Your Right Not to Know About Exploding Chemical Plants

Texas lets companies keep chemical inventories secret, even when their plants become dangerous enough to evacuate the surrounding neighborhood. New Jersey takes a different approach.


Michael Barajas reports for the Texas Observer:

On Tuesday, officials ordered the evacuation of hundreds of houses within a 1.5-mile radius of the flood-ravaged Arkema chemical plant in Crosby, about 20 miles northeast of Houston, after they saw a list of compounds at the site. On Wednesday, the company’s CEO refused to publicly release the inventory of chemicals inside his plant, even as the company warned of potential explosions. Early Thursday morning, containers of volatile organic peroxides started exploding.
This alarming uncertainty is state-sanctioned. Texas allows petrochemical plants to keep chemical inventories secret, even when those plants have become dangerous enough to evacuate the surrounding neighborhood. Why this basic information is no longer public speaks to the absurdity with which Texas, home to the nation’s petrochemical epicenter, regulates the industry.
For decades, state officials treated so-called Tier Two inventories — where facilities list the types and quantities of potentially dangerous chemicals on-site — like public records. The need for easy, quick access to that information became obvious in 2013 when a fire at a fertilizer plant in West, Texas, ignited 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate. The explosion registered a 2.1 on the Richter scale, injured more than 160 people and left 15 dead, including a dozen firefighters who didn’t know what was stored at the plant or how dangerous it was. Media and chemical safety experts started asking for Tier Two reports to map potential powder kegs across the state.
That’s when then-Attorney General Greg Abbott stepped in. In the middle of his first successful campaign for governor, Abbott ruled that facilities and government agencies could withhold those reports by citing a decade-old anti-terrorism law meant to block the release of information that could be “likely to assist in the construction of an explosive weapon.” When critics pushed back, Abbott told Texans to “just drive around” and ask the plant operators for that information if they’re so concerned.
Last year’s prescient investigation by the Houston Chronicle and Texas A&M University’s MKO Process Safety Center, which ranked the Arkema plant in Crosby among those with the “highest potential for harm to the public,” detailed how Abbott’s ruling emboldened industry, public agencies and even emergency management officials to start withholding those reports.
Hence the confusion this week as reporters, experts and community members struggled to assess the danger posed by the flooded plant. As Gretchen Goldman with the Union of Concerned Scientists wrote on Thursday, “We are witnessing in real time the confusion that results from limited access to chemical safety information in an emergency situation.”

Read the full story here 

In New Jersey, State Senator Ray Lesniak wrote yesterday: 
“Unlike Texas NJ Has A Right To Know Law To Protect You & First Responders. Back in 1986, I co-sponsored New Jersey’s Right to Know Law which still does not exist in Texas. I also formed the Union-Middlesex County Hazardous Materials Advisory Council which provided first responder training and alert systems in the event of a toxic discharge. This was the precursor of our County HAZMATs. New Jersey has the strongest Environmental Protection Laws in the country. We needed them more than any other state as well. Texas should follow our lead.” 

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Ethics probe of overseas trip by Lance, other congressmen

Rep. Leonard Lance (R-NJ)
Paul Milo reports for NJ.com:
Rep. Leonard Lance is one of 10 members of Congress who took a trip to the central Asian nation of Azerbaijan that is now the focus of an ethics probe, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.
The Post, citing a confidential report it obtained prepared by the Office of Congressional Ethics, said the May 2013 trip was secretly funded by state-owned SOCAR, the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic. Lance’s $1,885 airfare was paid by the company, according to the OCE report, which also funded expenses incurred and gifts received by other lawmakers during the conference in the city of Baku on the Caspian Sea.
The money for the 10 Congress members’ trips and several staffers, about $750,000, was channeled through two U.S.-based nonprofit organizations. In a filing, the corporations claimed they were actually funding the trips, the Post reported.
The trip came as Congress was considering sanctions against Iran, which has a partnership with SOCAR. Because of congressional rules barring foreign governments from attempting to influence foreign policy, the OCE report has been referred to the House Committee on Ethics for investigation of possible violations, the Post also reported.
Several of the Congress members mentioned in the report have denied any wrongdoing. A spokeswoman for Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, told the Associated Press that the Turquoise Council of Americans and Eurasians, one of the groups, told Poe’s office and the Ethics Committee before the trip that it was the sponsor of the event. Rep. Jim Bridenstine, R-Okla., reported a gift of two rugs received during the trip and later decided to return them.
Lance, a Hunterdon County Republican, also received a rug as well as earrings during the trip but also gave them back, his office told NorthJersey.com.
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Report: Fracking methane emissions up 20 percent in Pa.

Methane flaring. Photo credit: Sierra Club


Frank Kummer reports for Philly.com:

Emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, are increasing at natural gas industry sites in Pennsylvania at a rate greater than gas production, alarming some environmental groups.

That news released this week was tempered somewhat Wednesday for environmentalists when the U.S. Senate voted to block a Trump administration attempt to roll back Obama-era methane rules on federal lands, none of which are in Pennsylvania, however.

PennFuture says new data being self-reported by the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania show a 20 percent increase in methane, which is a byproduct of flaring and venting that occur during natural gas production. The data are for the years 2014 and 2015, the latest available.

At the same time, gas production rose about 12 percent, according to the Energy Information Agency.

“Any time emissions are rising faster than production, it’s clear that voluntary efforts to cut emissions are not working,” Rob Altenburg, director of PennFuture’s Energy Center, said in a statement.

The methane emissions are reported under federal New Source Performance Standards by drillers and compressor station owners. Natural gas industry operators are required to capture methane.

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection is reviewing some aspects of its methane permitting.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the Senate voted, 51-49, to block President Trump’s effort to do away with a 2016 rule that would seek to slow emissions from oil and gas drilling operations on Bureau of Land Management acreage, most if which is in the western U.S.

Under the rule, oil and gas companies would have to capture leaked gas and pay more for use of public land. The vote was a blow to the Trump administration and Republicans who tried for weeks to muster enough votes to support rolling back the methane rule.

Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, and Susan Collins of Maine all voted with Democrats.

“In a big win against fracking and pipelines, the Senate has stood up to the oil and gas industry by stopping Congress from overturning the methane emissions rule,” said Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club. “This was a crucial victory for climate change and the environment because methane is 80 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.”


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Delaware taking a fresh look at offshore wind energy

Carney establishes working group to study development options
Delaware leaders plan to revisit the potential of offshore wind. The wind turbine shown here at the University of Delaware in Lewes near the Great Marsh is the only commercial-sized wind turbine in the First State. NICK ROTH PHOTO
Maddy Lauria and Chris Flood report for the Cape Gazette:
Delaware is revisiting the potential of offshore wind energy.
Gov. John Carney signed an executive order Aug. 28 establishing a 17-member working group to explore environmental and economic benefits of offshore wind turbines on the First State’s coast.
“We must look for ways to participate in the development of alternative energy sources,” said the governor, who also has been outspoken in his disapproval of offshore drilling for oil and gas.
The Offshore Wind Working Group will begin meeting this month, and is expected to deliver a report on its findings by Friday, Dec. 15. That report will outline strategies for the development of wind power and propose draft legislation.
University of Delaware professor Jeremy Firestone, who has been studying wind energy since 2003 and will serve as a member of the working group, said the group will examine the costs and environmental benefits, projections of what ratepayers can expect from wind energy, and legislation to support the alternate energy source.
“We’ve surveyed the public many times, and they’re supportive of offshore wind,” Firestone said. “They hunger for an energy transformation.”
It’s been nearly a decade since Delaware last considered using wind energy to power its grid. Firestone said Delaware imports its power, most of which comes from fossil fuel and nuclear sources.
Back in 2007, Bluewater Wind was one of three bidders seeking to provide wind-generated power to the First State through a Public Service Commission-approved power-purchase agreement with Delmarva Power. Delaware was poised to be the nation’s offshore wind pioneer, Firestone said.
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Archbishop to Trump: Don’t deport young ‘Dreamers’

Archbishop Charles J. Chaput – Cameron B. Pollack photo for Philly.com 

Jeff Gammage reports for Philly.com:


Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput spoke out Friday morning in support of a federal program that blocks the deportation of people who as children were illegally brought to this country — an initiative now on the presidential chopping block.

“It’s one thing to tighten the security of our borders and to deport violent criminals,” the archbishop said in a statement. “It’s a different and much uglier thing to punish young people who’ve grown up in the United States as their home.”

DACA, which stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, allows certain people who entered the country as minors to gain a renewable, two-year deferment from deportation and to be eligible for work permits.

Commonly called “Dreamers” — for Dream Act legislation that has not passed — recipients may live, work and seek education in the U.S. They do not receive citizenship or legal status. Nearly 790,000 recipients who have largely grown up the U.S. have been able to contribute to their communities, pay taxes, hold jobs, and support families without fear of being deported.

“The White House has the power to end DACA. It has threatened to do so as early as today. This would be a drastic mistake,” Archbishop Chaput said. “It can only make our complicated immigration issues worse. It will poison our national debates and damage the lives of hundreds of thousands of young people who pose no threat to anyone.

“I ask the people of the Archdiocese to press their federal lawmakers to find a positive legislative replacement for DACA, and to prevent the deportation of these young people.”

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