Reusable Wipes' Risks Downplayed

As EPA moves closer to completing a long-stalled rule to ease waste-handling requirements for reusable and disposable industrial towels, the group that represents the reusable wipes sector is touting a study that suggests that laundered reusable shop towels pose little to no health risk to workers relative to risk values set by EPA. The Textile Rental Services Association of America (TRSA), which favors reusable towels, June 29 issued a risk analysis sponsored by consulting firm ARCADIS that challenges a 2011...

Concern Grows Over PFC Contamination But Officials Struggle To Set Limits

Regulators and other officials are suggesting that contamination from perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs), a class of about 400 chemicals widely used for their non-stick qualities, may be more widespread than previously believed, raising concern that broad cleanup will be required though regulators are struggling to set enforceable limits for the substances. "It's going to be interesting to see what transpires" because currently there are no enforceable federal cleanup levels, says one environmental attorney familiar with the issue. Driving the current concern...

EPA Plans New Rulemaking To Block Market Reentry Of PFCs In Carpet

EPA is launching a new rulemaking to restrict the use of so-called long-chain perfluorochemicals (PFCs) in carpets, recognizing growing concerns over the chemicals' toxicity and their widespread presence in the environment by preventing industry from re-introducing the voluntarily phased-out substances, sources say. EPA, in an April Action Initiation List (AIL) released June 22, says it plans to issue a notice of proposed rulemaking within the next 12 months to announce an upcoming significant new use rule (SNUR) for perfluoroalkyl sulfonates...

EPA Seeks Deference From Federal Court On 'Indefensible' Ozone NAAQS

EPA is defending its 2008 ozone ambient air standard from multiple legal attacks by arguing federal courts should defer to the agency on making policy judgments on scientific evidence, even as agency Administrator Lisa Jackson insists that the existing standard is not scientifically or legally defensible -- as activists have argued. In a new legal brief filed July 2 with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in consolidated litigation over the ozone standard, EPA does...

EPA Urges Industry To Expand POTW Monitoring Sites For Siloxanes Pact

EPA is urging industry to expand the number of publicly owned treatment works (POTWs) that monitor for the presence of certain siloxane chemicals as part of a voluntary enforceable data gathering agreement, but industry says that EPA's call to reach a deal on the sites within a month is too soon, potentially jeopardizing their commitment to the pact. Agency officials told a June 27 public meeting on the proposed agreement that using monitoring data from only five plants is not...

Court Readies Novel Ruling On Using Narrative Criteria For NPDES Permits

A federal appeals court is preparing to rule on litigation over the agency's novel effort to translate narrative water quality criteria for nutrient pollution into numeric permit limits for a Massachusetts wastewater treatment plant, denying a stay requested by the plant that EPA had argued would set a precedent for "endless delay" in permit challenges. In a June 29 order in Upper Blackstone Water Pollution Abatement District (UBWPAD) v. EPA, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit rejected...

Activists Lose Bid To Require Stricter EPA Permit Review For Shale Refinery

EPA's Environmental Appeals Board (EAB) has rejected a suit from environmentalists seeking to require the agency to conduct a stricter review of the first new domestic refinery slated for construction in years to consider the effect of the developers' decision to process local shale oil rather than Canadian synthetic crude that EPA assessed in its 2009 National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analysis. Environmentalists had challenged the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit issued by EPA Region VIII for the...

Health Care Ruling To Spur Challenges To EPA Air Act Penalty Process

The Supreme Court's landmark decision upholding President Obama's health care law -- while imposing limits on the federal government's ability to withhold Medicaid funding to states -- appears likely to drive new litigation challenging environmental programs that similarly withhold money as a sanction for non-compliance, such as EPA-imposed highway funding cuts for states that fail to craft Clean Air Act plans. But the high court's 5-4 decision June 28 in National Federation of Independent Business, et al. v. Department of...

EPA Lacks Data To Set Cancer Limit For Exhaust, Fracking Fluid Component

EPA says it lacks adequate data to assess the carcinogenicity of the three isomers of trimethylbenzene (TMB), a chemical mixture found in petroleum products and engine exhaust and also used in some hydraulic fracturing fluids, for which the agency has set toxicity values for preventing adverse neurological effects. The agency June 26 posted the assessment for the isomers 1,2,3-TMB, 1,2,4-TMB and 1,3,5-TMB, chemicals that EPA says are "produced during petroleum refining and production of aromatic hydrocarbons with nine carbons (i.e.,...

Citing Keystone, Activists Seek To Block Pipeline, Power Line Permits

Environmentalists are asking a federal court to vacate the Army Corps of Engineers' recently issued Clean Water Act (CWA) general permit for pipeline and power line projects, as well as its decision to apply the permit to the southern leg of the controversial Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline -- a decision that EPA has also opposed. The activists charged in a June 29 complaint in Sierra Club, et al. v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, et al. , which...

EPA Urges Court To Allow Appeal Of 'Enhanced' Mine Permit Review Vacatur

EPA is urging a federal district court to enter final judgment vacating its strict process for reviewing mountaintop mining discharge permits so the agency can seek appellate review of the decision even though the court is still reviewing the legality of the agency's permitting guide for the mining operations as part of the same suit. "Entry of final judgment will promote the goal of timely justice to the litigants, because the United States will be able to pursue an appeal...

'Poison Pill' In Florida Nutrient Rule May Shape EPA Review, Legal Fight

Florida officials have included language in their landmark numeric nutrient criteria that seeks to block the rule from being implemented if EPA revises or amends it during its ongoing review, providing what many say is a "poison pill" that could complicate the agency's response, though most observers say that the final outcome will be decided in court. Florida's rule, if approved by EPA, could replace the agency's controversial criteria -- providing what would be one of the first numeric state...

EPA Faces Competing Calls To Revise 'Diesel' Definition In Fracking Guide

EPA is facing competing calls from industry, utilities and environmentalists to amend its definition of what "diesel fuels" used in hydraulic fracturing injections are subject to Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) permit requirements, though some state officials are offering cautious praise for the agency's preferred definition. At a June 29 public meeting, the American Petroleum Institute (API) urged EPA to scrap the draft guidance, arguing it is not necessary and that some of the chemical abstract service (CAS) numbers that...

EPA Plans To Issue Endocrine Test Orders For Water Contaminants In FY2013

EPA is planning to issue in fiscal year 2013 its long-delayed list of drinking water contaminants it plans to test for potential endocrine-disrupting effects under its controversial Endocrine Disruptor Screening Program (EDSP), according to its just-released management plan, which also provides hints of how the agency will determine whether some pesticides must undergo a costly second round of testing. EPA developed the "EDSP Comprehensive Management Plan," released June 28, in response to critical reports from the agency's Inspector General (IG)...

House GOP Eyes EPA FY13 Bill As Vehicle To Block Future Climate Rules

House Republicans are using EPA's fiscal year 2013 spending bill as a legislative vehicle to block upcoming agency greenhouse gas (GHG) standards, including new vehicle GHG rules and a proposed GHG rule for utilities -- an effort to try and restrict EPA's climate regulatory authority following an appeals court ruling that upheld existing GHG rules. GOP lawmakers added the restrictions during a June 27-28 House Appropriations Committee markup of the bill, which would fund the agency at $7.05 billion --...

EPA Staff See Morale Boost After Sweeping Legal Victory In GHG Rule Suit

EPA staff members say they have received a major morale boost following a federal appeals court ruling upholding all of the agency's greenhouse gas (GHG) rule, according to sources inside and outside the agency, with the decision seen as bolstering the confidence of EPA headquarters and regional staff in implementing the agency's climate policies. "We are generally obviously pleased, we won every single issue," says a source familiar with EPA headquarters of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District...

After Ruling, Climate Skeptics Eye New Bid To Gut EPA's GHG Risk Finding

The libertarian Cato Institute has created a document that could serve as the backbone of a new climate skeptics' challenge to the science underlying EPA's greenhouse gas (GHG) "endangerment finding" for motor vehicles, the basis of the agency's GHG rules, now that a federal appellate court has upheld the finding and the related rules. The institute recently released a new draft document that seeks to serve as a point-by-point response to the U.S. Global Change Research Program's (USGCRP) 2009's assessment,...

Appeals Court Grants New Utility Developers' Bid To Expedite MACT Suit

A federal appeals court has granted new coal plant developers' request to sever and expedite their suit over EPA's utility maximum achievable control technology (MACT) air toxics rule from other lawsuits over the rule, ensuring swift court consideration of their claim that their projects could stall because of a "regulatory dilemma" of facing requirements under both the final air toxics rule and EPA's proposed greenhouse gas (GHG) rule for new power plants. The decision is a loss for the agency...

Industry Group Reiterates Bid To Stall Suit On Utility MACT 'Delisting' Push

A utility industry group is rejecting EPA and activists' opposition to its effort to sever and hold in abeyance its challenge to the agency's denial of a petition to "delist" coal plants from air toxics regulation, saying that severing the suit will not "frustrate judicial economy" as EPA claims. In a July 2 filing with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the Utility Air Regulatory Group (UARG) reaffirms its bid to sever and stall its...

Industry Eyes RFS Fix To Expand Biofuel Use For Boiler MACT Compliance

Industry is looking to a pending EPA rule revising the renewable fuel standard (RFS) to include additional types of fuels commonly used in larger facilities for heat as a way to expand the market for advanced biofuel use in boilers, in turn easing compliance with EPA's boiler air toxics rule by using the lower-emitting biofuel heating oil. The change could help to address a major concern from critics of EPA's boiler rule -- that it will impose massive costs to...

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