tarsands2bak
918 see main for older<div>
</div><div>=</div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">221 desmog</font></p><p><span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Meanwhile, an 18-month inquiry led by the province of Alberta into environmental groups opposed to Canadian tar sands is nearing completion — but a Canadian NGO wants the CA$3.5 million inquiry disbanded, alleging that it was improperly established to intimidate opponents of the fossil fuel industry. </span><a rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" href="https://desmogblog.cmail19.com/t/t-l-mydlujd-mgoiuir-t/" style="color: rgb(21, 46, 128); line-height: inherit; font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); transition: opacity 0.1s ease-in 0s;"><strong style="line-height: inherit;">Read more here</strong></a><span style="color: rgb(102, 102, 102); font-family: Merriweather, Georgia, serif; font-size: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span></p><p><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></p></div><div>=</div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Brent Nelson, emergency manager for Walsh County, North Dakota, told the local Grand Forks Herald that the cleanup process could take months.</b></font></font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div>“The roads around the spill area have been closed to assist with the cleanup,” the Herald reported. “Walsh County Sheriff Ronald Jurgens asks the public to avoid the area so the cleanup process can proceed. On-site security will stop and fine any driver ignoring the closed road signs.”</div><div>
</div><div>TC Energy, previously known as TransCanada, denied that the spill had any impact on drinking water, a claim that was met with skepticism.</div><div>
</div><div>@RuthH_Hopkins</div><div>Keystone Pipeline leak spills oil in northeastern North Dakota </div><div>
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Corp says the oil hasn’t contaminated any drinking water & they’re cleaning it up but<b> anyone who drives to the site will be fined by their security so who knows what’s going on. #</b>NOKXL</span> https://www.grandforksherald.com/news/4746575-Keystone-Pipeline-leak-spills-oil-in-northeastern-North-Dakota …</div><div>
</div><div>Keystone Pipeline leak spills oil in northeastern North Dakota</div><div>
</div><div>Corp says the oil hasn’t contaminated any drinking water & they’re cleaning it up but anyone who drives to the site will be fined by their security so who knows what’s going on. #NOKXL https://t.co/7H6Dcz4bsm</div><div>
</div><div>— Ruth Hopkins (@RuthH_Hopkins) October 31, 2019</div><div>
</div><div>Catherine Collentine, associate director of Sierra Club’s Beyond Dirty Fuels initiative, said “this is not the first time this pipeline has spilled toxic tar sands, and it won’t be the last.”</div><div>
</div><div>“We’ve always said it’s not a question of whether a pipeline will spill, but when,” said Collentine, “and once again TC Energy has made our case for us.”</div><div>
</div><div><b>Keystone’s leak in North Dakota was detected just hours after the U.S. State Department held a public hearing in Billings, Montana to solicit comments on the department’s new analysis (pdf) of the potential environmental impact of the Keystone XL project.</b></div><div>
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Trump administration has worked hard to approve and accelerate the project over the protests and legal challenges of indigenous rights organizations and green groups</span>.</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">
</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">Joye Braun, frontline community organizer with the <b>Indigenous Environmental Network,</b> said the State Department meeting on Keystone XL “seemed more like an industry showcase rather than public comment hearing.”</span></div><div>
</div><div>“We stand firm in opposing this project as the latest spill is further evidence of just how dangerous pipelines are,” said Braun.</div><div>
</div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">icn 4/19</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
home province of Canada's tar sands elected a combative, conservative leader this week who came out swinging on the side of the country's struggling oil industry. Jason Kenney<a href="https://calgaryherald.com/commodities/energy/kenney-vows-oil-fight-as-conservatives-regain-power-in-alberta/wcm/5a375b35-5613-4856-a159-6be73fa08277"> promised</a> to cancel Alberta's carbon tax, lift a cap on greenhouse gas emissions from the tar sands and create a "war room" to combat the oil industry's opponents.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But while his victory Tuesday threw more uncertainty into Canada's efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, there may be little Kenney can do on his own to reverse what has been a steady decline in fortunes for Alberta's tar sands over the past few years.</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Instead, the fate of the tar sands industry, also known as oil sands, may rest more in the hands of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the courts hearing legal challenges to proposed new oil pipelines—and, ultimately, with international energy markets and the macroeconomic forces that shape them.</font></font></font></font></p><div class="widget widget-newsletter-block mc-embed-signup embed-horiz fbia-strip"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In his acceptance speech, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/jason-kenney-justin-trudeau-notley-alberta-1.5100903">Kenney told the crowd</a>: "As long as there is growing global demand for oil and gas, the question is who will provide it."</font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Major oil companies have been asking themselves the same question, and increasingly, they've been saying it won't be the tar sands.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><h3><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Oil Majors Question the Economics</font></font></font></font></h3><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">New tar sands mining projects tend to be big and expensive, and they can take years or even decades to provide meaningful returns on investment. While details vary, they also tend to be among the <a href="https://earth.stanford.edu/news/measuring-crude-oils-carbon-footprint#gs.5rr48a">most carbon-intensive sources</a> of oil, raising the risk that future climate change policies could further increase their costs or even shut them down.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As governments try meet the goals of the <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/tags/paris-climate-agreement">Paris climate agreement</a>, advocacy campaigns and investors have been increasing pressure on oil companies to explain what a world of dwindling oil demand would mean for their balance sheets. And, increasingly, oil companies have been saying that, even if they're not turning away from their core product, they are focusing on the lower-cost, most efficient sources of oil.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">ConocoPhillips described in a <a href="https://static.conocophillips.com/files/resources/climate-change-report.pdf">report in February</a> its pivot toward low-cost oil and gas production, a process that included selling tar sands assets.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Executives at Chevron <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-07/chevron-pledges-alignment-with-paris-accord-but-won-t-cap-output">have said they plan</a> to cut the company's emissions, not by producing less oil and gas but by doing so more efficiently.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Saudi Arabia's state-owned oil company, Saudi Aramco, issued a filling with the London Stock Exchange earlier this month that <a href="https://www.axios.com/saudi-aramco-climate-change-oil-pitch-b21b71ed-592f-421d-8f62-6187436eb2ad.html">made the case to lenders</a> that the nation's reserves are well positioned because, it says, they can be produced relatively cheaply and with comparatively lower carbon emissions.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In recent years, as global oil prices fell from their highs in 2014—and with <a href="https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts">Canadian oil prices among the lowest</a>—most of the major international oil companies with a significant investment in Canada's oil sands <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/13042017/canadian-oil-sands-tar-sands-climate-change-conocophillips-exxon">sold their stakes</a>, primarily to Canadian companies.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><h3><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A Push for Pipelines and End to Carbon Taxes</font></font></font></font></h3><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Despite all this, Kenney answered his own question: The world needs more Canadian energy, he said. For that to happen, Canada is going to need to build more pipelines. But it's unclear how much leverage Kenney may have in making that happen.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As production increased in recent years without more capacity to ship it, oil companies have had a harder time exporting tar sands crude to refineries in the United States or overseas.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A series of proposals for <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/18032019/major-pipelines-delays-leave-canada%E2%80%99s-tar-sands-struggling">major pipelines</a> to the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and to the U.S. heartland—including <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/11042019/trump-pipeline-executive-order-environmental-review-keystone-xl-clean-water-act-states-rights">Keystone XL</a>—have been delayed by court fights, denied or canceled over the past few years.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In his <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xX-t5lqwCag">acceptance speech</a> on Tuesday, Kenney blamed other Canadian provinces, the Trudeau administration and a "foreign-funded campaign of special interests" for blocking pipeline expansions, and he called on Quebec and other provinces to help Alberta get its oil to markets overseas <a href="https://www.albertastrongandfree.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Alberta-Strong-and-Free-Platform-1.pdf">if they want to share</a> in its resource wealth.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Attempts to build a pipeline to the East Coast have in the past been stymied by opposition in other provinces—opposition that Quebec Premier Francois Legault made clear on Wednesday remains strong. "There is no social acceptability for a new oil pipeline in Quebec," Legault told reporters on Wednesday, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/jason-kenney-bc-quebec-1.5102373">according to the CBC</a>.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Alberta has also been pushing for the expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline, which carries tar sands crude to a port in British Columbia. U.S.-based Kinder Morgan had been trying for years to triple the pipeline's capacity, but British Columbia and some indigenous First Nations opposed the project. Last year, the <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/01062018/canada-climate-action-oil-trans-mountain-pipeline-alberta-oil-tar-sands-paris-trudeau">Canadian government bought</a> the pipeline to keep expansion hopes alive, but a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/30/trans-mountain-pipeline-latest-canada-court-overturns">court rejected the pipeline's permit and ordered</a> a new federal review of the project in consultation with First Nations along the route.</font></font></font></font></p><div class="media media-element-container media-image_centered_medium"><figure id="file-270588" itemscope="itemscope" itemtype="http://schema.org/ImageObject" class="file file-image file-image-png"><font size="4"><font face="Times New Roman">[map]
</font></font></figure></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">While a new decision on the project is expected by the end of May, Kenney's win adds uncertainty to the process.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's support for the expansion was widely viewed as one half of a grand bargain with Rachel Notley, the outgoing Alberta premier and member of Alberta's New Democratic Party, who lost the election this week to Kenney.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Trudeau had been pushing provinces to enact their own carbon taxes as part of his plan to meet Canada's pledge under the Paris climate agreement. Those that didn't would fall under a <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/tasker-federal-carbon-tax-explainer-1.5077445">new federal tax</a>, which is currently being challenged in court by the government of Ontario. Notley enacted a tax in Alberta along with a cap on emissions from the tar sands, and many political observers said that tax was central to securing Trudeau's support for the pipeline.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">With Kenney now promising to scrap both the tax and the cap, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2019/04/16/jason-kenney-justin-trudeau-transmountain_a_23712908/">the political calculus changes</a>. Trudeau could use the pipeline project as leverage over Kenney, pressing the provincial leader to maintain a carbon tax or for other concessions. Or he could decide to abandon the expansion altogether.</font></font></font></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://thinkprogress.org/oil-lobby-groups-epa-secret-science-proposal-clean-water-rules-9de63644deed/">https://thinkprogress.org/oil-lobby-groups-epa-secret-science-proposal-clean-water-rules-9de63644deed/</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx twt?</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>EPA’s ‘secret science’ proposal being used by Big Oil to undermine clean water rules</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Fossil fuel trade groups don't want the EPA to update a 1970s-era list of polluting petroleum chemicals.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>
</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">KYLA MANDEL</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">MAR 22, 2019, 8:00 AM</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Internal emails reveal two major fossil fuel trade groups are lobbying to stop the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from updating a decades-old list of toxic chemicals found in petroleum wastewater — and they’re using the Trump administration’s controversial “secret science” proposal to make their case. </b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The EPA currently monitors for 16 types of chemicals in wastewater, or effluent, released by petroleum refineries under the Clean Water Act. However, in the more than 40 years since the list was developed, scientific understanding around the number of chemicals and their toxicity levels has grown. As a result, the EPA is in the early stages of determining whether the priority list of chemicals needs to be updated.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>But according to emails released to the Sierra Club and reviewed by ThinkProgress, the American Petroleum Institute (API) and the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) are lobbying to limit the scope of the EPA’s study.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The fossil fuel trade groups want to ensure that two categories of chemicals known to be toxic to aquatic life, and potentially harmful to humans, are excluded from the study: alkylated polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (alkylated-PAHs) and naphthenic acids (NAs). The industry even goes so far as to state that including these in a study would risk “legal challenges.”</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">These two sets of chemicals are not currently on the EPA’s priority list. There are hundreds of different variations of PAH chemicals and levels of toxicity (alkylated-PAHs, for instance, are a derivative of the main “parent” PAH compounds). Burning coal and oil is the main source for these chemicals.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Yet, according to Jan Andersson, a chemistry professor at the University of Münster in Germany who has studied the EPA’s list, roughly 97 percent of the PAH chemical compounds found in crude oil are alkylated chemicals, making any lobbying against their inclusion quite significant. Meanwhile, NAs are found primarily in the byproduct of <b>tar sands oil</b>; the non-biodegradable compounds are stored in giant tailings ponds.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Excluding these types of chemicals from the EPA study would therefore serve to preemptively limit the scope of any potential rule changes in the future.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“They’re trying to cook the books at the very earliest stages of a study for petroleum refinery and ignoring the considerable data that’s out there that alkylated-PAHs are absolutely at least as toxic, if not more toxic, than the ones everybody monitors for right now,” Betsy Southerland, former director of the EPA’s Office of Water’s Office of Science and Technology, told ThinkProgress. Southerland worked for the EPA for 30 years before resigning in 2017 in response to the change in leadership.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">At high or prolonged exposure, PAH chemicals can cause tumors in aquatic life and birds as well as impact their reproduction, development, and immunity. Studies show that NAs have similar impacts, along with causing liver and heart damage in mice. Some known health effects to humans from PAH exposure include eye and skin irritation, nausea, and diarrhea, as well as longer-term impacts such as kidney or liver damage and asthma-like symptoms.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Scientists are still studying how the various chemicals impact humans; a range of PAH chemicals are classified as suspected or possibly carcinogenic to humans. What is known though, is that alkylated-PAHs are likely more toxic than other types of PAHs. They also take a longer time to biodegrade in the environment.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The ‘secret science’ argument</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Issued by the EPA in 1976, the list of 16 types of PAH chemicals is used to determine which chemicals must be monitored for risks to drinking water and human health. Under the Clean Water Act, petroleum wastewater effluent guidelines establish a national floor — a baseline limit — for these chemicals. So, if there is a discharge of waste such as the release of industrial wastewater, stormwater runoff, or oil spills, only these 16 chemicals are tested to determine the level of toxicity.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The simplicity of the list has made the process easily applicable and cost-effective, and other countries have also turned to it as a resource. The list hasn’t just been used to monitor wastewater, either — environmental studies frequently use it as a basis for research. However, as a 2015 article co-authored by Andersson and published in the academic journal Polycyclic Aromatic Compounds notes, the list leaves out three large groups of these chemical compounds, including alkylated-PAHs. As the paper states, crude oil and coal are “rich” in alkyl compounds.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Despite the potential impact on human health and the environment, the levels of these chemicals currently found in petroleum wastewater is unknown; that’s one thing the EPA’s study would determine. PAH concentrations can vary from site-to-site and by the source of the crude oil. The findings would then help guide any necessary changes to the list of chemicals that should be regulated.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">As part of its argument against the EPA measuring these chemicals, the trade groups are using the EPA’s proposed “secret science” rule to argue against disclosure of NAs because that would constitute a risk to companies’ proprietary data.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The proposed rule, also known as the “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” rule, was introduced last April by former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt. The rule has been supported by climate science deniers and effectively aims to restrict the use of scientific evidence in the rule-making process. The plan has been stalled under Administrator Andrew Wheeler, but if adopted, it would require the EPA to rely only on scientific studies where the underlying data used by the researchers is made public. Critics argue the bill would severely limit the kind of science the EPA could use in justifying regulations (excluding public health data, for instance) and would place a number of unnecessary burdens on EPA scientists.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Some in the chemical and fossil fuel industries, both of which maintain close ties with the Trump administration, have also warned that the rule would expose confidential corporate information. In a June 8, 2018 letter attached to an email to Brian d’Amico, branch chief at the EPA’s Office of Ground Water and Drinking Water, API and AFPM wrote that using the industry’s own proprietary method of analyzing naphthenic acids would be a “clear contradiction” to the EPA’s proposed secret science rule.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“Independent validation is clearly not possible when a proprietary analytical method is used to generate the data,” the organizations argued. “In the interest of transparency, per its own proposed rule, EPA should abandon the use of this proprietary method in the Detailed Study.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“Data derived from these methods could result in the EPA facing substantial scientific and legal challenge,” API and AFPM warned.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In other words, under the hypothetical scenario where the EPA decides to update its chemicals list at a time when the secret science rule is officially adopted, it would require the results of the EPA’s effluent study be made public, as that would be considered underlying data used to introduce the new chemicals rule. But doing so would, in the eyes of the fossil fuel industry, violate their proprietary methods used to analyze the chemical and so the chemicals should instead be simply excluded from the very beginning to avoid such a scenario.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“Quoting a rule that has not even gone final yet for the reason why [the EPA] shouldn’t be allowed to monitor it is pretty outrageous,” said Southerland.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The EPA did not respond to a request for comment from ThinkProgress about whether or not it will be studying the two types of chemicals the fossil fuel industry has been lobbying against. The API and AFPM also did not respond to requests for comment.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">‘Obsolete’ list</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The fossil fuel industry is also arguing that the EPA doesn’t have sufficient data to claim that these two groups of chemicals should be regulated. As Roger E. Claff, senior scientific adviser at API, wrote in a February 2018 email to d’Amico, among the concerns is a “lack of toxicity data for decision-making.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">But as Southerland explained, that’s precisely why the EPA is initiating its study; growing scientific findings suggest these chemicals are highly toxic and therefore updates might be warranted. Meanwhile, she said, “API is saying ‘hell no.'”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Andersson made the case for updating the list in his 2015 paper. The 1976 list was created based on what was commercially available at the time, but many more variations of PAH chemicals exist now. Meanwhile, toxicology has improved understanding of the adverse health impacts of a wide range of these chemicals, and “a wealth of new compounds have been added to the inventory of confirmed or suspect carcinogens.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“This list of compounds is not suitable,” Andersson told ThinkProgress. “Most of them are pretty innocuous… [there are] many that are much more toxic that don’t appear on this list because in 1976, people didn’t know about them. This list looks pretty obsolete.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">‘Collaboration through the years’</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The first meeting between the EPA and the fossil fuel trade groups on this issue occurred in May 2016, under the Obama administration. And as a January 2018 slide show presentation to the Trump administration shows, the industry highlighted its “collaboration through the years” with the EPA.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Internal emails released to the Sierra Club show a January 2018 presentation by API to the EPA.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">INTERNAL EMAILS RELEASED TO THE SIERRA CLUB SHOW A JANUARY 2018 PRESENTATION BY API TO THE EPA.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Of course, some degree of collaboration is needed in order for the EPA to properly conduct its study and gather the necessary data. However, the internal emails provide insight into the scale of influence the fossil fuel lobby is trying to exert at the very early stages of decision making.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Dalal Aboulhosn, who works on federal water policy for the Sierra Club, said this shows how under the current administration industry “is allowed to come in and pretty much write their wish list.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">On water specifically she said, there has been a pattern of industry approaching the EPA under both Pruitt and Wheeler with policy ideas before the EPA has actually decided to move on the issue. Shortly after, a change is announced.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“It’s very blatant and it’s across the board when it comes to issues in the agency, and we’re seeing it very starkly on water issues,” Aboulhosn said.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Indeed, after arguing last June that “the science and data for the toxicity of NAs and alkylated-PAHs are still a work in progress,” the two trade groups go so far as to suggest that, should the EPA wish to study them, the agency must address these two groups of chemicals “in a project outside of the Study.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">They argue the EPA should make a new official rule in order to create a new “method” for studying these chemicals. This separate project should undergo “the appropriate public notice and comment period required to gain method approval,” the trade groups’ letter states.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This, however, would be highly uncommon given public notice and comment periods typically apply to new regulations, or changes to existing regulations (such as repealing the Obama-era Clean Power Plan or introducing the “secret science” rule); it would also serve to delay the process by several years.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“It sounds like they’re trying to set some new bar to any future detailed studies,” Southerland said, “where no analyses can be done unless there’s a standard method… that would be a bar not just for petroleum refinery but every industry category.”</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It quickly becomes a “chicken and egg” situation, Southerland said; you need a study to determine if a new rule is needed, but the industry is arguing you need a new rule before conducting the study.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">But as the June 2018 industry letter to the EPA reads, “API and AFPM members believe in due diligence and support EPA in developing sound science.”</div></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></font></p></div></div><div><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> const local regs maine</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/28082018/tar-sands-pipeline-court-ruling-south-portland-ban-public-health-constitutional-big-oil-maine">https://insideclimatenews.org/news/28082018/tar-sands-pipeline-court-ruling-south-portland-ban-public-health-constitutional-big-oil-maine</a></font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>A federal judge has ruled that the coastal city of South Portland, Maine, did not violate the U.S. Constitution</b> when it passed an ordinance that blocked a local pipeline company from bringing tar sands oil through its port.</font></p><div class="content" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><div class="field-items" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">For the city of 25,000, the ruling was a surprise victory after years of fighting what <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/02112017/oil-pipeline-tar-sands-banned-south-portland-maine-industry-lawsuit-home-rule" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">felt like an impossible battle</a> against some of the world's biggest oil companies, which lined up to support the Portland Pipe Line Corporation (PPLC).</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Provided the ruling survives an appeal, it slams the door on a significant plan to ship Canadian tar sands oil</b>, one of the most carbon-intensive fuels on the planet, to the East Coast for export to international markets, and it could offer a guide for other communities hoping to block energy projects.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>"For other communities looking at opposing fossil fuel infrastructure, this case is a blueprint for how you should do it,"</b> said Patrick Parenteau, an environmental law professor at the Vermont Law School. "It's a strong opinion, and it could result in a really significant precedent for local control on petroleum-based industries." The pipeline company's plan involved a 70-year-old pipeline system that currently carries conventional crude oil in the opposite direction, from a tanker facility in South Portland to refineries in Montreal. After Canada's tar sands oil boom crippled the market for oil travelling from Maine to Montreal, PPLC saw its business dwindle.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A plan to reverse the flow and provide a route for tar sands oil to reach global markets through the port at South Portland represented a golden egg for the company—a way to redefine its business model, provide jobs and become a linchpin for oil exports.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But it also would have come at a steep price, the grassroots group Protect South Portland argued.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The plan called for the construction of a pair of 70-foot-high smokestacks next to a beloved waterfront park to burn off volatile compounds from the tar sands oil before it could be loaded into tankers. Concerns about emissions from those smokestacks led to the creation of the so-called Clear Skies Ordinance, which banned the bulk loading of crude oil onto tankers.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">When the City Council passed the ordinance in 2014, it sought to protect South Portland citizens from air pollution. The ordinance's foundation lay in Maine's "home rule authority," a stipulation of the<b> state Constitution</b> that allows municipalities to create regulations that go beyond state rules to protect public health and welfare.</font></p><div class="media media-element-container media-image_centered_medium" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; max-width: 648px; margin: 0.25em auto;"><figure id="file-271228" itemscope="itemscope" itemtype="http://schema.org/ImageObject" class="file file-image file-image-png" style="box-sizing: inherit; max-width: 100%; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">[map]</font></figure></div><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The pipeline company filed its lawsuit in 2015, and a lengthy, expensive legal battle ensued. <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/05012018/south-portland-maine-oil-sands-pipeline-local-control-environmentalists" style="box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">Late last year</a>, a federal district court judge threw out all but one of the industry's claims against the city, but left open the key question of whether the ordinance violated the Constitution.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In his 92-page decision issued on Friday, Judge John A Woodcock, Jr., found it did not.</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The decision "gives communities a powerful tool," said Ken Rumelt, a Vermont Law School professor who led students at its environmental law clinic in advising groups involved in the case. "</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">It says that a community, assuming there is<b> no state law</b> preempting what they're trying to do, can say no, we don't want to suffer these impacts."</span></font></p><h3 style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.5em; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.333;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A Tale of Two Portlands</font></h3><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The Maine decision echoes one issued earlier this month in the other Portland—Oregon.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">There, a group of industry and business groups had sued over a 2016 ordinance that banned the construction of new fossil fuel infrastructure. As in Maine, the petitioners argued that the ordinance violated the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/commerce_clause" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">Commerce Clause</a> of the Constitution, which regulates commerce with foreign nations, among states and with Native American tribes.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">After years of volleying through the courts, the Oregon Supreme Court <a href="https://portlandtribune.com/sl/402320-298953-court-decision-means-portland-can-sharply-restrict-fossil-fuel-terminal-expansion-" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">opted not to hear a challenge</a> to the ordinance.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"The two Portlands are setting the stage for lots of other communities in between the two coasts," said Sean Mahoney of the Conservation Law Foundation, who has advised South Portland. "The lesson is that communities have the right and the obligation to protect the public health of the people who live in them, whether that is from air pollution or water pollution or lead in drinking water or housing."</font></p><h3 style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.5em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.333;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As Goes Maine?</font></h3><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In the Maine case, the local pipeline company enlisted powerful allies as it opposed the ordinance. The <b>American Petroleum Institute</b>, whose members include most major oil and gas companies, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to defeat a 2013 ballot measure that would have blocked the project. After the ordinance was passed, API and the <b>U.S. Chamber of Commerce both supported PPLC in its lawsuit.</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Josh Axelrod, a policy analyst with Natural Resources Defense Council, said that support laid bare just how much the industry wanted to use the PPLC pipelines to gain access to the East Coast for exporting tar sands. "This is a huge win to stop that from happening," he said.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>One by one, viable options to export the tar sands via pipeline have run into challenges.</b> TransCanada <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/05102017/transcanada-tar-sands-oil-pipeline-canada-energy-east-climate-emissions" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">abandoned its plans</a> for the Energy East Pipeline in 2017, announcing it was uneconomical. Earlier this month, a federal judge ordered a <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/16082018/keystone-xl-oil-pipeline-map-new-route-environmental-impact-statement-nepa-transcanada-tar-sands" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">new environmental review</a> of the Keystone XL project. And later this week, a Canadian court <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/4408816/federal-court-of-appeal-trans-mountain-pipeline-august/" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold;">will rule </a>on whether First Nations groups were adequately consulted in the plans for the Trans Mountain pipeline—a decision that could delay or cancel the plans for that pipeline.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These challenges "put some upper limit on where the industry would like to go," Axelrod said. "Back almost 10 years ago, they would talk about growing to 9 million barrels of oil per day of [tar sands] production. Their most optimistic projections now are less than 4.5 million barrels of oil per day."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">And that's premised on the construction of at least two new pipelines, Axelrod said—a prospect that's seeming less likely given the opposition and court rulings.</font></p><h3 style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 0.5em; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.333;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">'Committed Citizens Can Change the World'</font></h3><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The South Portland case will most likely be appealed. But for now, the decision is being met with surprise, and relief.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Mayor Linda Cohen praised the ruling in a written statement, saying, "Faced with the prospect of hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude oil being loaded onto marine tank vessels in the City and threatening the health of the residents and preventing redevelopment of the waterfront, the City Council prohibited this new activity. We are pleased that the Court upheld the ordinance."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Rachel Burger, the co-founder and president of Protect South Portland, said she was overjoyed. "I didn't count on this happening, necessarily. I thought the ruling was more likely to be negative," she said. "I'm just amazed that a group of people can do something like this."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; padding: 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Thinking back on years of canvassing, fundraisers, marches and grassroots organizing, Burger said she keeps coming back to a Margaret Mead quote: "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has."</font></p></div></div></div></div><div class="tagged-with" style="box-sizing: inherit; text-transform: uppercase; margin-bottom: 1em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><label style="box-sizing: inherit; display: block; line-height: 1.2;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">PUBLISHED UNDER:</font></label><div class="field field-name-field-topics field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><div class="field-items" style="box-sizing: inherit;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div class="field-item even" style="box-sizing: inherit; display: inline-block; padding-right: 0.5em;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/topics/oiltar-sands" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="" style="box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none;">OIL/TAR SANDS</a></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div> <div class="field-item odd" style="box-sizing: inherit; display: inline-block; padding-right: 0.5em;"><a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/topics/regulation" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="" style="box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none;">REGULATION</a></div> <div class="field-item even" style="box-sizing: inherit; display: inline-block; padding-right: 0.5em;"><a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/topics/activism" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="" style="box-sizing: inherit; background-color: transparent; text-decoration-line: none;">ACTIVISM</a></div></div></div></div><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p></div><div></div></div>