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Protesters Warn Against Using Chemicals in Santa Barbara County Oil Spill Clean-Up
May 25, 2015 | LA Times
By Emily Alpert Reyes and Javier Panzar
Dozens of protesters chanted "End Oil Now!" and hoisted signs alongside an inflatable mock pipeline on a Santa Barbara beach on Sunday, demanding an end to fracking and other forms of "extreme oil extraction" days after a spill sent thousands of gallons of oil into the ocean and onto beaches. -
With New EPA Water Rule, Obama Again Takes Executive Action on Environment
May 25, 2015 | LA Times
By William Yardley
In April 1989, a Michigan developer named John Rapanos dumped fill on 54 acres of wetlands he owned to make way for a shopping center. -
(ACC Mentioned) U.S., Canada Require Sturdier Tank Cars
May 25, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Glenn Hess
Long-awaited new safety standards for trains carrying crude oil, ethanol, and other flammable liquids, including a new class of rail tank car, will start taking effect later this year in the U.S. and Canada.
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Protesters Warn Against Using Chemicals in Santa Barbara County Oil Spill Clean-Up
May 25, 2015 | LA Times
By Emily Alpert Reyes and Javier Panzar
Dozens of protesters chanted "End Oil Now!" and hoisted signs alongside an inflatable mock pipeline on a Santa Barbara beach on Sunday, demanding an end to fracking and other forms of "extreme oil extraction" days after a spill sent thousands of gallons of oil into the ocean and onto beaches.
Environmental groups such as Food and Water Watch are also pressing for authorities to publicly rule out the use of chemicals called dispersants in the cleanup of the spill near Refugio State Beach.
"This spill is so visible," said Kassie Siegel, climate law institute director for the Center for Biological Diversity in Joshua Tree, "but so much of the damage that the oil companies do is harder to see.
"This is a tragic reminder that oil production is dirty and dangerous from start to finish," Siegel said. She warned that chemical dispersants could make things worse by harming marine life and human health.
"Dolphins are still dying in the Gulf today because of these chemicals," she added.
U.S. Coast Guard officials have said no chemical dispersants have been used in the cleanup, although they did not rule out using them in the future.
The rupture occurred on the inland side of U.S. 101 on Tuesday, spilling up to 105,000 gallons onto the coastal bluffs. An estimated 21,000 gallons ran down a culvert under the freeway and into the ocean.
Among the protesters out on Sunday were two high school students from Santa Clarita, Dana Bowers and Kayla Yonkers, who had driven up to the sullied beach to try to help with the cleanup, equipped with rubber boots, gloves, buckets and trash bags.
The teens were turned away from Refugio State Beach and El Capitan State Beach before they headed south to Haskell's Beach, which remained open, and began picking globs of oil off the sand and rocks.
"A huge slick came in and the water was completely black," Yonkers said. At one point, they found a dead sea lion, she said.
Yet children were still playing nearby. Some people were venturing into the water, the teens said. The students said several officials approached them on the beach and told them it wasn't safe for them.
"But they didn't go up to the families telling their little children... They didn't tell them to get out of the water," Bowers said.
Many activists at the protest complained about being turned away from the cleanup, arguing that the official response had been slow and inadequate.
"If they don't want us on the beach, well they'd better start cleaning it up. Otherwise we're going out, we're gonna risk our health, because we risk our health by not cleaning it up," Tamlorn Chase of the activist group End Oil Now told the crowd to cheers and applause.
The activists want Gov. Jerry Brown to ban hydraulic fracturing, acidizing and other controversial methods of oil extraction in California. After rallying on the beach near Stearns Wharf, the protesters planned to head to a nearby Coast Guard office to deliver a letter against using dispersants in the spill cleanup and then march to Santa Barbara City Hall.
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With New EPA Water Rule, Obama Again Takes Executive Action on Environment
May 25, 2015 | LA Times
By William Yardley
In April 1989, a Michigan developer named John Rapanos dumped fill on 54 acres of wetlands he owned to make way for a shopping center. He did not have a permit, and when the state told him to stop, he refused. Courts found him in violation of the federal Clean Water Act. Prosecutors wanted to send him to prison.
Rapanos took his case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which found that the wetlands on his property, about 20 miles from a river that drained into Lake Huron, did not fall under the Clean Water Act's jurisdiction over discharges into "navigable waters."
Rapanos became something of a celebrity among property rights advocates, but the ruling raised as many questions as it answered. Although the court upheld federal protections for wetlands and streams when they connected with navigable waters, it left unclear what constituted a connection.
Now, nearly a decade later, the Obama administration is seeking to clarify those ambiguities, and the effort is causing controversy of its own. This week, the Environmental Protection Agency is expected to release a new rule to protect a significantly larger percentage of streams and wetlands that provide habitat for wildlife and sources of drinking water.
The move is another example of President Obama taking executive action on environmental and climate issues regardless of whether he has the support of Congress. The administration has already protected millions of acres from oil and gas development and is expected to set aside more, even as it has allowed the expansion of oil and gas drilling elsewhere. It plans to issue new rules this summer to reduce carbon emissions from power plants.
EPA officials say up to 60% of the nation's streams and millions of acres of wetlands lack clear protection from pollution under existing regulations. The new clean water rule would for the first time clearly define which tributaries and wetlands are protected under federal law.
"There is nothing complicated about the idea that we should protect the tributary system that flows into our nation's rivers," said David Uhlmann, a law professor at the University of Michigan who previously led the prosecution of environmental crimes at the Justice Department. "What is more difficult is deciding when to protect wetlands, which perform essential ecological functions but often make it difficult or impossible for landowners to develop their property."
The new rule, drafted by both the EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, has been under attack since it was proposed in draft form last year, with lawmakers, farmers, business groups and some local governments often coordinating the efforts.
The American Farm Bureau has led the opposition.
"The proposed rule provides none of the clarity and certainty it promises," the bureau wrote in a letter to Congress. "Instead, it creates confusion and risk by providing the agencies with almost unlimited authority to regulate, at their discretion, any low spot where rainwater collects." That could include farm ditches, agricultural ponds and isolated wetlands, it said.
The farm bureau started a social media campaign, using the Twitter hashtag #Ditchtherule. The EPA created its own, telling supporters to #Ditchthemyth. In a blog post in April, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said the agency may need to look at "better defining how protected waters are significant."
"A key part of the [new] Clean Water Rule is protecting water bodies, like streams and wetlands, which have strong impacts downstream," she wrote.
At issue is the Supreme Court's ruling that only water bodies with a "significant nexus" to navigable waterways fall under the Clean Water Act's regulatory authority. But what that means has left room for debate for years.
McCarthy conceded that the agency's initial definition of tributaries was "confusing and ambiguous" and could "pick up erosion in a farmer's field, when that's not our aim." The agency was also revisiting how it addressed ditches, she wrote, "limiting protection to ditches that function like tributaries and can carry pollution downstream." She also sought to assure local governments that the agency "did not intend to change" how stormwater systems are treated.
Several bills aimed at stopping the rule from taking effect have been introduced in Congress, including one sponsored by Sens. Jeff Flake and John McCain, both Republicans from Arizona. In a letter to McCarthy this month, the senators wrote that Arizona's "vast majority of 'waters' are desert washes that are part of ephemeral systems and often found at substantial distances from traditional navigable or interstate waters."
Under the proposed rule, they said, "every small ephemeral system of limited function, remote from traditional navigable or interstate waters, and with no practical ability to influence the physical, chemical or biological integrity of those downstream waters, would be regulated."
Arizona is "literally crisscrossed with man-made canals that are essential for critical water delivery," they wrote, and under the new rule, "it is possible that every mile of these canals" will now fall under the Clean Water Act.
In another arid state next door, Sanders Moore, director of Environment New Mexico, said waterways there had been put at risk under narrow interpretations of the existing rule that did not protect streams that are often dry until snowmelt or stormwater runs through them.
"When they run, they pick up all of those pollutants and take them into larger rivers," she said.
Ken Kopocis, deputy assistant administrator for the EPA's office of water, said the agency had heard concerns similar to those expressed by the Arizona senators, and that the final rule would clarify that washes and other ephemeral streams would not fall under regulation unless they had "bed and banks" and "ordinary high water marks" that indicated an active connection to waters that do fall under regulation.
"We understood and heard a lot from people in the Southwest that we need to be more clear, and the final rule will be more clear on this," he said.
He also said the agency was not revising its policies on the vast network of canals and waterways that provide irrigation and drinking water in much of the arid West.
Although Rapanos won at the Supreme Court, he faced other penalties for his actions. He and other defendants in the case eventually settled with the government, agreeing to pay a $150,000 penalty. Rapanos was also required to construct 100 acres of wetlands and buffer areas to offset the 54 acres he filled.
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(ACC Mentioned) U.S., Canada Require Sturdier Tank Cars
May 25, 2015 | Chemical & Engineering News
By Glenn Hess
Long-awaited new safety standards for trains carrying crude oil, ethanol, and other flammable liquids, including a new class of rail tank car, will start taking effect later this year in the U.S. and Canada.
The two countries’ regulatory action comes nearly two years after a train carrying crude oil slid off the tracks in the Canadian town of Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, in July 2013, exploding and killing 47 people. Since then, a series of derailments, explosions, and spills have occurred across North America, exposing the risks of shipping large quantities of petroleum and other hazardous materials by rail.
“Safety has been our top priority at every step in the process for finalizing this rule, which is a significant improvement over the current regulations and requirements and will make transporting flammable liquids safer,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said at a news conference earlier this month.
“We know that 99.9% of shipments reach their destination safely,” Foxx said. “The accidents involving crude and ethanol, though, have shown us that 99.9% isn’t enough. It only takes one accident to create a big problem for a community and a country.”
Foxx announced the stricter standards in an appearance in Washington, D.C., with Transport Canada Minister Lisa Raitt. She said the two countries have “developed a harmonized solution for North America’s tank car fleet.
“We can never undo the damage that took place in Lac-Mégantic or in any other railway accident, but we can and must learn from those events and improve our system,” Raitt said.
Although the initiative is primarily aimed at making the transportation of crude oil by rail tanker safer, the regulation includes provisions that also affect the movement of ethanol. Those two materials account for 68% of the flammable liquids on U.S. railroads, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT).
Plus, the new regulation has potential application to the chemical industry, which ships a wide variety of flammable liquids such as styrene, methanol, and benzene.
The string of high-profile derailments in recent years hasn’t involved flammable chemicals, so the industry had urged DOT to limit the reach of the new rule to only large-volume shipments of crude oil and ethanol.
Those two products are each shipped in mile-long unit trains with as many as 120 tank cars hauling millions of gallons of a single bulk commodity. In contrast, flammable liquid chemical products are transported in smaller volumes in manifest trains, which carry a mixture of railcars—such as boxcars and tank cars—loaded with various types of freight, both hazardous and nonhazardous.
DOT says unit trains are more accident-prone because they are longer and heavier, as well as more difficult to control, slow down, and stop than manifest trains.
But the requirements of the 395-page final rule apply to all “high-hazard flammable trains,” which are defined as “a continuous block of 20 or more cars loaded with a flammable liquid or 35 or more tank cars loaded with a flammable liquid dispersed throughout a train.”
“The exact impact remains to be seen, but the rule has the potential for applying to the chemical industry,” said Scott Jensen, spokesman for the American Chemistry Council, a trade association of major U.S. chemical companies. These companies do not control train composition, Jensen pointed out. “That is solely up to the railroads to decide. It is certainly possible that our shipments will be covered by DOT’s rule.”
Although DOT has recognized the difference between unit and manifest trains, the rule presents challenges, said Jennifer C. Gibson, vice president of regulatory affairs at the National Association of Chemical Distributors, an industry trade group.
“The definition of high-hazard flammable trains could still potentially sweep in flammable liquid chemicals,” Gibson said. This concept is flawed, she asserted, because it subjects all of the cars to the same restrictions, not only those carrying crude oil or ethanol.
The new rule addresses several factors intended to make the transportation of flammable liquids by rail safer, including a new standard for tank car construction. All cars built under the new DOT-117 standard (TC-117 in Canada) after Oct. 1, 2015, must have thicker steel walls, more protection at each end, thermal insulation, and sturdier pressure-relief and bottom-outlet valves than current models.
The new-model tank car will be more puncture-resistant and less likely to leak and burst into flames if an accident happens. “This stronger, safer, more robust tank car will protect communities on both sides of our shared border,” Transport Canada’s Raitt said. The new standards “will not be cheap” but are necessary given the risks, she added.
For shippers in the U.S., the suite of new requirements is expected to cost an estimated $2.5 billion to implement over the next two decades, two-thirds of which will be used to retrofit or retire existing tank cars. Benefits from damage avoided once the standards are implemented range from $912 million to $2.9 billion through 2034, according to DOT.
Safety investigators have known for years that older tank cars known as DOT-111s are prone to rupture even in low-speed accidents. The new rule requires the DOT-111s to be replaced or retrofitted by Jan. 1, 2018, in the U.S. and by May 1, 2017, in Canada.
In addition, a later generation of tank cars built since 2011 with more safety features, called CPC-1232s, will have to be retrofitted or phased out of crude oil service by April 2020. Shippers of less hazardous flammable liquids, such as ethanol, will have until July 2023 to retrofit or phase out their fleets. In all, nearly 100,000 tank cars will be affected.
“We want to make sure we’re being aggressive with the least safe situation first,” DOT’s Foxx said. “The crude that we’ve been worried about over the last couple years will all be moving on either these new tank cars or retrofitted tank cars by 2020.”
But shippers contend that the aggressive timeline for upgrading tank cars now in service is unrealistic and may be disruptive to transporting their products to markets across the country. “We anticipate shipping capacity problems,” Gibson told C&EN.
For example, she pointed to the requirement to install new electronic brakes by 2021. “While these cars are in the shops, their owners will want to take care of all of the retrofits at one time, rather than putting them into the shop multiple times,” Gibson said. “This will create backlogs in the shops as others will not be able to get in for other retrofits and repairs. This will result in cars being out of service and backups in the rail network.”
Some shippers also say that efforts to enhance rail safety should begin with addressing track maintenance and human factors, which, when combined, account for the majority of derailments.
“Now that tank car specifications have been addressed, we suggest that it is long overdue for DOT to show similar concern for the root causes of train derailments: track integrity and human error,” said Brendan Williams, executive vice president ofAmerican Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, which represents the majority of refiners that transport crude oil by rail.
“Keeping the trains on the tracks should be of the highest priority for DOT. The best way to mitigate an incident is to prevent it from happening,” Williams said. Federal Railroad Administration data show that there were more than 1,100 rail derailments in 2014, averaging more than three each day, with poor track integrity cited as the number one cause.
Members of Congress largely welcomed the new rule, but several have faulted DOT for not getting the most dangerous tank cars off the tracks faster. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) introduced legislation (S. 859) in March that would take the DOT-111s off the tracks immediately.
The new rule “is just like saying, ‘Let the oil trains roll,’ ” Cantwell said. “It does very little to reduce the threat of railcar punctures and is too slow on the removal of the most dangerous cars. It’s more of a status quo rule than the real safety changes needed to protect the public and first responders.”
Similarly, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he plans to sponsor a measure that would give shippers until 2017 to remove all DOT-111s, calling later deadlines a “reckless gamble that we can’t afford to make.”
Activist groups also argue that the rule grants shippers too much leeway by keeping the oldest, riskiest tank cars in service until 2018.
So far this year, there have been five oil-train accidents in the U.S. and Canada, but no fatalities or serious injuries. “It is luck, and only luck, that has kept rail workers, responders, and bystanders out of harm’s way,” said Todd J. Paglia, executive director of ForestEthics, an environmental organization. “But we are averaging a major oil-train accident a month. How long will our luck hold out?”
Central to the plan is a requirement for shippers to begin replacing or retrofitting their existing tank car fleets in 2017. Four years later, these cars must have electronically controlled pneumatic brakes that stop them simultaneously rather than sequentially when trains are pulling 70 or more cars of the most hazardous cargo. This change is expected to prevent catastrophic accordion-like pileups in derailments.
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