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Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) Backing Obama, Chemical Industry Squares Off Against Democrats And Activists Over Trade
Mar 23, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Glenn Hess

For chemical manufacturers and other industries, free-trade agreements mean greater access to growing overseas markets, increased exports, and more high-paying jobs in the U.S. “Boosting exports is one of the surest paths to a stronger economy and new jobs,” says Calvin M. Dooley, chief executive officer of the American Chemistry Council...
(ACC Mentioned) NPE '15: Lighter Autos Boosts Plastic Demand – US DuPont Execs
Mar 23, 2015 | ICIS Chemical Business
By Jessie Waldheim

The move to reduce the weight of automobiles to comply with stricter fuel-efficiency standards can be a boon to the plastics industry and the development of plastics technology, executives with US-based DuPont said on Monday. "I think this will be another accelerator for the growth of the plastics industry," Hok Hoh Wong, DuPont regional director...
(ACC Mentioned) Asia Light Vehicle Sales to Grow to 40M Units in 2015 - Consultant
Mar 23, 2015 | ICIS Chemical Business
By Nurluqman Suratman

Light vehicle sales in Asia are expected to grow by 3.9% year on year to 40m units in 2015, amid continued strong growth in key market China, an industry consultant said in Tuesday. This growth trend is expected to continue in the next five years, with light vehicle sales projected to reach 52.6m units in 2020, said Peter Kelly, the managing ...

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Lawmakers Look For 'Delicate Balance' As Senate Mulls Broad TSCA Changes
Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News
By Sam Pearson

With a high-stakes hearing complete, lawmakers are set to hunker down in the weeks ahead for crucial negotiations on a bipartisan bill to update the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976, in what observers say could be the most significant change to a federal environmental law since 1990's Clean Air Act amendments.
(ACC Mentioned) Reform of US Chemical Safety Rules Back On
Mar 24, 2015 | Chemistry World
By Rebecca Trager

The venerable law that governs the US’s chemicals policy appears poised to receive a revamp. The law, which is almost 40 years old, is one that government, industry and environmental groups agree hasn’t worked and needs updating. A bill to tackle this problem that industry and even some environmental groups are backing is proceeding ...
EPA Revokes New Use Rule Issued in 1990 For Two Flame Retardants Used in Plastic
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

Companies that make or import two flame retardants will no longer be subject to production volume limits and recordkeeping requirements under a final rule scheduled for publication March 24. The Environmental Protection Agency determined the two flame retardants have inherently low toxicity, according to the final rule (RIN 2070-AB27)...
Paint Stripper Poses Reproductive Risks To Workers, Consumers, EPA Says in Analysis
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Pat Rizzuto

Paint and coating strippers containing n-methylpyrrolidone may harm the health of people, particularly unborn babies, the Environmental Protection Agency said in a final analysis released March 23. The agency urged workers and consumers—especially pregnant women or women of childbearing age—that use the solvent to wear gloves...
Chemical in Paint Remover Found Dangerous for Pregnant Women
Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Lydia Wheeler

The Environmental Protection Agency has found that a chemical commonly used to remove paint poses a health risk to pregnant women and women of childbearing age. EPA released its risk assessment for N-Methylprrolidone (NMP) on Monday afternoon, which found there’s an acute and chronic risk for adverse developmental outcomes if...

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Energy and Environment News

New Us Fracking Rules Require Public Disclosure Of Chemicals
Mar 24, 2015 | Chemical Watch

Companies conducting hydraulic fracturing – fracking – on public lands will have to publicly disclose the chemicals used in the operations, under new rules issued by the US Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management. There are currently about 100,000 oil and gas wells on federally managed lands, more than 90% of which use fracking.
Federal Fracking Rule Sent to Federal Register
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Interior Department's final rule governing hydraulic fracturing on federal and Indian lands is scheduled to be published March 26 in the Federal Register. It will become effective June 24. The rule, from the Bureau of Land Management, provides for updated requirements on testing of well integrity, management of waste fluids and ...
Greens: Obama Caved on Fracking
Mar 24, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

Environmental groups say President Obama squandered the best opportunity he had to tighten regulations on the process of hydraulic fracturing for oil and natural gas. Congress exempted fracking from many environmental laws, and Interior Department regulations unveiled late last week were perhaps the last major chance environmentalists...
Wonks Vs. Greens
Mar 23, 2015 | PoliticoPro
By Alex Guillén

One of the most technocratic agencies in the federal government has become an unlikely magnet for unruly eco-protesters. That’s turned meetings of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission into monthly spectacles far different from the agency’s usually dry debates about transmission planning, pricing disputes and electric reliability...
Can Cruz Win the Oil Primary?
Mar 23, 2015 | PoliticoPro
By Andrew Restuccia & Elana Schor

Even in a strongly pro-fossil-fuel GOP presidential field, Ted Cruz stands out for his devotion to his home-state oil industry and its agenda. Republicans widely champion an energy platform based on expanded oil and gas drilling, opposition to EPA climate regulations and approval of the Keystone XL pipeline. But Cruz has gone beyond that ...
Former Coburn Aide Joins Western Drilling Group
Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News
By Phil Taylor

An energy aide to former Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) has joined the Western Energy Alliance, a Denver-based trade group representing hundreds of oil and gas developers. Tripp Parks, who has served the past three years as Coburn's counsel and legislative assistant, will be WEA's policy analyst overseeing public lands and wildlife issues.
What To Watch For In This Week's Senate 'Vote-A-Rama'
Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News
By Nick Juliano

The Senate took up its annual budget resolution last night, kicking off several days of debate that will cover just about every topic on Congress' plate -- from defense spending to health care to taxes -- and energy and environment issues will surely be part of the mix. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision to spend the entire month of...
EPA Moves to Consolidate Power Plant Reporting
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Environmental Protection Agency is taking a phased approach to consolidating how power plants will comply with reporting requirements under the mercury and air toxics standards. The agency March 24 will publish a final rule (RIN 2060-AS39) that the agency described as the first step in consolidating the submission of all electronic...
Whitfield Plans Legislation to Postpone State Compliance With Clean Power Plan
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Andrew Childers

Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) plans to introduce a bill that would delay implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan and allow states to opt out of the carbon dioxide regulation if it would increase utility rates or jeopardize reliability. The Ratepayer Protection Act, which Whitfield is distributing in the House for discussion, would postpone a requirement for states to submit plans to the EPA for implementing the carbon...
Whitfield Vows Bill Within 2 Weeks Offering States Relief From EPA Rule
Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News
By Jean Chemnick

Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) said yesterday he plans to introduce legislation soon that would let states opt out of U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan permanently. His measure would grant all states an automatic reprieve from deadlines to submit implementation plans (SIPs) for the existing power plant rule until judicial review has concluded, according...
EPA Rule On Power Plant Emissions Faces Formidable Hurdle In Supreme Court
Mar 23, 2015 | LA Times
By David G. Savage

Twenty-five years in the making, a new nationwide rule is set to take effect this spring that will sharply restrict coal and oil-fired power plants from releasing mercury, arsenic and other hazardous pollutants into the air and, eventually, into rivers and lakes. But the rule faces a final and formidable hurdle when the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments...
Analysis Group's Tierney Discusses Existing State Tools For Ensuring Reliability Under Clean Power Plan
Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

As the voices of concern over the Clean Power Plan's impact on grid reliability grow louder, do states have the ability to ensure reliability in their compliance plans by using tools currently at their disposal? During today's OnPoint, Susan Tierney, senior adviser at the Analysis Group, explains why she believes reliability issues will be solved as stakeholders...
California Committee Votes to Block Fuels Exemption
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Natural Resources Committee of the California Assembly has rejected a measure to retroactively exempt distributors of transportation fuels and natural gas from the state's greenhouse gas emissions cap-and-trade program. The committee's 6-3 vote blocks A.B. 23, which sought to repeal elements of the program that required fuel...
Inhofe Questions Whether White House Adviser Has Climate Policy Ethics Conflict
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Andrew Childers

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) questioned whether a former Environmental Defense Fund attorney hired by the White House would have a conflict of interest in pushing the administration's Climate Action Plan. Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, asked in a March 23 letter to the White House for copies of...
Sen. Inhofe Scrutinizes New White House Climate Adviser
Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) is scrutinizing the President for hiring a climate and energy adviser who used to work for a major environmental group. Megan Ceronsky was hired in January as a senior adviser to President Obama in the White House’s energy and climate change office, after having worked for near four years at the Environmental...
GOP Bill Delays Climate Rule, Gives States Veto
Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

House Republicans are preparing a bill that would delay implementation of the Obama administration’s climate rule for power plants and let state governors veto compliance plans. Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s panel on energy and power, unveiled the draft legislation Monday that he ...
Op-Ed Reining in the Coal Industry's Assault on Public Health
Mar 23, 2015 | LA Times
By Lisa Garcia

On Wednesday the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a crucial case about regulating mercury and other toxic air pollution coming from coal-fired power plants. At stake is a very dangerous precedent that industry profits are more important than thousands of lives. In late 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency issued its first-ever...
Areas in 28 States Will Be Addressed In 2016 Round of Sulfur Dioxide Designations
Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report
By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency has identified areas in 28 states that meet the criteria for inclusion in the next round of attainment designations for sulfur dioxide, which will be completed by July 2, 2016, under a settlement with environmental organizations. The EPA March 20 sent letters to environmental commissioners in Texas, Michigan...

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Industry and Association News

(ACC Mentioned) Backing Obama, Chemical Industry Squares Off Against Democrats And Activists Over Trade

Mar 23, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News

By Glenn Hess

For chemical manufacturers and other industries, free-trade agreements mean greater access to growing overseas markets, increased exports, and more high-paying jobs in the U.S.
“Boosting exports is one of the surest paths to a stronger economy and new jobs,” says Calvin M. Dooley, chief executive officer of the American Chemistry Council (ACC), a trade association that lobbies on behalf of the nation’s largest chemical companies.
But opponents, such as labor unions, maintain that trade agreements drive down wages and chase blue-collar jobs overseas as U.S.-based companies establish facilities and hire abroad.
Trade pacts negotiated by past Administrations “only benefited global corporations and not American workers who get brutalized by massive imports and jobs off-shored to exploit low labor and environmental standards,” says Leo W. Gerard, president of United Steelworkers, a union that represents approximately 30,000 chemical plant workers.
That sharp disparity in views is at the heart of a fight brewing in Congress over whether to grant President Barack Obama authority to complete two sweeping trade agreements. One pact is with a group of mostly Asian and Latin American countries. The other is with the European Union.
Advocates say the deals together would be worth tens of billions of dollars in new U.S. exports each year. But this opportunity won’t come about unless the President has the authority to finalize the agreements without the risk of Congress sending the pacts back to the drawing board.
Fast-track negotiating authority is formally known as Trade Promotion Authority (TPA). It empowers the President to unilaterally negotiate trade agreements and then submit them to Congress for yes-or-no votes without amendments that would force the Administration to reopen talks.
“This is important because, in the absence of TPA, negotiating partners are unlikely to put their best offers on the table, knowing that Congress can remove items from the agreement,” says Greg Skelton, ACC’s senior director of global affairs.
The expedited procedure also allows each chamber to approve the pacts by a simple majority vote instead of the two-thirds majority the Constitution requires to ratify international agreements.
“TPA would not only fast-track ratification of our pending free-trade agreements, it would also help ensure the best possible outcomes from the negotiations,” says William E. Allmond IV, vice president of government and public relations at the Society of Chemical Manufacturers & Affiliates (SOCMA). The trade group represents specialty chemical companies. “Our industry would see new markets open up for our products through expanded trade and elimination of nontariff barriers, which means increased investment, growth, and jobs,” Allmond asserts.
Congress has final constitutional authority to establish the terms on which the U.S. trades. But lawmakers have granted some form of enhanced trade powers to every President since Franklin D. Roosevelt. Supporters of fast-track authority argue that other countries won’t negotiate trade deals with the U.S. if the terms can unravel during congressional debate.
The authority expired in 2007, when a protracted standoff between President George W. Bush and the then-Democratic-controlled Congress allowed it to lapse. But with negotiations nearing completion on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), Obama wants Congress to pass legislation to reinstate the fast-track procedures.
Potentially the largest free-trade pact in history, TPP would tie the U.S. economy with those of Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. It aims to lower tariffs, establish strong protections for patents and corporate trade secrets, and level competition between multinational corporations and state-owned companies.
That agreement could boost U.S. chemical exports by $1.2 billion annually, Dooley says. Chemical exports surpassed the $190 billion mark in 2014 and are projected to grow nearly 8% per year through 2019 to $282 billion, according to industry forecasts.
Both TPP and the EU pact would help U.S. chemical manufacturers capitalize on the dramatic fall in production costs during the past five years because of lower prices for natural gas. This key feedstock has become plentiful and cheap with increased output in shale formations. “Even with the recent drop in oil prices, U.S. chemical manufacturers enjoy a distinct competitive advantage in global markets,” ACC’s Dooley says. That, in turn, will help expand other sectors of the U.S. economy, he adds.
For the specialty chemical sector, major growth areas are in regions such as Asia, which has seen an increase in manufacturing, SOCMA’s Allmond notes. “Increased market access shows that not only is our nation open for business but that other markets are open to U.S. manufacturers. If we don’t take our products around the world, then someone else will,” he says.
TPP, which would cover 40% of global gross domestic product and nearly 30% of world trade, is the centerpiece of Obama’s plan to position the U.S. as an economic power in the Pacific Rim and to counterbalance China’s influence in the region.
China isn’t party to TPP negotiations because its trade ministers have refused to accept the standards the agreement would require on issues such as the role of state-run enterprises and protection of intellectual property. But China isn’t standing on the sidelines. It’s attempting to convince its East Asian neighbors to create a rival 16-nation trade bloc that excludes the U.S.
Free trade is important, Obama explained in his weekly address on Feb. 21, because “95% of the world’s potential customers live outside our borders. Many of them live in the Asia-Pacific region—the world’s fastest-growing area. And as we speak, China is trying to write the rules for trade in the 21st century. That would put our workers and our businesses at a massive disadvantage. We can’t let that happen. We should write those rules.”
The White House, meanwhile, is crafting a separate multilateral trade accord with the 28-nation EU, the Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership. Those talks are at least a year away from the finish line.
But even before the U.S.-led trade deals with Asia and Europe are completed, both are being challenged—largely by the President’s own party. The Republican Party has traditionally been supportive of trade agreements because of their potential to spur economic growth. Consequently, most congressional Republicans are willing to give Obama fast-track authority.
“When the U.S. sits down at the negotiating table, everybody at that table has to trust us,” says Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), chairman of the Ways & Means Committee in the House of Representatives. “They have to know the deal the Administration wants is the deal Congress wants. We have to maintain a united front.”
But many Democratic lawmakers and a coalition of labor, environmental, and consumer activists vehemently oppose fast track. “The Administration is asking Congress to rubber-stamp this process. But we’re not going to rubber-stamp anything,” says Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn.).
She and other Democrats argue that Obama is asking for carte blanche to secretly negotiate trade deals that would send jobs abroad, suppress U.S. wages, weaken food safety and financial regulations, and undermine environmental and labor standards.
“Under fast track, all we get is an up-or-down vote on each trade deal. That is simply not acceptable. It is the opposite of our constitutional duty as members of Congress,” DeLauro remarks. “These deals affect everybody. We need to be able to scrutinize these deals page by page, line by line, word by word.”
Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) points to the U.S. trade deficit with South Korea that spiked to $25 billion last year, a 20% jump from before implementation of the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement in 2010. The U.S. also had trade deficits in 2014 with free-trade partners Mexico ($54 billion) and Canada ($34 billion). “We’re seeing a disinvestment here in the U.S.,” Ryan says. “We have seen too many trade agreements passed with no proper debate or transparency, and I cannot stand by and support a trade policy that moves jobs overseas and cripples American manufacturing.”
Although the GOP holds majorities in both the House and the Senate, fast-track legislation would need Democratic votes to get through Congress, ACC’s Dooley points out. “It’s going to take comprehensive engagement by the Administration to develop a significant degree of Democratic support,” he tells C&EN.
“We need to see some Democratic leaders in both the House and the Senate step up and support the President,” says Dooley, a former seven-term Democratic congressman from California.
“While Republicans are prepared to provide a significant number of the votes that are going to be needed to pass TPA, I think they are going to demand—and I don’t think it’s inappropriate—that President Obama secure the votes of a significant number of Democrats to ensure that there is bipartisan support,” he says.
Passing trade legislation has often been difficult. When Congress last reauthorized fast-track authority in 2002, it was by a razor-thin 215-212 margin in the House, with 190 Republicans and 25 Democrats making up the majority.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers is drafting legislation to renew fast-track authority, and Congress could vote on a bill this spring. But a lingering dispute among members of the Senate Finance Committee over the bill’s content could delay action.
“It’s going to take further selling by the Administration to convince members of their own party, including the ones most ardently opposed to TPA, to see the benefits and get on board,” SOCMA’s Allmond says. “The votes will be very close,” he predicts, “but I’m confident there will be enough support to pass TPA.”

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(ACC Mentioned) NPE '15: Lighter Autos Boosts Plastic Demand – US DuPont Execs

Mar 23, 2015 | ICIS Chemical Business

By Jessie Waldheim

The move to reduce the weight of automobiles to comply with stricter fuel-efficiency standards can be a boon to the plastics industry and the development of plastics technology, executives with US-based DuPont said on Monday.
"I think this will be another accelerator for the growth of the plastics industry," Hok Hoh Wong, DuPont regional director of the Americas, said.
Plastics have been part of vehicles for decades, and what can easily be replaced with plastics has been, Jeffery Sternberg, DuPont global automotive technology director said.
"We've picked the low-hanging fruit, so I think there's a recognition that we need to dig deeper, we need to be more creative, we need to work together more intimately in order to address that next level of light-weighting opportunity," Sternberg said.
The executives spoke on the sidelines of the National Plastics Exposition (NPE) in Orlando, Florida.
Increasingly, automobile producers are relying on plastics to reduce the weight of their vehicles. The American Chemistry Council (ACC) estimates that each vehicle contains an average of $3,500 worth of chemicals, an amount that has increased, in part, because companies are replacing metals with plastics that weigh less.
DuPont recently announced the expansion of its Zytel performance nylon capacity at its Richmond, Virginia, facility by 10% in part due to high demand from the automotive sector. The material can make engine cooling components, powertrain components, transmission housings and parts of brake, ignition systems and motors.
Wong and Sternberg believe there is further opportunities in the automotive industry for high-performance plastics.
As fuel efficiency standards become more stringent, original equipment manufacturers (OEM) are seeing the value in working with material suppliers.
Sternberg called the developing relationships a "synergistic strategy".
For example, an OEM asked DuPont to develop a better adhesive for its transmission baffles, which is a steel plate with attached rubber pieces. DuPont was able to use thermoplastic elastomers to recreate the entire part as one piece, alternately stiff and flexible where needed. The new solution is lighter and simpler.
As transmissions move from six-speed to 10-speed, they get heavier and the lighter-weight materials can make a bigger impact, Wong added.
For the auto industry, light-weighting offers more than fuel efficiency benefits. As the trend continues to move away from more traditional parts, there will be the opportunity to look at simplification and easier assembly, Wong said.
Lessons learned in working with OEMs to develop lighter, stronger, higher-heat resistant and other advanced plastics can translate into applications for other industries like consumer electronics, Wong said.
Other transportation modes, like aerospace, trains and boats, also can benefit from the developments.
"It's an exciting time to be working in the plastics space," Sternberg said. NPE runs through Friday.

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(ACC Mentioned) Asia Light Vehicle Sales to Grow to 40M Units in 2015 - Consultant

Mar 23, 2015 | ICIS Chemical Business

By Nurluqman Suratman

Light vehicle sales in Asia are expected to grow by 3.9% year on year to 40m units in 2015, amid continued strong growth in key market China, an industry consultant said in Tuesday.
This growth trend is expected to continue in the next five years, with light vehicle sales projected to reach 52.6m units in 2020, said Peter Kelly, the managing director of industry market intelligence firm LMC Automotive.
“Asia’s momentum comes primarily from China in the near term; other emergers gain later, but China will still be dominant,” Kelly said.
Kelly was speaking at the World Rubber Summit in Singapore which runs on 24-25 March.
China’s light vehicle sales is expected to grow at an average of 6.3% from 2014 to 2020, according to Kelly.
This compares with the 8.3% average growth rate of light vehicle sales in China from 2010 to 2014, he said.
Excluding China, light vehicle sales in the rest of Asia is projected to total around 14.9m units, which is less than half of the total expected in 2015, according to Kelly.
In comparison, other emerging markets – excluding China – is expected to grow by 5.3% on average from 2014 to 2020, he said.
Light vehicle sales in these emerging markets grew at an average of 2.4% in 2010-2014, according to Kelly.
On the production side, Kelly said that overall global light vehicle production is expected to grow by 2.8% year on year to 89.7m units in 2015, buoyed by the 3.9% growth in Asia at 46.4m units.
In other regions, light vehicle production in North America is expected to increase by 3.0% year on year to 17.5m units in 2015, while in Western Europe output is projected to rise by 0.4% to 13.3m units, Kelly said.
“US and China moderation in growth is now more likely [going forward], with risks growing in Western Europe,” he added.
Vehicle sales are a key indicator of the strength of the chemical industry, especially for polymers such as acrylonitrile-butadiene styrene (ABS), polycarbonate (PC) and nylon; butyl acetate for paints and coatings; and styrene butadiene rubber (SBR) in tyre production.
According to the American Chemistry Council (ACC) estimates, each automobile contains an average of $3,297 worth of chemicals.

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Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Lawmakers Look For 'Delicate Balance' As Senate Mulls Broad TSCA Changes

Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

By Sam Pearson

With a high-stakes hearing complete, lawmakers are set to hunker down in the weeks ahead for crucial negotiations on a bipartisan bill to update the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976, in what observers say could be the most significant change to a federal environmental law since 1990's Clean Air Act amendments.
Avenues of possible compromise include changing how states may enforce standards identical to federal law, a practice known as co-enforcement, and whether the timing of when state regulations would be superseded by federal law can be tweaked to placate concerned Senate Democrats -- though staffers must thread a delicate needle if they want to gain the support of additional Democrats without losing the backing of Republicans, who control the chamber.
"There's going to be some pretty intense behind-the-scenes negotiations," said Richard Denison, a senior scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund, who testified in favor of S. 697, or the "Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act," last week.
What remains to be seen is whether backers of the bill, sponsored by Sens. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and David Vitter (R-La.), can boost their vote totals by making changes that would bring on additional Democrats, and whether the Obama administration will favor a bill if some of its most reliable supporters in the Senate consider it dangerously regressive.
If lawmakers consider the right amendments, the legislation may have a path "to passing the Senate with very broad support -- 80 or 90 votes," said Ben Dunham, a former Lautenberg senior adviser who is now a director at McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP, which advises chemical industry clients on regulatory compliance, among other issues.
That would put the bill close to the Clean Air Act amendments of 1990's tally of 89 "yea" votes, a powerful signal of political consensus and a big contrast from the kind of political inertia that has gripped the chamber on other issues. At the time, even lawmakers from starkly different states found a way to wheel and deal their way to making broad changes to federal environmental law, in what was considered a difficult compromise (E&E Daily, Feb. 13, 2014). Udall says changes possible
Though the Environmental Defense Fund is the largest environmental organization to endorse the bill, others, while declining to support it, have held out hope that it might be altered to become more protective of the public health. Udall, its co-sponsor, hasn't precluded that possibility, either, though others say it can only move so far before GOP senators will jump ship.
Tweaking the bill is a "delicate balance," a Senate aide said, because adding too many regulations would irk Republicans not normally inclined to grant new powers to EPA.
An addition like altering bans on states' enforcement of federal chemicals laws or adjusting the timing of pre-emption "would not be a small change," the aide said. "It would be a major change, and I think it would likely have to come with a takeaway to balance it out."
In a blog post, Andy Igrejas, the director of Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, wrote that the hearing last week showed the need for at least moderate changes. Igrejas warned that it would be troubling if chemical industry groups push hard to avoid changes to the bill "as they attempted to do before the bill's introduction."
The bill needs to be open for modification because the hearing showed it is flawed, Igrejas wrote.
"The overwhelming conclusion to any but the most partisan observer was that the bill -- though improved over last year's version -- needs additional work before it represents true progress for public health and gathers the broader support needed to become law," Igrejas wrote.
Some of that uncertainty came from the testimony of Jim Jones, U.S. EPA's assistant administrator for chemical safety and pollution prevention, the top chemicals official at the agency.
Jones told the committee that the bill met most of the administration's criteria for updating the nearly 40-year-old chemicals law and noted that the White House had no position on what the federal chemicals law's relationship with state regulations should be -- a boon for the Udall-Vitter bill's supporters. But at the same time, he said the administration reserved the right to offer its support based on other, unstated factors that were not included in a 2009 document outlining EPA's principles for TSCA reform, holding out hope for the legislation's detractors that the agency could push back against changes that were too favorable to the chemical industry.
Jones also said that a provision in the bill that makes it more time-consuming for EPA to regulate uses of a chemical in multiple consumer products may violate the administration's principles, something that Vitter said at the hearing may be possible to adjust.
Udall said in a statement that he was still working to tweak the legislation, though it's not clear to what extent other lawmakers who currently support the proposal will be willing to adjust it.
"Our bill has solid bipartisan support because it will provide strong protections against dangerous chemicals and because most senators believe we can't afford to let this opportunity to pass a good, achievable law slip by," Udall said. "I said at the hearing, and I still believe, that we can make some improvements. We are having good conversations about issues that have been raised by members of the committee and others to strengthen the bill without undermining the fundamental bipartisan agreement. And I believe support will continue to grow."
In a statement, American Chemistry Council spokeswoman Anne Kolton said the trade group supports an inclusive process but declined to speculate about the group's legislative strategy.
"From the beginning we have supported an inclusive process and respect the interest of Senators Udall and Vitter in continuing to listen to input and find pragmatic ways to build support for S. 697 from both Republicans and Democrats," Kolton said.
Ron White, director of regulatory policy at the Center for Effective Government and an assistant vice president at the American Lung Association during the debate over the Clean Air Act amendments, said making changes this broad is never easy.
Getting lawmakers to expand EPA's powers to regulate air pollution "was a very, very long, complex and, frankly, difficult negotiation that took almost a decade," White said. "I think we're seeing some of that play out here with the TSCA reform bill, as well. Unfortunately, I think there are still some very significant problems with this bill, and it's going to require a substantial amount of revision in order to get it to be anything close to what's going to be acceptable, certainly to the public health and environmental and public interest communities, which are absolutely unified almost across the board -- with one exception."

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(ACC Mentioned) Reform of US Chemical Safety Rules Back On

Mar 24, 2015 | Chemistry World

By Rebecca Trager

The venerable law that governs the US’s chemicals policy appears poised to receive a revamp. The law, which is almost 40 years old, is one that government, industry and environmental groups agree hasn’t worked and needs updating. A bill to tackle this problem that industry and even some environmental groups are backing is proceeding apace in the Senate, but a competing proposal just introduced has threatened to throw a spanner in the works.
There is general agreement that the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has not effectively policed chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), yet a consensus on how to fix chemicals regulation remains elusive. The agency has tested only about 200 of the roughly 84,000 chemicals in the TSCA’s inventory since its enactment in 1976. In that time, the EPA has used the TSCA to restrict production or use of just five chemicals.
But after nearly two years of deliberations and negotiations, punctuated by political bickering that stalled a somewhat promising effort to modernise the TSCA last year, new bipartisan legislation was introduced in the Senate by Republican David Vitter and Democrat Tom Udall on 10 March.
Currently, the EPA has no mandate to review the safety of existing chemicals or impose restrictions. By contrast, the new bill includes numerous deadlines for EPA action in areas like developing policy and guidance, completing chemical prioritisation decisions, as well as chemical safety assessments. The measure also authorises the EPA to obtain new information on chemical substances at all stages of safety evaluation and requires safety reviews for new and existing chemicals.Screws would tighten
The legislation demands that new chemicals be tested for safety before they enter the market, and it also mandates that chemical safety decisions are solely based on the risks to public health and the environment and not on cost. The TSCA currently has a clause that requires the EPA to take into account how much it would cost to control the use of a chemical, which has been blamed for the failure to ban asbestos.
Furthermore, the measure explicitly requires the protection of populations particularly vulnerable to chemical exposure, and sets new limits on firms’ abilities to claim safety data as ‘confidential business information'. The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) says that confidentiality claims have led to data on around 17,000 chemicals remaining hidden from the public.
The Udall–Vitter bill has attracted bipartisan support meaning that its passage through the Senate should be relatively simple. However, the bill may not attract enough votes to prevent the president from vetoing the bill should he decide to oppose it. The Obama administration has not made it position on the bill clear yet.Duelling bills
This legislation has been hailed by the chemical industry and the EDF as a significant improvement, but Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer called it ‘worse than current law’. Two days after the bill’s introduction, Boxer and fellow Democrat Senator Ed Markey offered competing TSCA reform legislation that they said ensures faster chemical safety reviews and provides a stronger standard to judge chemicals’ safety.
The Society of Chemical Manufacturers and Affiliates’ (SOCMA) Dan Newton calls the Boxer–Markey legislation a ‘distraction’. Critics of the newest legislation argue that the Boxer–Markey measure will have minimal impact because it is a partisan offering. However, Senator Bernard Sanders, who is an Independent, is also co-sponsoring the Boxer–Markey bill.
Newton anticipates that the Udall–Vitter bill will pass in the Senate this year, and that a companion bill will be introduced in the House in April. He adds that, as the bill has the support of a number of Democrats, it is less likely that President Obama will veto it.Eyes on the prize
‘Keep your eye on the prize,’ says Jim Aidala, who served as assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Prevention, Pesticides and Toxic Substances under President Clinton. ‘Anything that makes it easier to get chemical test data in is really a good thing,’ he tells Chemistry World.
Aidala says the Udall–Vitter bill includes significant concessions by the chemical industry, yet the standoff continues. Industry says that it can’t back the Boxer–Markey bill, while some environmental groups are enthusiastic, seeing it as a route to fast track reviews of some chemicals.
Although Udall and Vitter say they spent nearly two years working with industry and environmental advocates to arrive at a legislative compromise, Boxer and several environmental groups claim that it was generated by the chemical industry.
Indeed, Udall – who is widely considered an environmental champion – has been accused of selling out to the chemical industry. The American Chemistry Council (ACC) was among his top 20 industry donors last year, according to opensecrets.org. The trade group also ran a television ad in New Mexico endorsing Udall and appears to have donated $13,500 (£9000) to his campaign in the last election.
Richard Denison, the EDF’s lead senior scientist, tells Chemistry World that EDF continues to support the Udall–Vitter proposal because it ‘has the bipartisan support to move forward’. Yet, it is evident that the debate about how to reform TSCA continues to rage on, and won’t likely end anytime soon.

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EPA Revokes New Use Rule Issued in 1990 For Two Flame Retardants Used in Plastic

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

Companies that make or import two flame retardants will no longer be subject to production volume limits and recordkeeping requirements under a final rule scheduled for publication March 24.
The Environmental Protection Agency determined the two flame retardants have inherently low toxicity, according to the final rule (RIN 2070-AB27), which revokes a significant new use rule (SNUR) issued Aug. 15, 1990 (55 Fed. Reg. 33,305).
Revocation of the rule means companies may make either chemical or import it in volumes that exceed the confidential limits set by the agency in 1990.
Companies that make or import either chemical will no longer be required to maintain records of certain information for five years. The SNUR required manufacturers to maintain data on volumes of the substances purchased by other companies, dates of the purchases and documents to show the chemical was used in compliance with applicable industrial, commercial and consumer use limitations.
Generic Names Only
The Federal Register notice identifies the two chemicals only by their generic names, metal salts of complex inorganic oxyacids, and premanufacture notice (PMN) numbers (P-89-576 and P-89-577).
Based on information in the docket supporting the EPA's revocation of the SNUR, the first chemical (PMN P-89-576) also is called Flamtard H, or zinc hydrostannate (CAS No. 12027-96-2). The second chemical is known as Flamtard S (P-89-577).
Flamtard S also is known as zinc stannate (CAS No. 12036-37-1) and is made by companies including William Blythe Ltd., which was the only chemical manufacturer to file a comment with the EPA regarding a notice issued in December 2014 proposing to revoke the SNUR (242 DEN A-10, 12/17/14).
Blythe supported revocation of the SNUR for Flamtard S and Flamtard H, which it also makes.
Toxicity Data Submitted in 1990
According to the company's website, the chemicals are used for cable sheathing, printing boards and other products, and they are part of the Flamtard line of chemicals that suppress flames and smoke generation.
In its comments supporting the revocation, Blythe said a 28-day oral toxicity study and acute dermal toxicity study that Alcan Chemicals—the original manufacturer of both Flamtard S and Flamtard H—submitted to the EPA in 1990 showed neither chemical posed an unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment.
The agency used the 1990 data to reach the conclusion that the SNUR could be revoked.

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Paint Stripper Poses Reproductive Risks To Workers, Consumers, EPA Says in Analysis

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Pat Rizzuto

Paint and coating strippers containing n-methylpyrrolidone may harm the health of people, particularly unborn babies, the Environmental Protection Agency said in a final analysis released March 23.
The agency urged workers and consumers—especially pregnant women or women of childbearing age—that use the solvent to wear gloves and take other precautions to reduce their exposure. People who do not use the solvent themselves, but who are near someone who does, do not face a health risk, the agency said.
BASF Corp., Bayer Group and Lyondell Chemical Co. are among the chemical manufacturers that reported making or importing 184.7 million pounds of n-methylpyrrolidone (NMP) in 2011, according to information submitted to the EPA under the Chemical Data Reporting rule.
The EPA released a draft assessment of NMP in January 2013 (04 DEN A-12, 1/7/13).
Synonyms for NMP include 1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone; n-methyl-butyrolactone; 1-methylazacyclopentan-2-one; m-pyrol; and MP, according to National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health information.
Petrochemical, Agricultural Uses
Much of the NMP manufactured is used in petrochemical processing, to make agricultural chemicals and for other uses, the EPA said in releasing its assessment. About 9 percent of the chemical's production is used to make paint and coating strippers, it said.
Worker and consumer activities that may involve the use of paint and coating strippers made with NMP include:
• aircraft paint stripping,
• art restoration and conservation,
• automotive refinishing,
• bathtub refinishing,
• furniture refinishing,
• graffiti removal and
• ship paint stripping.
“Identifying these industries is useful to identify workers who may be exposed to NMP due to the use of the NMP-based strippers,” the agency said. The EPA, however, was not able to determine the extent to which NMP-based strippers are used.
State, Federal Actions
In 2014, the California Occupational Safety and Health Division set a permissible exposure limit of 1 part per million (ppm) in air workers breathe. Cal/OSHA took the action due to its concern not only for reproductive problems, but also central nervous system effects and eye, skin, nose and throat irritation.
NMP, which is easily absorbed through the skin, is being widely used to replace methylene chloride and other chlorinated solvents, a fact sheet from California's Health Department said.
The EPA said it is considering a range of potential voluntary and regulatory actions it may pursue.
The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration does not have a permissible exposure limit for NMP.

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Chemical in Paint Remover Found Dangerous for Pregnant Women

Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Lydia Wheeler

The Environmental Protection Agency has found that a chemical commonly used to remove paint poses a health risk to pregnant women and women of childbearing age.
EPA released its risk assessment for N-Methylprrolidone (NMP) on Monday afternoon, which found there’s an acute and chronic risk for adverse developmental outcomes if the mother or an unborn baby is exposed to the chemical.
The use of gloves and respirators, EPA said do not adequately reduce the risks to women of childbearing age who use NMP for more than four hours per day on a single day or repeatedly use the chemical for a number of consecutive days.
The risk assessment was developed as part of the agency Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976, which is widely viewed as unenforceable. Lawmakers have been working to reform TSCA for almost a generation.
Two competing bills have been introduced in the Senate, one with bi-partisan support sponsored by Sens. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) and David Vitter (R-La.) and another Democratic bill sponsored by Sens. Barbara Boxer (Calif.) and Edward Markey (Mass.)
“By completing this assessment, we have taken an important step in protecting pregnant women and women of childbearing age who are using NMP to remove paint,” said Jim Jones, Assistant Administrator for EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
“It is a reminder that as we evaluate these risks, it is very clear that our nation’s chemical laws are in much need of reform. Completing this assessment will now trigger a process to address these unacceptable risks."

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Energy and Environment News

New Us Fracking Rules Require Public Disclosure Of Chemicals

Mar 24, 2015 | Chemical Watch

Companies conducting hydraulic fracturing – fracking – on public lands will have to publicly disclose the chemicals used in the operations, under new rules issued by the US Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management.
There are currently about 100,000 oil and gas wells on federally managed lands, more than 90% of which use fracking. Companies will have to report the chemicals they use to the Bureau, via the FracFocus website, within 30 days of completing their fracking operations. The rules provide limited disclosure exceptions for materials “demonstrated through affidavit to be trade secrets”.
A voluntary chemical disclosure registry for fracking companies, FracFocus is managed by the Ground Water Protection Council (GWPC), a non-profit organisation of state water quality regulatory agencies, and by the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission (IOGCC), a multi-state government agency, charged with balancing oil and gas development with environmental protection.
The Bureau is in the process of finalising a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the GWPC to ensure, among other things, that the database can be searched and downloaded easily. As a part of the MoU, FracFocus will automatically notify the Bureau when an operator uploads chemical disclosure information about a federal well. The online database currently has information provided by operators about oil and gas wells in 20 states.
The rules include a process that allows states to “request variances from provisions for which they have an equal or more protective regulation in place,” the agency said. “This will avoid duplication while enabling the development of more protective standards by state and tribal governments.”
According to FracFocus, several states have developed, or are formulating, their own public disclosure rules. They include Wyoming, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, West Virginia, Idaho and North Dakota.
“A duplicative layer of new federal regulation is unnecessary,” said the American Petroleum Institute, urging the Bureau to “work carefully with the states to minimise costs and delays created by the new rules to ensure that public lands can still be a source of job creation and economic growth.”
Meanwhile, Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman James Inhofe has introduced legislation aimed at clarifying that states have the sole authority to regulate hydraulic fracturing on federal land within the boundaries of the state. Calling the new federal fracking rules unnecessary, he said that the “past 60 years have proven that states are in the best position to understand their unique geologies and to determine what their energy needs are and what regulations are necessary to support and protect their communities. This is why I have introduced legislation with the support of 26 Senators to ensure states, and not the federal government, will continue to have the sole authority in regulating hydraulic fracturing.”
His Fracturing Regulations are Effective in State Hands (FRESH) Act would recognise fracking as a commercial practice, and thus keep regulations under state management.

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Federal Fracking Rule Sent to Federal Register

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Interior Department's final rule governing hydraulic fracturing on federal and Indian lands is scheduled to be published March 26 in the Federal Register. It will become effective June 24. The rule, from the Bureau of Land Management, provides for updated requirements on testing of well integrity, management of waste fluids and reporting of chemicals if an oil or natural gas well is fractured, or fracked. States and tribes with specific regulations equal to or more protective than the BLM regulations will be able to obtain a variance that allows use of their regulations rather than the federal regulations, to avoid duplication. The rule is available at http://bit.ly/1HrdvN5. It was publicly released March 20 (55 DEN A-14, 3/23/15).

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Greens: Obama Caved on Fracking

Mar 24, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

Environmental groups say President Obama squandered the best opportunity he had to tighten regulations on the process of hydraulic fracturing for oil and natural gas.
Congress exempted fracking from many environmental laws, and Interior Department regulations unveiled late last week were perhaps the last major chance environmentalists had to crack down on the controversial practice at the federal level.
Instead, they say, the rule amounts to a gift to the oil and natural gas industry that allows drillers to continue some of their worst environmental practices.
“We do think it’s a missed opportunity and continue to wonder why the Interior Department isn’t putting conservation as its top objective,” said Bill Snape, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. “It continues to give away favors to the oil and gas industry on our lands.”
Snape said the Interior Department was derelict in its duty to protect the nation’s public lands when it announced the rule last week. Fracking can contaminate groundwater, air, soil and waterways, and harm the health of humans and animals, he said.
The department “continues to shirk its mandate to protect lands and waters of the United States for all Americans,” he added.
The fracking standards only apply to drilling on leased federal land and land owned by American Indian tribes, which account for less than a quarter of the country’s oil production and 17 percent of its gas. The vast majority of fracking is done on non-federal land.
Still, Kate DeAngelis, the lead climate and energy campaigner for Friends of the Earth, said as the first major federal rules specific to fracking, the Interior Department’s regulations have an effect beyond the federal government’s holdings.
“If they had put out strong regulations, it would have had a huge impact,” she said. “So I think it was a lost opportunity.”
For example, regulators said they had hoped states would take the federal rules as a template to formulate their own fracking regulations for state and private land.
“Even in that, they failed, because it’s not setting a very strong example to begin with,” DeAngelis said.
To frack a well, an oil or gas company injects fluid into the well, breaking shale rock that contains deposits.
The practice has become widespread in recent years and has been one of the driving forces behind the energy boom that has made the United States the top oil and gas producer in the world.
Environmentalists concerned about fracking’s effects suffered a setback in 2005, when Congress exempted fracking from part of the Safe Drinking Water Act, as well as some clean water and air rules. Environmentalists call the provision the “Halliburton loophole, ” a reference to the company led by former Vice President Cheney before he was elected to office.
The action left few options for a crackdown on fracking. Chief among them were tough restrictions that Interior’s Bureau of Land Management could exercise over federal land that hosts mineral leases by private companies. About 8 percent of the nation’s wells are on federal land.
“Realistically, we would have just hoped for stronger regulations and stronger support for rules that would close those loopholes that were put in place in 2005, and making sure that oil and gas companies are held accountable for the devastation that they are causing in our water and our air,” DeAngelis said of the rules.
While fracking has been taking place on federal land for years, the new regulations seek to take account of recently developed technology and practices in three areas: well construction standards, disclosure of the chemicals injected into the ground and storage of the fluid that comes back out of the well.
The industry was disappointed with the rules as well and accused the Obama administration of catering to extreme environmental interests.
Less than an hour after the rules were unveiled, the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) and Western Energy Alliance filed a lawsuit in federal court to have them overturned.
“These new mandates on hydraulic fracturing by the federal government ... are the complete opposite of common sense,” IPAA President Barry Russell said in a statement.

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Wonks Vs. Greens

Mar 23, 2015 | PoliticoPro

By Alex Guillén

One of the most technocratic agencies in the federal government has become an unlikely magnet for unruly eco-protesters.
That’s turned meetings of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission into monthly spectacles far different from the agency’s usually dry debates about transmission planning, pricing disputes and electric reliability standards. Activists angry about fracking and climate change are chanting, shouting and squatting on the floor until uniformed officers haul them away — and, of course, they’re uploading the whole drama to YouTube.
At least twice last year, officers arrested dozens of protesters for blocking the entrance to FERC’s headquarters near Union Station, while the agency has felt compelled to issue its first official edict against “disruptive” behavior. The activists plan to go even bigger in May, when they hope to draw at least 500 people for a weeklong series of protests against the agency, at which some intend to be arrested. They even have anti-FERC signs — bearing messages like “Fracking Expansion Rubberstamp Commission” — and T-shirts, with slogans like “FERC Doesn’t Work.”
It’s an unusual amount of ruckus for an agency that most Americans probably couldn’t name, and which says it has no jurisdiction over either climate change or fracking. But FERC plays a role in vetting projects to export natural gas — and it holds monthly board meetings open to the public.
The activists aren’t buying the argument that the commissioners lack the power to act.
“If they understood, if they took the climate issue seriously, they would make a stand,” said North Carolina activist Steven Norris, from the umbrella organizing group Beyond Extreme Energy, shortly before he and about 14 other protesters were removed from the agency’s most recent meeting Thursday. “They would make a stand with [President Barack] Obama, they would make a stand with Congress, they would make a stand with industry, saying we have got to deal with this. … They’re just rubber-stamping this infrastructure, which if it’s built is going to keep this country on fossil fuels for the next 40 or 50 years, which is a disaster.”
FERC Chairwoman Cheryl LaFleur has called the turmoil “relatively new territory for FERC,” and said she and the four other commissioners remain upbeat “more in spite of the protests than because of them.”
“We recognize that a lot of the things we do are controversial, and people are entitled to differences of opinion on those things, and those differences of opinion are reflected in our docket, as they should be,” she said.
Former FERC Chairman Jon Wellinghoff said nothing like this happened during his time leading the commission, on which he sat from 2006 to 2013.
“Commissioners are pretty disciplined people, and they’re charged with making decisions based on the evidence of record,” said Wellinghoff, a Democrat. “Anything outside of that I think is a huge waste of time and money and effort.”
FERC’s authority includes regulation of interstate transmission of electricity, oil and natural gas, along with hydroelectric power and projects to import or export liquefied gas. Much of the activists’ ire has been focused on Cove Point, a project by Dominion that will convert a gas-import terminal 60 miles southeast of Washington, D.C., into an export terminal — which, the greens say, would provide markets abroad for gas extracted through fracking. FERC approved the construction plan for the site in September, though opponents requested a rehearing, a matter still pending.
At Thursday’s meeting, officers escorted Norris out of the room after he squatted cross-legged in front of the commissioners’ table, chanting slogans like “Stop Construction at Cove Point.” Another activist started reading from a prepared statement before a security official snatched the paper from her hand and led her out.
Security guards with latex gloves, officers in charcoal-gray suits and people wearing Homeland Security uniforms led or carried about 15 activists out of the building while all five commissioners temporarily marched out of the room — including LaFleur, nonchalantly sipping from her mug. The meeting resumed once the protesters were gone.
In its order calling for decorum earlier this month, FERC said the public isn’t allowed to “disrupt open meetings or to raise extraneous issues” and warned that the commissioners will not consider “disruptive statements, oral or written,” when making decisions. Though the order doesn’t impose penalties on protesters, activists have taken to calling it a “gag rule.”
FERC is an independent agency with a detailed process for reviewing projects, which includes environmental studies and opportunities for the public to weigh in through formal comments and meetings. Regulating fracking and tackling climate change are “not authority that’s been granted to the commission by Congress,” said Wellinghoff, who’s now at the law firm Stoel Rives. “That’s authority that’s been granted legitimately to the EPA.”
He noted, though, that FERC sometimes takes actions that happen to have climate benefits, such as its efforts to make it easier to transmit wind or solar power through the electric grid.
Former FERC Commissioner Marc Spitzer said the activists’ efforts are better aimed at Congress or state lawmakers.
”FERC doesn’t have the power to say, ‘We’re denying the certificate, not because there’s anything in the record, but because we don’t like gas. We think it’s dirty,’” said Spitzer, a Republican who served on the commission from 2006 to 2011 and is now an attorney at Steptoe & Johnson. “If FERC did that … they’d be reversed by the Court of Appeals in a New York minute.”
Wellinghoff and Spitzer both said they met with environmental groups during their terms on the commission, but insisted the meetings did not influence them.
But Norris argued that the commissioners could do more within their statutory limits — for example, by declaring that natural gas exports could raise domestic consumer prices. But FERC does only the environmental analyses for LNG terminals, while the Energy Department determines whether they would serve the public interest.
Norris also called on the commissioners to consider resigning, in the manner of Elliot Richardson, the attorney general who quit rather than obey one of Richard Nixon’s orders during Watergate. “They could get known pretty quickly if Cheryl LaFleur said, ‘I’m out of here,’” Norris said.
In the case of Cove Point, activists are upset that FERC has not decided on their request to rehear the project’s approval, and that the commission hasn’t halted construction in the meantime. The commission’s inaction on the rehearing request has prevented the opponents from appealing to the circuit courts, the activists say.
Some Cove Point opponents have also met with the FERC commissioners, to no avail.
Tracey Eno, co-founder of Calvert Citizens for a Healthy Community, said she met with LaFleur earlier this month — and that “I had no expectations going in, and they were all met.” During the meeting, a FERC lawyer cut her off whenever she started broaching specifics about the Cove Point project, a common practice meant to prevent the commissioners from being exposed to information outside the official record. She was instead limited to discussing general issues with FERC’s process and complaints about the agency’s website.
“I get it,” said Eno, who later attended Thursday’s public meeting and left quietly after most of the other protesters. “It wouldn’t be fair for Dominion to go in there and bend their ear and say, ‘Oh, you should hurry up and approve this.’ I get that it needs to be fair. It’s just frustrating that it’s come to this point and that they’re not doing anything.”
LaFleur said she understands why natural gas has become a flashpoint, noting that the fracking boom and the Obama administration’s climate rules have made it an increasingly important fuel source. Those regulations openly favor gas as a cleaner alternative to coal.
“At the same time, natural gas exploration, production and transportation — the part we regulate — has its own environmental issues,” LaFleur said. “We try to take them very seriously, but I don’t think this controversy will end.”
Eno said she doesn’t know if anything will change at FERC because of her efforts. But she said, “It doesn’t hurt to try.”
“I have seen things change because people have put pressure on and brought attention to issues,” she said. “I don’t know what the result will be, but it’s the right thing to do.”

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Can Cruz Win the Oil Primary?

Mar 23, 2015 | PoliticoPro

By Andrew Restuccia & Elana Schor

Even in a strongly pro-fossil-fuel GOP presidential field, Ted Cruz stands out for his devotion to his home-state oil industry and its agenda.
Republicans widely champion an energy platform based on expanded oil and gas drilling, opposition to EPA climate regulations and approval of the Keystone XL pipeline. But Cruz has gone beyond that by pushing legislation to lift the 1970s-era ban on crude oil exports — a prime industry cause that has some congressional Republicans nervous about catching the blame if gasoline prices rise. And while some of his potential White House rivals also want to phase out the federal mandate for blending ethanol into gasoline, Cruz made a point of starkly staking out that position in corn-rich Iowa.
Unlike former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Cruz doesn’t have any past ambivalence about offshore oil drilling to explain away. Cruz has also raked in more than $1 million in campaign cash from the oil and gas industry since 2011, outstripping rivals like Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.
It’s all enough to make Cruz an early target for critics such as the ethanol industry, which accused him Monday of “pandering to Big Oil.”
But the firebrand Texas senator — who on Monday became the first declared Republican presidential contender for 2016 — may still struggle to get oil and gas companies’ open endorsement against likely competitors like Bush, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, all of whom are also friendly to the industry’s causes. The industry has an embarrassment of riches in finding allies in the GOP primary field and no reason to alienate any of them at this stage.
“It is a little early for industry types to start to choose up sides,” one Republican adviser with close ties to the industry said.
Another industry insider weighed in: “Each one of them is going to have to make their own decision about how they want to position themselves. It’s so early in the process, it might make sense for them to wait and see where everybody is.”
Still, the GOP is so unified in its broad energy agenda — pro-drilling, pro-Keystone, anti-EPA-regulations — that subtle gradations on policy could become significant in making one or two candidates stand out. Cruz may succeed in doing just that with his aggressiveness on approving oil exports and abolishing the ethanol mandate, two oil industry priorities that have yet to make their way into GOP orthodoxy.
Even when the substance of Cruz’s stances doesn’t differ much from that of his rivals, he often pushes his views with a notable lack of caveats.
A Cruz campaign spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment, but the senator’s allies made the case that Cruz’s positions stem from his strongly held belief in free markets, not an allegiance to the oil industry.
“Ted Cruz was the strongest voice among GOP presidential contenders to call for ending the ethanol mandate,” conservative anti-tax activist Grover Norquist said through a spokesman Monday. He added: “Cruz’s support for ending an archaic law banning the export of oil is consistent with free trade and free markets going back to Adam Smith.”
Other Republicans considering runs for the White House — including Paul, Rubio and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — have also called for legalizing crude oil exports, which would allow U.S. oil producers to sell their product in more lucrative overseas markets. But that proposal has gotten a divided response from Republicans in Congress, who say they need to study the implications for consumers’ wallets, and has stirred opposition from some oil refiners, who fear losing access to cheap domestic crude.
Bush has been somewhat in the middle on the issue, saying last year that he could consider lifting the ban “at the appropriate time when we don’t have the refining capacity to take on the light crude that is fast being produced in our country.”
Cruz has shown no reluctance, though: He was one of the first congressional Republicans to favor lifting the ban, and in January he proposed an amendment abolishing it as part of the Senate’s bill to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline. That haste unnerved Cruz’s Republican colleagues and even the oil industry itself, which warned that voting on the issue before lawmakers had a chance to study it could spoil longer-term efforts to lift the ban. Cruz ended up dropping the amendment.
Cruz’s push for unfettered crude exports is driven by “free market” beliefs, said Charlie Drevna, president of the oil industry trade group American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, who declined to offer a prediction on the Texas senator’s presidential prospects. (Drevna added that he also hopes to bend Cruz’s ear on abolishing the Jones Act, a century-old law that restricts oil shipments between U.S. ports to U.S.-flagged ships.)
Cruz also made a point of taking his ethanol message to this month’s agricultural summit in Iowa, a crucial presidential caucus state where the EPA-run mandate — known as the Renewable Fuel Standard — enjoys broad support.
“Look, I recognize that this is a gathering of a lot of folks who the answer that you’d like me to give is, ‘I’m for the RFS, darn it.’ That would be the easy thing to do,” Cruz said during his appearance at the ag summit. “But I’ll tell you, people are pretty fed up I think with politicians that run around and tell one group one thing, tell another group another thing. And then they go to Washington and they don’t do anything that they said they would do.”
The oil industry opposes the mandate as a costly subsidy that raises both fuel and food prices. Ethanol producers say the oil companies are just afraid of competition.
Cruz has sponsored a Senate bill to phase out the requirement over five years. While Bush, former New York Gov. George Pataki and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker also support phasing out the mandate, Walker’s remarks in Iowa emphasized that he would leave it in place for now.
“In general, on any issue, I’m someone who believes in a free and open market,” Walker said at the time. “But … right now we don’t have a free and open marketplace, so that’s why I’m willing to take that position.” Walker later fended off tea party activists’ accusations that he had flip-flopped on the issue, since he strongly opposed ethanol mandates in his 2006 campaign for governor.
Meanwhile, Pataki emphasized that he’s “a great believer in renewable fuels,” although he added that “I honestly don’t think the federal government should require anybody in America to buy anything,” while Perry warned against going too fast to abolish the ethanol requirement as long as other kinds of subsidies exist. “I don’t think you pull the RFS out … and leave all these other subsidies and mandates in place,” the former Texas governor said.
Cruz, Pataki and Perry were the only potential GOP presidential candidates to speak against the mandate out of the nine who appeared at the summit, according to Tom Buis, CEO of the ethanol trade group Growth Energy. But Cruz’s Nixon-to-China comments stood out and got the most attention, particularly from conservative media.
Buis said Cruz’s prominent pushback on ethanol “doesn’t surprise me” given his Texas provenance. “He seems to be touting this as Profiles in Courage,” Buis said. “The real Profiles in Courage would be to go to his home state and try to take away the tax breaks that oil has had for 100 years.”
The group attacked Cruz’s ethanol legislation Monday, saying: “This is pandering to Big Oil.”
Like Texas lawmakers who came before him, Cruz is also a big recipient of the oil and gas industry’s cash. Oil and gas donors have contributed more than $1 million to Cruz’s campaign committee and leadership PAC, according to data collected by the Center for Responsive Politics. That makes oil and gas one of the top sectors that gave to him, second only to conservative groups.
In contrast, Rubio’s campaign committee and leadership PAC have received less than $500,000 from the oil and gas sector, while Paul’s committee and leadership PACs have received less than $200,000.
Environmentalists are already lining up to savage Cruz as the first in a long line of Republican presidential hopefuls whose ties to the oil industry play into the greens’ plans to drive a wedge between the GOP and general-election voters.
“Americans want clean energy and climate action now, and the more that leading Republicans desperately cling to the priorities of the fossil fuel industry, the more their whole party will be painted as one that puts polluters before people,” Athan Manuel, director of the Sierra Club’s lands protection program, said by email.
Cruz also has hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in the oil and gas industry. Financial disclosure records filed last year show that Cruz or his family purchased at least $50,000 in Chevron stock and at least $15,000 in ExxonMobil stock in 2013, among other energy-related investments. Just last month, Cruz disclosed a purchase of at least $50,000 in stock of Plains GP Holdings, an energy company that transports and stores both crude oil and natural gas liquids.

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Former Coburn Aide Joins Western Drilling Group

Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

By Phil Taylor

An energy aide to former Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) has joined the Western Energy Alliance, a Denver-based trade group representing hundreds of oil and gas developers.
Tripp Parks, who has served the past three years as Coburn's counsel and legislative assistant, will be WEA's policy analyst overseeing public lands and wildlife issues.
Parks, who hails from Oklahoma and holds a law degree from the University of Virginia, previously served as counsel on the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"Tripp's deep policy and regulatory experience, as well as his legal insights, will be tremendous assets as we encounter greater federal encroachment of our industry," WEA President Tim Wigley said in a statement. "Coming from Oklahoma, Tripp understands the critical role oil and natural gas plays in our national economy. He also understands the fundamental view that regulation is best done at the state level."
WEA has battled the Obama administration's energy policy on public lands in the West, where many of its members operate. It has contested the science the Interior Department has used to evaluate threats facing the greater sage grouse, and last Friday it filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Wyoming challenging the Bureau of Land Management's final hydraulic fracturing rule.
"The oil and natural gas industry is facing significant regulatory overreach from the Obama administration, and we expect this trend to grow in his final two years in office," Wigley said.
Coburn last Congress was a co-sponsor of a bill by Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) that would make states the sole regulators of hydraulic fracturing, effectively nullifying the BLM rule. Inhofe reintroduced the bill last week.

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What To Watch For In This Week's Senate 'Vote-A-Rama'

Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

By Nick Juliano

The Senate took up its annual budget resolution last night, kicking off several days of debate that will cover just about every topic on Congress' plate -- from defense spending to health care to taxes -- and energy and environment issues will surely be part of the mix.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's decision to spend the entire month of January debating legislation to approve the Keystone XL pipeline offered senators the chance to vote on dozens of amendments covering climate change science, the pace of energy development and federal land-use regulations, among other areas. But plenty of ground was left uncovered -- and President Obama quickly vetoed the underlying bill -- leaving ample opportunity to secure new votes this week.
Both parties are still putting the finishing touches on their amendment strategy, and the process will remain fluid throughout the week. But both parties have staked out identifiable terrain likely to emerge during the debate.
The "Byrd rule" prevents senators from offering amendments that are not germane to the underlying budget, but with some creative wording, senators can still use the process to raise a variety of issues. Amendments typically call for a "deficit-neutral reserve fund" that would direct an authorizing committee or committees to craft legislation addressing a particular policy area.
Amendments started being introduced yesterday, and voting is expected to begin around noon today with an amendment from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) that would eliminate various corporate tax breaks to raise money for infrastructure spending. Myriad other amendments had been filed by early yesterday evening, but it remained to be seen what would get a vote on the floor.
Among the early items introduced was an amendment from Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who is up for re-election next year, to block U.S. EPA from implementing rules on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants if a governor or state legislature determines they would increase retail electricity rates. Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) offered an amendment aimed at expanding offshore energy production, and Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) dropped one seeking limits to the jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act, a response to EPA's controversial power plant rule.
Most amendment votes are expected to come Thursday at the conclusion of 50 hours of debate time that ensures a robust discussion of the first several amendments brought to the floor. After the clock expires, senators may continue to offer amendments in quick succession indefinitely, a process known as the "vote-a-rama" -- which may not end until the wee hours of Friday morning.
The schedule remains a "moving target," a Republican aide said yesterday.
E&E Daily informally surveyed senators and aides from both sides of the aisle in recent days to compile a list of topics likely to be addressed during the budget week. Expectations are fairly modest given the dozens of energy-related amendments considered in January, but at least a few relevant topics are expected to come up. The votes can help guide future legislative efforts by indicating where senators stand on certain issues; they also typically re-emerge in campaign commercials closer to the election.
Sources stressed that their amendment strategies are works in progress; the following list is not exhaustive but provides highlights of issues each party could use this week's debate to highlight. In general, Republicans can be expected to warn of economic harm that federal regulations can cause and push to expand energy development on public lands and offshore. Democrats, meanwhile, likely will tout the health and safety concerns that regulations address, promote their support for alternative energy sources and take another opportunity to paint Republicans as out of sync with the prevailing scientific views on climate change. Republicans Climate change: Obama's efforts to limit the power sector's contribution to climate change is likely to be a top target for the Senate GOP. But this week's vote may not be on whether to eliminate the Clean Power Plan rule altogether. Instead, expect McConnell (R-Ky.) to build on his recent efforts to convince governors to refuse to submit plans to EPA on how they would reduce emissions from existing power plants. An expected amendment from McConnell would block the agency from imposing its own plan on recalcitrant states, although a spokesman declined to confirm his plans yesterday. If energy and environment issues are to come up at all during the first 50 hours of debate, a McConnell amendment would be the most likely avenue. Hydraulic fracturing: The Bureau of Land Management just last week finalized its requirement for oil and gas companies to disclose hydraulic fracturing chemicals and take other steps to protect water supplies (Greenwire, March 20). Even before the rule was published, Senate Environment and Public Works Chairman James Inhofe (R-Okla.) led GOP colleagues in introducing legislation to stop it. The BLM rule is another top contender to see action this week. It's also an issue where Republicans could cause political headaches for some of their opponents, such as Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet (D), who faces a tough re-election race next year in the gas-producing state. Air quality: The recently proposed standard to tighten acceptable concentrations of ground-level ozone has struggled for years to gain momentum amid industry concern that it could handcuff various types of development around the country; EPA recently found that 46 areas around the country do not comply with the current standard. Obama punted on the rule once before, and Republicans are optimistic that there may be bipartisan consensus to block it again. The upcoming debate over a long-term transportation funding bill is seen as a likely venue to try blocking the rule, and an amendment vote this week would provide a handy whip count to help guide those efforts. Water quality: The long-running saga over where the Clean Water Act's jurisdiction begins and ends will almost certainly continue to bedevil farmers, developers, environmentalists and anyone else who deals with regulation of streams and wetlands long after the budget debate is concluded. But opponents of EPA's "Waters of the United States" rule -- which the agency says is meant to clear up the confusion, but which critics pan as an overreaching power grab -- could have another opportunity to demonstrate their displeasure. While an anti-WOTUS amendment could give some of the Republican freshmen a first chance to vote on the issue, it would be unlikely to pick up enough Democratic support to clear the vital 60-vote threshold that would be necessary to actually get any binding change over the Senate's procedural hurdles. Democrats Public health and safety: When Republicans complain that tough environmental regulations can cause companies to go out of business, expect Democrats to counter by reminding the public that they also can help children with asthma breathe. This could mean Democratic "side by sides" to anti-EPA amendments touting the good the agency does combating health problems associated with air and water pollution and the benefit that provides to the economy through reduced sick leave, among other factors. Democrats also may pursue their own amendments highlighting the dangers related to ongoing energy development and supporting rules to address concerns such as oil train derailments, pipeline leaks or pollution tied to the recent increase in oil and gas production, especially as it relates to hydraulic fracturing. During consideration of the Keystone XL pipeline bill, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) secured a vote on an amendment to allow EPA to regulate fracking wells under federal drinking water law, and several senators have raised concerns about the spate of train derailments that have followed the dramatic rise in rail cars transporting crude oil. Climate change: Democrats offered more than 15 amendments to the KXL bill related to climate change and secured a handful of votes that clarified Republicans' views. Five GOP senators said human activity is a significant driver of climate change, 15 acknowledged at least a small role for humanity, and the majority of the caucus continue to dismiss the link altogether. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), one of his party's leading voices on climate issues, said recently that he is eyeing the budget for more climate change votes, but details are still being finalized. Oil company tax breaks: Democrats have long sought elimination of various tax incentives they see as "subsidies" for the major oil companies, such as their ability to deduct intangible drilling costs and their eligibility for a special domestic manufacturing tax break, but they have found no fans among Republicans. Bipartisan agreement can be found when it comes to a desire to eliminate the loophole that spares oil sands producers from paying into a spill liability trust fund, but nearly all Republicans bolted from the proposal when it was combined with the elimination of other tax breaks in an amendment Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) proposed in committee (E&E Daily, March 20). Amendments targeting the breaks likely will be raised again on the floor this week, but questions remain over how broadly they will be written and how Democrats would propose to spend the money raised from eliminating the tax breaks. Clean energy: Depending on the details, proposals to support additional renewable energy development or energy efficiency programs can find bipartisan support, but Democrats tend to be more aggressively in favor of federal mandates, spending and tax credits to push new technologies into the marketplace. The KXL debate saw votes on a renewable energy standard, a five-year extension of the wind production tax credit and a proposal to establish new solar energy rebates, among other proposals.

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EPA Moves to Consolidate Power Plant Reporting

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Environmental Protection Agency is taking a phased approach to consolidating how power plants will comply with reporting requirements under the mercury and air toxics standards. The agency March 24 will publish a final rule (RIN 2060-AS39) that the agency described as the first step in consolidating the submission of all electronic reports required under the MATS regulation to one system—the agency's ECMPS Client Tool. The rule, which is effective upon publication in the Federal Register, will remove requirements that power plant owners and operators submit various MATS compliance reports using a different tool—the Compliance and Emissions Data Reporting Interface. Those reports, which include reports on performance stack tests and semiannual compliance reports, will instead be submitted using the ECMPS Client Tool in a portable document format, commonly known as PDF. The EPA said it anticipates promulgating a follow-up rule that would require affected owners and operators to submit those required reports in a structured XML format using the ECMPS tool. The March 24 final rule is available at https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2015-06152.pdf.

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Whitfield Plans Legislation to Postpone State Compliance With Clean Power Plan

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Andrew Childers

Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) plans to introduce a bill that would delay implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Power Plan and allow states to opt out of the carbon dioxide regulation if it would increase utility rates or jeopardize reliability.
The Ratepayer Protection Act, which Whitfield is distributing in the House for discussion, would postpone a requirement for states to submit plans to the EPA for implementing the carbon dioxide standards for existing power plants until legal challenges have been resolved.
The Energy and Commerce Committee will hold a hearing April 14 on the Ratepayer Protection Act, Whitfield said.
“This rule is particularly controversial. It's unprecedented in the power they're to grab here from the states,” Whitfield, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Power, told reporters March 23.
Whitfield said he plans to introduce the bill within the next two weeks, along with a separate bill that would target EPA proposed carbon dioxide standards for new power plants.
Response to State Requests
The bill responds to state requests for additional time to develop compliance plans for the Clean Power Plan, Whitfield said. States would have to submit their compliance plans within one year of the EPA finalizing the rule, unlike other regulations that give states as long as three years to develop compliance measures, Whitfield said.
The EPA's proposed Clean Power Plan (RIN 2060-AR33) would set carbon dioxide emissions rates for the power sector in each state. State regulators would develop their own plans to comply with the emissions rates. The EPA could issue federal plans for states that choose not to comply. The final rule is expected this summer.
Whitfield acknowledged the role human activity plays in climate change and said his bill would recognize EPA authority to regulate carbon dioxide under the Clean Air Act while alleviating any uncertainty states may have about investing time and resources to develop a plan to comply with a rule that could be struck down by the courts.
“Many states are asking us for relief,” he said.
The bill also would allow state governors to opt out of compliance with the proposed rule if they could show it would have “a significant adverse effect” on electricity rates or grid reliability.
For now, Whitfield said he plans to pursue the Ratepayers Protection Act and his upcoming bill targeting carbon dioxide standards for new power plants as standalone legislation rather than as part of a larger package of bills.
McConnell Urges Boycott
The bill comes at a time when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is urging states not to submit their own compliance plans, forcing the EPA to issue federal plans instead. McConnell recommended states boycott compliance in a March 19 letter to the National Governors Association, which a White House aide called “outside the bounds of the position that he was elected to” (55 DEN A-1, 3/23/15).
Whitfield said he has not discussed that strategy with McConnell. He also hasn't discussed his latest bill with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), who has sponsored companion bills in the Senate previously.
“Like Congressman Whitfield, Sen. Manchin is very concerned about the EPA's existing source rule and will continue to work with his colleagues to make sure regulations strike a balance between environmental concerns and economic growth,” said a spokeswoman for Manchin.
A congressional aide said similar legislation has been discussed with Senate staff.

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Whitfield Vows Bill Within 2 Weeks Offering States Relief From EPA Rule

Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

By Jean Chemnick

Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) said yesterday he plans to introduce legislation soon that would let states opt out of U.S. EPA's Clean Power Plan permanently.
His measure would grant all states an automatic reprieve from deadlines to submit implementation plans (SIPs) for the existing power plant rule until judicial review has concluded, according to a draft bill provided by the committee.
It would also let governors refuse to comply indefinitely if they determine, after consulting with state agencies and regulators, that the carbon rule would drive up electricity rates or harm grid reliability, he said. EPA would be barred from stepping in with a federal implementation plan (FIP) in either case.
Whitfield, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Energy and Power Subcommittee, has introduced numerous bills in past years to limit or kill EPA's carbon rules. All have died in the Senate, and it's unclear whether the upper chamber's new GOP majority will change that equation. The president would be likely to veto the bill in any case.
Speaking to reporters in his Capitol Hill office, Whitfield said he expected a measure similar to his bill to be introduced in the Senate.
"I don't know if we'll be successful or not, but we are going to do everything possible so that the American people are aware of the effort made by EPA to control the electric generating system in each state," he said.
Succeed or fail, he said, his bill would give lawmakers an opportunity to weigh in on the policy, "rather than just saying 'EPA, you made the decision. We'll just bow down to it.'"
Whitfield said he will introduce his bill in the next two weeks, and a hearing with EPA officials is scheduled for April 14.
He pledged to move the bill through "regular order," allowing opportunity for amendments at both the subcommittee and committee levels.
He said he hoped to move it on its own, though he said he was open to other "vehicles" -- including must-pass spending legislation. He said he hoped a bill to offer states "safe harbor" from the EPA rule -- rather than to kill it outright -- would appeal to more members.
Also in the coming weeks, Whitfield plans to release a separate bill that would knock down EPA's new power plant rule. That measure will track more closely with a version Whitfield and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) introduced in the last Congress, which would have swapped EPA's proposed carbon capture and storage (CCS) mandate for new coal for a laxer standard that would allow new supercritical coal plants to comply.

Whitfield has said he does not believe CCS has been technologically and commercially demonstrated, but he added yesterday that he would not back new federal funding to help make it so.
"I'm just not a big fan of that right now," he said.
Whitfield said he believes that human-generated emissions are contributing some to climate change but that President Obama places too much importance on the issue.
"He thinks that it's the No. 1 issue," Whitfield said. "He wants to make sure as part of his legacy that the U.S. is the world leader" on carbon reduction, he said.
Obama has set his sights on an international agreement on global greenhouse gas emissions to be finalized in Paris at the end of this year. Last year, he pledged that the United States would cut its emissions between 26 and 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025 -- a commitment he said would help spur other countries to act.
While EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy has said her agency is not tailoring its actions to an international goal, Whitfield said the Clean Power Plan seems to be playing to a global audience.
Whitfield has said his bill will have Senate support but has not said from whom. Manchin has not said whether he will back it.
He said he has not spoken with his fellow Kentucky Republican, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has proposed that state governments wait to submit SIPs until litigation concludes on the rule. McConnell reiterated last week in a letter to all 50 governors that he believes the Clean Power Plan is legally vulnerable and that EPA may ultimately be prevented from imposing a FIP that is as stringent as the SIPs it hopes to persuade states to devise for themselves (E&E Daily, March 20).
Some officials in the Southeast have hinted they may hold off on submitting state plans until legal questions are resolved -- rather than meeting EPA deadlines that begin next year.
It is likely that litigation on the Clean Power Plan will be expedited. But if a decision isn't rendered next year, states that miss deadlines risk losing control of their state's implementation process, said David Doniger of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
"You go to court on your own time," he said. "It doesn't stop the clock."

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EPA Rule On Power Plant Emissions Faces Formidable Hurdle In Supreme Court

Mar 23, 2015 | LA Times

By David G. Savage

Twenty-five years in the making, a new nationwide rule is set to take effect this spring that will sharply restrict coal and oil-fired power plants from releasing mercury, arsenic and other hazardous pollutants into the air and, eventually, into rivers and lakes.
But the rule faces a final and formidable hurdle when the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments Wednesday from lawyers for the coal and power industries, who say it may be "the most costly rule" ever adopted under the Clean Air Act.
They will be joined by lawyers for Michigan and 19 other Republican-led states, who call the rule on mercury and other air pollutants a regulatory "overreach" by the Obama administration and the Environmental Protection Agency.
The combined case of Michigan vs. EPA poses yet another test of whether the conservative-leaning high court will defer to far-reaching regulations issued by the Obama administration.
Since the Reagan era of the 1980s, the high court has said judges should uphold regulations so long as they reflect a reasonable interpretation of the law. But the court's conservatives have been increasingly skeptical of President Obama's regulations.
Last month, the justices sounded closely split on whether to uphold a 2012 tax regulation issued under the Affordable Care Act that allows government subsidies to be paid to enrollees in every state, and not just in the dozen or so that run their own insurance exchanges.
If the court rejects that regulation, it could badly undercut Obama's healthcare law and cut off subsidies for millions of low- and middle-income Americans.
The court may face a similar decision in the months ahead on whether to uphold Obama's executive action on immigration. The action would offer work permits and a shield from deportation to several million immigrants who live in the country illegally. A federal judge in Texas has temporarily blocked it, saying the president overstepped his regulatory authority.
Supporters of the new toxics rule say it is vital to ensuring public health. Mercury is highly toxic and builds up in the food chain. It is particularly dangerous for pregnant women and developing fetuses. Other newly restricted pollutants are believed to trigger asthma attacks and are blamed for several thousand early deaths each year.
Michigan Atty. Gen. Bill Schuette said the rule would "result in rate increases for citizens across the country and threatens the reliability of the electricity grid by forcing the closure of many power plants."
Environmental lawyers were surprised when the court agreed to hear the industry challenge to the EPA's mercury rule, which was adopted in 2012 and upheld last year by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington.
"It was very hard to understand why they are hearing this," said Jim Pew, a lawyer for Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental law firm based in San Francisco. "I don't think it's a close case." He thinks the EPA has shown the restrictions are badly needed.
Congress passed the Clean Air Act in 1970, but lawmakers later became troubled by the slow pace of removing hazardous pollutants from the air. In 1990, they amended the law and told the EPA to study more than 180 toxic substances, including mercury, arsenic and several acid gases. If these substances were shown to harm human health and could be removed from the air, the law said, then the EPA "shall regulate" major sources of these pollutants where it is "appropriate and necessary."
After a lengthy study, the EPA in the final year of the Clinton administration said new regulation of the coal and oil-fired power plants was appropriate because they were the largest source by far of mercury and other hazardous pollutants.
But in 2005, the EPA under the George W. Bush administration backed off and said power plants could escape strict regulation if pollution were reduced through other means.
Several downwind states sued, and an appeals court ruled in 2008 that the EPA's retreat violated the law.
That ruling put the matter in the hands of the incoming Obama administration. The EPA proposed new power plant regulations in 2011. They are to take full effect next month, although some power plants have been granted an extension to comply.
The rule sets emissions standards for about 600 electric power plants across the nation. The new standards will force about a 90% reduction in emissions of mercury and other toxic metals and gases.
Although nearly every state is affected, the rule will hit hardest in states of the upper Midwest and the South, which rely heavily on coal to produce electricity.
In their appeal, lawyers for the coal industry and the Republican states say the EPA ignored the $10-billion-a-year compliance cost, which would include refurbishing or closing old power plants. Supporters of the rule estimate that it will create more than $37 billion a year in savings when considering the cost of early deaths and lost work days because of asthma.
Meanwhile, attorneys for 17 states, mostly led by Democrats, and several cities joined in support of the EPA.
They include California and New York, as well as Chicago and Baltimore. They said their states have regulated power plants, but their residents are still exposed to mercury and other toxic substances from the air and water.
Environmentalists are dismayed that the mercury rule has become caught up in the partisan divide.
"Clean air is a core American value — in red, purple and blue states," said Vickie Patton, a lawyer for the Environmental Defense Fund in Colorado. "These protections should have been put in place years ago."

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Analysis Group's Tierney Discusses Existing State Tools For Ensuring Reliability Under Clean Power Plan

Mar 24, 2015 | E&E Daily News

As the voices of concern over the Clean Power Plan's impact on grid reliability grow louder, do states have the ability to ensure reliability in their compliance plans by using tools currently at their disposal? During today's OnPoint, Susan Tierney, senior adviser at the Analysis Group, explains why she believes reliability issues will be solved as stakeholders proceed "in parallel" with compliance. She also discusses the growing support for states to employ the "just say no" option for power plan compliance. Today's OnPoint will air on E&ETV at 10 a.m. EDT.

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California Committee Votes to Block Fuels Exemption

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

The Natural Resources Committee of the California Assembly has rejected a measure to retroactively exempt distributors of transportation fuels and natural gas from the state's greenhouse gas emissions cap-and-trade program. The committee's 6-3 vote blocks A.B. 23, which sought to repeal elements of the program that required fuel distributors to be included in the program, effective Jan. 1, 2015. Assembly Member Jim Patterson (R), who introduced the bill, said there's no evidence that the program is reducing emissions. Patterson and other supporters of the measure said at the March 23 committee meeting that inclusion of fuels in emissions trading already is increasing the price of gasoline.

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Inhofe Questions Whether White House Adviser Has Climate Policy Ethics Conflict

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Andrew Childers

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) questioned whether a former Environmental Defense Fund attorney hired by the White House would have a conflict of interest in pushing the administration's Climate Action Plan.
Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, asked in a March 23 letter to the White House for copies of any ethics agreements or conflict of interest waivers Megan Ceronsky signed when she was hired in January as a senior adviser to the Office of Energy and Climate Change.
Inhofe argued that Ceronsky's work at the Environmental Defense Fund, where she led litigation seeking to force the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants, ran afoul of the Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch at 5 C.F.R. 2635, which bars federal employees from participating in any matters in which they previously represented a party.
“It appears highly inappropriate to have Ms. Ceronsky serve in any capacity interacting with EPA or otherwise involved in the development of these rules, considering her prior representation and advocacy on behalf of EDF before EPA on these very same matters,” Inhofe wrote in the letter to White House Counsel Neil Eggleston. “It is akin to having the fox watch the henhouse.”
The White House and Environmental Defense Fund could not be reached for comment.
Lawsuit Settled in 2010
Ceronsky, as a senior attorney, represented the Environmental Defense Fund in a lawsuit that resulted in a 2010 settlement in which the EPA agreed to propose carbon dioxide standards for power plants. Although the EPA failed to meet those agreed upon deadlines, it did propose carbon dioxide standards for both new and existing power plants as part of President Barack Obama's Climate Action Plan. The rules are expected to be finalized this summer.
Ceronsky also met with the EPA several times to discuss the rules and helped to write papers defending the agency's legal authority to set the carbon dioxide standards, Inhofe said.
“There is concern that key environmental activists will have had an outsized influence in developing the rules compared to states and ordinary Americans who will ultimately bear the burden of these actions,” Inhofe said.

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Sen. Inhofe Scrutinizes New White House Climate Adviser

Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) is scrutinizing the President for hiring a climate and energy adviser who used to work for a major environmental group.
Megan Ceronsky was hired in January as a senior adviser to President Obama in the White House’s energy and climate change office, after having worked for near four years at the Environmental Defense Fund as a top lawyer.
Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said Monday that the hire is akin to “having the fox watch the henhouse,” and asked various questions about whether her hire conforms with ethics rules.
Ceronsky was a key figure in efforts leading up to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) landmark carbon limits for power plants, and she should not be allowed to work on that rule, Inhofe argued.
“It appears highly inappropriate to have Ms. Ceronsky serve in any capacity interacting with EPA or otherwise involved in the development of these rules, considering her prior legal representation and advocacy on behalf of EDF before EPA on these very same matters,” Inhofe wrote in letter to the White House.
“Given these concerns, it is important that Congress and the American people have confidence that Obama administration officials are acting with impartiality and in the best interest of the American people, in accordance with federal conflict of interest and ethics laws, and not in any way advocating in favor of former employers or clients,” he continued.
Inhofe demanded to see various ethics and financial disclosures, in addition to all of Ceronksy’s communications with environmental and energy agencies.

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GOP Bill Delays Climate Rule, Gives States Veto

Mar 23, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

House Republicans are preparing a bill that would delay implementation of the Obama administration’s climate rule for power plants and let state governors veto compliance plans.
Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s panel on energy and power, unveiled the draft legislation Monday that he worked on with Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the full committee chairman, and other members.
The draft bill would delay the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) rule until all court challenges are over and let governors block any plans to implement the regulation — whether from the state or imposed by the EPA — if they think it would significantly increase electricity rates or harm reliability.
“This rule is particularly controversial. It’s unprecedented in the power that they’re trying to grab here from the states, and they’re significantly changing the way they are looking at compliance with these [carbon dioxide] regulations in each state,” Whitfield told reporters Monday.
Whitfield said while Republicans want to stop the rule altogether, this plan is more likely to pass.
“This legislation won’t stop it, but it does give courts the opportunity to render a decision,” Whitfield told reporters Monday.
The federal Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit will hear challenges to the proposed rule next month from a coal company and a dozen states.
Once the rule becomes final, lawmakers and advocates expect more litigation, including arguments at the Supreme Court. Whitfield’s bill would delay the rule until all challenges have been decided.
The GOP also wants to protect low electricity prices and reliability, Whitfield said.
"For those states where the governor thinks it will have an adverse impact on the ratepayers and the reliability and he or she can just talk to any groups they want to, consult with whoever they want to,” Whitfield said, "if they have a finding that it will have a significant adverse effect on them, then they can get a safe harbor out of having to comply with this state implementation plan and go from there.”
Beyond delaying the rule and stopping rate increases, the bill would accomplish Republicans’ goal of increased transparency for the climate rule, Whitfield added.
“The mere fact that we’re introducing a bill, we’ll have hearings on it, we’ll have markups on it, we’ll have regular order for amendments — we want the American people to be fully aware of the implication that this rule will have on electricity rates, reliability and so forth,” he said.
“We think it’s important to have a full airing of the issue, full transparency, so everybody’s pretty much aware of the impact of what’s going on.”
The rule, which the EPA wants to make final this summer, aims to slash the power sector’s carbon emissions 30 percent in 2030 from 2005 levels.
It is the most significant government action that’s been proposed to fight climate change, but businesses and Republicans say it would cost far too much, and are fighting it tooth and nail.
Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, welcomed Whitfield’s legislation.
“I appreciate Rep. Whitfield’s continued leadership on addressing the president’s costly climate regulations,” he said. “The discussion draft establishes a sound framework for providing the type of regulatory relief the American people deserve.”
Inhofe said he has worked with House lawmakers on how to fight the EPA rule, and would continue to do so.
Last year, Whitfield and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) sponsored legislation that would have allowed Congress to set the implementation timeline for the EPA’s carbon rules. That bill passed the House but did not move in the Senate.
Whitfield’s panel will hold its first hearing on the draft bill April 14.

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Op-Ed Reining in the Coal Industry's Assault on Public Health

Mar 23, 2015 | LA Times

By Lisa Garcia

On Wednesday the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a crucial case about regulating mercury and other toxic air pollution coming from coal-fired power plants. At stake is a very dangerous precedent that industry profits are more important than thousands of lives.
In late 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency issued its first-ever Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, or MATS, to reduce the pollution emitted by power plants. Simply by requiring the worst-polluting plants to match the performance and technology of their more responsible competitors, these standards will prevent between 4,200 and 11,000 premature deaths per year.
These public health protections already were years overdue because the coal industry and its allies tried to derail them from the beginning. In the current court case, the petitioners — two industry trade groups and 21 states — claim that the EPA can't set limits on toxic air pollution without first considering the financial impact that will have on the industry. Last year, the D.C. Circuit Court rejected this argument. Industry — in a last-ditch attempt to overturn these protections — appealed, and the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear this case.
Air pollution is lethal. The EPA calculated that 1 in 20 deaths in the U.S. each year is related to air pollution, mostly excess instances of heart attack, stroke, lung cancer and cardiopulmonary disease.
Coal-fired power plants are by far the largest industrial source of toxic air pollution, responsible for 50% of all U.S. emissions of mercury, a potent neurotoxin particularly dangerous to children. Scientific studies have found that nearly 7% of all U.S. women of childbearing age are exposed to mercury at levels that can harm fetal brain development.
Many of those whose health is at risk are low-income and people of color. “Coal Blooded: Putting Profits Before People,” a report by the NAACP, found that the 6 million people living near power plants in America have a per capita income 15% lower than the U.S. average income, and 39% are people of color.
The EPA's emissions standard for power plants represented a huge step forward in protecting all of us from this assault on public health.
With this lawsuit, the coal industry is trying to revive an old, dysfunctional approach to environmental protection that Congress scrapped more than 20 years ago. Before the Clean Air Act was amended in 1990, the EPA was paralyzed for decades by wrangling over which toxins should be regulated and whether controlling them was worth the expense. That system worked well for industry, but failed the American public.
In 1990, Congress decided that the EPA could consider the costs when determining how stringent its standards should be. But such estimates should not prevent the agency from controlling hazardous air pollutants at all. Nonetheless, coal industry lawyers are now claiming that before the EPA can require power plants to cut their toxic pollution, the agency must weigh the costs of compliance against the benefits.
To support this claim, the coal industry dishonestly asserts that the benefits of this particular standard are only $4 million to $6 million. But the technology needed to reduce mercury and other toxic air pollution will dramatically improve air quality, preventing thousands of non-fatal heart attacks, asthma attacks and hospitalizations and prevent up to 11,000 premature deaths a year. The EPA valued these health benefits at $37 billion to $90 billion annually.
This doesn't even include facets that are too difficult to monetize. How do you put a price tag on reduced cancer risk? Or on a child born healthy, without mercury poisoning?
This case has divided the utility industry and states. On one side sit those that refuse to invest in modern pollution-controlling technology, putting a higher value on their own short-term profits than on public health. On the other side sit industry and political leaders in clean energy who believe that allowing laggards to operate without up-to-date technology puts those who made the investments at a serious competitive disadvantage.
Other businesses in America, from dry cleaners to oil refineries, have taken steps to reduce hazardous emissions. But the coal industry thinks its should be treated differently.A decision for the coal industry would mean thousands of people will continue to fall ill, suffer, or even die prematurely — all to protect the profits of the worst corporate polluters.

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Areas in 28 States Will Be Addressed In 2016 Round of Sulfur Dioxide Designations

Mar 24, 2015 | BNA Daily Environment Report

By Patrick Ambrosio

The Environmental Protection Agency has identified areas in 28 states that meet the criteria for inclusion in the next round of attainment designations for sulfur dioxide, which will be completed by July 2, 2016, under a settlement with environmental organizations.
The EPA March 20 sent letters to environmental commissioners in Texas, Michigan, Indiana and other states informing them of counties in their states that have very large pollution sources that meet a threshold for inclusion in the next round of area designations for the 2010 national ambient air quality standards for sulfur dioxide. The agency also identified six counties that have newly monitored violations of the 75 parts per billion sulfur dioxide standard and will be included in the next round of designations.
Janet McCabe, EPA assistant administrator for air and radiation, told state air regulators March 16 that about half of states would be receiving letters alerting them about an area in their state. The area either showed a violation based on three years of monitoring data or is home to a stationary pollution source that emitted more than 16,000 tons of sulfur dioxide in 2012 or emitted more than 2,600 tons in 2012 with an average emissions rate above 0.45 pound of sulfur dioxide per 1 million British thermal units of heat input.
Those criteria were set in a court-approved consent decree between the EPA, the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council, which established a phased approach for making sulfur dioxide designations (Sierra Club v. McCarthy, N.D. Cal., No. 13-cv-3953, consent decree approved 3/2/15; 51 DEN A-3, 3/17/15).
The EPA acknowledged in a revised guidance document that the July 2016 deadline does not provide states with enough time to gather and use data from new ambient air quality monitors to inform the designation process. The most reliable information in many areas will be based on source modeling, the EPA said.
The EPA in 2013 designated areas in 16 states as being in nonattainment with the primary, one-hour sulfur dioxide standard, but delayed action on the rest of the country due to inadequate monitoring.
Additional Recommendations Sought
The updated guidance document outlined the general approach and schedule the agency will take to comply with the consent decree.
States initially submitted designation recommendations in 2011, but the EPA will accept and consider updated designation recommendations based on additional monitoring or modeling information. States are not required by the Clean Air Act to submit an update, the EPA said.
The revised guidance document instructed states to submit their updated recommendations and supporting data to the EPA by Sept. 18, which will give the agency more than nine months to consider that information before the July 2, 2016, deadline.
States will be informed by March 2, 2016, if the EPA intends to modify their designation recommendations. Both states and the public will have an opportunity to respond to those “120-day” letters in response to the state attainment recommendations, the EPA said.
The agency said it plans to provide additional information on the approach and schedule for the remaining rounds of designations in the future. The consent decree calls for the EPA to make designations by Dec. 31, 2017, for areas that have not installed an adequate sulfur dioxide monitoring network by the beginning of 2017. The sulfur dioxide designation process will conclude by Dec. 31, 2020, when the EPA must issue designations for all remaining undesignated areas.

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