Legalectric

I went to this weird meeting yesterday, sponsored by DNREC, regarding Delaware’s participation in the “Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative,” or RGGI. Here’s the:

RGGI Document List.

The purpose of the meeting, one of a series, was to address “The Allocation Issue” and “The Revenue Issue.” The “Allocation Issue” is DNREC wanting to figure out how to GIVE all the credits to the utilities, and “The Revenue Issue” is wanting to shift any revenue if any are auctioned rather than given, to Delaware’s “Sustainable Energy Utility” which is supposed to be the state entity to handle conservation and efficiency. But even the chair, David Small of DNREC, was frustrated because this meeting, as with the others, was all going around and around and around. To me, that indicates two things, that there is not enough information in the possession of the ’rounders to see clearly, and two, that there is not agreement with the agenda of those pushing for “consensus.” Then, with “consensus,” they’d put a bill together and march it through the legislature.

What was weird about it was that among those present, other than utilities and politicians with a vested interest, they didn’t seem to know enough about the system and valuation of CO2 to make a decision. There was some speculation, but it wasn’t even based on market rates in the markets already in existence:

Click here for CCX and ECX

It wasn’t based on the cost estimates made in other jurisdictions. The one chart showing “Potential Auction Revenue per year” had values of $2-5/ton, but as we saw in Minnesota, expect $9-30/ton.

Here’s a Motion for Reconsideration in the Big Stone II case that has a wide range of values, going far higher than the $2-5 that DNREC predicts:

Big Stone II – Application for Reconsideration II

Here’s the Minnesota PUC Order:

PUC’s CO2 valuation

I’m tempted to say it was like the blind leading the blind, but it was more like the ones with an interest leading those without sufficient information trying to force a decision. This is a job that the legislature should assign to the PSC, the ones with the expertise to address these policy issues.

Oh, and the “gotcha” part was the utilities, which in Delaware are not regulated, crying and begging and whining for this gift of credits. Ummmmmm… you’re unregulated, you’ve been enjoying the benefits to utilities of unfettered profit-taking, and now you want the state to GIVE utilities CO2 credits? Ummmm… hello, the market is working and it’s time you pony up! I love it when “free marketers” cry for regulation. And that brings up the bottom line in Delaware — it’s time to repeal deregulation.

… or is it Bitch & Kvetch… Google Analytics, it’s a wonderful thing, it leads me places I have no clue existed and asking questions that leaves me wondering just exactly how many people are spending way too much time on their computer. The tracking shows searches, what someone was digging around about before they landed on my site, and some are inexplicable, like the regular searches for Andrew Borene, who cares, or the constant searches for “shit” or Krispy Kreme.” Others are more understandable, like “coal gasification” and “Outland transmission line” and “Big Stone combustion waste – where does it go?” and “certificate of need corrupt.” Then there’s the ones by people I figure I must know and if I don’t, I should, like “Ken Lay is not dead” and “rip their eyes out Greg Davids” (remember him???!!! eeeeuw), or “Lenka Dusilova + credits” or bust a gut ones like “what are the positive aspects of coal?” and… and … and others send me right to google, where I figure something’s up that I should know about, like “technological leprosy” and “warrick project flour india” and “use of sludge as pozzalan in concrete,” and today’s favorite: “can’t sell my Black & Veatch stock.”

Turns out that Black & Veatch, if you believe what you read on the internet, has an employee stock ownership plan. Which then got me thinking about whether, with all these plants going down, if the conslutants take it in the shorts if a project doesn’t go forward for one reason or another. Many of the folks working on Mesaba are doing it on spec. What about the biggies, do they get paid, get paid a percentage, how does it work? With so many coal plants going down, and if they had to take a hit on each, maybe that’s connected with the query? If that’s you out there, let me know what’s up!!!

Anyway, when I was googling around, I found this week’s “Energy Strategies Report,” which is looking at financial picture of the electric industry. Watching all these plants go down, watching stocks downgraded, watching the industry, and the coal sector in particular, coal plants specifically, watching these downgraded as investments, oh, it makes my day. So here’s another of the gloom and doom reports, and it’s very well written, meaning that it’s easy to read and understand, and it’s taking from my favorite sources, like NERC, lots of good little gems to be found:

NERC 2007 Reliability Assessment

Here’s the report that made my week, already, in just a quick scan:

Energy Strategies – Black & Veatch – March 3, 2008

My favorite quote? Ya gotta love it:

To put it less charitably than Moody’s, the invester-owned sector now teeters on the cusp of non-investment grade (junk) status.

Hee hee hee hee hee hee, it’s pretty hard to hide the economics of these hare-brained schemes. And they’re getting smacked upside the head with it. ‘Bout time… more comments later after I’ve had a chance to really read it.

I’d posted before about the hearing in Millsboro on the water permit for NRG’s Indian River Generation Station, “NRG in hiding at DNREC meeting,” one more example of DNREC snoozing on the job, or working for someone else other than the public…

At the hearing, I’d asked about specific reports, the Discharge Monitoring Reports and Violation Reports. Well, I got them, and apparently it’s just Discharge Monitoring Reports, the Violation Reports are incorporated within. Hmmm… OK, anyway, here they are:

Indian River Power Plant Waste Water Discharge Data

Indian River Power Plant Waste Water Discharge Data – SORTED

Transcript of Feb 21 Indian River Power Plant Hearing

There it is… see for yourself!

Comments are due by March 28 (30 days from the date of the hearing), but it wouldn’t hurt to send in a request for extension. Send Comments to the hearing examiner, Robert Haynes at:

Robert.Haynes [at] state.de.us

SEND COMMENTS IN BY MARCH 28TH, and send Alan a copy too, at greendel [at] dca.net

There’s another case of the neuro-illness in workers who are using compressed air to blow the brains out of pig skulls at meat packing plants.  Most are in Minnesota thus far, a couple in Indiana, and now, there’s one in Nebraska:

Nebraska meatworker gets sick

By JOSEPHINE MARCOTTY, Star Tribune

Last update: March 6, 2008 – 9:01 PM

THE LATEST: A former meatpacker in Nebraska has the same neurological condition that has struck workers at pork processing plants in Minnesota and Indiana, and that sparked a nationwide disease investigation in November.

The Nebraska case is the first in that state. Like the other workers, the Nebraska meatpacker, who has not been identified, worked at a processing plant that uses a high pressure air system to remove brains from pigs, Nebraska health officials said.

HOW MANY AFFECTED: The newest case brings the total number of workers known to be affected to 14. Officials say that as the investigation continues to look into past workers at all three plants, they expect to find more cases.

SYMPTOMS: Those affected have reported fatigue, numbness and tingling in their arms and legs with a wide range of severity. Some have recovered and returned to work, while others are severely disabled. Officials are calling the condition progressive inflammatory neuropathy, or PIN.

WHERE: Most of those affected worked at Quality Pork Processors in Austin, Minn., where the condition was first recognized, and two have been identified in Indiana.

Nebraska officials declined to say which plant employed the meatpacker, but the only plant in the state that uses the high compression system is owned by Hormel Foods, based in Austin.

INQUIRY CONTINUES: State and federal health officials are looking into whether pig brain tissue, liquefied during removal by the air-compression system and sprayed into the air as droplets, somehow caused nerve damage in workers who were exposed to it. The brains are frozen in boxes and shipped to the southern United States and Asia, where they are sold as food.

All three plants stopped using the air compression system when the investigation began.

Investigators theorize that a protein or other substance from the animal brains triggered the workers’ immune systems into mistakenly attacking their own nerve tissue.

Josephine Marcotty 612-673-7394

The 3M Museum in Two Harbors, Minnesota

Remember not long ago the report that the Minnesota Health Department, when confronted with PFOA contamination of municipal wells by 3M, decided to take “further steps to protect the health of residents” and to do this they RAISE ACCEPTABLE LIMITS OF PFOA rather than come down hard on the polluters? WRONG ANSWER, FOLKS.

Cottage Grove wary of water assurances 

Here’s the MN Dept. of Health press release:

Minnesota Department of Health
News Release

March 1, 2007

Health officials issue new health guidelines for PFOA, PFOS; reiterate protective advice on PFBA

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) announced today that it is taking further steps to protect the health of residents in south Washington County from long-term exposure to perfluorochemicals (PFCs) in groundwater.

Based on the latest scientific information, MDH has lowered its Health Based Values (HBVs) for perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonate (PFOS), two members of PFC group of chemicals that have been found at low levels in groundwater in southern Washington County. The new HBVs are 0.5 parts per billion (ppb) for PFOA and 0.3 ppb for PFOS. The guidelines previously used were 1 ppb and 0.6 ppb respectively.

“We have been reviewing the available data over the last few months and concluded that there is sufficient scientific basis at this time to justify revising the health based values for PFOA and PFOS,” said Minnesota Health Commissioner Dianne Mandernach.

While research to date has shown no direct evidence that PFCs cause health problems in humans, studies in laboratory animals indicate that at higher doses, PFCs may interfere with liver and thyroid function and may cause developmental effects.

“The new values are protective, scientifically sound and well-researched,” said John Linc Stine, director of the Environmental Health Division for MDH. The new value for PFOA, 0.5 ppb, is the same as a number implemented by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in an enforcement action in West Virginia that became effective Nov. 17, 2006.

A Health Based Value is the concentration of a groundwater contaminant, or a mixture of contaminants, that poses little or no risk to health, even if consumed daily over a lifetime. The updated HBVs for PFOA and PFOS take into consideration the potential for health impacts during fetal and other developmental life stages. A clearer understanding of how long these chemicals stay in the human body is also reflecteded in the revised HBVs.

MDH is working with Oakdale and Lake Elmo to address public and private wells that may be affected by the lowering of the HBVs for PFOA and PFOS. Most residents in the Lake Elmo and Oakdale area will not be affected by the change because they are connected to municipal water systems that don’t contain PFCs or treat the groundwater before distribution.

The lowering of the Health Based Values for PFOA and PFOS does not affect those portions of southern Washington County and northern Dakota County where only perfluorobutanoic acid (PFBA), another PFC compound, has been found in groundwater.

Those areas fall under the department’s drinking water advice on PFBA, which the department reiterated today.

“We recommend that anyone who has concerns about the potential health impacts from PFBA in their water should limit or reduce their intake of water that has a concentration of more than 1 ppb,” Stine said.

Intake of contaminated drinking water can be reduced by drinking bottled water or by filtering tap water used for drinking or cooking through a point-of-use (POU) activated carbon filter, which removes or greatly reduces PFBA. Water used for bathing, showering or other non-ingestive household uses does not pose a health risk, based on current data.

“We’ve had an initial round of community meetings where more than 800 people heard our advice and heard us talk about things they can do to limit their exposure if they choose,” Stine said. “But we know that there are far more than 800 people in the communities and areas affected by the contamination, so we want to take every opportunity we can to re-emphasize our advice. We also want to share as broadly as possible what we know about point-of-use filters, small, inexpensive filters that can be used to filter tap water.”

Point-of-use (POU) filters can be an effective way to reduce exposure, MDH staff found. They recently tested a number of POU filters commonly available in stores. The testing found that a simple pitcher filter that contains activated carbon was partially effective at removing PFBA from the water, but allows more PFBA to pass through as additional water is filtered. A faucet-mounted filter containing activated carbon worked better, showing full removal of PFBA through about half of its manufacturer’s predicted filter lifetime, and good removal at up to 70-80 percent of its lifetime. Faucet-mounted filtering devices commonly range in price from $15 to $25 and replacement filters cost approximately $15 to $20. Additional information on POU filters with activated carbon is available from the MDH Web site or by calling 651-201-4897.

Stine said MDH staff have determined that sufficient toxicity data does not exist to calculate a chemical-specific HBV for PFBA. However, the advice is based on a comparison of the existing PFBA data to what is known about other PFCs.

“The data that are available for PFBA indicate that this chemical is less toxic than PFOA, a similar chemical,” Stine said. “We believe that 1 ppb is a protective number for PFBA, based on the most recent science, and is protective even of those who may have higher relative water consumption rates, such as pregnant women, nursing mothers and small children.”

Mandernach added, “As more data become available, we will examine it, with the intent of developing a Health Based Value for PFBA. We will continue to work with the EPA, private sector and academia, to accelerate that research and continue to consult with experts on this group of chemicals.”

-MDH-

For more information, contact:

Doug Schultz
MDH Communications
(651) 201-4993

John Linc Stine
MDH Environmental Health
(651) 201-4675

Rep. Sandy Wollschlager is in the 3M Environmental department — I expect her to represent her constituency and utilize her connections, to take a leadership role in this and broker a resolution of strong company and MDH and MPCA action, remediation, prevention, company liability to those with contaminated water and harm, and massive fines to 3M.

Today, there’s this in the STrib:

Study: Death rate up for 3M workers exposed to PFOA

By TOM MEERSMAN, Star Tribune

March 5, 2008

Workers who were exposed to a chemical called PFOA at 3M’s factory in Cottage Grove died of stroke and prostate cancer at higher rates than other workers at the plant, according to a new industry-funded study.

The study of nearly 4,000 people who worked at the plant from 1943 to 1997 found elevated stroke and prostate cancer death rates among those exposed to the chemical, which was used until 2000 for nonstick coatings and other products.

Workers with the highest exposures were twice as likely to die of prostate cancer and stroke than colleagues with little or no exposure to the chemical, the study found.

The death rates from those diseases among all workers at that plant were similar to those of the general population, leading 3M officials to call the difference a statistical anomaly.

“Nothing in this study changes our conclusion that there are no adverse health effects from PFOA,” 3M spokesman Bill Nelson said Wednesday.

3M manufactured PFOA from 1947 to 2000 at its Cottage Grove plant and phased out production by 2002. It was used for nonstick cookware, stain-repellent coatings and dozens of other products.

Starting in the 1970s, scientists became concerned about the tendency of PFOA — perfluorooctanoic acid — and other perfluorochemicals to accumulate in people’s blood. 3M started monitoring the health of its employees who worked with the chemical, and in 1980 undertook the first occupational mortality study of its workers.

Although PFOA has been shown to cause liver, pancreatic and testicular cancer in laboratory animals, 3M has maintained that studies of its workers show no health problems.

Dated August 2007

The latest study was financed by 3M and conducted by Bruce Alexander, a University of Minnesota epidemiologist. Although dated August 2007, the study wasn’t placed in a public file with the Environmental Protection Agency until last month.

Alexander did not respond to several requests for comment, and Nelson said Alexander would not talk about the study publicly because it has not been peer-reviewed by scientists and published in a scientific journal.

The study of Cottage Grove workers included nearly 4,000 people who worked at the plant for at least a year any time from 1943 until the end of 1997. About 12 percent of them had definite exposure to the chemical, which can be absorbed through “inhalation, ingestion, and dermal contact,” the study said. The rest were evenly divided between those who probably had some exposure to it, and those who had no exposure.

Researchers studied death certificates for workers through Dec. 31, 2002.

“A high or moderate exposure work history, compared to only working in low exposure jobs, was associated with an increased risk for [stroke] and prostate cancer,” it concluded.

Nelson said that differences between the employee groups led to “skewed ratios,” and that the important thing is that overall results for employees show no higher cancer risks than for the state’s population.

However, the researchers also noted that mortality studies “miss the cases that do not result in death,” or that for some reason “may not be listed as contributing causes of death on a death certificate.”

They mentioned that the association between prostate cancer and exposure to PFOA was similar to research conducted by others in 1993. That study found that those who worked for 10 years in the chemical division at the Cottage Grove plant had three times more prostate cancer deaths than those who worked for a decade in nonchemical areas there.

Nelson said that the 1993 research was a “flawed study” because it incorrectly characterized some of the exposed workers, and that the research was disproved by a 2002 study. He agreed with the latest study’s findings that more analysis is needed, now that the mortality study is done.

“Instead of death rates, we plan to look at the incidence of prostate cancer,” Nelson said. “That would be the next step.”

Informing the public

John Linc Stine, environmental health division director for the Minnesota Department of Health, said state officials received the latest 3M study of its Cottage Grove workers Wednesday and have not had time to review it.

Stine said it’s important that 3M has done the work, and that the public will want to know what it means. PFOA is more than merely a concern for 3M workers: Community wells in Oakdale and private wells in Lake Elmo were contaminated with the chemical, likely from wastes that 3M sent to dumps in those areas decades ago. The company has paid for Oakdale to install a huge water filtration system to remove all perfluorochemicals, and for more than 200 private wells in Lake Elmo to be hooked up to untainted city water.

“It’s likely that people exposed to this chemical in drinking water will want to know if they are at elevated levels for heart disease or stroke or cancer,” Stine said. “I can’t answer those questions now but we will look at the study and try to put it in context for the communities.”

Information about the research comes just a week after state health officials relaxed a limit for a different perfluorochemical, PFBA, that has been detected in groundwater beneath much of the east metro area. Water supplies in those communities are no longer considered to be contaminated except for a few private households, which continue to use bottled water or filtering systems.

Tom Meersman • 612-673-7388