| Page 5823 | InsideEPA.com

Maine Eyes Adding Household Hazardous Waste To Stewardship Programs

Maine's environment department is proposing to add household hazardous waste (HHW) including architectural paint, unused pharmaceuticals and medical sharps, to the state's product stewardship programs, and if adopted would make the state the first in the nation to have a statewide medicine disposal program. The product stewardship recommendations are the first since the state enacted a landmark law last year outlining a process for adding new sectors. Regulators with Maine's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) are also recommending minor changes...

http://InsideEpa.com/sites/insideepa.com/documents/jan2011/epa2011_0067.pdf

http://InsideEpa.com/sites/insideepa.com/documents/jan2011/epa2011_0066.pdf

State Water Suit Highlights Need For Strict EPA Coal Ash Rules, Activists Say

Maryland's recent vow to expand a Clean Water Act (CWA) suit against a major power company over the company's coal ash disposal operations highlights the need for EPA to issue rules designating the ash as “hazardous” subject to strict regulation under the Resource Conservation & Recovery Act (RCRA), environmentalists say. Environmentalists say that without strict “hazardous” waste management requirements, states will be unable to prevent water contamination. "You have at all these sites in Maryland and across the country, where...

Activists Say EPA Bid To Stall Boiler MACT Limits Impact Of Court Deadlines

The Sierra Club is urging a federal court to deny EPA's request for a 15-month delay to a court-ordered Jan. 16 deadline for issuing a strict air toxics rule for boilers, warning that approving the delay would undermine future court-ordered deadlines by not requiring EPA to prove that meeting such dates is “impossible.” Earthjustice, on behalf of Sierra Club, in a Jan. 10 filing asks the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to reject EPA's request for a...

EPA Opposes Quick Cement Suit

EPA is opposing the cement industry's bid for a federal appeals court to accelerate briefing in lawsuits over its strict air rules for the sector, saying a recent industry brief fails to justify proceeding with the cases while the agency reviews administrative petitions to reconsider the rules. In a Jan. 10 reply filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, EPA reiterates an earlier request for the court to consolidate several lawsuits over the combined...

Insider - January 11, 2011

Fracking Risks The outcome of an industry lawsuit could determine the ability of EPA to use its emergency powers under the Safe Drinking Water Act to address groundwater risks from hydraulic fracturing: Industry Suit Could Test EPA Use Of SDWA Power To Address Fracking A Texas energy producer is suing to force EPA to turn over data underlying its allegation that the company's drilling operations contaminated local water supplies in a suit that could test EPA's use of its Safe...

http://InsideEpa.com/sites/insideepa.com/documents/jan2011/epa2011_0063.pdf

Failed Talks Leave It Up To Court To Rule On GHG Limits For Stalled Permits

EPA and backers of a planned power plant have failed to reach agreement on a schedule for the agency to issue a long-delayed air permit for the facility, leaving it up to a federal court to rule on the potentially precedent-setting question of whether regulators can set permit limits on greenhouse gas (GHG) and other pollutants that are regulated after the permits were first sought but before they were issued. The developers of the proposed California Avenal Power Center, LLC...

Industry Motion

EPA Motion

EPA Targets Fluoride Pesticide

Days after releasing new, more conservative risk and exposure assessments for the mineral fluoride, EPA is proposing to withdraw longstanding food safety limits, or tolerances, for the fluorinated pesticide sulfuryl fluoride, a move that will effectively ban many of its current uses. In a Jan. 7 proposed order signed by Office of Pesticide Programs Director Steve Bradbury, EPA announced it will grant a petition filed by environmentalists objecting to the Bush-era tolerances for sulfuryl fluoride, a fumigant used as an...

Industry Asks EPA To Redo Strict Risk Studies For Several Key Chemicals

Industry groups are urging EPA to redo risk assessments for several controversial chemicals -- including the flame retardant decabrominated diphenyl ether (deca) and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) -- that industry says are too strict, offering new data that they believe should prompt the agency to weaken its various risk studies. State environmental regulators and environmentalists meanwhile are asking EPA to undertake new risk assessments of some chemicals whose risks are unknown, including amphibole mineral fibers similar to asbestos. EPA's risk assessments...

States, Activists Claim EPA 'Residual Risk' Method Spurs Weaker Air Rules

State air officials and environmentalists are sparring with EPA over the agency's approach to performing "residual risk" reviews to determine whether it should revise existing air toxics rules for various industry sectors, claiming that the Obama administration's first residual risk reviews signal an approach that leads to insufficiently strict rules. EPA in September proposed residual risk rules for six industry sectors, including chromium electroplating and marine tank vessel loading. The rules assess the remaining health risks caused by emissions from...

Activists Vow To Sue EPA Over Novel Oregon Water Toxics Standard

Environmentalists are planning on suing EPA for failing to properly review Oregon's proposed revisions to narrative water criteria for toxics that assume high fish consumption rates, citing violations of a number of federal statutes, and activist sources say they hope the suit will force the agency to speed up reviews of state water quality criteria nationally. While activists were generally supportive of EPA's mandate last year that Oregon set stringent criteria to protect Native American populations that consume large amounts...

States, Environmentalists Seek Stricter EPA Air Rule For Chromium Plating

State officials and environmentalists are criticizing EPA's recently proposed air toxics rule for chromium plating operations as insufficiently stringent and attacking the agency's decision to soften the rule in response to industry outcry, while the Defense Department (DOD) is questioning the scope of some compliance provisions in the proposal. EPA earlier this year issued a proposed "residual risk" rule for the chromium plating industry sector. Under the residual risk program the agency reviews the remaining health risks posed by emissions...

Industry Request Prompts California To Strengthen Chromium 6 Water Limit

California's Environmental Protection Agency (Cal/EPA) has released for public review a hexavalent chromium (Cr6) drinking water public health goal (PHG) even more stringent than its first-in-the-country 2009 standard, following an independent review performed at the request of industry, which argued the previous draft PHG was too stringent. Industries and some drinking water agencies strongly opposed the original draft PHG and are likely to raise even more concerns about the more stringent, updated standard. EPA, meanwhile, has indicated it is also...

Industry Urges Stringent Review Of EPA's Hexavalent Chromium Analysis

The chemical industry is urging EPA to seek strict expert peer review of its recently released assessment of the risks that the metal hexavalent chromium (Cr6) poses when ingested, due to the assessment's highly influential nature, suggesting the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) or the agency's Science Advisory Board (SAB) conduct the review. EPA's draft assessment of Cr6, has been controversial since its release last September because it suggests for the first time that Cr6 is a human carcinogen when...