Advanced Search
July 23, 2018
The Trump administration has significantly relaxed regulations designed to manage toxic coal ash waste. Pictured above, a collapsed coal ash storage site. Photo courtesy of wikipedia.org.
On July 19, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a resolution expressing that a nation-wide carbon tax would be harmful to the economy. The resolution precedes the introduction of a Republican-sponsored bill that would eliminate the federal gas tax in exchange for an escalating $23-per-ton annual carbon tax. The resolution passed by a 229-180 vote, with six Republicans against and seven Democrats for. Notably, only four of the Climate Solutions Caucus' 43 Republican members chose to vote against the resolution. Following the vote, critics claimed the Caucus had "no credibility," while the body's advocates suggested voting against such a measure contrary to the wishes of GOP leadership was too much to ask from members. A group of 20 conservative advocacy groups, including the American Energy Alliance (AEA) and Heartland Institute had lobbied House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) to bring the resolution to a vote. AEA President Thomas Pyle alleged the motivation for the vote was to get congressional members on record about a carbon tax ahead of the November midterm elections.
For more information see:
InsideClimate News
Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-FL) is reportedly seeking co-sponsors for a carbon tax bill his office is drafting. The bill is expected to be made public before the end of July. The legislation does not currently have a companion bill in the Senate. On July 19, the House voted 229-180 to pass a resolution declaring a federal carbon tax would be harmful to the country's economy. The draft version of the bill would eliminate the federal gas tax and replace it with a $23-per-ton tax on carbon emissions from specific industries starting in 2020. The tax would increase by two percent above inflation annually and would increase by an additional $2-per-ton for a given year if the prior year's emission reduction goals were not met. The legislation's initial projections claim the tax would cut fossil fuel emissions by 24 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 30 percent by 2032. The bill would affect manufacturers of cement, aluminum, steel, and glass, as well as oil refineries, gas processing plants, and coal mines.
EE News
On July 18, EPA acting Administrator Andrew Wheeler relaxed the agency's rules on the management of coal ash waste, citing cost savings for the electric utility industry. Coal ash is a toxic byproduct of burning coal and is typically stored in unlined disposal ponds, some decades old. Power plants produce 100 million tons of ash and other waste annually. The regulatory rollback will extend the 18-month deadline for coal-fired power plants to close troublesome ash dump sites to October 31, 2020, while deferring further authority to state regulators on how to address the issue. For instance, state regulators may now suspend monitoring requirements for dump sites that may fail clean water standards. The Obama administration had adopted the regulation in 2015 in response to a large-scale failure of a coal ash containment dike in 2008 in Tennessee. The incident destroyed homes and fouled two rivers with toxic waste. Environmentalists have long cited the public health risks associated with living in proximity to the coal ash dumps.
Associated Press
In Indian cities like New Delhi, global warming is beginning to have devastating impacts on public health. With average temperatures and peak temperatures rising, what was once nearly unbearable heat is becoming unlivable. This extreme heat threatens to become a public health crisis for South Asian cities, as the current rate of greenhouse gas emissions are contributing to temperatures that would likely kill those exposed to it for more than six hours. Changes to the urban landscape, including the construction of roads and the removal of urban foliage exacerbate the heat. Cities and governments have begun to test ways of reducing heat and the fatalities that it has begun to cause. Researchers have tested painting roofs white to help reflect heat, and they are also working to plant more trees in hot urban areas. Heat stroke, increasingly common, causes laborers to lose work and pay on which they depend. Those who work outside during the day, without access to air conditioning, are among the most vulnerable to the heat.
New York Times
Scientific journals and institutions are pushing back on a Trump administration proposal to narrow the use of scientific findings in developing federal regulations. The EPA proposal would prohibit the agency from using a vast set of peer-reviewed scientific research unless a study's data is made publicly available, including medical studies essential to crafting rules on air pollution, water pollution, and toxic chemicals. In its pitch, the administration falsely claimed the proposal was "consistent with data access requirements for major scientific journals like Science, Nature, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.” Institutions are objecting, since the rule would put public health scientists in an impossible position. Either they publish private and closely-guarded data on patient medical histories and face criminal penalties for doing so (in addition to ethical and privacy concerns) or they issue a study that is forbidden from consideration by one of the federal agencies primarily responsible for protecting public health. Editor in Chief of Science Jeremy Berg said, “If the EPA wanted to engage in a good-faith discussion in how to improve transparency, that’s certainly something they could have done. But this doesn’t seem to be that."
The Atlantic
On July 17, more than 130 public health, environmental, labor, and consumer advocacy groups submitted a petition to the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requesting greater action to protect workers from extreme heat. There are currently no federal heat stress standards requiring employers to provide water, rest, or shade to help protect workers. A wave of record-breaking heat this summer has renewed calls for action. From 1992 to 2016, high temperatures reportedly led to 783 fatalities and nearly 70,000 injuries among laborers in the United States, but cases often go unreported. Migrant workers may be particularly hesitant to request breaks or water on the job due to fears of retaliation or deportation if an employer objects. The states of California, Minnesota, and Washington all have heat-protection standards of some kind, while the U.S. military also has heat exposure rules. Jeannie Economos with the Farmworker Association of Florida said, "This is a public health issue. This is a justice issue. The people who feed us deserve strong protections from the effects of climate change."
A new study investigated how rising sea levels may affect the physical infrastructure that allows for internet connectivity. The study, published by researchers from the University of Wisconsin and University of Oregon, compared the location of internet infrastructure to sea-level rise projections from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The results found Seattle and Miami to be particularly vulnerable. Twenty percent of the fiber-optic cables across New York City and 32 percent of the cables that connect it with other cities and data centers are expected to flood within 15 years. Extreme weather events, such as hurricanes, can also knock out internet access for millions of people at a time. Given the interconnected nature of the internet, any disruption of coastal cables or data centers could also reach further inland. Lead author Ramakrishnan Durairajan of the University of Oregon said, "We need to better understand the scope of the problem to create good solutions." Follow-up studies could examine how to better engineer web traffic to withstand extreme weather and flooding.
Wired
Amidst Trump administration efforts to diminish the social cost of carbon (SCC) used by the federal government to assess climate change impacts, independent researchers continue to refine these metrics for future use. Researchers at the University of Chicago's Climate Impact Lab have been working for years to improve the calculations with the goal of providing better tools to communities for dealing with climate change. UC economist Michael Greenstone said, "What the SCC does is it provides a bright line on how much society should be willing to spend, such that the benefits from doing that are going to be greater than the cost." The SCC accounts for numerous factors, such as illness or death due to extreme heat or property damage from sea level rise. The SCC is one of the tools policymakers use to conduct cost-benefit analyses for prospective climate regulations. Researchers hope to use more empirical data for the future version of the SCC, thus reducing the current version's heavy reliance on models.
Marketplace
According to a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the increased risk of wildfires due to climate change is eroding improvements in air quality in the western United States. The fine particulate matter (PM2.5) produced by wildfires has led to spikes in air pollution in regions that have worked for decades to reduce such pollution. Anthropogenic PM2.5 pollution results from coal-fired power plants, automobiles, and manufacturing. EPA's National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) have succeeded in reducing pollution from man-made sources over time. A 2017 study found that even modest reductions in PM2.5 levels could prevent 12,000 deaths annually, while lowering NAAQS pollutants "may produce important public health benefits overall, especially among self-identified racial minorities and people with low income." During 2017 wildfires in Montana, air quality monitors recorded the highest air pollution levels ever for August and September in that region. Climate change is expected to produce more frequent and more severe wildfires in the future, along with the accompanying pollution.
Scientific American
Federal Appeals Court Blocks EPA Move to Lift Sale Limits on Polluting "Glider Trucks"
FEMA Publicly Downplays Role of Climate Change in Worsening Natural Disasters
Young People Suing Federal Government over Climate Inaction Request a Trial
Report: More Than a Billion People Face Future Risks Due to Lack of Cooling and Refrigeration
Commercial Airlines Working to Adapt Operations and Planes to Extreme Heat
Writer and Editor: Brian La Shier
Top-Rated Climate Nonprofit – 4-Star Charity