Alabama labor, conservation groups oppose EPA rollback of clean car standards
Labor union representatives and conservation group leaders are voicing their concerns about President Donald Trump‘s U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) efforts to rollback clean car standards. “At the pump, we are paying more and more for gasoline, the clean car standards provide the mechanism to move towards the higher miles per gallon vehicle in our country,” Mark Bentley with Alabama Clean Fuels Coalition, told WHNT-19. The standards, finalized in 2012, would have required companies to target a goal of 54.5 miles per gallon across their fleets by 2025, will annual year-over-year improvement. The vehicles would have needed to have a range between 31 and 61 miles per gallon, depending on the type and size. The federal government is proposing freezing the standards for six years at the 2020 target of 39 miles per gallon. According to WHNT-19, the Union of Concerned Scientists says Alabama has saved $600 million because of the clean car standards. “What happens is you won’t get the benefit of the higher miles per gallon. You will be paying more at the pump. You will be visiting the pump more often for fuel,” Bentley added. Meanwhile, the Union of Concerned Scientist say the clean car standards could create jobs in the state. Alabama’s GASP group claims the Yellowhammer State could expect 11,900 new jobs by 2030 as a result of the standards. These leaders are traveling the state to promote clean car standards in hopes of influencing local elected officials to support reinstating them.
Ash closure efforts see significant progress at Alabama Power facilities
Alabama Power is making measurable progress to comply with federal rules regulating the management of coal ash, with steps to safely close all its ash facilities. The company has managed coal ash, also known as coal combustion residuals or CCRs, for decades in compliance with all regulations and continues to do so. Alabama Power is working to maintain a reliable generation fleet while conducting the closure process as efficiently as possible. Following the issuance of new rules by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2015, Alabama Power announced plans to close the ash facilities at six coal-fired power plants. The company expects all facilities to stop receiving ash within a year. Alabama Power is installing state-of-the-art dry ash handling and wastewater treatment facilities designed to meet or do better than all environmental standards and replace the function of ash facilities. The company worked with professionally licensed third-party engineers to evaluate and identify the safest and most effective closure plans. The closing of the ash facility at Plant Gadsden has been completed, while work on Plants Barry, Gaston, Gorgas, Greene County and Miller continues to move forward. Closures are site specific and involve complex processes that balance multiple factors such as plant location, size of the CCR facility and amount of material. “Alabama Power is committed to building on its long history of complying with state and federal regulations, including following the new rules set by EPA three years ago,” said Susan Comensky, Alabama Power vice president of Environmental Affairs. “In managing CCRs, as with all our operations, the safety of the customers and communities we serve is paramount,” she added. “Our employees live and work in these communities too.” The procedure being used to close the ash facilities is called close in place, which EPA recognizes as safe and effective. It includes dewatering, capping and implementing robust flood control measures. Alabama Power also will move material away from the river and ultimately reduce a facility’s footprint by as much as half. CCRs, including ash and gypsum, can be safely recycled for a variety of beneficial uses – such as in cement, concrete, wallboard and agricultural applications – and Alabama Power continues to make these opportunities a priority, Comensky noted. Currently, the company beneficially reuses almost half of the ash and gypsum material in those applications. A part of the EPA’s CCR rule required Alabama Power – along with all other electric utilities across the country that manage coal ash facilities – to analyze multiple groundwater samples from around coal-fired generating plants and report the results by March 2. Alabama Power recently completed analyzing multiple groundwater samples taken from more than 150 locations at Plants Barry, Gaston, Gorgas, Greene County and Miller. The initial results, from a process involving experts from Alabama Power’s nationally accredited environmental lab, are available on the company’s website and have been proactively communicated to the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM). The testing of groundwater around the facilities will continue for 30 years, long after they are closed, in compliance with state and federal rules. Alabama Power will work with ADEM on the closure plans. Alabama Power has a strong record of working to protect the environment and is committed to open communication with the communities it serves, said Comensky. Overall, in the past 15 years Alabama Power has invested more than $4 billion on environmental controls at power plants, resulting in significant reductions in emissions. The company also works with a wide range of public agencies and non-profit organizations to improve wildlife habitat, protect endangered species and conserve natural resources. *Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements is included on the original story found on Alabama News Center.
Donald Trump takes aim at Dodd-Frank financial overhaul
The Latest on President Donald Trump (all times local): 1:28 p.m. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order that will direct the Treasury secretary to review the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial overhaul. It’s Trump’s first step at scaling back regulations on financial services. Trump has called the law a “disaster” and said it failed to address some of the causes of the 2008-2009 financial crisis. The president has also signed a presidential memorandum related to retirement planning. The administration’s move will delay implementing an Obama-era rule that requires financial professionals who charge commissions to put their clients’ best interests first when giving advice on retirement investments. ___ 1 p.m. The Trump administration says it has thawed its temporary freeze on contract and grant approvals at the Environmental Protection Agency, with all $3.9 billion in planned spending moving forward. A media blackout at the agency also appears to have been partially lifted, as a trickle of press releases were issued by EPA this week. However, the agency still has not posted to its official Twitter feed since President Donald Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration. The Associated Press and other media outlets reported last week that Trump political appointees had instructed EPA staff not to issue press releases or make posts to the agency’s official social media accounts without prior approval. Contract and grant spending at the agency was also put on hold, prompting confusion and concern among state agencies expecting funding. ___ 12:05 p.m. Foreign leaders and groups are finding new ways to make known their disagreement with President Donald Trump’s policies. An international school in Bosnia announced Friday it would extend scholarships to students affected by Trump’s travel ban on citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. The United World College’s branch in Mostar said it was motivated by its belief in equal opportunities. In Portugal, the parliament there voted to condemn the U.S. travel ban and highlighted the role of the U.S. to promote tolerance and human rights. In Sweden, Deputy Prime Minister Isabella Lovin posted on Facebook a photo of her signing the country’s new climate law while surrounded by seven female members of her staff. Swedish media say it resembles photos of Trump in the Oval office surrounded by male advisers. ___ 10:25 a.m. President Donald Trump is applauding the January jobs report, saying it shows there’s a “great spirit in the country right now.” Trump addressed last month’s job report, which showed the U.S. economy adding 227,000 jobs and the unemployment rate at 4.8 percent. The report also says that more Americans started looking for work, although not all of them found jobs immediately. Trump is joining business leaders and CEOs in the White House and also previewing some of his economic priorities. He says he expects “to be cutting a lot out of Dodd-Frank,” the financial regulations put in place in response to the Great Recession. The president says they’ll be discussing how to bring back jobs, lower taxes and reduce regulations. ___ 8:15 a.m. President Donald Trump says that a “new radical Islamic terrorist” is behind an attack outside the Louvre Museum in Paris. Trump tweeted early Friday that America needs to “get smart,” in light of the incident. He writes, “a new radical Islamic terrorist has just attacked in Louvre Museum in Paris. Tourists were locked down. France on edge again.” A knife-wielding man shouting “Allahu akbar” — “God is Great,” in Arabic — attacked French soldiers on patrol near the museum Friday in what officials described as a suspected terror attack. The soldiers first tried to fight off the attacker and then opened fire, shooting him five times. There were no immediate details about the identity of the suspect. ___ 7:40 a.m. President Donald Trump says reports of his contentious conversation with Australia’s prime minister are “fake news.” In a tweet Friday morning, Trump thanked Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull “for telling the truth about our very civil conversation that FAKE NEWS media lied about. Very nice!” Turnbull told journalists that Trump had agreed to honor a deal to resettle refugees from among around 1,600 asylum seekers. Most are in island camps on the Pacific nations of Nauru and Papua New Guinea. Turnbull also said the U.S.-Australia relationship is strong. Australia has refused to accept them and instead pays for them to be housed on the impoverished islands. Trump earlier took to Twitter to call the agreement with Australia a “dumb deal.” ___ 7:04 a.m. President Donald Trump says movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger “tried hard” to make “Celebrity Apprentice” a success, but has failed. In an early morning Twitter post Friday, the president kept alive a theme he brought up a day earlier during his first appearance at the National Prayer Breakfast. Trump, who once hosted the NBC reality TV show, took a pot shot there at Schwarzenegger, the current host and former California governor, over a ratings nosedive for the show. On Friday, Trump said in his tweet, “Yes, Arnold Schwarzenegger did a really bad job as Governor of California and even worse on the Apprentice … but at least he tried hard!” Schwarzenegger responded quickly to Thursday’s remarks in a video on his verified Twitter account, suggesting that he and Trump switch jobs. Republished with permission of The Associated Press.
U.S. agency orders corrective action after gas pipeline spill
Fuel supplies in at least five states are threatened by a gasoline pipeline spill in Alabama, and the U.S. Department of Transportation has ordered the company responsible to take corrective action before the fuel starts flowing again. Colonial Pipeline Co. must conduct testing and analysis on the failed section of the pipeline, according to the department’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Agency, which is investigating the spill in rural Alabama. The company has acknowledged that between 252,000 gallons and 336,000 gallons of gasoline leaked from a pipeline near Helena, Alabama, since the spill was first detected Sept. 9. It’s unclear when the spill actually started. The pipeline section that failed runs from Mississippi to Atlanta. The agency said the spill is “within an unusually sensitive ecological area” and it ordered Colonial to take action “to protect the public, property and the environment from potential hazards.” “The department will remain on site to carry out its investigation, and make sure the operator is taking the necessary steps to prevent any future incidents,” agency administrator Marie Therese Dominguez said in a statement. In a statement Saturday, the Alpharetta, Georgia-based company said that repair work had begun in an effort to return the pipeline to service “as rapidly and safely as possible.” The company said it is shipping as much gasoline as possible on its distillate mainline, or Line 2, in order to mitigate the impact of the pipeline that has been shut down. Colonial earlier said most of the leaked gasoline is contained in a retention pond near the city of Helena and there’s no public safety concern. In response to the shutdown, the governors in Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee announced they would lift restrictions on the number of hours that truck drivers delivering fuel can work, in hopes of preventing fuel shortages. Governors can suspend federal transportation regulations during emergencies. A spokeswoman for Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said Friday that he’s in communication with pipeline company officials along with state and federal officials assisting at the spill location. Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal said he was confident his order lifting restrictions for drivers would help. “We are confident these measures will help ensure Georgians’ uninterrupted access to motor fuel until Alabama’s pipeline is fixed,” Deal said in a statement. Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam said his order was a precautionary measure. “We are not currently seeing any widespread unavailability of petroleum in Tennessee,” Haslam said in a statement. “We urge Tennesseans to maintain their normal fuel purchasing and driving patterns to help prevent any potential impacts on our fuel supply while the pipeline undergoes repairs.” The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency waived requirements this week that metro areas with air quality issues in Georgia and Tennessee use a cleaner-burning type of gasoline during the summer months. That requirement of the Clean Air Act expired at midnight Thursday. Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
Alabama, states reliant on fossil fuels sue over new clean air rules
States and industry groups dependent on fossil fuels filed court challenges Friday to President Barack Obama‘s Clean Power Plan, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Opponents of the plan filed a flurry of lawsuits at the U.S. Court of Appeals as the Environmental Protection Agency published its final version of the new regulations. The challenges from all but two of the 25 states were filed by Republicans. They deride the plan as an “unlawful power grab by Washington bureaucrats” that will kill coal mining jobs and drive up electricity costs. “The Clean Power Plan is one of the most far-reaching energy regulations in this nation’s history,” said West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, among those leading the challenges. “I have a responsibility to protect the lives of millions of working families, the elderly and the poor, from such illegal and unconscionable federal government actions.” The Obama administration and environmental groups counter that the rules are needed to cut carbon emissions while curbing the worst impacts of climate change and sea-level rise. They also say the plan will spur new clean-energy jobs. The new rules require states to cut carbon emissions by 30 percent by 2030. Each state has a customized target and is responsible for drawing up an effective plan to meet its goal. “We are confident we will again prevail against these challenges and will be able to work with states to successfully implement these first-ever national standards to limit carbon pollution, the largest source of carbon emissions in the United States,” said EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy. The EPA says it has authority to enact the plan under the Clean Air Act. At issue are dueling provisions added to the law by the House and Senate in 1990. The EPA’s interpretation relies on the Senate language, but opponents argue that the House version should win out. EPA already regulates other power-plant pollutants under a different section of the Clean Air Act, and the opponents claim the law prohibits “double regulation.” Under the act, certain challenges to agency rules skip the federal district court and go directly to the appeals court in Washington, D.C. Morrisey also filed a stay barring the plan from taking effect while the court challenges proceed, a question that will likely be up to the Supreme Court. “We expect polluters and their allies to throw everything they’ve got at the Clean Power Plan, and we expect them to fail,” said Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune, among those defending the law. “The Clean Power Plan is based on a law passed by Congress, upheld by the Supreme Court, and demanded by the American people.” The states challenging the plan in court are Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, Wyoming and Wisconsin. Also filing suit against the EPA on Friday was Murray Energy Corp., the nation’s largest privately owned coal company. Members of Congress from coal-mining states joined in, saying they will introduce new legislation aimed at blocking the EPA from enforcing the plan. On the other side, 15 states and the District of Columbia say they are backing the Obama administration and will begin working to comply with the new rules. There is some political variation in the positions taken within the states. In North Carolina, for example, the environmental agency controlled by the Republican governor joined the opposition without the participation of the state’s Democratic attorney general. Governors in Colorado and Michigan said they will work to comply with the new EPA rules, even as attorneys general from their states joined the lawsuit. “Clean air and protecting public health should be everyone’s top priority,” Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, said Friday. “We believe that Colorado can achieve the clean air goals set by the EPA, at little or no increased cost to our residents.” Republished with permission of the Associated Press.
Marco Rubio touts end to oil-export ban, bemoans EPA in Oklahoma
The United States should end its ban on crude-oil exports and reduce federal regulations that are stifling an energy industry central to the nation’s future economic prosperity, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio said Wednesday to a friendly group of mostly oil and natural gas producers. The GOP presidential hopeful from Florida unveiled some highlights of his domestic energy policies at a meeting with members of the Oklahoma Independent Petroleum Association in Oklahoma City. “I believe that energy independence and energy innovation is one of the most transformative developments that America has ever seen in its history, if properly harnessed,” Rubio said. “Yet despite its importance, our outdated government continues to make energy one of the most politicized and regulated aspects of our entire economy.” Rubio said the ban on crude-oil exports is a throwback to the 1970s, long before a domestic oil production boom that resulted from industry advances like horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing. Lifting the ban, Rubio said, “will strengthen our national security interests by stabilizing global energy markets and reducing the leverage of anti-American, oil-rich governments.” Rubio also bemoaned the regulatory influence of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and said if elected president, he would immediately push to end the agency’s Clean Power Plan aimed at reducing power plant carbon emissions. “As president, I will immediately stop this massive regulation,” Rubio said. Finally, Rubio said he would leave energy regulations up to individual states, which he said are in a better position to impose them. Patrice Douglas, a former member of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission, which oversees oil and gas production, utilities and other industries in Oklahoma, said rising utility costs are largely the result of mandates imposed by federal regulators like the EPA. “State regulators understand what’s going on in their states above the ground and under the ground,” Douglas said. “I think state regulators are more well-suited to that kind of regulation. We can tailor what we need to meet the needs of Oklahomans.” Christine Freundlich, a spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee, described Rubio as a “puppet to Big Oil” and said his energy plan would move the country backward. “An oil- and gas-focused energy plan that weakens environmental protections is not a modern plan — it’s a plan written and bankrolled by Big Oil for an outdated candidate like Marco Rubio,” Freundlich said in a statement. Before Rubio’s speech to the OIPA, he attended a couple of private fundraisers and toured the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum, which is dedicated to the 168 people killed on April 19, 1995, when a truck bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City. Republished with permission from The Associated Press.
