Preview Newsletter
ACC PM
-
The Obama EPA Has No Intention of Slowing Down
May 27, 2015 | National Journal
By Jason Plautz
In finalizing new rule that will give it new authority to regulate pollution in streams, lakes, and rivers, the Environmental Protection Agency has a message for its critics: Bring it on. -
EPA Full Steam with Waters Rule, But Trouble Ahead
May 27, 2015 | PoliticoPro
By Jenny Hopkinson
The Obama administration on Wednesday launched a sweeping measure to protect the nation’s waterways and wetlands — an initiative that faces a fierce counterattack from powerhouse industries like agriculture, oil and home-building. -
President Obama Asserts Power Over Small Waterways
May 27, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The Obama administration on Wednesday asserted its authority over the nation's streams, wetlands and other smaller waterways, moving forward with one of the most controversial environmental regulations in recent years. -
GOP Vows to Fight Against Obama’s ‘Power Grab’ Water Rule
|
-
‘We Are Definitely Heading Toward a Cleaner Future’
May 27, 2015 | Politico
By Michael Grunwald
Dr. Ernest Moniz, the MIT physicist who is President Obama’s energy secretary, has been busy lately negotiating the nitty-gritty details of the Iran nuclear deal. -
House Committees Press Agency on Lobbying for Water Rule
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
U.S. EPA is facing a barrage of questions over its advocacy for its new water regulation -- this time from a trio of House committees. -
EPA Sets 'Brighter Lines' For CWA Jurisdiction In Final 'Waters' Regulation
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers are setting “brighter lines” for determining the scope of the Clean Water Act (CWA) in their final rule on the water law's reach, aiming to address concerns about uncertainty in the proposed version of the rule -- such as clarifying when waters have a “significant nexus” triggering CWA jurisdiction. -
5 Reasons Obama’s Transformative Power Plan Won’t Transform Anything
May 27, 2015 | Politico
By Michael Grunwald
Just about everyone seems to agree that President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan is an “ambitious” effort to rein in the electric sector’s carbon emissions. -
Air Regulator Group's Becker Discusses Power Plan Compliance 'Menu of Options'
May 27, 2015 | E&E - TV
Will a new report outlining a wide variety of Clean Power Plan compliance options change the minds of stakeholders who oppose the rule? -
Study Casts Doubt on Life-Saving Potential of EPA Regs
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Peterka
Estimates of the number of lives saved by federal air regulations are highly uncertain, researchers from Indiana University concluded in a new study. -
Enviros Petition EPA Over Texas Emission Limits
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Peterka
Environmentalists today petitioned U.S. EPA over what they say are illegal actions by Texas to authorize more pollution than federal standards allow. -
Solvent Makers, Suppliers Fight Push For EPA To List Chemical As Air Toxic
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Maria Hegstad
Makers and suppliers of the solvent n-propyl bromide (nPB) are defending the chemical against years-old efforts by the makers of other solvents and New York for EPA to list nPB as a Clean Air Act hazardous air pollutant (HAP) subject to strict air toxics rules, arguing the listing petitions contain outdated and inaccurate information. -
Markey Flaring Bill Prompts Debate Over Oil And Gas Methane Emissions
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
Sen. Ed Markey's (D-MA) bill to curb flaring and venting of methane emissions from oil and gas drilling on federally owned land is prompting debate about how best to limit air pollution from the sector, ahead of pending proposals expected from EPA and the Department of Interior's (DOI) Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on regulating flaring.
Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Chemical Management News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Chemical Security News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Energy and Environment News
Transportation News - There are no clips to report at this time
-
The Obama EPA Has No Intention of Slowing Down
May 27, 2015 | National Journal
By Jason Plautz
In finalizing new rule that will give it new authority to regulate pollution in streams, lakes, and rivers, the Environmental Protection Agency has a message for its critics: Bring it on.
Wednesday, EPA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced it was going ahead with one of the Obama administration's more controversial environmental regulation proposals—the so-called Waters of the United States rule. The new rule, using authority to reduce pollution in waterways under the 1972 Clean Water Act, says that federal agencies have regulatory power over streams and wetlands that flow into downstream water sources, which EPA says will ensure that the government can restrict upstream pollutants.
The proposal has drawn aggressive fire from congressional Republicans and industry groups, notably the agriculture industry. The rule, they say, represents a regulatory overstep that would give EPA power over streams, ditches, and other small waterways, potentially opening up routine activities to permit requirements.
The House this month passed two legislative attempts to scale back the rule, one a rider on the energy and water appropriations bill, the other a bill from the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee that would require EPA to withdraw the rule and write a new one.
A bipartisan group of 12 senators introduced a bill in April that would also require EPA to rewrite its regulation, which cosponsor Republican Pat Roberts called "EPA's egregious federal overreach."
But even EPA's outreach has attracted criticism.
A New York Times story charged that EPA used grassroots campaigning to drum up positive comments for its rule and questions have arisen over an EPA-backed hashtag called #DitchTheMyth designed to beat back criticism of the rule. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe has said he'd like to probe the agency's social-media work and Senate Small Business Committee Chairman David Vitter sent a letter Tuesday requesting more information on EPA's work with outside groups on the rule.
"EPA needs to be held accountable and confirm to the American people that it followed all relevant laws during the rule-making process before the WOTUS rule is finalized," the Louisiana Republican wrote.
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said she'd "welcome anyone to take a look at what we do," calling the Times story "baffling."
"The agency is doing what we have always done with outreach," McCarthy told reporters Wednesday. "This is our job, and we've done a good job, and there is no way in the world we have crossed a legal line."
"The only people with reason to oppose the rule are polluters who knowingly threaten our clean water," said White House climate adviser Brian Deese.
McCarthy said the listening tour for the rule was extensive and included more than 400 meetings with and direct outreach to several agricultural groups to hear their concerns. Since proposing the rule last year, EPA clarified its definition of tributaries and connections to downstream waterways, McCarthy said, trying to reduce confusion over EPA's plans.
-
EPA Full Steam with Waters Rule, But Trouble Ahead
May 27, 2015 | PoliticoPro
By Jenny Hopkinson
The Obama administration on Wednesday launched a sweeping measure to protect the nation’s waterways and wetlands — an initiative that faces a fierce counterattack from powerhouse industries like agriculture, oil and home-building.
On its face, the final Waters of the United States rule is largely a technical document, defining which rivers, streams, lakes and marshes fall under the jurisdiction of the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers. But the industries and their allies in Congress condemn it as a massive power grab by Washington, saying it will give bureaucrats carte blanche to swoop in and penalize landowners every time a cow walks through a ditch. And it comes amid years of complaints from Republicans about President Barack Obama’s regulatory agenda, which has encompassed everything from power plants and health insurers to Internet providers and for-profit colleges.
Opponents of the water rule are already fighting back. Republicans, along with some farm- and energy-state Democrats, are pushing legislation in both the House and Senate to kill the rule. Opponents are also preparing lawsuits that will add to an already long trail of litigation over the federal government’s powers to regulate water — an issue the Supreme Court has taken up twice, with confusing results, since 2001.
But the president was quick to publicly back the change, saying in a statement that the measure is needed to protect vulnerable waters and drinking water and to keep the economy going.
“This rule will provide the clarity and certainty businesses and industry need about which waters are protected by the Clean Water Act, and it will ensure polluters who knowingly threaten our waters can be held accountable,” Obama said. “My administration has made historic commitments to clean water, from restoring iconic watersheds like the Chesapeake Bay and the Great Lakes to preserving more than a thousand miles of rivers and other waters for future generations. With today’s rule, we take another step towards protecting the waters that belong to all of us.”
The agencies and their supporters say the safety of drinking water and stream health are threatened because of weak state and local regulation and a lack of enforcement. The rule is meant to make it clearer which waterways EPA and the Corps of Engineers can oversee under the 43-year-old Clean Water Act, which covers “navigable waters” such as the Mississippi River and Lake Erie but is vague on how far upstream protections must go to keep those water bodies clean. It would establish whether antipollution laws are triggered if a farmer blocks a stream to make a pond for livestock, a developer fills in part of a wetland to put up a house, or an oil pipeline has to cross a creek.
“The only people with reason to oppose the rule are polluters who threaten our clean water,” Brian Deese, a senior adviser at the White House, told reporters earlier on a call announcing the rule.
The rule “is based on common sense,” Deese said. It’s “structured around existing practices and it is built on the best science available … This rule is about certainty. The status quo is rife with unsustainable confusion over what’s protected and what’s not.”
The final rule ensures protections for tributaries that have physical signs of flowing water, even if they don’t run all year round, and ditches that “look and act” like tributaries, Jo-Ellen Darcy, assistant Army secretary for civil works, said during the call.
EPA and the corps also decided to extend protections to regional water features, like prairie potholes and coastal bays in Delmarva and the Carolinas, on a case-by-case basis.
Long held exemptions for agriculture have been preserved, and the rule does not cover things like tile drainage systems, regular farm activities or moving livestock, EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said. The agency detailed many of the changes in a series of industry specific fact sheets aimed at addressing specific concerns, also released Wednesday.
Despite the changes, McCarthy added that the new rule would expand the reach of the Clean Water Act by only about 3 percent. The measure is expected to take effect 60 days after it’s published in the Federal Register.
Defining where a navigable waterway begins and ends has long spurred disputes among the government, environmentalists and industry. Supreme Court rulings in 2001 and 2006 added to the confusion, imposing a less than clear requirement that an upstream water must have a “significant nexus” to a navigable waterway to fall under the federal government’s jurisdiction.
Groups that back the rule, such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, Environment America and fishing organizations, want the definition to be as broad as possible, saying you can’t protect major lakes and rivers unless you protect their sources upstream. And they say the federal government needs an oversight role, argued that states lack the financial resources and manpower to keep water from becoming polluted.
Supporters of the rule have been quick to herald the administration’s latest action.
“Small streams and wetlands provide drinking water to roughly 1 in 3 Americans and they must be protected from pollution at the source,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, in a statement.
On the other side are Republicans and some of the biggest spenders in Washington.
“The administration’s decree to unilaterally expand federal authority is a raw and tyrannical power grab that will crush jobs,” House Speaker John Boehner said in a statement. “The rule is being shoved down the throats of hardworking people with no input, and places landowners, small businesses, farmers and manufacturers on the road to a regulatory and economic hell.”
The Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers have joined the American Farm Bureau Federation, Dairy Farmers of America, pesticide manufacturers, mining companies, homebuilders, state and local governments, water utilities, flood control districts, the timber industry, railroads, real estate developers and even golf course operators among the more than 230 organizations and companies that have listed “Waters of the United States” on federal lobbying disclosures since the administration proposed the rule in March 2014.
Many food and beverage giants have pitched their thoughts to lawmakers on the measure, too, including Tyson Foods, Perdue Farms, Land O’Lakes, the potato giant J.R. Simplot and Ocean Spray Cranberries. Also weighing in are about 40 energy companies, including Halliburton, BP, Shell, Chevron, Rio Tinto and the Oklahoma Independent Petroleum Association, in addition to two dozen power companies such as Duke Energy and Pepco.
Many of the groups also made their case directly to White House and EPA officials during more than a dozen visits after the rule was sent for review at the Office of Management and Budget, meeting records show.
The lobbying effort has already had some success.
This month, the House passed a bill from Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) that would force EPA and the Army Corps to kick their rule back to the drawing board and consult with states and industries before writing a new proposal. The 261-155 vote included yes votes from 24 Democrats, of whom eight sit on the House Agriculture Committee and two sit on Energy and Commerce. Four of the Democrats are from energy-heavy Texas.
The Senate is considering a similar measure from Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) that is awaiting a vote in the Environment and Public Works Committee and has the backing of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Boehner argued for the bill, too, in the comments he made Wednesday. Other supporters include three Democrats on the Agriculture Committee: Joe Donnelly of Illinois, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
Barrasso’s measure includes more detailed consultation requirements than the House version and sets a Dec. 31, 2016, goal for EPA to finish a revised rule.
The White House has threatened to veto Shuster’s bill, arguing that it would “derail current efforts to clarify the scope of the CWA, hamstring future regulatory efforts and deny businesses and communities the regulatory certainty needed to invest in projects that rely on clean water.”
However, that won’t stop the agriculture industry and other opponents from suing. Among other objections, the suits are likely to debate whether the agencies violated the Administrative Procedure Act when trying to garner support for the measure and in reviewing comments, whether the rule-making violated federal protections for small businesses, and whether the rule’s expanded oversight of waterways falls outside what Congress intended when it wrote the Clean Water Act.
-
President Obama Asserts Power Over Small Waterways
May 27, 2015 | The Hill - E2 Wire
By Timothy Cama
The Obama administration on Wednesday asserted its authority over the nation's streams, wetlands and other smaller waterways, moving forward with one of the most controversial environmental regulations in recent years.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Army Corps of Engineers said they are making final their proposed waters of the United States rule, which Republicans and many businesses have long panned as a massive federal overreach that would put the EPA in charge of ditches, puddles and wet areas.
“We’re finalizing a clean water rule to protect the streams and the wetlands that one in three Americans rely on for drinking water. And we’re doing that without creating any new permitting requirements and maintaining all previous exemptions and exclusions,” EPA head Gina McCarthy told reporters Wednesday.
McCarthy and other Obama officials sought to emphasize that the rule is about increasing clarity for businesses and helping make it easier to determine which waterways are subject to the pollution rules of the Clean Water Act.
“This rule is about clarification, and in fact, we’re adding exclusions for features like artificial lakes and ponds, water-filled depressions from constructions and grass swales,” she said
“This rule will make it easier to identify protected waters and will make those protections consistent with the law as well as the latest peer-reviewed science. This rule is based on science,” she continued.
With the Wednesday action, the Obama administration is doubling down on an effort that has sustained repeated attacks from congressional Republicans hoping to overturn the regulations.
In doing so, the administration is fulfilling what it sees as a responsibility to protect the wetlands, headwaters and small water bodies that can carry pollution to the larger waterways, like bays and rivers, that are more clearly protected by the Clean Water Act. Officials said the rule was made necessary by a pair of Supreme Court decisions in the last decade that called into question Clean Water Act protections for some small tributaries, streams and wetlands that were previously covered.
Brian Deese, Obama’s top environmental adviser, said the rule “is an important win for public health and for our economy,” and sought to paint its opponents as fighting clean water.
“The only people with reason to oppose the rule are polluters who want to threaten our clean water,” he said.
McCarthy said the regulation would result in a modest increase in the federal government’s jurisdiction, amounting to less than a 3 percent growth.
Responding to criticisms from farmers, ranchers, developers, manufacturers and others, she took time to list what is not covered by the waters of the United States rule.
“It does not interfere with private property rights or address land use,” she said. “It does not regulate any ditches unless they function as tributaries. It does not apply to groundwater or shallow subsurface water, copper tile drains or change policy on irrigation or water transfer.”
She said the rule specifically does not interfere with agriculture, nor roll back any of the existing exemptions for farmers, ranchers or foresters.
Those have been some of the most vocal opponents of the rule since it was proposed in March 2014, saying that the EPA wants to insert itself into their businesses.
While critics are unlikely to be pleased by the new rule, the EPA’s supporters applauded it.
“The Obama administration listened to all perspectives and developed a final rule that will help guarantee safe drinking water supplies for American families and businesses and restore much-needed certainty, consistency, and effectiveness to the Clean Water Act,” Sen. Barbara Boxer (Calif.), top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, said in a statement.
Environment America said the rule is an important step toward protecting drinking water for the one in three Americans whose drinking water was not sufficiently protected before.
“Our rivers, lakes, and drinking water can only be clean if the streams that flow into them are protected,” Margie Alt, executive director of Environment America, said in a statement. “That’s why today’s action is the biggest victory for clean water in a decade.”
The House has voted multiple times to overturn the rule in its draft form. Senate Republicans have taken a different strategy, with a bill to overturn the rule and give the EPA specific instructions and a deadline to re-write it.
But the White House has remained steadfast in its push to enact the rule. On Wednesday, President Obama defended the regulation as protecting vulnerable waterways and providing clear guidance to businesses that are affected.“Too many of our waters have been left vulnerable to pollution,” Obama said in a statement, adding that the federal agencies wrote the rule to “restore protection for the streams and wetlands that form the foundation of our nation’s water resources, without getting in the way of farming, ranching, or forestry.
-
GOP Vows to Fight Against Obama’s ‘Power Grab’ Water Rule
|
-
‘We Are Definitely Heading Toward a Cleaner Future’
May 27, 2015 | Politico
By Michael Grunwald
Dr. Ernest Moniz, the MIT physicist who is President Obama’s energy secretary, has been busy lately negotiating the nitty-gritty details of the Iran nuclear deal. But he’s now back to his day job, where his main focus is trying to nudge America toward a climate-friendly future. He looks like a founding father, and he says we’re in the midst of another revolution, a transformation driven by the plunging costs of green technologies like wind power, solar power, LED bulbs and advanced batteries, as well as a fracking boom that has brought the U.S. percentage of petroleum imports to its lowest level since the 1950s. In an interview with The Agenda’s Michael Grunwald, Moniz talked about the low-carbon revolution he believes has already begun—and why he thinks even skeptical Republicans will eventually get on board.
Michael Grunwald: There’s been spectacular progress in bringing down the cost of solar, wind, LEDs, batteries for electric vehicles. In the past, you’ve been pretty bullish on clean coal, but it’s seemed like a real disappointment – we see the skyrocketing costs at the Kemper plant, the cancellation of FutureGen 2.0. Have you been disappointed?
Ernest Moniz: Well, you know I think technologists, and I guess I’m one of those, are always optimistic and trying to speed things up. [But] let me also draw a very important distinction: The projects we support [at the Energy Department] are very aggressive projects. They’re typically looking to capture 90 percent of their carbon, and as with Kemper, with multiple product streams, not just carbon. But if you look at the EPA’s proposed rule for new power plants that came out last year and you look at the target in terms of emissions, if you start with a very highly efficient coal plant, a new, ultra-super-critical plant, the amount of capture required to meet that proposed rule is roughly a third – a very far cry from 90-plus percent.
MG: Back in 2007, you made the obvious point that coal was cheap. But now with mercury, carbon and ozone coming up, regional haze – all these different regulations – it seems like coal is less cheap, especially with gas and wind and solar coming down so much in price.
EM: Right. And the capital requirements for a new coal plant are substantially higher than for a gas plant. And substantially higher than wind. Obviously, wind has a lower capacity factor, but even now we’re seeing wind capacity factors in the 40-plus percent range, and I think the typical coal plant capacity factor is only in the sixties. So you know, a lot of competition out there for coal. [Laughs.]
MG: Coal advocates have this new “Cold in the Dark” campaign — basically, if we get rid of coal there’s going to be no reliability. We also hear a lot about distributed generation and too many renewables hurting the reliability of the grid. Are you worried, or have those concerns been overblown?
EM: Well look, we need more detailed analysis. But I’ll give you one example where – this was in our quadrennial energy review – that really needs to be taken with a grain of salt. That is the idea that somehow continued expansion of natural gas in the power sector would result in large infrastructure challenges. Well, the reality is that we did analytical work and what we found is that a very substantial expansion of gas would not significantly strain, at least at the national level, natural gas transmission pipes. There has been a big buildup of the transmission pipeline in the last 15 years and a lot of overcapacity.
On distributed generation, that raises a couple of issues. One, obviously: There is the issue of effective integration in the distribution system, and that will be part of a smart-grid approach. But the other thing I want to emphasize is that – and we’re seeing the beginnings of this right now clearly – is that the increase in distributed generation, combined with net metering or smart metering, does also provide a challenge to the traditional utility business model. And so it’s not only the hardware. Business models are going to have to adjust to new realities.
MG: The administration is letting Shell drill in the Arctic. You get a lot of Republicans complaining that you’re not drill-baby-drill enough, but you also have enviros saying you need to start leaving fossil fuels in the ground. You guys say you’re all-of-the-above. How do you strike that balance?
EM: Well let me just start with what “all of the above” is. Again, we start with the clear commitment to lower carbon. So “all of the above” is in the context of continued progress toward significant carbon reduction. Obviously, efficiency, renewables, nuclear, fit in to that framework, and cost reduction, cost reduction, cost reduction, is a huge part of the game. As for fossil fuels in the low carbon world, for coal, carbon capture [is] quite critical. In terms of gas, [it’s displacing] coal as natural gas prices remain quite low. Of course, eventually, in the long term, natural gas itself would need carbon capture for a very low carbon world. That’s the bridge concept of natural gas.
Finally, if I go to oil, the impact of increased oil production has been a dramatic decrease in our imports. The fraction of our petroleum crude and petroleum products we import has now gone back to the level of 1952. And that has tremendous economic impacts. However, in the low-carbon context, we remain completely focused on continuing to minimize our oil dependence, and we are doing that with three clear tracks. One is fuel-efficient vehicles, and there the CAFE standards for 2025 are central. Second is alternative lower-carbon fuels, specifically our push on next-generation biofuels. And third, the move toward electrification of vehicles, and there again we’ve had a dramatic cost reduction of batteries, but we’ve still got another factor of two or three to go. But [we’ve made] tremendous progress. [W]e are committed to this low carbon world and are doing so within this “all of the above” approach.
MG: Obviously not everyone is committed to this low carbon world. You’ve talked about how it’s time to stop debating climate change and time to start believing. Just recently Jeb Bush, who’s considered one of the more moderate in the Republican field, said that’s “arrogant.” You’re a physicist, not a politician. What has it been like dealing with Republicans on this?
EM: Well frankly I think, by and large, there’s a lot of recognition that we have to address climate change. The debate then becomes about what’s the scope and scale. There are few who are still in this fruitless science-denial stage, but if you were a corporate CEO and your risk manager told you that there is a 90-plus percent probability that something really bad is going to happen if you don’t start taking some action, and you say, Oh, I like that 10 percent or that 5 percent, you wouldn’t be in that job very long. And I think there’s a lesson there.
MG: Republicans are still trying to cut the budget for clean energy research, development, innovation. You hear from them a lot: Well, if the cost of renewables is so low now, then why do we need to subsidize it?
EM: It’s about continued cost reduction. Let me give you a couple of examples. OK, let’s say wind. In good wind locations, we are basically in the five cents per kilowatt-hour range, but that’s in the best wind sites. So we just released a report this week that says if we raised the hub heights, we go to longer blades, etc., basically if we can capture lower-quality wind resources, there’s a tremendous expansion opportunity in the United States, literally opening up the footprint for effective wind by a half to two thirds. And then if you look at what we’re doing in R&D, we’re not interested in continuing to support the existing successful technology, but we are looking at off-shore wind. It’s got a very, very large cost trajectory that it’s got to go down to become competitive. So why do we support it if it’s so expensive today? Well again, it’s an enormous resource. It could have a tremendous capacity factor. So that’s kind of the spirit. At one time, the department supported the technologies that are becoming successful today. Now we’re supporting the ones that can come in 10, 20 years down the road.
MG: On a lot of this stuff, there was a feeling in the past, you’d hear from Republicans, “Oh, well, China’s never going to cut its emissions, so what’s the point of us doing it??” Now it seems like China is doing a lot of this – they’re building the wind, they’re building the transmission lines, they’re building the solar. So is China now winning this race?
EM: I think the U.S.-China [emissions reductions] announcement by Presidents Obama and Xi really has changed the nature of the discussion on climate internationally, and as you have just implied, should be even more changing the domestic discussion. China is doing something, and actually doing something pretty serious. China remains a very large market for expansion [of renewable energy] because they are still in the 6-7 percent annual growth stage. So in terms of deployment, they are a very important driver. In terms of innovation, I would still stack us up very favorably. What we need to do is make sure that as we develop these technologies we not only deploy them in the United States, but we also capture the very, very significant export markets, China being part of that, but only one part of that. I think we’re in good shape in terms of maintaining a very strong innovation edge, but you don’t stay there by sitting still, and that’s why have to keep pushing.
MG: Tesla just came out with this home storage battery. Is storage of renewable energy the next new frontier, do you see? As a technologist, when you look into the next few years, what do you think will be the big innovations that are going to change the world?
EM: Well, storage has always been talked about as one of the major game changers. A lot of the discussion has been on storage for vehicles, which of course Tesla has also engaged in, storage for utility scale. But I think the recent announcement, I think the idea of distributed storage could be – absolutely could be a big game changer. Now, we still need to keep working on cost reductions to keep driving things down before there’s big market penetration. But that’s what we are constantly doing.
MG: You said we’re in a revolution. Have we passed the tipping point? Have we gone from dirty to clean, and is it all going to be one direction from here on in?
EM: Oh, I think so, absolutely. And that is both policy- and technology-driven. Of course, we’re all working hard to go to Paris and to see ambitious declarations of targets backed up to the extent possible by credible implementation programs, globally. And of course the U.S., China, Europe, and I really want to note the Mexican declaration as the first big commitment from a major emerging economy. So I think the pattern is very clear, and I think we are definitely heading toward a cleaner future.
-
House Committees Press Agency on Lobbying for Water Rule
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Kevin Bogardus
U.S. EPA is facing a barrage of questions over its advocacy for its new water regulation -- this time from a trio of House committees.
In a letter sent yesterday and obtained by Greenwire, lawmakers from the House Agriculture; Oversight and Government Reform; and Science, Space and Technology committees asked EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy for documents regarding the agency's campaign of support for the "Waters of the U.S." rule (see related story).
The lawmakers cite a story in The New York Times last week that described how the agency helped generate public comments in favor of the rule. Their letter said EPA worked with the Sierra Club and Organizing for Action -- an outside group established to support President Obama's agenda -- in support of the rule.
"The fact that the EPA would take the drastic and unprecedented measure of partnering with advocacy groups in order to promote a particular regulatory action raises serious questions about the integrity of the agency's rulemaking process," said the lawmakers in the letters.
Reps. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), Michael Conaway (R-Texas) and Lamar Smith (R-Texas), chairmen of the Oversight, Agriculture and Science committees, respectively, signed onto the letter. Also signing onto the letter were Reps. Jim Bridenstine (R-Okla.), Glenn Thompson (R-Pa.) and Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), who lead relevant subcommittees.
The panel leaders ask for several documents, including those dealing with EPA's communications with the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Organizing for Action. In addition, the lawmakers ask the agency to provide an accounting of how much the campaign cost as well as internal EPA legal documents on the Anti-Lobbying Act, which the lawmakers suggest the agency may have been broken in advocating for the water rule.
Advertisement
The committees asked EPA to respond to their request no later than 5 p.m. June 9.
EPA has dismissed concerns about its campaign for the regulation. In a blog post last week, Liz Purchia, an EPA spokeswoman, said the agency's "public outreach effort" was within the agency's mission.
Also in a statement, Purchia said, "None of the social media activity ever asked for or solicited public comment on the rule or provided a link to the official docket for public comment," noting that everyone -- supporters and opponents of the rule -- was "provided the same link to the general webpage in education and outreach materials, emails and presentations, and were told the deadline for submitting public comments and how to do so."
"The public outreach effort to increase awareness and support of EPA's proposed Clean Water Rule was also entirely legal under the Anti-Lobbying Act. This Act does not prohibit agencies from seeking input from the public on a rulemaking or restrict the agencies from educating or informing the public on a rulemaking under development," Purchia said.
EPA's outreach effort for the water rule has also attracted the attention of Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), a fierce agency critic, who has requested a trove of documents from EPA on its campaign earlier this week (E&ENews PM, May 26).
Chaffetz and other lawmakers in the House have pressed the agency for other records on the regulation, sending letters to EPA in March and May this year with queries about the water rule (Greenwire, May 15).
-
EPA Sets 'Brighter Lines' For CWA Jurisdiction In Final 'Waters' Regulation
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Bridget DiCosmo
EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers are setting “brighter lines” for determining the scope of the Clean Water Act (CWA) in their final rule on the water law's reach, aiming to address concerns about uncertainty in the proposed version of the rule -- such as clarifying when waters have a “significant nexus” triggering CWA jurisdiction.
The agencies' joint final rule released May 27 would automatically apply jurisdiction to all tributaries and adjacent waters, or waters bordering, neighboring or contiguous to other jurisdictional waters.
It lists five specific types of “similarly situated” waters in regions that science shows should be subject to a case-by-case analysis to determine whether there is a “significant nexus.” These waters are prairie potholes, Carolina and Delmarva bays, pocosins, western vernal pools in California and Texas coastal prairie wetlands.
Waters within a 100-year floodplain of other waters would be subject to case -by-case jurisdictional analysis, while a host of water features, such as ditches with ephemeral flow that are not a relocated tributary or excavated in a tributary, groundwater, erosional features, and stormwater control features would be excluded from jurisdiction.
In the preamble of the rule -- which has not yet been published in the Federal Register -- the agencies say they “are guided, in part, by the compelling need for clearer, more consistent, and easily implementable standards to govern administration of the Act, including brighter line boundaries where feasible and appropriate.”
The agencies developed the rule in order to try and resolve uncertainty about the CWA's reach, following Supreme Court rulings that created competing tests for determining the law's jurisdiction.
In a fact sheet, the agencies says the rule “protects streams and wetlands that are scientifically shown to have the greatest impact on downstream water quality and form the foundation of our nation’s water resources. EPA and the U.S. Army are ensuring that waters protected under the Clean Water Act are more precisely defined, more predictable, easier for businesses and industry to understand, and consistent with the law and the latest science.”
President Obama issued a statement alongside issuance of the rule that cited uncertainty over the law. “I called on the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to clear up the confusion and uphold our basic duty to protect these vital resources. Today, after extensive input from the American public, they’re doing just that -- finalizing the Clean Water Rule to restore protection for the streams and wetlands that form the foundation of our nation’s water resources, without getting in the way of farming, ranching, or forestry,” he said. “This rule will provide the clarity and certainty businesses and industry need about which waters are protected by the Clean Water Act, and it will ensure polluters who knowingly threaten our waters can be held accountable.”
Early Reaction
Environmentalists and Democratic lawmakers are already praising the rule, saying it restores vital protections needed after Supreme Court rulings created confusion about which waters are subject to the CWA.
For example, Senate Environment & Public Works Committee water panel ranking member Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) in a statement said, “This final rule makes clear that the claims from its opponents -- that it would impose federal regulations on mud puddles and every ditch -- are flat-out wrong. The truth is that downstream states like Rhode Island and many others need this rule to protect us from pollutants discharged in upstream states.”
He added, “This rule provides commonsense guidelines to protect the public from exposure to harmful toxins and pollutants, and helps meet our basic obligations to assure clean water for American families.”
But industry groups and GOP lawmakers are calling on Congress to quickly approve a bill, S. 1140, that would force the agencies to withdraw the rule and start over with an extensive consultation process. They say the agencies failed to adequately consult with industry, states and others on development of the rule.
Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY), who introduced S. 1140, known as the Federal Water Quality Protection Act, said, “Instead of reaching a reasonable solution, today the EPA has ignored millions of Americans and taken more control over private land in our country. . . . Under this outrageously broad rule, Washington will have control over how family farmers, ranchers and small businesses not only use their water, but also their privately owned land.”
He said the rule highlights the need for his bill, adding, “Instead of moving forward with a rule that fails to represent the interests of many Americans, we should act immediately to pass the bipartisan Federal Water Quality Protection Act. We can protect America’s waterways and our farmers, ranchers and landowners. Today’s action ensures further momentum for our bill that says yes to clean water -- and no to extreme bureaucracy.”
In a separate statement, National Rural Electric Cooperative Association CEO Jo Ann Emerson said, ““While we are still examining the details, electric co-ops are concerned by the expansion of regulatory power contained in the rule.”
She also reiterated concerns about development of the rule, saying, “Not only did these agencies fail to consult with their co-regulators under the Clean Water Act -- state and local regulators -- they also failed to consult with the myriad stakeholders who would be affected by the change. The broad opposition, as well as bipartisan support for withdrawing the rule, offers a clear indication of flaws in the process.”
-
5 Reasons Obama’s Transformative Power Plan Won’t Transform Anything
May 27, 2015 | Politico
By Michael Grunwald
Just about everyone seems to agree that President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan is an “ambitious” effort to rein in the electric sector’s carbon emissions. There’s intense debate whether it’s good-ambitious, a “sweeping” and “groundbreaking” effort to fight pollution and climate change, or bad-ambitious, a “draconian” and “job-killing” assault on the coal industry that will jack up America’s utility bills. But it’s been taken for granted on both sides that the Environmental Protection Agency’s draft regulations, expected to be finalized this summer, would smash the status quo.
Actually, they’re pretty weak.
This is partly because the Obama administration, understandably, wants the first-ever U.S. carbon limits to survive legal challenges, and to maintain enough political support to prevent Congress from shredding them. After she released the draft plan last June, EPA administrator Gina McCarthy told me her goal was something “doable, reasonable, and practical,” not something utopian. The mere existence of carbon rules should send a signal to markets about greenhouse-gas emissions, adding to the riskiness of investments in coal plants that already face stricter limits on soot, mercury, sulfur dioxide, and other toxics in the Obama era. The rules should also bolster Obama’s negotiators in this year’s global climate talks in Paris, sending a message that the U.S. is doing something about carbon.
But while environmentalists have hailed the Clean Power Plan as Obama’s crowning climate achievement, and Republicans like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have denounced it as climate radicalism, it doesn’t really anticipate more dramatic emissions reductions than we’re getting now. Overall, it seeks to cut power-sector emissions 30 percent from 2005 levels by 2030. That sounds like a lot, but the ongoing transformation of the U.S. grid—a shift from carbon-intensive coal to lower-carbon natural gas and zero-carbon renewables, plus a general easing of electricity demand—has already gotten us almost halfway to that goal, and the Clean Power Plan hasn’t even taken effect yet. Utilities would have to cut emissions less than 1 percent a year to make it the rest of the way. At that tepid rate, it’s hard to see how America could fulfill Obama’s genuinely ambitious recent pledge to cut our entire economy’s emissions 26 to 28 percent by 2025, since the coal-heavy power sector is clearly our lowest-hanging fruit.
The EPA expects to finalize the plan this summer, so it still could get stronger. And any plan that regulates carbon will qualify as “historic,” the other adjective you hear a lot in the current debate. In its current form, though, at least five elements of the Obama plan—its treatment of coal, its state targets, its treatment of renewables, its approach to bioenergy, and its timelines—are a long way from “ambitious.”
1. Coal The EPA insists the Clean Power Plan is about limiting carbon from power plants, not limiting coal. But let’s be honest: Limiting carbon from power plants means limiting coal, which produces 75 percent of the electricity sector’s emissions. That’s why critics have portrayed the plan as a nuclear weapon in the war on coal. The thing is, the draft rules won’t do much to coal. It’s already declining, but the plan doesn’t really aim to accelerate the decline.
One giveaway is the plan’s projection that U.S. coal generation will drop just 30 percent from 2005 levels by 2030. It’s already dropped 20 percent—and aging coal plants with another 50 gigawatts of capacity, nearly 15 percent of the U.S. fleet, are already scheduled for retirement. In other words, the EPA expects the decline of coal to abate somewhat under the Clean Power Plan, even though the average coal plant is over 40 years old, nobody is planning new coal plants, and the coal industry is already scrambling to comply with a barrage of new clean-air and clean-water regulations that have nothing to do with carbon. The Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign is almost on schedule to achieve its goal of retiring every U.S. coal plant by 2030, yet the EPA plan projects that 30 percent of our power will still come from coal that year. That would be a disaster for the climate.
In fairness, those lame EPA projections are not binding. And McCarthy herself told me not to put too much stock in them. In a November interview, she predicted that “in the end, you will probably see significantly more emissions reductions than we anticipated.” That’s almost certainly true, because utilities seem likely to keep retiring coal plants at a rapid rate. But Obama’s carbon rules do not seem likely to drive many of those retirements—and the EPA’s nationwide projections are not the only giveaway.
2. State targets The Clean Power Plan doesn’t impose strict emissions limits; it merely assigns states targets for reducing their carbon intensity. The plan doesn’t mandate how to achieve those targets, either; it lets the states chart their own paths. While overwrought critics squeal about bureaucratic tyranny, the EPA’s documents outlining its plan are almost laughably deferential, full of references to “maximizing flexibility,” “making sure states have the flexibility they need,” “offering states broad flexibility,” and so on. This actually makes a lot of sense, practically as well as legally and politically. Washington bureaucrats don’t need to micromanage how states decide to cut their emissions. They just need to make sure emissions get cut.
The glaring hole in the plan is not the flexibility it gives states to meet targets, but the targets themselves. The states with the deepest addictions to coal—usually in the form of filthy plants built before the passage of the Clean Air Act—have some of the weakest targets for reducing their emissions. It’s amusing that McConnell is calling for states to rise up and defy the EPA, since his home state of Kentucky will only have to cut its emissions 18 percent from 2005 levels by 2030, and it’s already retiring so many inefficient coal boilers that state officials have said they doubt they’ll need to shut down any more to meet their target. The EPA came up with similarly modest targets for coal-rich states like West Virginia, Wyoming and Indiana. McCarthy told me the agency was trying to avoid years of negotiations about what was achievable, but when a plan sets targets that are likely to be achieved even without the plan, it’s hard to see the point of the plan.
3. Renewables The U.S. is enjoying a green revolution, with wind power up threefold in the Obama era and solar power up more than tenfold, thanks to a remarkable decline in costs that has continued to this day. But Obama’s EPA apparently believes this boom is about to go bust. If its projections for coal are unambitious, its projections for renewables are downright ridiculous, essentially assuming a collapse of America’s fastest-growing electricity sector.
For example: At least five states—Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, South Dakota, and North Dakota—are already producing more renewable electricity than they would be expected to produce under the Clean Power Plan by 2030. And at least seventeen states already have renewable power targets that are higher than the EPA’s. The Clean Power Plan target for California is 21 percent renewable by 2030, even though it’s required by law to reach 33 percent by 2020; the plan’s target for Hawaii is a mere 10 percent by 2030, while the state’s official goal is 40 percent. Overall, the draft EPA plan predicted just 21 gigawatts of new renewable-power capacity nationwide by 2030; the U.S. installed about half that much just last year.
I offered to bet McCarthy that the U.S. would beat the draft plan’s projections for renewables, but she said she agreed they were too low. Wind and solar power are already much cheaper than the EPA assumed when devising its models. But the body language out of the EPA, which already faces Clean Power Plan lawsuits by a dozen states, has not suggested that the final plan will be dramatically stronger.
4. Bioenergy When environmentalists have aired concerns about the plan, they’ve usually focused on its favorable treatment of nuclear power and natural gas. But nuclear power, setting aside its many challenges, is carbon-free. Why wouldn’t it get favorable treatment in carbon regulations? Natural gas does emit carbon, but much less than coal, so it would also look like an attractive substitute in just about any carbon regime. But as I wrote in January, the plan’s favorable treatment of bioenergy—power derived from trees, crops, or other plants—could be much more problematic.
The problem is that an EPA policy memo suggested the plan will treat most bioenergy as carbon-neutral, which could encourage massive amounts of deforestation, which would not be carbon-neutral at all. The EPA has waffled a bit about the memo, so it’s not clear whether the final plan’s approach to bioenergy will be as generous to the timber industry. Suffice to say that some bioenergy critics believe a lenient approach could end up producing far more emissions through the cutting and burning of trees than the rest of the Clean Power Plan would reduce.
5. Timelines If the Obama administration finalizes the Clean Power Plan this summer, and if it isn’t held up by litigation, states will be required to submit implementation plans by June 2016. Not really, though. They’ll be allowed to request extensions of up to two years. Then they EPA will have another year to review their plans. They won’t be required to begin implementation until 2020—assuming no litigation delays, and no reversals by future administrations. And when McCarthy spoke to the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners in February, she hinted that the EPA might give states even more time.
“You and I know that flexibility is the key to this proposal,” she said.
This is all a bit odd, because the EPA has set “interim goals” for 2020 that are much more ambitious than its targets for 2030. Overall power-sector emissions are somehow expected to drop more than 10 percent within the next five years, before implementation even begins, then less than 5 percent over the next ten years, after implementation is in full swing. It’s as if the carbon rules were supposed to relieve the pressure on states to reduce carbon.
In fact, they were supposed to minimize the risk of legal and political reversals. McCarthy is a climate hawk, and Obama cares about his climate legacy; his 2009 stimulus bill helped create the renewables boom, and a host of other EPA regulations have helped decimate the coal industry. There is every reason to believe the U.S. will continue to reduce its emissions whether or not the Clean Power Plan turns out to be ambitious.
But an ambitious plan would reduce more emissions. And isn’t that supposed to be the point?
-
Air Regulator Group's Becker Discusses Power Plan Compliance 'Menu of Options'
May 27, 2015 | E&E - TV
Will a new report outlining a wide variety of Clean Power Plan compliance options change the minds of stakeholders who oppose the rule? During today's OnPoint, Bill Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, discusses his group's report outlining a series of options for stakeholders for power plan compliance. He explains how states can use the tool as they craft their compliance mechanisms and says the tool could sway stakeholders who are currently in the "just say no" camp.Transcript
Monica Trauzzi: Hello and welcome to OnPoint. I'm Monica Trauzzi. With me today is Bill Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies. Bill, it's nice to have you back on the show.
Bill Becker: It's great to be back, Monica.
Monica Trauzzi: So, Bill, when you were last here on the show you previewed a project your organization was working on, a menu of options for state Clean Power Plan compliance. You've since released that work. What strategy did your group use to formulate this set of options for states?
Bill Becker: Well, we put everything on the table. First our strategy was to hire a group that we knew had a tremendous reputation, the Regulatory Assistance Project. They have a number of former air pollution directors, and we asked them to come up with anything they could possibly think of that a state could include in their Clean Power Plan plans, and then we would take a look at that and see whether or not it had any kind of viability.
Monica Trauzzi: So how do you envision states using this tool?
Bill Becker: Well, we hope that every state -- and not just states but stakeholders -- will have this tool at their disposal and on their computer at every stakeholder meeting. It is a tool that is agnostic with regard to individual targets, with regard to the policies of the plan, but it's simply an encyclopedic compilation of anything we could think of that could be included in the plan. What's really important is most people think that the only strategies that could be incorporated into a plan are those derived from EPA's four building blocks -- not true. Once EPA publishes the target for each state the state then presses a reset button and begins anew, begins fresh, and can decide for itself whatever options, either inside the four building blocks or outside the four building blocks, it chooses to pursue.
Monica Trauzzi: So do you think the work that you've done opens doors even for states that are considering just saying no to the power plan?
Bill Becker: I think it opens doors to those states and it makes it more difficult for those states to just say no because they can't figure out what could be included in a plan. We think there are enough options and there's enough flexibility in our report for any state who wishes to do so to develop a plan that could either reach compliance status or come very close. There are enough strategies in here, so long as the politics allowed it, that could bring a state very close if not at compliance, especially within the time frames that we envision in the program.
Monica Trauzzi: And you're not making any specific recommendations of which route states should go down? I mean, you even acknowledge in the report that there are pros and cons to each option.
Bill Becker: Correct. We have a menu that's good for vegans. It's good for those who like steak. We don't tell that person what to order off of our menu, but there's enough that if you want to bring your whole family with different tastes and different needs, we have enough to whet your appetite.
Monica Trauzzi: How does the report address multistate planning?
Bill Becker: The report doesn't specifically address multistate planning. Our report is what to do, not how to do it. What's coming up next, probably within 30 days after EPA promulgates its final rule, is our model plan that will help provide not just explanation but actually regulatory language on how states can team together to develop multistate plans. So our menu is what you can do; our model will be how to do it.
Monica Trauzzi: Right. So this menu won't be out of date once the final plan is released?
Bill Becker: Not at all. In fact we put a lot of thought into what to call the menu. It's really designed to address EPA's Clean Power Plan, but if EPA's Clean Power Plan for whatever reason was overturned by the courts or a governor didn't want to pursue it for whatever reason, these strategies are still viable for any state or locality who wished to pursue greenhouse gas reductions on their own.
Monica Trauzzi: All right, we'll end it there. Very interesting stuff.
Bill Becker: OK, sure, sure.
Monica Trauzzi: Thanks for coming on the show.
Bill Becker: Thank you.
Monica Trauzzi: And thanks for watching. We'll see you back here tomorrow.
[End of Audio]
-
Study Casts Doubt on Life-Saving Potential of EPA Regs
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Peterka
Estimates of the number of lives saved by federal air regulations are highly uncertain, researchers from Indiana University concluded in a new study.
The team, which included a former top official in President George W. Bush's administration, analyzed nine air pollution regulations issued by U.S. EPA between 2011 and 2013 and found that the number of lives saved ranged from zero to 80,000. The wide range was driven largely by uncertainties over the effects of exposures to fine particulate matter, according to the study.
"There is both the possibility that benefits from lifesavings alone are sufficient to cover the rules' costs," the authors wrote, "and the possibility that no lives will be saved."
The study was first published online last month in the Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis and was released yesterday by the university. The Electric Power Research Institute provided financial support.
Kerry Krutilla, David Good and John Graham of the Indiana University School of Public and Environmental Affairs conducted the research. Graham served as administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs for President Bush.
The nine rules in the analysis mostly govern emissions of hazardous air pollutants. They include EPA's Mercury and Air Toxics Standards for power plants, its Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, performance standards for refineries, and emissions limits for boilers and incinerators.
According to the study, the goal was to find whether lifesaving regulations are cost-effective and how regulatory impact analyses deal with uncertainties in estimates of benefits.
Of the rules, EPA estimated MATS to be the most costly -- it represented about 60 percent of the total costs of all the rules in the study -- and the CSAPR to save the most lives. EPA found that CSAPR would save between 12,000 and 31,000 lives a year by reducing fine particle exposure.
The trio of researchers found such a wide range in the lifesavings attributable to the rules because of uncertainties of the health effects of fine particulate matter exposure. Fine particles are about one-thirtieth the width of a strand of human hair.
The study found that there is the possibility that exposure to fine particles does not increase premature mortality risks. They also noted that slight changes in mortality risk translate into big differences in lifesavings in large populations.
"The higher bound for lives saved in the study is comparable to estimates by the EPA, but the possibility that no lives are saved is not reflected in standard EPA analyses of these regulations," according to IU. "If exposures to fine particles do not increase the risk of premature deaths, then most of the regulations in the study are less likely to have economic benefits in excess of their costs."
The Indiana University team's results are based mostly on a re-evaluation of a 2006 study commissioned by EPA to obtain expert opinions on the health effects of exposure to fine particles.
-
Enviros Petition EPA Over Texas Emission Limits
May 27, 2015 | E&E - Greenwire
By Amanda Peterka
Environmentalists today petitioned U.S. EPA over what they say are illegal actions by Texas to authorize more pollution than federal standards allow.
Led by the Environmental Integrity Project, the groups say the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality allowed 19 coal-fired power plants to raise permit limits for emissions during plant startups, shutdowns and malfunctions. The environmentalists also charge that the state commission made the changes without going through the proper channels to provide for public input.
"These exemptions for coal-fired power plants are evidence of the state's chronic disregard for federal Clean Air Act standards," Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the Environmental Integrity Project, said in a statement today. "EPA should now step in and force Texas to tighten up these permits to protect public health."
Air Alliance Houston, Environment Texas, the Texas Campaign for the Environment, Downwinders at Risk, Neighbors for Neighbors, Public Citizen's Texas Office, and the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition also joined the petition.
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality today said it followed all the rules for permitting emissions and that public notice requirements were not trigged by the changes in question.
At issue are allowable emission rates for the power plants during times when they're starting up, shutting down or undergoing malfunctions. EIP says it obtained emails and correspondence through a Public Information Act request that allegedly show the TCEQ worked directly with the state's electric power industry to revise the permit limits during those times.
Advertisement
The Association of Electric Companies of Texas proposed language to revise the permits, EIP said, and then the state included the language "verbatim" in final permits. The changes applied to 35 units at 19 coal-fired power plants.
The environmentalists say the revised permits created exemptions for more than 1,000 hours a year of emissions during startup, shutdown and malfunction events. According to the groups, the Texas commission's decision to increase the permit limits goes against both the Clean Air Act and the state's plan to comply with national ambient air quality standards.
"Industry and the state colluded behind closed doors to produce these illegal exemptions, which result in tons of additional air pollution being released annually," said Jim Schermbeck, director of Downwinders at Risk.
In their petition, the environmental organizations asked EPA to find that Texas violated its state implementation plan to reduce fine particle pollution. They also asked the agency to put in place a federal plan if the state does not propose revisions to the permits within two years.
In a statement provided via email, TCEQ pushed back against the allegations.
"The permit language found in power plant permits is the result of negotiated efforts that transpired between TCEQ and industry over the course of a year," the commission said, adding, "It is necessary for TCEQ to work with regulated entities to ensure that they can comply with the conditions or requirements of a permit."
The increases in emission rates were less than the Texas threshold that triggers public notice, TCEQ said. According to state rules, public notice is not required if increases in emissions are less than 50 tons of carbon monoxide, 10 tons of sulfur dioxide or 5 tons of any other air contaminant.
TCEQ also said that its permitting of emissions released during startup, shutdown and malfunction events "did not relax any federal requirements" and did not trigger federal permitting rules because there were no physical changes or changes in operation at the plants.
The petition comes after EPA on Friday finalized a rule changing the way states are supposed to address excess air emissions during startup, shutdown and malfunction events. The rule rescinded long-standing state provisions that provide a legal shield for industrial facilities from civil penalties for violations during those times.
The rule requires 36 states, including Texas, to submit changes to their state plans within 18 months to comply with the rule (Greenwire, May 22).
-
Solvent Makers, Suppliers Fight Push For EPA To List Chemical As Air Toxic
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Maria Hegstad
Makers and suppliers of the solvent n-propyl bromide (nPB) are defending the chemical against years-old efforts by the makers of other solvents and New York for EPA to list nPB as a Clean Air Act hazardous air pollutant (HAP) subject to strict air toxics rules, arguing the listing petitions contain outdated and inaccurate information.
EPA announced in February that it is reviewing a 2010 petition from the Halogenated Solvents Industry Alliance, Inc. (HSIA), which represents makers and users of solvents that can be used interchangeably in some cases with nPB, and a 2011 petition from New York also seeking an air toxics listing. The announcement followed HSIA's December notice of intent to sue the agency for failure to respond to its petition.
Both petitions argued that nPB causes neurological effects in workers and is a reproductive toxicant and carcinogen, which make the chemical eligible to be included on the HAP list.
But in recently filed comments, Albemarle Corp. and Enviro Tech International, Inc. (ETI) urge EPA to reject the petitions, arguing that the information presented does not support the petition's Clean Air Act requirements. The companies say that in addition to outdated information, the petitions overstate the amounts of nPB used in various applications in the United States as well as the chemical's human health risks.
Both companies argue that only one of three existing uses, precision cleaning or vapor degreasing, is a "long term domestic use" noting that drycleaning uses are decreasing over time as existing machines reach the end of their lives and EPA launched an ongoing rulemaking in 2007 to regulate the use of nPB in adhesives.
As a result, ETI argues in May 7 comments that "If nPB is regulated as a HAP, there would be absolutely no difference for a user of nPB solvents and of trichloroethylene (TCE). TCE is an original HAP, [and] has been deemed to be a known human carcinogen by numerous governmental agencies and health organizations around the world . . . TCE for use in vapor degreasers costs about one half of the price of nPB based solvents. A simple economic analysis concludes that all things being regulatorily equal, a user will switch to the lowest price option, thereby going from a product that is 'reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen' to a product that is deemed to be a 'KNOWN HUMAN CARCINOGEN.'"
States' Concerns
The companies' arguments counter those of multiple state air and environmental agencies and environmentalists, who support HSIA's and the Empire State's petitions. They argue in recent comments that there is ample evidence to support listing nPB as a HAP.
ETI, which describes itself as the "largest supplier of [nPB] based cleaning solvents in the country," explains that its comments are based on trade secret information, and offers to provide EPA, at its request, this confidential information regarding sales of nPB to refute claims made in the petitions.
The company provides estimates of the amounts of nPB used in the United States in 2012-2014, indicating that use decreased from 8.8 million pounds in 2012 to 8.1 million pounds in 2014. ETI adds that nPB use in the United States "has been fairly static for the last eight years. . . . Our projections conclude that the use of nPB based solvents is likely to stay stagnant or actually decrease by small percentages in the next three years, without factoring in any commercial response to additional governmental regulation."
ETI explains that there are three domestic industries using nPB: drycleaning, adhesives and vapor degreasing or precision cleaning. ETI explains that after states began regulating perchloroethylene (perc), some drycleaners chose to convert their machinery to run nPB instead of purchasing expensive new equipment. However, most of these machines are reaching the end of their 15-year lifespan, and ETI reports that it stopped converting perc machines to run with nPB in 2012. ETI reports that "to its chagrin" drycleaners have chosen not to switch permanently to machines that use nPB, and are instead purchasing machines that use hydrocarbon solvents instead.
By contrast, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) in its March 20 comments raises "particular concern" that nPB use in drycleaning will increase because of "EPA's upcoming ban on perc dry cleaning in residential buildings, which will go into effect in 2020. It is expected that some of these co-located dry cleaners would switch to nPB, in part because of a lack of regulatory limitations on nPB."
NJDEP also notes a study that state did regarding a drycleaner who experienced neurological symptoms after switching from perc to nPB, and points out that nPB is more volatile than perc. "Studies measuring the less-volatile perc in apartments adjacent to or above dry cleaners have shown that concentrations can build up to unsafe exposure levels. If the operators switch to nPB, the nPB concentrations in the residence could be higher than perc."
Chemical Exposures
ETI explains that it does not sell nPB to the adhesive sector because it "feels that such uses either cannot or will not be controlled to provide a safe workplace," but it points to Albemarle's comments to show that the adhesives industry has sought to tighten controls to reduce workplace exposures to the chemical.
Further, ETI notes that EPA is working on a final nPB rule, proposed in 2007 under the significant new alternatives policy (SNAP) program, that would find use of nPB in the adhesives sector unacceptable, citing a presentation at an industry trade show last month.
"ETI and the vast majority of nPB solvent formulators and sellers agree with this particular proposed rule under SNAP, which would essentially ban the use of nPB in these sectors . . . Since it would seem this SNAP rule is well on the way to becoming final (only USEPA action is preventing it) it would be a waste of USEPA's limited resources to consider any use of nPB solvents in an industry which will likely not exist in a year in consideration of the current HAP petitions,” ETI says in its comments.
Lastly, ETI cites Albemarle's comments to argue that the only long term domestic use of nPB, vapor degreasing, is already regulated through a limit set under the agency's National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants, to which all of the machines are compliant.
Albemarle in its May 7 comments provides a trio of analyses from its consultants and attorneys. Environmental consultants Trinity Consultants analyze the petitioners' emissions estimations from the various uses of nPB, while toxicity consultants Gradient Corp. reviewed the petitioners' calculations of nPB's inhaled carcinogenicity and their risk assessment.
Gradient argues that notwithstanding the National Toxicology Program's conclusion last year that the chemical is "reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen," nPB's toxicity data is "contradictory and provides limited information for assessing human carcinogenicity." Further, Gradient argues that the petitioners' "quantitative dose-response assessment used to estimate cancer risks was not calculated in accordance with US EPA's recommended methods."
Gradient uses this information to critique petitioners' findings that individuals could be placed at a higher risk of cancer from exposure to nPB from a nearby drycleaner or other facility using the chemicals than the 1 in 1 million excess cases of cancer used, and argues that their overestimates lead them to reach this conclusion.
"Overall, we modeled four realistic case studies of facilities that use nPB: one dry cleaner, a narrow tube manufacturing facility, and two fabrication companies. Using conservative modeling scenarios and a revised inventory update report for nPB, which are likely to overestimate potential cancer risks to populations exposed to nPB in ambient air, we found individual lifetime cancer risk at maximally impacted census receptors to be less than 1 in 1 million for all the facilities but the narrow tube manufacturing facility, for which the maximum individual lifetime cancer risk remains below 10 in 1 million. We thus conclude that estimated lifetime cancer risks associated with nPB air emissions are well within US EPA's acceptable cancer risk range of 1 in 1 million to 1 in 10,000."
Adverse Effects
In contrast, Earthjustice outlines the Clean Air Act's standard for the petition to list as HAPs any substances which "are known to cause or may reasonably be anticipated to cause adverse effects to human health or adverse environmental effects," a standard which Earthjustice argues nPB meets. Earthjustice in its comments cites instances of occupational exposure leading to neurological effects as well as emissions data from Massachusetts, and argues that listing nPB would meet both EPA's Clean Air Act objectives as well as its environmental justice objectives.
Earthjustice argues that efforts to reduce workers' exposure could end up increasing the exposure of bystanders. "[T]he need to list n-PB as a HAP is becoming increasingly important as occupational best practices for use of n-PB have significant potential to lead to more n-PB in the ambient air. For example, [the Occupational Safety and Health Administration] recommends ventilation as an engineering control to protect workers exposed to n-PB. This precaution that can help protect workers in the dry-cleaning or foam cushion manufacturing businesses, however, is likely to increase exposure for community members living, working, and going to school near these sources, unless EPA sets appropriate standards to protect local communities' air and health."
-
Markey Flaring Bill Prompts Debate Over Oil And Gas Methane Emissions
May 27, 2015 | InsideEPA
By Stuart Parker
Sen. Ed Markey's (D-MA) bill to curb flaring and venting of methane emissions from oil and gas drilling on federally owned land is prompting debate about how best to limit air pollution from the sector, ahead of pending proposals expected from EPA and the Department of Interior's (DOI) Bureau of Land Management (BLM) on regulating flaring.
S. 1271, introduced May 11, would require the Secretary of Interior within 180 days of enactment to issue rules to "prevent or minimize the venting and flaring of gas in oil and gas production on Federal land onshore and offshore in the United States," and to "promote the capture and beneficial reuse or reinjection of gas," with respect to future drilling leases.
The bill would further require DOI to craft regulations to "treat gas that is flared or vented in operations under a lease under this Act as production for which a royalty is required to be paid to the United States."
Environmentalists oppose venting and flaring -- or burning off -- of gas from drilling as wasteful and also harmful to the environment. Venting has the most acute greenhouse gas (GHG) impacts, because unburned methane has a global warming potential many times that of carbon dioxide, and also releases the most conventional pollution including air toxics. Flares, if not operated efficiently, can also emit toxic air pollution.
One Western environmentalist welcomes the bill, but doubts its prospects in the Republican Congress, and says one drawback is that the legislation would require payment of royalties only at the existing rate of 12.5 percent. The government already requires payment of royalties for "avoidable" release of gas, sources note.
The source says that experience in the West -- where much drilling takes place on federal land -- has shown that oil drillers will pay the royalty and continue to flare or vent co-produced gas a waste product, because the gas is not sufficiently valuable to warrant capture and beneficial use. "Venting is horrible, flaring is bad," says the source.
To incentivize capture of gas, the federal government would have to increase the royalty rate to 100 percent of the gas price, the source says. Nonetheless, Markey's bill would have value in helping to curb emissions from the "thousands" of oil and gas wells that will still likely be drilled on public lands, the source adds.
Flaring Regulations
BLM is working on a proposed rule to address flaring at existing drilling sites and some new sites, and could issue the rule by next month, the environmentalist says. EPA is separately working on venting and flaring regulations for oil and gas wells and is expected to propose those rules this summer, the source says.
Kathleen Sgamma, vice-president of government and public affairs for the Western Energy Alliance, representing oil and gas producers in the West, however, told Inside EPA May 15 that Markey's bill is ill-conceived.
Since both BLM and EPA are already working on flaring and venting regulations, "why do this?" Sgamma asks. The 180-day time limit would also not allow for reasoned decision-making, with the normal provisions for public notice and comment, so the bill would in effect "subvert" the existing regulatory process, she said.
There are a "host" of reasons why oil and gas producers might have to vent or flare, including safety concerns and a lack of pipeline infrastructure to transport captured gas, Sgamma said. But she said venting is "rare," if occasionally necessary. She said the royalties collected on "associated" gas under Markey's bill would be small.
Oil revenues, however, are substantial, and enable the oil and gas sector to put in place the required pipeline infrastructure for oil and gas. Sgamma said that a rival bill, S. 411 by Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY), would provide a much more effective means of getting co-produced gas to market by clearing the way for new pipeline infrastructure. The bill aims to ease the permitting process for the construction of new pipelines, which Sgamma says is necessary to overcome the federal government's slowness in approving new pipelines on federal land.
Barrasso's Legislation
Barrasso's bill, according to a Congressional Research Service summary, would authorize the Secretary of the Interior to grant a right of way for natural gas pipelines through a unit of the National Park System for a maximum term of 30 years, and a maximum width of 50 feet, and to permit the use of rights of way for natural gas pipelines through public lands, forest, and other reservations of the United States, and specified national parks in California.
Under certain circumstances, the bill would provide an exemption for pipeline projects from National Environmental Policy Act review, normally mandatory for projects on federal lands.
The American Petroleum Institute (API), representing oil and gas producers, in a May 14 statement said, "API doesn't support or oppose a rule on venting and flaring because we have not seen one yet and can't provide an opinion until we know what the rules of the game look like. What we can say is that the industry takes loss of resource very seriously and has taken great steps and made substantial investments to reduce venting and flaring."
The statement adds that, "The problem that we routinely face is government delays in approving the infrastructure to gather and collect gas, which is why we urge Congress and the Administration to move forward with policies that streamline infrastructure permitting."
Industry and Association News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Chemical Management News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Chemical Security News - There are no clips to report at this time.
Energy and Environment News
Transportation News - There are no clips to report at this time
Add recipients
Suggested