Legalectric

DATE: Wednesday, December 4, 2013

TIME: Open House: 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. (CST)
Meeting: 7:00 p.m. – 10:00 p.m. (CST)

LOCATION: Minneapolis Marriott Southwest
5801 Opus Parkway
Minnetonka, Minnesota 55343
Lake of the Woods Meeting Room

SUBJECT: PUBLIC MEETING TO RECEIVE COMMENTS ON THE WASTE CONFIDENCE DRAFT GENERIC ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT AND PROPOSED RULE

That’s an old photo of Prairie Island, appropriate for an early winter day.  There is nuclear waste from the plant stored in casks just outside of the plant, and this whole nuclear compound is right next to the Mississippi River and the Prairie Island Indian Community.  Great… just great.  It’s just a couple miles upriver from us here in Red Wing, and it’s been incorporated into the City so the City could get utility personal property tax revenues, but that’s another can of worms for another day…

Nuclear Waste isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, but it’s allowed to keep piling up, and the nuclear reactors are allowed to continue to generate electricity and waste, based on the “Nuclear Waste Confidence Decision,” which was first issued in 1984, and then revisited since, and it’s essentially myopia in action:

A federal court didn’t buy the NRC’s policy:

NY v NRC-Nuclear Waste Confidence Decision 11-1045-1377720

So now they’re getting more public input into the rule.

NRC Nuclear Waste Confidence Page

What’s at issue now is the proposed Rule and the Environmental Impact Statement, and they’re soliciting comments on that EIS with the final due out about a year from now.  Here it is, and the EIS is BIG, 585 pages — yup, that’s what you’ve got to comment about (anything else will be tossed out and disregarded):

Nuclear Waste Confidence Rule_Proposed

Nuclear Waste GEIS

From the NRC’s page, the important documents/info:

• NRC Documents Related to Waste Confidence
• Waste Confidence Update Schedule
• Public Involvement in Waste Confidence
• GEIS and Waste Confidence Rule References
  • By Chapter
  • By Appendix
  • By Proposed Rule
  • By Author
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Contact Us About Waste Confidence

So now it’s up to us to sort through all of this and explain why this is utterly insane policy… New York managed to get through to the federal court, so it isn’t hopeless.  But the NRC’s persistence in its “Nuclear Waste Confidence” is inexplicable.

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You seem to think you’re Dog’s gift to this earth…

Two things appeared in the inbox at about the same time, the first an announcement of McKnight Foundation and Energy Foundation grants in the Midwest, and from Truthout, a review and interview of Ozzie Zehner, author of Green Illusions: The Dirty Secrets of Clean Energy and the Future of Environmentalism.

First, the massive foundation to “environmental” organizations:

McKnight fights climate change with $25 million in grants

The two-year grants of $20 million to Energy Foundation and $5 million to RE-AMP, a network of nonprofits, extend existing funding partnerships and the philanthropy’s $100 million commitment, announced in 2008, to blunt climate change. The two groups will focus on developing policies and public education to reduce dependence on fossil fuels in Minnesota, the Dakotas, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan and Ohio.

And on to Green Illusions: The Dirty Secrets of Clean Energy and the Future of Environmentalism.  GO HERE TO ORDER.

Power Shift Away From Green Illusions

Mainstream environmental groups are exchanging their principles for power at a suspect rate of exchange. It’s not just the alternative energy technologies that rely on fossil fuels. The environmental groups do, too. They rely on funding from the excess wealth accumulated as froth on the top of the fossil fuel economy. But it’s not just money. There are other influences too.

That pretty much sums up what I’ve seen over the last 20 years…

There is an impression that we have a choice between fossil fuels and clean energy technologies such as solar cells and wind turbines. That choice is an illusion. Alternative energy technologies rely on fossil fuels through every stage of their life. Alternative energy technologies rely on fossil fuels for mining operations, fabrication plants, installation, ongoing maintenance and decommissioning. Also, due to the irregular output of wind and solar, these technologies require fossil fuel plants to be running alongside them at all times. Most significantly, alternative energy financing relies on the kind of growth that fossil fuels drive.

…the binary aspect, and looking for a simple “flick the switch” solution when it’s oh-so-complicated.

Gov. Mark Dayton rolled out the plan early in his term — GUT environmental review and protection.  What do Minnesotans think?  This week we got a chance to tell him.

Surprise!  The first meeting about the state’s environmental review was standing room only, when we got there a line started at the door going back and winding in.  They’d supposedly expected 30-40 but got about 200, 175 signed in and I’d bet quite a few didn’t.  Keep in mind that this was a meeting held at 9:30 a.m. on a weekday.  Suzanne found a spot with just enough room for us to stand.  As it was getting started, I noticed, DUH, that there was a white board behind me, so because there was no designated way to make comments other than holler, well, of course I did that too, particularly regarding FUNDING, because there was no mention of funding and how all the agencies are hurting to the point of being unable to regulate, anyway, a few of my comments (click photo for larger view):

There were meetings this week, and there are more the week of December 10 — SHOW UP AND LET THEM KNOW WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT THE STATE’S JOB ON ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW:

December 10 – Worthington, Worthington High School 3:30pm – 6:00pm

December 12 – St. Cloud, Stearns County Service Center 5:30pm – 8:00pm

December 14 – Moorhead, Minnesota State University 3:00pm – 5:30pm

I’ve posted before about Gov. Dayton’s brown environmental initiatives — right off the bat he muzzled and prodded MPCA and DNR to ram permits through:

Dayton’s Executive Order 11-04

And then he announced plans to “streamline” environmental review, and we all know what “streamline” means”

Executive Order 11-32

So at these meetings ostensibly about “environmental review” we were funneled into a “multiple guess” exercise about the “Environmental Report Card” and nothing about “Improvement of Environmental Review” or “EQB Governance and Coordination” which were reports that, in addition to the “Environmental Report Card” were approved by the EQB on November 14, 2012.  There was a “comment” opportunity at the EQB, but there were maybe 5 people who commented, utterly ineffective solicitation.

EARTH TO MARS!  With the EQB approving those reports November 14, BEFORE the public meetings, there was pretty much ZERO input into those reports.  Although it’s heartening to see that there’s been some pull-back from the overt gutting of the EQB laid out in the draft report, and maybe, MAYBE, pull back from reframing the whole intent of environmental review, it’s a problem where the fix is in and where the important policy documents are done before we’re invited to join the game.  Thanks, guys…

Here are the reports:

• Evaluation and Recommendations for Improving Environmental Review
• Recommendations for Environmental Governance and Coordination
• Minnesota Environment and Energy Report Card

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, someone like Bill Grant, formerly Izaak Walton League, now Dayton’s Deputy Commissioner in charge of Energy Facility Permitting, the guy who facilitated the CapX 2020 transmission buildout, and who promoted coal gasification, he has no business being involved in siting of utility permits.  He has an egregious conflict of interest, having been part of energy project promotional efforts, and needs to be fired.  Here’s Grant eing interviewed before the program started:

At two recent frac sand mining meetings in Red Wing and Wabasha, I handed out at least 270 flyers, , posted info on this blog and sent info out on lists.  I’m hoping that had something to do with so many turning out.  Frac sand was a major topic, I really stressed the need to fund the state’s regulatory agencies so they can do their job, and others way over across the room were not happy with how the discussion was an exercise in control of discussion.  It’s safe to say that they got an earful.

Rep. Denny McNamara came in and worked his way back to a tiny open spot by us, he ended up next to Alan, and Alan quietly said hello and noted that they’d first met at a meeting in Cottage Grove regarding the 3M incinerator, and he gives Alan a nasty look and makes a gratuitous snide comment about “Oh, did you get a haircut?” and looks at the back of his head.  EH?  Alan said something in his oh so nice way, and I piped up from behind, “At least he doesn’t dye his!”

Denny McNamara’s trainer better put a muzzle on him.  That guy is supposed to be representing the people in his district, and in that case he represented the interests of 3M, notorious polluter of the water and air, and he has the nerve to be a defensive jerk when there’s no need to be.  If mere mention of meeting him at a hearing regarding the 3M incinerator elicits that brand of obnoxiousness, oh my, he must be guilty of more offensive rolling to corporate interests than suspected!

A google pops up this article right at the top:

McNamara plans big refashioning of LCCMR projects

Rep. Denny McNamara tonight plans to take an axe to a swath of proposed environmental projects that are paid for by Minnesota Lottery money.

McNamara, R-Hastings, is planning to initiate a challenge to about $8 million worth of projects that were previously recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR). The total bill recommends $52 million in projects that are paid over a two-year period out of the Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund, which is built up by Lottery proceeds.

Check out that post… Hey Denny, how about addressing the extreme environmental issues around Hastings?  So glad he’s been ousted as Chair of the House Environment Committee.

OAH Rulemaking Request for Comments

OAH Rulemaking Draft Changes

Well, folks, here we go, just got notice TODAY from Judge Lipman of the rulemaking at Office Administrative Hearings. Send Comments to:

Honorable Eric L. Lipman, Assistant Chief ALJ

P.O. Box 64620

St. Paul, Minnesota   55164-0620,

Electronic Mail: eric.lipman@state.mn.us

Here’s the “purpose” according to OAH (listed in numbers, not letters):

The purpose of these draft revisions to Parts 1400 and 1405 is to:

1. streamline hearing procedures across different types of administrative proceedings;
2. leverage the broader familiarity with contested case procedures to improve predictability in the hearing process for other types of cases;
3. better reflect contemporary hearing practice and the technological changes occurring since September of 2001 (when the last revision of OAH’s procedural rules was completed); and
   
4. improve predictability in the hearing process by more closely aligning OAH’s procedures with the General Rules of Practice of the District Courts.

I have a vested interest in this because I’d filed a Rulemaking Petition ages ago:

Overland – Petition for Rulemaking – OAH

That was March, 2011, IT TOOK A YEAR AND A HALF!

Here are a few things I hope you’ll look at — the parts cited with a page number are from the OAH Rulemaking Draft Changes:

• Draft Changes, p. 2, definitions of Participant and Person – narrowing definition of person:

As proposed, on p. 4:

20   Subp. 6a. Participant. “Participant” means a nonparty who:
21
22  A. files comments or makes a formal appearance in a
23   proceeding authorized by the Minnesota Public Utilities
24   Commission, other than those commission proceedings that
25   are conducted to receive general public comments; or,
26
27   B. with the approval of judge, offers testimony or
28   evidence pursuant to part 1400.7150 or 1400.8605.

37  Subp. 8. Person. “Person” means any individual, business,
38   nonprofit association or society, or governmental entity.

As found in the PUC’s Rules, Minn. R. 7829.0100, Subp. 13 and 15:

Another in a trend of limiting participation by the public, QUESTIONING WITNESSES IS OUT – SAY WHAT????  See Draft Changes, p. 14-15 (see also p. 59-60):

45   Subp. 5. Participation by public. The judge may, in the
46  absence of a petition to intervene, nevertheless hear the

1    testimony and receive exhibits from any person at the
2    hearing, or allow a person to note that person’s appearance,
3    or allow a person to question witnesses, but no person shall
4    become, or be deemed to have become, a party by reason
5     of such participation. Persons offering testimony or exhibits
6    may be questioned by parties to the proceeding.

Where then PUC’s rules provide for much more — check out current Minn. R. 1405.0800, which they want to just ELIMINATE!  It starts here:

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“MISO” trademark owned by… JPMorgan Chase!

But seriously folks!  JPMorgan got caught with its hand in the cookie jar again, CAISO and MISO have filed claims of abusive practices at FERC.  Here’s the short version of what they allegedly did (it’s allegedly for now, but just you wait!) — from the second article below:

In the Midwest, the alleged manipulation involved day-ahead margin assurance payments, under which generators are compensated for situations when their real-time dispatch falls below the level set by the day-ahead dispatch schedule. As in California, traders found a flaw where they could force the market to make “inappropriate or excess” payments by placing lowball bids in the day-ahead market – as low as negative $500 per megawatt-hour – and much higher bids in the real-time market, Miso said.

Here’s the Amended CAISO Petition against JPMorgan Chase:

CAISO Petition

Still looking for the MISO Petition and FERC’s legendary Constellation Order.

In the news:

JPMorgan Chase Manipulation Scandal Raises Specter of Enron

JPMorgan probe highlights FERC power trading crackdown

JPMorgan’s Role in Power Market Comes Under Scrutiny