As EPA Rules Stall, Activists Seek Faster OMB Review Of Health Measures

As EPA and other agencies' rules continue to languish at the White House Office of Management & Budget (OMB), environmentalists are pressing the Obama administration to speed the review process for new public health protections, in part by dropping its strict application of the cost-benefit test that activists say aids industry and hinders much-needed rules. Representatives from Public Citizen, the Coalition for Sensible Safeguards, OMB Watch, the Natural Resources Defense Council, trade associations and other groups met with officials at...

EPA Revises CWA Orders To Comply With High Court's Sackett Ruling

EPA is taking steps to implement the high court's Sackett ruling that subjects Clean Water Act (CWA) orders to pre-enforcement judicial review, including instructing staff to add language to such orders specifying that recipients can challenge the allegations in court before the agency seeks to enforce them or impose penalties. The agency is also urging staff to weigh use of notices of violation (NOVs) and warning letters in the early stages of enforcement proceedings, both of which may escape judicial...

Power Plant ELG Suit Tests Industry Bid To Intervene In Sue-And-Settle Pacts

Industry litigation challenging EPA's deadlines for its upcoming power plant effluent limitation guidelines (ELG) is emerging as a test of private parties' ability to intervene in so-called "sue-and-settle" cases, an issue that industry and some lawmakers are seeking to address in pending legislation easing private parties' ability to intervene in such cases. The case could go all the way to the Supreme Court as industry groups are arguing that appellate courts are split. But the industry effort appears to face...

EPA Limits On Local Drilling Acknowledge 'Regulatory Gap' In Fracking NSPS

One day before EPA publishes its landmark rule regulating emissions from hydraulic fracturing and other drilling wells, the agency is acknowledging that the rule will not limit volatile organic compound (VOCs) and other emissions from scores of wells because its definition of "gas" wells precludes from regulation hybrid wells that produce both oil and gas. In an Aug. 15 Federal Register notice, EPA issued a federal implementation plan (FIP) imposing strict controls for VOCs emissions from oil and gas production...

Activists Seek Legal Deadline For Broad EPA Review Of Ash Regulations

Environmentalists are urging a federal district court to set a hard legal deadline forcing EPA within six months to undertake a broad review of its regulations on coal combustion residuals (CCR) disposal, including whether to regulate CCR as hazardous waste and to review possible changes to its toxicity testing process for analyzing coal ash. Coal ash recyclers that use the waste in products such as cement are seeking a shorter three-month deadline, though their request is narrower as they only...

Activists Claim EPA Ignored Key Health Data In Rule Retaining CO NAAQS

Environmentalists suing EPA over its decision not to tighten its carbon monoxide (CO) national ambient air quality standard (NAAQS) are attacking the agency over claims it ignored new epidemiological studies on the adverse effects CO pollution can have on public health, saying the data warrants a tightening of the air standard. In an Aug. 10 reply brief , WildEarth Guardians and other activist groups say the decision is at odds with a Clean Air Act requirement that the agency consider...

Aug 15 Order On Panel Hearing

Aug. 15 Order On En Banc Rehearing

Cummins' Comments On Nonconformance Penalty Rule

Background Reading: Court Urged To Rehear Engine Suit

 

 

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Activists Vow Suit After Maine Rejects EPA's Water Act Review Of Fish Law

Environmentalists are promising to sue Maine officials after the state rejected EPA's landmark disapproval of a fish control statute that the agency deemed a violation of the Clean Water Act (CWA) -- one of a number of measures signaling EPA's willingness to broaden its review of local resource measures it considers to be water quality standards. If Maine refuses to comply with the agency's disapproval, a source with the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) -- which sued EPA to force the...

API Seeks Election Focus On EPA

The American Petroleum Institute (API) is seeking to make the costs of EPA regulations a key issue in the presidential election, warning that agency rules for drilling and fuel could have a “chilling effect” on economic growth and the push for U.S. energy independence. On an Aug. 14 conference call, API announced that it is sending letters to both the White House and the Republican presidential campaign for Mitt Romney urging both sides to make energy issues central to their...

Rep. Stearns Loses Reelection Bid

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) -- a key EPA critic who has used his position as House Energy & Commerce Committee oversight panel chair to target various Obama administration energy and environmental policies -- has conceded defeat in his primary reelection bid. Stearns is the latest GOP incumbent lawmaker to fall to a Tea Party challenger in a primary contest. But House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee John Mica (R-FL) beat back a Tea Party challenge from fellow incumbent Rep. Sandy Adams...

GenOn Aug. 14 Filing

Utility Air Regulatory Group Aug. 14 Filing

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Environmentalists' Aug. 14 Motion

Industry's Aug. 14 Motion

Aug. 9 Scheduling Order

 

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EPA Limits On Local Drilling Acknowledge 'Regulatory Gap' In Fracking NSPS

One day before EPA publishes its landmark rule regulating emissions from hydraulic fracturing and other drilling wells, the agency is acknowledging that the rule will not limit volatile organic compound (VOCs) and other emissions from scores of wells because its definition of “gas” wells precludes from regulation hybrid wells that produce both oil and gas. In an Aug. 15 Federal Register notice , EPA issued a federal implementation plan (FIP) imposing strict controls for VOCs emissions from oil and...

EPA To Grant Oil Industry Bid For 'Affirmative' Defense In RFS Fraud Rule

EPA in a pending rulemaking plans to give the oil industry its long-sought “affirmative defense” against liability for purchasing fraudulent renewable fuel standard (RFS) compliance credits and is also trying to meet industry's demand for expedited issuance of a rule with a proposal due by the end of 2012 and a final rule soon after in 2013. The move could prompt opposition from biofuels groups that are urging the agency to set a narrow defense in the pending rulemaking. Biofuels...

EPA Response To Key NAS Advice Sparks Environmentalists' Concerns

EPA's Risk Assessment Forum (RAF) has released a draft human health framework document aimed at increasing the utility of agency risk assessments -- the first formal step toward implementing recommendations in a seminal 2009 National Academy of Sciences (NAS) report on improving risk assessments. But environmentalists are already raising concerns over what they see as efforts to link risk assessment and cost-benefit analysis, with Matt Shudtz of the Center for Progressive Reform (CPR) calling it a "revolutionary shift in the...

GHG Ruling's Scope Downplayed

Industry groups are downplaying the scope of a federal appeals court's ruling upholding several EPA greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations, rejecting activists' claims that the suit is relevant to litigation environmentalists filed over EPA's deferral of GHG permit mandates for biomass sources. The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) and other environmental groups are suing EPA in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, claiming EPA's decision deferring GHG permit mandates for biomass sources fails to meet a...

EPA FIP For Fort Berthold Indian Reservation

Final Air Rules For Oil & Gas Drilling Wells

 

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New Jersey, Activists Back EPA 'Right' To Impose Interstate Emission Cuts

Environmentalists and the state of New Jersey are defending EPA's "right" to grant Clean Air Act petitions from states asking the agency to directly impose pollution controls on industrial sources in neighboring states, in a closely watched case that could determine a key tool Eastern states plan to use to force cuts in cross-state emissions. EPA is fighting a power industry lawsuit over its rule granting the Garden State's petition under section 126 of the air law, in which the...

EPA Rejects States' Claim Over 'Contribution' Flaws In Transport Air Rule

EPA is rejecting states' claim that the agency has taken a contradictory position on how the "contribution" of upwind states' emissions on downwind states is determined, rejecting the states' argument that the contradiction undermines the agency's utility emissions trading rule that states and industry are suing to overturn. Instead, EPA argues that the statements claimed to be contradictory are instead routine agency statements that some provisions of state air quality plans require more detailed analysis than others, and that nothing...

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