A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing: Senator Rucker’s Anti-Science Bill

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Veteran watchers of the West Virginia Legislature will have noticed the trend to hide controversial bills behind innocent titles. This is the case with SB 599 introduced by Senator Patricia Rucker from Jefferson County on February 26. The title of the bill is Sound Science in Regulations Act, but the bill would impose an anti-science regime that would hobble the regulatory ability of state administrative agencies.

As in other states and the federal government, the West Virginia public is protected more by the regulatory and enforcement activity of administrative agencies than by the legislature or executive. But regulated industries have a pure profit motive and regard regulations as burdens on their profits. It is no wonder these industries urge their favorite legislators to restrain administrative agencies.

That’s what SB 599 does. It applies when agencies seek to regulate “chemicals related to drinking water, water pollution control, hazardous substances or contaminated site remediation, air quality or solid or hazardous waste handling.” Shouldn’t all of us want these agencies to take a broad and inclusive view of which chemicals might hurt us, like PFAS in our drinking water?

Not so fast, says industry! In its sheep’s clothing SB 599 says only “the best available science” should be used in making these regulations. Sounds good, doesn’t it? But it goes on to create two absurdly high tests for what that science is, obviously seeking to limit what may be considered.

First, if a regulation relates to human health the “best available science” must indicate that exposure to the chemical above the level proposed is “causally linked to manifest bodily harm in humans.” This very important limitation is not defined, but science rarely concludes that exposure to a chemical “causes” human harm. Rather, it proves that the chemical and a human health condition are found together so often that the statistical connection is reliable.

For example, does smoking “cause” lung disease? Tobacco companies still deny this, but the two are found together so often that a reasonable person can rely on it. And so can regulatory agencies. But you can bet that if SB 599 becomes law it will provide industry with endless opportunity to undermine important regulatory efforts by dwelling on whether X causes Y.

Second, SB 599 requires that any new regulation be supported by studies that are published in “refereed journals” that don’t charge publication or submission fees to authors. This would exclude excellent publications like the Journal of the American Medical Association that do charge fees.

But worse, requiring publishing in these refereed journals exalts the exclusive use of a heavily academic way to determine reliability that often takes years to complete. Sometimes valuable and reliable scientific work doesn’t follow this route and shouldn’t be excluded from consideration because it doesn’t.

All this boils down to a contest between a small group of people who manufacture chemicals — and want to sell more of them — and the rest of the people in the state. In the large regulatory space before there is a “causal link to manifest bodily harm,” SB 599 tells the DEP that no limits can be put on the use of the chemical. Instead of requiring chemical manufacturers to prove that their chemicals are benign, Senator Rucker’s bill will require opponents to jump through hoops.

If you are not convinced that SB 599 is an industry bill, then consider this. A virtually identical bill was introduced recently in the Tennessee legislature backed by the U.S.Chamber of Commerce. In Tennessee it is generally understood that their bill is designed to limit regulatory agencies from adopting strict anti-PFAS regulations. These chemicals are not currently regulated at all in Tennessee. The bill was subsequently modified to remove the requirement of publication in refereed journals.

SB 599 has been assigned to the Government Organization Committee chaired by Senator Rucker. That Committee has fourteen members, four of whom (including Senator Rucker) are sponsors of the bill. A majority of the Committee is required to vote to send the bill to the full Senate for consideration. This seems relatively certain unless concerned citizens make their voices heard in opposition.

Science should work for all of us, not just the powerful industries who have allies in the Legislature.

As the Electorate Becomes More Democratic, Republicans Suppress Voting.

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Donald Trump might singlehandedly ensure Democratic victories up and down the ballot in 2024. But the biggest threat to the long-term viability of the Republican Party is not Trump – it is demographics. Each year the electorate becomes more Democratic. Republican strategists know this. Their solution is to suppress voting and hide behind the made-up justification of election integrity. Voters aren’t fooled.

First, the GOP’s demographic problem. Republican voter strength is primarily among older voters – Baby Boomers and the Silent Generation. These are voters born before 1965 and they are aging out. The number of Boomers has declined 10% since 2000. Younger voters in the cohorts Generation X (1965 to 1980) and Millennial (1981 to 1996) vote overwhelmingly Democratic. For example, in 2016 Millennials voted Democratic over Republican by a margin of 24%.

It is not just aging Boomers that are problematic for Republicans, it is also that the electorate is becoming more diverse. African American, Latino, and Asian voters are overwhelmingly Democrats, even though Republicans have recently made inroads with Latinos.

While Republicans are generally strong among white voters, each year the proportion of white voters in America declines. In 2020 Trump lost seven states – Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Virginia, Arizona, Georgia and Nevada — even though he carried the white vote in them.

Republicans have gained strength among white voters without college educations. In fact, turning this group into supporters is the biggest success for Republicans in the last half century. This has not happened because Republicans have offered policies that meet the needs working class Americans. Instead, exit polling and other data show that non-college whites have switched allegiance to the Republican Party because of racial resentment. This switch has taken 40 years, but has accelerated since 2012. It is not pretty, but there you have it.

More recently GOP strategists have responded to adverse demographic changes in the electorate with voter suppression legislation. Measures to make it harder to vote have been introduced in every Republican-controlled state legislature, including our own in West Virginia. Republicans claim these are election integrity measures, but if that were true you would expect them to be responsive to particular integrity problems occurring in those states. But this legislation is not solving real election integrity problems.

The situation in West Virginia perfectly illustrates this. West Virginia does not have election integrity problems. Just ask Mac Warner, our Republican Secretary of State for the last seven years. Warner is now a candidate for Governor. In June 2023 he said, “West Virginia voters can rest assured that our election process is safe, secure, and anchored by the most accurate voter registration lists in the history of our state.” Warner boasted about the integrity of the 2020 election and said West Virginia “has become an election model for the rest of the country.”

Voter impersonation fraud is virtually non-existent in the United States and no cases have been identified in West Virginia. Ignorant of this, the Republican-controlled West Virginia legislature passed a law in 2018 requiring aspiring voters to present specific types of identification to the poll clerk. Strict voter ID laws complicate the voting process, intimidate some potential voters, and reduce the numbers of poor and less-educated voters. These are the people who are less likely to have the required ID. Strict voter ID laws are chasing a problem that doesn’t exist and discourage voter participation as a side effect.

What should be of greater concern to the Legislature than non-existent voter fraud is the abysmal voter turnout numbers in West Virginia. Statewide, only 43% of registered voters cast ballots in the November 2022 mid-term election. Only five of 55 West Virginia counties had turnout over 50%. In 2016, the most recent, non-COVID presidential election year, voter turnout in West Virginia ranked 50th among the 50 states and Washington, D.C. We ranked 48th in 2020. If they cared about democracy, shouldn’t our leaders be advancing policies and legislation that improve these numbers? 

But no. In the 2023 legislative session another assault on voting access was attempted, led by Sen. Patricia Rucker (R-Jefferson). This came in the form of SB 459, a measure with several voter suppression features, including even stricter voter ID measures.

SB 459 would have limited eligibility either to register or vote in West Virginia to “legal” residents of the state. Legal resident was defined as someone who is both actually living in the state (domiciled) and who intends to remain in the state. On its face, this definition would have excluded students who come from out of state and are living here while studying at our colleges and universities, but who intend to return home after graduation.

Why should someone’s future plans disqualify them from voting? Obviously, future plans should have nothing to do with the right to cast a ballot if other requirements are met. Unless, of course, you are more concerned with how they will vote rather than whether they will vote.

What the Right Gets Wrong About Immigration

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Immigration has been so important to the development of the United States that our national motto — E Pluribus Unum — refers to it. Out of many, one. But these days right wing fear-mongers led by Donald Trump have caused many of us to oppose robust immigration. Tightening immigration, especially for counter-factual or racist reasons, is contrary to this country’s long-term economic interests. But it is fair to question how well immigrants integrate into existing society and to consider what costs we incur along with the benefits.

Integration is the process by which immigrant groups and the host population come to resemble one another. Integration depends on the participation by immigrants and their descendants in the major social institutions of the country, such as schools and the workforce, and their social acceptance by other Americans.

In some developed countries, such as France, integration has been a problem. But not here. First and second generation immigrants represent one out of four members of the U.S. population.

These immigrants have become Americans, embracing American identity and citizenship, serving in the military, working hard in jobs up and down the economic spectrum, and enriching American art, music, and cuisine. Immigrants are home owners, taxpayers, college students, and contributors to American society across the board.

Many of the following statistics and comparisons come from The Integration of Immigrants Into American Society, published by the National Academy of Sciences in 2016.

Education. Despite large differences in starting points of their parents, most second generation immigrants — men and women — meet or exceed the schooling level of  third+ generation native born Americans. This is, in part, because many immigrants are already highly skilled when they arrive.

More than a quarter of our foreign-born now have a college degree or more. Educational integration is more challenging for Mexican and Central American immigrants and their children, who start with lower levels of education and English proficiency.

Labor Force Participation. First-generation immigrant men have high employment rates. This is especially pronounced among the least educated, who are more likely to be employed even than comparably educated native-born men. Obviously, they are filling a need in the U.S. economy. Immigrant women begin with lower employment levels than natives but reach parity by the third generation.

Competition with Native Americans.  Unskilled immigrants (both lawful and unlawful) compete with those most similar to themselves in the U.S. economy – immigrants who arrived just before them and unskilled, undereducated natives. Unskilled immigrants may reduce employment opportunities and slightly lower wage rates for these competing groups in the short run. But they have no effect on the overall longer-term availability of jobs or the wage rates in the U.S. economy.

Political Ideology and Party Identification. Immigrants tend to be less committed to one political party than native born Americans. The largest percentage of foreign-born (44%) consider their views to be moderate, while 31% consider their views to be conservative and 25% to be liberal. When it comes to political parties, the foreign born are much more likely than native-born to consider themselves  “independent.”

Crime. Increased prevalence of immigrants is associated with lower crime rates — the opposite of the common right-wing trope. Among men ages 18-39, immigrants are incarcerated at one-fourth the rate of the native born. Cities and neighborhoods with high concentrations of immigrants have much lower levels of crime and violence. This is born out by a Cato Institute study which looked at crime conviction statistics in Texas for 2019.

Still you hear that immigrants, especially illegal immigrants crossing our southern border, harbor large numbers of drug-related criminals. Donald Trump, playing on racist fears, claimed that Mexican immigrants were drug dealers and rapists. Others now claim that the Biden Administration’s border policy is allowing large quantities of fentanyl to enter the country. That is baloney. Here are the facts.

Most of the people convicted of fentanyl trafficking between 2018 and 2021 were American citizens, not Mexicans or asylum-seekers. In FY 2021 American citizens were 86.2% of those convicted. Still, Mexican drug cartels are responsible for the bulk of fentanyl entering the U.S. The drug is transported by land, sea, air and even tunnels to safe houses in Los Angeles, Phoenix and El Paso, to be distributed across America. No absurd border wall will be effective in stopping fentanyl because the traffickers don’t wade across the Rio Grande.

While We Dither on Immigration Policy, Other Countries Take Advantage. Recently, The Wall Street Journal published an article detailing how Canada has opened up its immigration system to foreign-born workers in America on H-1 temporary visas in a clear bid to lure away highly-educated foreigners frustrated by the restrictive U.S. immigration process. H-1 visa holders have advanced degrees and are eagerly sought by tech companies who are unable to find similar U.S. workers.

Canada’s proposed work permit would allow H-1B visa holders to move to Canada without a job and look for one once they arrive. The types of immigrants who would qualify for the program could also quickly become permanent residents under that country’s merit-based points immigration system.

So while we suffer from political fear-mongering and Republican opposition to immigration that has no factual support, we will continue to lose ground to other countries and put our long-term economic security in jeopardy. This is insane.

 

 

Thank Goodness for Jennifer Krouse

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Thank goodness for Jennifer Krouse. While we thought we were only electing her to the Jefferson County Commission, she has grown into so much more. She has become the protector of our children at this critical time when we have so miserably failed in our own responsibilities. We must now recognize her with a new title – Leader of the Jefferson County Morality Squad.

Of course, I mainly write in praise of Leader Krouse for her role in the enactment by the County Commission of an ordinance prohibiting a parent (or anyone else) from taking a child to an “adult live performance,” which everyone knows means drag shows. Drag shows are where men dress up like women and make jokes about it.

I remember reading some Shakespeare plays as an assignment in high school. There were men dressing up like women and women dressing up like men. Oh, the inhumanity! This just shows what we get when we allow artists to run amok.

A friend showed me a letter she had written to the County Commission complaining that there had been no public hearing before the ordinance was enacted. She pointed out that Commissioner Stolipher advocated for holding a public hearing but was overruled.

The Leader responded to my friend’s letter by saying that “Only someone with an irredeemably damaged moral compass would be against protecting children from such material. Given that, there was no need to open this up to an extraordinary level of debate.”

Now that’s what I call enlightened leadership!

I looked up the ordinance and it uses an entire paragraph to define “adult live performance.” The definition was confusing and maybe that’s the point! If parents are unsure what it means, they won’t take the chance of being fined. They won’t dare take a 17-year-old child to entertainment where anything about sex could possibly be mentioned. That’s what we want, right?

I did understand that you can’t take kids to any show that is obscene and lacks serious literary and artistic value – and everyone knows what that means. Don’t they?

I must confess that I once went to a drag show in Palm Springs with some friends. The queens were flamboyant, but they didn’t take themselves seriously. They laughed and made fun of the audience. The whole thing was, well . . . very funny.

I know that this is totally disgusting and that I should be ashamed of myself. Because we know that there is only one way to think about gender and sexuality and you are showing us that way. We were meant to be very strict about these things, and our children should be stopped from thinking that they are humorous in any way.

So, Leader Krouse, the parents of Jefferson County will be forever grateful to you and the other members of the Morality Squad for passing an ordinance that fines us if we expose our children to moral corruption. We have so needed your firm hand on our shoulder. You have helped us identify that corruption even though, in our weakness, we could not see it on our own.

And blowing off a public hearing to discuss the ordinance spared us from unnecessary discussion and irrelevant points of view. Who knows what could have come from that?

But whatever else you and the Squad do, please protect our children from Shakespeare!

We Need More Immigration, Not Less

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Thanks to Donald Trump, many at the right-wing fringe of the Republican party peddle fear about immigration. To hear them tell it, we are in jeopardy of being overrun by benefit-stealing, swarthy criminals from south of the border. But this is a false narrative designed only to reap political advantage among an older, conservative political base. Scratch the surface of this anti-immigration narrative and you will find racism.

Fortunately, this nativism is not broadly shared in America —  surveys by the Pew Research Center found that 59% of Americans believe that immigrants make our country stronger. And the pro-immigration sentiment is even higher in communities where immigrants live. To understand why we need only consider the facts. Immigration is not only helpful to the nation in the short run, it will be essential for our economic future. We need more immigration.

Today, the U.S. population is roughly 330 million, although the rate of increase has declined. New data from the Census Bureau show that our population has basically flatlined, growing only .12% in the year ending July 1, 2021. Eighteen states showed actual population losses during the same period. West Virginia has either tread water or lost population for decades running. The U.S. has been below the replacement rate of 2.1 births per woman since 1970.

Our population is growing older. Among six age groups — 0 to 4, 5 to 19, 20 to 34, 35 to 49, 50 to 64, and 65 and older — the 65+ group was the fastest growing between 2010 and 2021 with its population increasing 38%. The 0 to 4 age group declined the most, dropping 6.7% between 2010 and 2021.

The harm from these population trends is real. As older workers age out of the workforce, there will be too few younger workers to replace them. This will disrupt the labor market, reduce economic activity and wealth in general, and reduce income tax revenues. And here is a dirty secret about social security. Your benefits aren’t paid for by your own contributions, they are paid for by the contributions of workers who come after you. If there are fewer of them, the insolvency date for the social security system looms closer.

So maybe we should stop being afraid of immigration and begin seeing it as a tool to solve some of our problems. Adding immigrants can quickly improve the ratio of working to nonworking people. Immigration also helps with fertility rates. Foreign born people make up 13% of the U.S. population, but account for 23% of the births. The U.S. Census Bureau forecasts that without immigration and births to foreign-born mothers, the U.S. population would decline about 6 million between 2014 and 2060. With them it is forecast to grow by 98 million.

Increasing immigration doesn’t mean opening the borders to undocumented multitudes. We have an immigration system and it needs to be reformed so that it advances all our goals — border security as well as greater immigration of the right kind.

Trump’s absurd policy sought to reduce immigration of all kinds, even lawful immigration by highly skilled people. This runs counter to the approach of the smarter developed countries like Canada and New Zealand, whose policies promote immigration of skilled workers and will allow them to compete economically for decades to come.

But even the immigration of unskilled workers can help us. Despite increased automation, our farm economy needs farm workers. And unskilled immigrants fill positions throughout the economy that native workers can’t or won’t.

As for all these people lined up at our southern border? They want to work. Finding a fair way to accommodate that would not snatch jobs from native Americans or reduce wages. We are at full employment of native workers as it is. Ask any business owner how difficult it is to find people willing to work these days.

Recently a comprehensive bill addressing immigration was introduced in the House of Representatives by a bi-partisan group. The bill offers a solution for the asylum crisis at the southern border, funding several U.S. asylum campuses where hundreds of new asylum officers would rule on applications within a short time. Those whose applications are denied would be removed from the country.

The bill also involves increased funding for border security and the creation of regional processing centers in key Latin American countries to deal with asylum seekers and economic migrants before they arrive at our border.

But significantly, the bill addresses our need for additional workers. It creates “dignity status”  for undocumented people already in the U.S. with no criminal record, allowing them to work anywhere and have a path to citizenship after ten years. It would also create a renewable legal status for undocumented farm workers and increase the visas available for skilled workers. The bill is called The Dignity Act of 2023. I encourage you to read the summary online. There is a lot to like.

The New Civilian Climate Corps

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Immediately upon assuming office, President Biden issued an executive order addressing his climate objectives.  Prominent among these was the creation of a Civilian Climate Corps to tackle climate change resiliency and provide job training to underemployed youth.  The new CCC would be modeled on a popular New Deal program that put thousands to work on conservation projects during the Depression. From every angle the new CCC seems like a good idea, but its uncertain future is bound up with the stalled Build Back Better legislation.

The Depression-era program was known as the Civilian Conservation Corps, which ran from 1933 to 1942 and employed roughly 3 million young men.  They were set to work fighting wildfires, building more than 100,000 miles of roads and trails, 318,000 dams and tens of thousands of bridges.  They strung telephone wire where it had never been before.  They dug erosion-control ditches on private land and helped farmers with other land conservation projects.  Many of the fire towers, state park buildings and other structures built by the Corps are still in use.

The participants in the Depression-era Corps were overwhelmingly male, white and poor.  A Time magazine article from the period described the 1938 Corps as 67% from “relief families” and another 29% from families “below the normal standard of living.”  Only 11% had finished high school.  Corpsmen were paid $30 per month, much of which had to be set aside either for dependents or to be drawn when the participants left the program.  This whole scheme was enormously popular with the Corpsmen and the public.  When back home the Corpsmen were treated as heroes.

The proposed new Civilian Climate Corps has a different name to reflect the needs of the present day.  The focus would be on job training for careers in the conservation space for urban youth who don’t normally have opportunities of that sort.  Biden proposes to spend a mere $10 billion on the new CCC, a small sliver of the proposed $1.75 trillion Build Back Better legislation. Pay would be $15 per hour plus health care and other benefits.  The jobs would mostly be short-term, following the model of AmeriCorps.  Perhaps 20,000 per year could be employed.

The new CCC would not become involved in politically charged climate issues. Its goals are noncontroversial and clearly stated in the executive order:

The initiative shall aim to conserve and restore public lands and waters, bolster community resilience, increase reforestation, increase carbon sequestration in the agricultural sector, protect biodiversity, improve access to recreation, and address the changing climate.

It is also unlikely to be a gap year for college kids from the suburbs.  Rather it would recruit from lower-income families and communities of color.

While the new CCC is not overtly designed to reduce political polarization, that would be a welcome byproduct.  The racial integration of military units during World War II and Korea, while not complete or perfect, went far better than critics thought it would.  It was largely responsible for a greater general acceptance of integration in later decades.  In 2006 a meta-study of over 500 studies in thirty-eight countries revealed strong evidence of the power of simple contact to reduce prejudice among groups.  Proponents of national service have recognized its power to serve as a binding agent and catalyst for democracy. Our racially and politically polarized society could use a dose of this. Instead, we sort ourselves into like-minded communities.

We are so polarized now that even the name Civilian Climate Corps causes opposition to the initiative. In October 2020, when the name was still Civilian Conservation Corps, 44% of Republican voters said they “strongly supported” the idea and 40% of Republican voters “somewhat supported” it.  In April 2021, after the initiative was renamed the Civilian Climate Corps, just 11% of Republican voters “strongly supported” and 33% “somewhat supported” it.  In a floor speech in the fall of 2021, Senate Minority Leader McConnell said the new CCC was “pure socialist wish fulfillment” and called it a “made-up government work program . . . for young liberal activists.”

Government cost accounting and revenue projections are often hard to penetrate and surely must be taken with a grain of salt. But since the new CCC would operate on a model similar to AmeriCorps, return on investment from that government program offers a clue of what to expect from a Civilian Climate Corps. The federal ROI for AmeriCorps and similar programs at the national level is 3.5.  That means that for every dollar spent on these programs the federal government alone receives $3.50 in returns from tax revenue gains and savings.  The federal cost-benefit ratio, calculated differently, is 17.3.  That means for every dollar spent on AmeriCorps and similar programs the return to society, program members and the government is $17.30.

Biden’s executive order directed the Interior and Agriculture departments to design the new CCC initiative “within existing appropriations.”  How this could happen is unclear. These departments were to have submitted a strategy report by April 2021, but that report is overdue.  Without financial support through the Build Back Better Act, or some other specifically targeted legislation, this worthy program is unlikely to get off the ground. And without support from West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, Build Back Better cannot pass the Senate.

The Hot Air About Methane

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When President Biden left for the COP26 meeting in Glasgow recently, his primary plan for reaching the greenhouse gas reduction goals in the Paris Accords was in disarray.  The cause of this disarray was mainly the opposition of West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin.  But Biden had Plan B, which involves a two-pronged approach to sharply reducing methane emissions.  In Glasgow, Biden announced that more than thirty countries have pledged to cut emissions of methane 30% by 2030.  Given our decades-long focus on reducing carbon dioxide, this pivot to methane is a bit disorienting.

Carbon dioxide is by far the largest contributor to climate change, and it comes from recognizable fossil fuel sources such as coal-burning utilities, and automobile tailpipes. Carbon dioxide persists in the atmosphere for hundreds of years, making the climate change it causes not just a current problem, but a future one as well.

Yet some experts say that methane (CH4) is a bigger problem than carbon dioxide (CO2).  While methane dissipates naturally after about 100 years, its pound for pound impact is 25 times greater than carbon dioxide in trapping heat reflected from the Earth’s surface.

Sources of Methane

Some methane occurs naturally from the decay of plant and animal matter. Domestic livestock, such as beef cattle, pigs and sheep, produce CH4 as part of their normal digestive process.  But human-produced methane far exceeds what is produced naturally.

Agriculture, including raising of cattle for human consumption and management of animal wastes, is the single largest source of methane. Natural gas and petroleum systems are the second largest source. The U.S. oil and gas industry emits more methane than the total emissions of greenhouse gases from 164 countries combined. Landfills are the third-largest source.

Some politicians call natural gas a “bridge fuel,” meaning that burning it emits less carbon dioxide than burning coal.  But it is wrong to call natural gas clean. Methane is the primary component of natural gas. Methane is emitted during the production, processing, storage, transmission, and distribution of natural gas.  In addition, burning natural gas still releases carbon.

Satellite imagery of the Permian gas field in Texas show huge plumes of methane erupting from hot spots throughout the area. No human artifice or industrial process is infallible, and that is certainly true with gas production and pipeline transmission. Major failures to capture methane and leaks from pipelines, pumps and valves are endemic.

Biden’s Plan B 

Not surprisingly, Biden’s plan to reduce methane emissions focuses on the oil and gas industry.  Regulations issued under President Obama placed controls on methane emissions from new and modified sources in the industry, but failed to address existing wells, production facilities and pipelines.  Even as toothless as they were, these regulations were shelved during the Trump Administration.  In April 2021, Congress restored the Obama-era methane regulations.

Then on the eve of Biden’s trip to Glasgow, the Environmental Protection Agency issued a proposed new rule that covers existing sources of methane emissions in the oil and gas industry. The proposed rule involves a comprehensive monitoring program for new and existing well sites and compressor stations, and proposed performance standards for other sources, such as storage tanks, pneumatic pumps, and compressors.

The proposed rule would reduce 41 million tons of methane emissions from 2023 to 2035, the equivalent of 920 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. That’s more than the amount of carbon dioxide emitted from all U.S. passenger cars and commercial aircraft in 2019. The EPA will receive public comment for 60 days and projects a new final rule by the end of 2022.

Also Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, which just passed both houses and awaits the President’s signature, contains a provision to spend $4.7 billion to clean up abandoned oil and gas wells, many of which spew methane into the atmosphere.  Central West Virginia is littered with these orphan wells.

But the stronger second prong of Biden’s Plan B is a methane tax contained in the Build Back Better social spending bill that has not passed either the House or the Senate. As described in a recent Forbes article, the plan would tax methane emitted in excess of specified thresholds and begin at $60 per ton. It would take effect in 2023, with the revenues used to administer the program, provide technical and financial assistance to companies for monitoring and reducing emissions, and to support communities affected by pollution from oil and gas systems.

A fee on methane would boost the incentive for companies to reduce emissions and require companies to internalize the cost of the pollution they emit. A methane fee would have double duty – raising revenues and discouraging pollution – while holding industry accountable. Climate policy experts say that the two-pronged approach – regulation and fee — is necessary to shut down methane emissions, particularly because executive regulations alone could be undone by a future administration.

The Ball is in Manchin’s Court

By now, we are all aware of the immense power that has fallen to Senator Joe Manchin purely because he is a key vote in a balanced Senate.  Unfortunately for the environmental community, his power has been exercised to block legislation that is widely seen as necessary to meet the challenge of climate change.  Having already caused the removal of Biden’s plan to radically reduce CO2 emissions in the electric power sector, all eyes are now on Manchin regarding the methane tax in the Build Back Better Act.

Initial signs are not good, even though Democrats reduced the starting fee level from $1500 per ton to $60 to win Manchin’s support.  But Manchin appears still to be opposed, arguing that since we have the technology to reduce methane then the technology should be used, not a fee that he regards as punitive.  One wonders how it is “punitive” to impose a fee designed to cause the largest industrial producers of methane finally to end their harmful practices.  Instead, it seems exactly the sort of measure required to make them internalize the true cost of their behavior. The language of money is the language this industry understands.

 

Industry To West Virginia: We Can’t Be Bothered

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They’re at it again. Under the cover of the Covid pandemic, when citizens can’t rally in numbers, the West Virginia legislature is poised to gut one of the key protections of the Aboveground Storage Tank Act enacted after the 2014 water crisis. Remember the crisis? When 300,000 Mountain Staters had no access to safe water? Apparently, the legislature does not. The bill is pushed by tank owners and backed by industry. The reason? As Charlie Burd of the Gas and Oil Association of WV says, according to Gazette-Mail reporter Mike Tony, the regulation is too burdensome. Translation: We can’t be bothered.

We can’t be bothered to operate responsibly, they’re telling us. We can’t be bothered to make sure dangerous chemicals don’t foul drinking water supplies. We can’t be bothered to make an honest dollar — one with a reasonable return that does not force people to live under the specter of mass contamination.

The bill in question is HB 2598. It would exempt more than 1,000 oil and gas waste tanks — tanks near drinking water supplies across 27 counties — from Aboveground Storage Tank Act regulation. That’s right. The legislature wants to make our water less safe by throwing out common sense rules.

Oil and gas waste tanks contain a mixture of produced water and crude oil. The mixture is composed of a variety of pollutants that can contaminate drinking water supplies. This is true for surface water systems and surface water-influenced groundwater systems, or SWIGs, appropriately. There are some 20 SWIG systems along the Ohio River.

The Aboveground Storage Tank Act helps ensure that tanks in “zones of critical concern” are properly inspected and maintained. These zones are areas along streams located upstream from a public water system’s intake or well. This seems sensible. Rather than having the public pay for leaks, spills, and disasters in the water supply, let’s inspect tanks closest to drinking water supply more often, and keep them in working order.

That’s it. Seriously.

How can inspection and maintenance of a business asset be too burdensome? This is the same old trope industry rolls out every time it can’t be bothered. Installing seat belts in every car, the auto industry said, would make cars unaffordable. Too burdensome. The food industry said the same thing when the FDA required companies to state the ingredients on packaging so that people actually can know what they are eating. Too burdensome. It’s the same story every time.

We all face regulatory “burdens” every day. Like the 70 miles per hour speed limit on our wide-open interstates. Rules for safe food storage and handling in restaurants. Restricting hunting to certain seasons.

We accept these rules as minor inconveniences because we know, in our great big West Virginia hearts, that we do unto others as we would have them to unto ourselves. And that’s what the aboveground storage tank rules do, especially in the Ohio River Valley, where the vast majority are located. Call it the Good Neighbor Rule. It ensures people that their government cares and takes its responsibilities seriously. That their government is up to the task of fulfilling its most basic function: to protect the health and safety of its citizens. We need these protections.

In nearly laughable displays of feigned outrage, tank owners may level the ultimate threat — leaving the state altogether if they don’t get their free pass. For good. Take their ball and go home. I say, Good Riddance. Bye bye. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out. We don’t need you in West Virginia. We don’t want you in West Virginia if you’re not willing to play by the rules.

Another company, one that accepts the responsibility that comes with handling and storing dangerous chemicals, will step in and find a way to make an honest buck. Now that’s the free market. And then maybe other industries that value clean air, safe water, and responsive government will move in to create 21st century jobs.

I keep hoping that one day our legislature will have the courage to acknowledge one existential fact. That the states with the weakest environmental and public health and safety rules are consistently among the poorest. Exempting tanks near drinking water supplies will make us not only less safe, but poorer. A slap on both cheeks to people who live in the Ohio Valley and across West Virginia.

— David Lillard is on the board of directors of Conservation West Virginia; he lives in Jefferson County.

What President Biden Could Do for the Environment in His First Ninety Days

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I recognize that some of my readers may be Trump supporters who would prefer not to see a Biden administration. And, of course, one should not count one’s chickens too early. That said, there can be little debate that the Trump administration has been more hostile to sound environmental policy than any administration in modern history. From the start President Trump identified environmental protection as the territory of Obama liberals and played strongly to his populist base and big fossil fuel industry donors by dismantling every protection in sight. So, a Biden administration has a lot of work to do restoring the positive direction set in previous administrations. Here is where I think he should start.

Rejoin the Paris Accords

Almost every nation in the world, including the United States, signed the Paris Accords in 2015. The central aim of the Accords is to coordinate a global response to climate change by keeping a global temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius and to find the means to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

But Trump is a climate change denier, and his fossil fuel backers have a financial stake in things remaining as they are. On November 4, 2019, the Trump administration began the official process of withdrawing the United States from the Paris Accords, which will not be completed until the day after the November 2020 election. Upon withdrawal, the U.S. will no longer be committed to reach its emissions reduction targets under the Accords.

Why does this matter? First, the United States is one of the two largest emitters of greenhouse gasses in the world so relaxing our efforts to reduce these emissions will have a hugely negative effect on the world’s ability to reach the Paris goals. Second, the United States is an environmental policy and technology leader in world. Our absence from the Accords takes our gravitas and leadership out of the equation. It weakens our international soft power and opens the door to preening by the Chinese.

How could a Biden administration reverse Trump’s withdrawal? The Paris Accords are a non-binding expression of national commitment. President  Obama was able to enter the United States into the agreement through executive action, since it imposed no new legal obligations on the country. Candidate Biden has pledged to recommit the country to the Paris Accords, and can do so most likely through similar executive action. Legislation is also possible.  Experts believe that the United States could rejoin the Accords in a matter of a few months. It is inconceivable that other nations would oppose our rejoining.

Appoint Environmentalists to Head Environmental Agencies

What a concept. But President Trump’s first appointment to head the EPA was Scott Pruitt, a notorious climate change skeptic. As Oklahoma’s Attorney General, Pruitt sued the EPA 14 times. Pruitt’s replacement, Andrew Wheeler, is a former coal industry lobbyist who has proposed dubious rules limiting the kind of scientific information the EPA can consider. One that called on the EPA to consider only “double blind” studies of the sort used in drug trials was called “breathtakingly ignorant” by the Union of Concerned Scientists. The Biden administration should be able to improve upon the quality of the EPA Administrator in short order.

The Department of the Interior sets policy and manages the implementation of many environmental statutes through a group of key agencies, including the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, and others. Having a Secretary with environmental sensitivity and purpose could make a huge difference.

President Trump has seemed mainly interested in using the Department of Interior as a conduit to reward his friends in the extractive industries by shrinking protected land and opening federal lands to resource exploitation. Trump’s first appointment to Interior, Ryan Zinke, has been called “the most anti-conservation Interior secretary in our nation’s history.” President Biden’s appointment of a Secretary of Interior will be significant and closely watched.

Revive Obama’s Executive Order Requiring All Federal Agencies to Enhance Climate Preparedness and Resilience

In 2013, President Obama issued Executive Order 13653 instructing all federal agencies to identify global warming’s probable impact on their operations and take the actions necessary to protect against that impact. The importance of this is obvious. In 2016 alone the United States suffered 15 extreme weather and climate-related disasters each exceeding $1 billion in losses. Moreover, the Pentagon has for years regarded global warming as a significant threat to American national security.

But in March 2017, shortly after taking office, President Trump rescinded Obama’s Executive Order. In this order, Trump clearly set out the reason for this rescission:

It is the policy of the United States that executive departments and agencies immediately review existing regulations that potentially burden the development or use of domestically produced energy resources [oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear energy resources] and appropriately suspend, revise, or rescind those that unduly burden the development of domestic energy resources beyond the degree necessary to protect the public interest or otherwise comply with the law. “Burden” means to unnecessarily obstruct, delay, curtail, or otherwise impose significant costs on the siting, permitting, production, utilization, transmission, or delivery of energy resources.

It is not immediately obvious why unburdening the production of domestic energy required the rescission of Obama’s direction to plan for climate disasters, but there you have it. President Biden should immediately rescind this absurd Order and restore good sense to the nation’s efforts to protect itself against the effects of global warming.

Establish Science, Not Politics, As the Guiding Principle of Environmental Policy

President Trump has politicized agencies that are only effective and credible when they rely on the best science. This has happened since the beginning of the Trump administration. For example, he has marginalized the EPA’s Science Advisory Board by prohibiting any member but the Chairman from reviewing decisions regarding agency regulations. His 2021 budget proposes eliminating funding for that agency’s Climate Change Research Program. Pursuant to a direction from a Trump executive order EPA terminated the National Advisory Council on Environmental Policy and Technology. The BLM issued a final environmental impact statement for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and concluded there was no climate crisis.

The list of anti-science policies and actions during the Trump administration is quite long. These have been catalogued by Columbia University Law School’s “Silencing Science Tracker.” Within the first ninety days of a Biden administration, he could issue an executive order directing federal agencies to act only after giving heightened consideration to the best data and scientific opinion available, and he could restore to a prominent role the various science advisory bodies Trump has marginalized or dismantled.

Reversing Anti-Environment Regulations

President Biden will be unable in the first ninety days to reverse many of the harmful regulatory rollbacks and changes wrought by the Trump administration. All of these have been listed by the Harvard Law School’s Regulatory Rollback Tracker. This is because any such action must proceed deliberately and be based on a reasonable assessment of all factors, usually involving public testimony or input. He will not simply be able to change a regulation because he believes it is the ill-conceived product of the previous administration. Trump learned this lesson the hard way, most recently in connection with reversing Obama’s DACA order deferring deportation of children brought here illegally.

But President Biden can direct that these be triaged and that the process for reversing the most significant of them be started. The list is long and tantalizing. It includes Obama’s Clean Power Plan setting standards for power plant emissions, which the Trump administration repealed. The Clean Power Plan was a primary means to reach the nation’s Paris Accords emissions commitment.

There may be other, more important steps President Biden could take immediately to restore the correct course on the environment. The plate will certainly be full. One thing is certain — January 2021 cannot come soon enough for the environment.

Solar Energy and the Legislature: A Power Play in Charleston

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For a state beholden to the coal and natural gas industries, solar energy generated a lot of heat at the recent West Virginia legislative session. Two initiatives concerning alternative energy, including solar, were introduced. One survived and will become law. Unfortunately, the survivor is a timid effort to attract a specific hi-tech enterprise that will involve no new solar energy facilities unless that enterprise locates here. But progress on renewable energy in West Virginia will have to be made in small steps, and this was a start.

The unsuccessful initiative – SB 759 – contained a number of wonderful ideas that would have enabled commercial and individual property owners to develop alternative energy for their own consumption.  The bill would have accomplished this by authorizing municipalities to establish low-cost alternative energy revolving loan programs to assist the property owners. Interest rates charged on the loans from these programs would have been below prevailing market rates.

The alternative energy technologies eligible for loans from the municipal loan program included solar photovoltaic projects, solar thermal energy projects, geothermal energy projects, as well as wind energy, biomass or gasification facilities for generating electricity.

SB 759 was introduced by Democratic Senators Robert Plymale and Mike Woelfel, both from District 5 (Cabell and Wayne counties). It was referred to the Government Organization Committee, the place where bills of this sort go to die. At the end of the session 67 bills, including SB 759, had expired in that committee with no action.

The survivor of the two initiatives — SB 583 — was introduced by Republican Senator Patricia Rucker of Jefferson County, among others. This bill will authorize electric utilities in the state to construct or purchase solar energy facilities on sites that have previously been used for industrial, manufacturing or mining operations. Wind and other alternative energy sources are not covered.

Demonstrating how timorous this initiative is, solar facilities under the law can only be built in 50 megawatt increments. When 85% of the power from the first increment is under contract, facilities for the next 50 megawatts can be built. No single such facility can generate more than 200 megawatts and the state-wide cumulative generating capacity of renewable energy facilities can’t exceed 400 megawatts. Evidently, neither the utility industry nor the coal industry wanted a lot of excess solar power sloshing around that would require companies to reduce coal-fired power generation.

This bill surprisingly had the support of the West Virginia Department of Commerce. It seems that whenever the business recruiters at the Department tried to lure tech companies to the state, these companies insisted on the availability of solar energy. Well, of course, we have had no such capacity.

The particular focus of the Department’s recent efforts is a company that proposes to build a research and development facility in Preston County that will test ultra-high speed transportation systems. The provisions of SB 583 that enable utilities to recover their costs for constructing solar facilities will sunset in 2025, by which time this company will either have located in West Virginia or not. So despite the high-sounding rhetoric about the need for West Virginia to enter the twenty-first century world of renewable energy, the real driver of this legislation was immediate business development and not a long-term commitment to renewable energy.

A similar bill – HB 4562 – was introduced in the House and debated extensively in the House Energy Committee, where it appeared to be stalled by objections from the coal industry. When SB 583 was passed by the Senate and sent to the House, it sidestepped the troublesome Energy Committee and went straight to House Judiciary and then to the House floor. Debate there was contentious. Delegate Tom Bibby, a Republican from Berkeley County, grumbled 

If renewable energy and solar energy were so good they (the tech companies) could afford to pay for it themselves. Renewables may sound nice and good, but they are heavily subsidized. To say coal-fired power plants won’t suffer from this legislation is just sticking your head in the sand.

House environmental advocates were initially considering an amendment that would broaden SB 583 to include solar power purchase agreements (PPAs). These are contractual arrangements where a third-party developer designs, finances and installs a solar energy system on a customer’s property at little to no cost. The developer sells the power generated to the host customer at a fixed rate that is typically lower than the local utility’s retail rate.

However, the idea for an amendment allowing PPAs was dropped. Democrats favoring the amendment had little time to gather support and it was feared that complicating the process would threaten passage of the main bill. Karan Ireland, lead lobbyist for the West Virginia Environmental Council, lamented that “what we see is utilities calling the shots and getting everything they want in the process.”

So West Virginia will move forward with a solar facilities law limited in scope that was carefully managed by electric utility and coal interests to avoid any threat to the existing carbon-based power generation monopoly in the state. The motivation for this law had nothing to do with any recognition that burning coal is fouling our air and literally killing us. Nevertheless, it is a first step and progress will have to be made this way.