU registrations held by UK-based companies, including only representatives, which meet certain criteria with "no break in their validity".
The transfer applies to qualifying registrations held by UK-based companies two years prior to EU withdrawal, with some 12,000 registrations expected to be 'grandfathered'.
However, as previously reported, all transferring UK registrants will need to resubmit registration data to the the Health & Safety Executive (HSE), which will be the country’s new chemicals agency.
During the first stage, they must submit basic data to the agency within 60 days of exit day. Full information appropriate to the registrant’s tonnage band is then required within two years – a timeframe that has alarmed industry. In December the government promised to review the timetable.
While Echa decisions concerning UK registrations that existed immediately prior to Brexit will continue to have force, the HSE will be able to amend any deadline in those decisions.
The SI also confirms that British businesses using substances supplied by EU27 players will become importers and provides "transitional support" through an interim notification system instead of requiring a full registration.
Companies importing chemicals would need to submit basic data on any substances within 180 days. The interim notification will be replaced by a full registration after two years.
And any EU REACH authorisations held by UK companies will continue to have effect after EU exit. The UK chemicals agency will consider any applications requesting an extension to the authorisation.
In cases where Echa’s committees have given opinions on a UK application for an authorisation and the Commission is yet to make a decision, the Secretary of State will do so.Public participation
According to the draft, the HSE will accept advice from the Environment Agency and the devolved environmental regulators on chemicals controls.
But Michael Warhurst, executive director of NGO CHEM Trust, said the SI would create "a very closed system with a huge reduction in public participation".
The government has "stripped out" all committees and associated stakeholder engagement provided for under the EU REACH umbrella, "replacing it with an obligation for HSE to get external advice", Mr Warhurst said.
In place of Echa’s Board of Appeal, the government will hear any appeals against HSE decisions on chemicals in its existing First Tier Tribunal, which currently hears appeals concerning environmental regulations.‘Fit for purpose’
Meanwhile, an independent regulatory committee has found the government's assessment of implementing a UK REACH is "fit for purpose".
However, the Regulatory Policy Committee’s report into the SI, and a government impact assessment that accompanied it, highlighted the need for more accurate information on data and other UK REACH-related costs, including those for familiarisation, labour and time.
The impact assessment says firms may incur "substantial costs" to acquire data if they cannot gain access to their old data registered under EU REACH.
The RPC report calls for further clarity on these costs. It asks how much new data need be generated in the UK if the data has changed. Additionally, it said, if the data has not changed and is the sole property of the company "it is not clear why they cannot simply provide copies from their own records".
It also questions the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) whether costs from new registrations and authorisations with the HSE are solely to provide access to UK markets, or if they can use the revenues from the EU access to offset these costs.
The UK competent authority may well have access to data already, the RPC report says, and Defra should explain how these data assets "will be apportioned" in a no-deal Brexit.
Defra says the measures it plans to put in place will bring some benefits, including giving the UK authorities "the power to respond to new and emerging risks" from chemicals.
There may be a negative impact on animal welfare, however, if data sharing with Echa is not established and firms may be required to duplicate animal testing, it says.
https://chemicalwatch.com/73430/government-publishes-draft-uk-reach-statutory-instrument
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EU Lawmakers Call for More Transparent Pesticide Authorizations
Jan 16, 2019 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Stephen Gardner
Pesticide producers could face greater constraints when seeking authorization for their products in the European Union, if European Parliament recommendations go forward.
As part of the EU risk assessment procedure for substances in pesticides, companies seeking authorizations should be obliged to publish all relevant studies, the underlying data, and sales data, according to lawmakers.
Sitting in Strasbourg, France, European Parliament lawmakers Jan. 16 voted 526-66, with 72 abstentions, in favor of a nonbinding opinion on the EU’s system for the authorization of pesticides.
In addition, pesticide companies would face more oversight when authorizations were granted, through a system created to “monitor the real-life impacts of the use of plant protection products,” and to publish data on their application, Parliament said in the opinion.
Many pesticide producers do believe “the existing system needs to be better implemented,” though didn’t agree with all the points in the lawmakers’ opinion, said Graeme Taylor, public affairs director at the European Crop Protection Association in Brussels
BASF SE spokeswoman Birgit Lau, Corteva Agriscience spokesman Jozsef Mate, and Syngenta AG spokeswoman Anna Bakola all referred a request for comment to the European Crop Protection Association.
Nominated AuthoritiesOther changes that lawmakers supported could mean companies would no longer be able to choose an EU country to assess their pesticide authorization applications. Instead, the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, would allocate a country to assess each application.
In the EU system, authorization applications for substances in pesticides are initially assessed by the authorities in one country and the European Food Safety Authority then reviews that country’s findings. Once authorization for a substance is granted, individual countries subsequently license pesticide products that contain that substance.
The Parliament’s opinion is nonbinding, but the commission said it would be taken into account in an ongoing review of EU laws on pesticides, which will publish its findings during the first half of 2019 and could lead to proposals to amend the laws.
At the heart of lawmakers’ concerns about pesticides was “the need to answer the question of what model of food production we want to see in Europe,” Taylor said.
The European Parliament and European Commission should “make answering this question a priority so that we might move beyond the polarized debate we see today,” he said.
Glyphosate ConcernsThe Parliament’s opinion is based on the outcome of a special committee set up in 2018 to look into the EU’s pesticide authorization process in the wake of controversy about the reauthorization of glyphosate, the world’s most widely used herbicide.
Glyphosate is controversial because of fears about whether it causes cancer, with conflicting opinions issued by different scientific and regulatory agencies. The substance was reauthorized in the EU in late 2017 for a five-year period compared to a more typical 15-year re-approval.
On Jan. 15, a group of European Parliament lawmakers published findings that they said showed material from glyphosate-producing companies had been directly copied and pasted into the assessment report prepared by Germany’s Federal Institute for Risk Assessment on the renewal of glyphosate.
This action underlined the need for a reform of the EU pesticide authorization system in order to “reinforce independent, transparent assessment procedures,” Bart Staes, a Belgian Green member of the European Parliament, told Bloomberg Environment Jan. 16.
The German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment said in a Jan. 15 statement that it was acceptable for relevant material from pesticide companies to be copied into official assessment reports as long as it was “up to standard.”
While pointing out that “we do not say that the agrochemical companies have no role to play in providing studies,” Staes said the assessment process should be independent and any such copy-pasting should be “limited to an absolute minimum” and should be clearly indicated in assessment reports.
https://news.bloombergenvironment.com/environment-and-energy/eu-lawmakers-call-for-more-transparent-pesticide-authorizations
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Shutdown Leaves Oil and Gas Unscathed, but for How Long?
Jan 16, 2019 | Houston Chronicle
By James Osborne
Airport security waits mount behind absentee screeners and paycheck-less federal workers try to figure out how to pay their mortgages. But at least for now, the business of drilling for oil and gas continues to hum along during the three-week-old-and-counting partial shutdown of the federal government.
While most of the Bureau of Land Management is closed, the agency says it continues to issue permits for oil and gas drilling on federal land. And under the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement’s shutdown plan, it will continue to inspect offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico.
A spokesman for the oil lobbying group American Petroleum Institute said in an email, “We are monitoring the shut down impacts, but production does not appear to have been affected at this point.” But how much longer oil and gas companies can avoid the deeper pain of a government shutdown, as suffered by industries as diverse as farming and defense contracting, remains to be seen.
Even as permits for near-term projects are issued by skeleton staffs at federal agencies, the harder work of assessing the effects of future projects on the environment, Native American sites and wildlife has come to a virtual halt within government offices, industry officials and attorneys say.
“What folks are starting to see is where they have projects that are in process and need some sort of government approval, those reviews are starting to slow down,” said Ann Navaro, a Washington attorney and former top official at the Interior Department. “Some of those projects have long time lines so a couple weeks may not make a significant difference. But it will if the shutdown continues.”
On edge
In the western United States, where large portions of the oil and gas industry rely on federal lease sales for new drilling sites, nerves are already on edge.
The Bureau of Land Management has yet to delay any lease sales, with a big sale in Wyoming scheduled for next month. But Dan Naatz, senior vice president of government relations at the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said he wouldn’t be surprised if they were delayed.
“It’s that uncertainty that can really cast a long shadow as you’re trying to make investments, especially for our smaller companies,” he said. “We hope the White House and Congress - all this is above our pay grade - but we hope they will take action and the shutdown will be resolved soon.”
The so-far relatively painless experience of the oil and gas sector has drawn criticism that the Trump administration is playing favorites, helping along an industry at the center of its American “energy dominance” economic strategy. Last week, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management updated its plans for a government shutdown to allow staff working on the agency’s five-year plan for offshore oil and gas drilling to come back to work, potentially allowing that document to be released during the shutdown and keep the administration’s efforts to open the Arctic and the Atlantic moving forward.
Michael Saul, senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, questioned how it was that oil and gas permitting continued while government environmental work was suspended and national parks were left unmaintained.
“They say no permits would go forward that require cultural and environmental reviews. But how can they determine that when the people with the expertise aren’t working?” Saul said. “There’s so much confusion right now. The problem we have is this is an administration hostile to transparency at the best of times.”
Past administrations' actions during shutdowns are mixed. During a 2013 shutdown under the Obama administration, the Bureau of Land Management did not issue any drilling permits, an agency spokesman said.
But during that same shutdown, Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement did continue to issue permits and conduct safety inspections, said Eileen Angelico, a spokeswoman at BSEE said.
"Processing permits and inspections of offshore oil and gas operations are considered mission critical activities to continue support of the sustained exploration and development of energy resources on the Outer Continental Shelf," she said in an email.
2020 looming
Not all aspects of the government's oversight over the oil and gas sector continue to operate during the shutdown.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration, which oversees the permitting of deep water oil and natural gas import and export terminals, has been closed. That has put at least three proposed crude oil export terminals along the Gulf Coast in limbo, including an export terminal south of Galveston developed by Houston pipeline and storage terminal operator Enterprise Products Partners.
Also, the Trump administration’s efforts to repeal Obama-era environmental laws has ground to a halt during the shutdown. With the Environmental Protection Agency closed, no employees are reviewing the thousands of comments on the administration proposal to rewrite regulations limiting methane regulations from oil and gas wells or to work on a proposal to roll back a sprawling water protection regulation.
With the 2020 election drawing closer, that is creating concern among lobbyists who fear lawsuits opposing the regulatory changes might delay implementation to the point that a new president could be in office before they take effect.
“We would like to see all these regulatory issues settled before the presidential election. We don’t know what’s going to happen and the timeline is getting more and more compressed,” said Lee Fuller, executive vice President of government relations at the Independent Petroleum Association of America. “There’s no clear path. The litigation is going to be fairly extensive and complex.”
For now, government shutdown shows few signs of ending. And even when it does end, industry officials warn that agencies will need weeks, if not months to catch up.
Not only will backlogs need to be addressed, but also with new problems that arose in the three weeks and counting the government was shut down.
“You can’t just pick up exactly where you left off because in the meantime other priorities emerge,” Navaro said. “The shutdown causes a ripple effect.”
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Shutdown-leaves-oil-and-gas-unscathed-but-for-13536955.php
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Dems Blast Interior over Leasing Work During Shutdown
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Greenwire
By Kellie Lunney
Top House Democrats today called Interior's move allowing employees to work on the department's offshore drilling activities during the government shutdown "outrageous," demanding acting Secretary David Bernhardt reverse the decision — or come to Capitol Hill to explain it.
The reasons Interior provided for bringing staff back during the longest government shutdown in history to work on offshore drilling leases sales, seismic permits and related tasks are "farcical and make it clear that the administration cares only about the impacts of its favorite industry and not about workers, their families, and ordinary Americans," said the letter to Bernhardt.
It came from House Natural Resources Chairman Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.); Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), incoming head of the Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee; and Rep. Alan Lowenthal (D-Calif.).
If Bernhardt ignores their request to reverse the decision, Democrats "insist" the acting secretary "come to Capitol Hill this week for a detailed briefing providing the legal justification for what appears to be a violation of the Antideficiency Act, and providing information on where the funding for these activities is coming from, how it is being spent, and what the consequences are of spending that funding during the shutdown," said the letter.
Interior last week updated its shutdown contingency plans so 40 employees at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management could be available on-call to perform "the exempt functions" of preparing decision documents related to the National Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Program (E&E News PM, Jan. 15).
The work includes conducting environmental review and finalizing seismic testing permits for energy exploration off the Atlantic coast.
"In order to comply with the Administration's America First energy strategy to develop a new [outer continental shelf] Oil and Gas leasing program, work must continue toward issuing the Proposed Program per the Outer Continental Shelf Leasing Act requirements," reads the Jan. 8 updated plan.
The plan also said if the shutdown, now in its 26th day, goes on, more employees will be designated as exempt to prepare for upcoming oil leasing sales in the Gulf of Mexico. They will be exempt "only for the amount of time needed to complete this work" and paid with carryover funds.
"Failure to hold these sales would have a negative impact to the Treasury and negatively impact investment in the U.S. Offshore Gulf of Mexico," the plan says.
The former shutdown plan, dated December 2018, does not mention the OCS leasing program. It says that BOEM employees would not work on new energy development and that essential employees would permit ongoing work to buttress sister agency the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, the offshore regulator.
Grijalva, McCollum and Lowenthal blasted Interior for the move "while 800,000 federal workers are missing paychecks, Native Americans are at risk of losing access to food and health care, travelers face extended delays at the airport, and our national parks are piling up with trash and seeing the destruction of irreplaceable natural resources."
Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association, said Interior's move makes sense, given the offshore energy industry generates billions of dollars for the economy and provides thousands of well-paying jobs.
Luthi added that "much of the work" for the upcoming March sale already is finished.
"NOIA supports the administration's decision to bring back, on a limited basis, dedicated Department of Interior employees to continue preparatory work for upcoming offshore oil and natural gas lease sales, which were approved and scheduled during the Obama administration," said Luthi.
Interior spokeswoman Faith Vander Voort said, "We are happy to meet with the Committee, as appropriate. We are confident we are fully meeting our legal obligations. We care about our employees, parks, public lands, and border security."
Earlier this month, multiple coastal lawmakers introduced bills to halt the Trump administration's controversial five-year drilling plan, which proposes opening up more than 90 percent of the OCS to oil and gas extraction.
The bipartisan legislation would prohibit offshore drilling or energy exploration in federal waters off the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf of Mexico coasts. Some bills are state-specific, and others span the entire Eastern Seaboard (E&E News PM, Jan. 8).
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2019/01/16/stories/1060116249
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Less Volatile Gas Prices Give Newest US LNG Plant Smoother Start-Up
Jan 16, 2019 | Platts
By Jason Lord
US LNG export projects, whether brownfield or greenfield, are multi-year, billion dollar projects. While construction timelines dictate their commissioning schedule, there can be inconvenient and convenient times in the unpredictable natural gas market to begin this testing.
The two most recent additions to the US fleet of natural gas liquefaction and export facilities – Cove Point LNG and Corpus Christi LNG – demonstrate this. They began operations about one year apart during the winter months, when gas prices are typically elevated, but disparate conditions over the two winters meant vastly different feedgas costs in the critical ramp-up phase.
Corpus Christi, located in Texas, is the latest facility to begin commissioning. It has been making progress toward commercial operation at Train 1 following that train’s first cargo export onboard the Maria Energy, December 11. Meanwhile, its second train recently received Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approval for fuel gas introduction.
Corpus Christi facility has enjoyed unusually low 2018-2019 winter gas prices in the Southeast and East Texas. Henry Hub’s cash settlement on Thursday January 3, 2019 priced at $2.685/MMBtu, its lowest price back to May 4, 2018, when it was trading at the same price. Prices since then have climbed back above $3/MMBtu, trading at $3.36/MMBtu on January 14, a three week high.
S&P Global Platts Analytics data shows that flows for the January 4 and 5 gas days were record-setting, with total US LNG feedgas demand reaching 5.5 Bcf/d, including feedgas demand pull from Sabine Pass, Cove Point and Corpus Christi.
One year ago, the US gas market dealt quite a different hand to Maryland’s Cove Point facility during its commissioning period.
On January 3, 2018 Henry Hub’s cash price spiked to $6.875/MMBtu, its highest cash price of 2018.
Cove Point ended up being delayed with its lone Train 1 commissioning. Data from Platts Analytics showed LNG feedgas demand pull didn’t kick in substantially until January 31, 2018 when 206 MMcf/d of feed gas flowed to the facility. On that date, Transco Zone 5 priced at $4.58/MMBtu and Transco Zone 6 non-NY was $4.62/MMBtu.
Dominion, the owner of the Cove Point facility, blamed the delays on “typical start-up issues.”
This start-up delay occurred at a time in January when there were also record cold temperatures in early 2018 that led to cash prices above $100/MMBtu. Transco Zone 5 and Transco Zone 6 non-New York on January 4, 2018, spiked to $127.00/MMBtu and $124.735/MMBtu, respectively, the two locations’ highest cash prices ever. Cove Point’s first cargo ultimately was shipped in March 2018.
Cash natural gas prices are certainly not the only factor affecting for terminal start-up schedules, but LNG facility commissioning timelines could be impacted by the volatile prices of the winter natural gas market.
Platts Analytics data shows that Cove Point had the longest duration in days, of any recent US lower 48 liquefaction train, between FERC fuel and feedgas approvals to first significant (100 MMcf/d) flows at 299 days from their fuel gas approval and 153 days from their feedgas approval.
In comparison, Cheniere’s Corpus Christi Train 1 had 139 days between its fuel gas approval and significant flows above 100 MMcf/d. Even shorter, at 55 days was its feedgas approval timeline to significant flows, Platts Analytics data shows.
While Cove Point only has one train at its facility, Corpus Christi’s continuing progression in the commissioning of its second train may be helped by historically low natural gas prices that have returned to Texas and the Southeast this winter and at the start of 2019.
https://blogs.platts.com/2019/01/16/less-volatile-gas-prices-give-newest-us-lng-plant-smoother-start-up/#more-29156
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Study Sees CO2 'Rebound' Under Proposed Carbon Rule
Jan 16, 2019 | E&E Climatewire
By Niina Heikkinen
EPA's proposed replacement for the Obama-era Clean Power Plan could lead to increases in carbon emissions in 2030 compared with having no climate rule in place at all, a new study has found.
The proposed Affordable Clean Energy rule's focus on cutting emissions through efficiency improvements could cause emissions to increase at 28 percent of regulated power plants, as more efficient plants run more frequently and states delay retirement of older, dirtier plants, according to the study.
This phenomenon — known as the emissions "rebound effect" — was one environmental and public health groups had warned of following the rule's announcement in August.
The researchers from Harvard University, Syracuse University and Resources for the Future found the rule would lead to "substantial variation" in carbon emissions among states. Eighteen states and Washington, D.C., would see higher emissions. Of those, Maryland would have the highest percentage increase: an 8.7 percent uptick in 2030.
"It's sort of an astonishing outcome for a re-draft of a regulation," said Dallas Burtraw, senior fellow at Resources for the Future and the report's co-author.
The study's publication comes as acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler prepares for his confirmation hearing today before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Democrats are likely to press Wheeler, who's making his case to be permanent head of EPA, on the agency's continued push to rewrite Obama-era rules.
The ACE rule is a marked departure from the 2015 Clean Power Plan, which took a systems-based approach to cutting carbon from the power sector. The Trump EPA's proposal instead focuses on power plants making efficiency improvements at the facility level. It does not provide specific emissions reductions targets, giving states broad leeway to decide how much carbon-cutting they consider reasonable within the power sector.
The resulting rule is expected to lead to higher carbon emissions than the Clean Power Plan, with emissions reductions nationwide only slightly more than what would occur with no rule in place at all.
Foes of the Trump administration have widely criticized the proposal for failing to drive aggressive emissions reductions. Mounting scientific evidence, including from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has shown the need to slash fossil fuel use across the globe as quickly as possible to forestall catastrophic climate impacts.
An EPA spokesman argued the ACE rule would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 34 percent compared with 2005 levels.
"CPP did not result in any reduction in CO2 because it was legally problematic and stayed by the U.S. Supreme Court. ACE on the other hand would continue to reduce emissions across the nation," John Konkus, deputy associate administrator for public affairs, said in an email.
"Many states have already taken a number of actions to improve their GHG emissions profile. Once the ACE rule is finalized, we have three years to work with states to continue to make these reductions as they develop their implementation plans," he added.
In their new study, the researchers zeroed in on the agency's regulatory impact analysis for the rule, which laid out projections for emissions reductions. They point out that while EPA briefly acknowledged the potential for a rebound effect, its modeling did not estimate how large that effect could be.
"Since ACE doesn't mandate a carbon emissions rate, it gives the electricity sector a free pass on emissions, we weren't too surprised that this is the outcome. It's pretty much a recipe for increasing carbon emissions in some regions going forward," said Kathleen Fallon Lambert, senior adviser at Harvard's Center for Climate, Health and the Global Environment (C-CHANGE) and a co-author of the paper.
For 14 states, increased generation from coal-fired power plants would be a big driver of emissions. California, Georgia, Massachusetts, Oregon and D.C. would see heightened emissions from increases in natural gas use.
Lambert noted the study's modeling assumes electricity demand will remain constant. But a separate preliminary report by the Rhodium Group recently found an increase in electricity demand last year, leading to a 1.9 percent increase in emissions from the power sector.
"We think these numbers are probably a bit overly optimistic," Lambert said.
The researchers also found the plan could lead to increased emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. Nineteen states would see increases in SO2 by 2030 under ACE, while 20 states and D.C. would see increases in NOx.
"These pollutants contribute to PM 2.5 [fine particles] and ozone, with health effects including increased risk of premature death, respiratory disease, heart attack and some neuro-cognitive diseases as well," said Jonathan Buonocore, research associate at C-CHANGE and another co-author of the paper.
The researchers questioned how a proposal that would lead to increased emissions in 28 percent of power plants could represent a plan that meets the legal standards of the "best system of emissions reductions" under the Clean Air Act.
"This is a policy-driven decision to back away from the approach of the Clean Power Plan and use a source-based approach, with a perverse outcome. This rule seems inadequate for achieving its intended purposes," Burtraw said.
He noted EPA could address the rebound effect by requiring power plants to at least maintain their current level of carbon emissions.
The researchers said the rule would make it even harder for specific states with emissions targets to meet their goals and for the United States to meet emissions reductions targets laid out in the Paris Agreement.
"A rule like ACE could lock us in an energy pathway that's dependent on fossil fuels and slow the transition to renewable energy and energy efficiency," Lambert said.
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2019/01/16/stories/1060114981
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