Environmental and Policy Focus
Los Angeles Business - Jan 12 State Senator Fran Pavley is calling for Southern California Gas Co. to close older natural gas wells at Aliso Canyon until state officials and experts can verify that they do not pose a public health risk. The proposal, part of a legislative package in response to the gas leak at the gas company's facility near Porter Ranch, includes urgency legislation, Senate Bill 875 (SB 875), to enact an immediate moratorium on any new injections of natural gas and the use of vintage wells for production at Aliso Canyon until state agencies and independent experts determine future activities will not pose a risk to public health and safety. According to Senator Pavley’s office, over half of the roughly 420 gas storage wells in California are more than 40 years old. Other measures include SB 876, to ensure that SoCal Gas will pay all housing, relocation and emergency response costs and prohibit the California Public Utilities Commission from allocating any of those costs to ratepayers. Also being proposed is SB 877, which would require that the state’s 14 underground natural gas storage facilities be inspected within the next 12 months and at least annually thereafter.
EPA - Jan 13 The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved new water quality standards for trash in California’s waters. The standards are part of the state’s new Trash Control Policy adopted by the State Water Resources Control Board in 2015, which is designed to keep trash out of streams, lakes, bays, estuaries, coastal and ocean waters in California to protect people and the environment. The Trash Policy provides a phased approach to eliminate trash in California’s waters by 2026. Much of the trash generated on land is transported to waterways via storm drains. The policy calls for the use of trash capture devices in areas that generate large amounts of garbage. California’s municipalities and other storm water permit holders must comply by either installing full trash capture systems, or by using equivalent devices coupled with programs such as increased street sweeping and educational outreach. The new Trash Policy amends the Water Quality Control Plans for ocean waters, inland waters, enclosed bays and estuaries of California, and prohibits the discharge of trash to state waters through storm drain systems, as well as at transportation and industrial facilities and construction sites that are regulated under National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits, making such discharges enforceable and reportable. EPA approved these water quality standards under its federal Clean Water Act authority.
Los Angeles Times - Jan 10 A key piece of a three-part agreement to end decades of feuding on the Klamath River expired when Congress failed to approve it by December 31. Tribes, farmers, hydropower interests and commercial fishermen all have fought over the 255-mile river, which winds from southern Oregon through Northern California to the Pacific Ocean. Dams, farm and ranch diversions and agricultural runoff have exacted a heavy toll on a waterway that once supported Chinook salmon runs half a million strong. The complicated agreement, backed by the states of California and Oregon, called for the removal of four hydroelectric dams, settled water rights disputes and set forth water allocations for irrigators and wildlife refuges in the Klamath Basin. The dams, spread across 65 miles of the Klamath, block historic salmon spawning grounds on the upper river and create stagnant pools of water that breed toxics-producing algae. The agreement had called for PacificCorp, owner of the dams, to remove the structures by 2020, and for California to help pay for the dam removal. Without the agreement, PacifiCorp faces a lengthy dam relicensing process and requirements to meet California water quality standards that could force it to spend an estimated $400 million on fish ladders and other improvements.
Los Angeles Times - Jan 10 The California Air Resources Board (CARB) criticized the adoption by the South Coast Air Quality Management District in December of industry-backed versions of regulations to control smog-forming emissions from the region's largest facilities - oil refineries, power plants, factories and other major sources. The regulations were intended to overhaul a decades-old cap-and-trade program known as the Regional Clean Air Incentives Market (known as RECLAIM), which regulates emissions of nitrogen oxides, a pollutant that mixes in the atmosphere with volatile organic compounds to form smog. In the December vote, the District's board rejected a District staff recommendation to impose a 14-ton-per-day reduction in the RECLAIM cap on nitrogen oxide emissions by 2022, and opted instead to approve a proposal supported by the Western States Petroleum Association and other business interests, calling for a 12 ton-per-day reduction to be implemented at a slower pace. According to CARB, the regulations as adopted may violate state law and will harm people's health.
SF Gate - Jan 12 California officials on Tuesday rejected Volkswagen’s plans to recall and fix 75,688 diesel cars equipped with software to cheat on air pollution tests, saying the proposals lacked so many key details that the state could not tell whether they would work. “VW’s submissions are incomplete, substantially deficient, and fall far short of meeting the legal requirements to return these vehicles to the claimed certified configuration,” the California Air Resources Board wrote in a letter to Volkswagen executives. The Board said Volkswagen had failed to describe precisely how it would fix the vehicles, failed to explain how its proposed fixes would affect the cars’ fuel economy, performance and safety, and failed to include a sufficient method for identifying and contacting the vehicles’ owners. The move represents another setback for Volkswagen, which in September admitted to installing "defeat device" software on 11 million cars it had marketed as "clean diesel." Volkswagen said it remained committed to developing a recall plan that will meet California’s requirements.
Courthouse News Service - Jan 12 A citizens group, Concerned Citizens about Centennial Corridor, filed a lawsuit against the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) in Kern County Superior Court, alleging violations of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The plaintiffs claim that hundreds of people will lose their homes and businesses and air quality will go from bad to worse if Centennial Corridor, a state project to connect State Route 58 with Interstate 5, goes forward. According to the plaintiffs, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency gave the project a failing rating, but Caltrans nevertheless decided to proceed. An environmental impact report identified two alternate routes with fewer environmental impacts, but Caltrans rejected those alternatives as more expensive and less feasible. The federal government is funding part of the project through the National Corridor Infrastructure Act, a program established in 2005 to earmark federal funds for corridor projects that would, among other things, promote regional economic growth, facilitate interregional trade and reduce congestion on existing highways. The Centennial Corridor received $300 million under this program.
Phys.com - Jan 13 Farmers in drought-stricken California are turning to oilfield wastewater to irrigate crops. In response, a new panel assembled by the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board has begun investigating the safety of using chemical-laced water on food crops. In the fourth year of California's drought, at least five oilfields in the state are now passing along their leftover production fluid to water districts for irrigation, for recharging underground water supplies, and for other uses. The state officials, academic experts and industry representatives on the panel are charged with studying the safety of irrigating food crops with oilfield wastewater that may contain chemicals and other material from hydraulic fracturing, other intensive drilling methods and oilfield maintenance. The effect of oilfield chemicals on food is "largely unstudied and unknown," says the nonprofit Pacific Institute, which studies water issues. Almond, pistachio and citrus growers are the main farmers already using such water.
