Smithers: Well, sir, where should we dump this batch [of nuclear waste]? Playground?
Burns: No. All those bald children are arousing suspicion.
Uh, I don’t disagree with that. You should read the rest of that line
We don’t need a federal agency like the EPA, because pollutants stop at each states’ border and knock before they are allowed to enter.
Thank you, yes. The conservative candidates in my OP are not talking about just making changes, they’re talking about completely shitcanning the entire agency. All of its scientists, engineers, chemists, biologists, public policy experts, industry liasons, enforcement officials, and so on. Everything.
Your example is flawed. The EPA regulates the tailpipe emissions, not the technology. The EPA has nothing to do with enabling new technology.
Most of the electric coal plants in the United States still don’t use scrubbers to reduce their sulfur dioxide emissions, they just use low sulfur coal.
You seem obsessed that we need protection from future risks and the EPA should allowed to control it without future congressional action. If the risk is clear enough, let Congress decide and not unelected bureaucrats who don’t care how many people they put out of work or what the economic consequences of their regulations are.
The EPA has shown a tendency to regulate situations where the health risks are unproven and the result is to destroy the business they try to regulate.
Can you provide some examples?
I didn’t say they had anything to do with enabling new technology; rather, I spoke of taking advantage of new technology as it becomes available. Example, EPA never mandated closed-loop fuel injection and three-way cats for cars. But when that technology became feasible, EPA mandated emissions reductions that more or less necessitated the use of that technology in order to achieve the desired emissions levels.
If you’re willing to freeze regs and disband the body of scientists who study new and old technology to identify previously unknown hazards, then you seem amazingly unconcerned. I’m imagining Indy’s jungle guide in Raiders of the Lost Ark: “we must go quickly, there is nothing to fear here…”
:rolleyes:
Gimme a break. If EPA didn’t care about jobs or the economy, they would have enacted LEV standards back in the early '70’s and banned coal power plants altogether.
If it is true that the EPA doesn’t care about the economic consequences of its actions, I don’t think the answer is to disband them and turn over regulatory authority to a body of people who are subject to intense lobbying by business interests that will be the subject of said regulatory authority.
Can you provide a few examples?
The first example I can think of is refining rare earth elements. Our domestic rare production has been essentially destroyed by regulation. This is a sad case of the actual results being to export pollution rather than reduce it.
Cite, please?
IMO, the EPA has the right approach. The EPA shouldn’t say “You must use scrubbers, a catalytic converter, and a baghouse.” They should say “Emissions must be below this level, which has been demonstrated to be achievable. How you get there is up to you. You may use new technology if you demonstrate that it is effective.”
If the EPA said you must use a single technology for a given application, there would be no market to develop another technology. If they leave that door open, more effective technology can be developed. This also results in lowering emissions even further, because established new technology becomes the new standard for anybody coming afterward.
Dear god, no. Congress has no background in toxicology, epidemiology, or even the basic statistics needed to understand the fields. Do you want them evaluating the validity of toxicology papers? Those unelected bureaucrats are toxicologists, doctors, engineers, and geologists who understand pollution, its transport, and its effects on plants and animals.
I hear a lot more complaining about the opposite. For example, perchlorate has been looked at as a toxic candidate by the EPA since 1998. It took 21 years for proposed rulemaking, which took another three and a half years while it gets input from the public and industry. Perchlorate has been shown to have chronic toxological effects since the 1970s. The delay in putting it on the candidate list is primarily due to a limitation in the detection technology, but subsequent delays are due to the slow machinations of evaluating how toxic it is, what can be done about contamination in drinking water, and industry resistance.
To say the EPA just jumps in and regulates when risks are unknown is an exageration. They may regulate when the risk is unknown, but it’s almost always on the side of underregulation. If they know a pollutant is harmful, but not how harmful, they will regulate it but typically allow a much higher concentration or emission than they would if once they have a complete profile. Lead is one such example. In 1978, the EPA established a standard of 1.5 ug/m^3 for lead. That was based on the data available then. Since 1978, studies have demonstrated that people (especially children) are more sensitive to lead and are impacted at a much lower level than previously believed. In 2005, the standard was lowered to 0.15 ug/m^3.
I think that (the export of pollution-producing industries) may be the case with a lot of industries - which is why places like Beijing and Mexico City have permanent smog. If those countries want to have brown air, that’s their prerogative.
By your own admission, rare-earth production produces pollution. So what are you proposing as an alternative to the status quo? Bring those jobs and that smog back here?
While JU’s assertion that rare earth metal production in the US is collapsed (cite), I would like some evidence of the following:
[ol]
[li]EPA regulation led to the collapse of the US rare earth metal industry.[/li][li]Said EPA regulation targeted a low-risk hazard.[/li][/ol]
Lets face it. Mining is full of toxic waste, product, and feedstock (cite). It will always be cheaper to farm that out to a country with no regulation that’s willing to let its businesses kill its citizens in toxic environments. I’m glad the US has stepped out of the race for the bottom.
I’ll jump in with a specific example.
I recommend reading the entire short article, but I will provide a couple a quotes.
[QUOTE=Loyola]
In December 2009, one Steven Lipsky noticed a problem with his water well at his new home just west of Dallas, Texas. He began to suspect that the source was a nearby natural gas well that Range Resources had built and “fracked” earlier that year to exploit a part of the massive Barnet Shale a mile underground.
…
EPA testing soon showed that there were traces of methane in his drinking water, and that, like the methane deep in the Barnet Shale, it was “thermogenic” rather than “biogenic.” All that proved was that both samples had come from deep underground, which was obvious anyway. But that was all the EPA needed to slap Range Resources with an endangerment finding and remediation order. “We know they’ve polluted the well,” claimed EPA regional administrator Al Armendariz in a television interview at the time. “We know they’re getting natural gas in there.”
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Loyola]
At every step in this fast-moving fiasco, EPA’s legal position shifted: Its original order was based on the factual assertion that Range had caused the contamination; when it couldn’t explain how, it retreated to the position that Range “may have” caused it; and when that possibility was excluded, it retreated to the ultimate redoubt of government authority: arbitrary power. Now, confronted with incontrovertible evidence that the source of the gas was something else entirely, EPA claims that the law didn’t require to prove or even allege any connection between Range and the contamination. It is suing Range for millions of dollars for failure to comply fully with its original order.
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Loyola]
By now it should be no surprise to learn that the Lipsky well wasn’t even “contaminated” to start with. The methane measured in Lipsky’s well water, 2.3 parts per million, was well within the typical range for wells in that area, and significantly below the federal endangerment threshold of 10 parts per million. According to the Department of Interior, water wells bearing methane below that threshold pose no endangerment if properly monitored and vented.
[/QUOTE]
Additionally, the state regulator for oil and gas in Texas, the Railroad Commission of Texas, has fought with the EPA over this issue and in fact issued a letter exonerating Range Resources.
[QUOTE=RRC]
It is accordingly ORDERED that production from the Butler Unit Well No. 1H and Teak Unit Well No. 1H, operated by Range Production Company, shall be allowed to continue as Range Production Company has established that the operations of the wells have not caused or contributed, and are not causing or contributing to contamination of any domestic water wells
[/QUOTE]
Thanks for finding a cite.
I will note The Weekly Standard is distinctly conservative, started by William Kristol and owned by Rupert Murdoch. The bio for the author:
NOTE: This is not to say anything he wrote about this is false or wrong. I do not mean that to be an ad hominem on Mr. Loyola’s article. It does however make one suspicious and want to read a bit more closely.
It starts right in the first sentence:
“If you’re looking for a dramatic example of a government regulatory agency run amok, consider EPA’s arbitrary and shameful attack on one Texas natural gas company.” (from The Weekly Standard article)
“Run amok” is loaded language and hardly indicated by a single example. Right off the bat he is painting a picture not merited by this one example in order to sway the reader into feeling there is a government agency out there running rampant and harming people.
Even if this one example is 100% true as Range Resources would have it that indicates one mistake. Shit happens. Innocent people are thrown in jail. Do we describe the judicial system as “running amok” because of it?
He then cites another article claiming the documentary Gasland is “largely fraudulent”. The makers of Gasland have a a lengthy and point-by-point rebuttal (PDF) of claims made against them. Far more in depth than and well cited than the article Mr. Loyola referenced.
Obviously the makers have an agenda too and they want to protect their film. So, who to believe? Frankly I am not sure I would like someone like Una Persson to give an assessment. Barring that at least the Gasland rebuttal is, in fact, well cited and thorough.
As for the rest of it I am not sure what conclusions we can draw. So far it is mostly a he said/she said deal. They are in court and each side has sued the other. It remains to be seen who is correct.
Seems to me Mr. Loyola is jumping to conclusions. He may be right, he may be wrong. We just don’t know yet and won’t (probably) till the court cases are done and all the evidence is in.
In the end though the main point is this does not show a pervasive, overreaching EPA. It is one example and a data point. A good start perhaps but one example does not indicate a trend.
From the administrations of Lyndon Johnson to that of George W. Bush there were always more jobs created per year under Democratic presidents than Republican presidents. More jobs were created when Harry Truman was president than when Dwight Eisenhower was president.
Don’t take my word for it. Read this article from The Wall Street Journal.
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2009/01/09/bush-on-jobs-the-worst-track-record-on-record/
When Republicans complain that legislation favored by liberals interferes with job creation, do not trust them. They like a high unemployment rate because it relieves employers of the need to compete for employees.
Republicans dislike environmental restrictions because they interfere with investment opportunities and profit making. They do not care any more about unemployed people than they care about Spotted Owls and Snail Darters.
Oh yeah, don’t hold your breath on that one.
In the Love Canal waste problem everyone knew who buried the waste there. The company fully admitted it and it was no secret. Waste barrels were literally floating up through the ground. The problem and the cause were abundantly apparent to anyone with eyes. Love Canal story broke in 1976. The case against the company finished in 1994.
For the Exxon Valdez again there was absolutely zero question of who owned the tanker and whose oil was washing up on shore. It took nearly 20 years for that case to be resolved.
Those were cases with a smoking gun. Here the facts are far harder to pin down. Expect the litigation to run for a loooong time.
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With rare earth production air pollution isn’t the problem.
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Do you think that the Chinese are dumping pollution into a different planet’s atmosphere? Or a different ocean? Chinese pollution is a global problem.
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Is it okay if we export the pollution? Is it okay to kill foreigners to sustain our lifestyle? If the result of the pollution regulation is to export the pollution, then you are actually making the problem worse, because you are sending it someplace where there are no controls at all.
The Gasland comment is an aside and largely pointless to this EPA example. Further, stating that you believe the Gasland rebuttal to be better cited than this article is an apples to oranges issue. Gasland is attempting to rebut point by point claims made against it. This is a short article about an entirely different subject. Surely you can agree that a typical article is not a 39 page point by point writing exercise. Why in the world would you think it would be a legitimate criticism to state that this article is not as well cited and thorough as the rebuttal?
It is worth mentioning once again that the primary regulator, the RRC, has opposed the EPA. It’s not exactly just a he-said, she-said issue. I would agree if this was the company vs. the landowner. The EPA has certainly backed away from their initial claim and the primary regulator sides with the company. That’s at least enough to tip the scales toward the EPA acting inappropriately initially.
Also, I wasn’t attempting to make an full case of the EPA being overreaching. I was only trying to provide a single datapoint. I personally think they are stepping outside their authority and knowledge base on issues like this. However, I make no statement regarding overall overreaching done by the EPA; I have no opinion.
This is hardly the industry killing overreach the EPA has been accused of.
First, the linked article misrepresents some facts in the case. Methane isn’t the only alleged containment; the testing also found hydrocarbons like benzene. Benzene was near the EPA limit, but not over. I’m not sure what standard the linked article is comparing the methane concentration to; however, the EPA order cites concentrations over 8 times higher than article and well above typical background concentrations. The presence of both methane and VOCs is very important because benzene is not naturally occurring in significant quantities. It’s a common groundwater containment, typically from leaking underground storage tanks. If they only found methane in the water, I’d be leaning toward the Railroad Commission’s conclusion that the methane was naturally occurring, but the presence of VOCs points to either a common source of both benzene and methane or two separate sources of contamination.
[QUOTE=The linked article]
EPA testing soon showed that there were traces of methane in his drinking water, and that, like the methane deep in the Barnet Shale, it was “thermogenic” rather than “biogenic.” All that proved was that both samples had come from deep underground, which was obvious anyway.
[/QUOTE]
The source of underground methane is never obvious. Take that from somebody who works with landfills, a methane generator. The data cited by the EPA (hydrocarbon contamination, elevated methane) could point to underground decay, which is why the determination of thermogenic rather than biogenic is important. The EPA has taken the first several steps toward finding the source of the contamination. To get any further, they need to collect sampling data and information about the fracking operations.
The article implies (though it doesn’t directly lie) that this is a settled matter. It isn’t. The case was stayed in June and sent to the Fifth Circuit, but that isn’t the end of the case and the EPA will get a chance to substantiate its claim that Range Resources is the source of the pollution. This is a minor setback for the EPA at worst, and far from a total loss. Range Production had asked that the case be dismissed, which was denied.
On to the evil order issued by the EPA. This is the order being characterized as an overreach. What does the order say? Does it shut down an operation or even an entire industry? Does it bankrupt a small mom and pop startup, scrabbling to survive? Not even close. It requires the following:
[ol]
[li]Range Production notify the EPA of their intent to comply with the order.[/li][li]Range Production provide an alternate water supply to the nearby residents.[/li][li]Range Production will install explosivity meters in the impacted wells.[/li][li]Range Production will identify nearby wells and propose a sampling plan and conduct sampling for those wells.[/li][li]Range Production will submit a sampling plan and conduct that sampling of the nearby residences as well as soil gas.[/li][li]Range Production will identify possible pathways for contamination of the aquifer, eliminate gas flow to the aquifer if possible, and remediate impacted areas of the aquifer.[/li][/ol]
The EPA hasn’t told Range Production to shut down a single well, they told them to see if they were causing the contamination. This is the data collection phase I was discussing above. Before it’s pointed out that Range Production already conducted sampling, including soil gas and well sampling, I’ll concede that point. However, that sampling was not conducted with the oversight or guidance of the EPA. For example, the soil gas sampling (cited in the Railroad Commission paper) were collected from 1-3 feet beneath the surface. Soil gas at that depth is practically meaningless due to the high exchange rate in the first few feet of soil and the high chance of atmospheric infiltration during sampling. EPA guidance recommends that samples be taken at least 5 beet below the ground surface for this reason. In this case, sampling near the water table makes the most sense, not sampling near the surface. There’s a good reason the EPA isn’t accepting those data; it wasn’t done according to the EPA guidance.
Here are the EPA’s order and the June stay. (Warning: pdf)
EPA Order
June Decision
Mr. Loyola was the one who brought it up and did so to show the people calling in the EPA did so in part from watching a “fraudulent” documentary. I point it out to show the nature of the language Loyola is using and how it is heavily skewed to form an unfavorable impression in the reader’s mind.
That and other such unsupported (or barely supported and distinctly in question) assertions run through his article. The writer is not being honest and unbiased (as far as that goes in reporting) with his readers. Indeed is conservative skew and hostility to the EPA is quite apparent.
As such it throws doubt on the whole article as a source of reliable information on the facts.
It is also worth mentioning that the RRC has been accused of “corruption and ignoring public safety”. Not by some lefty group but rather by a state commission formed to look into it. “Every 12 years, the Sunset Advisory Commission reviews all the state agencies throughout Texas. It has been highly critical of the Texas Railroad Commission.” (from same linked story)
I think I will take RRC pronouncements with a lump of salt.
If you want to say there is room for improvement in the EPA I would agree. There is room for improvement almost everywhere. You made the claim they are putting companies out of business. Even with this cite that is not the case (it may be someday but isn’t now).