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Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Groups Want to Classify Many Flame Retardants as Hazardous Substances
Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Sam Pearson

A coalition of chemical safety and public health groups filed a petition today asking the Consumer Product Safety Commission to ban a broad class of flame retardants from most household products, saying the chemicals are harmful to human health and serve little purpose.
Government Asked to Ban Household Products with Harmful Class of Chemicals
Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog
By Arlene Blum, PhD and Eve C. Gartner

While reform of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) is swirling in controversy, a targeted effort begins today to reduce the use of an entire class of harmful chemicals in everyday products.
EPA Identifies Another Risky Chemical: Can It Succeed in Using TSCA to Restrict It?
Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Defense Fund
By Lindsay McCormick

Last week, EPA released a risk assessment on the chemical N-Methylpyrrolidone (NMP). NMP is produced and imported into the U.S. in huge quantities (184 million pounds reported in 2012), and has a variety of uses including petrochemical processing, making plastics, and paint stripping.
US EPA Looking at Bans/Restrictions on Three Chemicals
Mar 31, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The US EPA plans to develop proposed rules to ban or restrict the use of trichloroethylene (TCE), n-methylpyrrolidone (NMP) and methylene chloride in certain applications. It is seeking input on the possible impact of the proposed rules on small businesses.
Shouldn’t Chemical Safety Law Overhaul Prioritize An Asbestos Ban?
Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Working Group
By Alex Formuzis and Tina Sigurdson

In 1989, the federal Environmental Protection Agency tried to ban asbestos. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit threw out most of the agency’s regulations in 1991.
Groups Petition Federal Agency to Ban Products Containing Certain Flame-Retardants.
Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Health News
By Brian Bienkowski

A group of firefighters, scientists, and health and consumer advocates are petitioning federal authorities to ban children’s products, furniture, mattresses and electronic casings if they contain a class of flame-retardants.
Dutch TV Programme Alleges Syringes Leak BPA and BADGE
Mar 31, 2015 | Chemical Watch

A Japanese manufacturer of syringes says a Dutch television programme that highlighted problems of bisphenol A (BPA) contamination through its needles "incorrectly creates a sense of anxiety with patients".

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Energy and Environment News

(ACC Blog) ACC Celebrates World Water Day
Mar 31, 2015 | American Chemistry Matters

In 1993, the United Nations declared March 22 to be celebrated as “World Day of Water.” Most people now simply call it World Water Day and it has grown in awareness ever since. In the United States, we have the good fortune to take safe drinking water for granted. http://blog.americanchemistry.com/2015/03/acc-celebrates-world-water-day/
Barack Obama Pledges Greenhouse Gas Emissions Cuts
Mar 31, 2015 | Politico
By Andrew Restuccia

The Obama administration formally pledged Tuesday that the U.S. will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 28 percent over the next decade — the opening salvo in an eight-month sprint toward reaching an international climate change deal.
Obama Offers 28 Percent Emissions Cut for UN Climate Treaty
Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

President Obama is promising the United Nations that the United States will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 28 percent.
U.S. Pledges to Try for 28% GHG Cut By 2025
Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Jean Chemnick

The Obama administration formally promised the world today that the United States would use laws already on the books to cut greenhouse gases across the economy by at least 26 percent by 2025, and "to make best efforts to reduce its emissions by 28 percent."
U.S. Climate Plan Touts EPA Actions, Vehicle Fuel Rules
Mar 31, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard
By Andrew Restuccia

The climate change plan the U.S. submitted to the United Nations today touts the actions the Obama administration is taking to cut greenhouse gas emissions, including EPA power plant regulations, vehicle fuel economy rules and energy efficiency standards.
McConnell Warns Countries Against UN Climate Plan
Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told foreign countries to think twice before entering into the United Nations’ climate pact.
Bracewell & Giuliani's Segal Says 'Just Say No' a Political Play with Legal Teeth
Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - TV

With U.S. EPA expected to release a federal implementation plan for Clean Power Plan compliance this summer, how much flexibility does the "just say no" option buy states?
Utility MACT Ruling Could Presage Attempt To Block EPA's GHG Rules
Mar 31, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker

If the Supreme Court decides to overturn EPA's air toxics rule for power plants, the court's conservative wing would likely write a broad opinion seeking to rein in the agency's clean air programs, including its upcoming greenhouse gas (GHG) rules for power plants, a former top Obama administration official says, although it is still far from clear which way the court will rule.
Letter to the Editor: The E.P.A.’s Climate Plan
Mar 31, 2015 | The New York Times
By Laurence H. Tribe

To read Richard L. Revesz’s Op-Ed article attacking as “far-fetched” the arguments I made against the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate plan in a recent congressional hearing (“An Obama Friend Turns Foe on Coal,” March 26), one would never know that Mr. Revesz also testified at that hearing, making the identical attacks, which I refuted in detail. I strongly disagree with the way he portrays my arguments.
Emissions vs. Efficiency: The Battle Rages
Mar 31, 2015 | The Wall Street Journal
By John Bussey

Coal consumption globally—and all that pollution—just keeps growing, thanks largely to economic expansion in China and India. But is there a safe role for coal in the U.S. energy mix?
Renewable Energy is Growing Very, Very Fast. It’s Just Still Not Fast Enough.
Mar 31, 2015 | The Washington Post
By Chris Mooney

The global shift toward renewable energy is not only continuing apace — it may be picking up speed.

Transportation News

Federal Data Agency Tracks Oil Train Movements
Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama

The federal government’s energy data agency has started releasing monthly data on crude oil shipments by rail.
Industry Groups Slam 'Severe' Crude-by-Rail Safety Plans
Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Energywire
By Blake Sobczak

Oil and rail industry lobbyists have lashed out against recent crude-by-rail safety proposals aimed at addressing a string of derailments and explosions.

Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.

Chemical Management News

(ACC Mentioned) Groups Want to Classify Many Flame Retardants as Hazardous Substances

Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Sam Pearson

A coalition of chemical safety and public health groups filed a petition today asking the Consumer Product Safety Commission to ban a broad class of flame retardants from most household products, saying the chemicals are harmful to human health and serve little purpose.
The groups asked CPSC to use its authority under the Federal Hazardous Substances Act to ban the use of "any non-polymeric, additive organohalogen flame retardant" in children's products, furniture, mattresses and electronic casing, a restriction that would be far broader than existing regulations.
The move is necessary because U.S. EPA's regulation of flame retardants is hampered by chemical companies' ability to shift from chemicals subject to restrictions to other, similar chemicals that can be used more freely, said Arlene Blum, executive director of the Green Science Policy Institute, even as research shows that many of the chemicals can migrate from products into house dust, through which children are exposed to the compounds.
"We feel that this class of chemicals, since the '70s, has been a series of regrettable substitutions, where each chemical is heralded as safe and effective, and then turns out to be neither for many uses," Blum said. "So we think it's time, instead of going one by one, where there's always a new chemical cousin or substitute, to really look at the whole class."
Blum said the petition was the result of years of scientific and legal work by the groups. Signatories to the petition include the American Academy of Pediatrics; the National Hispanic Medical Association; the International Association of Fire Fighters; the Learning Disabilities Association of America; Consumers Union; the Consumer Federation of America; the League of United Latin American Citizens; Worksafe; and Philip Landrigan, director of the Children's Environmental Health Center at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York.
"Ridding these toxics from the many products we use everyday would improve the health of most people in the United States, and especially children," said Eve Gartner, an Earthjustice staff attorney who worked on the petition, in a statement.
Still, it's not clear whether CPSC has an appetite for a broad rulemaking that is sure to face steep resistance from the chemical industry and burden the agency. A much narrower proposed rule to restrict certain phthalates from children's products and child care articles has taken the agency several years longer than anticipated and has prompted a vigorous dispute from chemical industry groups, including the American Chemistry Council, over scientific decisions made by CPSC staff and a panel of scientists who studied the issue (E&ENews PM, March 16).
CPSC spokesman Scott Wolfson said he wasn't sure if the agency had received the petition.
Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, said that while it is clear that certain flame retardants are likely to harm humans and the environment and that many flame retardants do not work effectively at the levels at which they are used in most consumer products, it may not be possible to justify targeting such a large class of the chemicals.
"I'm concerned with the idea of just saying, because something has a halogen on it, we don't want it," Birnbaum said. She added, "I haven't seen enough data to convince me that that's true."
Under the Federal Hazardous Substances Act, CPSC can designate "a substance or any mixture of substance" as a hazard if it finds that the chemicals "may cause substantial personal injury or substantial illness during or as a proximate result of any customary or reasonably foreseeable handling or use." Products defined as hazardous substances must be sold with warning labels, but the petition argues warning labels would be insufficient to protect the public from halogenated flame retardants.
The Federal Hazardous Substances Act, which became law in 1960 and has been amended several times since, pre-dates the Toxic Substances Control Act, which specifies how EPA may regulate toxic chemicals. FHSA is aimed at toxic household products and has led to regulations that, for example, require Drano and other potentially harmful consumer products to be sold with labels explaining their proper use. But the law also allows CPSC to declare a product a "banned hazardous substance" if it can show that labeling alone would not sufficiently protect the public from the hazardous substance.
"It's unfortunate these groups are presenting families with the false choice between chemical safety and fire safety when we can have both," Bryan Goodman, a spokesman for the North American Flame Retardant Alliance, a branch of the American Chemistry Council, said in a statement.
Goodman added that it is "not appropriate to make broad conclusions or impose a one-size-fits-all regulatory approach for these substances."

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Government Asked to Ban Household Products with Harmful Class of Chemicals

Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - Congress Blog

By Arlene Blum, PhD and Eve C. Gartner

While reform of the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) is swirling in controversy, a targeted effort begins today to reduce the use of an entire class of harmful chemicals in everyday products.
For decades, regulators have been playing a dangerous game of toxic whack-a-mole: banning a toxic chemical only to have it replaced with a chemical cousin that turns out to be just as problematic after years of use. But today, a diverse coalition including firefighters, doctors, advocates for children with learning disabilities, scientists, and worker and consumer groupspetitioned the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) to adopt regulations banning products containing any member of the class of organohalogen flame retardants in furniture, children’s products, mattresses and electronic enclosures. By seeking regulations addressing an entire class of intrinsically toxic chemicals in these uses, this petition aims to jump-start a more effective way to increase the chemical safety of household products.
The class of flame retardants known as organohalogens (because they all contain either chlorine or bromine bonded to carbon) has been associated with cancer, reduced sperm count, increased time to pregnancy, decreased IQ in children, impaired memory, learning deficits, hyperactivity, hormone disruption, and lowered immunity. Due to their chemical structure, organohalogen flame retardants tend to be very persistent in the environment and in our bodies.
Because of the failures of TSCA, new members of this class continue to be used at high levels in consumer products despite a deficit of safety data, putting our health and that of future generations at risk. In 2012, a toxicologist at the University of California, Riverside – Dr. David Eastmond, found that all 86 organohalogen flame retardants available on the market at the time of the study were either toxic or of high concern for human health.
Children’s developing brains and reproductive organs are the most vulnerable to toxic flame retardants, and children are the ones most exposed. These chemicals migrate out of consumer products into dust, and children, who play on the floor and frequently put their hands in their mouths, inevitably touch and eat that dust. The cost of children’s exposure to these chemicals is enormous. A recent study estimated that the European Union (EU) spends over $200 billion a year on health problems, especially neurological disorders, related to endocrine disruptors such as flame retardants. In another recent paper, the authors report a 70-100 percent probability that polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), a subgroup of organohalogen flame retardants commonly used for the past few decades in consumer products, are associated with 873,000 lost IQ points and 3290 cases of intellectual disability that cost society over $10 billion – in the EU alone.
Furthermore, organohalogen flame retardants, as currently used in furniture, toys, mattresses and electronic enclosures, offer no significant protection in realistic fire scenarios. Household products containing these flame retardants can still burn, and when they do, they tend to produce more smoke, soot, toxic gases and carcinogenic combustion products such as dioxins and furans. This puts building residents, firefighters and other first responders at greater risk of harm in the event of a fire.
The science that the class of organohalogen flame retardants is hazardous is compelling. The question is: will the CPSC protect consumers and first responders by prohibiting the sale of consumer products containing any member of this toxic chemical class?
Blum is visiting scholar in Chemistry, University of California, Berkeley and executive director of the Green Science Policy Institute. Gartner, with Earthjustice, is the counsel on the petition.

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EPA Identifies Another Risky Chemical: Can It Succeed in Using TSCA to Restrict It?

Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Defense Fund

By Lindsay McCormick

Lindsay McCormick is a Research Analyst.
Last week, EPA released a risk assessment on the chemical N-Methylpyrrolidone (NMP). NMP is produced and imported into the U.S. in huge quantities (184 million pounds reported in 2012), and has a variety of uses including petrochemical processing, making plastics, and paint stripping.
Experiments in laboratory animals demonstrate that exposure to NMP during pregnancy leads to adverse developmental outcomes in the offspring, such as low birth weight, skeletal malformations, and mortality (seehere and here).
EPA’s assessment focused exclusively on NMP exposure from its presence in products used to remove paint and other coatings. Because of NMP’s potential to disrupt fetal development, EPA assessed exposures in women of childbearing age.
EPA found that exposure to NMP-based paint strippers in women of childbearing age beyond four hours per day presents risks that cannot be mitigated from use of protective gear such as gloves and respirators. Risks obviously could be greater, even for shorter exposure times, if protective equipment is not consistently used.
The latest risk assessment of a TSCA Work Plan Chemical
The NMP risk assessment is the fifth risk assessment EPA has completed of the Work Plan Chemicals identified using its authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA). Developed in 2012, the TSCA Work Plan Chemicals program is designed to assess the risk of priority chemicals on the market (new chemicals go through a separate process). Currently, the work plan includes 90 chemicals, selected based on factors such as potential concern for children’s health, neurotoxic effects, and carcinogenicity. Where possible, EPA is assessing groups of chemicals with similar chemistries and potential health effects, such as the brominated phthalate flame retardant cluster.
NMP is a common alternative to dichloromethane (DCM), another paint stripper that EPA recently assessed under the same program (see our previous blog). DCM-based paint strippers are widely used in occupational settings and have led to a number of worker deaths from refurbishing bathtubs in confined spaces. The DCM risk assessment released in August 2014 identified carcinogenic and neurotoxic risks associated with this use.
Although there are clear risks from DCM-based paint strippers, the new EPA risk assessment demonstrates that NMP is a risky alternative. This illustrates the importance of systematically assessing groups of chemicals in order to avoid substituting one bad chemical with another bad one.
Risk management difficult under TSCA
Despite the risks that these paint-stripping chemicals pose, it is unclear what action EPA will be able to take to limit their use. TSCA, the U.S.’s primary chemical safety law, is outdated and provides EPA with very limited authority to regulate toxic chemicals in consumer products. Unlike many other statutes EPA administers, such as the Clean Air Act, risk assessments under TSCA are rare and do not directly lead to regulatory actions. Even if EPA identifies a significant risk from a specific chemical, it is not legally required to take action to address the risk. And TSCA has proven nearly impossible for EPA to use to ban or restrict chemicals in commerce.
In 1989, EPA issued a regulation to ban asbestos using TSCA Section 6, which in principle provides EPA with the authority to limit manufacture, processing, distribution, use or disposal of a chemical in commerce. However, EPA’s regulation was challenged, and in 1991, a U.S. Court of Appeals struck down EPA’s proposal, arguing EPA had not met its burdens under TSCA. EPA has never again tried to restrict a chemical using TSCA. Its failure to ban asbestos, a chemical that kills 10,000 Americans a year, is widely referenced as a prime example of TSCA’s failure.
For the first time since 1989, EPA has indicated its intent to attempt to utilize its authority under TSCA Section 6 to restrict the uses of several of the Work Plan Chemicals for which it has found significant risks. EPA is developing a rulemaking to ban or restrict certain uses of Trichloroethylene (TCE), a chemical degreaser linked to cancer and adverse developmental effects. And an EPA press release posted yesterday indicates EPA is taking the first step toward developing a TSCA rule to ban or restrict DCM and NMP in paint strippers. EDF commends EPA’s efforts to revive its authority under TSCA Section 6, but it will clearly be confronted with major hurdles if history is any guide.
Need for TSCA reform
While EPA is trying to making the best of a bad situation, in order to effectively protect Americans from toxic chemicals, Congress must reform TSCA. Only a tiny fraction of the thousands of chemicals used in home improvement products, such as paint strippers, and in everyday items ranging from cleaning products to clothing to furniture, have ever been reviewed for safety. And TSCA leaves EPA powerless to effectively regulate even known hazardous chemicals like asbestos, lead, and formaldehyde – not to mention NMP, DCM and TCE.
In announcing the release of the NMP assessment, Jim Jones, Assistant Administrator for EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, alluded to the difficulty the Agency will face in seeking to regulate the Work Plan Chemicals under TSCA: “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.”
TSCA is turning 40 in 2016. It’s long overdue for a total makeover.

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US EPA Looking at Bans/Restrictions on Three Chemicals

Mar 31, 2015 | Chemical Watch

The US EPA plans to develop proposed rules to ban or restrict the use of trichloroethylene (TCE), n-methylpyrrolidone (NMP) and methylene chloride in certain applications. It is seeking input on the possible impact of the proposed rules on small businesses.
For TCE the proposed rule will apply to its use as a commercial degreaser, a spotting agent in dry cleaning, and in certain consumer products. In the case of NMP and methylene chloride, the proposed rule would target their use in paint and coating removal.
Final risk assessments for all three found health risks from their use in these applications (CW 26 June 2014 and CW 24 March 2015) .
The agency is now seeking nominations from individuals representing small businesses, small governments and small not-for-profit organisations to provide input to a federal panel that will explore risk reduction options in the use of the substances.
The Regulatory Flexibility Act requires agencies to establish a small business advocacy review panel (SBAR) for rules that may have a “significant economic impact on a substantial number of small businesses,” the agency said. This panel will include federal representatives from the Small Business Administration (SBA), the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the EPA.
Small entity representatives (SERs) will be selected by the panel to provide comments on behalf of their company, community or organisation, and advise the panel about the potential impacts of the proposed rules. The EPA is seeking self-nominations directly from the small entities that may be subject to the rule requirements. Others such as representatives of trade associations that exclusively, or primarily, represent potentially regulated small entities, may also serve as SERs.
Nominations must be submitted by 10 April.

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Shouldn’t Chemical Safety Law Overhaul Prioritize An Asbestos Ban?

Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Working Group

By Alex Formuzis and Tina Sigurdson

In 1989, the federal Environmental Protection Agency tried to ban asbestos. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit threw out most of the agency’s regulations in 1991. This case, commonly called Corrosion Proof Fittings, is frequently cited as an example of just how broken the Toxic Substances Control Act, really is.
Almost 25 years later, hundreds of thousands of pounds of raw asbestos and asbestos-laden materials are still being imported into the U.S. annually. In fact, since 2006, more than 8 million pounds have arrived through our ports.
Now, the Senate is debating two competing bills for overhauling the TSCA law. The first is a chemical industry-backed bill, proposed by Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), based on an earlier bill introduced by Sen. David Vitter (R-La.). The second is a bill proposed by Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.). They named it The Alan Reinstein and Trevor Schaefer Toxic Chemical Protection Act, for Alan Reinstein, who died of mesothelioma in May 2006, and Trevor Schaefer, who was diagnosed with brain cancer in November 2002. This bill is supported by many environmental and public health groups.
One of the many stark differences between the two proposals is their approach to regulating asbestos. The Boxer-Markey proposal would require the EPA to reassess the risks of asbestos within two years of the bill’s enactment and take appropriate regulatory action within the following year.
The Udall-Vitter bill fails to mention asbestos.
The Boxer-Markey bill would compel the EPA to begin evaluation of 75 chemicals within the first five years of enactment and, as soon as fees were in place, would add three more chemicals to the queue every time EPA completed a chemical review. The Udall-Vitter bill set a slower pace, requiring the EPA to launch reviews of 25 chemicals in the first five years and to add one substance to the queue with every completed review. The bottom line: the Udall-Vitter bill would not guarantee a review of asbestos anytime soon.
More than 10,000 people die from asbestos-related disease each year in the U.S. Wouldn’t real reform of our nation’s chemical policy require the EPA to take a second look at this known killer?

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Groups Petition Federal Agency to Ban Products Containing Certain Flame-Retardants.

Mar 31, 2015 | Environmental Health News

By Brian Bienkowski

A group of firefighters, scientists, and health and consumer advocates are petitioning federal authorities to ban children’s products, furniture, mattresses and electronic casings if they contain a class of flame-retardants.
The petition, announced today and put together by the Green Science Policy Institute and Earthjustice, calls on the Consumer Product Safety Commission to ban these products if they contain organohalogens flame-retardants, a class of chemicals that have been linked to cancer, hormone disruption, and reproductive, developmental and immune system problems, according to the petitioners.
By targeting an entire class of compounds, rather than a single chemical, the petition is a new approach to tackling the seemingly intractable problem of keeping up with harmful chemicals in our environment, said Arlene Blum, executive director of the Green Science Policy Institute.
There are more than 80,000 chemicals registered in the United States, most of which haven’t been fully studied for potential health impacts. The National Toxicology Program estimates 2,000 new chemicals are introduced every year.
Some flame-retardants, such as polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), have been largely banned or voluntarily phased out by manufacturers because they’re persistent in the environment and toxic. But the replacements often have similar properties to the banned compounds, something Blum referred to as “toxic whack-a-mole.”
“Moving from a harmful substance to its chemical cousin,” she said.
Organohalogen flame-retardants are added to products such as mattresses, baby strollers, changing pads, the casings of computers and TVs, and building insulation to keep them from catching fire.
But because some of these compounds do not stay in products – but can migrate into dust - almost all people have these compounds in their bodies. Some of the highest levels of flame-retardants are found in children, mostly because of their hand-to-mouth habits.
U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences director Linda Birnbaum, a toxicologist who specializes in the health effects of environmental contaminants, said she understands the petition but thinks it may be a bit too ambitious.
“Just banning things because they have a halogen atom in them could be problematic,” Birnbaum said. “There may be sub-classes that we could look at, or certain chemical structures that are known to be problematic, but I can’t say that banning an entire class is the way to go.”
Numerous animal studies have shown the compounds to impact development and reproduction and disrupt the endocrine system.
Several organohalogen flame-retardants, or their by-products, are banned by the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, a global treaty of 150 countries. The first 12 compounds the Convention banned were organohalogen pesticides, such as DDT.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission doesn’t have a set timeline to deal with the petition, said Eve Gartner, a staff attorney at EarthJustice, who is working on this case.
If it meets criteria as a legit petition, it could possibly be open to public comment, as some petitions in the past have, Gartner said. Most petitions sent to the Commission have not dealt with chemicals, she said.
“Clearly they [the Commision] have authority over toxic chemicals,” Gartner said, referring to the Federal Hazardous Substances Act. “They just haven’t used it much.”macwagen/flickrIn 2013 California relaxed flame-retardant requirements in furniture.
A major issue with flame-retardants is whether they’re effective and necessary in products. The chemicals became widely used in the 1970s after a California law required furniture to be more resistant to flames.
However, an investigation three years ago by the Chicago Tribune found that since the California law, deceptive campaigns have promoted flame-retardant use and the chemicals don’t always work as promised. In 2013, California relaxed the 1970s law and now requires furniture made with flame-retardants to be labeled as such.
But that doesn’t necessarily mean that all flame-retardants aren’t needed, Birnbaum said.
“Maybe we don’t need them in all of the mattresses, furniture, but I think we might need them in electronics,” she said. “Have electronics changed enough that they are no longer subject to sparking?”
The petition has a diverse backing and includes the American Academy of Pediatrics, the National Hispanic Medical Association, the International Association of Fire Fighters, the Learning Disabilities Association of America, Consumers Union, Consumer Federation of America, the League of United Latin American Citizens, Worksafe and Dr. Philip J. Landrigan of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.
The children’s health organizations cited research that showed women with higher levels of flame retardants in their blood had babies with lower birth weights and, years later, the children had lower IQs.
Harold Schaitberger, general president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, said in a statement that flame-retardants create “a serious health risk for fire fighters."
A 2013 study found elevated levels of flame-retardants and harmful byproducts in twelve San Francisco firefighters’ blood. Researchers suspect such exposure might be behind the elevated rates of cancer that firefighters suffer from, as reported by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health last year.
While the petition seeks to address new products containing these chemicals, there’s also the “tens of millions of toxic couches and other products” that already contain them, Blum said.
“This petition and process can start helping people change about how they think about chemicals,” she said. “One way we’ll get ahead is to think about classes when we’re talking about harmful compounds in everyday products.”

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Dutch TV Programme Alleges Syringes Leak BPA and BADGE

Mar 31, 2015 | Chemical Watch

A Japanese manufacturer of syringes says a Dutch television programme that highlighted problems of bisphenol A (BPA) contamination through its needles "incorrectly creates a sense of anxiety with patients".
The current affairs programme File EénVandaag says that the epoxy adhesive, used to make K-Pack II syringes, does not harden properly. As a result the resin, which contains BPA and bisphenol A diglycidyl ether (BADGE), can potentially enter the needle and patients' bloodstreams, the programme alleges. It also says there are problems with another syringe called Neolus.
The NGO Health Care Without Harm called the report worrying, adding that "exposure through Terumo syringes is not an isolated case. Many other medical devices in common use are thought to be leaching BPA.”
The syringes, produced at the Japanese-owned Terumo Europe plant, in Leuven, are used in vaccine programmes and sold to large pharmaceutical companies. Terumo says it did research in 2012 that found minuscule fluid glue parts did not harden and that there was a chance that traces could enter into patients' bodies through the needle.
However, it points out that BADGE is not considered as a carcinogen, mutagen or toxic for reproduction (CMR) under European regulations, and adds that, based on its findings, it launched further internal and external research. "These analyses," the company says, "have proven that our injection needles represent no health risk.”

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Energy and Environment News

(ACC Blog) ACC Celebrates World Water Day

Mar 31, 2015 | American Chemistry Matters

In 1993, the United Nations declared March 22 to be celebrated as “World Day of Water.” Most people now simply call it World Water Day and it has grown in awareness ever since. In the United States, we have the good fortune to take safe drinking water for granted.
The very idea of developing a chlorinated drinking water supply started in Jersey City, New Jersey in 1908. At the time, the bold experiment was considered risky. Yet there was no doubt that drinking water chlorination proved effective in reducing the spread of waterborne diseases like typhoid fever and cholera. More than 100 years ago, those diseases were all too common in American communities. Today, they’ve been virtually eliminated in the United States thanks to widespread water disinfection – with most water systems still using chlorine chemistry in some capacity.
In many countries, safe drinking water is a luxury and often unattainable. In Haiti, groups like International Action are working to provide safe drinking water to communities across the country. The American Chemistry Council’s Chlorine Chemistry Division has partnered with International Action over the last several years to help bring safe drinking water technologies, such as community chlorinators to the country.
Thanks to International Action workers, like Jeffrey Sejour, tens of thousands of Haitians now have access to safe drinking water. Not only is it safe, but money that used to be spent by some Haitians on healthcare or medicine can now be spent on other endeavors like education. The positive ripple effect can be felt throughout these communities – giving many Haitians hope for a brighter future.
In celebration of World Water Day, Jeffrey Sejour came to the American Chemistry Council in Washington, D.C. to demonstrate how the technology works to a group of 24 students from a local Montessori School on Capitol Hill. He also shared his experience working to bring safe drinking water to Haitians. These students and their teachers showed a tremendous enthusiasm for science and chemistry. The students also participated in a safe drinking water activity.
Following the demonstration, ACC President and CEO Cal Dooley presented Jeffrey Sejour with a $5,000 donation to International Action to assist drinking water chlorination efforts in Haiti. It’s just one more example of how the power of chemistry can help improve lives around the world.

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Barack Obama Pledges Greenhouse Gas Emissions Cuts

Mar 31, 2015 | Politico

By Andrew Restuccia

The Obama administration formally pledged Tuesday that the U.S. will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 28 percent over the next decade — the opening salvo in an eight-month sprint toward reaching an international climate change deal.
The five-page submission to the United Nations repeats a pledge that President Barack Obama first unveiled four months ago in Beijing and relies on Environmental Protection Agency regulations that have been a centerpiece of his second-term climate agenda. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell immediately warned international negotiators to “proceed with caution” before trusting Obama’s promise — the continuation of the GOP’s attempt to undermine the administration’s climate strategy at every turn.

White House adviser Brian Deese announced the submission in a post on Medium. “The United States’ target is ambitious and achievable, and we have the tools we need to reach it,” he wrote.

The pledge calls for the U.S. to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 26 percent to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025. Meeting that target would also set the stage for the U.S. to push toward far deeper cuts, the administration said — perhaps exceeding 80 percent by 2050.
Green groups praised the administration’s move. “This important commitment sends a powerful message to the world: Together we can slash dangerous carbon pollution and combat climate change,” Natural Resources Defense Council President Rhea Suh said in a statement.
Tuesday’s submission, known in U.N. jargon as an Intended Nationally Determined Contribution, fulfills a mandate that countries submit plans detailing their contributions to the global climate effort before a December summit in Paris.

The heart of the U.S. commitment consists of proposed EPA power-plant regulations that industry groups and congressional Republicans are already trying to undercut, both by pursuing court challenges and by urging states not to comply. But EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said this week that she’s not worried that the courts will overturn the rules and undermine the president’s pledge.
“We certainly don’t expect that to happen,” McCarthy said during a POLITICO policy forum Monday. “I don’t need a plan B if I’m solid in my plan A.”
In contrast, McConnell alleged in a statement Tuesday that the United States couldn’t meet Obama’s 2025 emissions target “even if the job-killing and likely illegal Clean Power Plan were fully implemented.”
“Considering that two-thirds of the U.S. federal government hasn’t even signed off on the Clean Power Plan and 13 states have already pledged to fight it, our international partners should proceed with caution before entering into a binding, unattainable deal,” said the Kentucky Republican, who has lambasted Obama’s climate initiative as a “war on coal.”
The statement was the continuation of McConnell’s “just say no” strategy on the president’s climate strategy. It also echoed Senate Republicans’ attempt earlier this month to undermine nuclear negotiations with Iran by telling leaders in Tehran that Obama can’t make binding commitments without backing from Congress.
The plan the United States submitted Tuesday provides little new detail on Obama’s climate plans, but it nonetheless allows the administration to make the case to other countries that its target is transparent, achievable and ambitious. That could help the U.S. — the world’s No. 2 carbon polluter — shake the years of complaints that it has largely shirked its responsibilities to tackle the climate problem, especially after the George W. Bush administration walked away from the 1997 Kyoto agreement.
Tuesday’s submission touts the actions the administration is already taking to cut greenhouse gas emissions, including the EPA’s power-plant regulations as well as vehicle fuel-economy rules and energy efficiency standards. In addition, the plan says the U.S. will “make best efforts” to hit the higher end of its target: a 28 percent carbon reduction.
The document says the U.S. is already on a path toward meeting Obama’s earlier target of cutting emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. Meeting the 2025 goal will require an additional reduction of 9 percent to 11 percent beyond the 2020 target, according to the plan, as well as an “approximate doubling” of the 2005-through-2020 annual pace of emissions reductions.
The plan says the 2025 target also puts the United States on a path toward deeper emissions reductions in the coming decades.

“This target is consistent with a straight line emission reduction pathway from 2020 to deep, economy-wide emission reductions of 80% or more by 2050,” the plan says. “The target is part of a longer range, collective effort to transition to a low-carbon global economy as rapidly as possible.”
Jennifer Morgan, global director of the World Resources Institute’s Climate Change Program, called the U.S. target “serious and achievable.”
“The United States’ proposal shows that it is ready to lead by example on the climate crisis,” she said in a statement. “By enacting these common sense actions, the U.S. can grow its economy and save money through cleaner technologies.”
International climate negotiators have embraced a bottom-up structure that allows individual countries to determine how they will cut emissions, abandoning failed efforts to impose top-down mandates. While that approach makes the talks more likely to succeed, it also means the end result will be less ambitious. Indeed, analysts agree that the final international pact almost certainly won’t do enough on its own to avert the most catastrophic effects of climate change.
The U.N. has strongly encouraged major polluters to submit their domestic plans well in advance of the Paris meeting. At interim climate talks last year in Lima, Peru, negotiators set a goal of countries issuing the plans by the end of March if they can.
But as of Tuesday morning, only the European Union, Switzerland, Norway and Mexico had submitted their plans. Most major polluters are expected to release their plans by June.
Still, the EU and U.S. pledges, combined with China’s target of seeing its emissions peak by 2030, mean that the planet’s three largest carbon polluters have committed to taking action on climate change — a feat that once seemed impossible. (China has not yet formally submitted its domestic plan.)
It remains to be seen what other big polluters like India and Russia will do.
Despite some early progress, climate negotiators will have to clear a series of hurdles before they can clinch a deal, which would take effect in 2020. Negotiators must whittle down a 90-page negotiating text that is full of contradictory language being pushed by various countries. And they must strike difficult compromises on the legal framework of the agreement, as well as the degree to which wealthy nations will contribute billions of dollars to help poor countries deal with the effects of a warming planet.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are already fuming because they likely will have little oversight of the climate deal, especially since the Obama administration is expected to ensure that the final agreement will not require approval from the Republican-led Senate. Sens. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) have launched a last-ditch effort to undermine that strategy, offering legislative amendments that would allow the Senate to weigh in on the deal.

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Obama Offers 28 Percent Emissions Cut for UN Climate Treaty

Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

President Obama is promising the United Nations that the United States will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 28 percent.
Top Obama adviser Brian Deese announced Tuesday that the White House sent the pledge to the U.N. as the official U.S. contribution toward an emerging international climate change agreement.
"President Obama announced that the United States would build on the historic progress we’ve already made to cut carbon pollution and protect public health by reducing emissions 26–28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025," Deese wrote on the blogging platform Medium.
Deese later told reporters that the UN submission “is ambitious and achievable within existing legal authority,” and that Congress would not have to pass any new legislation to enable it.

“Over the last eight years, we, the United States, have already cut carbon pollution more than any other country,” Deese said. “By formalizing this goal, we are committing to build on that progress and to pick up that pace.”

Deese said the United States would roughly double its carbon emissions reductions from current levels, and would be on a trajectory to slashing carbon 80 percent by 2050.

The pledge reflects an agreement Obama made with Chinese President Xi Jinping in November, in exchange for China’s commitment to stop increasing greenhouse gases by 2030.
The cut will come by 2025 and is based on 2005 levels as a starting point.
Deese said the U.N. submission goes beyond the China deal by detailing how the United States would achieve the reduction.
It includes fuel efficiency standards for cars and trucks, energy efficiency measures for buildings and appliances, as well as measures to reduce the output of hydrofluorocarbons, greenhouse gases that are about 10,000 times more potent than carbon for global warming.
“These policies deliver real benefits to the American people,” he said, noting the administration’s estimates that car efficiency and low gas prices are saving the average family $750 a year, and the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate rule for power plants will prevent thousands of premature deaths.
The United States’ is only the sixth entity to offer a contribution to the U.N. agreement, following China, the 28-nation European Union, Switzerland, Norway and Mexico.
The contribution process reflects the unique nature of the climate negotiations, which leaders hope will wrap up at a December meeting in Paris.
Each country in the world is being asked to submit their own, national plans to fight climate change, which will be rolled together into one pact that might or might not be legally binding.
The U.N. wants emissions cuts that will keep global warming at or below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial times. If countries’ contributions cannot reach that level, leaders may try to negotiate stronger deals.
Environmental groups welcomed the announcement.
“This important commitment sends a powerful message to the world: Together we can slash dangerous carbon pollution and combat climate change,” Rhea Suh, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in a statement.
“We are confident that the U.S. commitment can be met — and even exceeded,” Suh continued.The commitment immediately came under fire from congressional Republicans who say attempts to legislate greenhouse gas cuts could ruin the economy and increase energy prices. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) said the agreement requires Senate approval, and it will not happen in the current Senate. “As the Obama administration continues to pursue a radical agenda on global warming, it’s clear Americans are beginning to question if the cost of billions of dollars to our economy and tens of thousands of lost job opportunities is really worth it for potentially no gain,” Inhofe said in a statement. Republicans have vowed to do all they can to block the United States from committing itself to major emissions cuts. Inhofe, along with Sens. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), proposed amendments to the Senate budget last week that would have prohibited the Obama administration from entering into any international climate pacts.

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U.S. Pledges to Try for 28% GHG Cut By 2025

Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire

By Jean Chemnick

The Obama administration formally promised the world today that the United States would use laws already on the books to cut greenhouse gases across the economy by at least 26 percent by 2025, and "to make best efforts to reduce its emissions by 28 percent."
Today's submission tracks with the U.S.-China bilateral agreement President Obama announced last November in Beijing and uses a 2005 base line. China pledged at the time to peak its emissions by 2030 and to draw 20 percent of its power from non-fossil-fuel sources by that year.
The U.S. submission will form the core of its negotiating position during U.N. climate talks in Paris this December, which countries hope will finally produce a global climate agreement.
In a post today on the website Medium, White House senior adviser Brian Deese said that the U.S. target "is ambitious and achievable, and we have the tools we need to reach it."
The White House said in the submission that its goal will require the United States to cut emissions between 2.3 and 2.8 percent each year compared with 2005, an approximate doubling of the rate at which the U.S. economy has shed emissions over the previous decade. It will also put the United States on a trajectory to meet its goal of cutting emissions more than 80 percent by 2050, the administration said.
Deese wrote that the U.S. public will benefit from steps the executive branch will take to achieve the target -- including regulations under the Clean Air Act, the Energy Policy Act, and the Energy Independence and Security Act. Efficiency and greenhouse gas restrictions will reduce fuel and electric bills and help avoid health care costs, he argued.
But he also emphasized that other countries must respond with commitments of their own.
"Under President Obama's leadership, the United States is doing our part to take on this global challenge," he said.
In the Medium post and on a call this morning with reporters, Deese hammered home the importance of other countries submitting "timely, transparent, measurable and above all ambitious targets for cutting carbon pollution and building lower-carbon economies to the [U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change]."
At least 81 developed and developing countries are expected to offer these pledges, known in U.N. jargon as "intended nationally determined contributions," or INDCs. Governments were asked to submit their documents by today if possible, but only the European Union, Switzerland, Norway and Mexico have done so. But those who track the negotiations say the U.S. INDC will play a key role in prompting other top emitters to take formal action, including China and India.
"I think it's a really important step to strengthen climate action, both here and abroad," said Elliot Diringer, executive vice president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. "I think by stepping up early with an ambitious contribution, the U.S. is putting pressure on other countries to pitch in their fair share, too."Changed political landscape
The last time the Obama administration offered the world a climate pledge was in 2009 in Copenhagen, Denmark, and the submission was explicitly based on a cap-and-trade bill then moving through Congress sponsored by then-Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.). The administration even borrowed the bill's target -- 17 percent compared with 2005 levels by 2020.
But the political landscape has shifted since the president made that pledge in the Danish capital. Rather than advancing new laws, Democrats in Congress are now engaged in defending old ones that U.S. EPA and other agencies are using to fashion controls for carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases.
And today's submission states that the United States can achieve its promised reductions through regulations that have already been promulgated or that will be final before Obama leaves office in January 2017.
This will include EPA's Clean Power Plan, which is due to be finalized this summer. The submission does not say how much the existing power plant rule will cut carbon dioxide, though in the call Deese noted the draft rule's 30 percent by 2030 reduction. Diringer said the administration would be unlikely to assign emissions reductions to particular policies as part of its U.N. submission.
"They can only describe in detail what they're confident of, and to the degree that policy processes are still underway, it makes sense to preserve some flexibility in what you're putting forward," he said.
The submission also mentioned new and pending rules for light-duty and heavy-duty vehicles, Energy Department building and appliance efficiency mandates, EPA's forthcoming rules for landfill and oil and gas methane, and steps EPA has taken to phase out heat-trapping hydrofluorocarbons.
While these policies will be final before 2017, the next administration would have to implement them -- and not work with Congress to repeal them.
But on the same call this morning, U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern said that he regularly assures negotiators from other countries that U.S. laws are hard to change.
"Undoing the kind of regulation that we're putting in place is something that is very tough to do, and countries ask me about the solidity of what we're doing all the time, and that's exactly what I explain," he said.
The submission assigns no role to Congress. "Congress having dropped the oar for the moment, I think the administration has decided it's going to keep rowing," said Pete Ogden, a senior fellow at the liberal Center for American Progress.
But Democrats in Congress rushed last night and this morning to register their approval.
The 118 Democratic members of the Bicameral Task Force on Climate Change released a letter to the president last night promising to "help you seize this opportunity to strengthen the global response to climate change."
The task force, led by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), praised the administration's efforts to curb emissions without the help of Congress (ClimateWire, March 31).GOP pans 'costly promises'
Senate Environment and Public Works ranking member Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said in a statement of her own that the INDC follows on Obama's "demonstrated leadership" in forging the deal with China. "Today's announcement confirms that the United States is doing its part to reduce dangerous carbon pollution, and this effort will continue to bring other countries along the path to a strong agreement in Paris," she said.
Republican opponents of U.S. participation in the U.N. climate processes cast today's action as another unilateral effort by the administration that could prove costly to U.S. interests.
Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), who last week floated an amendment to the nonbinding fiscal 2016 budget resolution opposing the administration's climate diplomacy, tied the climate submission to the administration's efforts to forge a nuclear agreement with Iran.
"Just as we witnessed throughout recent negotiations with Iran and during the previous climate agreement with China, President Obama and his administration act as if Congress has no role in these discussions," he said in a statement. "These costly promises should not be forced upon families and workers across America without the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate."
Today's submission does not weigh in on the legal structure of the Paris accord, though Stern said again in today's call that he favors a "hybrid" approach to legal form being floated by New Zealand (ClimateWire, Oct. 22, 2014).
The plan calls for countries to set domestic emissions targets of their choosing, then face legal obligations to give the United Nations a schedule for when those cuts will happen and to submit to binding review measures.
Stern said today that the approach should encourage "broad participation."
"It's important generally to have this agreement really be applicable to all," he said.
But Blunt promised that the Senate will "not stand by" while the administration commits the United States to actions that could prove economically disastrous.
Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), who leads a House Energy and Commerce Committee subpanel that has jurisdiction over EPA's emissions rules, said in a statement that the House will not permit the president to act without Congress, either.
"We are not going to allow him to make unilateral international commitments based on assumptions from the Clean Power Plan and other rules that are pending or have not yet been proposed," said the Energy and Power Subcommittee chairman. "Given the constitutional, statutory, and other legal issues surrounding the Clean Power Plan, I don't believe it will withstand judicial scrutiny."
Whitfield has floated legislative language that would allow states to opt out of the existing power plant rule.
Most environmental leaders, meanwhile, praised the administration's action as a good "first step" toward bending the curve on emissions.
"To win the fight against climate change, the world first needs to turn the corner on global greenhouse gas emissions, so that they stop rising and start falling," said Nathaniel Keohane, vice president for international climate at the Environmental Defense Fund and a former economic adviser in the Obama administration. "Ultimately, the science is clear that the U.S. and other major emitters will need to do more to reduce emissions."
"In the coming months, we expect additional ambitious commitments to pour in that will further prove the world is ready to act and keep us on the right track to Paris and beyond," Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said in a statement that mentioned the goal of avoiding more than 2 degrees Celsius of post-industrial warming. The administration has downplayed that goal in recent years.
But some left-leaning environmental groups panned the pledge as not robust enough.
"The starting gun in the race against global warming went off a long time ago, but the United States is still just jogging," said Kevin Bundy of the Center for Biological Diversity. "We need a stronger strategy. Global efforts to prevent catastrophic climate change depend on the United States making much more ambitious cuts to planet-warming pollution."

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U.S. Climate Plan Touts EPA Actions, Vehicle Fuel Rules

Mar 31, 2015 | PoliticoPro - Whiteboard

By Andrew Restuccia

The climate change plan the U.S. submitted to the United Nations today touts the actions the Obama administration is taking to cut greenhouse gas emissions, including EPA power plant regulations, vehicle fuel economy rules and energy efficiency standards.

While the five-page plan — known as an Intended Nationally Determined Contribution — does not offer much new information, it stresses that the economy-wide target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions 26-28 percent from 2005 levels by 2025 is achievable. In addition, the plan says the U.S. will "make best efforts" to hit the higher end of it's target: a 28 percent reduction.

The U.S. is already on a path toward meeting its target of cutting emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, the plan says. Meeting the 2025 goal will require an additional reduction of of 9 to11 percent beyond the 2020 target, according to the plan, as well as an "approximate doubling" of the 2005-2020 annual pace of emissions reduction.

The 2025 target puts the United States on a path toward deeper emissions reductions in the coming decades, the administration said.

"This target is consistent with a straight line emission reduction pathway from 2020 to deep, economy-wide emission reductions of 80 percent or more by 2050," the plan says. "The target is part of a longer range, collective effort to transition to a low-carbon global economy as rapidly as possible."

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McConnell Warns Countries Against UN Climate Plan

Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told foreign countries to think twice before entering into the United Nations’ climate pact.
McConnell’s statement came after the Obama administration submitted its plan to cut the United States’ greenhouse gases as much as 28 percent as part of the international agreement.
He called President Obama’s submission “job-killing and likely illegal,” and said that one of the main pillars of the United States’ commitment — the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate rule for power plants — is at risk since Congress and the Supreme Court have not weighed in on it.
“Considering that two-thirds of the U.S. federal government hasn’t even signed off on the Clean Power Plan and 13 states have already pledged to fight it, our international partners should proceed with caution before entering into a binding, unattainable deal,” McConnell said in a Tuesday statement.
McConnell has similarly warned states against complying with the EPA’s climate rule, saying it’s illegal and states should not enable the rule.
The Sierra Club accused McConnell of trying to undermine the international negotiation and compared him to Senate Republicans who wrote a letter to Iran to undermine nuclear talks with that country.
“Mitch McConnell has evidently stolen Tom Cotton's playbook for undermining American leadership in the face of international crises,” John Coequyt, director of the group’s climate programs, said in a statement.
Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) also blasted the Obama administration’s commitment.
“The Obama administration’s pledge to the United Nations today will not see the light of day with the 114th Congress,” he said in a statement.

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Bracewell & Giuliani's Segal Says 'Just Say No' a Political Play with Legal Teeth

Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - TV

With U.S. EPA expected to release a federal implementation plan for Clean Power Plan compliance this summer, how much flexibility does the "just say no" option buy states? During today's OnPoint, Scott Segal, a partner at Bracewell & Giuliani and director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, discusses the politics of "just say no." He also explains why he believes a reliability safety valve is only part of the solution to ensuring reliability under the power plan.Transcript
Monica Trauzzi: Hello, and welcome to OnPoint. I'm Monica Trauzzi. With me today is Scott Segal, a partner at Bracewell and Giuliani and director of the Electrical Reliability Coordinating Council. Scott, nice to have you back on the show.
Scott Segal: Great to be back.
Monica Trauzzi: Scott, there's a lot of talk recently, here in Washington and some state capitals around the country, about a possible "just say no" option on the EPA's Clean Power Plan. EPA will release a proposed federal implementation plan for states, perhaps as soon as early summer. How much flexibility does "just say no," then, by the states, if they're going to have to comply with the FIP?
Scott Segal: Well, the point of it is this: EPA has this all to blame in their own hands. The fact that states might be considering noncooperation starts with the fact that the advocacy for the rule was all about flexibility. But the numbers that each state has to make are basically based on four building blocks.
Each of those building blocks is like a maxed-out credit card. If you can't make your numbers under one of those building blocks, then the EPA says, "Well, just do more on the other building blocks." Unfortunately, for their methodology, they've already maxed out the numbers.
Unless the EPA changes the actual plan itself -- the actual Clean Power Plan -- let alone does a very reasonable federal implementation plan, the result will be that the states will only have the option of noncooperation.
So if the EPA wants to minimize noncooperation among the states, they actually have to take action to change the rules. And what could they do? They need to remove the interim deadlines in the rule. That's an affront to state flexibility. That's not a maximization of state flexibility, which Administrator McCarthy has been promising all along.
They need to make sure the states have sufficient time to file their plans. They need to make sure that at the back end there's enough time, and they need to make sure that the technological assumptions and the policy assumptions that underlay things like energy efficiency are accurate. If they don't do any of that, then they don't leave the states with any choice but noncooperation.
Monica Trauzzi: But on many of these fronts they've already indicated that in the final plan we will see a lot of these changes. They're working on changing --
Scott Segal: Have they?
Monica Trauzzi: Yeah. We're hearing that they're working on altering the building blocks and some of the state targets as well as some of those interim deadlines.
Scott Segal: There has been some inconsistent statements coming out of EPA. In fact, if anything, the EPA has doubled down on the importance of interim deadlines. Now the question of whether they'll actually change those interim deadlines I think is still very much up in the air.
If the EPA wants to minimize the chances for massive noncooperation among the states -- as many as 15 or 20 states saying no and not filing plans -- then the EPA had better make some concrete changes to the Clean Power Plan, or that's the only option that's going to be on the table.
Monica Trauzzi: Is noncooperation, though, more of a political play, or does it have legal teeth to it?
Scott Segal: In fairness, I think it's both because I think it has teeth to it in the sense that, as Majority Leader McConnell and others have pointed out, the rule itself has underlying legal difficulties and the ability of the federal government to enforce a federal plan -- remember, the EPA is cleared not to call it a federal implementation plan -- but an actual federal plan probably does not include the seizure of highway funds and the like. So the states are in a far more leveraged position than they were, say, with respect to other rules.
So I think it's important to know there are legal teeth. On the other hand, from a political perspective, if the EPA has meetings with, but does not listen to, people in the regulated community or at regional transmission organizations concerned with reliability, then one way to maximize the pressure on the agency is to line up the states so that they say no.
Monica Trauzzi: The Institute for Policy Integrity's Richard Revesz was on the show last week, and he says that Laurence Tribe's constitutional arguments against the power plan are being made to influence the political process and give opponents of the power plan in Congress cover to go around the country and tell governors, "You don't have to come up with implementation plans." So is Mitch McConnell pushing this "just say no" idea because -- he's tied? His hands are tied, legislatively. Nothing's going to move in Congress.
Scott Segal: Well, with respect to the Institute of Policy Integrity, I would tell you they have seldom seen an EPA rule that they thought was illegal or had any form of legal challenge, so I'm not sure they speak with a tremendous amount of credibility or open-mindedness on what the actual legal flaws may be.
Laurence Tribe was once under active consideration to be appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court but was too liberal for Clinton to get him through. Now what that tells me is -- I don't think a man takes 40 years of work on constitutional law, including authorship of "American Constitutional Law," one of the seminal works on the subject, and mortgages it because he has a beef with the EPA. I think he has advanced serious arguments, and he brings serious credibility to the discussion.
The fact of the matter is -- everyone will admit this, from NRDC on to Richard Revesz, and others -- there has never been a rule like the Clean Power Plan. This concept of going beyond the fence line is not just an interesting phraseology. What this really means is there is no practical limit on the assertion of EPA authority, and I think each of Laurence Tribe's arguments are to be viewed in that context. There is no limiting principle, as the professor says. And, in fact, he says that it reduces the states to mere marionettes.
We have not seen anything like this in any other rulemaking. So the burden of proof really is on Richard Revesz and on Gina McCarthy to demonstrate why this exceptional assertion of EPA authority should be acceptable under a constitutional or statutory framework.
Monica Trauzzi: But is Tribe being financially backed by industry?
Scott Segal: Well, as Tribe says on the cover of his document that he filed, for example, with the House of Representatives, he says that he was asked to review the rule based on his coordination with his client, Peabody, but his views are his own. And this gets us back to the question of 40 years of excellence in constitutional law. I don't think the adoption of a particular client is enough to overcome all of that experience and expertise that he brings to bear on the issue.
Monica Trauzzi: Let's talk about reliability. There are a number of competing reports on reliability.
Scott Segal: Indeed.
Monica Trauzzi: One, released by your group ERCC, is opposite to what the analysis group says in their latest report. Is a reliability safety valve an effective way to sort of resolve a lot of the questions surrounding reliability on the power plan?
Scott Segal: It's a piece of the puzzle, but it's only a small piece of the puzzle. Let me describe. When most people say "safety valve," what they mean is, "Let us fully implement the rule, and if over time there's a problem with reliability, then we'll blow the whistle and everyone can get out of the pool."
Let me say this: That kind of brinksmanship standing alone is not an acceptable way to resolve the reliability problems with the rule. The reliability problems of the rule have to begin with the rule itself, and this is true in a couple of ways.
I've already mentioned taking out the interim deadlines infuses the rule with more flexibility at the get-go to respond to problems that may crop up as an implementation proceeds. But further, there are other mechanisms, like reliability mechanisms that could be adopted at the front end, which allow states to consider those options and allow reliability operators to consider those options at the front end and make sure we don't get into problems.
And look, even if we do have a safety valve, we still have to fix the underlying law. Just this past week, Senator McCaskill, from Missouri, and Congressman Olson, from Texas, reintroduced important legislation, which resolves a conflict between the emergency authority the Department of Energy has to order a facility to keep running to meet reliability demands and EPA's penchant for saying, "OK, well, that's fine, but we're going to keep fining you and enforcing against you, even if you're doing it on an emergency basis." So we have to resolve things like that in order to make sure that safety valves can be functional.
Do I like safety valves? Yes, I do, but they're part of a broader picture, which includes reliability mechanisms at the front end and includes fixing the rule so that it doesn't impose adverse impacts on reliability from the get-go.
Monica Trauzzi: The administration has proposed draft NEPA guidance on pipeline and export facility approvals that would require FERC to consider climate change in its reviews. If enacted, could it make it more challenging to comply with the power plan due to hurdles with bringing new infrastructure online?
Scott Segal: Well, yes, it would. And first, let me just say that is an overbroad reading of NEPA. Think about it. It's almost metaphysical in its scope. It would be like saying, anytime I turn on the light switch in a room, that will cause an increase in energy demand, and we have to know the source of the energy, which could then cause climate change. You could really bring NEPA down to its most ridiculous point of view. We have never asked agencies to place every single piece of infrastructure in some kind of a global perspective; that's just not what NEPA was designed to do.
But if that is the direction the administration wants to go, I wonder how Building Block 2 of the administration's Clean Power Plan gets done. That's the one that says bring every power plant that is a natural gas fire-powered plant in the country -- combined-cycle plant -- from 40 percent utilization rate to 70 percent utilization rate. Easier said than done. You have to make sure that you have infrastructure to support that, and you have to make sure that you have production to feed the infrastructure to support that.
And if we take these moves -- I'd add on top of that the new rules from the Department of Interior on hydraulic fracturing as well -- in addition to the NEPA guidance, and you have a policy which is speaking out of both sides of its mouth. The Clean Power Plan says use more gas, and then these proposals make it harder to produce the gas and to move it around.
Monica Trauzzi: All right. We'll end it there. Thank you for coming on the show. Very interesting as always.
Scott Segal: My pleasure.
Monica Trauzzi: And thanks for watching. We'll see you back here tomorrow. Very nice. Thank you. Good job.
[End of Audio]

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Utility MACT Ruling Could Presage Attempt To Block EPA's GHG Rules

Mar 31, 2015 | InsideEPA

By Stuart Parker

If the Supreme Court decides to overturn EPA's air toxics rule for power plants, the court's conservative wing would likely write a broad opinion seeking to rein in the agency's clean air programs, including its upcoming greenhouse gas (GHG) rules for power plants, a former top Obama administration official says, although it is still far from clear which way the court will rule.
Gary Guzy, who served as a top White House environmental lawyer during the Obama administration, told a District of Columbia Bar Association briefing March 26 that if the high court vacates the air toxics rule, the court “would try and speak as broadly as possible about the entirety of EPA's Clean Air Act implementation program.” This would include, notably, rules to curb GHGs from new and existing power plants under air law sections 111(b) and 111(d), which EPA is due to finalize this summer.
Guzy did not believe such a ruling likely, however, pointing to the possibility of a limited vacatur or remand of the air toxics standard, known as the utility maximum achievable control technology (MACT), which was issued under section 112 of the air act.
He suggested that the court agreed to hear the case in the first place based on the success of industry and some states' arguments in persuading conservative justices that EPA is overreaching its authority in crafting rules, such as the power plant existing source performance standards (ESPS) for GHGs under section 111(d).
Critics argue EPA is barred from issuing the GHG rules because the air act bars EPA from regulating plants under both section 111 and section 112 and that the proposed rule goes beyond EPA's authority by attempting to influence behavior beyond power plants' fencelines.
The high court, though, took the cases over the MACT to examine a narrow question: whether in a preliminary decision to determine if it was “appropriate and necessary” to regulate power plants' air toxics emissions, EPA had to consider costs. The court March 25 heard oral arguments on the issue in three related cases, National Mining Association v. EPA, et al., Utility Air Regulatory Group (UARG) v. EPA, et al. and State of Michigan, et al. v. EPA, et al.
While the outcome is far from certain, the MACT litigation could pose several challenges to administration efforts to curb GHG emissions from power plants. For one thing, scrapping the mercury rule could also mean losing a slew of “co-benefits,” including GHG reductions from coal plants that choose to shut down instead of install pollution controls. That could make compliance with the ESPS -- which proposes to set state-specific emission reduction targets -- more difficult.
Observers like Guzy say the mercury litigation could also undermine EPA's separate effort to craft GHG rules for power plants by providing justices with an opportunity to opine indirectly about EPA's discretion to interpret vague provisions in the air act.
Ironically, the case could also undermine separate litigation filed by states and industry groups opposed to the GHG rules, who argue that that a “literal” reading of section 111(d) bars EPA from regulating power plants' GHG emissions when it already regulates plants' air toxics under section 112.
The issue is complicated because there are two competing amendments to the section that were never reconciled in a conference committee before the 1990 Clean Air Act amendments were signed into law.
But if the Supreme Court vacates the utility MACT, it would allow EPA to evade the threshold legal challenge and remove uncertainty over whether it has authority to issue the GHG rule in the first place. Even so, it would not impact a host of other likely legal challenges, chief of which is the argument that EPA cannot set standards under the rule based on GHG reduction measures that take place beyond a facility's “fenceline.”
Oral Arguments
During the March 25 oral arguments, the justices appeared split over when EPA was required to consider costs when crafting the rule, with Justice Anthony Kennedy emerging as a key swing vote, raising doubts about both EPA and critics' arguments.
EPA has said the Clean Air Act is ambiguous on whether the agency must consider costs when deciding to regulate an industrial source category with an air toxics standard, and Kennedy at first hinted at deferring to EPA's interpretation by noting the “capacious” language at issue -- only to ask the administration tough questions later.
Other justices' statements signaled more clearly whether they would back EPA's claims or agree with the rule's critics. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen Breyer made statements that suggested they might side with EPA, while Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito had harsh questions for the agency. Justice Clarence Thomas asked no questions.
Following the arguments, some observers suggested that Roberts may also be a swing vote.
If there are doubts about how the court ultimately votes, there are similar doubts over any remedy.
Guzy, for example, told the Bar Association event that if the justices rule against the government, they could remand the rule to EPA asking for a cost analysis in its preliminary finding, but that EPA already conducted a cost-benefit analysis in the second, standard-setting phase, rendering the rule “robust and compelling” already.
But industry attorney and former EPA air official William Wehrum differed on this point, telling the Bar Association event that “it may be if EPA went through this process again, [it] would come up with the exact same regulation.”
But “there is a very good chance it wouldn't.” Wehrum, like other critics of the rule, questions EPA's cost-benefit analysis, which finds most of the rule's monetized benefits in reductions of fine particulate, a pollutant not targeted by the rule.
The MACT rule has also been blamed by industry for a lot of coal plant retirements, which taken together with projected plant closures spurred by the 111(d) rules will account for much of the GHG emissions reductions sought by the Obama administration under its climate action plan. “Clean” utilities that burn mostly low-emitting fuels such as natural gas argued at the high court that the MACT's implementation costs have already largely been spent, as an April 16 compliance date looms. Vacating the rule now would therefore waste industry's investment, these utilities argued.
Asked at the D.C. Bar event whether a high court ruling against the MACT would halt closure of older coal-burning power plants, Wehrum replied that many plants are taking advantage of extra compliance time offered by the MACT of one year, and some may ask for two years, illustrating that “it is far from over and this case is not moot.”
“The rule was highly influential in the decision to shut down a lot of power plants,” Wehrum said, although he conceded that “decisions about retirement are complex” and also driven by fuel costs and other factors.
One legal expert says that high court argument over the utility MACT fits with a broader desire by some conservatives on the court, such as Scalia, Alito or Thomas to prevent EPA from enacting sweeping new programs, such as the 111(d) program, based on its expansive interpretation of air law authorities. “I think you saw some preview of that in Scalia's argument” in the MACT suit, the source says.
'Pivotal' Term
Another legal expert doubts, however, that the high court would issue a broad opinion on EPA's powers even if it strikes down the MACT, because the case turns on the “pivotal” term “appropriate,” which is unique to the air law provision governing air toxics pollution from power plants.
The source notes that there is “a lot of talk in Congress” among Republicans about the issue of courts' deference to EPA on its latitude for rulemaking. However, “the deference issue is ultimately a consequence of the fact that Congress has not spelled out in enough detail what it wants the agency to do.”
The issue is closely related to the ongoing debate over the “nondelegation” doctrine, under which Congress is not supposed to delegate to agencies powers reserved for itself without an “intelligible principle” closely guiding agencies in how to proceed.
The Supreme Court addressed this question in its 2001 opinion -- authored by Scalia -- in Whitman v. American Trucking Associations, in which the court held that EPA must not consider costs when setting national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS), contrary to industry's argument at the time. “I think it is more likely, frankly, to deal with the delegation issue,” than wade into a revision of deference doctrines, the source says.

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Letter to the Editor: The E.P.A.’s Climate Plan

Mar 31, 2015 | The New York Times

By Laurence H. Tribe

To read Richard L. Revesz’s Op-Ed article attacking as “far-fetched” the arguments I made against the Environmental Protection Agency’s climate plan in a recent congressional hearing (“An Obama Friend Turns Foe on Coal,” March 26), one would never know that Mr. Revesz also testified at that hearing, making the identical attacks, which I refuted in detail. I strongly disagree with the way he portrays my arguments.
I have “ignored” no amendment, and this isn’t a case of an agency “tasked with interpreting seemingly inconsistent provisions of a law.” No “inconsistent” versions of the law that the E.P.A. invokes exist. Just one “version” was adopted by Congress in 1990, and it flatly bars the E.P.A.’s plan.
Mr. Revesz’s theory contradicts what the E.P.A. concluded in 1995 and what courts, including the D.C. Circuit in 2008 and the Supreme Court in 2011, have uniformly said. Were all their conclusions “far-fetched”?
The shoe is on the other foot. No one disputes that, since Congress enacted the law in question, the E.P.A. has never adopted a regulation based on its newly minted version of the statute, which Congress listed in a grab bag of discarded parts in 1990. If the E.P.A.’s approach is so unremarkable, why is it unprecedented?
To say my arguments would imperil the Clean Air Act’s centerpiece is absurd. The E.P.A. is defying the rule of law, and allowing its gambit here would allow agencies to rewrite the United States Code at their pleasure.
LAURENCE H. TRIBE
Cambridge, Mass.
The writer is a professor of constitutional law at Harvard.

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Emissions vs. Efficiency: The Battle Rages

Mar 31, 2015 | The Wall Street Journal

By John Bussey

Coal consumption globally—and all that pollution—just keeps growing, thanks largely to economic expansion in China and India. But is there a safe role for coal in the U.S. energy mix?
That was a hot debate at The Wall Street Journal’s ECO:nomics conference in Santa Barbara, Calif., last week.
The big annual gathering of environmentalists, business executives and energy experts tackled an array of dislocations and opportunities rocking their world. Among them: the stunning drop in oil and natural-gas prices; the continued rise of alternative fuels such as hydro, wind and solar; the empowerment at companies of the “sustainability officer”; and the evolution of the environmental movement itself into big business.
Firing the coal debate: The Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed new restrictions on power-plant emissions. The rules still face legal hurdles, but it was evident to even the staunchest fossil-fuel die-hard at the conference that coal—in an era of plentiful shale gas and oil, and energy generated from cleaner sources—is burning on borrowed time.

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Renewable Energy is Growing Very, Very Fast. It’s Just Still Not Fast Enough.

Mar 31, 2015 | The Washington Post

By Chris Mooney

The global shift toward renewable energy is not only continuing apace — it may be picking up speed.
Such is the upshot of a new report from the United Nations Environment Programme, finding that worldwide investment in renewables totaled $ 270.2 billion in 2014, which represented an almost 17 percent increase over the prior year. Key drivers of renewables growth in 2014, the report found, were major solar investments in Japan and China and huge offshore wind outlays in Europe.
Strikingly, nearly half of the total investment — $ 131.3 billion — was in developing countries. That includes investments of over $1 billion apiece in Kenya, South Africa and Turkey.
The report, which was written by the Frankfurt School-UNEP Collaborating Centre along with Bloomberg New Energy Finance, did not include large hydropower projects in arriving at its totals.
Solar and wind led the way in 2014, reaping $149.6 billion and $99.5 billion in investment, respectively. And while slightly more total money was invested in renewables in 2011 — $278.8 billion — the report notes that this is principally because “capital costs in wind, and particularly in solar PV, fell sharply in the intervening three years, so each billion dollars committed added up to many more [megawatts] of capacity than it did in the earlier year.”
In other words, when it comes to renewables, the world is not only investing more and more — it’s getting more for its money.
One surprising finding from the report is just how much wind and solar are leaving all other renewables in the dust. The two forms of energy received 92 percent of global renewables investment in 2014, leaving other sectors like biofuels and geothermal far behind.
China continued its dominance in the renewable space, leading the world in total investment ($ 83.3 billion), followed by the United States ($38.3 billion) and Japan ($35.7 billion).
The overall increase in renewable investments is now large enough that it is having planetary implications. According to the report, renewable energy constituted 9.1 percent of total world energy generation in 2014, an increase from 8.5 percent in 2013. In a world in which the International Energy Agency says we can only emit about 1,000 more gigatons of carbon without likely crossing the dangerous 2 degrees Celsius warming threshold, the shift is highly significant. The new report finds that it probably amounts to about 1.3 gigatonnes less of carbon in the atmosphere (a gigatonne is a billion metric tons).
However, the report cautions, we shouldn’t get too optimistic about renewables overtaking fossil energy based on these numbers. “It is less reassuring to note,” it observes, “that at the current rate of progress (of yearly steps of roughly 0.6-0.7 percentage points), it will take until 2030 to reach 20% of global generation.”
Indeed, looking at trends in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, there’s a rather anguishing finding buried in report. Namely, even as the world shifts more and more quickly toward renewables, it still may not be moving nearly fast enough.
The study notes that the International Energy Agency has outlined a “450 scenario” in which the world limits carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere to 450 parts per million — and thus, has at least even odds of staying below 2 degrees Celsius of warming. But based on current trends, the UNEP report finds little chance that without further policy action, we’ll stay below 450.
“The chances of the world limiting the increase in average temperatures to less than two degrees Centigrade appear very slim,” the study finds.

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Transportation News

Federal Data Agency Tracks Oil Train Movements

Mar 31, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire

By Timothy Cama

The federal government’s energy data agency has started releasing monthly data on crude oil shipments by rail.
The Energy Information Administration (EIA), which is part of the Energy Department but operates independently, announced the launch of the data Tuesday with January’s information and monthly totals going back to 2010.
It’s part of the federal government’s response to the nearly exponential increase in shipments of oil by rail, which has accompanied a domestic oil boom.
“The new crude-by-rail data provides a clearer picture on a mode of oil transportation that has experienced rapid growth in recent years and is of great interest to policy makers, the public, and industry,” EIA Administrator Adam Sieminski said in a statement.
Sieminski said the EIA hopes the data “will provide key insights into oil-by-rail movements, including shipments to and from Canada.”
The data is limited in that it only tracks movements within and between the five regions into which the EIA divides the country, as well as movements between Canada and each region.
In the January report, the region that includes the Midwest and North Dakota’s Bakken formation was by far the largest shipper of crude by rail, at 732,000 barrels per day on average.
The region that covers the entire East Coast was the largest recipient, taking in 523,000 barrels a day.
The EIA culls information for the report from the Surface Transportation Board and various third-party sources, it said.
The reports will come out each month with the agency’s regular petroleum reports, which also include oil transportation data for pipelines, tankers and barges.

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Industry Groups Slam 'Severe' Crude-by-Rail Safety Plans

Mar 31, 2015 | E&E - Energywire

By Blake Sobczak

Oil and rail industry lobbyists have lashed out against recent crude-by-rail safety proposals aimed at addressing a string of derailments and explosions.
The American Petroleum Institute, which represents many of the biggest oil producers in the United States, urged lawmakers to nix a budget amendment last week that sought funding to set tougher tank car requirements and tests for crude oil's volatility. The nonbinding measure, sponsored by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), was withdrawn Friday (E&E Daily, March 27).
Earlier in the month, rail car manufacturers criticized a Department of Transportation crude safety rule during a closed-door meeting at the White House, records show. The Railway Supply Institute, a tank car trade group, said faulty DOT estimates had made the rule "not workable" for the industry.
API met separately with regulators and White House officials at the Office of Management and Budget last Tuesday to pick apart provisions of the same rule.
Both groups have said they support DOT's efforts to improve oil train safety, which include tougher requirements for tank cars normally used to haul crude. But the lobbying blitz reflects anxiety over the economic impact of pending oil safety legislation and federal rulemaking.
Freight railways, which hardly carried any crude oil eight years ago, now bring hundreds of thousands of barrels daily out of North Dakota alone, making them a vital part of the North American fuel supply chain. The rapid rise in crude-by-rail shipments has also brought a spate of fiery oil train derailments, including two in the United States since last month.
In 2013, a 72-car train hauling oil from North Dakota's Bakken Shale derailed and exploded in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killing 47 people in the worst crude-by-rail disaster to date.
Since then, the U.S. DOT's effort to pass comprehensive rail safety standards has slipped past several deadlines, drawing ire from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
Cantwell's amendment to the Senate's budget resolution came under fire for clearing the way to remove thousands of old, puncture-prone tank cars from crude service (EnergyWire, March 26). Louis Finkel, executive vice president of government affairs at API, circulated a letter warning that the amendment would potentially result "in nearly halting the continued transport of crude oil by rail, which could increase the cost of gasoline and other petroleum products."
Finkel also appeared at the White House earlier in the week to warn that regulators are understating the cost of impending upgrades for tens of thousands of older tank cars. The API estimates that more than 154,000 tank cars will need repairs under proposed crude-by-rail regulations, with the total cost of the rule climbing to $38 billion over the next 10 years.
Finkel added that Cantwell's effort, "with its even shorter time frame, could have much more severe impacts."
Cantwell spokesman Reid Walker called API's letter "misleading and confusing," noting that it addressed the senator's "Crude-By-Rail Safety Act" and not her budget amendment lacking the same language.
Other groups have poked holes in the analyses promulgated by groups such as RSI, which has estimated the upcoming crude-by-rail rule could carry a $60 billion price tag.
Tank car manufacturer Greenbrier Cos. Inc. -- itself a member of RSI -- has said the trade group's estimates are too high (EnergyWire, March 11). Greenbrier has separately lobbied the White House as it weighs the costs and benefits of new tank car standards.
It's unclear whose estimates will hold sway with Obama administration officials as they put the finishing touches on the crude-by-rail rule. DOT has declined to comment on the details of the regulations, scheduled for release in May. Similarly, it's unknown what effect Cantwell's legislation will have, although analysts have portrayed her "Crude-by-Rail Safety Act" as a way to pressure regulators to expand their rule's scope.
"Given the partisan alignment of the Cantwell bill's sponsorship and the imminent (May 12) finalization of the DOT rule, we give low odds for Senate passage," noted Kevin Book, managing director at ClearView Energy Partners, in an analysis Wednesday. "That said, we reiterate that the Crude-By-Rail Safety Act -- or an even stricter measure -- could potentially advance through the legislative process in the wake of a serious accident."

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