Tag / Congress

by Frank Maduri

Supreme Court Decision on EPA Clean Air Act: Follow Up

In a follow up story to a previous article I wrote on the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) via the Clean Air Act the Supreme Court announced their ruling today. The Court ruled, in a close decision, to allow the EPA to continue to oversee the regulation of greenhouse gases particularly in the industry areas of energy and other industrial manufacturing.

 

The decision from the high court did place some limitations on the authority of the EPA, but for the most part, it upheld the notion that the EPA had the authority to regulate the air emissions policies relative to current and future proposed manufacturing plants.

 

In my initial article on this subject, the industry leaders in many segments related to energy and other industrial manufacturing groups were upset regarding the requirements instituted by the EPA relative to the construction of new coal plants and other energy generating facilities.

 

These groups maintained then, and their position has not changed despite the ruling today, that the EPA overreached their authority in interpreting the Clean Air Act and that the proposed limits on carbon dioxide emissions would require new technology which was cost prohibitive. They argued that only Congress, and not the EPA, had the authority to enact any such regulations on their business.

 

Furthermore, these industry groups asserted that these changes would result in a decrease in new coal plant construction and a net loss in jobs. They challenged the EPA in multiple lawsuits which were combined and heard as one case by the Supreme Court, which reached the final verdict earlier today.

 

Big Impact

 

The ruling today will have a big impact moving forward on the future of coal and other energy producing plants. The industry is looking at having to adapt and change their normal business practices, which will have a cost both in time and money to those respective manufacturers.

 

I had mentioned in my prior article that these energy producers may attempt to pass along the increase in the cost of these plant upgrades to the consumer. That would mean increased energy costs for many already cash-strapped American families.

 

The one section of today’s ruling where the Supreme Court provided some limitations to the EPA was with regard to the size of the industry types they could regulate within the confines of the Clean Air Act.

 

Initially, the EPA was seeking to regulate entities which emitted 100 – 250 tons of greenhouse gases and had to increase that amount to 75,000 – 100,000 tons of emissions in order to adequately address the issues with air quality. The Supreme Court decision today reinforced that methodology in their opinion the EPA does not have the authority to start mandating that business across a wide scale have to endure a permitting process.

 

In response to the assertion that the agency did not have the proper authority to require these changes to the policy, the Court wrote that, in essence, the EPA was acting in the best interests of Congress and the American people by regulating this area and saving the costs of creating a separate government program or regulatory entity to do so.

 

This decision has huge positive environmental protection ramifications because it provides the EPA with the authority to regulate the entities which contribute the most carbon emissions into our air. The effective management of these emissions will have a dramatic impact on the protection of the ozone layer and reverse the negative aspects of global warming and climate change.

 

The Future

 

The EPA, through the ruling today, will be able to regulate the entities responsible for 83 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. The industry groups involved and their representative interest groups are obviously unhappy with the decision today, and they will mobilize a concerted effort to file more legal suits and injunctions in an effort to reverse this decision.

 

In the end, whether you think the EPA overreached its authority or not, the vast emissions of huge amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases has been linked in numerous scientific studies to have a negative effect on the quality of our air.

 

I also think that the government should look into some sort of cap on the amount the energy industry could potentially raise on rates to the consumer. I understand they have to maintain profitability, but it would be patently unfair to pass along a large percentage of the cost to the average American family based on these new potential regulatory requirements.

 

A government sanctioned regulatory process, whether it is via the EPA or Congress, was bound to be instituted based on the evidence at hand. I know I would like our children and future generations to be able to take a deep breath when they turn 30, and I think we all have a vested interest in having cleaner air. If you disagree with that sentiment, then this society has more problems than I initially thought we had.

 

(Statistics and some background information courtesy of The Washington Post and Associated Press)

 

 

by Frank Maduri

Superfund: Cleaning America – Part 5

This article series has reviewed the EPA and their Superfund program from the start of the program in response to the Love Canal environmental emergency, through the new protocols of the program, through to the most recent Superfund efforts at the Gowanus Canal site in Brooklyn.

 

This final section of the series on the Superfund will focus on the feedback I received before writing these articles as well as while I was in the process of writing them. It will also look at the future of the Superfund program with its role in an evolving American industrial landscape.

 

The future

 

The future of the Superfund program, in my view, appears to be very robust because the number of sites and proposed sites continues to grow each year. The economic climate and the extreme disapproval of the American public toward new forms of taxation of any kind will continue to funnel more environmental cleanup responsibilities to the federal level.

 

The Superfund, as stated earlier, utilizes the funds from the potentially responsible parties or (PRP) to pay for the remediation functions required to fully clean the respective site. In the cases where the PRP cannot be found, or they no longer exist, the Superfund used to receive funds from a tax levied on the oil, gas, and petroleum industry.

 

That tax is no longer utilized, though many environmental groups think it should be restored, and the Superfund receives the funds in those cases from a general spending fund through Congress. They also have a trust fund in place to handle certain aspects of the functionality of the program.

 

In my experience with the EPA, I have found them to be very professional and they have the right expertise needed to solve some very difficult pollution or contamination issues. Their approach is not the “quick fix” solution, rather it is the big picture, long term solutions that they favor to adequately address the pollution to insure that the affected area remains clean for a sustained period in the future.

 

Their approach also works, in my opinion, because it has several steps involved which account for changes in the priorities of a given site remediation project. It also incorporates the community in the decision making process and has set protocols that work very well for that exchange of ideas. This portion of the process is particularly important in today’s world of interactivity and social media, so the general public and the business community feel involved in the project, which creates a scenario where effective changes to the site can take place.

 

Furthermore, in my research and in my past interactions with the EPA, I view the Superfund as an example of a federal government program that is well thought out and actually works effectively. It is essentially the public’s check and balance against the potential for corporate or industrial disregard for environmental safety protocols.

 

I also understand the criticism of the Superfund, that it can be a cumbersome process filled with “red tape” and that it is costly to clean the sites to their standards. However, the central task I see being posed to both the EPA and the Superfund is concerning the public safety and the safety of our natural resources.

 

If you view the Superfund through that prism, with the public safety aspect as well as the safety of our resources such as drinking water; then I pose to those critics: How much money is that worth to you and the future of your family?

 

The future of the Superfund is one where it will likely take on an important role in the changing landscape of American industry. Anyone watching the evening news or checking out the CBS News website on their laptop or mobile device knows that America has seen the manufacturing sector shipped overseas to Asia and other emerging markets.

 

However, as the push back of the American public for more “made in America” products continues to gain traction, the EPA has to be ready to insure that the return of manufacturing is not correlated with the return of heavy industrial pollution.

 

The other major area for Superfund involvement is the before mentioned fracking, and other energy or mining activities which could perilously endanger our drinking water and other natural resources. I predict a future where the EPA will, through Superfund, play a vital role in the restoration of areas used for energy or mining development.

 

I wrote this article series because in many conversations I was having, I realized that many people were not aware of what the Superfund was, or what it was designed to achieve. I covered a great deal of information, and I feel like I only scratched the surface. The program has so many layers and sub-sections associated with it, that you can certainly feel free to visit the EPA website for further information on the role of the Superfund.

 

The other question which I was asked often when I told people that I was working on this article series was: which state has the fewest Superfund sites?  I presume it is out of curiosity because New Jersey has the most sites on the list (113 sites). However, some of those people told me that they wanted to look into moving their families to that state. Other states with a large number of Superfund sites are California with 97 and New York with 95.

 

 

The answer to that question is North Dakota with 0 sites on the list, though that could change in subsequent years based on the recent increase in fracking activities there by big energy producing corporations.

 

Some other states with very small numbers of sites are Nevada with 1, South Dakota with 2, Wyoming with 2, and Hawaii has 3.

 

The future for the Superfund will be marked with increasingly difficult potential chemical remediation projects, projects which feature sites that have seepage of pollutants deep into the ground as a result of new technologies such as fracking for natural gas or in the mining of other resources. In any case, the EPA will be ready and prepared for the complex challenges ahead as they strive to keep our land and water clean and safe both today and for the generations to follow.