Inside Cal/EPA - 07/21/2017
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Just-passed landmark legislation to extend California's greenhouse gas cap-and-trade program to 2030 presents state air regulators with critical policy and regulatory choices about the program, which will have major implications for costs to regulated entities and consumers, the state's broader economy and how it reduces GHGs to meet declining limits.
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Despite being touted by supporters as creating a landmark program to slash harmful criteria and toxic air pollution in disadvantaged communities, legislation that served as a companion measure to a bill extending California's greenhouse gas cap-and-trade program to 2030 faces opposition and hostility from major air districts and a host of unresolved implementation questions.
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After concluding extensive safety inspections, California energy regulators have announced that the controversial Aliso Canyon natural gas storage facility that suffered a massive methane leak last year can resume limited gas injections, a move they believe will help avoid power shortages in the Los Angeles area.
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California water board officials this week adopted a new health risk limit for a toxic chemical that has been found in numerous drinking water systems in the Central Valley and Los Angeles area, drawing praise from environmentalists and community activists but criticism from chemical companies that manufacture the compound and some public water agencies that must comply with the limit.
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As part of a broader deal to pass a landmark bill extending California's greenhouse gas cap-and-trade program to 2030, Republicans succeeded in passing a proposed constitutional amendment that would require a "one-time" two-thirds vote of lawmakers to pass a plan to spend revenue generated by GHG allowance auctions in 2024.
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Supporters of California's low-carbon fuel standard (LCFS) argue that language in the landmark bill to extend California's greenhouse gas cap-and-trade program to 2030 would "codify" the fuel program in statute, presumably protecting it from potential repeal by a future governor.
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U.S. EPA and environmentalists are renewing arguments in federal court over the fate of a novel water quality standards suit that seeks to require the agency to review California's relaxation of its regulations during the state's drought, litigation that could broaden rules governing when state standards are "revised" and subject to EPA review.
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Ethanol producer Growth Energy and its allied plaintiffs are dropping several remaining claims in its federal court challenge to California's "re-adopted" low-carbon fuel standard (LCFS), with the firm opting to instead focus on supporting a pending ethanol industry case against the revised regulation in state court and potential appeals.
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The Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) is criticizing U.S. EPA's proposed approval of a California air district's clean air plan that they say wrongly excludes consideration of ammonia as a precursor to forming air pollution, reviving a debate over the regulation of animal feeding operations' ammonia emissions and implementation of federal air standards.
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EPA and groups representing several major industries are opposing a request by Democratic-led states to intervene in litigation over the Obama-era rule tightening federal ozone standard in order to defend the measure, with the agency and others saying the request is untimely and EPA also claiming the states lack legal standing to join the suit.
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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in a unanimous July 18 ruling has remanded EPA's final rule declaring that it has met a Clean Air Act mandate to regulate 90 percent of sources of seven air toxics, agreeing with environmentalists that the agency needs to better justify its explanation for the rule.
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