Basic Framework Applied to EPCRA Proposed GHG Registry

Values Framework:

The excessive emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) into the atmosphere can be equated into being a direct result of the over consumptive activity and behavior of the human race. The Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act (EPCRA) has four major provisions:
· Emergency planning
· Emergency release notification
· Hazardous chemical storage reporting requirements
· Toxic chemical release inventory (Section 313).

The bill under examination in this case is a proposed GHG registry under EPCRA, which under Cohen’s criteria raises some critical questions of values. Given that the foundation of this bill is the creation of GHG registry for the purpose of reporting under what is commonly referred to as the “Right to Know” Act, the issue of right and wrong seems oblivious to based solely on the need to create such a registry and subsequently report it to the EPA.

Tradeoffs of economic well being, which Cohen states is a function of value (Cohen pg. 14), are paramount in this legislation. Cohen states in the text the good life “includes a high level of resource consumption” (Cohen pg. 14), which is directly proportion to atmospheric GHG emission in the post industrial revolution era.

Ethics and conflicting value are at the heart of the GHG and climate change debate. Most commonly associated with the conflict between sustainability and the need account for future generations, and the converse that all resources are for the dominion of man and should be exploited to maximize current well being are in direct conflict.

The developed and developing economies face such when one side is pleading with international law makers to create climate change frameworks when other economies may not survive to have a future generation.

What the GHG registry would is establish increase public accessibility to information and knowledge about who is contributing to GHG emission and by how much.

Political:

Politics associated with the need to address GHG emissions in the United States and abroad are sharply divided into two respective camps, which are those who are in strong support, and those who are in strong opposition to the climate change agenda. By virtue of the fact that a proposed GHG registry is in congress, its political legitimacy is apparent.

As Cohen cites property rights have been made to counter balance the environmental movement (Cohen pg. 21), however with GHG there are no administrative boundaries to define these rights, but winners and losers exist in the registry process.

Under the registry, affected facilities will be required to report GHG emissions and processes which generate these emissions. This will either force cost prohibitive change to their production practices or being viewed as an environmental bad actor in the public eye. Winners will be the planet, the atmosphere future generation, and those who choice to engage in development, which is conducive with less GHG production.

EPCRA is a federally managed framework, but the issue of GHG production and climate change is intertwined in all levels of government as the issues legitimacy is politically sensitive. The Bush administration’s removal of the United States from the Kyoto process resulted in various administrative and legal action at the state and local with regard to GHG production, reduction, mitigation and targets technologies. The legality to regulate GHG under the CAAA itself has made it all the way to the nine wise souls in Washington.

Science and Technology:

The GHG registry is pertinent due the potential impacts of climate change and/or global warming to the planet. Scientific certainty of the impact of anthropogenic GHG to the climate is at the heart of the matter when it comes any issue regarding potential cost prohibitive regulatory action.

The science is leaning toward validating GHG impacts to the climate however given the limited and disputed knowledge of climatic patterns a costly registry and reporting process can be a difficult sale especially in current economic times.

Technologies to eliminate or reduce GHG emission are available; however their cost effectiveness is highly volatile and subject to market manipulation. The price of oil has risen and fallen and supply and demand has not been the only factors. Given the large financial and political resources of the petroleum industry, along with price fluctuation, the viability of technological alternative to GHG producing activity changes by the day.

GHG activities can be halted, but at what real and opportunity cost and to whom. The logical assumption would be for developed countries to limit their GHG activity and allow developing countries some latitude to offset past sins. The GHG registry will allow the government to ascertain the magnitude of such activity by facility and sector.

Policy Design:

The GHG registry is the combination of a burden information disclosure and formal reporting being pleased on the affect facilities for the purpose of informing the government and the public of activity with respect to GHG production as well as establishing a formal methodology of tracking GHG producing activity.

The registry is a strategic process because it is established under the “Right to Know” act and heavy generation can be viewed by the public as bad acting, and no facility would want to fall in the classification of public opinion. It seems clear that industry is aware of why they have to report such activity although some do not agree with it.

From a public stand point there is only gain and non burden associated with regulation GHG activity in any way, but some could argue that the cost of compliance will be passed on to the consumer or result in a purging of the industry. Opinions in these matters usually mirror U.S. political party lines.

The incentive to comply with the GHG registry is to reduce GHG activity to avoid being subject to reporting or at least reporting data on the high end of the spectrum. There are a multitude of alternative technologies, tax and fee incentives, and regulatory waivers to encourage process GHG reduction.

Environmental Management:
The GHG registry is similar in design to the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI)currently regulated under EPCRA, what the proposed legislation would do is expand the scope of EPCRA authority to cover GHG emission based on their anticipated “toxic” to the climate or planet.

EPCRA has the experience to regulate and manage such a registry because the TRI has been in place for almost a generation and affected facilities have been subject to the compliance and enforcement process for most of that time. The reporting process will mirror the TRI so the EPA has a proven methodology of success to guide this program. This is not to infer that the TRI program is perfect, but it is functional.

Leadership in the EPA, which manages EPCRA changes depending on the ideology of the current administration however given the overwhelming public awareness in the developed world of GHG emission and their potential impacts, time will only lead toward a paradigm shift toward GHG reduction and mitigation the EPA will maintain a positive flow in the registry process.

Week 9 Posting RD

1. Based on the definition on exploit provided in a comment by one of our fellow students, use to greatest advantage, developing would and should have the right to exploit natural resources such as forest wood or oil reserves. If you follow a free market environmentalist point of view, which mandates all problems shall be correct through the proper definition of property rights then a developing country could use any resource they chose as they see fit, so long as they own it. Hardin’s lifeboat analogy in the reading is a valid point, and a viable one, if you’re one of the 50 on the boat. For the rest of the stragglers, if the boat capsized they would be no worse off than before.

So, may take is if divvy-up all of the resources and assets in the world evenly then resources exploitation would not be a right. Otherwise, as a member of the developed rich, I’ll do my best to educate and inform the developing world of the implication of exploitation, but not blame them if they ignored me as a hypocrite.

2. With respect to climate change the same rational applies. “Do as I say not as I have done” is a tough sale, especially if the only loser by non-action is me, and those who have done as I have.
The token response to question and issues such as this is to educate, inform, and set the standard with emissions reduction. Blah, blah, blah…

At the end of the day, there are winners and losers in every facet of life. So, should equity be the goal, absolutely, but as far as emissions reduction goes, what about the sins of the past. Hardin says they can’t be undone. True, but the proceeds can be redistributed to justify global participation in the program. Wait, that would mean real long-term change and who wants that… Who is really willing to make a true sacrifice that would actually reduce their standard of living? Sure, give to charity, but would you cut your own food rations to help out starving farmer in Africa. Would Bush, Clinton, Gore, Buffet, Gates, Oprah or anybody else really change their consumption habits in such a manner? Don’t even give me that charity stuff, they like everybody in the developed world over consume and exploit world resources.

Should developing nations participate in emission reduction? What do you think? They’re starving and Al Gore flies around the world and talks about GHG reduction at $250,000 a pop. Sign me up…

What expectations should we have of developing nation? If they were smart, they’d tell us to go pound sand, so long as we did it with a clean burning motor and not in their backyard.

I know, I’m a heathen, but the truth is I believe in environmental justice and resource equity with every fiber of my existence. I’d give up me share if everybody else did, and you know what else, so would most of you, but there are those that wouldn’t and they would let everybody suffer to increase their own bottom line. Liberal, and conservative a like we all know who they, and they run the country.
George, Dick, Barack, Joe, Hank, Tim, Condy, Hillary, and on and on…
They’re all rich and they all scammed others to get there.

Greenhouse Gas Registry to be Included in EPCRA

The Federal Greenhouse Gas Registry Act of 2008 (S.1387) is bill that was introduced in the 110th Congress for the purpose of amending the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act of 1986 (EPCRA) to provide for greenhouse gases.

EPCRA establishes requirements for Federal, State and local governments, Indian Tribes, and industry regarding emergency planning and the community's "right to know" by way reporting requirements on hazardous and toxic chemicals. The right to know piece of the act provides education to the public with knowledge and access to information with regards to hazardous chemicals and their application.

The Federal Greenhouse Gas Registry Act of 2008 intends to establish a registry for greenhouse gases that:

(1) Is complete, consistent, transparent, and accurate;
(2) Will collect reliable and accurate data that can be used to design efficient and effective energy security initiatives and greenhouse gas emission reduction strategies
(3) Will provide appropriate high-quality data to be used for implementing greenhouse gas reduction policies.

The proposed act will further require that the registry:

(1) Builds upon the final rule promulgated under the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2008

(2) Will make changes necessary to achieve the purposes of the Act

(3) Require emission reporting to begin by not later than January 1, 2011. Sets forth the duties of the Administrator in establishing the registry, including designing and operating the registry, establishing an advisory body to guide the development and management of the registry, providing coordination and technical assistance, and developing an electronic format for reporting.

The EPA must promulgate the final regulations for implementing the registry no later than July 1, 2009.

The act will also authorize the EPA to bring a civil action against the owner or operator of an affected facility that fails to comply with the Act, and imposes a $25,000 per day for each violation of this Act.


reference:

http://www.thomas.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/Dd110:51:./temp/~bdt3jH:@@@L&summ2=m&/bss/d110query.html

http://www.epa.gov/emergencies/docs/chem/epcra.pdf

Environmental Justice for All? The Navy's Recent Failure to Protect North Carolina's Citizens

In 2000, the United States Navy determined that Washington County, North Carolina was the preferred site for its new Outlying Landing Field (OLF) relocation project. At the time OLF was located in Chesapeake, Virginia. The author cites that it initially appeared that the Navy selected the North Carolina location after a thorough review of the alternatives generated during the required NEPA process. After a dissection of the issues surrounding the process, it became clear that Washington County was a preselected and a reverse engineering of the NEPA process to create favorable conditions had occurred. The OLF location, at the time, was a wealthy area of Virginia where the Navy was constantly at odds with residents of the area over noise pollution generated from the field.

The U.S. District Court of North Carolina issued a sweeping injunction on the project based on the systematic deficiency of the Navy’s EIS and the subjective intent of the Navy in placing the OLF in Washington County, North Carolina. On appeal by the Navy, The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the Navy failed to take a “hard environmental look” at environmental impacts, but lifted the subjective intent injunction incorrectly dismissing it as irrelevant.

A simple demographic analysis would shed some light on that subject. The area around the Virginia OLF had a median household income of approximately $51,000 per year with only 7 percent of the city’s residents living at or below the poverty line. Median income in
Washington County area was just under $29,000 per year, with 22 percent of the population at or below the poverty line. The Chesapeake area is 29 percent African-American, compared to 49 percent of the Washington County area 1. After a review of the Record of Decision from the court of appeals, the author determined that it was an issue of economics and politics. The Navy chose the location it did because the residences were less likely to interfere with their operation, and they did not possess the political or economic means that the residents around the Virginia did.

The author cited the Navy’s DEIS and SEIS as a blatant disregard for the NEPA process and most striking of the specific failures identified in the article was the Bird Aircraft Strike Hazard (BASH) analysis that the Navy was required to perform. The Navy concluded that the strike hazard was minimal and the risk to pilots was not significant. Many flight operations experts disagreed and with a retired air force colonial calling the Navy selection one of the worst areas in the U.S. with respect to a potential BASH hazard. In addition to the BASH analysis, it was cited that the Navy also failed to disclose negative evidence to their position, failed to properly conduct comparative analysis and did not assess the cumulative environmental impacts.

In the text there was a distinction direct and indirect intent. This case could prove difficult to classify in that context, but I would be inclined to argue for direct discrimination based on the through reverse engineering process engaging in by the Navy as well as the omission of facts relevant to the issues at hand. One could argue for market rationality based of the value of land and the location of the Washington county land to Naval Support Operations, but as the author described the Navy’s disregard of the NEPA process with the subjective intent being clear. Also the weakened political strength on the Washington County Area as well as the States economics reliance on the Navy’s presence in the areas supports a position of direct intent.


Eubanks, William S., Environmental Justice for All? The Navy's Recent Failure to Protect North Carolina's Citizens(April 15, 2008). North Carolina Central Law Review, Vol. 30, p. 206, 2008. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1285559
1. A Source of the demographical statistics was not provided in the article.