Something’s fishy about this mine plan

One of the few good things about Sarah Palin’s Alaska was the brief glimpses it offered into Alaska’s biggest industries, one of which was salmon fishing. (Seriously, though, other than that, the show was crap.) No doubt its cast isn’t happy about the proposed Pebble Mine on Bristol Bay, which would mine an estimated 85.5 billion pounds of gold, copper and molybdenum. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is launching an ad campaign against it while the industry, along with some congressional Republicans, insist it’s perfectly safe, despite what the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has said about it.

In fairness, though, what the EPA has said has been largely based on speculation. The environmental assessment comment period is still on, ending at the end of the month, and Pebble Mine’s developers have yet to submit formal blueprints. But the EPA has already released a draft assessment for a “hypothetical” mine. Industry backers, namely the Pebble Limited Partnership (PLP), fear this could turn into a “pre-emptive veto” that would effectively chill future watershed investment in Alaska and across the U.S.

That may be an exaggeration. But they do have a point about the necessity of this draft, which certainly costs taxpayers some money. In order to have a completely accurate picture of the environmental impact of the mine, the EPA needs to know exactly which space it will occupy, and which environmental protection and safety methods that PLP plans to employ. Mine opponents insist the EPA has enough information; however, without the blueprints, that’s just not the current reality.

But don’t be too surprised if the EPA releases a report that matches up quite well with the draft. Bristol Bay supplies nearly half the sockeye salmon on the planet; its exvessel (dock) value in 2010 totaled $148.7 million. Alaskan seafood accounts for up to half the private sector employment in coastal areas of the state. Since many of those areas are only accessible by air or sea, it’s also essential for subsistence, especially among Alaska Natives. There are reasons for concern, even if, like me, you’re generally OK with mining and would prefer mined-in-America metals.

If mine opponents are going to continue to argue on economic grounds, which is a good idea, the future of the mine may come down to estimates of net gains in terms of local jobs and state revenue. They’ll also need to bring up the health angle, as the mine will no doubt have an effect on the local water and air supply. And if there’s somewhere else in the U.S. where a massive gold and copper mine would be viable, point it out.

This isn’t simple NIMBYism. Opponents have identified ways that the Pebble Mine would be legitimately detrimental to a lucrative local economy. Proponents had better be prepared for a fight that they could very well lose, and lose fairly.

The eagle parts are blowin’ in the wind

An Associated Press (AP) investigation into eagle deaths as the result of wind farming, and the lack of ensuing fines or prosecutions, would look less like vengeance against the Obama administration if not for this. But that may purely be an effect of timing. Of course, with Benghazi and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) still fresh in the news, the timing is also such that if the administration has any excuses for what was reported, fewer people will buy them.

Here’s what poor White House Press Secretary Jay Carney will have to explain:

• Since President Obama took office, exactly how many oil and electric companies have been fined or prosecuted when eagles drown in waste pits or are electrocuted by power lines?
• What’s with the proposed rule that would shield wind companies from eagle rules for 30 years?
• Why did the Interior Department update eagle guidelines to the effect that wind farms would not be scrutinized for a single permit-free eagle death, which is standard for other industries?
• Is there any justification for any of the above besides the White House’s preference for wind over fossil fuels, which is exemplified by its sizable tax breaks for the wind industry?

And here’s a sample of the excuses you can expect – perhaps not from Carney or Obama, but from someone:

“It is the rationale that we have to get off of carbon, we have to get off of fossil fuels, that allows them to justify this,” said Tom Dougherty, a long-time environmentalist who worked for nearly 20 years for the National Wildlife Federation in the West . . .

. . . the wind-energy industry points out that more eagles are killed each year by cars, electrocutions and poisoning . . .

In sum, expect deflections from the very serious charge of eagle-chopping through references to their own net environmental benefits, and other industries’ net environmental damage. It’s the kind of thing Canadian governments do, in political or economic terms, when they don’t want to admit they’ve done something wrong.

Given the choice, I’d rather have wind power my house than fossil fuels. But there are environmental risks involved in wind (and solar, and nuclear, and hydro, and natural gas) that have nothing to do with carbon. You can object to eagle protection laws; however, until no industry has to deal with them, it’s unfair to shield the wind industry from dealing with them – if this is all true. But only one entity can answer that.

And another thing: Don’t tell me that fines for eagle deaths would be financially harmful to the emerging wind industry. The tax breaks it’s gotten over the years should more than make up for those.

No-bid contracts can also be disasters

Congress’s inaction on Hurricane Sandy relief, up until this weekend at least, has succeeded in maintaining the sense of urgency to arrange relief efforts that began as soon as people knew the storm was coming. A $60 billion relief package has finally cleared the Senate, but debate over what the package should have looked like has not. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) is one senator keeping that debate going; expect him to turn his failed amendment into its own legislation as soon as it’s convenient.

The amendment would have required competitive bidding for new disaster recovery contracts, which did not happen for Sandy relief, plus reviews and re-competitions of all existing no-bid contracts. In the amendment text, Coburn cites waste from similar no-bid contracts after Katrina, including $11 billion in improper spending and 1,700 indictments for stealing and abusing funds, according to Inspectors General of various agencies. He also cites the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) record of non-compliance with current rules.

The amendment required a supermajority to pass and only managed a 48-47 vote. My less cynical side tells me most of the opposition was along the lines of that of Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who said bidding during disasters wasn’t “appropriate” and would end up costing more, presumably in the paperwork involved in the actual bidding process. And then my more cynical side wonders whose market share those 47 senators are trying to protect.

In response to Schumer, Coburn pointed out that disaster contracts are often pre-negotiated, allowing equipment and supplies to flow as soon as they can be used. Unfortunately, his amendment text says nothing about the timing of a competitive bidding process. In cases of natural disasters that can be predicted – hurricanes, tornadoes, floods – the amendment might have benefitted from text requiring the process to be streamlined to a few days, tops, before it hits. With that improvement, this amendment should have passed.

Those who suffer during and after disasters are still taxpayers. They would benefit from a bidding process that ensured, at least from the federal government, the most relief for the least money and bureaucracy. They deserve a contractor who has an incentive to provide it. That’s considerably worse for them than any delay created by bidding. If they’re going to lose along with the rest of the country if we go over the cliff, they might as well get this much consolation.

Unlike another Republican, Coburn isn’t talking about privatizing the entire disaster relief system, as some who hear the word “competition” automatically assume. (See also: Manitoba Hydro.) Compared to the kind of changes he could have proposed, this one is plain common sense.

Unspoiled wilderness and spoiled employment

It’s time once again for The Future American’s FAIL OF THE WEEK! Every Saturday, I name a person or group who has spent the past seven days behaving in a particularly idiotic way. Since it’s my belief that idiocy knows no politics, nobody is safe.

This week’s fail was brought to you by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, who appears not to have received the memo that the Obama administration is all about job creation now. Salazar himself called Kevin Lunny, the owner of the Drakes Bay Oyster Co. in Inverness, California, to tell him that his bid to extend the lease on a section of the estuary at Point Reyes National Seashore had been rejected, and he had 90 days to pack up and leave. The oyster company employed 30 people, seven of whose families lived on the property, and formed the last oyster cannery in the state, producing 40 percent of oysters sold in California – 460,000 pounds every year. They’d been getting along fine.

So why evict? Here’s Salazar’s quote:

After careful consideration of the applicable law and policy, I have directed the National Park Service to allow the permit for the Drakes Bay Oyster Co. to expire at the end of its current term and to return the Drakes Estero to the state of wilderness that Congress designated for it in 1976. I believe it is the right decision for Point Reyes National Seashore and for future generations who will enjoy this treasured landscape.

As if current generations didn’t already enjoy the area because of the oysters. Backers of the move point out that Congress decided in 1976 to designate the estuary as a wilderness area, the first of its kind on the West Coast. Thanks to 36 years of feet-dragging, a company that has been in business for 40 will shut down. It would have been nice if they’d acted in 2004, when Lunny bought the company from its previous owner. It would have saved him some money.

But had the oyster company been harming the health of the estuary? The National Park Service says it had; Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) isn’t convinced. The article points out that the Park Service’s numbers on other matters of this nature have been highly dubious. Salazar, for his part, ordered them to help the oyster company employees dismantle the operation and relocate and train for other jobs. Had he ordered them to make sure their facts were straight, on the other hand, or help the company do business more cleanly if necessary, this might have been avoided. The estuary and the cannery could have kept co-existing.

Instead, 30 people are out of work and four-tenths of an entire state industry is disappearing, for the sake of “future generations.” How many of those generations would prefer an unspoiled estuary over a successful company and (I’m assuming) delicious seafood?

Smog gets in your eyes

Few things are more annoying for a pundit than when a headline fails to reflect the body of a story accurately. (A lack of stories to comment on, plus running out of granola bars, are notable exceptions.) When I first set out to write about the vote on the Transparency in Regulatory Analysis of Impacts on the Nation (TRAIN) Act, having only read a snippet, I mistakenly believed the Republicans were declaring war on clean air rules in principle for the economy’s sake. Well, that’s not . . . completely true.

The real story is that the TRAIN Act would require the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to provide a full projection of how its regulations might affect “jobs, electricity, gasoline prices and competitiveness.” While the EPA has some cost-benefit analysis measures in place already, these would go substantially further. This, they say, would “allow further analyses and buy time for the economy to recover.”

On this main thrust of the bill, I have to declare the Republicans completely sane. Though I cannot recall them actually identifying an EPA regulation that can be described as a job-killer, there is nothing at all wrong with a full regulatory review in all government agencies. President Obama himself has called for one on numerous occasions. If duplications and simple unnecessities exist, by all means scrap them.

However, if we’re going by the Republicans’ talking points and nothing else, Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) is justified in his concern that they’re not considering the part of a cost-benefit analysis in which there are benefits. Let’s frame this argument in a fashion that they can get behind: Bad air means lower property values means people moving elsewhere means towns (and their local businesses) suffering economically means other people (taxpayers) picking up the slack. Bad air also means higher health costs means other people (taxpayers) picking up the slack. See how that can work?

That said, I will throw my support behind the bill if the Republicans agree that truly full projections – one that estimates savings incurred through EPA regulations – are in order. No jobs are worth creating if Americans’ health must remain at risk to keep them. It would be nice if the GOP could at least acknowledge something to this effect in public so they don’t come off as completely ignorant of how frickin’ awesome clean air is.

The consistent anti-regulation message is a good political sell if all you care about is keeping your base happy. If you’re hoping to craft the legislation that best suits the American public and market it effectively, well, you’ll have to try harder than this.

What the frack is this stuff?!

Hands up if you think Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) will sign legislation requiring drilling companies to release the list of chemicals they use for “fracking.” . . . Yeah, me neither. He’ll probably agree with whoever first came up with the excuse that doing so would “harm their competitive edge.” That’s a petty problem for anyone looking to make bank on recent pushes for natural gas.

The above link gives us a rundown of fracking (hydraulic fracturing):

The contentious technique allows oil and gas companies to permeate tight shale formations and release once out-of-reach minerals. Drillers pump millions of gallons of chemically laced water into the ground to break the rock, allowing natural gas to flow.

Now I can’t claim to be a chemist, geologist, agronomist, hydrologist, ecologist or expert on public health or natural gas. But those who can might be interested to know what impact fracking could have on groundwater and soil, neither of which is a trifling matter. To do that, they would likely need to know exactly which chemicals are in use already – although it would be even more interesting to see them compare chromatographic samples of groundwater and soil from before, during and after fracking.

This is one of many examples of companies refusing to understand the importance of budgeting against externalities. Should fracking turn out to be sufficiently dangerous for anyone depending on groundwater and soil – which would include anyone involved in farming and anyone who eats, drinks or bathes – the ensuing legal damages wouldn’t exactly be fantastic for profits, not to mention all the medical bills they’ll have to ease off. Besides, ignoring practices that could put community health at risk for the sake of extra money is just wrong, y’all.

If that’s not convincing enough, perhaps these drilling companies ought to think of it this way: If it’s possible to retool the chemical mix in order to prevent any natural damage, a ”soil-safe” company would get a lot more contracts than one that hasn’t achieved such a designation. This is one way that the EPA could improve the lot of energy companies and others, as opposed to being a burden. I only mention the EPA because a mish-mash of state regulations would be insufficient if fracking takes hold in other states.

As for Perry, if he doesn’t sign this bill, he’ll have to prove that he has some concern for conservation in a very big way. Trusting drilling companies to do the right thing hasn’t proven all that effective before.

The delicate art of parks

President Obama has definitely lost his touch when it comes to political timing. This week, he released a budget I call “Death by 1.1 Trillion Cuts,” and even that wasn’t good enough for people who would prefer major slashes in entitlement and defense spending. Now he’s calling for $900 million in new spending on public land conservation, which is only at the top of the list for people whose jobs are centered on it.

Obama’s justification is that the plan will encourage Americans to spend their leisure time in public parks and keep land and water clean. He adds, for the record, that it will add jobs in the tourism and recreation sectors. No word on how many, likely because his numbers on jobs have tended to be off. “The money would be used to buy private land for public use and provide grants to states,” which immediately sends up a red flag: Whose private land would they be buying?

The argument for land and water cleanliness is definitely the most compelling. Considering that we drink this stuff and have our livestock graze on it, there is no excuse for it to be left unhealthy. I’m not convinced that government ownership of the land is the best way to ensure that, though; my expectation is that restrictions on dumping waste would turn out to be more effective.

The first Republican to step up in opposition is Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA), who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee. He has vowed to stand against any effort to “restrict farming, ranching or timber production in the name of conservation.” All industries that are unlikely to create an impactful amount of jobs in this age. However, I will side with him if he wants to protect land belonging to family farms and ranches.

In order to bolster his argument, Obama said it would help get kids some exercise and fresh air, and pointed out that Yosemite National Park was purchased during the Civil War, and FDR protected Mount Rushmore and the Statue of Liberty, among other landmarks, during the depression. He’s really taking a gamble if he thinks this initiative will result in outdoor space as well-known as all of those. Kids these days aren’t completely sedentary or indoorsy; most of them would just rather go to the skateboard park. Besides, who has leisure time?

Obama’s heart is in the right place, but Americans are looking for someone who can take a heartless approach to spending cuts, and it doesn’t look like he can. Another argument for reducing the influence of the Office of the First Lady; it’s clear that that’s who he’s trying to impress.

Less hot air from Gingrich

When walking by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) building on my trip to D.C. last summer, the first thing I remember thinking was “Holy shit! Do they really need that much space?” It’s about the size of the Manitoba Parliament Building, and according to former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA), nobody needs that much room to do nothing more than hand down regulations. His solution? Get rid of it. Not the building, the EPA. He’ll need the building to house his incredible chutzpah.

Gingrich, who may run for the Republican nomination in 2012 – along with every other Republican in the country – believes the EPA was nobly intended from the outset, but has since lost relevance and become another faceless Washington bureaucracy. He would like to replace it with something like the National Institutes of Health or the National Science Foundation, which would focus on environmental innovation as opposed to rules.

No one, aside from Adam, is a bigger supporter of environmental innovation than I am, and I can’t give Gingrich enough credit for standing for it. Hopefully his specifics, in that regard, will be more numerous than “clean coal” and smaller-scale nuclear plants. Environmentalists remain skeptical that any coal can be clean or that any nuclear plant can be safe, so any elected Republican who runs with Gingrich’s idea will have a lot of reassuring to do.

But I am not a supporter of, essentially, disposing of environmental regulatory power. Doubtless existing rules could do with a review, lest any of them be unnecessary. However, given that Americans will never stop needing untainted water, air and land, there is no reason for pollution to be left unchecked, and for those who create it not to be held to account.

This may not be easy to implement, but it’s certainly easy to think of. The EPA should not be scrapped, but it should adopt a twofold mandate. One branch of it will be concerned with regulation and enforcement, and the other will be concerned with providing assistance to those seeking to put together green projects. I would vote for spending a moderate amount of money to research clean coal and smaller nuclear plants. They at least merit that much attention.

I didn’t think Gingrich, of all people, would be the one to do it, but he has just proven that Republicans can have a pro-environment agenda. With everyone focused on spurring jobs and global competitiveness, this provides Congress with ample opportunity to truly come together on this issue. I’m keeping optimistic.

Rules that won’t leave power plants fuming

It has consistently baffled me why a company whose production creates negative externalities (the most obvious example of which is pollution, as you will soon see) would not want to pull out all the stops to reduce them. Sure, nobody likes the upfront costs, but it’s better than unexpected costs for indirectly causing a slew of health, safety, and environmental problems. Besides, it would bring in more revenue from those who prefer buying from companies who commit to social responsibility, and they are a growing market.

Thus the political issues that may arise from the EPA’s Transport Rule, which calls for a 71% reduction in sulfur dioxide emissions and a 52% reduction in nitrogen oxide emissions by 2014. This would be after the rule is implemented in 2012, giving power plants two years to figure out ways to comply with the regulations. The EPA estimates a total cost of $2.8 billion a year for these ways, which may include

• using control equipment more often;
• installing new control equipment;
• or using low-sulfur coal.

What’s even more baffling is that an act handed down by the EPA is what it takes for power plants to do these things in the first place. If you’ve already paid for the control equipment, why wouldn’t you bother using it? I can understand the financial unwillingness to do the other two things, and I respond to that by bringing this up. It’s a perfect example of the need to invest against future fallouts.

The article does not indicate, however, that the companies will be receiving anything in exchange for their compliance. I’m not one to favor giving polluters much of anything except a hard time, but a small quid pro quo might be needed in order to get them to abide by the rules. It would be an investment for the EPA against scrambling to find incentives, as well as an investment for the company against possible penalties.

In Canada, whenever politicians want people to do things, they almost automatically go for tax credits. Were the EPA to take this route, it would have to be conditional upon compliance for, say, three years after the deadline, bearing in mind that they would have to be allowed to check up on the companies every now and then. But if the substance of any of the companies’ complaints will only be financial in nature, the EPA’s offer need only be financial, too. Besides, less cost to them will (hopefully) mean less cost to consumers, which ought to keep public opinion secure. Assuming nobody turns against  the EPA for Tea Party-style reasons, or some such nonsense.

The bill vs. the spill

It should come as no surprise that a number of environmentalists and Democratic lawmakers have used the oil spill off the the Gulf Coast to attack a proposal for increased offshore drilling that has made its way into The Climate Bill. (I’m capitalizing it because it’s yet another defining piece of legislation for the Obama administration, and attention must be paid.) But this won’t get them very far. The country still runs on oil.

These people aren’t completely lacking an argument. Current attempts to contain the oil aren’t working, and wetland wildlife and fishing grounds are the most at risk. (Of the spill itself, I mean; I am well aware that 11 people died from the initial blowout.) It’s easy to see why someone would be tempted to resort to blaming the very use of oil; it takes much less effort than accepting that this was an accident on the part of one company and cannot always be prevented, especially not by a government.

Most of the quotes in this article come from representatives of various indistinguishable environmental groups. The first of the most reasonable quotes comes from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who puts it this way: “We’ve had problems with car design, but you don’t stop driving. The Challenger accident was heart-breaking but we went back to space.” Unfortunately for him and the rest of the pro-drilling faction, he is not quoted as recommending any new course of action that would alleviate some of the damage. Not a long-term thinker, this guy.

Steve Cochran of the Environmental Defense Fund and Carl Pope of the Sierra Club are, sort of. Both call for a provision in The Climate Bill that would set out a more stringent clean-up policy should a spill happen again. No, they don’t specify what it could be. But at least they’re calm enough not to snap into Teh Oil is Evil OMG.

Here’s why the rig exploded, and here’s why the oil started to spill. The first couple of solutions seem easy when you look at them: Install cement caps early, and stop listening to oil companies who tell you that any safety precaution is unnecessary because of the existence of other safety precautions. BP has already admitted that the first mechanism simply failed, but they don’t want to install acoustic switches because of how expensive they are. More so than 30 miles worth of spilled oil, lads?

And as for the oil that has already spilled: well, don’t fucking burn it. That’s a waste of good oil. Do what you can to absorb it and use it. In fact, fund research for new ways to absorb it after we’re done here.