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Showing posts with label Clean Air Act. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Clean Air Act. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Updates on America's Persistent Air and Water Pollution Challenges


The dirty little secret in the US is that pollution continues of the nation's air and water supply. Today's post is shared from nytimes.com.

Houston cloaked in a haze of pollution on Oct. 23, 2013. Sources range from cars to oil and gas installations and refineries.
Andrew C. RevkinHouston cloaked in a haze of pollution on Oct. 23, 2013. Sources range from cars to oil and gas installations and refineries.
Houston cloaked in a haze of pollution on Oct. 23, 2013. Sources range from cars to oil and gas installations and refineries.Air and water problems mainly make headlines these days when extraordinary pulses of pollution surge in places like Beijing and Shanghai. But there are still enormous, if largely hidden, health and environmental costs in many parts of the United States that have failed to meet the goals set decades ago under the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act (e.g., see Muller, Mendelsohn, Nordhaus, 2011). Sometimes the issue is visible. I visited Houston briefly this week and snapped the photo above on the airport approach. Not pretty.
Read on for excerpts from two relevant articles. The first, from the Allegheny Front, explores how lessons learned in trying to cut pollution from natural gas facilities in Houston can be applied in Pennsylvania’s fracking zone. The second, by my Pace University colleague and longtime water analyst John Cronin, digs in on the gap between Environmental Protection Agency statements on water pollution and the results in America’s waterways.
Here’s “Houston Air Pollution: Preview for Pennsylvania?” It’s the second article in a planned four-part series, “The Coming Chemical Boom,” that was in part paid for by the Fund for Investigative Journalism.
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Friday, October 25, 2013

EPA Hits The Road To Seek Input On New Rules

Today's post was shared by Huffington Post and comes from www.huffingtonpost.com

epa carbon emissions
The U.S. states that already have a plan in place to cut carbon pollution from power plants are likely to make the case to regulators this week that their program offers a viable model for others to follow.

The Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday kicks off an 11-city "listening tour" as part of its effort to craft emissions rules for existing power plants. The tour starts in New York and Atlanta. Meetings will then be held from Boston to Seattle, wrapping up on Nov. 8.

The agency is expected to solicit ideas on how best to regulate carbon emissions from the more than 1,000 power plants now in operation - the cornerstone and arguably the most controversial part of the Obama administration's strategy to address climate change.

The EPA will use a rarely employed section of the federal Clean Air Act, known as section 111(d), and will rely heavily on input from states to craft a flexible rule that can be applied to states with different energy profiles.

President Barack Obama set a June 2014 deadline for the agency to propose its rules, which need to be finalized in June 2015.

Officials from some of the nine northeastern states in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) - a carbon trading program targeting power sector emissions - will attend some of the sessions and make the case that the initiative has a "plug and play" option for states to meet future federal...
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Saturday, July 21, 2012

Welcome, sulfur dioxide...not

Emissions from the Valero refinery in Port Arthur, Texas
( Photo by Mike Breaux) ENS
Welcome, sulfur dioxide
Hello, carbon monoxide
The air, the air
Is everywhere
HAIR, The Broadway Musical


A Federal Court of Appeals ruled against several states and state regulatory agencies, together with corporations and industrial associations, who petitioned for review of the Environmental Protection Agency’s rule entitled “Primary National Ambient Air Quality Standard for Sulfur Dioxide,” and of the subsequent denial of their petitions for reconsideration of the standard.

The petitioners contended, first, that EPA failed to follow notice-and-comment rulemaking [ 
75 Fed. Reg. 35520 procedures, and second, that the agency arbitrarily set the maximum sulfur dioxide (SO2) concentration at a level lower than statutorily authorized. National Environmental Development v. EPA, No. 10-1252, (Cir Ct App DC) Decided July 20, 2012

See also:  Texans Sickened by 'Accidental' Gas, Oil, Chemical Emissions